Brother Wind

by Sue Harrison

  But She Cries said, “You should go. They will wonder where you are.

  Without looking at the women, Kukutux went to the edge of the water. She lowered her gathering bag to rinse the clams, then washed her scoop, sluiced off the water with the edge of her hand, and settled the scoop back on top of her head.

  As she walked toward the village beach, small spirits wove worries into her thoughts. What if the traders did not like the food she prepared? What if she did not have enough clams to satisfy them? Then she thought of sleeping places and the needs that seemed to rule every man’s life.

  “What will I do if one of them wants me for his bed?” Kukutux asked aloud. She waited, as though the wind would answer, as though the bothering spirits would carry wisdom as well as worry. When no answer came, she spoke for herself, and in a strong voice said, “Hope for a son.”

  CHAPTER 41

  The River People

  The Kuskokwim River, Alaska

  RAVEN TOOK THE FOOD offered him and nodded his thanks to Dyenen’s wife. She was an old woman, her back humped, her vision dimmed by the white caul that covers the eyes of the very old.

  “My traders call you Saghani,” Dyenen said, speaking in the River People language.

  Though the words were polite, Raven could feel the old man’s uneasiness. Dyenen sat with his back rigid, his right hand caressing the bulge of his sleeve knife.

  What child did not know the stories of times long ago when River and Walrus People were one? What child had not heard the stories of the anger, the killing that had driven them apart, one tribe following the rivers, the other finding a place on the shores of the North Sea? But why let the anger of men long dead destroy the living? So Raven pretended not to notice the old man’s nervousness.

  Even with the anger that divided them, River and Walrus had always been traders, setting aside their battles to visit one another’s villages and exchange goods. Raven himself had made trading trips to the River People, so he understood most of Dyenen’s words, but he turned toward White Fox and waited for the man’s translation. It was best if Dyenen did not know that Raven understood.

  What did the storytellers say? Knowledge hidden is a strong man’s power.

  White Fox repeated Dyenen’s words, and Raven nodded his head slowly, and slowly said, “Saghani s’uze’ dilaen.” Saghani—Raven. Yes, it was his name, yet he would not limit its power only to a name. Long ago, in his vision quest, he had become raven. He had flown; he had looked down on the earth, had seen the smallness of the men beneath him. What man, after seeing such a thing, could be the same?

  The shaman laughed, shook his head, and looked at the other River hunters gathered in the lodge. They, too, laughed, raised hands with fingers spread to show their approval that Raven would attempt to speak their language.

  The shaman’s wife, reaching out to ladle more food into bowls, turned her head to laugh with foul-smelling breath into Raven’s face. Raven forced himself to smile at her. Then to push her away, he thrust his still-full bowl toward her and said, “Good!”

  White Fox repeated his word in the River People’s language: “Ugheli.”

  “Ugheli!” Raven shouted out, which again brought a roar of approval from the River hunters. But the shaman narrowed his eyes, and Raven saw that quick moment of doubt, so reached over and slapped the back of his hand against White Fox’s arm, pointed with his chin toward a River hunter who was speaking, then leaned close to get White Fox’s translation of the man’s words. They were nothing important, those words, only an inquiry as to which hunter had provided the meat the shaman’s wife served, but Raven nodded his head, lowered his eyes as he listened to White Fox’s words, as though there was some importance in what the man said.

  The old shaman moved his eyes quickly toward the River man and back again with some satisfaction toward Raven.

  Enough, then, Raven told himself. No other River words will come out of my mouth until I decide Dyenen must know I speak his language. The old man has used his years well. Wisdom guides his eyes. Raven pulled a necklace of wolf teeth from around his neck and handed it to the shaman.

  “Dyenen, in honor of your wisdom,” Raven said. He did not wait for White Fox to translate, but instead stood and removed a string of shell beads from his neck. He left the circle of men who sat around the fire coals at the center of the lodge, and, careful to walk behind each man so as not to give insult, went to Dyenen’s wife. The old woman was standing at the back of the caribou skin lodge, near the door, so that she could go quickly to the outside cooking hearth for more food. Raven draped the necklace over the old woman’s head. She showed no surprise, only reached up to stroke the necklace with one crooked finger. Raven tried to look into her face, to see something that would give him an idea of her place in this village. Was her advice eagerly sought or taken lightly? Did the hunters treat her with honor or with tolerance? But the cauls of her eyes did not let him see into her soul, and so he earned nothing with his gift, except perhaps an extra bowl of meat.

  He turned and went back to his place beside the River People shaman. He picked up his bowl and began to eat, catching snatches of conversations between the hunters. Though he understood much of their language, they spoke too quickly for him to understand everything. Besides, the thin walls of the caribou skin lodge seemed to let words escape outside into the wind, where they tumbled like willow leaves in a storm. As though hearing his thoughts, the wind suddenly increased, pushing in one side of the lodge wall and forcing the fire’s smoke from the roof hole at the top of the lodge back into the faces of the hunters.

  The River People men did not seem to notice, but Raven’s eyes met those of White Fox and Bird Sings, each man pulling himself more tightly into the warmth of his fur seal parka. How could the River People live in such flimsy lodges? Raven wondered. They were nothing more than a double thickness of caribou skin stretched up into a dome over bent willow and held to the ground with sharpened sticks and a circle of river rocks. Raven longed for the sturdy earthen walls of his own lodge, the sweet thin smoke that rose from his oil lamps, so much better than the thick, throat-clogging smoke from the wood burned in every River People lodge.

  One of the River People hunters waved the smoke away from his eyes and laughed, saying loudly, “Spring wind. It is good to get away from the dark winter lodges, no?”

  Other hunters laughed their agreement, and though Raven almost joined their laughter, he remembered to look at White Fox for a translation. When White Fox had finished, Raven, too, laughed and tried to think of some compliment to give the River People’s spring lodges. He thought of one good thing, something he enjoyed in spite of smoke and cold—the brightness of the skin walls. So he raised his voice above the din of the River hunters and said, “What Walrus hunter does not appreciate the brightness of a River man’s spring tent?”

  White Fox leaned against him and said in a quiet voice, “The tents belong to the women.”

  “Tell them what I said,” Raven answered.

  “It is an insult,” White Fox whispered. “You are asking me to call these hunters women.”

  “Tell them what I said,” Raven told White Fox.

  “Insult them?”

  “No, explain. Tell them what I want to say, and what I said instead.”

  White Fox spoke to Dyenen, his words slow, deliberate. As White Fox spoke, Dyenen’s face first darkened, then he began to laugh. He nodded his head and laughed again as White Fox finished his explanation.

  “Good,” Raven said quietly to White Fox, then widened his eyes and shrugged his shoulders, allowing himself to smile as Dyenen, in turn, explained to all the men what Raven had said. The men, too, laughed, then laughed again when White Fox explained that the Walrus men owned their lodges.

  Raven watched Dyenen from the corners of his eyes. There was no trace of caution, no shadow of worry in the old man’s face. Good, Raven thought. Let him think his power puts him beyond my reach. Let him laugh. Let him think I am a fool. What ma
n hesitates to trade with a fool?

  CHAPTER 42

  RAVEN WALKED THE LENGTH of the trade goods White Fox and Bird Sings had laid out. The skies were clear, promising no rain, so they had displayed their goods outside on a ridge of ground that rose at the back of the village. Raven reached into one of the grass bags and took out a strip of dried meat. The rich heavy taste filled his mouth and nose, but he was no fool; walrus meat was too strong for the River People. Even their hunters were raised on the soft flesh of fish, the fine-grained meat of caribou. White Fox had protested at the bags of walrus meat Raven insisted they bring, the man saying, “They will not eat it. You know most River men do not like the taste.”

  Raven had laughed. “All the better for us,” he had said. “If they wanted it for food, we would have to sell it bag by bag, traded in equal measure for fish or caribou meat. Now we can sell it piece by piece as medicine for power, something to be ground up and taken with water or eaten in small amounts before a vision fast.”

  White Fox had smiled and Raven had laughed, but now that assurance seemed to have left him, and Raven felt as he did before every trading session. He held his body taut against the doubt that churned his belly and made the edges of his head throb. He reminded himself that each trading began this way, with Raven’s eyes newly open to flaws, as though he were seeing the trade goods for the first time, the seal fur pelts that could be thicker, the baskets that could be more evenly woven, the wooden bowls too thick or too thin, the edges of the dried meat—were they beginning to show the white powder of mold? So he looked away, told himself all things were good, better than what these River People had to offer, these men whose breath and clothes and skin stank of fish.

  He saw the first group of men coming, and suddenly the uneasiness was gone, and he was again Raven, shaman, able to read men’s thoughts through their eyes, to know their hearts by the sets of their mouths, to understand their wants by the tightening of their fingers.

  He stood up and stretched his arms out toward them, smiled, and stepped up on a small rise of ground he had found before Ice Hunter’s sons had spread out the trade goods, a hillock so small that few people would notice it, but something that gave him more height. Though it seemed a foolish thing, Raven had found that the man whose eyes were highest often had the advantage in trading.

  Most of the River men brought dried fish to trade. Fools, Raven thought, though he was careful to keep a smile on his face. What did he need with fish? He already had enough for the journey home. While here they would eat from Dyenen’s caches. Why worry about providing food for themselves?

  The last of the River men had a girl with him, his hand tight around her upper arm. She was young, but with the curves of a woman. This time Raven turned away, sure his face would show his displeasure. A daughter traded for a night of favors by a father wanting furs or spearpoints was often worth less than nothing. In a man’s bed, the girl would either be like someone dead, or she would fight, kick, gouge. Either way, the brief moment of release was not worth the struggle.

  Then Raven asked himself why he should care. He was not here to trade the goods laid out before the River People. That was for White Fox and Bird Sings to do. His trading would be with Dyenen, and for something far more precious than those things brought in by a hunter or made by the hands of a woman. What Raven wanted in trade, he would give anything to get—anything except his life. But that was something Dyenen could never know.

  Until Dyenen came, Raven would watch, would see what the River People seemed to favor. Already, White Fox had approached the father and daughter. The father pointed toward a pile of obsidian, then picked up a small piece, no larger than a man’s thumb. He pulled the girl toward White Fox, spoke to him, but White Fox shook his head. Again the father spoke, moving close to look into White Fox’s eyes, but White Fox backed away, again shook his head. Raven held his smile in his cheek as the father reached beneath his caribou skin parka and pulled out a fistful of bear claws. White Fox held up both hands, and the man, still gripping his daughter’s arm, again reached into his parka and this time brought out a medicine bag, made from the skin of a flicker.

  Raven drew in his breath. What man did not know the powers of the flicker, a small bird never seen on the Walrus beaches? White Fox smiled and began bargaining. His words, spoken in the River People’s language, were just loud enough for Raven to hear as he dickered for more nights with the daughter.

  Finally the deal was made. Three nights, the first tomorrow. The daughter stood with head down, lips pursed, but as the two turned to leave, White Fox called out to them, stopped the girl with a hand on her shoulder, and as she stood, face averted, White Fox slipped a shell bead necklace over her head. The girl looked at him, made a quick murmur of surprise.

  With a gesture of impatience, the father reached for the necklace, shaking his head at White Fox, but the girl clutched the beads with both hands. White Fox said a few words so that soon both father and daughter were smiling, both laughing. And Raven, too, laughed his admiration for White Fox’s trade. For a necklace of shells White Fox had bought himself three nights’ pleasure, and who could say? Perhaps more would come after that, for nothing more than a few words of praise for the girl’s comely face and young body.

  Near evening, as White Fox and Bird Sings were gathering trade goods into bundles, Dyenen came. Raven called to the men, told them to roll out the skins, display the trade goods again, but when Dyenen saw the traders begin to unroll their packs, he gestured for them to stop.

  “I will come tomorrow,” he said in the River language, and White Fox called up to Raven: “He says he will return tomorrow.”

  “Good!” Raven called. He patted the basket of Kiin’s carvings he kept hidden under his birdskin cloak.

  Dyenen walked slowly up to stand beside Raven, the two saying nothing as Bird Sings and White Fox worked. When all was packed away, Dyenen left, and Raven, Bird Sings, and White Fox returned to the lodge given them for their stay with the River People.

  Three River People women were there waiting with Bird Sings’ wife, with food and bedding laid out. Dyenen left them alone, and the women brought bowl after bowl of fish, meat, and roots, until they could eat no more. Bird Sings’ wife then settled herself close beside her husband, looking up at the River women with hardness in her eyes. The River women went to stand between White Fox and Raven, their lips curled in smiles, eyes boldly darting to the faces of both men.

  “Do we choose?” White Fox asked.

  “Ask them if they can stay,” said Raven.

  White Fox asked, and the women giggled, nodded their heads. One met Raven’s eyes. He smiled and, remembering White Fox’s lesson, reached beneath his parka, took out a necklace of long birdbone beads. As the woman clasped the necklace, Raven grabbed her wrists and pulled her over to the mound of furs that was his bed. Then, turning his back on the others in the lodge, he pulled off her leggings and rolled her over to lie beneath him.

  CHAPTER 43

  DYENEN CAME THE NEXT MORNING—early, even before White Fox and Bird Sings had unrolled the sealskin packs, even before the women had gathered at the outside cooking hearths.

  In the early sunlight, the man looked older, weaker than he had the evening before. The long edge of his nose was sharp, almost as if some stone knapper had honed it. His eyes were set deep into his face, with lids that looked as thick and heavy as the curtains that hang over sleeping place doors. He was a tall man, though not as tall as Raven, and wore a stiff robe of long brown fur, something musty with age.

  In bold familiarity, Raven reached out and touched the fur. He was surprised by its softness.

  “Musk ox,” the old man said, and at his words White Fox called out the same words, the animal carrying the same name in both languages, a name that did not sound like either a River People or a Walrus word but something spoken by others, perhaps those hairy men with tails that storytellers said lived at the edge of the world.

  White Fox came to stand besid
e Raven and Dyenen. Directing his words to White Fox, Dyenen said, “Tell your shaman that I have come to trade. Tell him that I have furs, caribou parkas, and the best fish spears, even a few flint spearheads made by the men who live along river flats far to the south.”

  Raven pretended to listen to White Fox as the man translated, then held his hand out toward the bundles of trade goods Bird Sings was unrolling. “Much was traded yesterday,” Raven said, “but we have some things left. Pelts, seal oil, dried walrus meat. We have necklaces and feathers from seabirds, shells and obsidian. All these things we will trade for your pelts and spearpoints.”

  White Fox repeated Raven’s words, and Dyenen grunted back an answer, then waited until Bird Sings had finished arranging the trade goods. The old man spent a long time looking at everything. Now and again he would turn to Bird Sings and ask a question, and Bird Sings would answer. Raven did not watch, but instead squatted down on his haunches. He drew a handful of dried fish from inside his parka sleeve and began to eat.

  When Dyenen had finished looking, he came back to Raven, squatted beside the man. Raven handed him a piece of fish, and both men, saying nothing, ate. Finally, Raven stood. Dyenen, licking his fingers, slowly straightened to stand beside him.

  “Your women make good meat,” Raven said, and waited while White Fox translated his words.

  Dyenen nodded. “It is better when warmed over a flame.”

  Yes, Raven thought as White Fox repeated Dyenen’s words. He had seen the River People hold the skin side of a dried fish over the fire, waiting until the skin wrinkled and writhed in the heat. He had tried it himself and found it to be good. The flame seemed to bring out the oil in the fish and to soften the flesh. But who had time to build a fire or wait for the women to bring the cooking hearth coals to life? When a man was hungry, he should eat. That was the way of the Walrus People.

  “So,” began Dyenen, “a man might see things that would be useful. A man might have something to trade for those things.”