by Angus Wells
“And you saw only these scouts?” Racharran asked. “None others?”
“No.” Bakaan’s teeth began to chatter. “Only those five. I …”
His voice choked off. The light went out in his eyes and his lips hung slackly open, dribbling blood that slowly stopped.
Lhyn said, “He’s dead.” The women with her began to chant the deathsong.
Racharran nodded grimly and reached out to shutter Bakaan’s lids over the lifeless, staring eyes. “Prepare him for burial with all honor. He was a brave man.”
Lhyn said softly, “Shall we all die bravely, like him?”
Racharran looked at his wife and answered, “The Maker willing, no.” And to himself silently: Save the Maker turns his face from us and leaves us to this scourge.
“Are they what Colun warned of?” Lhyn asked. “What Morrhyn dreamed of?”
Racharran said, “I think they must be. What else can they be?”
“Then …”
“Yes.” Racharran finished the sentence for her. “They’ve come through the mountains and are into Ket-Ta-Witko. And we had best prepare for such war as shall make this summer seem nothing.”
She said, “O Maker, defend us! What of Rannach, Arrhyna? What of Morrhyn?”
Racharran had no ready answer, and a problem of far more immediate concern—that these strangeling invaders approached dangerously close to the wintering clan. He pondered awhile in silence, staring at Bakaan’s ravaged face, then said, “I must see them for myself.”
Lhyn gasped and shook her head in mute denial.
Racharran sighed. “The People must be warned,” he said. “I must see these invaders with my own eyes, and send word to the other clans.”
“Not you.” Lhyn reached for his hand. “Why must you go?”
“I must know for myself,” he said. “Can you not understand that?”
“I can understand that I’ve lost my son and Morrhyn,” Lhyn returned. “And now, perhaps, shall lose my husband.”
“How else can I tell them?” Racharran asked. “Do I go to Juh and the others with only the word of a dead young warrior, think you they’ll believe me?”
“Why not?” she gave him back. “Shall they name Bakaan a liar? His dying words all untruths?”
“The way they’ve been, yes!” he said. “They’d likely tell me Bakaan fell to the Tachyn and only looked to glorify his defeat.”
“Then they’d be fools.”
“Yes!” he said. “Just as they’ve been fools this bloody summer. Think you they’ll not look to turn their eyes the other way on this as on all else?”
Lhyn knew he spoke the truth. But even so … Must she now lose her husband as she’d lost her son and Morrhyn, about whom her feelings were all confused and mixed since his departure. She shook her head and sighed.
Racharran said, “I must! It’s the only way I can be sure.”
She said, not yet ready to admit defeat, “Sure? Are you not sure now?”
“Yes, but I am akaman of the Commacht,” he said. “Shall I ask others to do what I will not? Besides, it must be my eyes see them and my word to the rest; else none shall believe it.”
“Then let them not,” she said.
Racharran smiled sadly and squeezed her hand. “And the People all go down before these strangelings? Save we fight together, I think we shall not survive—any of us. Did Morrhyn not say as much? Are we not united, then these invaders shall likely eat us up. I must go.”
“And die alone?”
He shook his head. “I’ve no intention of dying. I intend only to see. To scout and bring back word.”
“Like Bakaan?”
“Bakaan did not expect them. He had no warning. I do, and so shall be very careful.”
Her fingers played in his, clutching tight as if she’d not leave him go, not chance another loss. She would not look at him, not meet his gaze for fear he see the tears brimming there.
“I shall be very cautious,” he said, and squeezed her hand harder. “I’ve too much to lose, else.”
“Ach, go!” She pulled her hand free so that she might cup his face with both, and draw him close and kiss him. “Go and be brave! But also careful, eh? I’d not lose you too.”
Hadduth studied his akaman from under hooded lids. Chakthi’s hair hung all unbound and tangled, dull with the ashes that he still daily scattered over his head; and would, Hadduth knew, until his lust for vengeance was assuaged. Which meant until Rannach was slain, or all the Commacht. The Tachyn Dreamer was no longer sure one death would satisfy Chakthi.
Carefully, he said, “We cannot pursue them in such weather. We’re not even sure where they winter.”
Chakthi looked up from his contemplation of the flames. His eyes were dark and cruel in the midst of the mourning paint he still wore. “We can find them.”
“Not easily,” Hadduth said. “Perhaps not at all.”
“Dream of their Wintering Ground,” Chakthi demanded. “Tell me where it is, where they hide.”
Hadduth paused an instant, choosing the words of his reply. “I cannot command the dreams,” he said slowly. “Only interpret what the Maker sends me.”
Chakthi smiled, which made Hadduth distinctly uneasy, and for long moments fixed the wakanisha with his burning gaze. Then he asked, “What use are you, then?”
Hadduth swallowed, forcing himself to face Chakthi’s accusing glare. “I am wakanisha of the Tachyn,” he said, “I speak the Will.”
“The Ahsa-tye-Patiko?” Chakthi spat into the fire. “What does that mean to me? Vachyr is dead, slain by the whoreson Commacht in defiance of the Will. And Rannach’s punishment? To live, when the Ahsa-tye-Patiko demands his death. I’ve no more use for the Will.”
“It was,” Hadduth said very carefully, “a judgment I consider wrong. But even so, it was the judgment of the Chiefs’ Council.”
“The Council?” Chakthi said it like a curse. “I’ve less use for those toothless old women than I have for the Will.”
Hadduth frowned, his eyes wandering about the lodge. Surreptitiously, he shaped a sign of warding: Chakthi voiced blasphemy now. “Perhaps he’s dead,” he suggested. “It cannot be easy to survive in the high mountains in winter.”
“The Grannach aid him!” Chakthi snarled. “Colun was ever Racharran’s friend, and he’ll be friend to Racharran’s son. Could I, I’d take the war to the Stone Folk.”
Again, Hadduth made a gesture of warding: the Stone Folk were inviolate under the Will. Save, he thought, nothing was inviolate to Chakthi’s lust, neither the Stone Folk nor the Ahsa-tye-Patiko. He licked his lips and said, “When the Moon of the Turning Year rises, we can go back to war. The Maker knows, we’ve fought hard this past year, but the clan is hungry. They’ve …”
“I know.” Chakthi’s hand chopped air, silencing the Dreamer. “They’d fill their bellies sooner than avenge my son.”
“Hungry men make poor warriors,” Hadduth said. “Let them rest awhile. Let them hunt.”
“Hunt what?” snapped Chakthi. “Where’s the game? There are no deer, nor buffalo. Save what they find dead.”
Hadduth said, “Even so …” And fell silent as Chakthi’s hand snaked to seize his wrist.
The grip was hard and he must fight not to struggle, not to show his discomfort. “Listen,” Chakthi said, his voice hot and heavy. “I’ll see Rannach and his whoreson father dead for what they’ve done. I’ll have Racharran’s wife for my pleasure, and Rannach’s traitorous bride too. And when I tire of them, I’ll give them to my favored men. I’ll have my revenge, and I care nothing for what the Ahsa-tye-Patiko says or what people think of me. And who is not with me is against me. Do you understand?”
Hadduth nodded, frightened. Vaguely, in that part of his mind that stood aloof from Chakthi’s fury and observed dispassionately what they said, he wondered if he did not fear his akaman more than the Maker. Surely Chakthi’s anger was the more immediate: he saw vividly the punishments Chakthi had ordered for those who
argued with him or disobeyed him. He thought of Dohnse, stripped of all he owned and banished to the farther edges of the Wintering Ground for allowing Morrhyn to ride free. Dohnse’s life was hard now: Hadduth would not see himself consigned to such ignominy. He said, “I understand, and I am with you.”
He wondered if in that moment he forsook the Maker. But Chakthi loosed his wrist, and as he massaged his numbed hand, he knew he feared the instancy of Chakthi’s rage at least as much as he feared the disapprobation of the Maker. Later, he thought, he could make apology.
Chakthi said, “Good,” and smiled. “I’d have my wakanisha with me, and have him dream for me.”
“I can try,” Hadduth said.
“You can do better,” Chakthi returned. “You’ve pahé root?”
Hadduth nodded.
“Then go build a sweat lodge and eat your pahé and dream for me. I’ll not see your face again until you’ve answers.”
Hadduth nodded again. “As my akaman commands.”
Chakthi flicked dismissive fingers and the Dreamer quit the lodge. He tugged his wolfskin cloak tight about his shoulders as he emerged from the warmth into the cold outside. Great soft flakes of snow fell out of a dark and starless sky. The White Grass Moon was hidden behind the overcast that delivered the snow, and the lodges of the Tachyn huddled like some great crop of mushrooms over the Wintering Ground. A dog barked and was challenged by others. Hadduth thought the sound mocking, perhaps even condemnatory, as if the Maker spoke through the throats of the dogs. He had made a choice, he realized: he had chosen Chakthi’s service over that of his calling, and for a moment he contemplated turning back, telling his akaman that he could no longer dream and the pahé root would make no difference because the Maker turned his face from the Tachyn for their betrayal of the Ahsa-tye-Patiko.
Then he saw Dohnse, out toward the farthest edge of the Wintering Ground. The warrior shuffled across the snow, hunting for wood, and when others saw him, they presented him their backs or flung balled handfuls of snow at him. None spoke to him; some urged dogs to attack him, children pointed and jeered. Hadduth thought he could not endure that: he found his own warm lodge and the pahé root and set about Chakthi’s business.
28 Endings and Beginnings
Rannach saw them first. He was out on his snowshoes with a deer slung across his shoulders. He let the carcass drop and nocked an arrow to his bowstring before he recognized them against the glare of sun on snow. When he did, he set arrow and bow back in the quiver and began to shuffle his way over the hardpack toward them, wondering why so many Grannach came when before only Colun and Marjia had ventured into the valley.
He saw those two at the head of the little column, four more behind, and wondered what it was the others dragged on that sled.
When he saw the fur-swathed burden, he gasped, scarce able to believe his eyes.
“Morrhyn?”
“Rannach.” The wakanisha was hard to recognize, he was so thin, his skin burned dark as old leather in stark contrast to the white of his hair, but his eyes burned bright as if lit by some inner fire. “Is Arrhyna well?”
“Yes.” Rannach nodded dumbly, gaping at the Dreamer. “You?”
His voice begged a question filled with doubt. Morrhyn smiled and said, “My friends would not let me walk, for all I’m quite capable.”
“He’s weak,” Marjia said disapprovingly. “Perhaps weak as he’s obstinate.”
“You see?” Morrhyn raised a hand to gesture at the Grannach woman. Rannach saw how the skin clung taut to the bones. “I told them I could walk, but there’s no arguing with this one.”
“Hush, you,” Marjia said. “Save your strength. You’ll need it, are you to do what you insist you must.”
“She’s a tyrant,” Morrhyn said, his fond tone belying the words. “Nor her husband much better.”
“We’d have kept him longer,” Colun said. “But he insisted—”
“And he is obstinate as all men,” Marjia interrupted, “and as foolish, so we bring him. Now, shall we see him warm in your lodge?”
“And tell you all that’s happened,” Colun said.
“And what must happen now,” Morrhyn added.
Rannach frowned, confused, then nodded and fell into shuffling step alongside the Grannach as they strode onward, hauling the sled.
Like her husband before her, Arrhyna was surprised to see so many Grannach, and wondered what it was they dragged with them on the sled. But she set aside the trout she cleaned and washed her fishy hands with snow, then rose to greet them as they came up.
“I bring guests.”
Rannach smiled as he called to her, as if this were all quite normal, but behind his cheerful humor Arrhyna saw concern. She called back, “And most welcome,” but still she felt the ugly prickling of presentiment. And when she saw Morrhyn, she could not help but gasp at his appearance.
“I’ve changed somewhat, eh?” The Dreamer thrust aside the furs covering him and clambered from the sled. “But you’ve not. You’re lovely as ever. Even lovelier.”
He waved back the Grannach, who looked to support him and stepped toward her. She thought him vastly changed yet somehow the same, as if he were transformed. She thought his eyes burned, and when they fell toward her belly she knew, even though she did not yet swell, that he was aware of the life she carried there.
She said, “You flatter me,” and wondered what he did here, where he had come from. And what his arrival presaged. She felt suddenly frightened.
He said, “No, I speak only the truth,” and put his arms around her in a friendly embrace that succeeded in bringing his mouth close enough to her ear that he might whisper, “Does Rannach know?”
“Not yet,” she said, not needing amplification.
“Perhaps you should tell him,” he murmured. “You’ve both decisions to make.”
Arrhyna felt her smile freeze. For an instant she felt an unwelcome future rush upon her, then Morrhyn let her go and she looked to the others. “I bid you welcome, and enter our lodge in friendship.” She sought stability in the formal greeting.
Marjia said, “It shall be crowded.”
“No matter.” Rannach stepped out of his snowshoes and hung the deer on the gutting frame. “Friends can never overcrowd a lodge.”
Even so, there was little clear space when all entered and settled around the fire. The Grannach were short but bulky, and seemed to take up more space than the three Matawaye. Arrhyna thought that Morrhyn, thin as he was, took up less than any other. She could not help but study him even as she set a kettle to boiling and prepared tea. She anticipated Colun asking after his promised tiswin, but the creddan made no mention of the brew and that disturbed her further. She waited for someone to speak, aware they brought news she doubted would be good.
All, it seemed, waited for Morrhyn, whilst he appeared only to luxuriate in the lodge’s warmth.
He beamed, stretching his hands toward the fire, and said, “Ach, but it’s good to sit in a lodge again. Not”—with an apologetic glance at the Grannach—“that it was not fine in the caves. But this is somewhat like coming home.”
Rannach said, “This is home.”
“Yes.” Morrhyn looked around. “And a fine place you’ve made of it. You prosper here.”
Arrhyna lifted the kettle from the fire and realized she lacked cups enough for all. Marjia saw her discomfort and went bustling outside to return with cups that she held as Arrhyna filled them and then passed around.
When all were served, Colun said bluntly, “Do we get down to it? Or shall we sit around talking small, while …”
“Hush, you.” Marjia dug an elbow into his ribs. “This is for Morrhyn to say, no?”
Colun grunted and ducked his head and looked to the snow-haired wakanisha. Arrhyna felt her mouth dry. It seemed a draft found a way through the lodge’s hides, dancing cold fingers down the length of her spine. She touched Rannach’s hand, staring at Morrhyn.
He sighed, no longer smiling, a
nd said, “I’ve news, and not much of it good. Ket-Ta-Witko stands in danger, and all the People; terrible danger … ”
He spoke then of the war Chakthi pressed, and the attacks the Commacht had suffered, the indifference of all save Yazte’s Lakanti. He told of his quest, of finding the cave and surviving there, and the dreams that came to him. From time to time he broke off, allowing Colun to describe the ravages suffered by the Grannach, and how the invaders came through the mountains, and the Stone Folk were slain and now become a single people with him their leader. Arrhyna listened and felt her heart grow chill. Her fingers entwined with Rannach’s and held them hard.
“They’ve not come here,” Rannach said when the awful telling was done.
“Not yet,” Colun returned him. “This valley is out of their way; they go to your plains. But when they’re done there …”
“Are they successful,” Rannach said. “Are they not defeated.”
“The People stand no chance against them.” Morrhyn’s voice was a cold wind blowing down the night, unwelcome as it was unavoidable. “This I have dreamed, and I tell you it is true. The clans are all divided, and save they unite … Even if they do unite … ”
He shook his head helplessly, hopelessly. Rannach said, “Then the Maker delivers the People to these … Breakers, you name them? He turns his face from us?”
Morrhyn looked awhile into the fire and then shrugged. “Surely the People are tested,” he said lowly. “Surely they have erred, and—I believe—earned his displeasure.”
“What’s that to do with me?” Rannach asked, and glanced sidelong at Arrhyna. “With us?”
Morrhyn raised his head to face the younger man. Arrhyna thought she saw pain writ there. “Nothing,” he said, “and everything. Do you not see it?”
Arrhyna believed she did, and liked it not at all; but she kept silent, waiting for her husband to speak.
Rannach frowned. “I am banished,” he said at last. “Accounted no longer of the People, but an outcast.”
