'Go back.' The bone najd lifted his drum-claw. 'Go back and finish dying, forest najd.'
There was a sound like an old tent splitting in the wind. The pain stopped. Kerlew opened his eyes. His hand was on the end of his wrist, unmarked. He felt Wolf stir within it. Carp stood just off the edge of the ledge, looking suddenly mournful. 'A last word,' he begged, and it was the voice of the tired old man Kerlew knew.
'No.' The bone najd forbade it, and Carp suddenly tattered to pieces and was swept away on the wind. Something ripped out of Kerlew and went with him, like a hook tearing free of his flesh. He hunched over his knees, feeling his pain run hot down his face. He did not know how many lifetimes it lasted. When he could lift his head, the day was blue and clear before him. He looked down on the tiny herdfolk village below him. Below him, their lives went on. Folk clustered and shouted thinly by the reindeer pens, children raced between the tents, the herd gazed on the meadows and flanks of the Cataclysm.
The ledge was suddenly darkened, the opening to the niche blocked by a dark shape.
Kerlew breathed in sudden fear, hid his hands from more pain.
'Comes the second,' the bone najd sighed. She filled the opening to the niche, closing the day away from them. Her feathers were sleek and gleaming. She stood, looking down on Kerlew and he almost knew her. But she was not for him. She had come for the bone najd with the bird-bright eyes, and it was for him that Kerlew lifted the tiny skull in his hand. She took the owl talisman into her hand. 'Be free,' he told her. She smiled suddenly, eyes as black as Raven's feathers. She leaned far out, looked down to the village below. Kerlew followed her gaze. The meadow at the foot of the steps teemed with folk, all crying out in thin voices and waving their arms. Owl gazed down on them for a long moment. Then she spread wide her wings and swooped. Kerlew watched her silent flight. Shrill squeals of terror rose as she descended on her prey. She would feed well. The bone najd looked satisfied. Kerlew leaned back once more in his niche, to await the third. The morning passed its peak, and the warm sun of afternoon touched Kerlew's feet with feeble fingers. And still Kerlew was patient, knowing he would come.
He came as hot panting breath, as the scent of warm life and fresh blood. He felt like a rush of sleek fur under Kerlew's hands, like a tumble of cubs against his chest. He stood before Kerlew, larger than the moon, and his eyes were green. His narrow black lips writhed in a smile that bared brave white teeth, and Kerlew laughed in joy with him. Tears washed his eyes clean and he saw his brother. The hand he reached was not to claim or to subdue, but to touch with fondness. His brother suffered the touch of his human fingers upon his furred brow. 'Wolf,' he whispered. Joy was hot in him. 'At last you have come.'
'Kerlew,' whispered Wolf, and his voice was a voice to trust at last.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Tillu awakened slowly. She had drifted at the edge of sleep for much of the night, feeling that she should rise and go back to Capiam's hut, but never finding the willpower to leave the body comfort of the nest of hides and Heckram's warm chest rising and falling beneath her cheek. She pushed a handful of hair back from her eyes.
A dim light gave substance to the furnishings of the tent, color to the woolen blanket that wrapped her close to Heckram. Bird sounds, and the mutter of folk moving past the tent. Morning sounds. She sat up abruptly, suddenly awake.
'Kerlew!' she said aloud. And then, 'Kari!' At the sound of her voice, Heckram reared up and sat blinking in the light.
'It's morning,' he said blearily. For a moment he sat still, catching up with himself.
Then he reached across Tillu to scoop up their clothes. 'Here,' he said, thrusting the wrong shirt at her, 'you've got to get to Kari, talk to her. Take her to Ristin, if you want.
Or to Stina. Tell them what's wrong, and let them take care of it. But do it quickly, before they start making her ready for the joining ceremony. I've got to get up the Steps, after Kerlew.'
Tillu experienced a moment of disorientation. Someone else had taken charge. She smiled a crooked smile as she pushed his shirt back at him and found her own. She wasn't sure if she liked being directed. But as she pulled her shirt on, she thought of the alternative; of being responsible for everything, handling not only every problem but every decision, however minor. She could find nothing wrong with his suggestions; it was only that he had voiced them first. 'You'll find Kerlew for me.' She said the words aloud, trying them out. The confidence she felt in him surprised her.
'Yes. And I'll bring him back to you, not Carp.' Heckram pulled on his leggings as he spoke. He glanced over his shoulder at her. He stopped suddenly and looked at her, long. She looked back, wondering what to say. Nothing, she decided. They would not need to always explain things to each other. They already understood. So she didn't apologize as she stuffed Kari's knife into her belt and ducked out of his tent. It wasn't necessary.
She hurried past children carrying birch scoops of reindeer milk, thick as cream, and women fetching buckets of water. She nodded hastily to those she knew. 'Oh, Healer!'
called one, 'My husband's fever is back again and ...' But Tillu only nodded quickly and hurried on. Soon, she promised her guilt, soon. The fevers and headaches that came and went, the tick bites that suddenly abscessed, could be tended tomorrow. Kari's joining had to be stopped today.
'Here you are! I've had the whole herdfolk searching for you!' Ketla exclaimed, annoyed, as Tillu pushed into the tent.
Tillu's eyes flew to Rolke, fearing the worst. But his thin chest still rose and fell, and the fever still tossed him. Habit made her push past the women to him, kneel to feel his skin.
'But where's Kari?' Ketla demanded of her back. 'Surely she's been out with you this morning? When we awoke and you were both gone, we worried. It's like her, off playing like a child when she should be preparing herself for her joining. A hundred things to be done, and she leaves them all for me. But now you are back, and we can ...'
'Kari's not with me,' Tillu replied distractedly. The boy's fever was higher today, consuming what little flesh he had left. But his breathing disturbed her most. It sounded like water splashing over stones, a nasty, gurgling sound. She scooped up a dipper of yesterday's cold willow-bark tea and held it to his lips. He didn't even turn his head away. He was unaware of her. Tillu closed her eyes tightly.
'Kari's not here?' she demanded an instant later. Ketla glared at her.
'Isn't that what I've been telling you? She's not here. We thought she was with you. I sent Joboam out to find you both. When he didn't come back, I sent Pirtsi. Don't think that was an easy thing to do; you tell a young man that his girl has run off on their joining day! But he took it well and went.' The other women murmured assent.
'You sent Joboam after her?' Tillu asked in outrage and dismay. 'Where's Capiam?'
'Well, of course I sent him after her. What else was I to do? Capiam would have done the same thing, had he been up to it. We've always sent Joboam after Kari when she ran away and hid from us. He was always the best at finding her. Rolke was no use at all.
And he certainly couldn't be asked to do anything now, sick as he is.' Ketla looked flustered and a little angry. The healer wasn't listening at all. 'As for Capiam, he's still abed. Feverish, like Rolke, and not feeling well.'
Snorting her exasperation, Tillu stepped over to the pallet Capiam and Ketla shared.
The man was lost beneath blankets and hides. She tried to pull his blanket down, but he gripped it tightly. His eyes were shiny, his lips papery as bark, but he spoke in weary command. 'I am not as ill as Ketla thinks I am. I am just tired, and a bit feverish. Leave me alone.'
Tillu pulled stubbornly at the hides, but Capiam was just as stubborn in retaining them. 'Leave me alone,' he repeated obstinately. She sighed and sat back on her heels.
'All right. I'll leave you alone. But I will leave some tea that I want you to drink, whenever you are even a little thirsty.' She glanced about. Ketla was directing the women who were setting out Kari's joining clothes
and discussing the food to be prepared. Tillu leaned closer to Capiam. 'Have you any idea where Kari is? Where did Joboam say he would look for her?' Capiam only flapped a hand at her irritably.
'Can't you leave me alone? Joboam will find her, and Ketla will handle the joining ceremony. It isn't until this afternoon. By then, I will have rested, and I will be there.
Until then, Joboam will find her. Joboam will ... he can see to things. Ask Joboam.'
Capiam's eyes sagged shut with weary finality. His hand fell limply atop the blankets.
Tillu rose abruptly.
'Ketla,' she said clearly, slicing through the women's conversations. Recklessness settled on her, a premonition of hovering disaster that could be averted only by direct action. She pushed through the circle of women and knelt to put her face on a level with Ketla's. She took the stout herdwoman's hands in hers, noting the fever that still simmered in them.
'Put off the joining,' she said in a voice so deadly soft that it filled the tent. 'Your husband is ill, you yourself are not well,' and, over the beginning of Ketla's objections,
'and your son is dying. Dying. Now is not the time for a joining.'
'No! Oh, no, not dying, Tillu.' Fear and refusal whitened Ketla's face. 'You'll see, Healer, he's a strong boy. And the najd has said he'll get better. He's sleeping now, resting, and when he awakes he'll feel better. He'll be up to the feeding grounds, watching the reindeer and the young girls before the end of summer, you'll see.' Ketla's voice rose higher and higher as her frantic words tumbled out. Tillu shook her head.
'No. Dying, Ketla, despite the best I can do.'
'But the najd ...'
'The najd has ways of making words say nothing at all. What did he say, exactly?
Wasn't it, 'In the shadow of the Cataclysm, Ketla and Rolke would be freed of pain.'
Don't you see? He will be right, whether Rolke gets better or dies. That is always how he speaks. With promises that offer nothing, predictions that take no chances. No, Ketla.
Listen to me, even though I tell you hard things. Put off this joining. Don't make me leave Rolke to run and find Kari. For she must be found before Joboam finds her. She must be told she doesn't have to join with Pirtsi. You know she doesn't want to. That's why she has run away. And you've sent Joboam after her, the very one who has made her hate and fear the idea of being any man's mate. And you know that, too!'
Certainty grew in Tillu as she watched Ketla's eyes widen in horror. She felt a flicker of hope. Ketla would put off the joining, would hear Kari out. But Ketla's face set more deeply into stubborn denial. The gathered women, shocked to silence by Tillu's words, began to mutter among themselves. Sudden glints of anger kindled in Ketla's deep eyes.
'Get out!' she shrieked abruptly. 'Healer, you call yourself? And kneel before me and wish death on my son, and carry wild tales about my daughter! Speaking lies about the najd who chants for my son, and has taken your own son into his tent! Get out! Take your evil tongue and useless medicines with you! Get out of my tent! The najd.
Someone fetch the najd for me! I want him to come now, to drum and chant for Rolke and Capiam.'
'Ketla!' came Capiam's weary rebuke from across the tent, but Tillu had already risen.
She was not surprised at Ketla's behavior. It was how she dealt with things she did not wish to face; she denied them. Tillu stiffened her back and forced herself to speak calmly.
'I will go. There is little I can do here that you cannot do yourself. Rub Rolke with water often, and pour tea into his mouth; even if he does not swallow, it will wet his tongue. And give the same tea to Capiam. It may keep his fever down. The sickness is rising in him, as it did in Rolke.'
'Get out! Get out! Get!' Ketla was shrieking now, shaking with fury. The healer's calmness only incensed her more.
'I will. I'm going to find Kari. I'm going to tell her she does not have to join with Pirtsi, that she can go to Stina and the older women. They will tell her that she is free to join or not join. And they will see that no one forces her. Some of the herdwomen seem to have forgotten their old traditions.' Tillu's eyes raked the women standing speechless around Ketla. They shifted uneasily, their sudden silence more unsettling than their previous whispering had been.
'Is it true Kari does not wish to join with Pirtsi?' asked one softly.
'Get out!' Ketla shrieked, and Tillu did not bother to reply. She swung her pouch of herbs to her shoulder and left, slapping the door-flap aside. A panting Pirtsi stood before her.
'Well?' Tillu demanded recklessly. 'Are you going to say you didn't know Kari didn't want you?'
'I ... no ... What?' He took a breath, gathered his wits. 'Healer! You are needed at the reindeer pens.'
Tillu gave a wordless cry of frustration, stamping her foot. Some fool with a broken shoulder or leg, no doubt. 'It will have to wait!' she declared fiercely. 'Have him lie still and put a cold wet cloth on it until I can come! Do what you did for a broken bone before I came along.'
'But it's the najd!' Pirtsi exclaimed, horrified.
'All the better!' Tillu snarled.
'But he's dying ...' Pirtsi's voice trailed off. Tillu looked at him hard, seeing the shock in the boy's face, the trembling of his hands. 'Like Elsa,' he added on a breath.
'What do you mean?' Tillu demanded. She stepped closer to the youth, steadying him with her hands on his shoulders. She locked gazes with him, willing the truth out of him.
'He's crumpled,' he said abruptly. 'Broken like dry sticks.' He shuddered violently and turned from her. She let him go. 'Tell Capiam,' she instructed him and began to run.
She did not see the tents she passed, didn't hear the folk who cried out to ask what was wrong. Her savage expression was enough to bring men and women running after her, all eager to witness whatever disaster she raced to.
The sorting pens were on a hillside above the camp. Years ago, the pens had been built of boulders and stones. Brush and bushes had grown up around them. The men standing at the open mouth of the pen shouted when they saw her. She pushed past them, ignoring their words. Abruptly she slowed to a walk.
Carp lay like a crumpled doll. A herdsman from one of the other herdfolk stood over him. At the far end of the pen, herders shouted and trotted, keeping the restive vajor and their calves back from the shaman. Tillu drew near reluctantly. He had to be dead.
No one could be so crumpled and be alive. One leg was bent under him and out from his body. The wrongness of the twist hurt to look at. The herdsman stared down at the body entranced. When Tillu touched him to move him aside, he looked at her as if she were an apparition. His wet lips trembled.
'They must have thought he meant harm to the calves. The vajor trampled him.
Usually they jump over a fallen man, swerve aside from a standing one. I've never seen anything like this. What was he doing up here before dawn? Why did he come in here?'
Tillu didn't answer. The print of a cloven hoof was clear on Carp's face. His left eyelid was split open, and the eyeball dangled on his bloody cheek. He wore one of Joboam's fine tunics of bleached leather. Mud smeared it and blood seeped up through it. His hands were curled defensively over his chest. Two of the fingers twitched, and Tillu cried out softly. He heard her.
'Kerlew.' Blood came out with the name. 'A last word,' he begged. She knelt in the churned mud and dung beside the old man. Something moved her to put one hand softly over his.
'Guilty hands. Say he has guilty hands.' A grayish tongue moved briefly inside the bloody mouth. 'I didn't touch it, but he did. I knew it would show.' He stopped, struggled to draw a breath. Tillu heard a wet bubbling from his chest. She could not move. The herdsman was transfixed with horror. At the mouth of the pen, voices were raised, but no one came near.
'Fool to fear a woman. Only a woman. He say, kill her, kill the secret. I say, no. I laughed at him. Thinking he could kill a secret. Not when I knew. Fearing a woman.
Weak man. Strong hands. When wolverines fight, one must die.' His other eye
opened, stared sightlessly up. 'Take his drum. It's a good drum. Kerlew. My. Son.'
His mouth sagged open, blood running thinly over his chin. Tillu bent closer to hear his last words. There was only a sigh.
'He's dead.' She did not know how much time passed before she finally uttered the words. Time had paused as she knelt there. My son, my son. Her heart beat out the words. She could no longer hate the bones and flesh heaped before her. He was gone, and in his passing had stolen the hatred that had fueled her resolve. Like a mask cast aside, the najd was gone. An old man had died, an old man who had longed for a son.
For a short time, he had had one. Could she begrudge him that?
She rose stiffly, not feeling the caked mud that clung to her legs and feet. She pushed through a crowd of herdfolk. They milled past, crowding about the body to exclaim over the horror of it. No one detained her. The ones that met her eyes faltered and looked away. Old Bror caught her arm, speaking words of concern, but she pulled free and walked on. She was nearly outside the pen when Joboam confronted her. She shook her head, not looking at him, and tried to step around him. He moved to block her.
'What do you want?' she asked dully.
'Only to know what you saw, Healer.' The contained glee in his voice lifted her eyes to his face. His mouth was solemn, but his eyes gleamed with a mocking challenge.
'Where is Kari?' she demanded suddenly.
For an instant his control slipped. She looked up into black anger, and felt suddenly small as the man towered over her. Then he smiled, slowly. The anger stayed bright in his eyes but he kept it from his voice.
'Why, Healer, I don't know. I looked all morning for her, but found no trace. When I went to tell Capiam I couldn't find his silly little daughter, he told me the najd had been killed. As he is too ill to move, he asked me to look into it. Pirtsi said the reindeer trampled the najd. Is that what you saw?'
The challenge was plain now. 'I saw an old man dying in the mud and filth,' Tillu said carefully. Anger shook her body and voice. For an instant Joboam's confidence faltered.
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