by Sue Harrison
“He is a problem we do not need,” Chakliux said. “Did she see any other Near River hunters?”
“No.”
“Perhaps they have tired of the boy’s foolish ways and made him leave the village. Or perhaps the Near Rivers think their victory has given them the right to hunt our river.”
Chakliux tilted his head to look up at the sky. If the Near River hunters planned to take their caribou, then there was little hope the Cousin People would survive the winter. Perhaps by luck they could move quickly enough to find another herd, but that was unlikely. They could not even be sure the caribou would come to them here, though the animals had crossed within a half day’s walk of this place as long as Chakliux could remember. Perhaps the Near Rivers knew this also. The Cousin women they had taken as slaves and wives might have told them how to hunt at a river crossing.
K’os lived with the Near Rivers now. A woman who would kill her own grandson would have no trouble betraying her people if it meant her belly would be full. And how could they hope to fight the Near Rivers with only five healthy men in the Cousin River camp?
“Go back and tell your father,” Chakliux told Cries-loud. “Eat and sleep. Then, if the caribou have not yet come, return to the tree.”
He watched until Cries-loud was safely across the river, then walked with Ghaden toward the dark shadows of the spruce tree ridge.
Chapter Twenty
YAA HEARD SOMEONE CLIMBING and was surprised that Cries-loud had returned so quickly. When Chakliux popped up beside her in the tree, she gasped.
“I brought Ghaden to watch so you could go back to camp and get some sleep,” he said.
When Chakliux said Ghaden’s name, Yaa nearly spoke out loud, and remembered just as she opened her mouth that she was supposed to whisper. “He’s not hurt?”
“He is fine, but I don’t want to leave him here watching overnight. Go back and sleep, then return before the sun sets. I will stay with him. Go down and tell him to climb up, but first, where is this Near River hunter Cries-loud told us about?”
Yaa pointed with her chin toward River Ice Dancer. He was close enough now that she could make out several spears slung over his shoulder.
“You are sure it is River Ice Dancer?” Chakliux asked.
“Look,” Yaa whispered. “See how he walks with his head up like that? See the way he moves his arms?”
“He’s alone?” Chakliux asked.
Yaa nodded.
“Go down and send Ghaden up.”
She untied herself and fastened her pack to her back. When she was nearly to the ground, she saw Ghaden. Tears spilled from her eyes, and she knew he would be disgusted with her. She shimmied down the trunk, turning her face away until her feet were on the ground and she could rub her cheeks dry with the heels of her hands. Then she pointed up, but said nothing.
Ghaden looked pale, though his eyes were clear.
“Cries-loud told us about River Ice Dancer,” he said to her.
Yaa leaned close to whisper, “Go up and see what you think.”
“You’re going to the camp?”
“To sleep. I’ll return tonight if the caribou have not come.”
She boosted him to the first limbs, and when he caught hold, released her grip. He looked down, gave her a grin, then was gone, hidden by the thick branches of the tree.
Sok left camp as soon as Cries-loud told him about River Ice Dancer. He did not bother to take a pack, only picked up his spear and ran to the river. He waded across and began calling when he reached the second ridge. He pushed through the alder brush that edged the growth of spruce, then heard Chakliux’s voice. He followed it to the tree where Chakliux and Ghaden were watching.
Sok climbed up, took several deep breaths before he could get out his questions. “You’re sure it’s River Ice Dancer? Are there others?”
Ghaden extended his arm to point. “There. Look.”
Sok watched for a time, then said, “Yes, it’s him.”
“I haven’t seen any others,” Chakliux said. “You think he’s a scout?”
“Ghaden, did he own a dog?” Sok asked.
“A big black one,” Ghaden answered. “Mean.”
“He would have his dog if he was on a trading trip, and his pack would be larger.”
They watched as River Ice Dancer topped a treeless ridge, looked for a time toward the river, then broke into an easy lope, returning the way he had come.
“They sent him to find the river,” Chakliux said.
Sok patted the knife bound to his left arm. “They’ll have a fight if they think they can take our camp and hunt our caribou.”
Chakliux tried to clear his mind of the images that came to him. Men dying. Women weeping over the dead. The acrid smell of lodges burning. But the destruction had been greater than that. When it came time for the warriors to find their places in the spirit world, what would they do? For surely their souls were maimed by their hatred.
At dusk, Yaa and Cries-loud returned. Yaa climbed to her perch in the tree, whispered greetings to Chakliux and Ghaden, and watched as they climbed down. Though she had slept most of the afternoon, she still found it difficult to stay awake once the sun set. Her eyes kept closing until finally she bit the insides of her cheeks, used the taste of her own blood to keep away the dreams that crowded themselves under her eyelids.
The moon had not yet risen, and the stars seemed dim. It is the worst part of the night, she told herself, and thought of the caribou that would come, the days the women would spend cutting meat from the bones, slicing it thin to dry in smoky fires, eating some raw, still warm and rich with blood.
Perhaps, since she had been one of the watchers, Chakliux would allow her to have a few caribou teeth for a necklace. She thought of the warm parkas the women would make from the hides, the boot uppers from the leg skins. She made herself name the Cousin boys who had gone out to search for caribou—Squirrel, Caribou Tail and Black Stick—and wondered if River Ice Dancer was doing the same for the Near River People.
She knew that Chakliux was concerned to see River Ice Dancer near the Cousin hunting camp, but perhaps he had come on his own. He was like that. He did what he wanted and would not take the blame if his choices caused problems. Besides, why would the Near Rivers hunt caribou at a river crossing? They had never hunted rivers before.
Yaa hoped River Ice Dancer had not been kicked out of the Near River Village. If he had been, he would probably come to them, ask to join the Cousin People. How could they refuse him? He was strong, and they needed more hunters.
She would tell them not to take him in—perhaps Chakliux would listen to her, and certainly Sok knew what a problem River Ice Dancer could be.
A sound interrupted her thoughts. It was not caribou, but rather a wind combing the branches of her tree. The needles whispered, spoke to her in riddles:
Listen. What do you hear?
Then she heard the thunder of hooves, not in her ears but through her hands as she gripped the tree. Their walking was a pulse, as though she felt the earth’s heart beating.
The moon had risen and was a large yellow circle at the edge of the sky, still not high enough to give much light. But even so she saw the caribou, the white of their necks, the wide stripes that glazed their sides. They were a river, flowing light and dark over the tundra, and she heard their song: the clatter of antlers and leg joints, as though they were dancers, keeping rhythm to sacred chants.
Yaa pursed her lips and made a long, clear whistle. She smiled when she heard Cries-loud call out: “Caribou! Caribou! Caribou!”
Chapter Twenty-one
CHAKLIUX FIRST FELT THE tremor of the earth in his otter foot, and then he heard Cries-loud calling as the boy ran into camp.
“Caribou! Caribou coming! Caribou!”
“Where?” Chakliux asked, and heard his question echoed by Sok and Night Man and several of the women.
“West, they are coming from the west and are turning south. Some have already begun to
swim.”
Then the hunters were running, each of them grabbing spears and lances and heading upriver, telling the women to gather at that place downriver where the water was shallow and the river wide, the current slow.
The women also were running, slinging ropes over their shoulders and grabbing packs filled with butchering knives and burins.
In the moonlight, Chakliux could see the caribou were a mixed herd led by a large cow, a calf at her side. They swam with heads and chests high in the water, their short tails held straight up. That first cow and her calf were allowed to go through, to feel no spear. For if they killed the leader, how would the caribou know where to come the next year? Who would take them to the Cousin People’s camp?
But other cows followed her, then the bulls. The hunters stood on the banks, a few venturing into shallow water. Chakliux’s first animal was a cow. She was old, with one broken antler. Chakliux’s spear—thrust at her exposed back—severed her spine, and her hollow-haired hide kept her afloat as the current took her downriver to where the women waited.
The caribou that gained the opposite shore did not look back, but scrambled up the bank and went on, as though nothing were happening, as though this river were like every other river they crossed.
Chakliux’s second caribou was a young bull, good for meat and hide. The animal, in avoiding one of the other hunters, struck out swimming toward Chakliux. Chakliux stood still, held his spear ready to thrust. When the bull saw him, its eyes rolled white and it began to turn, offering Chakliux an easy strike to the spine at the base of the neck. The hit was solid, but Chakliux’s spear point wedged between two vertebrae. He pulled hard against the birch shaft, lost his balance and slipped into the river. The current pushed him into the caribou carcasses that were now floating downstream, but then his otter foot found a submerged log, caught and held until Chakliux could regain his footing. He waded into the shallows, pulled another spear from those he had slung on his back, and waited to make another kill.
During the crossing he took three handfuls of cows, several calves and two young bulls before the large bulls passed him. Their hides, scarred from years of fighting, were good mostly for tents and lodge skins. They were close to the rut, and their need for cows would sour their meat. Chakliux killed only two, then the herd was past. It had been a good hunt, with no one hurt and many caribou taken.
Then suddenly Sok was laughing, clapping his hands to his knees, then the others, too, laughed, and though Chakliux knew their laughter showed their joy, as Dzuuggi, he realized that they must also show their gratitude. He lifted his voice in an ancient song of praise known to men in both Cousin and Near River Villages.
The hunters joined him: Sky Watcher, whose spear hand was wrapped and dripped blood; Cries-loud, now after this hunt a man rather than boy. Sok, Night Man, Take More and Man Laughing, each hunter with his own story to tell.
Sky Watcher had dragged the first cow taken ashore, and now they beckoned Chakliux forward. He praised the caribou for its meat, then helped Take More remove the heart and liver, give out equal portions.
As the hunters ate, their boasting words left them, and they gave honor in silence. Chakliux took his share, and as the blood soaked into his hands, the meat, warm in his mouth, lifted the cold and weariness of the hunt from his body.
Aqamdax waited with the women, downriver from the crossing and the camp. They had chosen a wide section of sandbars where the current slowed, women standing on each bank. She stayed close to Star, so she could be sure the woman did not do anything foolish. Yaa had not yet joined them, and Aqamdax knew Sok had told her to remain in the watcher’s tree until the caribou had passed. It was good she was taking so long, Aqamdax thought. That meant a large herd, not just a few animals straggling at the edge of a group passing a half day’s walk to the east or west.
“The best thing about caribou is they float,” Twisted Stalk explained to Aqamdax, the old woman chewing at her words as though she were eating while she talked. “That is something to think about since this is your first hunt.”
Twisted Stalk took a scrap of haired caribou hide to the edge of the river and threw it out into the current. It bobbed along at the surface until the water swept it out of their sight.
“They are land animals, you see,” Twisted Stalk said. “When they are in the river, the water spirits want them out. They bring too much smell of grass and earth with them, so the river floats them up and keeps them high. That way they can see their way to land.”
Then several women called out. Aqamdax saw what they saw, the carcasses of caribou floating down to them, their blood coloring the water. Most of the animals were cows. Aqamdax watched as Hollow Cup and Twisted Stalk waded out into the waist-deep river, wrapped a rope around a cow’s spindly antlers, then pulled her to land. Then other women on that side of the river helped them until they had heaved the carcass away from the grip of the water.
Star grabbed Aqamdax’s arm, and Aqamdax saw a caribou coming toward them. They each caught an antler and between them pulled the animal to shore. Aqamdax heard Twisted Stalk call to her. Another caribou was floating down their side of the river, and one after that. Aqamdax took the first, and she felt the river lift her from her feet as she caught the animal. It was a large bull, full-necked, the dark portions of its fur nearly black in the moonlight. As she dragged it toward the shore, she saw that other women were wading into the water, then she looked back to see that the river was full of caribou, floating like a raft that stretched bank to bank.
Already she was tired, cold from the river, but still her heart lifted, and she felt like singing. With so much meat, they would have an easier winter. What had Chakliux told her? Fifty caribou for each hunter during a year, some taken in spring hunts, others in the fall, in order to have enough for food and lodges, clothing and oil.
She dragged her caribou ashore and went out for another, choosing to go to the middle of the river, since she was young and strong. And with each caribou she caught, the song of thanksgiving grew in her heart. And with that another song: Wife to Chakliux! Wife to Chakliux!
Yaa watched until the last of the caribou had passed the ridge, then she waited a little while longer. She did not want to curse anyone’s hunting luck or drive the caribou back the way they had come, but finally she untied herself from the tree and took one last look.
It was dawn now, the sun working its way up the sky. Yaa grasped the limb she was sitting on and hoisted herself down, then she saw something move out on the tundra. She sighed. Probably a few more caribou straggling in the wake of the main herd. She boosted herself back to her perch. She was tired of the tree and wanted to be a part of the excitement of the butchering, but if more caribou were coming, she would wait as Sok had told her.
She lifted a hand to shield her eyes, squinted, then realized they were not caribou but hunters. A group of three coming from the northwest. Near River? What was he doing out there? Once the Cousin People had killed the caribou did the Near Rivers plan to come in and steal the meat?
That would not be good. The Near Rivers knew this place was claimed by the Cousin People. Forever the caribou had crossed this river, sometimes in large herds, sometimes only a few, but they had always crossed, and the Cousin People had always hunted them here. At least that was what Star had told her. Would there be more fighting?
She pressed her cheek against the tree trunk. The cool pungent smell of black spruce calmed her, but she could still hear her own breath, harsh in her throat, as if she had been running. Finally she heard faint cries and she could see that the hunters had raised their spears toward the ridge, toward the tall trees at the center of that ridge. Did they know she was here? How could they?
Then Yaa realized that they were too small to be River hunters. They were boys, and the middle one walked with a limp. Hadn’t Squirrel twisted his ankle only a few days before they left camp? And there was his brother Black Stick beside him.
Because she was a girl, Sok had not been able
to tell her the signals watchers used. But she had listened back in the camp, though she pretended to be busy with women things, each time he taught Ghaden.
She closed her eyes and thought for a moment, trying to remember the sign for caribou. A stick or spear raised to the sky three times. Yes. She watched, and her eyes ached with the intensity of trying to see something so distant.
Then she was sure she saw the sign, sure each boy was waving a stick, slinging it three times toward the sky. But what should she do? There was no one with her to carry the news, and the boys were still a long way off. Besides, when they came to camp they would find it empty, and how would they know which way the people had gone?
She climbed down the tree and ran toward the river.
Star, the only woman not bent over a caribou carcass, was the first to see Yaa. Star lifted her voice in a wail so much like a mourning cry that it startled the others.
“What?” Aqamdax said, and Star pointed toward Yaa.
“Yaa! You are all right?” Aqamdax yelled.
“The boys!” Yaa called. “The boys! Squirrel! Black Stick! Caribou Tail!” Her words were broken by her breathlessness, and Aqamdax could tell she had run a long way.
Aqamdax went out to meet her, clasped her shoulders and said, “Don’t try to talk. Take a long breath. Take another. There. Now what has happened?”
“I was…I was in the tree…waiting like Chakliux told me to…then I saw Squirrel and Black Stick and Caribou Tail…. They gave the signal for caribou. They were so far away and Cries-loud had already left to help the men, so I came myself and…”
“Caribou? She said caribou are coming? More caribou?” It was Twisted Stalk, and soon the other women were also crowded close.
“We need to tell Chakliux,” Star said, and for once Aqamdax agreed with her.
“Should Yaa go?” Bird Caller asked.
“She is the only one among us who is old enough to go alone and yet has not known moon blood.”
“There will be a curse,” Star cried.
“Do not speak of curses,” Twisted Stalk said. She looked at the other women, then back at the dead caribou they had taken from the river. “Does anyone have a hide off yet?”
