All the same, Yili noticed she would often stare off into nothing with a haunted look on her face. And in the evenings she would cry herself to sleep.
Then, some of the hunters found Air-ick's body.
Three men brought him into the village at noon. His body was decaying, rank. Putrid even. But the elders had decreed that he be found, if possible, and returned for a proper burial. After Yili described where on the beach the event had occurred, some men were sent each day to search. Yili had gone himself the first several days, even though he knew there was no hope of finding anything; the Beast had taken him away to the netherworld, and mere men could not travel there.
But in the end, the elders were right. They always were right.
The hunters related that they had found a mound of sand no
