Teuvo carefully picked his way down the steep slope of the valley. Fresh powdered snow had been deposited during the night in knee deep drifts which made finding foot holds difficult. Using the shaft of his spear he probed the ground in front, checking for solid ground. On his back he carried a large pack with enough provisions for the next few days while the hunting party was away from the village. Winter had made many of the valleys impassable, deep drifts and biting winds blocked the ancient pathways used by the Lossoth. During the winter they would remain in their villages, using the stores of food that they had spent the spring and summer collecting whilst the hunting had been good and the days long.
Now with the spring thaw almost at an end the hunting parties were out once more to restock and prepare for next winter. Their target would be the vast herds of Elk and Auroch that would be returning to the valleys, drawn by the thinning of the snow which would allow them to find and eat the spring shoots and the soft moss. The herd’s numbers would have grown during the winter months as the new young had been born and nursed in the safety of the hidden valleys behind the walls of snow and ice. But the young and nursing mothers were strictly off limits for the Lossoth; the young would grow and be a source of food for future generations. The first and most important rule of the hunt was never taking more than you need. Although great numbers of prey would be hunted the Lossoth only took the older creatures, this way the herd’s numbers would be protected ensuring the Lossoth would always have a source of food and materials .The creatures they hunted provided them with everything, food, clothing, tools and shelter.
Reaching the bottom of the valley floor the Teuvo began their search for tracks. At first the tracks of single animals were found which would then be joined by others like mountain streams flowing towards the river. Soon the tracks formed large tracts of trampled snow which signaled that the herds were close.
As Teuvo made his way through the trees more prints traveling from the north joined the hoofed prints of the Elk, these new prints had been made by many men but they were not the usual soft prints made by the Lossoth's fur boots, they had been made by large boots and everywhere Teuvo looked he could see trampled and broken saplings. A little further and Teuvo came across a sight that made him gasp in horror.
In a clearing the snow had been trampled and everywhere he looked it was stained bright crimson with blood. To the centre piled almost as high as Teuvo was tall was a stinking mound of dead Elk. The Elk had been butchered in places but large amounts of meat and fur had been left to rot. No Lossoth would kill so many from a single herd and no Lossoth would leave behind a scrap of carcass; every bit of the animal was taken and used. To leave so much meat to go bad was unthinkable, if a Lossoth as much as wasted a handful of meat it would bring bad luck for that seasons hunt and the wrath of the spirits of the prey animals.
Not only had new-born and mothers been slaughtered but scattered around the clearing were large traps of dark iron, vicious jaws that had snapped the legs of the Elk, leaving them to suffer until the owners arrived to finish off the unfortunate animal. The Lossoth forbid the use of such traps, each creature hunted was given the right to a fair chance to escape, if a hunter was clumsy or badly prepared or a poor shot with his bow the animal would escape. When a hunter made a kill he always gave thanks to the animal that had given its life and praised it's bravery. To use such traps would anger the spirits and the meat would be tainted with bad luck.
Teuvo knew of only one people who would cause such wanton destruction, The Angmarim.
