He had lost count of the years.
Sometimes, when he woke in the middle of the night and the silence pressed down like a slab of stone, he tried to remember. The faces of his mother, his father, the siblings he once had. Blurred. Like drawings on rock worn away by water. Only Yara remained clear, and Arkhan, and that little girl of four winters who had asked him if he died. Those did not fade.
But the rest… the rest was a dense fog.
He kept walking.
The settlement appeared one summer morning, when the sun was just beginning to warm the earth. He was coming down a gentle hill covered in yellow flowers when he saw it below, beside a wide, slow river. Many huts. More than he had ever seen gathered in one place. Reed roofs, mud walls, animal pens. People moving like ants.
He stood there for a while, watching. His stomach reminded him he had not eaten well in days. His body reminded him it had been months since he had spoken to anyone.
He walked down slowly.
When he drew near, the children were the first to see him. They ran toward the huts. Men came out from among them, some with sticks, others with stone knives. The one in front was gray-haired, though his arms were still strong. He looked him up and down with that distrust all villages have toward the one who arrives alone.
"You've come from far away," he said.
He nodded.
"Very far."
"What are you looking for?"
He thought. What was he looking for? It had been so long since he had looked for anything. Only to keep going.
"Fire," he said. "Food. I can pay."
He pointed to the knife he carried. Good flint, well knapped. The gray-haired man looked at it, then at him again.
"Stay the night," he said. "We'll see tomorrow."
He entered the settlement.
They called themselves Those Who Live by the Water. The gray-haired man was the chief, or something like it. His name was Tor. That night they gave him a corner in a shared hut and a bowl of thick soup with pieces of meat and seeds he did not recognize.
"What is this?" he asked.
The woman who had given him the soup looked at him strangely.
"Wheat," she said. "Where do you come from that you don't know wheat?"
He did not answer. He ate in silence, listening.
The settlement buzzed. Children, women, men returning from fishing or tending the pens. It smelled of smoke, of food, of manure, of people. It had been so long since he had smelled all that. It made him a little dizzy.
That night he slept wrapped in many breaths. He dreamed of Yara.
Days passed.
He did not leave the next morning. Nor the one after. He helped where he could: firewood, repairing huts, driving off wolves. He was a good hunter, and that earned respect. He was quiet, and that made people wary, but he caused no trouble.
Tor watched him. One day, while they were fixing a fence together, they spoke.
"You have a hunter's hands," Tor said.
"Yes."
"Where did you learn?"
"Many places."
Tor waited for more, but there was nothing else. He nodded and went on working.
He did not ask why he had no gray hair. He did not ask why his eyes looked as if they had seen too much. Old men learn not to ask certain questions.
One night, the settlement was attacked.
They came from the other side of the river. Many of them, twenty or more, with sticks and knives and painted faces. They were shouting. The huts began to burn.
He woke to the noise. People ran, screamed, died. He saw a man fall with his skull split open. He saw a woman dragging a child toward the river. He saw Tor, alone, fighting three.
He did not think.
He grabbed a burning branch from the fire and rushed in. The first man fell with his face scorched. The second had his arm broken before he could drive in his knife. The third fled. He kept going. Hut after hut, man after man. He did not kill unless he had to, but when it was necessary, he did not hesitate.
When dawn came, the attackers had fled. The settlement was half burned, but still standing. There were dead. And among the defenders, covered in blood that was not his own, stood him.
Tor approached. He had a cut on his arm and was breathing hard. He looked at him for a long time.
"I've seen many men fight," he said. "But not like you."
He wiped his face with the back of his hand.
"I've had time."
"How much time?"
He did not answer. Tor nodded slowly and asked no more.
That night they invited him into the circle of elders. He listened to their stories, their plans, their fears. He did not speak much, but when he did, he noticed they listened differently.
Moons passed.
He helped rebuild. He taught the young how to hunt, how to read tracks, how to anticipate the animal. At night he told stories of journeys, of distant lands, of strange beasts. But always of others. Never of himself.
A woman began to watch him. Her name was Ira. She was young, a widow, with a small child. One day she brought him food without his asking. Another day she sat beside him by the fire. He knew what it meant. He knew what she wanted.
And he knew, too, that he should not.
But one night she sat closer. She smelled of herbs and smoke. Her hands were small and calloused.
"I've seen you look at me," she said.
"I have."
"Then…"
He looked at her. He saw youth, strength, life. He also saw what would come. The years. The wrinkles. The end. He saw all of it and knew he would not be able to stop it.
"If I stay," he said, "one day I will leave."
Ira frowned.
"Everyone leaves."
"I do."
"Why?"
He did not know how to explain it. Not in words she could understand.
"That's how I am," he said. "Those who stay with me… suffer."
She looked at him for a long time. Then, slowly, she touched his hand.
"I've already suffered," she said. "My man died. The cold took him. If you leave later, I'll suffer again. But now… now I am alone."
She tightened her grip.
"Stay tonight."
He stayed.
Years passed.
He did not know how many. Five. Ten. Perhaps more. Ira aged beside him, but slowly, because she had been young when they began. They had children. Two. First a girl, whom they named Sela. Then a boy, Ken. Ira's child, the one she already had when he arrived, grew up and called him father, though he was not.
They were good years. Days of hunting, afternoons by the river, nights of shared skins. Ira laughed with that laugh he had learned to love. The children grew strong. The settlement prospered.
Sometimes, at night, when everyone slept, he would look at her and feel a weight in his chest. He knew what would come. But he learned not to think. To live the day, the moon, the season. As they all did.
Tor died. One winter, the cold took him, as it takes the old. They mourned. He did too, in his way. They buried him by the river, as they did their chiefs.
Another took his place. Then another. And he remained.
He began to notice the looks.
They were not looks of fear at first. More confusion. Those who had been children when he arrived were now adults. The adults from then were old. And he was still the same.
One afternoon, a woman already well into her years, one he had known when she was young, approached him while he was sharpening a spear.
"You don't change," she said.
It was not a question.
He kept sharpening.
"No," he said.
She waited for more, but there was nothing else. She left, shaking her head.
Another time, some young men followed him while he hunted. They did not hide well. They whispered. By the time he returned to the settlement, the rumor was already spreading among the huts.
"They say you don't age," Ira told him that night. There was no fear in her voice. Curiosity, perhaps. Or something close to pride.
"You knew," he said.
"I knew you were different. I didn't know how much."
She looked at him with eyes that now had crow's feet, with gray beginning in her hair.
"Are you a spirit?"
"No."
"A god?"
"Less."
She smiled, that crooked smile he loved so much.
"Well, to me you are my man. Whatever you are doesn't matter."
She embraced him. He embraced her too. And for a while, the weight of the years was forgotten.
But the looks did not stop. They grew. The young watched him with admiration, the old with respect. Some began to bring him offerings. Food, skins, pretty stones. As if he were something more than a man.
One night, Ken—his son, now nearly a man—sat beside him by the fire.
"Father," he said, "people are talking."
"They always talk."
"They say you don't die."
He did not answer.
"It's true, isn't it?" Ken looked at him. "I've watched you. For years. You don't change. I have changed. My mother has changed. You haven't."
He looked at him. He saw his eyes—like Ira's, but with something of his own.
"It's true," he said.
Ken was silent for a while.
"What are you?"
"I don't know."
"Will you never die?"
"I don't know. I've come close. I've died, perhaps. But I come back."
"How?"
"I don't know."
Ken nodded slowly, as if it made sense.
"Will you leave?" he finally asked.
And there it was. The question that always came.
"Yes," he said. "One day."
"Why?"
"Because if I stay, they will end up worshiping me. Or fearing me. Or both. And I am not a god. I am only a man who does not die. Nothing more."
Ken looked at him. His eyes were wet, but he did not cry.
"Will you come back?"
"I don't know."
"Will I remember you?"
He smiled. A sad smile, the kind that no longer hurts because it hurts too much.
"Yes," he said. "You will. And your children. And their children. They will remember me. But it will be a story. A tale by the fire. It won't be me."
Ken nodded. He stood, took a few steps, then turned back.
"Thank you," he said. "For being my father."
He left.
He remained alone by the fire. He took out Yara's pendant. He clenched it in his hand. He had carried it for so many years that the bone was worn smooth, like a river stone.
"You see?" he whispered. "I go on."
No one answered.
That spring, Ira fell ill.
It was not a violent sickness, the kind that kills in days. It was slow, like the wearing down of stone by water. She lost strength. She lost weight. She lost her laughter—that laughter he had learned to love.
He cared for her. He did not leave her side. The children helped. The settlement watched in silence.
One night, she touched his face with those fingers now so thin.
"You will leave," she said. It was not a question.
"Yes."
"When I go."
"Yes."
She smiled, barely a gesture.
"You're right to. You're not from here anymore. You never were."
He kissed her forehead.
"You were mine," she said. "For some years. That is enough for me."
"For me too."
She died three days later. They buried her by the river, near Tor, near the others. He dug the earth with his own hands.
That night, alone, he watched the fire for a long time.
He did not cry. He had cried so much over so many centuries that he had no tears left. But the weight was there. It would always be.
Moons passed.
The settlement endured. Ira's children—his children—were now adults. Ken had a wife and a son. Sela too had taken a partner. There were grandchildren. They called him grandfather, though they knew he was not like other grandfathers.
The looks had changed again. They were no longer of curiosity. They were of reverence. When he passed, some bowed their heads. When he spoke, all fell silent. When he hunted, the young followed him to learn, but also to be near him, as if something of what he was might be caught.
One night, after a particularly good hunt, the new chief—Tor's grandson, already nearly old—stood in the circle and said:
"We have a god among us."
There were murmurs. Nods.
He stood slowly. All fell silent.
"I am not a god," he said. "I am a man. Only a man."
The chief shook his head.
"Men die. You do not."
"That does not make me a god. It makes me something else. But I am not what you think."
They looked at one another. He saw in their eyes that they did not believe him. Or did not want to.
That night he knew it was time.
Three days later, when the sun was beginning to stain the sky red, he gathered his own. Ken. Sela. The grandchildren. Ira's children, those who called him father though he was not. Only them.
"I'm leaving," he said.
Ken nodded. He knew.
"Where?" Sela asked.
"I don't know. Far. Where no one knows me."
"Will you come back?"
He looked at her. She had Ira's eyes. The same eyes.
"I don't know," he said. "But if I do, it will be after a long time. So long you won't be here."
Sela lowered her head. The grandchildren, who barely understood, looked at him with wide eyes.
"I love you," he said. "All of you. But I have to go."
No one protested. No one said stay. They knew it would not matter.
He embraced each of them. Long. Tight. Memorizing their scent, their warmth, their shape. He knew that when he remembered them decades from now, these moments would be all he had left.
Then he gathered his things. The knife. The stones. Yara's pendant. Nothing more.
He stepped out of the hut. The entire settlement was waiting. Word had spread. They were all there, from the oldest to the nursing infants. In silence. Watching him.
He walked among them. No one spoke. No one touched him. But in their eyes he saw something he had never seen before: love. And something else. Something that looked like faith.
When he reached the edge of the settlement, he turned. They were all there, still, watching him. Ken in front, with his wife and son. Sela with hers. The others gathered close, silent.
He raised his hand. A greeting. A farewell.
Then he kept walking.
He climbed the hill of yellow flowers. When he reached the top, he turned one last time. The settlement below, small, smoking, alive. His people. His family. His years of peace.
He knew that some of them—the oldest—would tell the story that very night. They would tell how a man who did not die had lived among them, had loved a woman, had fathered children, and one day had left. The young would listen. The children would ask. And over the years, the story would grow, filling with things that never happened, with wonders he never performed.
It would become legend.
A god who walked among men.
He smiled. A tired, sorrowful smile, of someone who has lived too long.
And he kept walking.