by Sue Harrison
“Ghaden, are you hurt?”
He looked down, shook his head.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” he murmured. He took a long shuddering breath.
She knew him well enough to guess that more questions would do no good. What boy ever admitted he was crying? She reached for his hands, turned them over, pushed his hair off his forehead, then ran her fingers down his leggings to his feet. No blood. Probably a bruised foot from a stick or rock hidden in the riverbank sod. She slowed her pace but went on to the next trap. At the last trap, they would rest, but even a little boy had to learn to finish his work. If hunters stayed home each time they got hurt, who would feed the people?
Aqamdax was glad when the path led out into an open space of grasses. The trees were taller here than where her people lived. Though their branches were high over her head, it seemed as though they pressed against her shoulders with whatever thoughts and powers trees had. Some were so large that they blocked out the sky. When she looked up at them, she felt as though they pulled her spirit out through her eyes and into the hidden places of their dark boughs.
The open grasses were better. Though there was little wind and a river instead of a sea, it seemed more like her home. How could a person know what was happening in the world if the sky was covered by trees? How could anyone know of storms coming or rain? Snow or sun?
The men had stopped, and Aqamdax, seeing them, stopped also. She lay a hand on each of the dogs’ backs to be sure they did not run on ahead. They had learned to obey her, these dogs, but sometimes they seemed to turn wild, even snarling at Sok’s commands. She could not blame them. There were times when she, too, wanted to run, to leave the packs she was carrying, to forget the many River taboos Chakliux had taught her.
First Men taboos made sense, but the taboos she must follow now that she had a River husband—ways of cutting meat, words that must be said when she took water or something from the earth—were foolish. Would not her own words be better? Now that she was River wife, now that she was here in the place where River People lived, did that mean the First Men taboos, First Men wisdom, should no longer be followed? Finally, she had decided to follow both ways. She spoke First Men chants and River chants, followed First Men taboos and River taboos, but their weight was like the heaviness of the tree branches, and she found herself watching the birds, following their flight, and wishing she, too, could soar above trees and earth, taking nothing with her but a cloak of feathers and the wind.
“Aqamdax! Come.” It was Sok. He gestured for her to join them, and so she walked to his side. He held out one arm, fingers splayed, and she saw that he was pointing toward a village, the ulas crowded close in a valley that was shaped like a bowl.
Aqamdax could not hide her curiosity. Who could believe how many different ways people made ulas?
“Listen, you can hear the dogs,” Sok said.
Aqamdax nodded. Looking back at Snow Hawk and Gray, she saw their ears were pricked forward, bodies stiff.
“This is your village?” Aqamdax asked, then realized she had spoken in the First Men tongue. She searched for River words, lifted her chin toward the village, then pressed fingertips against Sok’s arm and asked, “Your?”
“Yes,” he answered.
Chakliux stepped forward, told her the River word for “village,” and corrected her pronunciation when she repeated it.
They started again, Sok walking so quickly that Aqamdax saw Chakliux had difficulty keeping up. Finally Chakliux dropped back to walk beside her, and she slowed her pace. What did it matter if Sok arrived first? She had many days to live here in this village, time to learn their language and then to find her mother, a long time to devise a way to return to her own people. She thought of Tut, who had grown into an old woman before she got back to the First Men, and wondered if she, too, would be old before she found her way home.
They went first to the elders’ lodge. They set their heavy packs at the entrance, left the dogs and Aqamdax outside.
Dog Trainer greeted them, and when Chakliux’s eyes adjusted to the smoky light of the hearth fire, he saw that Wolf-and-Raven, Blue-head Duck, Fox Barking, Sleeps Long and Camp Maker sat at the back of the lodge. Fox Barking rose and made much of seeing his wife’s sons again, but after his greetings, Chakliux heard the man’s greed as he asked subtle questions about dogs and trade goods.
Finally Sok interrupted him. “Yes, we have trade goods,” he said, “but most important, we must know if my brother is welcome in this village.”
“You are both welcome,” Blue-head Duck said. “In this lodge and in this village. Sit down and I will tell you what has happened.”
They sat, and soon Blue-head Duck’s wife came carrying a boiling bag of thick, hot stew. They ate before they spoke, the hot food filling Chakliux with contentment, and he hoped that Blue-head Duck was not being only polite when he said they were welcome in the village.
Finally, when he had emptied his bowl, Blue-head Duck said, “After you left, a woman and her husband and two young hunters came from the Cousin River Village.” He looked at Chakliux. “She claimed to be your mother, and the man said he was your father. They brought golden-eyed dogs to help you in your trading. We told them that you had never arrived here, that you must have gone on to trade with the Walrus, or perhaps to other River villages.”
“They did not seek revenge?” Sok asked.
“They only seemed concerned for Chakliux’s safety,” Blue-head Duck said.
“My mother,” said Chakliux. “K’os?”
“Yes,” said Blue-head Duck. “It was not easy to pretend you had never come to the village. She was afraid for you, that you might be dead. It was a hard time for her. She found much sorrow here during her stay.”
Fox Barking leaned forward, used his bowl to point at Chakliux. “Now you have only one man to call father,” he said. “Be grateful your mother Day Woman has a husband.”
At first Chakliux was puzzled by Fox Barking’s words, but as understanding came, his breath seemed to leave him, and he could not speak.
“You are telling us that Chakliux’s father is dead?” Sok asked.
Blue-head Duck looked at Fox Barking. “There are better ways to tell such a thing,” he said, then reached out to clasp Chakliux’s arm. “I am sorry. In the few times I traded with him, I found your father to be an honorable man.”
Chakliux’s voice returned, and he asked softly, “How did he die?”
“A fire,” said Blue-head Duck. “Your mother and father were staying in an elder’s lodge, with his wife, that one who was always singing. The lodge burned in the night. Your father and the two old ones, they died. Your mother spent mourning days here, then went back to her own village.”
“She was not hurt?” Chakliux asked.
“No, she alone survived.”
Chakliux kept his face still, did not show his anger or his grief. Of course his mother had survived. Of course. And the two elders who died—he remembered the woman, Song. And her husband was … Blue Jay. Yes. There were many reasons for his father Ground Beater to die, many ways he might have displeased K’os. But why kill the two old ones? Perhaps only to cover her part in Ground Beater’s death. Perhaps only that.
“Brother,” Sok said, “I share your sorrow.”
Chakliux looked into Sok’s eyes, and grief tightened his throat so he could only nod acknowledgment of his brother’s words.
“Blue-head Duck,” Sok said, “there were no others who came from the Cousin River Village? No one seeking revenge? No one who asked about Chakliux and where he had gone?”
“No one.”
“Who were the two young hunters that came with Chakliux’s mother and father?”
“Tikaani and Snow Breaker,” Blue-head Duck said. He looked at Sok. “You know them?”
“No,” said Sok.
“I know them,” Chakliux said softly.
Yes, he thought, and if they were the two who came with his mother, they
came seeking revenge. Perhaps, though, they believed what the elders told them, that Chakliux had not returned to the village. But there are many people in a village, old ones, wives, children. Someone might have told them that he had stopped, then gone to the Walrus. Either way, the elders did not seem to think the Cousin River People planned any revenge.
It was best, then, to stay for a while, Chakliux decided, at least until he saw what happened with Aqamdax. Besides, someone had to keep watch. Who could say what plans K’os had made? There should be someone in the village with eyes open.
“You are welcome to stay here with us. We need a good storyteller in this village,” Blue-head Duck told Chakliux.
The others murmured their agreement, and Camp Maker said, “You should know that your mother left your father’s bones in our burial place.”
The man’s words gave comfort. His father’s bones—another tie to hold him to this village. “I will stay,” Chakliux said.
Yaa pulled Ghaden into the lodge’s entrance tunnel. She was close to losing her temper with him. He had kept up with her as long as they followed the trapline, but on the way back to the village, he kept lagging behind until finally she had to carry him. He was in his fourth summer—too big to expect her to carry him, too old to act like a baby. She stuck her head out of the entrance tunnel. Brown Water was sitting inside the lodge, poking holes in a caribou skin with a birdbone awl.
Yaa turned and pulled Ghaden’s thumb from his mouth, then crawled into the lodge. Ghaden followed her, sliding across the floor on his knees, then flinging himself into the rolls of bed mats. He curled up with his back toward Brown Water, and Biter flopped down beside him.
Yaa held out the two hares, but Brown Water ignored her to say, “Hunters do not curse their throwing sticks with wet thumbs.”
Ghaden lay still, and Brown Water sighed, then turned her eyes to Yaa. She looked at the hares, then said, “Did you reset the traps?”
The question was an insult. Of course she had reset the traps. Even Ghaden knew better than to leave trap strings loose. “Yes,” she said.
“Gut the hares and skin them,” Brown Water told her. “Then take them to the hearths. Sok and his brother are back, and they have brought a Sea Hunter woman. Wolf-and-Raven has decided to show her that we are a strong village. She was a storyteller among her own people, Sok says.”
Yaa widened her eyes and looked over at Ghaden. They loved storytelling evenings, but Ghaden lay still, as if he were asleep.
“She is Chakliux’s wife?” Yaa asked.
“Someone said she is Sok’s wife.”
“But Sok already has a wife, and Chakliux has none.”
Brown Water shrugged her shoulders, then said, “You talk too much. Do your work. If every woman in this village was like you, we would never have anything to eat.”
Chakliux waited outside Red Leaf’s lodge with Aqamdax. His nephews had run out to welcome him, the youngest with a wild fling of arms and happy chatter. The older boy had greeted Chakliux with a shy smile and then questions, many questions—about the First Men, how they hunted, about their iqyan, their weapons. All the while, Aqamdax waited, crouched on her haunches beside the dogs, her eyes straight ahead. She said nothing, though soon a crowd of villagers, mostly women, had gathered, pointing at her with pursed lips and chins outthrust, speaking about her as though she were not there to hear their words.
Of course, Chakliux thought, she would understand little, which was good since they were not always kind, though all spoke in awe of her feather sax.
When Sok finally came outside, several women rudely asked questions, but he did not answer. He leaned over to clasp Aqamdax’s arm, then to gesture for Chakliux to follow them inside.
Chakliux did not know what to expect from Red Leaf. Some first wives were angry when a second wife came into their lodge, but others, especially those who welcomed sisters or cousins as second wife, were glad—one more person to help with sewing and cooking, with preparing hides and maintaining traplines. But how would any River woman react when she found the second wife was a First Men woman, one who could scarcely speak the River language? One who was as beautiful as Aqamdax?
He glanced quickly at Red Leaf, saw her swollen eyes, her tears.
“You will always be my wife,” Sok told her, but Red Leaf looked away.
“Even if she gives you many sons?” she finally asked in a small voice.
“What son could be better than Carries Much?” Sok answered. “What child could bring me more joy than Cries-loud?”
Sok tried to laugh, but the sound was strange, as though the laughter were not his own.
Red Leaf pursed her lips, then drew close to watch as Sok brought out several finely woven grass baskets and a split walrus hide needle case, as large as Sok’s hand and filled with strips of seal skin pierced by many needles of all sizes and shapes.
“I have also brought walrus meat for our sons,” he said, “and a bladder of whale oil. What will bring them more power than the oil and meat of animals as strong as whales and walrus?
“This woman,” Sok said, and pointed at Aqamdax with his chin, “she is nothing in a man’s bed. She is good, though, to weave baskets and mats. She can do the things you do not want to do. She can take care of our dogs and gather wood. She can clean fish and keep the snow banked around our lodge in winter. I thought that of all the gifts I brought you, she would please you most.”
Red Leaf tipped her head and studied Aqamdax. Aqamdax met the woman’s stare.
“Here,” Sok said, and pulled a sea otter skin from one of his packs. “This, too, I brought you.”
Red Leaf took the pelt, smoothed her hand over the thick, soft fur, turned it to the skin side and sniffed.
“It is beautiful,” she said. She looked again at Aqamdax. “She does not understand our language?”
“Only a few words,” Sok replied.
“I do not have time to worry about her,” Red Leaf said. “I cannot teach her to speak the true language and sew also.”
“I did not bring her to make you more work,” Sok told his wife. Looking over his shoulder at his brother, he said, “Chakliux will teach her. Whatever you want her to do, tell Chakliux.”
“Stay here, then!” Yaa shouted, and she left Ghaden alone in the lodge. “I’m going to the cooking hearths.” She carried the hares, gutted and skinned, in one hand, holding them out at arm’s length, away from her parka.
It was not easy to be a mother, especially now that Ghaden’s wound was healed. The stronger he got, the more often he disobeyed her. Well, she was not going to miss the feast. Besides, she wanted to tell her friends that she had seen the First Men woman before anyone else had.
She wished now she had left the trapline and rushed back to tell everyone Sok and Chakliux were coming. Now her friends might say she only made up the story, though they knew she was not one to tell lies.
Her thoughts were so full of what she would say to her friends that she did not see River Ice Dancer until he was beside her.
“Sok and the Cousin River brother are back,” he said. “I saw them when they were coming into the village.”
“I already saw them,” Yaa said, then wished she had said nothing.
“You liar.”
River Ice Dancer curled his lips, and suddenly Yaa remembered the joy of punching him, the blood that had flowed from his nose. He was big, and older than she was, but he was not as brave as he pretended to be.
This time she did not answer him, but only shrugged. When he saw that she was not going to ask any questions, he tossed his head back and broke into a run, leaving her behind. Yaa let out a sigh and slowed her pace so she would not catch up to him. When she passed Red Leaf’s lodge, she walked even more slowly, hoping to see the First Men woman, or Sok or Chakliux, but even the dogs near the lodge were quiet, save one that Yaa recognized as a golden-eyed dog from the Cousin River People. She was surprised to see that dog back in the village. One of her friends had told her that t
he elders did not want it here, though why that was so, Yaa’s friend was not sure.
Next she came to Spotted Flower’s lodge. Spotted Flower’s mother was outside and called to Yaa, told her that Spotted Flower was already at the cooking hearths. Yaa hurried then, and when she came to the hearths, she scanned the group of children, took the hares to the cooking bag farthest from where River Ice Dancer stood. A group of younger boys had already gathered around him, and River Ice Dancer was telling them about the Sea Hunter woman.
The grandmother Helps-herself took the hares from her hand. Since they were so large, Yaa thought she might skewer them on cooking sticks, but Helps-herself laid the hares on a slab of wood and began to cut them into pieces with her woman’s knife.
As though she knew Yaa’s thoughts, she looked up and said, “These are too fine to allow their fat to drip away into the fire.”
Of course everyone knew that fat dripped into the fire was not wasted. The grass and berries and trees used it to grow. The spirits smelled it in the smoke and refrained from whatever evil mischief they had decided upon. But the people must have fat, too, and Yaa was proud that her hares would bring joy to bellies, strength to arms and legs. She sucked the raw hare juice from her hand and fingers, then she saw Spotted Flower sitting with a group of their friends. They had chosen a place where the wind brought smoke from the cooking fires to keep away the mosquitoes and gnats.
Yaa joined the group, listening for a while before she spoke, laughing when Best Fist told about the fight she had had with her brother, and then standing to see the new comb Breaks-wood-fast had at the top of her head, a gift from the young hunter who had been promised to her as husband as soon as she came into her moon times.
Breaks-wood-fast was two years older than Yaa, but it seemed strange to think of her as someone’s wife. Yet, in some ways she was further from being a woman than Yaa was, as were all these friends. None of them was mother like Yaa was mother. Green Stripe had her new brother strapped to her back in a cradleboard, but caring for a brother or sister, cousin or nephew was not like being mother. Sometimes when she was with her friends, Yaa felt like an old woman sitting with children; their eyes were not yet open to the hard things in life.
