The Storyteller Trilogy

by Sue Harrison

  Ghaden looked down at his sister, then slowly up at Cen. “She is asleep?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “I need Biter.”

  “Who is Biter?”

  “My dog. He is at Brown Water’s lodge. I need him.”

  “We will have to get him later,” Cen said.

  Ghaden’s face crinkled so that Cen thought the boy might cry, but he stuck his thumb into his mouth and closed his eyes.

  Cen shifted him into one arm and started deeper into the trees. They could not risk walking the river paths by day, but had marked a trail through the woods, bending stems of grass, chipping out small chunks of bark, signs that would not be noticed unless someone was watching for them.

  The weight of the boy in his arms brought a sudden joy, and Cen did not allow himself to think of the girl he had left lying on the ground. Finally Tikaani caught up to him, the First Men woman slung over one shoulder, her pack over the other.

  They walked a long time without stopping, but eventually Tikaani groaned, crouched and let the woman fall forward to the ground.

  Cen set Ghaden down, straightened his arm to relieve the cramps in his muscles. Ghaden knelt beside Aqamdax, laid his face against hers and clasped a handful of her hair. Cen shook his head. She looked so much like Daes. Somehow she had discovered where he had taken her mother, had come to this village. He wondered if he could persuade her to go with him. She could take care of Ghaden, help carry his packs. He had once thought a wife would be a hindrance, but since Daes had died, he had thought of little else but having a wife. He knelt beside her, placed a hand against her neck, felt her pulse strong under his fingers.

  “What did you do to her?” he asked Tikaani.

  “Better to ask what she did to me.” Dried blood marked four cuts that ran from his forehead to his chin. He held out one hand and Cen saw a line of tooth marks. “I hit her.” He leaned forward and pointed to a bruise that darkened Aqamdax’s jaw. “There.” He raised his hand to his mouth. He sucked, spat out a mouthful of blood, then said, “Tie her now.”

  “She will remember me,” Cen said. “She will not fight.” But he raised her sax and took the woman’s knife from the packet she had tied at her waist, then patted her sleeves to see if she had knives sheathed there.

  “You watch her. I’m going to eat, then sleep. It will be easier if we do not take her.”

  “And do what instead?”

  “Kill her, or tie her and leave her here.”

  “She will not live long if we tie her.”

  “She does not deserve to live long.”

  “So you would not fight if someone took you and your brother? It is right if you seek revenge, but not if she does?”

  Tikaani muttered something under his breath, then stalked to a mossy rise under a tree and sat down. He opened the pack the First Men woman had been carrying and found a sael of dried fish. He threw a piece to Cen. “A heavy pack for a woman to carry,” he said through a mouthful of fish. “Lots of food in here.”

  “She was leaving,” Ghaden said, his voice small. “She was going home. She said I could come see her when I was a trader.”

  “Come here, Ghaden,” Cen said.

  The boy stayed beside the woman for a moment, but when Cen held out his arms, he came. Cen pulled him into his lap and gave him part of his fish.

  “When can we go get Biter?” Ghaden asked.

  “His dog,” Cen explained to Tikaani.

  The man smirked, then bent his head over Aqamdax’s pack, pulled out more supplies.

  “Not today,” Cen said.

  “I told Yaa we should bring him, but she said he was too noisy. Someone would hear him. Is Yaa awake yet?”

  “The little girl, her name is Yaa?” Cen asked.

  “Yes.”

  “She is awake now.”

  “Brown Water will be mad.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I am not home. I have work to do.”

  “Let her be mad. You are with me, and I am not mad.”

  “She might not feed Biter.”

  “Yaa will feed Biter.”

  “Yaa will?”

  “Yaa will.”

  Ghaden put his thumb into his mouth and leaned back against Cen. “Make Aqamdax wake up,” he said. “I think it is better if she sleeps.”

  Grasses were trampled. There was blood. The broken strand of a necklace. Chakliux picked it up and recognized it as Aqamdax’s. His heart began to hammer, thick, hard beats that echoed in his throat. What had happened here? Had she and Sok had a fight? Would his brother hurt her, perhaps kill her? He was a man to act in anger, without thought to consequences. Chakliux picked up the remaining beads and began to search the area, walking the path almost up to the women’s place, and then down into the village. There were footprints, some large enough to belong to a man, but it was a path worn hard by women, and it was impossible to see any clear track.

  He went to Red Leaf’s lodge, found Sok there, staring into the flames of the hearth fire.

  “Where is Aqamdax?” Chakliux demanded.

  “How should I know? I threw her away.”

  “You did nothing to her?”

  “What?”

  “Where was she the last time you saw her?”

  “In her lodge. I told you I threw her away. She is probably there now.”

  “After that, where did you go?”

  “Chakliux, what has happened?”

  “Where were you?”

  “I went to find Snow-in-her-hair. I was with her and with Red Leaf all day. Ask them.”

  Chakliux left the lodge. How could he know if his brother was telling the truth? How could he trust anyone in this Near River Village? Perhaps his own people were right. Would good people allow men like Fox Barking and Sleeps Long to remain in their village? But then he thought of Blue-head Duck and Tsaani. Of Camp Maker and Dog Trainer. All good men. Even Wolf-and-Raven was a good man, though weak.

  Among the Cousin River People were there not good and bad as well? Why judge a whole village by one or two?

  He would go back to the path where he had found the necklace. He ducked into Aqamdax’s lodge as he passed. It was still empty. Though he did not want to, he went back through the village, stopped at Brown Water’s lodge, scratched at the entrance tunnel.

  “Yaa?” a thin voice called out.

  Brown Water shouted, “Where have you been, you and Ghaden? It is nearly dark.”

  Her head popped out of the entrance tunnel. She scowled when she saw him. “You have not found the woman?” she asked.

  “No.”

  “You’d better find her. She’s taken Ghaden and Yaa with her.”

  “She would not take your children.”

  “You know her so well? She is evil, that one. If those children are not back soon, I will send hunters after her. I will send my son and he will kill her.”

  She pulled herself back into the lodge, but as Chakliux turned away, a dog yelped, then scooted out through the entrance tunnel, tail tucked between his legs. The dog cowered when he saw Chakliux, but Chakliux knelt down, extended a hand for the dog to smell. He had seen the animal before, always at Ghaden’s side. It had long gangly legs, and the chest was still narrow, but it had already grown to a good size. What had the boy named him? A strange name for a dog.

  Biter. That was it. He had heard people say that when the dog hunted, he brought his kill back to the boy. Whoever heard of a dog doing such a thing?

  “Biter,” Chakliux called softly. “Biter. Will you help me find Ghaden?”

  Chakliux had to coax the dog away from Brown Water’s lodge, but finally he followed. “Good boy. We will find Ghaden and Yaa and Aqamdax,” he told the dog, a promise he made to Biter and to himself.

  Chapter Thirty-six

  AT FIRST GHADEN DID not believe the man who carried him was Cen, the trader. Cen, the one who always had good things to give him, who always had good food. How could Cen be so old? Cen was a trader, not an el
der. How could he get white hair? How could his face be so full of wrinkles and spots?

  But when they rested, the old man opened a pack, pulled out some of the same things Ghaden had played with the last time he was in Cen’s lodge, in the trader’s tent with his first mother. He looked carefully into the old man’s face. The nose was not Cen’s nose. And there was a scar, pink and shining. Cen had not had a scar. But the eyes, they looked like Cen’s eyes, and the hair …

  Ghaden reached up, touched a tuft of white hair. The old man laughed, then tugged at the white hair, pulled it right out of his head and handed it to Ghaden. Ghaden did not want to touch it. It had some kind of magic in it, he was sure. Otherwise it would not have come out of the old one’s head so easily, but the man had given it to him. Like a gift. You did not throw away gifts or act like you didn’t want them. He held the hair but did not close his fingers over it.

  The old man laughed, reached out to rub the hair between his thumb and fingers. “Look,” he said. “It is caribou hair. See?”

  Ghaden leaned down, looked closely, rubbed the hair as the old man had. It was caribou. He had heard stories of men who became animals, and animals who became men. “You are caribou?” he asked softly.

  The old man laughed. “No,” he said. “I told you I am Cen, your father, Cen.”

  His father? No, his father was dead. He had died while Ghaden stayed in the shaman’s lodge, while he was getting over the knife wound.

  “My father died,” Ghaden said.

  “One of your fathers,” the man told him. “I am your other father. Your first father. When your mother decided to stay with the River People, you got another father.”

  Ghaden tilted his head, stared at the man. He did look a little like Cen. Just a little, and his voice was Cen’s voice. When Ghaden closed his eyes and listened, it was like Cen talking. He had Cen’s trader packs. Even the boots he wore looked like Cen’s boots, though maybe not exactly.

  “Why do you have caribou hair?” Ghaden finally asked.

  “To make me look old.”

  “Why?”

  “So I could sneak close to the village and take you to live with me.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I am your father.”

  “Brown Water will be mad.”

  “Do not worry about Brown Water. I will protect you from her. How could I let you grow up with Brown Water when I want to teach you to be a trader like me, and to hunt and to paddle a trader’s boat?”

  Ghaden stuck his thumb in his mouth, spoke around it. “I want Biter. I want my Yaa.”

  “I will get you a dog. A better dog than Biter, bigger and better.”

  Ghaden shook his head slowly. “No,” he said, then got up and went to where they had laid Aqamdax. He sat down beside her, his back turned so he could not see the old man who said he was Cen. Ghaden wound his hand into Aqamdax’s hair. He would wait for her to wake up, then they would leave these old men and go back to their own village. The next time Yaa said they couldn’t take Biter with them to the den, he wouldn’t go either.

  “Leave the woman.” A man’s voice. He spoke the River language.

  Aqamdax lay with eyes closed. She knew Ghaden was beside her, could feel his small hands stroking her head, clutching her hair. He shuddered now and again, as though he were trying to hold in tears.

  “I will not leave her,” another man said. Though his words were River, his voice held the accent of a trader, a man who spoke many languages, each leaving some bit of itself, like a stone holds the colors of the seeds and dried berries ground on it. “She was my wife’s daughter. I will not leave her.”

  Aqamdax’s eyes almost flew open at his words. His wife’s daughter? Her first thoughts were of her own father, drowned in the North Sea. Had she left the earth and gone to live in the spirit world? Then she realized her foolishness. This man was a trader. Probably the one who had brought her mother to the River Village. Perhaps Ghaden’s father.

  Slowly, she opened her eyes to narrow slits, tried to see through the fringe of her eyelashes. Yes, there were two men. They were squatting on their haunches near their packs. Her pack, too, was there. Though it was difficult to see the men clearly, they seemed to have the white hair of elders, but held their bodies erect like young hunters. Who were they? Why had they attacked her and Ghaden and Yaa?

  Yaa! Where was she? Had they killed her?

  “How will you bring her? She is too heavy to carry. She will only slow us down. They will find the other one and come after us. A good tracker will soon see the signs we left to guide us back through the trees.”

  If I lie still, Aqamdax thought, they will leave me. Then I can go for help. But they will take Ghaden, and what if our hunters cannot find them?

  She turned her head, opened her eyes and smiled at Ghaden. He smiled at her, a wide smile.

  She raised her head, clenched her teeth against the pain and sat up. The whole side of her face ached.

  “I will go with you,” she said. The words were slurred, and she raised her hand to her mouth. Her lips were swollen, crusted with blood.

  Both men looked startled. One stood, came toward her. Even in the shadows of the forest, she could see that the white in his hair had been sewn in, like embroidery, that it was … caribou hair. His face was wrinkled and dark, scarred as well, but his eyes were the eyes of a young man, his teeth white, his lips not yet thinned with age.

  “I am Cen,” he said, speaking in the First Men language. “I have no knife.” He held his hands out, fingers open, in the greeting Aqamdax had seen so often. The words, in her own language, were like a gift, but she warned herself that just because a man spoke her language did not mean he was a friend.

  “I will go with you and my brother,” she said, and reached to pull Ghaden into her lap.

  “You can walk?” the other man asked. “We cannot carry you. As soon as it is dark, we will leave.”

  “Where are you going?”

  The man squinted his eyes into slits, and Aqamdax wished she had not asked.

  “A long way,” he finally said, then spoke to the one called Cen. “You know the choice you have. If you take her, you are responsible for her.”

  “I want them both,” the man said, then went to his pack, untied a water bladder and pulled out dried fish. He thrust them at Aqamdax. “Eat and be sure your brother eats. We will not stop until morning.”

  The thought of food nauseated her, but she forced herself to take a bite, then gave the fish to Ghaden. “Eat,” she told him, and prayed he did not refuse.

  “I want Yaa. I want Biter,” he said in a small voice.

  “Ghaden, you have to eat.” He stared into her eyes, watched as she took another bite, then he, too, ate.

  How could the dog disappear? It had been with him, only a little ahead of him, then the path turned and Biter was gone.

  How does any animal disappear? he asked himself. Ground squirrels, foxes, even ptarmigan in snow? They have holes, safe places, hidden dens.

  Unlike most of the black spruce that grew at the edge of the village, the branches of those at the sides of the path grew to the ground. He lowered himself to hands and knees, pushing aside grass and branches, peering into the dark recesses under the boughs. The tree at the corner, where the path turned toward the women’s place, was the largest. Its branches were a jagged circle that extended out almost the length of a man’s body from the trunk. He lifted up the largest branch. There was another, smaller, growing under it. He lifted this branch, then caught his breath as something shot from under the tree.

  Chakliux reached for his sleeve knife, whipped the blade from the sheath before he saw that the animal was a dog. He dropped the knife before Biter, in his eagerness, could impale himself on the point.

  “Where were you?” Chakliux asked, then lifted the branch again, held it up as the dog wiggled back under the tree and into a dark hole that seemed to dip down beneath the roots.

  Chakliux followed the dog, pushing himse
lf into the hole. His shoulders stuck, the earth like hands, holding him. He kicked hard with his strong right leg, once, twice, then found himself in a den, his hair caught painfully in a tangle of tree roots. Gradually his eyes adjusted until he could see Biter and something huddled beside him.

  It moved, and he heard a small voice, Yaa’s voice: “Biter, now everyone knows where our secret place is. You bad dog.”

  Chakliux carried her as he had once carried Ghaden, but this time, Biter was at his heels, snapping at anyone who came too close. By the time they were at Brown Water’s lodge, a troop of children were behind him, the older boys asking questions, one of the girls crying. He called at the lodge entrance, then went inside. When she saw him, Happy Mouth cried out, began a high screaming lament that Brown Water stopped with a quick hand over the woman’s mouth.

  “Do not invite death,” Brown Water said, and tucked her fingertips against the girl’s neck. “She is alive.”

  Happy Mouth rolled out sleeping furs, and Chakliux laid the girl down. He held Biter away from her face as Brown Water and Happy Mouth checked her arms and legs, lifted her parka and palpitated her belly and chest, then finally ran quick hands over her head.

  “Here,” Brown Water said, her fingers probing over Yaa’s left ear.

  Happy Mouth pressed her own fingers in the same place, and Chakliux saw Yaa wince. “It hurts?” Happy Mouth asked the girl.

  “Yes,” Yaa said in a tiny voice.

  Chakliux, kneeling behind the women, felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked up to see Ligige’.

  “Best Fist came and got me,” she whispered to him. “Where did you find Yaa?”

  “Out by the women’s path there is a large spruce. Under it—”

  “I know the place,” Ligige’ said. “Do you know what happened to her?”

  “No.”

  Yaa lifted her head, struggled to see past her mother and Brown Water, her eyes seeking out Chakliux. “Ghaden?” she asked.

  “He was not there.”

  She fell back against the bedding furs, closed her eyes. “I should have … he wanted to bring Biter. They took him.”