by C. S. Bills
“We won’t build canoes like this,” Ubantu said as they worked to carve out the burned portion toward the front of the canoe that was cool enough to touch. “We have no need of such large crafts.”
“I remember seeing the smaller trees as Rika and I drifted south on the ice chunk. The first sight of those green waving branches scared me, until I realized they weren’t spirit beings with many arms.” Attu chuckled. “They were much smaller than the trees here.”
“How tall did they grow?” Suka asked.
Attu opened his mouth to answer when a high shriek ripped through the air. Attu jumped and Ubantu dropped the tool he’d been working with.
Rika, sitting off to the side of the clearing with the other women, leaped up and ran toward a large cooking fire. A woman cried out again, keening as she held a screaming poolik in her arms. Rika ran to her and shouted at her, but the woman pulled away, guarding the howling child.
“Give him to me!” Rika said. “Now!” She wrenched the child from his mother and raced toward the beach. Several women, realizing what she was about to do, ran after her, but Rika reached the water first and dunked the yowling toddler into the water, again and again, pulling off what looked like burned clothing, holding the child under the water up to his chin. He stopped screaming.
“Great Water filled with evil water spirits, not for Raven Clan!” Farnook translated the shrieking woman’s speech. “You give him back!”
Attu ran with the other men to the beach, followed by a crowd of other women and children. An older woman, the same one who had waved her stirring stick in anger at Farnook, waded out into the water. Attu ran toward Rika but Yural reached the screaming woman first. She stood in front of her, eyes flashing, daring her to try to take the child.
Farnook stood on the beach, wringing her hands.
“Tell her,” Yural cried to the girl. “Tell her Rika is a healer and this is the best way to stop the burning.”
Farnook shook her head, obviously terrified.
“Tell her,” Attu begged the girl.
Farnook called to the woman in the Raven Clan’s tongue, but another of the Raven women grabbed her from behind, spun her around and slapped her across the mouth. Farnook reeled.
Attu raced to the girl’s side. Yural was keeping the other woman from grabbing Rika, at least for the moment. He needed Farnook.
“Sha Na!” A voice like thunder boomed across the clearing. Kagit stepped out of a nearby beached canoe where he had been working. The clearing was instantly silent.
Kagit strode toward the crowd, bellowing what sounded like orders. Rika held on to the child, who was resting quietly in her submerged arms, looking up at this strange person, his eyes filled with a toddler’s curiosity. Attu knew he would be in pain soon enough, once he was brought back out of the cooling water, but for now, he was content as Rika gently swished him back and forth in the salt water, cleaning the ash and dirt away and stopping the flesh from continuing to burn.
“I don’t understand,” Rika said to Kagit. “He needed to be placed in the water, and his mother was too shocked to act quickly. What is wrong with what I did?”
Kagit yelled again, and this time, Farnook pushed past the crowd, who opened a path for her to reach Kagit. She ran up to him, her eyes pleading. He barked an order to her.
“Give the baby back to his mother,” Farnook said.
“Will she keep him in the water? The burns will hurt him terribly if she takes him out now.” Rika said, her voice calm but firm as she continued to soothe the child in the water.
Farnook flinched at her words but translated them.
Kagit reached for Farnook as if to shake her, then looking around and seeing all the people from Attu’s Clan, he pulled back and spoke to Attu through Farnook. “Tell your woman to give the child back to his mother.”
Attu tried to speak as calmly as he could. “Rika is a healer, as my father told you. She knows what she’s doing. She will help him.”
“We have a healer; she will help him.”
Rika turned to Kagit. “And when your healer gets here, I will give her the child. I want to see what your healer will do for him.”
Kagit hissed when Rika spoke. The sound made the hairs on Attu’s neck rise. But he didn’t change his expression. Why the anger, and toward Rika? Couldn’t Kagit see she was helping the child?
“Rika, healer of the Ice Mountain Clan, respectfully wishes to watch your healer work on the child,” Attu said to Farnook. She translated.
“He is Raven Clan; Ravens will heal him,” Kagit scowled. “Your woman can watch our healer another time. She should not be touching this child. Tell her to put the child back in his mother’s arms. Ravens do not use the Great Water for healing. It is not done. River water, yes. Ocean, never. She could kill the child. ” Farnook relayed his words, her face pale, her eyes pleading.
“Do it, Rika,” Attu said. “We can’t afford to make these people any angrier.”
Reluctantly, Rika handed the child over to his mother, who grabbed him and carried him out of the water. As the cool water was left behind, the boy started howling again.
Kagit barked another order, and the woman disappeared into one of the almost-completed cedar houses.
Attu and Rika, along with the others, gathered up their things and walked out of the settlement. No one in the clearing said a word until they were gone. Farnook had turned away and was tending the fire again. Suka kept turning back, frowning at her.
“We may never be welcomed back,” Attu said. “I hope they’re not angry enough to fight.”
“He is the leader of a great number of people,” Yural added. “I can’t help but wonder how this came to be. Who did he have to overpower to lead as he does? You see how everyone obeys him without question? This is wrong.”
As his mother spoke the words, a sense of dread rose in Attu again, increasing with every step he took back to the caves.
Chapter 10
No one ventured near the Raven Clan’s camp again and Ubantu posted guards around their camp.
“Advanced warning of our slaughter,” Suka said. “But we must at least try to defend ourselves if they come.”
On the third day, as Attu was straightening another seal skin against his father’s boat frame, two Raven hunters, with Farnook between them, walked onto the beach.
Attu turned to see Suka striding over. He followed.
“Farnook-” Suka began, and the girl looked at Attu’s cousin, her face lighting up for a heartbeat until one of the hunters yelled something at her and grabbed her arm. She dropped her head and stared at her feet.
Suka scowled at the taller man, but kept control of himself and didn’t reach to free the girl. The man spoke to Attu, a short burst of sound, complete with its odd clicks and grunts. Farnook looked at the ground as she spoke. “The Raven leader, mighty Kagit, wishes to speak to the healer Rika. You are to tell your woman to come. Now.”
“I do not tell the healer of our Clan to do anything, but I’m sure she will come, out of politeness. I will come with her. She does not go alone without protection.” Attu held the speaker’s gaze.
Farnook translated, her voice strained.
The man tightened his grasp on Farnook and flashed a looked of distaste at Attu, as if he were foul-smelling. The hunter muttered a string of words before spreading his lips, showing too many of his teeth.
Farnook hesitated, and the hunter tightened his grip. She flinched and Attu saw fresh bruises covering her upper arm. He felt like someone had struck him in the stomach.
Suka growled deep in his throat and moved to stop the man, but Attu grasped Suka’s shoulder. “I know. But not now, Suka. We’ll handle it later. If you try to stop him now, he’ll only hurt Farnook more.”
Farnook glanced at Suka, and Attu could see she had heard what he’d told his cousin. Farnook said nothing, but her eyes pleaded with Suka to do as Attu had said.
Suka stayed where he was, but Attu could feel his cousin’s body
pushing on his hand, still tense and ready to spring.
Farnook looked away again. “The man holding me said he hopes you have better control over your weapons than you do your woman, or your family will go hungry.” Her voice caught at the end, her cheeks reddened.
Attu popped his lips in disbelief at such an insult.
The two Raven hunters jumped, then scowled at him.
The one who had been silent up until now grunted something, and the other nodded.
“Now,” Farnook said, and the hunters turned, stalking back into the woods with Farnook hurrying to keep from being dragged.
Attu felt something brush at his mind. Not words but an emotion. Anger mixed with fear mixed with surprise and something else. What is it? Longing. Intense longing for something...
Attu looked around, trying to find the source.
“He is an animal.” Suka spat into the bushes.
“You dishonor the animals by calling him that,” Attu said, his thoughts turning back to Suka and the hunters’ request. “I’ll go get Rika. First the burned child, and now this. We don’t want to be their excuse to kill us all, just because we didn’t come when they called.”
“This time,” Ubantu said. He’d walked up behind them so quietly Attu hadn’t heard him approach. He stood, the shaper tool in his hands like a weapon. “Ask Rika to go this time, but we will not run at the Raven Clan’s command. We are not their slaves.”
Suka grimaced and moved as if to get ready to come with Attu.
“I will go, Suka,” Ubantu said. “You have angered the Ravens, and although it was right for you to be disgusted at their treatment of Farnook, I don’t think they understood. Their ways are not our ways.”
Suka bristled. “Their ways are evil.” He reached for his spear.
“Still, we must think of Farnook.” Ubantu held Suka’s gaze until the younger hunter looked away.
Attu gasped when he stepped into the Raven Clan’s longhouse. Such a big man-made space overwhelmed him. Attu let his breath out slowly and calmed his face after his initial surprise. He didn’t want to give the Ravens any more reason to think he believed their dwellings were unique or impressive.
A Raven woman led them through an opening into a smaller section at the back of the longhouse, separated from the larger part and filled with potions, pouches, and an area of raised stones where a small fire burned. The room swam with odors, some pungent, some sweet, and Rika’s eyes sparkled as she looked at all the healing herbs and pouches of salves and colored liquids in small wooden bowls, resting on boards that had been cleverly hung on the walls.
“I examined the child, and the burns upon him were not as bad as they should have been.” An old woman approached them. She was clothed in dark grasses, and strange swirling tattoos covered her arms and legs. Next to her stood a woman holding the child who had been burned, so both Rika and this healer could examine him.
The healer’s eyes were keen as she spoke. They reminded Attu of Elder Nuanu’s, full of intelligence and curiosity. Her husky voice echoed back from the other end of the shelter and the clicks and grunts in her speech were so strong, Farnook seemed to be having a hard time understanding her. But the girl was dutifully listening and translating.
Rika studied the old woman.
She wasn’t at the gathering when we first came to the Raven camp, she mind spoke to Attu.
I’ve never seen her before. She has tattoos. I would have remembered them, no matter how many people were there.
The woman continued. “How did you know putting him in the Great Water would help his burns?”
“It is the way of my people,” Rika said. “Cold water stops the burning of the skin. Snow works also.”
Rika reached out for the child, who came readily into her arms. “If I’d been able to keep him under for a longer time, these blisters might not have formed,” she added, pointing to large blisters on the boys legs, “or at least might have been smaller.”
Farnook tensed, but told the old woman what Rika had said. The healer did not grow angry, however, as Farnook must have thought she would, but continued her questioning.
“Why?” she asked.
“The skin continues to burn after the body is removed from the source of the heat. The water stops the heat and stops the burning.”
“But Ravens must avoid the spirits in the Great Waters. Our hunters sometimes cut themselves on the shells or rocks in the Great Waters in the south, from where we came. They were often then attacked by fever spirits. Some died. The evil water spirits came into the cuts and killed them.”
“Perhaps to the south the waters contain evil spirits,” Rika considered. “Here, it is the animal inside the shells that contains the evil spirits. We must beware of the evil mussel spirits. The water, however, heals.”
“We use the fat of the fish,” the healer said. “Is that not what your people do? After the burn?”
Rika looked as if she might be sick. Pointing to the child’s legs, where blisters had broken and were weeping, she said, “I do not wish to offend you, healer of the Raven Clan, but I must tell you what I know. We come from the far north and there we have learned cold can heal as well as kill, and fat can soothe the skin as well as burn. Until the skin has been cool to the touch for half a day, fat will burn on the skin, like blubber on a hot stone.”
“But surely the fat soothes?” The old woman objected. “We have found this to be true.”
“The fat covers the skin, so for a time, it feels better to the one burned,” Rika said. “But it also holds in the heat, and doesn’t allow the spirits of fire and fever out.”
“Here and here, he has the fever,” the old woman agreed.
“And his skin is shiny there with fat.”
“You would take it off?” The healer scoffed. “And remove more skin with it, no doubt.”
“Once the fat is on, it is hard to remove,” Rika agreed. “But not only does the fat trap in the bad spirits of fever, the potions the healer makes cannot go into the skin through it, because...because...” her voice trailed off.
Attu knew Rika was thinking hard for an explanation. Skin boats, he spoke into her mind. Like the skin boats.
Rika shot a smile of relief at him and continued. “Like how the seal fat keeps the water out of the seams of a skin boat, the fish fat keeps the healing potions out of the injured skin.”
Farnook shot Attu a look, her brows raised, before she looked away again, and spoke Rika’s explanation.
She definitely heard me, Attu thought. Farnook can hear mind speak.
Attu was tempted to mind speak something else to Farnook, but when he glanced her way again, she looked away and busied herself gathering items back into her basket.
The old woman was murmuring. Attu came back to the moment as the healer was considering what Rika had said about the seal fat. “You say there would be no fever spirits on his leg at all if no fat had been put on the burns. What would you have done, instead?”
Attu had to respect the old healer for wanting to hear what Rika, a stranger, had to say. She seemed to desire what might work best for her people over her own ideas of what was right. But as much as he was impressed by this Raven healer, he was becoming more impressed with Farnook. Each time he’d seen her, she’d been in a difficult situation, yet although she was apparently enslaved to these people, still, she held something back, something inside herself, something strong. And she had the Gifts. Attu was sure of it.
Rika continued. “I would have held him in the water until there was no more heat in his skin. I’d have made sure it was washed clean of the fire’s dirt and ash. I’d have placed clean wet skins on him for the rest of the day and taken him back to the water of the bay at least once or twice more, depending on how bad the burns looked. The salt in the water also helps with healing.”
Rika paused, looking again at the child. “For him, I would have wrapped the burns after placing a soothing potion made from the blue algae, except,” and she paused again
, “here there is no blue algae.” Her face grew sad as well as serious. “I would have watched for fever spirits, and Ashukat’s healer taught me to use the bark of the white bark tree, made into tea, to reduce fever if needed.”
“Perhaps the bark of the white bark tree, made into a poultice could also help him, like the blue algae?” the old woman said. “We could try it in a small area...”
The next thing Attu knew, two women were being sent for bark, and he’d been shooed out of the longhouse; he sat on a fallen log watching the Raven people put the finishing slabs of square wood pieces around the bottom of the second longhouse. Ubantu was nowhere in sight. Once they’d realized Kagit and his people were no longer angry with them, Ubantu had gone with Kagit to look at a new building project.
A movement beside him caused Attu to look up. Farnook stood there, a load of wood in her hands.
“The child,” she said, her voice a mere whisper through lips barely moving, “the one who was burned? You should know. He is Kagit’s only son.”
And you can hear mind speak, Attu tried, studying Farnook’s face as he did so.
Yes. But I don’t want to. Farnook looked at Attu, her face now reflecting fear mixed with the longing Attu had felt earlier back in the Ice Mountain camp.
“You have a son?” Farnook asked, ducking her head and avoiding Attu’s gaze.
“No,” Attu said. “Not yet.”
Farnook looked up again, and there was something in the way she looked at him... a mixture of understanding and pity... it was as if she somehow knew Attu’s distress over Rika not growing a child within her yet. How could Farnook know of this hidden wound? Is this another Gift the girl has?
“Then you could not understand what it means for Kagit to see his son burned and then held in the water where the water spirits can attack him, also.” Farnook met his eyes boldly.
