On the stairs stood several vé’hó’e who waited to write down all that they heard and saw. The vé’ho’e talked among themselves but did not speak to One Who Flies or anyone else.
Standing in the plaza below were most of the soldiers who had survived the trip and the battles with the bluecoats. They stood waiting along with the whistlers and walkers that would carry them all home.
“You are quiet this morning,” Storm Arriving said.
“For three days, you and I have been talking for the chiefs. Nothing but talking. I am sick of talking.”
The newly-repaired doors in the front of the great domed edifice opened up and the chiefs walked out into the sunlight. They walked with slow deliberation to the top of the steps and there they stopped and turned. After them came the rest of the soldiers—Kit Foxes, Crazy Dogs, and Red Shield soldiers, mostly. They carried the shrouded bodies of their fallen comrades, including the body of Laughs like a Woman. There were twenty-four bodies in all, men who had fallen here or down by the foot of the bridge. The soldiers bore them down the steps and loaded them, two-by-two, onto whistlers. It would be a long trip, but every man had agreed that all of these slain—both here and those whose bodies still lay up at the mountain pass—would return to their homeland. Leaving their bones here among these strange people and odd places was not a thing that he or anyone else would accept.
Storm Arriving thought of his family and of Speaks While Leaving. It would be many days before he was once again amongst the People. He hoped they would not worry too much at his prolonged absence. He missed them, especially Speaks While Leaving. For some reason, though, he felt that she knew he was safe and about to start for home.
After the bodies had been readied, the vé’hó’e appeared at the doorway. They blinked and squinted as they came outside, as if the sun were an alien thing and unnatural to them. They all wore the same clothes: heavy black fabrics, long and in many layers, covering their entire bodies from their feet to the tops of their heads. They gathered in a group at the head of the stairs, next to the chiefs. Two of them came forward.
The first was the one he and the others had dubbed Dark Eyes, and who One Who Flies called Duschesnes. He was a sharp and intelligent man who had treated the chiefs with great respect. Next to him, however, was a very different creature: Long Hair himself.
Storm Arriving found it difficult even now not to reach for his knife and rush up to the man who had brought death to so many. A moon ago, he would have done it regardless of the consequences, but he had learned a great deal since finding One Who Flies in the cloud-that-fell. Part of that learning had been knowing when not to fight.
Besides, he said to himself, the man looks miserable. I can enjoy that much, and I will enjoy watching as more misery comes upon him.
Dark Eyes began to speak to the chiefs, and the vé’hó’e on the steps began to write. One Who Flies translated the words. Storm Arriving translated them in turn, just as he had done for the past three days.
“I would like to thank One Bear and Two Roads and the other chiefs,” Dark Eyes said, “for providing us the opportunity to meet and begin the long work of understanding. We have taken the first step, and that has been to put a halt to the violence and aggression that has cost us all so much in recent weeks. This short war is now at an end, and there is peace between our two peoples.”
The black-clothed vé’hó’e smiled without humor and clapped their hands without enthusiasm. Long Hair did neither, but only stood and stared at his son.
Dark Eyes cleared his throat and continued. “We will meet again soon, to discuss our future and to craft a solution that is agreeable to all.” The men applauded his words again and Dark Eyes stepped forward, offering his hand. The chiefs shook his hand, one by one, and then One Bear spoke.
“I give thanks for our new friends and I look forward to the time when we shall meet once more. There are many things yet to be settled and understood, but much can be done when reasonable men sit down to talk. We will leave you now, but we will all sit down again when the cherries begin to ripen.” He nodded in farewell and then walked down the steps before his words had passed through the veils of translation. The other chiefs followed him and, when One Who Flies finished telling the vé’hó’e what was said, they applauded One Bear’s words as they had their own.
Storm Arriving turned to leave, but stopped when he realized that One Who Flies was not with him. His pale-haired friend was still standing at the top of the steps. He and his father faced one another. Long Hair did not look happy.
Storm Arriving had no problem with that.
George heard Storm Arriving call to him.
“Ame’haooestse. Nóheto, néséne.” One Who Flies. Let’s go, my friend.
“Héehe’e,” he said, turning. “I will be there.” He looked back at his father. The old man was mired somewhere between indignation and repulsion and didn’t seem likely to free himself any time soon. “I’m sorry, Father,” George said. “I just couldn’t see it done any other way.”
He waited for his father to speak, even to open his mouth as if to speak, but he did not. He simply stood there, ramrod stiff and just as cold. Finally, he gave up waiting.
“Tell Mother I love her. I’ll miss you all.” He started down the stairs.
“You’ve achieved nothing,” his father said. George stopped without turning. “You know that, don’t you?”
George nodded, the sunlight off the white steps making his head hurt. “I know,” he said. “But I’ve bought us time. A little time.”
He heard his father expel a breath of exasperation. “I can’t say how disappointed I am in you,” he said.
George waited to see if he would say anything more. He did not.
“Just remember, Father, that those were the last words you chose to say to me.”
Then he continued on down the stairs. His walker crouched down for him and he climbed up on her back.
“She looks hungry,” he said to Storm Arriving as she stood.
“Just keep her away from my whistler,” he said. “I want to get home in one piece.”
George laughed. “Let’s go home,” he said.
Custer watched as his son sat atop a lizard the size of a house and shared a joke with an Indian, just as he himself might joke with Samuel or Jacob. It rankled. More than the jeers of the press, more than his wife’s silence, more than the feigned remonstrance of Congress, watching his son so easy and friendly with one of them rankled him.
And saddened him.
He had never known George well enough to joke with him in such a way. Now, he was riding away, and Custer felt that every last chance was riding away with him.
The great lizard barked—a harsh, ugly sound—and the others like it did likewise. The smaller, horse-sized lizards whistled and changed color from green to white and red. Then the whole company began to move.
“George!” Custer dashed down the steps. “George!”
His son heard his call and stopped. Custer ran up to the beast that carried his son but stopped as it turned its head toward him. With a simple touch, George made the beast lie down on the ground, and Custer walked the rest of the way to speak with his son.
“Be careful,” he said, and stopped, stymied and unable to think of anything else. He forced himself through it. “I…I just didn’t want the last words I said… Just be careful, Son. Your mother worries so.” He held out his hand.
George stepped down from the back of the lizard but did not take his hand. Instead the young man reached out and took his father in an embrace. Custer stiffened, then put his arms around his son and held him tightly. It would be, he knew—they both knew—the last time.
She was up with the morning star. It had been several days since her last vision, several days since the war party had left the city of white stone and headed for home. She wanted to get out, alone and away from the looks and unspoken questions of her family and neighbors. She wrapped a blanket about her shoulders and stepped
quietly out of the lodge.
The sky was hard and clear; the air, crisp and still. The camp of the people lay spread out at the feet of the surrounding knolls and grades that sheltered the Little Sheep River. She ran between the lodges on feet made light by anticipation, heading out toward the flocks.
The whistlers huddled close together for warmth beneath the clear night and had colored themselves a pale brown to blend in. The flock was nearly indistinguishable from the terrain, appearing in the dim starlight like a stretch of tumbled ground.
“Two Cuts,” she called softly. “Hip-ip-ip. Two Cuts.”
A crested head rose up on a long neck.
“Come to me. Come.”
Two Cuts stood and stretched before he gingerly made his way out from the rest of his kin. He came up to her and she scratched him in the place-that-whistlers-love. Then he crouched and she got up on his back.
Bareback on the whistler, she nudged him into motion. She rode, supporting herself on hands and knees, guiding him with a word or a dig of her toe. He took her away from the camp and away from the river. They ran over the hilly crests—each one higher than the last—like a canoe against the river’s current. They climbed up to a high place that she knew well, and there she called Two Cuts to a halt.
The hilltop was graced by an outcropping of stone and a single tamarack tree. The tree was the height of ten men and, due to its height and its solitude, had long been used as a landmark by the People. She let Two Cuts graze while she clambered up to the top of the tall pile of rock nearby.
She could see to the edge of the world. The fingernail moon was up and almost washed away by the nearly-risen sun. The sky along the horizon was a pale blue-green, and growing lighter with each moment.
She frowned. It grew too light too fast, faster than was possible, faster than the world allowed.
“No,” she moaned. “I am not ready.” She crouched down to grip the stone to keep from falling. The vision light coursed over her, and the stone stole all of her warmth. She cried out in anguish as she was taken from her world and into the place of dreams.
There was light, as there always was, and the light lessened to reveal an open plain. At her side were her two guides, the thunder beings. They stood with her as the vision unfolded.
The land undulated like a shook blanket and when it settled it was a camp by a wide river. It was the place where the People camped near Cherry Stone Creek, but it was not like any camp she had ever seen. There were many buffalo skin lodges, just like the one she had left a short time ago, but there were also among them some large earthen lodges. She looked at the people who walked and played and worked throughout the camp and saw many of the Earth Lodge Builders there: Hidatsa, Mandan, and even the shy and reclusive Arikara. Here, at Cherry Stone Creek, far from their homes on the Big Greasy, they lived and worked together with the People.
She looked further. Beyond the camp she saw plantings of beans and corn growing and beyond that she saw men and women of many tribes all working to plant more crops. They used tools she had never seen: they used hardbacks to pull large wedges through the earth, and they dug trenches to bring the water from the river down to the cropland.
The thunder being on her left, his arm still scarred from where she tore the lightning from his skin, pointed to one of the earthen lodges. Smoke rose up from the smokehole and the sounds of clanging metal could be heard echoing from within it. The thunder beings brought her down to the place and they walked through the walls like ghosts.
To one side, men worked at hot fires and beat hot metal on an iron stone. To the other side, men worked at melting down white and yellow metal and casting them into the small disks that the vé’hó’e prized so greatly. Then she was taken out of the lodge and back up into the sky.
She looked back over her shoulder as she was carried up toward the clouds. Behind her she saw the camp change. The lodges became buildings, the paths became roads. The land shrank below her and she saw the People move across their country, following the hunt, protecting the borders, while their camps became villages and towns. She saw machines and weaponry, and she grew afraid.
“We will become them,” she said aloud.
The thunder being pointed once more and she saw dancing in the center of the town. She saw men sitting in a circle in a small room, reverently passing a finely-decorated pipe between them. She saw men who now rode whistlers as they watched over and protected their herds of buffalo, and she saw the men sing to the spirit of the beast as they brought it down to provide food for their families. She saw a grandmother teaching her daughter how to make skillet-bread and showing her how to always leave a piece to the side for the spirits to enjoy.
She knew it was possible then; to change and yet to remain the same.
“My thanks,” she said to the thunder beings. She looked up into the clouds and the sky turned white.
She lay on the boulder and felt the rough stone beneath her. Her sight returned and she blinked to clear it. The sun was up, streaming in from just above the horizon. The light glinted off something near her hand, a shiny spot within a crack in the boulder, a place that could be lit only by the rays of the rising sun. She reached within the crack and pulled out a stone. It was lustrous and globular. It gleamed like metal. She pushed at the stone above the crack and a piece of it came away. Within the boulder was a vein of white stone and within the white stone was another vein of yellow metal as wide as two of her fingers. She thought of the vision, and thought of the future of her People and the other tribes that lived in this land.
We will have to be careful, she thought.
Two Cuts whistled, a long and keening note. She looked up and saw him intent on something several hilltops away, far beyond the camp. She peered into the distance, and Two Cuts whistled again. There came a whistle in return, faint and nearly lost in the sound of the wind through the tamarack tree.
Then she spotted them. A long line of whistlers, tiny shadows cresting a far-off ridge. They were home.
She grabbed the piece of yellow metal and tucked it into her belt pouch, then replaced the stone to hide the boulder’s secret. In a heartbeat she was up on Two Cuts’ back and they were off at speed. She held onto him as tightly as she could, leaning low along his back and praying he didn’t turn too sharply. At every hillcrest she stopped and made Two Cuts call until she heard the reply. When she came within sight she saw that she was not the only one riding to welcome the returning soldiers. Dozens of others had heard the calls and were converging on the group. As they all came together, there was a great outcry of joy and song.
She saw them near the front of the column, the men who had helped her define her life: One Bear, Storm Arriving, and One Who Flies. Her father and One Who Flies waved as she rode up. Storm Arriving smiled more broadly than she had ever seen. They both leapt from their whistlers and embraced one another, standing still in the ebb and flow of the growing celebration.
“I have never been so glad to see anyone,” she said into his ear. His arms were around her, enwrapping her and squeezing her. She felt his hands upon her and felt his body press against the length of her own. She reveled in it, savoring the moment.
“May I talk to your father?” he asked.
She kissed his neck and bounced on her toes as she held on to him. She beamed with happiness.
“Yes,” she said. “Yes. And soon.”
The walls of the Council Lodge had been rolled up to let the wind blow through the meeting place. It looked like the entire camp sat and listened from outside the circle of lodgepoles.
“You have won the first battle,” George said as he stood before the Council, “but you have yet to win the war. It will take time, and you must be very careful. Do not trust them. Do not depend on their word.”
“You are not very kind to your own people,” Three Trees Together said. “Are you still so angry with them?”
George thought about it. “I am angry with some of them,” he told the ancient chief. “But more i
mportantly, I know them too well to ignore the danger. They still consider this land to be part of their nation. All they have agreed to do so far is not to kill you for defending your homes.”
He sat down and listened as Storm Arriving translated his words. He heard the translation travel out beyond the lodge in a wave of whispers, and saw the chiefs as they considered the notion.
“I have a question,” said Two Roads. “You all know that I was with the war party that went to the city-of-white-stone. I saw One Who Flies fight alongside our own soldiers. He led us to a great coup against the vé’hó’e, and I believe him to be a brave and passionate man. But I have seen the great strength of the Horse Nations with my own eyes. How shall we overcome such strength?”
George stood to reply. “I do not know,” he said. “Ultimately, you will have to find a better way than warring with them. Sooner or later, they will win any fight through sheer numbers. There has to be a middle road that can be traveled, a way for both nations to live side by side. You must protect your lands, to be sure, and you must protect your ways, but there are also some things you might learn from them. Not everything about them is bad.” He shrugged. “For now, though, talk will only hold them back for so long. After that, we will need stronger weapons, vé’hó’e weapons, to match them strength for strength. That is the only way the queen-across-the-water has held the Grandmother Land of the north, and the same is true for the Iron Shirts to the west of us. Perhaps we can trade for them, though with whom and with what I do not know. I’m sorry, Two Roads. We’ll just have to figure that part out later.”
George sat down and waited for the words to be translated. After a moment of silence had passed, One Bear stood. He reached into his shirt and pulled out an object the size of a hen’s egg. Even from across the lodge George could see that it was a large nugget of gold. He tossed it to George. It was heavy, bulbous, and gleamed with natural purity.
“My daughter has been given another vision,” One Bear said. “I think it might hold some answers.”
The Year the Cloud Fell Page 33
