17: Waiting
A
long
the reed-fringed margin of the shore, across the Little Sea that separated the island of the flint-men from the vast lands of the herdsmen, there had arisen a great commotion.
Cows lowed to their calves, in fear of being hustled together and of losing them among the many tossing horned herds that clustered nibbling at the coarse salt-grass; sheep bleated in terror in the strange smell of the sea waters; horses whinnied, stretching their nostrils wide, their red-rimmed nostrils, as though they smelled battle from afar and were both anxious to be a part of it and yet afraid of the whining arrow, the upthrust javelin that brings ruin to the proudest stallion born.
And above them the sea-birds wheeled and screamed, white in the morning sunlight, frightened of the many m
