My Sister the Moon

by Sue Harrison

  Suddenly his heart was pounding, his chest full with a rush of blood. His hands trembled and when he clenched his fists, he felt the trembling move up into his arms. What foolishness was this? Samiq wondered. He was here in his own ulaq. There was no problem. Amgigh would have called him if there was. But again the trembling came, and again the pounding of his heart. Perhaps something had happened to Kiin, to one of her sons. Perhaps something had happened to Three Fish.

  He pulled on his parka and climbed out of the ulaq. A cold wind blew in from the sea and the sky was gray with a misty rain. Samiq looked up toward the hills, where Kiin and Three Fish had spent the night, but he could see no one, then he turned and looked toward the sea. The ulaq was high, giving good view of the sea and the beach. There were no ikyan on the water.

  It is early, Samiq thought. The traders have become lazy. But then he turned again, this time toward the flat sand near the line of high tide. And as he turned, his breath caught and he knew the reason his heart had raced while he was still in the ulaq. Amgigh’s own spirit had called to his spirit, had called in pain, in fear.

  Samiq ran toward the beach, toward his brother, toward the circle of traders who had gathered to watch. Samiq pushed through to the inside edge of the circle. One of the Walrus People was fighting Amgigh. The man’s chest was bare and glistened with sweat. Amgigh stood before him, one hand clasping his amulet. The other hand, bleeding, held no knife, and Samiq saw that the Walrus man had cut through one of Amgigh’s fingers and that the knife and finger lay together in the sand.

  The Walrus man held up one hand, palm out.

  He spoke, said something in the Walrus tongue, and by the tightness of his breathing, Samiq knew the two had been fighting a long time. He pointed at Samiq.

  One of the men watching the fight held his hands out toward Samiq and said, “I am Ice Hunter. The one who fights is Raven. He asks if you are Samiq, Amgigh’s brother.”

  “Yes,” Samiq answered. “But how does he know who I am?”

  “His wife, Kiin, she told him about you.”

  “Raven,” Samiq said and Ice Hunter nodded. The one who had bought Kiin from Qakan. So he was here to claim Kiin, perhaps to claim her sons.

  “You should have spoken to Kiin,” Samiq’s spirit whispered. “You could have helped her; kept a watch for this man; prevented the fight.” But it had seemed enough that Kiin had been alive, that she had given Samiq a son. If he would have let himself speak to her, could he have kept from taking her into his arms, could he have kept from claiming her again as wife? She belonged to him. The belonging was in her eyes each time he looked at her. If he had taken time to ask the questions he wanted to ask, to speak to her, man to woman, how could he have kept from betraying Amgigh, from betraying Three Fish?

  The man beside Samiq still held his hands out, still waited for Samiq’s answer. “Tell your friend that if he kills my brother Amgigh, he should be ready to fight me also, for I will kill him.”

  Samiq glanced at Amgigh and saw his brother’s arms drop, saw his eyes leave Raven to glance at Samiq. “Do not fight him,” Amgigh called. “He has killed many men. What do you know of fighting?”

  Almost Samiq said the same to Amgigh, but then stopped himself. Why pull away Amgigh’s confidence?

  Then Samiq had his own knife out, the one Amgigh had made him. He tossed the knife to Amgigh and Amgigh caught it with his uninjured left hand. He smiled at Samiq, but the smile was grim, edged in bitterness.

  Then suddenly Raven thrust forward, catching Amgigh before Amgigh could bring Samiq’s knife forward. Raven’s knife cut deep along Amgigh’s left arm. Samiq groaned, and his sleeve knife was in his hand before he knew what he did. But then Ice Hunter was beside Samiq, his hand tight around Samiq’s wrist. “What is fair is fair,” Ice Hunter said. “Who are you to say which man is right? Let the spirits decide.”

  Amgigh clamped his teeth tight, and Samiq knew he did so to keep the spirits that bring pain from entering in through his mouth. Then Amgigh lunged forward and drew his knife across Raven’s bare chest. A line of blood beaded from the cut and dripped into the sand.

  Then again, the knives were thrust, and again. Raven’s knife drew blood, then Amgigh’s. Both men backed away, stood for a moment, hands on knees, breaths drawn long and hard. Then Raven lunged again, and this time his knife hit Amgigh’s knife. Amgigh’s knife blade snapped, and the point of the blade flew in a wide arc, first up like a bird casting toward the sky, then down, to bury itself in the sand.

  Then Samiq saw the fear in Amgigh’s face, and with a sickness that pulled at his stomach, Samiq realized what Amgigh had known when Samiq threw him the knife, what Amgigh had known when he first gave Samiq the knife. But Samiq let his eyes hold his brother’s eyes, let his brother see that Amgigh’s fear was his own fear, that spirit to spirit they were still brothers.

  Then also for the first time, Samiq saw the line of Kiin’s carvings that stood on Raven’s side of the circle. The carvings were the ones that Samiq and Amgigh had helped her trade for food and skins, life for their people this winter.

  Raven stepped back, rested his hands on his bent knees and breathed deeply. Amgigh, too, stood, blood running in hard rivers from the stump of his finger into the sand.

  “The animals,” Samiq whispered to the Walrus man beside him, “they belong to Raven?”

  “He traded for them. For all of them.”

  Ten and another ten, Samiq counted. Kiin’s animals. Now they were giving power to the man who would kill her husband. Then Samiq felt a hand on his arm, turned and saw that Kiin was beside him.

  “What have I done?” Kiin whispered. “What have I done to my husband?” And Samiq saw that her eyes, too, were fixed on the animals, on the ring of carvings that watched: soft gray of wood, hard yellow of ivory, the shine of many eyes, many spirits on the ground giving power to Raven.

  Then suddenly Amgigh looked at Kiin, and Samiq felt the pull of their spirits, one to the other, and the sorrow in Kiin’s eyes was so strong that Samiq felt it crash against him like the power of the sea, wave after wave.

  Again Samiq drew out his sleeve knife. He held it up for the Walrus men to see. It was a small knife, but sharp with a hard andesite blade. He tossed it to Amgigh, but as Amgigh reached to catch it, Raven sprang forward and thrust his knife into Amgigh’s belly. Amgigh staggered back and the sleeve knife fell to the ground. Amgigh dropped to his hands and knees, his blood staining the sand. He grabbed the sleeve knife, but Raven aimed a kick into Amgigh’s side, kicked twice, and then again. Amgigh drove the short blade of the sleeve knife into Raven’s leg, but Raven kicked again, this time into Amgigh’s face.

  Amgigh’s head jerked back and Samiq heard the snap of bone. Amgigh collapsed, and Raven was suddenly on top of him. He turned Amgigh over then drove his knife into Amgigh’s chest. Samiq ran to his brother’s side. Raven stood, moved back, let Samiq kneel beside Amgigh.

  Samiq pushed his hands against the wounds, but his fingers would not hold the blood, could not stop the flow.

  Then Kiin, too, was beside them, her arms over Amgigh’s chest, her hair turning red with Amgigh’s blood. She clasped her amulet, rubbed it over Amgigh’s forehead, over his cheeks.

  Amgigh took one long breath, tried to speak, but his words were lost in the blood that bubbled from his mouth. He took another breath, choked. Then his eyes rolled back, widened to release his spirit.

  Kiin moved to cradle Amgigh’s head in her arms, and softly, softly, Samiq heard the words of a song, not a mourning song, but one of Kiin’s own songs—words asking spirits to act, words that begged Amgigh’s forgiveness, that cursed the animals Kiin had carved.

  Finally Kiin stood, wiped one hand over her eyes. “He is gone,” Kiin said. “I should have come sooner. I should have known he would fight the Raven. It is my fault; I…”

  But Samiq pressed his fingers against her lips, shook his head.

  “You could not have stopped him,” he said. He laid his hand on Ki
in’s head. “You are my wife, now,” he said. “I will not let Raven take you.”

  “No, Samiq,” said Kiin. “You are not strong enough to kill him.”

  But anger burned in Samiq’s chest, in his throat, in the spaces behind his eyes. “A knife,” he said and turned to the men gathered around him.

  Someone handed him a knife, poorly made, the edge blunt, but Samiq grabbed it, his anger making him see the knife as something stronger than it was.

  Raven clenched his teeth, screamed at him in the Walrus tongue.

  “He does not want to fight you,” Kiin said, her breath coming in sobs. “Samiq, please. You are not strong enough. He will kill you.”

  But Samiq lunged forward, wrist cocked so the longest edge of the blade was toward Raven. Raven crouched, and Samiq heard him mumbling—words spoken in anger, words coming from between clenched teeth. Samiq drew close, slashed his knife in an arc toward Raven, close enough to catch the back of Raven’s hand, to rip the skin open, draw blood, but still Raven did not move.

  The man called out to Kiin, something in Walrus words that Samiq did not understand, and he heard Kiin answering also in the Walrus tongue, Kiin’s voice coming from the circle of her carved animals. For a moment Samiq looked toward her, for a moment he turned his head. Kiin was pushing her animals into the ground, heaping sand over them.

  But in that moment of looking, Samiq felt Raven’s knife. It slashed across the top of his right wrist, the obsidian blade biting through his skin into tendons and muscle. Samiq felt the strength leave his hand, as though Raven’s knife pulled the power out through the wound. Samiq tried to open his fingers, to release his own small knife into his left hand, but he could not.

  Then Kiin was beside him, standing between him and Raven. “No,” she said. “Please, no.” And then Small Knife was there also, his hands gripping Samiq’s.

  “You cannot win,” Small Knife said. “Look at your hand.”

  Samiq glanced down at the blood, at his fingers that would not straighten when he willed them to.

  “I have to fight,” he hissed. “I cannot let him take Kiin.”

  But Small Knife looked away, not meeting Samiq’s eyes.

  “Do not fight,” Kiin said again. “You have Small Knife. He is your son now. You have Three Fish. She is a good wife. Someday you will be strong enough to fight the Raven and win. Until then I will stay with him. I am not strong enough to stand against him, but I am strong enough to wait for you.”

  Then Ice Hunter was beside Kiin, reaching for Samiq’s arm, wrapping a strip of seal hide around the bleeding wrist, pulling it tight to stop the blood. “You have no reason to fight,” Ice Hunter said, “The first fight was fair. The spirits decided. Why else would your brother’s knife break?”

  Then it seemed to Samiq that not only the strength of his hand but the power he had left in his body flowed out with the blood from his wrist, and he had no words to argue with Small Knife or Ice Hunter, no promises to give to Kiin.

  Kiin pulled off the necklace Samiq had given her the night of her naming. Slowly she placed it over Samiq’s head. “Someday you will fight him,” she said. “You will fight him and then you will give this necklace back to me.”

  She turned to Raven. “If I am to go with you, I must go now,” she said, and she spoke in the First Men’s language, then repeated the words in the Walrus tongue.

  Raven asked a question, and again Kiin answered, first in her people’s language, then in Raven’s.

  “I gave Takha to the spirit of the wind as the Grandmother said I must.”

  Samiq’s spirit, heavy with Amgigh’s death, was shattered by her words. She had given Takha to the wind? His son, without telling him, without…

  Then Kiin lifted her suk, took Shuku from his carrying sling. She spoke to Raven in the Walrus tongue, then as though she still spoke only to him, said in the language of the First Men, “This is your son, but he is no longer Shuku. He is Amgigh.”

  And Samiq saw the anger on Raven’s face, the clouding of Raven’s eyes until they were as black as the darkest obsidian. But Kiin did not look away, did not flinch, even when the man raised one hand as though to strike her.

  “Hit me,” Kiin said to Raven. “Show these people that a shaman has only the power of anger against his wife, the power of his hands, the power of his knife.” Then she dropped her voice to a whisper, “A man does not need a strong spirit when he has a large knife, a knife stolen from someone else.”

  Then Raven threw the obsidian knife to the ground. Kiin picked it up, walked back to Samiq, placed it in his left hand. Her eyes locked with Samiq’s eyes, and he saw her pain. “Always,” she said, “I am your wife.”

  Raven gestured toward the men who had come with him. One picked up Kiin’s carvings; another brought Raven’s ik to the water.

  “We will not return to this beach,” Raven said, but Kiin bent down and picked up a handful of pebbles from the sand. Once more she looked at Samiq, then she turned and followed Raven to the ik, stepped in as he pushed the ik into the sea.

  Samiq raised his wounded hand to the necklace Kiin had given him. The shell beads were still warm from the heat of Kiin’s neck. He watched as Raven’s ik grew smaller on the water, watched hoping Kiin would look back once more, but some part of his spirit knew she would not.

  He lowered his wounded hand. Blood escaped from the sealskin wrap, and his fingers were still locked around the dull-bladed Walrus hunter’s knife. In his left hand was Amgigh’s obsidian knife, marked with Amgigh’s blood.

  His mother and Crooked Nose were on the beach, his mother kneeling beside Amgigh, cradling Amgigh’s head in her lap, her voice raised in mourning, and Three Fish, too, was there, her face marked with tears.

  “He took Kiin?” she asked. She wiped her eyes against her sleeve and also began a mourning song, a Whale Hunters’ song, something different from Chagak’s song.

  Samiq moved away from her. He needed to be alone, away from the noise of mourning, from the sight of his brother, the sorrow of his mother, but Three Fish followed him, still singing, her voice harsh.

  Then she thrust something toward him and Samiq looked down, saw his son, his and Kiin’s, in Three Fish’s arms. The baby looked into his eyes and Samiq felt a sudden power like the power of waves, spirit to spirit.

  He dropped Amgigh’s knife and reached out to his son. The baby’s hand closed around Samiq’s fingers, gripped tight. The mourning songs rose around them, but were not strong enough to cover the sound of the sea.

  Author’s Notes

  THE BASIC STORY LINE of My Sister the Moon is borrowed from an Aleut sea otter legend—an incest story. Other legends used in the book include the moon myths of the Pueblo and the Osage; the Aleut raven’s marriage story; the Inuit oral histories of a mother hiding the son of an enemy; blue ice men legends; Ojibway twin sons stories; tiger legends from the Orient (which have counterparts in Aleut whale-hunting traditions); Aleut Shuganan and “Outside Men” stories; and the raven-trickster legends, which have parallels throughout most Native American cultures and are so ancient that their roots can be found in the monkey-trickster stories of the Orient.

  At the time of My Sister the Moon, basketry in the far north was in its infancy; therefore, I hypothesize that the coil and sew technique was used to make baskets, and the simple over-and-under weave used for most matting. These techniques were gradually joined by or replaced by (depending on the culture) the more complex twining weave, which is used today by those few artisans who still make the exquisite Aleut ryegrass baskets and mats.

  In an effort to imitate the oral traditions of Native American storytellers, I have begun My Sister the Moon with a story already told (Chapter 36 of Mother Earth Father Sky). In the storytellers’ tradition, this narrative of Kiin’s birth is related in a slightly different way and with a slightly different emphasis so it can serve as a foundation for My Sister the Moon.

  In many Native American cultures, names are seen as having special p
owers. Throughout a lifetime, a warrior or hunter may possess several names: a “real” name, given by an honored relative or a person respected in regard to spiritual powers; a nickname, which is used instead of a “real” name to protect the holder of the real name against an onslaught of curses or spells by those intending harm; a “pet” name used by family members and close friends; names chosen by the nameholder himself to commemorate an occasion in his life; and a spirit name, often kept secret, which was earned in spiritual quest or fasting. In My Sister the Moon, as in Mother Earth Father Sky, characters whose thoughts are open to the reader are given names which are presented in a Native American language. These names represent the character’s spiritual nature or destiny. Very occasionally a character will also be given a spirit name, as in the case of Kiin (Tugidaq).

  At the time of My Sister the Moon, stone-knappers on the Eastern Aleutian islands were producing only unifacial blades, although in other parts of North America knappers had developed the beautiful and technically superior bifacial Piano points.

  Glossary of Native Words

  AKA: (ALUET) UP; STRAIGHT out there.

  ALANANASIKA: (Aleut) Chief whale hunter.

  AMGIGH: (Aleut—pronounced with undefined vowel syllable between “m” and “g” and unvoiced ending) Blood.

  ATAL: (Aleut) Burn, flame.

  BABICHE: Lacing made from rawhide. Probably from the Cree word “assababish,” a diminutive of “assabab,” thread.

  CHAGAK: (Aleut—also chagagh) Obsidian. (In the Aleut Atkan dialect, red cedar.)

  CHIGADAX: (Aleut—ending unvoiced) A waterproof parka made of sea lion or bear intestines, esophagus of seal or sea lion, or the tongue skin of a whale. The hood had a drawstring and the sleeves were tied at the wrist for sea travel. These knee-length garments were often decorated with feathers and pieces of colored esophagus.

  IK: (Aleut) Open-top skin boat.

  IKYAK, pl. IKYAN: (Aleut—also, iqyax, pl. iqyas) A canoe-shaped boat made of skins stretched around a wooden frame with an opening in the top for the occupant; a kayak.