The Return of Tharn

Trakor, while tremendously flattered at being compared with the stranger, was far from convinced that Tharn was telling the truth.

"A caveman could not slay Sadu thus," he declared, pushing a bare toe gingerly against the dead beast's back. "No, you are a god, for gods have been described to me many times by old Wokard, who knows all about such things."

The giant Cro-Magnard shrugged, smiling, and sought to change the subject. "Who are you?" he asked.

"I am Trakor, of the tribe of Gerdak."

"The caves of your people are nearby?"

"An hour's march in that direction," Trakor said, pointing.

Tharn's eyebrows lifted in surprise. "So far? Do you often go alone this deep into the jungle?"

Whereupon Trakor found himself telling the forest god the whole story: how the raven-haired Lanoa had shown, by her admiration for the young hunters of the tribe, that she would never become the mate of a man who did not excel in the hunt; how he was determined to prove to her