Free The First Ark: Deathless Prequel by Chris Fox

Chapter 1- The First Ark
    24,000 BCE, Central England

    Isis huddled in a small gully with the last survivors of her tribe, shivering beneath layers of crudely stitched fur. Fat flakes of snow fell from the sky, dusting them all in a thick layer of white. They needed to find shelter soon, or they'd no longer need to fear their pursuers. The land would claim them.
    "How much longer will that take? We cannot be here when night falls, or we will leave nothing but our own corpses for our pursuers," Sobek growled. He was short, but stocky. Arms thick with muscle from launching spears on many hunts. He cradled one such in his right hand, the flint still as sharp as the day he'd shaped it. The snow had painted his bristly beard white and Isis could not help but smile. His appearance made it difficult to take his words seriously, despite their dire situation.  
    The man he'd spoken to looked up calmly with gray eyes, Osiris, her mate. His hair was also dark, though it was more brown than black. His beard was shorter but just as tangled as the other man's. It too had been painted white. He struck deftly at a flint core with swift, sure, strokes. It was nearly complete, a perfect fit for the yew shaft propped against the rock face next to him. If Sobek's words alarmed Osiris, he did not show it. "If Set and his followers catch us and we are unarmed then we will be just as dead. My last blade was lost saving your life, Sobek."
    The heat in his words worried her. Osiris only showed anger when he was afraid, and in this instance he had cause. Set had abandoned their ways and joined with the flesh eaters. If they were caught it meant more than death. It meant being eaten alive.
    "Patience. We have time yet," Isis said, hoping her words would cool both men's fire since the snow would not.
    "Precious little of it," Sekhmet said, rising from a bundle of furs piled between two rocks. She towered over Isis's comparatively tiny form. Her long, red hair bound with a simple leather cord. She too carried a spear, one of the few women accepted into the hunters. She was Isis's near sister. More than that, she was her closest friend. "They've dogged us for many days now. I still do not understand why Set is so persistent. Osiris, you are chieftain now. We will follow where you lead, but Sobek is not wrong."
    "I know, Sekhmet," he said, without looking up to meet her gaze. "That is why you will head to the top of the ridge and see if we are still pursued. Silently, like a cave lion."
    The flame-haired warrior scrambled up the hillside in near silence, kicking loose little drifts of snow as she ascended. She was out of sight in seconds, moving with a grace Isis knew she could never possess.
    "You know as well as I that our pursuers have not given up. What did you not wish her to hear?" Sobek rumbled. He folded his arms and stared a challenge at Osiris.
    Osiris didn't answer, didn't address the challenge in any way. He turned to Isis, meeting her gaze. The love was fierce there, the need to protect her. Yet it was suborned by his need to protect the tribe, as well it should be.
    "Isis, you speak for the spirits. The Valley of Hidden Voices is close. Will the spirits protect us if we enter?" Osiris asked, striking a final flake from his new blade and then affixing it into a notch cut in the top of the spear shaft. He applied a thick glue she'd blended from amber and animal fat, then wrapped the shaft in a leather strip.
    "You cannot mean to enter," Sobek hissed, eyes narrowing as he took a step toward Osiris.  
    Osiris uncoiled like a viper, the tip of his new spear resting against Sobek's throat before the smaller man could react. "I am chieftain now, Sobek. Not your rival. Not your far brother. Your chieftain. You will abide by my decision, or we will take your meat to sustain the tribe."
    "I am sorry, Osiris," Sobek said, shrinking away from the newly made stone blade. He was a strong warrior, but there was a reason Osiris had become chieftain and not