by Sue Harrison
She was glad Red Leaf was going, but she would miss Chakliux. Even now, with him away on the bear hunt, she felt a small ache under her ribs each time she thought of him. He had taught her not only River People words, but also some of the riddles spoken in the Cousin River Village, the village where Chakliux, though he was brother to Sok, had been raised.
Aqamdax ended her story and stood up, bringing groans and sighs from the children. “Come tomorrow. There will be more stories then,” she said.
“A riddle before we go,” pleaded Yaa, a girl whose little brother sat with his face hidden against her chest each time they came.
“Look,” Aqamdax said, beginning as Chakliux had taught her, “I see something.”
“A bird,” one of the boys called out before she could finish.
“A cloud,” said Best Fist.
“A dead animal, stinking,” said River Ice Dancer, a boy Aqamdax had learned to ignore.
“It brings a feast,” said someone behind her.
Aqamdax turned at the voice, a sudden gladness in her heart. “An easy riddle,” she said, then asked, “You bring meat?”
“If the riddle is so easy, why do you ask?” said Chakliux.
He looked thinner than he had when he left, and his parka needed to be brushed, one of the sleeves was torn at the seam, but his eyes were bright and he was smiling.
“Hunters are back?” several of the children asked, then bounded off to tell the news.
“It is good my lodge is here at the edge of the village,” Aqamdax said. “I am first to learn good things.”
“You speak well, Aqamdax,” Chakliux told her. “Even in these few days I have been gone, you have learned more, though you still speak your words like First Men do.”
“I am First Men,” she said softly. “I will always be First Men. I will not change. I will learn, but I will not change. You, Otter Foot, should understand that as well as anyone.”
He smiled at her, and she looked into his eyes, found she had to look away. It was not good to have her heart quicken for Chakliux when she did not feel that way about Sok.
She turned as though to enter her lodge, but looked back over her shoulder to ask if Chakliux was hungry.
“We have spent the last day eating, honoring the animals we have taken, and tonight, I am sure, the women will prepare another feast, though only with the meat the women can touch.”
Aqamdax shook her head. There were strange taboos among these people. Some were what anyone would expect—the burial of bones, the honoring of animals. Others, such as the eating and preparation of bear meat, the use of certain birds and animals, seemed strange and senseless. But who was she to comment? She was a woman of the First Men, and Sea Hunters seldom took a bear.
“They will cook the meat at the hearths?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Are there taboos I should know?”
“Do you have a new ladle or stirring stick?”
“I can get a stirring stick,” she said.
“Good. Bring that. I told you women should not say the name of the animal?”
“Yes.”
“Remember that, and also, do not eat until Red Leaf has eaten.”
Aqamdax raised her eyebrows. “It is taboo?”
“It is a custom of politeness.”
Aqamdax felt the first stirrings of anger, like the anger she had often known when she lived with He Sings’s wives and their foolish rules.
“Perhaps I will not go. I have good food here.” She nodded toward the food cache near her lodge. It was a high platform that held a small square of logs where she kept meat and dried fish, berries saved in oil, and the few bellies of seal fat she had brought all the way from her village. “I have walrus meat, too,” she said, though Chakliux himself had been the one to give it to her.
Chakliux looked away, and she thought she saw disappointment in his eyes. No, she told herself, do not believe he cares for you. You have a husband. He has given you your own lodge. Perhaps someday you will have the good luck to bear children.
But as Chakliux walked away, he said softly, “Two of the animals are mine.”
“Perhaps I will have the honor of preparing their meat for you,” Aqamdax called after him.
THE COUSIN RIVER VILLAGE
Cen held his breath, pulled back the bowstring and loosed the arrow. It flew toward the tree, hit hard against the grass-stuffed goose skin the hunters had hung from a low branch.
Tikaani let out a shout of approval. “Soon you will be as good as any of us,” he said, but Cen knew the words were an exaggeration.
Though his first shots were usually accurate, the longer he practiced in any one day, the worse he became. Finally, his left wrist would throb so hard from the strain of holding the bow, his eyes could no longer guide the arrow to its target.
He shot again, but the arrow flew wide to the left, his wrist buckling as soon as he released the string. “Enough,” he said, and did not miss the sly smile that twisted the side of Tikaani’s face.
Why fault the man? They shared an uneasy peace, the two of them, united by their need for revenge, he for Daes, and Tikaani for two brothers who were dead and another who might as well be, one of his arms crippled, his body weakened by whatever spirit had come in through the wound to fester in sores and lumps.
They also both shared K’os’s bed. No one man could keep K’os as his own, but Cen was not sure Tikaani understood that.
Cen did not hold the same feelings for K’os that he had for Daes, but with his wrist aching, his thoughts had already strayed to K’os’s fingers kneading away his pain, layering hot wet strips of ground squirrel hide tightly over his hand and wrist, the smell of partner grass pungent in the lodge.
“You are ready to go with me,” Tikaani said.
“You are going somewhere?”
“K’os has not told you?” he asked.
She had, but Cen was wise enough to feign surprise. “Told me what?”
“That the hunters are almost ready, that they want us to go first, to scout out the best place to stand for attack. Perhaps we will be able to bring back your son.”
“When do we leave?”
“Tomorrow, early, before the sun rises,” Tikaani said.
“We will take dogs?”
“No dogs. Only hunting weapons, and if our elders ask, we tell them that we go to see if our bows will be honored by bears.”
“You think we will not break our luck by claiming something that is not true, something that might make bears think we do not respect them?”
“You believe we cannot find your son and also hunt?”
Cen thought for a moment, then said, “And perhaps trade as well.”
“Trade?”
“Life for life.”
“Life for life,” said Tikaani.
THE NEAR RIVER VILLAGE
“I will stir for you,” Yaa said, raising her voice above the chatter of the women at the cooking hearths. The sun had set and most of the people had eaten. Soon the dancing and stories would begin.
Aqamdax handed Yaa the stirring stick. “It is a new one?” Yaa asked.
“Yes.”
“You have the same custom in your village?”
“We do not take many—” She stopped, clapping a hand over her mouth before she said the word for bear.
“What do you eat?”
“Mostly fish and seal meat. Sea lion.”
“Caribou?”
“Some.”
“You can sit there.” Yaa lifted her chin toward a pile of hare fur blankets.
“Your brother?”
“He is asleep. You cannot see him?”
In the darkness, lit only by the yellow flames of the dying hearth fires, Aqamdax had missed the shadow of the boy’s head against the fur.
“He does not like me. What if he wakes up?”
“He likes you, but he is afraid. He thinks you are a ghost.”
“A ghost? Why?”
“His mo
ther died.” Yaa had lowered her voice to a whisper and Aqamdax had to lean forward to hear her. “He was hurt.”
When Aqamdax first came to the village, Chakliux had told her the story of a woman killed and a son injured, but that was before Aqamdax knew much of the River language, and she had not understood all of his words, had never been sure which boy he meant.
“So he is the one,” Aqamdax said. “But your mother …”
“Was his mother’s sister-wife.”
“Ah.”
“I am Ghaden’s mother now,” Yaa said, and her smile was that of a woman much older, a woman who speaks with pride of her son. “He thinks you are ghost because you look a little like his mother.”
“I will sit beside him, but if he wakes, come over. I do not want him to be afraid.”
Aqamdax handed Yaa the stirring stick, then crouched down with a sigh, sitting as the First Men sat, feet flat against the ground, arms clasped around raised knees. The River People wasted many furs in their preference to sit with legs crossed, padding the ground when it was wet or cold with woven hare fur blankets and mats of caribou hide. Any pelt grew weak when it became wet. Who did not know that?
She closed her eyes for a moment, wishing someone would leave so she also could go without fear of breaking taboos or showing rudeness. For all his desire to have her come to this feast, Chakliux had not spoken to her, even though he came to her cooking bag each time he wanted his bowl filled.
She looked down at the boy lying beside her. Her heart made a small jump in her chest. Each time she saw him, she felt as though she were seeing a child of her own village. He looked as if he belonged to the First Men. He had a wide face, and his nose, though humped, was small, unlike the larger noses of these River People. She remembered, though, that he had River People eyes, tilted at the corners and narrower than the eyes of her people. He was lighter of skin also. Still, looking at him, she could imagine she was home, perhaps in an ulax, celebrating with a feast and stories. She could almost hear her people’s drums, beating hard then soft, the rhythm of a heart.
Aqamdax closed her eyes. Dreams called her, and almost, she let herself follow them, but then came a scream, a hunter’s voice. Aqamdax’s eyes flew open, and she jumped to her feet only to hear the laughter of the women sitting around her. One, still laughing, leaned close to draw Aqamdax back down, to whisper that the men would now tell stories of their hunts.
Aqamdax smiled, realizing that their laughter was not done out of spite, then settled herself again beside Ghaden, the boy still asleep, and opened her eyes wide to wake herself up. Two elders came into the center of the hearth circle, the place left bare but lit by remnants of the cooking fires.
Their stories were easy for her to follow because the words were accompanied by actions, so that everyone could see the way the hunter stalked the bear; everyone could watch as he told of placing a spear in his thrower and making the kill.
Aqamdax watched carefully, trying to remember the words they used to begin and end their stories, such things having importance as tradition in a village, and perhaps also some connection to good luck and proper respect. She tried to remember their hand movements, small things she might adapt for her own storytelling, ways of placing pictures in the listeners’ minds. For what is storytelling if not ideas brought full and whole to the inner eyes of those who listen?
After the elders, two men came out, one wearing a mask that hung to his knees; its mouth was agape and studded with bear teeth. The other man was dressed as a hunter and carried weapons. Their story was told without words, only actions set to the rhythm of drums. When they had finished, Sok came out. At first he was alone, wearing no mask, carrying no weapons, the beautiful patterns of his parka and boots catching the light, bringing honor to Red Leaf’s handiwork, so that there was a murmur among the women.
Aqamdax turned her eyes to where her sister-wife sat and saw that Red Leaf’s head was held high, her face set and proud. In that moment, though Red Leaf had been a difficult woman to call sister, Aqamdax felt a thrill of pride, as though she herself were being honored. The women raised a high ululation, one rise, then a fall, and Aqamdax joined them, purposely turning her head toward Red Leaf so everyone knew she praised her sister-wife.
Red Leaf saw Aqamdax, eyes meeting eyes, and in that quick moment, Aqamdax read the woman’s surprise, then her understanding.
Sok began to dance, setting his own rhythm with the clatter of the hoof rattlers sewn at the tops of his boots. His body moved in strong, sharp swings. Aqamdax knew each step must carry some meaning, though here among the River People that would be different from what she had learned among the First Men. As he danced, she noticed that he often looked in one direction, often turned his eyes in one way. At first she thought he was watching Red Leaf, but then she realized that he looked beyond her to the place where the younger women of the village sat, and finally, by watching carefully, she saw that his eyes were on a woman named Snow-in-her-hair. Aqamdax had met her sometimes at the cooking hearths, though Snow-in-her-hair ignored her when they were the only ones at the hearths and cut her eyes rudely away if other women were near.
Aqamdax looked quickly at Red Leaf, but the woman did not seem to notice, her eyes totally on her husband, her lips moving as though she counted his steps in an effort to help him keep the rhythm. Aqamdax felt an uneasiness, a sudden weight of apprehension, then scolded herself for her foolishness. What man did not want to impress young women, especially someone as pretty as Snow-in-her-hair? But Sok had two wives. He was not a chief hunter to take three or four like He Sings, and among the River People, most men had one wife.
Finally, another masked hunter entered the dance circle. This one also wore a bear mask, though it covered only his face and was painted with bright colors. The dancer was barefoot, so it was not difficult to tell he was Chakliux. He moved gracefully, as if he had the normal feet of a man, and Aqamdax’s thoughts were so filled with his dancing that at first she did not hear the thin keening that rose from beside her. When the keening turned into a wail, she realized it was the child Ghaden. He was staring at the dancers, mouth open, eyes wide.
Aqamdax scooped him into her arms, and he looked up at her, then began to scream, “The ghost! The ghost! She is here! Yaa, don’t let her get me!”
Yaa took the sobbing child from Aqamdax, soothed him with quiet humming. Yaa’s mother and Brown Water came, moved the two children away from the dance circle and toward the comfort of Brown Water’s lodge.
Aqamdax watched them until they disappeared into the darkness, then she squatted on her haunches, gathered the boy’s blankets so she could return them when the dance was finished. For a time, the women around her whispered among themselves, but Aqamdax turned her thoughts back to Sok and Chakliux. Almost, she missed that one word, the name, spoken quietly, then hushed with a hiss of fear, covered with a charm of words and a flurry of hands to prevent a curse.
Suddenly many things became clear. Suddenly she did not feel like a daughter betrayed but like one who was loved. Then she watched her husband not in pride but in anger, saw his brother not with fondness but in loathing, and only because she did not want to disgrace Red Leaf did she stay until their dance was finished. Then she stood, and before the women could nod their heads in acknowledgment of her place as second wife, as sister-in-law, before Sok or Chakliux could look toward her expecting praise, she left, and carrying the bundle of Ghaden’s blankets, she walked to Brown Water’s lodge.
She heard Yaa’s singing through the walls of the lodge and scratched against the caribou hide covering until Brown Water called for her to come in. She crawled through the entrance tunnel.
Yaa’s eyes widened when she saw her, and she pulled her brother close, turning his head against her breast.
Choosing her words slowly, carefully, Aqamdax said to Brown Water, “I am not of your people. I do not know all taboos, but I must ask something.”
“Come with me then,” Brown Water said, and Aqamdax fo
llowed her from the lodge.
Aqamdax knew Brown Water must be a strong woman. She had kept her place of respect even after the death of her husband and now lived alone, as widow, she and her sister-wife and the two children. Strange, the ways of these River People. Among the First Men, once the mourning was complete, each woman would have gone to another hunter, at worst to a brother, to his ulax. How did they live, these women, without a hunter in their lodge?
Brown Water walked a short way from the lodge, then turned and said to Aqamdax, “What is it you want to know?”
“This sister-wife of yours, Ghaden’s mother,” Aqamdax said, “how did she die?”
Brown Water wrapped her arms around herself. “It is not a good thing to talk about,” she said.
“It breaks taboos?”
The woman would not look at Aqamdax, and instead moved her eyes to the lodge, then to the ground and up to the sky. “No one knows,” she finally said.
“She was of the First Men—the Sea Hunters,” said Aqamdax.
“Yes. You knew her?”
Aqamdax sighed. “I knew her. Someone told me there was a knife.”
Brown Water nodded. “There was a knife,” she said. “But Wolf-and-Raven says a spirit killed her.”
“With a knife?”
“Who knows what a spirit might do? Who knows what spirits she might have offended? She should not have been here.” Brown Water fastened her eyes on Aqamdax, but Aqamdax did not look away. Brown Water raised one hand, rudely pointed with one thick finger at Aqamdax’s chest. “You should not be here. It is one thing for your people to come to trade, but when hunters take wives, too many things can happen.”
“This woman had enemies?”
“I did not like her,” Brown Water said. “I did not want her in my lodge. If she had an enemy, I was that one, but I would not dishonor my husband. I did not kill her. She was killed by a spirit. It was what she deserved.”
