by Jeff Posey
“Sit and rest,” said Pók in a soft, friendly tone. “You have had a long run. Have you had water?”
The runner signed Yes, his eyes wide.
“Good,” said Pók. He indicated the boy’s headdress, a mantle of buffalo fur and eagle feathers. “Please. I know that is hot for you. Set it aside and rest yourself.”
The boy’s eyes never left Pók’s face as he removed his headgear and sat on a stone bench along the curved wall. Pók smiled, more to himself than for the benefit of the boy. He remembers his own face and clothing still had the gore of his recent kill. He must look a sight. That was good. It would make the right impression.
“Now, tell me, what do you have to report?” asked Pók.
“I am a runner for the High Priest. I report to him.” The boy’s voice pitched high.
“It’s okay. Everything is fine. You can tell The Builder. Nobody will stop you. But he’s asleep, and he doesn’t like to be wakened unless it’s very important.”
The runner stared at Pók. “I should tell The Builder first.”
“As you wish,” said Pók, sitting beside the boy. “I’ll wait with you.”
The runner cowered from Pók as he sat on the bench.
“We should wake The Builder,” said the boy.
“Go ahead,” said Pók. “We’ll take you to him.”
The runner shivered. “He must know.”
“Of course.”
The runner stared at Pók. “What happens if…?” the boy didn’t finish his question.
“What’s that?” Pók asked absent-mindedly. “What happens if he doesn’t like that you woke him? Well,” Pók smiled, “the last couple, they were tough. You runners are hard to chew. No matter how long they cook you.”
The boy began shaking. “What…what…?”
“What happens if you tell me instead? Why, nothing. I value nothing more than accurate and quick information. And The Builder never harms those who give me that information. I am, after all, chief of the Másaw Warriors.”
The boy nodded and swallowed. “Maybe you need to know more than The Builder, anyway.”
Pók nodded in unison with the boy. “Whatever you decide. I trust your judgment.”
“Seven warriors were killed in Black Stone Town yesterday,” blurted the runner. “Ihu escaped and took over my patrol that happened to be camped a half-day away. He sent me here to report, but gave no message to deliver. They should be to Black Stone by now.”
Pók took great care not to react and frighten the boy. “Seven warriors,” said Pók. “Who did it?”
“Ihu said children of the red-hat man.”
“Children!” Pók resisted the urge to stand and shout at the absurdity.
“That’s what Ihu said. That’s all I know.” The runner raised his hands, to explain or to defend himself, Pók couldn’t tell.
“Calm yourself, boy. I’m not going to hurt you. I take care of all my best runners. I’ll send you a special prize tonight that you’ll like. An older, experienced one. They’re best for your first time. It will be your first time won’t it? Of course, of course. Now. What else can you tell me? What children committed these deeds you report?”
“All I know, all I know is what Ihu said. He said children of the red-hat man. I don’t even know what that means.”
“Fine, that’s fine. You did very good, very good. We’ll do well together, boy,” Pók said with a forced smile. “I’ll give The Builder high praise for you. Good work. You’re an asset to the canyon.”
“Thank you, sir.” The boy stood and gathered his headdress, shied from Pok, and hurried from the room.
“You there,” Pók called to an aide. “Tell the captain of the guard to send a patrol to back up Ihu in Black Stone Town, at top speed. This is blood secret. Tell no one else. And send that runner a used woman and post a sentry outside his door. I don’t want him going anywhere until I say he can.”
After the aide left, Pók paced in the light of the single flame breathing the scent of burning bear fat and muttering. “That cursed trader and his children! Killing my warriors. Just before the gathering of the Summer Council.” He shook his head trying to imagine what and how this had happened and what it would do to him if word leaked out that children had killed his warriors. “We must keep this quiet,” he whispered. “Very quiet.”
The Danger of Children
After a bath, a few hours’ erratic sleep, and a leisurely breakfast of sweet corn cakes, Pók strolled to The Builder’s council chamber. He wanted no one to suspect him worried or distracted, so he behaved with painstaking aloofness, his normal demeanor among the insufferably spoiled people who ran about the canyon as if their actions justified the existence of the entire world. He found The Builder sitting on the floor drawing with a piece of charcoal on a stretched coyote skin. Pók had expected The Builder to sleep long and delay his daily council as usual, but discussions were already underway. He disliked being late. He nodded to The Builder, who raised his eyebrows as if to say, “Look who’s late this time.” Fine, Pók thought, let him have his childish victory. He noted three others in the room, none of whom acknowledged his presence. The same way the stronger boys treated him as a child. He forced a small, thin smile, promising himself a day of reckoning, and listened.
“This is what we finished yesterday,” said The Builder, showing a row of rooms along the top of the crescent-shaped palace. “And since you were here last, we finished this row of rooms across the back. That made the fifth level. Now we’re almost halfway through the sixth level. And above that, these faint lines, that’s a half-room seventh level. And I’m thinking in the middle, above that, a small platform to make an eighth level. From there you could see everything, and everyone could see you. You’d be almost to the top of the canyon wall.” He cupped his jaw in his hand. “I wonder if we could make it a two-level platform? Nine levels? Ten? Hmm. Maybe.”
“Are you quite through now?” asked Tókotsi, top man of the Southern Alliance. As foolish as Pók regarded The Builder at times, he admired his single-minded devotion to building higher and larger than anyone before him. Tókotsi, on the other hand, couldn’t likely stack three stones atop one another, devoting himself instead to political intrigue and self-aggrandizement. That the two could work together was a testament to the power of mutual self-interest.
“Yes, yes,” said The Builder, gazing at his drawing and absently wiping his charcoal-blackened fingers on his shirt. He was a man who looked like the blocks of stone Pók’s warriors forced men to shape and carry to the masons on the high walls. His cheeks and jaw were wide, his forehead high and angular, and his hair cut in a square block that lay on his otherwise plucked head like a tiny black bear pelt.
“That’s good work on the higher levels,” said Tókotsi. “I’ll want my Southern Palace to be just as high. Or higher.” He was the physical opposite of The Builder, a reed of a man, with a long, narrow nose with no hook, white hair cut in an upside-down bowl-shape, wearing a flowing cotton robe and dozens of strands of bluestone beads around his neck. He liked to make men squirm under political pressure just as Pók liked to make men squirm under physical pressure.
“Oh, if we can make it work here, we can make it work on yours. Even better. There’s always something new we figure out.”
“Excellent. You remember my grandson, Ráana, I’m sure,” said Tókotsi, introducing a young man with eyes that bulged from their sockets. He blinked slowly.
“You were smaller when I saw you last,” said The Builder.
“I’ve just made him chief of my Southern Guard. He’s quite a boy. Did I tell you how he won the harvest race?”
The news startled Pók. He didn’t even know Tókotsi had a chief of his Southern Guard. He knew the captain of their three patrols, who reported to Tókotsi and who had been trained by Pók. He looked at Ráana, who sat beside Tókotsi staring into space with only the slightest of smiles on his lips. The arrogant little bullfrog, Pók thought, twisting Ráana’s na
me slightly to sound like the word for a frog that croaked.
“I think maybe you have mentioned it a time or two,” said The Builder, getting up and pacing behind his official seat, a pile of seventy-two mats, one from each significant outlying village that gave fealty and paid tribute to the High Priest of the canyon. Without the work of Pók’s warriors, there would be perhaps a dozen mats, at most.
Pók rolled his eyes when Tókotsi plowed ahead with his story. “When two other boys got ahead of him,” Tókotsi said, using both hands to illustrate, “he picked up rocks and threw them as hard and as straight as arrows. He ran and threw, ran and threw, stooping to pick up more stones along the way. He hit them a dozen times each until they were bloodied and fell back, then darted around them like a lizard and won the race!” The old man laughed, rocking where he sat on several layers of mats, and beamed at his grandson. “He may not have the fastest feet, but from that moment, I knew the Shadow Gods had given me just the kind of grandson I wanted.”
Ráana flicked his frog eyes to Pók, who took it as a sign of warning or challenge. He’d heard this story from others who had been there and believed it had not been Ráana throwing the stones, but his henchmen. Ráana had fixed the race, just as his grandfather had ensured his position as chief of the Southern Alliance. Family members of those who spoke against him tended to suffer “accidents,” which made opposition to him vanish. For the moment, Pók and Tókotsi had a truce and worked together, though nothing among men like them was anything but temporary. But this Ráana could become a problem. Perhaps Pók would have to make the young man croak like a frog.
Pók eyed Tókotsi. Even without imposing physical presence, he ruled the Southern Alliance, the chiefs and priests of all the towns and villages south and west of Center Place Canyon, with a hand of hard stone, relentlessly pounding those who did not please him, and granting favors to those who did. If he trusted him, Pók would feel a kinship of spirit, even camaraderie. But Pók trusted no one.
A few moons after the Day Star, Tókotsi commissioned the completion of a large stone structure he called his Southern Palace, the foundation of which had been laid generations ago, so close to the palace of The Builder that the shouts of workers could be heard one to the other. The Builder, who pretended to be ruler of all within the sphere of influence of Center Place, owed his position to the Southern Alliance and could say nothing in protest, but Pók knew he disliked being crowded in his own domain.
The Builder himself was more than he seemed. He appeared more stonemason than priest, which was true. He spent far more time designing and directing new stonework than on religious duties, which he mostly ignored, and he often played the part of simple-minded commoner to lull his opponents into believing him gentle and even soft-hearted. But Pók knew him to be a shrewd politician, with just the barest of pretense to serve the gods. Pók’s power aligned more with The Builder than Tókotsi at the moment, and he knew he must show loyalty to him until a better opportunity presented itself, which it would. Without Pók, The Builder had the defenses of a newborn. If The Builder ever crossed him, Pók would easily come out on top. Tókotsi, on the other hand, could be a more formidable opponent. Especially if he had designs on frog-boy taking command of his Másaw Warriors. He would have to be, as always, vigilant.
The remaining person in the room bothered Pók the most because he had no access to her. To The Builder’s left, and a half-head lower than him, sat a figure in a full bluestone body mask, unmoving, unspeaking, the only sign of life an occasional shift of a foot or twitch of an elbow. His network of listeners told Pók she was a young woman of exceptional beauty, unblemished skin, straight hair, and narrow hips. She lived in the former chambers of The Builder himself, tended by an albino woman Pók suspected he knew from long ago, an unreliable witch he would eliminate when the opportunity presented itself, even with the taboos on killing albinos of any kind. They hid themselves well in the dark depths of the palace. Pók had never even glimpsed them, except when this one attended council in her costume.
The Builder doted on the woman in the mask, whom he referred to as his Goddess of the Future, a fortuneteller who had his private ear, who mysteriously appeared after the glorious human sacrifices of the Day Star. She never spoke openly, but sat mute. When she wanted the attention of The Builder, she rang a tiny copper bell and whispered into his ear. One of Pók’s recurring daydreams involved ripping the mask from her face, stripping her naked, and tasting her flesh in more ways than one. Short of that, he merely wanted to strangle her. Unless she really could see fortunes and futures. Then she might be worth keeping. She shifted as he stared at her, and Pók felt pleased that he made her uncomfortable.
“Let’s begin what we came here for, to discuss an escort for the muster of the Summer Council,” said The Builder. He indicated for Tókotsi to speak, but turned to watch Pók’s face. Pók felt a tickle of discomfort. Something was about to happen, a setup.
Tókotsi sniffed with his nose raised and directed his comments to Pók. “The Summer Council of the Southern Alliance wants an official escort into the canyon by your elite guard. Ráana and I are here to take your four top patrols south to accompany the council members. You know how those old men like pageantry. Ráana will command them until we return here. The Builder has graciously given his approval.” The chief smiled and wrinkled his brow as a signal to stifle discussion.
Pók looked from Tókotsi, to The Builder, to Ráana. He had no intention of letting this frog-boy command his guard. Pók had trained them himself. They were his alone to command.
Pók knew he must be careful not to walk into a trap. Yet he must also protect his authority or risk losing it. “I will bring them to you, under my command, at the time and place of your choosing, Council Chief,” he said, looking at The Builder to gauge his reaction. The Builder had approved Ráana taking command of Pók’s special guard to muster the Council. Why would he want to diminish Pók like that?
Ráana showed a facial expression for the first time, which pleased Pók. He smirked and looked to his grandfather.
“Ráana is quite capable of commanding your forces,” said Tókotsi. Pók heard the fortuneteller ring her bell to get The Builder’s attention. She whispered into his ear. The Builder gave Pók an astonished look.
“I am certain your grandson shows maturity beyond his summers, my Chief.” Pók said to Tókotsi, but his attention focused on his peripheral vision of the High Priest. “But I have hand-chosen and trained these men since before the Day Star. They are loyal to me, and I to them.”
“Surely you are not saying they would refuse the command of Ráana! That’s insubordination!” Tókotsi’s eyes flashed.
“Of course not, my Chief,” said Pók unctuously. “They will obey whomever I instruct them to obey. But there is more danger to field operations than most novices realize.”
Anger fired in Ráana’s eyes. “Danger from children perhaps?” The Builder asked. He leaned forward as if to attack Pók with his words. Tókotsi and Ráana looked from The Builder to Pók with puzzled expressions.
Pók’s heart raced. Did The Builder know? Had the fortuneteller just told him? How had she found out? From the runner? Or did she really possess an ability to see and know things?
“Yes,” Pók said carefully, feeling prickles of sweat on his scalp. “Even children can present a danger in the field.”
“How could children kill a half-dozen of your warriors?” asked The Builder.
“I sent a patrol of regulars this morning to find out,” said Pók, forcing himself not to glare at the masked fortuneteller.
“Where did this happen?” demanded Chief Tókotsi.
“Black Stone Town,” said Pók, wishing he knew what The Builder knew.
“What!” said Tókotsi. He turned to Ráana. “That’s the town we cleaned out and gave to you!”
Ráana’s eyes went large. Pók didn’t know what they were talking about.
“What?” asked The Builder. Pók stifled
a smile. The fortuneteller had missed something.
“I gave that town to Ráana after the Day of Balance,” said Tókotsi. The equal length of day and night had been more than two moons ago. “He is chief of Black Stone Town. I pulled every man and woman of working age out of there to raise stone on my new Southern Palace. Ráana was to have staffed the town with his personal guardsmen to ready it for new settlers. Did you?” His angry eyes bored into Ráana.
Ráana hesitated while a wave of relief passed through Pók. His warriors hadn’t been killed by children. Ráana’s warriors had.
“Y-yes,” stuttered Ráana. “I posted Ihu with a half patrol….” He halted and cut his eyes to the fortuneteller. “How could children kill my warriors?”
“That’s what we all want to know,” said The Builder.
Pók couldn’t help himself and smiled. Tókotsi caught him and looked infuriated.
“Did you have anything to do with this?” Tókotsi roared.
“Until this moment, I thought my own warriors had been killed and that Ihu was a loyal member of my own guard, not Ráana’s.” He managed to swallow his pleasure. In just a few well-placed comments, he had implicated inexperience by Ráana and treachery by Ihu. He avoided eye contact with anyone. Then something else leaped into his brain. The Builder had not mentioned the red-hat trader. Did the fortuneteller not know?
Chief Tókotsi glared at Ráana. Through clenched teeth he gave orders. “Pók. Bring your special guard to me at New Star Town in four days. We will begin the muster for the Summer Council. And you, Ráana, will lead as many men as you can gather to your Black Stone Town to do battle with children. May Másaw and the Shadow Gods help your soul.”
A few moments after he walked out of The Builder’s chamber, Pók summoned a runner. He remembered the boy. One of his favorites. “I’m glad it’s you,” he said. He told the boy to take a message to the captain of the patrol of regulars Pók had sent to Black Stone Town earlier that morning.
