"I know – they look like they could break your arm like a piece of kindling. I always thought they were small."

"Short, maybe, but not small. Definitely not small. Big Brother, I've got to admit, you were right. Let's go visit the Losadunai. They live so close, they must know more about flatheads. Besides, the Great Mother River seems to be a boundary, and I don't think flatheads want us on their side."

The two men hiked for several days looking for landmarks given them by Dalanar, following the stream that was no different in character at this stage from the other stream – lets, rills, and creeks flowing down the slope. It was only convention that selected this particular one as the source of the Great Mother River. Most of them came together to form the beginning of the great river that would rush down hills and meander through plains for eighteen hundred miles before she emptied her load of water and silt into the inland sea far to the southeast.

The crystalline rocks of the massif that gave rise to the mighty river were among the most ancient on the earth, and its broad depression was formed by the extravagant pressures that had heaved up and folded the rugged mountains glistening in prodigal splendor. More than three hundred tributaries, many of them large rivers, draining the slopes of the ranges all along her course, would be gathered into her voluminous swells. And one day her fame would spread to the far reaches of the globe, and her muddy, silty waters would be called blue.

Modified by mountains and massifs, the influence of both the oceanic west and the continental east was felt. Vegetable and animal life were a mixture of the western tundra – taiga and the eastern steppes. The upper slopes saw ibex, chamois, and mouflon; in the woodlands deer were more common. Tarpan, a wild horse that would one day be tame, grazed the sheltered lowlands and river terraces. Wolves, lynxes, and snow leopards slunk noiselessly through shadows. Lumbering out of hibernation were omnivorous brown bears; the huge vegetarian cave bears would make a later appearance. And many small mammals were poking noses out of winter nests.