A thin trickle of water flowed through a mostly dry riverbed. Where a once mighty waterfall had once been were a few wet rocks that went, drip, drip, drip into the canyon below. Along the banks of the "river", Saya and Tadali carried buckets, gathering water from the trickle in between the rocks. I looked down at them. These people were heroes, without them scavenging our people would die of thirst.

Every winter the snows came, bringing with them new hope, water, dances. Life in the snow was hard, but along with the snow came lots of thick winter game that had been avoiding the humans for the summer and now had no choice but to come out. In my tribe, the winter was celebrated.

But then summer would come, and it would show no mercy. The trees would turn brown, the mountains would lose their snow, the rivers would run dry, and the sky would turn gray with smoke as the settlers burned everything they had to to get at oil.

And even worse than all of this were the forest fires. As the snows disappeared and the earth turned dry, the ground erupted in flame, burning everything in its path. And the settlers with all their advanced technology, computers, and flying machines, did nothing to help quell the flames. In fact, after the flames had burned the forests into meadows, the settlers would sometimes come in and add insult to injury by digging for oil in the burned area.

"Tadek! Tadek!" shouted Saya.

"What can I help you with?" I asked.

She looked nervous as she glanced at the trees around her. "A scout has reported settlers in the distance, we should probably get moving."

That was another thing. The forest known to the settlers as the Boreal Forest was getting smaller and smaller, and my tribe lived on the edges of the forest. So whenever the settlers advanced, they overpowered us, and we were forced to retreat and retreat, into the heartland of the area known to the settlers as Canada. Our tribe was constantly on the move, constantly packing up the things they needed and trekking north. Many people died on these treks.

"There's mountains to the north not that far from here," I pointed out. "The mountain glaciers might be the solutions to our water problem, at least temporarily."

"Absolutely, Master Tadek," said Saya, bowing. She then ran back down into the forest to let people know of the current move. A move like this had happened not 6 months ago, so everybody knew the drill. The young and the old were carried on the backs of the strong; everybody worked to get everybody to their new home.

The next day at dawn, everybody got up, and we started walking. It was good to start early in the day; that way we would get good walking done before the midday heat hit.

We walked and walked, through grassy meadows and burnt forests, finally emerging above the timberline to a rocky moonscape, looking down across the forests, and in the distance the horrible oil sand mines.

Soon it was midday, and the sun turned the rocks into coals. Even the strong men and women were getting tired, carrying the burden of the weak on their backs, walking through the hot sun. There was no water to be seen. We passed by dry lake beds, but no lakes. The glaciers on the distant mountains seemed close enough to touch, but I knew that looks could be deceiving. Those icefields were miles away.

"When are we going to get there?" asked a little kid. He was only just old enough to be walking, maybe nine at the most. He already looked as tired as a cow and they were only maybe halfway to where they needed to be. "I want some water. I already drank mine."

I looked down at the poor kid. He was only nine. He didn't deserve to die a child. I still had some of my water, but not much. If I gave it to the kid, I wouldn't have any for myself.

I looked to the sky and began to pray to God. Not the settlers' god, not the tribal god, not any specific god, but God. I prayed to whoever was out there to help get me through this mission. And that was when I knew the truth. It would take work, but I had the endurance to make it through this trek. But the kid did not. If he didn't die of thirst, he would probably die of sunstroke. And after all, I was the chief. It was my job to protect my tribe. So I took a deep breath and gave the kid my water. "All yours," I said.

"Thanks, Master Tadek."

In the distance, water shimmered in a river. And it wasn't a mirage, this was a real glacier-fed river. Renewed by the promise of water and more game to hunt and snows that lasted all year, I put one foot in front of another foot in front of another foot. My head pounded and throbbed with each step, but I just had to get there.

The sun began to move lower in the sky, turning a glowing orange and cooling the air, much to the relief of all the tired trekkers. It turned the rocks glistening yellow and cast a deep shadow over the forest to the right. It turned the glaciers pink and the river red. The mountain cast a cone-like shadow across the gentle valley down below the timberline to the thick forest.

As soon as they were at the river, almost everybody found a place to sleep and huddled up. I took some more time to survey the scene.

The river wasn't that big, but it sure as hell was bigger than the little trickle that we had made our home earlier. I knew from experience that below the timberline near rivers was lots of wildlife, and that the glaciers would provide water as long as they would last.

But they wouldn't last forever. Our tribe had definitely noticed the world getting warmer, and if something didn't happen to stop the current trend, eventually there would be no glaciers, and therefore no water. If this happened, our tribe would probably disappear entirely.

And no one would remember our names.