Short story about humanoid creatures living on ice, which can swim under the ice and eat the moss/plants that grow on the underside of the ice

Question

I read this story in 2014. The book was old though. Seemed like before the 2000s. It could be part of a collection of stories, but I remember it being short. It was also in English, in case that’s important.

What I remember is the story revolves around humanoid creatures living on ice, but they've evolved into creatures that can swim under the ice and eat the moss/plants that grow on the underside of the ice. The protagonist is one of these. There's a male "alpha" who has his way with all the females of the group but eventually the protagonist fights him and breaks the alpha's teeth, meaning he can't eat anymore and will starve. Then he goes on a journey to find another land with two of his friends, but one friend gets eaten by a whale? Shark? While they try and cross the water. They get to the new land and find other evolved humans/creatures but they can't understand them. So they go home.

That's about all I can remember and for the life of me, I can't find the story anywhere. I feel like I'm making it up?

Answer 1

Huddle by Stephen Baxter. It was published in 1999 and I read it in Year's Best SF 5. In fact it immediately follows the story Valour that I identified only a couple of days ago.

The creatures are walrus like, or at least that's how I picture it. The fight you remember is:

The Bull was facing him, pawing at the ice with a great scaly foot.

“I don't wish to fight you,” Night-Dawn said.

The Bull laughed, and lumbered forward, wheezing. Night-Dawn stood his ground, braced his feet against the ice, and put his head down. The Bull's roar turned to alarm, and he tried to stop; but his feet could gain no purchase. His mouth slammed over Night-Dawn's skull.

Night-Dawn screamed as the Bull's teeth grated through his fur and flesh to his very bone. They bounced off each other. Night-Dawn felt himself tumbling back, and finished up on his backside on the ice. His chest felt crushed; he labored to breathe. He could barely see through the blood streaming into his eyes.

The Bull was lying on his back, his loose belly hoisted toward the violet sky. He was feeling his mouth with his fingers. He let out a long, despairing moan.

No-Sun helped Night-Dawn to his feet. “You did it. You smashed his teeth, Night-Dawn. He'll be dead in days.”

As you remember, the group led by Night-Dawn find other evolved humans but they are so different that there can be no companionship between them. The story ends with Night-Dawn leading the group home:

Night-Dawn thought of the loathing he had seen in the strange woman's eyes. He saw himself through her eyes: squat, fat, waddling, as if deformed.

He felt shame. “We are not welcome here,” he said.

“We must bring the others here,” Frazil was saying.

“And what then? Beg to be allowed to stay, to enter the warmth? No. We will go home.”

“Home? To a place where people live a handful of winters, and must scrape food from ice with their teeth? How can that compare to this?”

He took her hands. “But this is not for us. We are monsters to these people. As they are to us. And we cannot live here.”
...

The shadows lengthened. The sun was descending toward the circular sea, and one of Earth's two Moons was rising.