Shellfishing - A Stone Age Romance

The names, characters, places and events in this story are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. All characters are over the age of 18. Any similarities to real persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

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It was an unseasonably hot day. There had been many such since the ice retreated. In the days of their grandfather's grandfather's day, or so they were told, glaciers had covered the land and even the summers were cold. Ice-floes filled the seas and life was a bitter struggle to survive. But in these days the summers were warm and only the darkest of winter days were icy. Nobody now had seen the rivers of ice far to the north nor even the great white bears which had once roamed here.

The sun was high in the sky pouring its life-giving heat onto the land. Along a beach roamed a young woman of some eight and ten summers. It was too warm for furs so she was completely naked except for a leather thong tying back her hair, which was black except for an auburn tint, and a seashell necklace. A woven grass basket was slung over one shoulder, the strap of which ran between her full breasts. In her hand, she held a wooden rake which she used to search for cockles in the sands. She was alone and enjoyed this time of solitude away from the rest of her clan.

Taking a pause from her search, she stood and stretched her back. To her left was the estuary leading to the sea. In the far west, towards the lands of the sunset, was a distant range of snow-capped mountains. She had never walked that far. To her right the beach stretched away to a low line of dunes beyond which the sands merged into marshland which shimmered in the summer haze.

Gulls wheeled and screamed out as she raised her hand against the noon glare and screwed up her eyes. She could see something coming and for a moment a flicker of fear filled her heart. Could it be danger -- like a wolf or bear? Her heart-rate slowed when she saw that walking towards her was a figure of a person but at this distance, she did not know who it was. Now she felt no fear because, as far as she knew, only her kin group, the People of the Fox, were this far west so she bent down and resumed raking the beach, putting any cockles into her bag.

Soon, she heard footsteps splashing through a shallow channel. She looked up again and saw a man approaching her. It was Bruakoe, a hunter who had only joined their clan at the end of last winter while the geese still flocked in their hundreds. He was taller than most men of her clan with lighter skin and those strange, gray eyes which marked him as a man from the South. Like herself, he was naked except for a wooden penis-sheath, the tip of which was tied around his waist, exposing only his hairy balls. Because of the sun, he had smeared mud over his back, chest and shoulders for protection. His hair and beard were tawny, again unlike the black hair of most of the people of her clan. Over his shoulder, he carried a wooden harpoon tipped with bone barbs and several bream hung from a sinew at the end.

She smiled up at him, "I see the fishing was good?" she said.

Bruakoe nodded. "Yes, Una'ah. We will eat well tonight."

"I must gather more cockles before I go back to camp," Una'ah said with a sigh.

"Let me help you," said Bruakoe.

Bruakoe looked at the young woman already busy raking the sand. Like the rest of her people, Una'ah had tanned, chestnut skin and she had full breasts which swayed delightfully as her rake scraped up the shellfish. Her breasts were tipped with brown nipples which stuck out proudly in the breeze. Her hair was black as was the thatch between her toned legs. She had deep, brown eyes which showed her wit and white teeth which flashed when she laughed. Of all the available women in the clan, Bruakoe most wanted to make Una'ah his.

Una'ah was glad of his help. She had not let any man as yet claim her as his woman. However, this fall there would be a large tribal gathering of all the scattered kin groups of the People of the Fox and she knew she would then be expected to take a man. This would mean leaving her kinship group and going to live elsewhere among distant relatives she did not really know. Although she had told no-one apart from her mother, if any man could claim her, it would be Bruakoe. Since joining her clan, he had proved to be a good hunter and provider. But more than that, he was an enthralling storyteller and entertained them at night with stories about his travels from the far South.

Together, they walked northwards up the beach towards their summer camp, the sun hot on their shoulders and backs. The beach narrowed as they walked, drawing closer to the dunes, and a few rocky outcrops of sandstone poked through the shallow sands. As they walked, Una'ah carried on raking the sands, and together they scooped up the found shellfish.

Then, as they neared a rock pool, a herring gull swooped down from the skies, screeching harshly at Una'ah. Startled, she stepped backwards and her foot slipped on a loose stone covered by a patch of slimy seaweed. Her arms flailed and she dropped her rake. With a cry of shock, she fell backwards as a flare of pain shot up from her ankle. She crashed down onto a boulder and her leg twisted awkwardly on impact. She screamed out with hurt, matching the gull's cries.

Bruakoe looked around, eyes wide. He saw the herring gull swoop past again and then saw its chick nearby, its mottled back hidden among the rocks. The bird was only defending its young. But more importantly, there was Una'ah herself laying winded on the rocks. She was lying back with her legs apart. He saw the deep furrow between her legs, her labia a luscious deep pink set within her dark pubic hair and in contrast with her tanned skin. Her bosom heaved with shock. The sight of her lying there, so vulnerable against the hard rocks, caused his cock to stiffen within the confines of his penis-sheath.

He carefully stepped over the seaweed beslimed rocks, his feet sinking into the ooze between the boulders, and knelt by her.

"Are you hurt?" he asked, concern in his voice.

"My ankle -- I think I've sprained it," she said, grimacing with pain.

Her legs were still spread and the sight of her pussy was distracting him. The angry herring gull swooped down again, trying to drive off the intruders.

"Let me help," he said. He put an arm around her shoulders, helping her to sit up, enjoying the feel of her skin against his and her firm back muscles beneath. Her breasts moved, drawing the eyes. When she felt up to it, she got to her feet and cried out with pain as her ankle took her weight. He helped her hobble away from the screaming gull and onto a patch of warm, dry sand nearby where he lowered her down to rest. Leaving her for a moment, he hurried back to the rock pool and collected their gear and basket.

He sat down on the sand next to her. She extended her leg and he knelt before her, taking her ankle in his hands and gently felt it, pressing on the bones beneath. He was relieved that it was not broken as that would have slowed the clan down when it came time to move on. If it was bad enough, if her injury did not heal or turned septic, she could be left behind to fend for herself which would mean she would probably starve. Far better to lose one person than the whole group. But he thought that she was right, that it was only a sprain.

"We'll rest for a while," he said. He was still kneeling before her, her ankle in his hands but looking up, past her muscular calves and thighs, he again saw the triangle of hair on her lower belly and the pink slit of her snatch. He was so glad he was wearing his penis-sheath as his hard-on was now so obvious and she was not yet his woman. However, the wood was digging painfully into his flesh, making him want to tear it off and show her how he felt.

She nodded agreement. He looked up at her face and saw that she was staring down at his groin. He shifted position slightly but it did not make the ache go away. As if in response, she opened her legs a bit further and her inner lips separated, revealing dark shadows between. He saw the beauty of her clit hood. If possible, his cock got even harder until it felt like seasoned oak-wood.

"You haven't thought of choosing a woman yet?" Una'ah asked.

Bruakoe shook his head and swallowed thickly. "I was going to wait until the big gathering. Unless...?" He broke off.

In response, Una'ah leaned forward, bringing her bosom close to his face. Her hands held his penis-sheath and stroked it. Even through the wooden shaft, he felt the motion. He swallowed again. Her hands slipped down the covering until she reached his exposed balls. She cupped them both in the palm of her hand, rubbing, stroking and pleasing those heavy stones.

His fingers fumbled as he tried to untie the knot in the thong holding the penis-sheath to his waist. Instead Una'ah untied it for him and pulled the wooden sheath off, dropping it onto the sand. Her eyes opened as she took in the size of his cock. She had seen him without it before but then his manhood was flaccid and merely hung down between his legs whereas now it was rigid, hard, veined and pointing straight up to the sky. Its bulbous tip glistened with pre-cum.

Una'ah had seen other members of her clan fuck many times as there was little privacy in their encampment and while it was considered rude to watch, she could not help seeing what was going on. She kissed the tip of his cock, licking up his salty pre-cum. She heard Bruakoe groan under her tongue's attention. Her tongue slid up and down his thick shaft and she felt it shudder beneath her.

"Not yet," she whispered. Her mouth and tongue searched out his balls and she slipped first one and then the other into her mouth as if she were swallowing oysters. She saw Bruakoe's fists clench and his legs tremble. She suckled on the hard, hairy stones between his legs, savoring their slightly, sweaty, salty flavor.

Her own body had its needs. She let his balls slip out of her mouth and lay back on the soft, warm sand and opened her legs wide in a gesture of absolute want. She looked up into Bruakoe's face and smiled. She spread her vaginal lips fully exposing herself. Bruakoe lowered himself down onto her body, supporting his torso with his forearms but enjoying their skin to skin contact. The swell of her belly beneath his harder stomach, her breasts against his chest, their thighs rubbing together. But most delightfully, most pleasurably, the feel of his wood-hard shaft sinking into her smooth cavern as she guided him into her body.

Bruakoe grunted as Una'ah let out a gasp of mixed shock and joy. She raised her knees while her arms held his muscular back while her vaginal muscles gripped his penis. She cried out as he penetrated her, startling the nearby gulls into another raucous display. She had not expected the feelings now overwhelming her mind and body. His penis rose and fell like a woodpecker pecking a hollow into a tree trunk. His penis hammered in and hammered in, rubbing against that sensitive nub at the front, bringing her emotions to a point where she could not take any more and, with a cry, she felt a huge wave surge over her emotions and it was like she lost her whole self but gained something so much more.

Just as she cried out, Bruakoe's body surged forwards and he felt an explosion of his seed flood out, filling Una'ah's hole. He cried out himself, a counterpoint to her yell. He felt a part of his spirit leave him to join hers in a moment of supreme rapture. Finally, spent, he fell back and lay on her breasts for a moment before rolling over to lie by her side. They lay together, listening to each other's breathing, the sound merging with the sea surf. He lay with his hand over her breast, his fingers gently massaging her nipple. She lay on her side, facing him, with one hand rubbing her belly and the other loosely holding his now limp penis.

"Will you agree to be my woman?" Bruakoe asked after a while.

"Of course. There is no-one else I want," Una'ah said softly in reply. "You have me."

"I will tell the elders and the shaman when we get back," Bruakoe said with a big smile.

They kissed again, looking deeply in each other's eyes, trying to see their future together until, satisfied, content to be in each other's company, they lay together on the sun-warmed sands, occasionally murmuring to each other but mostly happy to listen to the incoming waves. With sadness at the coming end of this afternoon, they noticed the sun was gradually slipping down towards the sea and the tide was coming in.

Una'ah sighed. "We should start back," she said.

Bruakoe nodded and got to his feet. He extended an arm and helped her stand. She winced with pain as her swollen ankle took her weight. As Bruakoe gathered their belongings, she squatted and urinated.

"Come, let me help you," Bruakoe said once she had relieved herself.

Using her rake as well as Bruakoe's strong arm for support, they made their way along the beach, through the low gap in the dunes to the clan's encampment on a knoll of higher ground overlooking both the marsh and the sea. A single large hut had been built, walled with hides and thatched with bundles of reeds. A fire burned in front of it and the homely and comforting smell of wood smoke told them that they were back where they belonged with their clan.

That evening, as the kindred relaxed by the fire doing little chores and repairs that needed fixing, Bruakoe looked up from a new spearhead he was knapping and announced that he wanted to claim Una'ah as his woman. The clan cheered and Una'ah's mother burst into tears and kissed him. The elders looked pleased as they did not want Bruakoe to move on from their little group. He had proved his value as a hunter and flint-knapper many times. The elders gathered around and hugged both Una'ah and Bruakoe.

At the next full moon, the shaman put on his deer robes and fox head-dress and, with the aid of the kin group's chanting and drumming as well as certain herbs and mushrooms to help him contact the spirits of the dead, he performed the ceremonies. To help propitiate the tribal ancestors, Una'ah threw her prized sea-shell necklace into a sacred willow pool while Bruakoe sacrificed his new spear. The shaman announced that the spirits were well pleased and linked Una'ah and Bruakoe in union. That night, the clan feasted long into the night.

EPILOGUE:

The spirits blessed Una'ah and Bruakoe with many healthy children and some years later Bruakoe became one of the elders. Over ten summers came and went but one chill winter, not long before the mid-winter feast to mark the shortest day, the marsh-damp settled on Una'ah's lungs. She had endured a difficult birth that fall and her body was quite worn out. Her coughing got worse and, despite the best attempts of the shaman's spells and the women's poultices, she passed into the realm of the ancestors. Before she did so, she squeezed Bruakoe's hand and her loving brown eyes looked up into his.

"Lay me on the beach near where you claimed me," she whispered. He kissed her in response. Then she turned her face away and closed her eyes. She never spoke again. The next day, after the sobbing women had washed the body, Bruakoe picked it up and was surprised by how light it was. Cradling her naked form in his arms, he followed the tracks and trails through the marsh and dunes and laid her down on a rocky outcrop near where the tide was coming in. He took off a bone amulet she had made for him years ago and tied it around her neck. With tears in his eyes, he sat and watched and waited for the tide to claim her body. Then, alone, his spear trailing in the dirt, he walked back to the clan's base. At first, he dreamed of his Una'ah often but as over time she went deeper into the realm of spirits, she appeared less and less often to him until he rarely saw her shade in his visions.

Bruakoe himself lived many more years after and had other women. But it was long-lost Una'ah his mind usually turned to when he was alone hunting or fishing and, in the silences, when no stories were being told, it was noticed that he often looked thoughtful. One day, when there was frost in Bruakoe's tawny hair and beard, several men were out tracking a drove of young pigs. Bruakoe, as the most experienced hunter, was circling around the pigs to drive them onto the spears of the younger men crouching in the brushwood to ambush them.

With no warning, a large boar erupted from a hazel thicket. Taken by surprise, Bruakoe's spear was too slow and the huge tusker gored him badly, its tusks ripping into him, blood pouring like a river from a ruptured artery in his leg. He screamed with both shock and pain. The boar charged off through the oak wood, and he heard its bulk crashing away taking his life with it. Bruakoe fell back onto a pile of old leaves, his life-blood turning them scarlet. He tried to staunch the flow with his furs but knew it was useless.

A moment later, one of the hunters rounded an oak trunk. He saw it was Iccakoe, his oldest son by Una'ah and a mighty hunter. The younger man immediately saw what had happened and knelt by his father's head.

"I am for the spirits now, Bruakoe said, gritting his teeth against the pain. "Take me to the beach when I am over."

His son nodded his head as hot tears fell onto his father's face but Bruakoe did not feel them for, in his mind's eye, his was back on that beach on that summer's day, so long ago, when Una'ah first agreed to be his woman. He died with a slight smile on his face and Iccakoe wondered if his father would meet his mother again on another beach in another world. He hoped so.

Over the years, the climate continued to warm and the glaciers carried on retreating north. The sea rose, drowning both the beach and marsh. The tribe followed the game northwards, new people from the south came and claimed the land, and after a few generations both Bruakoe's and Una'ah's stories were lost to memory. Yet their descendants lived on -- and some live even into the present times.

The End.

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

My tenth story and I wanted it to be something different. I know this may be a bit left-field but I wrote this for Summer Lovin 2022 but then decided it wasn't really suitable for that theme. This is meant to be a 'realistic' story set in the Mesolithic stone age of Northern Europe. It is dated approximately 8,500 BCE when the climate was warmer than now. At this point, Britain was still connected to the continent via Doggerland which is now under the North Sea. In common with other hunter-gatherer societies, people probably did not wear clothes during the summer and so would have had few inhibitions about nudity. By this time, the ice shelf had long retreated and the tundra itself was gone with the land now covered with beech, larch, alder and oak together with extensive marshes and fens. The mega fauna, like mammoths and woolly rhinoceros, had vanished to be replaced by deer and boar. It is thought that the small nomadic population lived along the coast and rivers for ease of travel and the abundant food supply rather than deep in the forests.

Una'ah and Bruakoe lived approximately 450 generations ago from us. People must have led tough, arduous lives by our standards and life expectancy was shorter then than now. Women especially must have led hard lives worn out by the demands of pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding.

However, despite the ending, I do not think that this is a sad story as death comes to us all in the end. Una'ah and Bruakoe led happy, fulfilling lives in their time-frame and society and I hope it makes us think about our long-distant predecessors. Thank you for reading.