Children of the Dawn

by Patricia Rowe

  Poor, poor Tsilka. Life was so unfair. Ashan now had everything she wanted and deserved. People obeyed the Moon-keeper, even loved her. Tor was her faithful mate. Tsilka’s own daughter, Tahna, spent more and more time in the Moon-keeper’s hut learning medicine. All Tsilka had left was her beauty—which men no longer cared about—and a shy daughter, Tsagaia, who would someday lose her fight with the Breath Ogre, as the Moonkeeper called the invisible creature who stalked the girl and choked her.

  What could Tsilka do? She hated Ashan, but everything she had done to destroy her enemy had failed. Now, in addition to humiliation, she lived in fear that Ashan might go crazy again someday and kill her.

  And then, on a chilly autumn afternoon, she saw a way out of her intolerable life.

  “Hayah!”

  Hearing the shout, neither Tlikit nor Shahala, Tsilka peered through the door of her hut.

  At the downriver end of the village, five strange men stood on a rise of ground. They looked massive in furs that covered them from shoulders to feet.

  Sitting around the village fire, waiting for food the women were preparing, the men of Teahra jumped to their feet and scurried for their weapons.

  “Hayah! Ee cha!” one of the strangers yelled. They threw down their spears and held out their arms in peace.

  “Ee cha! Ee cha!” they said.

  Nothing like this had happened before. Women and little ones scattered in noisy confusion, hiding in the huts. Brandishing spears, blades, and sticks, Teahra men charged at the strangers. But they didn’t run.

  “No!” the Moonkeeper yelled, putting herself in front of her men.

  “Who are you?” she said. “What do you want?”

  The strangers looked at each other. One pointed at the Moonkeeper, shook his head, touched his ears. She repeated the words in Tlikit. It was obvious they did not understand.

  “Masat,” one said. “Chi chi ah nee.” Which meant nothing. But from the looks on their faces and the way they held their bodies, Tsilka knew they meant no harm. Besides, what could five men do against a whole tribe?

  “Ee cha,” said the one who spoke for the others. Stepping forward, he took off his fur robe and held it out, offering it to Ashan.

  “Get away from her!” Tor yelled. With a thrust of his spear, he knocked the robe out of the man’s hands.

  “Tor!” she said. “There’s no reason for that. I don’t think they came to hurt us.”

  The Moonkeeper picked up the fur and draped it over her shoulders. The size of it made her look very small.

  “Thank you,” she said. “You are kind.”

  Behind the Moonkeeper, the men of Teahra grumbled.

  “We should kill them,” Tor said, “or at least chase them away. What if they have a tribe behind them?”

  “If they do, it could be much larger than ours. We will welcome them. That is my command.”

  The Moonkeeper motioned for the strangers to come into the village. Teahra warriors opened a path for them. Women cautiously came from the huts bringing food. Even Tsilka came out. This was too exciting to miss.

  The night passed uneasily around the fire. With hand-signs and marks on the ground, the strangers told about their tribe, the Masat, and about their home, far away in the direction Where Day Ends. There, they said, the dirt-world stopped and the water-world began. Compared to the water-world, the Great River was just a trickle flowing into it. The Masat men patted their well-fed stomachs to show that life was good there.

  As Tsilka watched, an idea was born: She saw herself in a new home, with a new tribe, living a new life that had to be better than this miserable existence. Here was a chance to start over with people not poisoned by Ashan, people who would value Tsilka for the beautiful and powerful woman she was. She bubbled with excitement to think of going away with the strangers, of leaving forever this hateful place and its memories of humiliation, pain, and loss.

  When it was time to sleep, the strangers chose a spot by the riverbank. Tsilka followed. She dropped her dress and stood naked before them, becoming the animal that drove men wild. She gave herself to the one who seemed strongest. The others watched—strange, though not unpleasant. Afterward she let them know that she wanted to go away with them. Eagerly agreeing, they headed down the river trail in the dark.

  Tsilka wished she could have said good-bye to her daughters, but she wasn’t worried. Tor would take care of them. The twins would be better off without her. She wondered what people would think when they found her and the strangers gone. Would they think she’d been stolen, or would they realize that she’d run away? Tsilka didn’t care what they thought. In her mind, the people of Teahra Village already belonged to the past. A whole new life awaited her. She would be happy at last.

  Filled with dreams, thriving on everything new and different, feeling like a girl again, she traveled with the five men for many days. She turned the dried food they carried into tasty meals, adding things she gathered along the way. Every night she made love to the leader, Lacanya. Not understanding each other’s words didn’t matter. The sounds they made would not be mistaken for anything but lust.

  Hills turned into mountains, prairie into forest, as they followed the Great River along low banks and high, gouged canyons. They crossed rivers that flowed into it, making it ever wider, until she could barely see the gray-green trees on the other side. At a place where the water began to flow backward, they turned away from the Great River and headed in the direction Colder. After walking for several more days, they arrived at the home of the Masat tribe.

  Dense forest marched down to a beach at the edge of a gently sloshing bay. A line of rocks separated the bay from the water beyond that went on until it joined the sky. It was raining, but Tsilka thought it was a wonderful place. She saw many huts, each large enough for several families to live in. There were people everywhere, many more than lived at Teahra. They stopped what they were doing and rushed to greet the returning men.

  Standing tall and proud, Tsilka readied herself to meet her new tribe. They would see from the beginning that she was someone to be reckoned with.

  Suddenly Lacanya grabbed her arm, threw her to the ground, and put his foot on her back.

  Face down in the mud, Tsilka was too shocked to move. All the way here, he’d treated her like she was something special. Now this? Why?

  “Let me up!” she cried, struggling.

  The pressure of his foot increased. He sneered down at her, then said something to his people in a proud voice. Everyone jabbered at once. She couldn’t understand their words, but they were happy and excited.

  Lacanya jerked Tsilka to her feet. She was wet, muddy, humiliated, infuriated, and, most of all, scared. People surrounded her, pinching, poking, laughing. They shoved her into the village, pushed her down at the base of a tree, and tied her arms to it. As if she were some fine piece of meat, they sang and danced around her in the rain.

  “No!” she cried. “This isn’t how it’s supposed to be!”

  Tsilka was just what the five Masat brothers had gone hunting for: a gift for their father to give away at their sister’s mating ceremony.

  A slave.

  Her new life was nothing like she had hoped for. The family who received her forced her to work from morning till night. They watched her all the time, and beat her if she did anything wrong or moved too slowly.

  She and another slave lived with three men, four women, and six little ones, in a large hut made from stacked cedar slabs split with sharpened blades of yew. Long, thin pieces lapped over each other on top, and the hut didn’t leak. On rare sunny days, pieces were removed. It always smelled fresh inside.

  Masat huts were much better than the hide-covered brush huts of her own people. Everything about her new home was different. It rained when it wasn’t foggy, but the air was usually warm, except when storms blew in from the great ocean beyond the line of rocks.

  The Masat floated in carved-out cedar trees that held twenty men. Far out in the endless
water, they speared black-and-white fish—monstrous creatures larger than tree trunks—layers of fat over mountains of meat that fed the village for days. Animals with shells lived in the salty water, and strange-looking fish. People were fat from so much food. They had skins of beaver and otter, furs of bear, cougar, and sheep, hides of elk and deer—more than they needed. And plenty of time to enjoy it all, since slaves did most of the work. When they weren’t out hunting or fishing, the men sat around smoking dried plants in carved wood pipes. They threw bone pieces and guessed how they would land, and the wrong one gave something to right one. They carved the walls of their huts, and made totems of people and animals that stood up in the ground. Women made baskets of spruce roots with woven grass designs. They made beads of shell, wood, and seed, and wooden holders to keep them in. Little ones didn’t do anything but play.

  They gave feasts for any reason, with lavish gifts to each other. Sometimes at a feast a slave would be killed, just to show how rich a family was. Of course, Tsilka was much too smart to let that happen to her.

  Each morning some half-grown boys took Tsilka and other slaves into the forest. They lashed wood to a carrier on her back until it was so heavy she could barely stand, roping large pieces to her waist to be dragged. To stumble or fall brought scornful laughter or a beating. Morning after rainy morning, one exhausting trip after another, autumn turned to winter. There were huge woodpiles stacked all around the village, covered with leather to keep them dry, but no matter how much wood the slaves hauled in, the Masat never had enough.

  Afternoons were spent with the four women of the family she belonged to. Tsilka and their other slave, a girl named Eenoway, worked hides, prepared food, twisted ropes, made baskets. Though the women expected their slaves to work without stopping, they were kinder than the men.

  Winter passed in a dull haze. Tsilka, at first too shocked, was now too tired to fight back or try to escape. For a Masat slave, the only escape was death.

  Though at first it had seemed impossible, Tsilka began to adjust. She realized that sullen or angry slaves were treated with the greatest cruelty. Those who were pleasant had better lives. If she had to live here, she would make the best of it. Forcing herself to be pleasant, she learned the Masat language. Gradually the women demanded less work of her and gave her more freedom.

  She became a friend to Twe We, the young woman she’d been given to. One morning Twe We confided in her.

  “I don’t enjoy making love with my mate,” she said, rubbing her bruised eye. “I think that’s why he hit me.”

  “Lovemaking is not for enjoyment,” Tsilka told her. Of course that wasn’t true, but Twe We needed to learn the most important thing first. “Lovemaking is power, the only power a woman can have over a man. You are wasting it. I can teach you how to use it.”

  The grunts and groans she heard in the night as Twe We used her new skills made Tsilka long for a man. It had been a long time. Lacanya had wanted her on the journey, but once she was a slave, no man wanted anything to do with her.

  She turned her attention to the youngest son of the Masat chief. Squill was little more than a boy, but Tsilka knew there was a man growing inside that hard, muscular body, a man who hadn’t yet known a woman, but who must surely be dreaming of it. She could tell by the way he looked at her. She returned looks that would encourage him.

  One day she found him alone.

  “Haven’t you dreamed of being with a woman, Squill? Of making love?”

  “You are a slave. I would not make love with an animal.”

  “I’m a woman, just as human as you are. See?”

  Tsilka shrugged the robe from her shoulders. He stared openmouthed at her breasts.

  “Touch me.”

  She guided his hand. It lay hot on her breast, without moving.

  “I am more than just a woman. I am a Tlikit, and we know things about making love that Masat women have never thought of.”

  Pulling him down on the soft forest floor, Tsilka showed him. It was wonderful—wonderful—to have a man again, even a half-grown one. In fact it was better to have one so young, so eager, so grateful. Tsilka never forgot that the boy was the best-loved son of the chief. If she used him well, maybe she could someday become an important woman who would have the best of everything.

  At times being a Masat slave seemed better than being a free woman of Teahra. Tsilka didn’t love Tor anymore; she didn’t hate him; she didn’t care. She missed her daughters, but not enough to return.

  CHAPTER 32

  WHEN THE PEOPLE OF TEAHRA VILLAGE DISCOVERED Tsilka and the strangers missing, a few thought she’d been stolen, but most thought she had left because she wanted to. People knew of her unhappiness. They had seen her looking at the strangers in a hungry way. Warriors were not sent in pursuit. Tsilka’s hut was taken by a family who’d outgrown theirs.

  The twins came to live with Ashan and Tor.

  Ashan knew that she hated Tsilka, but she hadn’t realized how pleasant life would be without her. The strange tricks stopped. A snake in a boot, a dress somehow made too small during the night, being startled by tossed pebbles—Ashan had thought Tsilka was responsible. Now she knew for sure.

  She loved being with the twins. They unfolded like trilliums who’d been waiting for snow-melt.

  Tsagaia had always kept to herself because the Breath Ogre could attack her at any time. She didn’t want anyone to see the helpless gasping, and no one but her mother, sister, and Ashan ever had. But the demon must have gone away with her mother. Cautiously, Tsagaia joined other little ones in play.

  It pleased Ashan to see Tsagaia and Kai El becoming friends. Friendship might someday become love. The sweet girl would make a good mate for her son.

  And Tahna… after her mother left, Ashan saw no more dangerous flashes in her eyes. Tahna wanted to learn. Ashan loved to teach. Someone so eager and smart would learn fast. The growing tribe could use three women who knew the ways. Tor surprised Ashan. She expected complaints about the crowded hut, but he seemed to love having the twins as much as she did.

  For Tor, life without Tsilka was beyond wonderful. He’d been her slave—bound by the secret Ashan must never know—and now he was free. No more sneaking to her hut and resisting temptation so he could give his daughters gifts; no more gazing at them with longing.

  All his little ones with him… his secret safe forever… it was so good that it scared him.

  The friendship between his son and his daughter should have scared him. What if it did turn to love? He told himself that it wouldn’t, that being raised together would make them feel like brother and sister.

  But what if Tor was wrong? Maybe there was no such thing as a “safe” secret.

  Tahna loved the Moonkeeper’s hut. Its muted light calmed her eyes. The air, smelling of smoke and herbs, seemed to wrap around her. She delighted in learning new things from the Moonkeeper, in being smart, and doing important work. She liked medicine plants, and thought they had a language not made of sounds. Holding them, staring until her eyes blurred, she tried to understand.

  One morning after everyone else had gone, Tahna said,

  “I think plants want to talk to me, but I’m too stupid to understand.”

  Ashan smiled and placed her hand on Tahna’s shoulder.

  “You’re not stupid. It seems you have the gift.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Ashan didn’t answer.

  “Let’s sit and work. I have herbs for Mitawi. She’s been bleeding since her baby was born.”

  They sat on the mat-covered floor. Ashan unfolded a medicine pouch, and put pinches of dried leaves on a flat grinding stone.

  “Watchwater, goldengrass, and stick-to-moccasin.”

  She crushed them with the stone’s worn mate, grinding slowly, round and round, pulling Tahna’s eyes into her hand.

  When she spoke again, the Moonkeeper’s voice was different, as if some other creature used her, a deep, sure voice, in no hurry with its ancien
t words.

  “In the Misty Time, Amotkan gave the work of healing to Plant Spirits. They divided human sickness among themselves, making sure every sickness had a cure. But how would people know which plant to use for what? The plants decided that Coyote should teach First Woman their language.”

  Tahna blurted, “They do have a language!”

  “Yes,” Ashan said in her own voice. “That is the gift of medicine… to understand the language of plants. It takes patience. And you will have to learn not to blurt.”

  The Moonkeeper ground the herbs in silence, then spoke in the strange voice.

  “The people were glad First Woman could heal them, but they weren’t interested in how. So she taught her daughter, who taught hers, and hers, until the knowledge reached me.”

  The Moonkeeper picked up a pinch of the pungent powder she had made, rubbed it between her fingers, let it drift down.

  “Take some. Feel it. Smell it. Taste it. Say: Watchwater, goldengrass, stick-to-moccasin. Stop the bleeding that is no longer needed.”

  When Tahna had done this, Ashan smiled and spoke in her own voice.

  “If you have the gift—and I think you do—plants will share their secrets with you. You’ll know what’s wrong with people when they don’t know themselves. But there’s a lot of work between now and the day we can call you Medicine Woman.”

  “Medicine Woman!”

  “Someday, perhaps. Would you like to be my helper for now? Amotkan knows I need one.”

  “Oh yes!” Tahna said, clapping her hands and trying not to jump up and down. “This is the happiest time of my life!”

  After many moons, a bedraggled Tsilka returned to Teahra Village. Everyone gathered to hear her story.

  “Those men,” she said. “I don’t know why they wanted me, but they did. They came in my hut and took me away, and kept me tied for days while we walked down the Great River. When we got to their village, I was a slave. They were cruel. They made me work from morning till night. I cried all the time, missing my daughters. I thought I would never escape, that I’d die and they’d throw my body in the water that reaches to the sky—that’s what they do with the bodies of slaves.