by C. S. Bills
“I helped Elder Nuanu, yes.” Rika said as her eyes filled with tears.
“If Moolnik hadn’t stopped your Clan on their journey, as your people have told me he did, and wasted valuable time by his arrogance, Rika would have made it here in time to save Vanreda and her child.” Ashukat gazed into the fire. “Vanreda means, ‘the one with hair red as fire,’ did you know that?”
“No.”
“She had hair so thick and long and red that when she stood with her hair loose, it surrounded her like she was a pillar of fire. And now, she is a fiery spirit of the Between.”
Rika stiffened beside Attu. “Hair like fire?”
“Yes.” Ashukat was studying Rika in the firelight. She was as pale as the white bark tree.
“And she had a newborn son. They both died.” Rika rubbed her forehead.
“Yes. That’s what I said. I-”
“She is coming to me in dreams.” Rika’s voice was flat, like a person who has seen a great wonder, and can’t believe it.
“Tell me, please,” Ashukat pleaded.
“I have dreamed of her,” Rika said. “Calling for me to trust when the time comes. I didn’t know it was her, but I’m sure it must be. You called her the woman in the pillar of fire and that is how she appeared to me. It must be her, don’t you think?”
“What did she say? Tell me exactly.”
“I can do better than that.” Rika opened her mind and relayed what she had seen to Ashukat and Tingiyok.
Ashukat arched his brows at first as if to say, “So, you have discovered how to share your dreams with others who See,” but his face quickly grew serious again, and his eyes glistened with tears as Rika finished. “It’s her. It could be no one else.”
Tingiyok said, “You need to heed her warning.”
“Trust Vanreda to reach someone through a dream, even from the Between of Death,” Ashukat shook his head in wonder, his eyes now brimming over. “You must do as she says, Rika, for truly the Great Spirit is working through Vanreda.”
“And,” Yural added, “Elder Nuanu is working through Farnook. What could this all mean?”
Attu stepped back into his shelter late that night. As he slipped under the furs, he heard Rika’s muffled sobs.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. He reached for her and she nestled into his arms, snuffling and wiping her nose on the furs like a child.
“The baby boy, the one who was in the Between of Death,” Rika choked out the last words, then stopped as sobs tore from her throat.
Attu held her, waiting.
“Not mine. Hers.” Rika gulped.
Then Attu understood. He wrapped his arms around Rika, and as she cried out all the fear she had held inside herself for so long, Attu let out a long slow breath of relief.
It had snowed the night before, covering everything with a wet heaviness.
Attu had gone out early to see if he could trail a rabbit using its tracks left in the snow.
Soon, he thought as he walked. Rika will need their soft hides to begin making baby things. We will have a child. The spirits will bless us. Soon. I just know it will happen soon.
He’d been fortunate and had speared two rabbits with his light fish spear. Returning from the forest, he heard his mother call out, “Meavu, Meavu. Where are you?”
Attu’s heart skipped a beat. He ran toward the sound of his mother’s voice. As he neared the edge of the clearing, he heard a jangling sound and turned toward it. Dangling on a tree limb a few feet further down the path was Meavu’s ice bear claw necklace. Attu approached the necklace carefully, searching the ground for tracks and for signs of a struggle. He saw Meavu’s small footprints, walking up the path, barely out of sight of the camp, just far enough to relieve herself in private before returning to the fire to eat the morning meal. He looked down at where the footprints stopped. No sign of a struggle, no other tracks... except...
Attu examined some unusual prints. Larger than both his hands spread wide, imprinted perfectly in the fresh snow, were two huge bird animal tracks directly under the necklace, which had been tied, not thrown, over the tree.
Attu looked up. Far ahead he saw three ravens, circling in the rising currents of air from the ocean, circling, circling. He grabbed the necklace and tore it off the tree, stepped around the bird animal tracks, and raced toward his parents’ shelter.
They searched every place Meavu ever went, every place she could have gone. Yural’s eyes were swollen from crying, Ubantu’s face a mask of pain. The Clans searched and searched and searched the same places, over and over again. There wasn’t a trace of Meavu.
It was a rare sunny day, but still cold. Everywhere around them the snow sparkled in the sunlight and a few birds called among the trees.
Meavu would love how beautiful it is today. Like the day was meant for her, for her name spirit. But instead, she has been stolen.
Ghost Ravens?
Attu felt sick.
“I’m going to kill Kagit,” Ubantu said, as the Clan and Seers rested for a moment near mid day. “This is his fault. He has done this thing with his Ghost Ravens, and I will kill him for it.”
“We don’t know that for sure,” Attu said. “It may be something Kagit has done, it may not. If it is, and we make the first move against him, he could kill every hunter among us, enslave our women and children, and prove to his people he is the leader of all in this place. But he could do that anyway, any time he wanted to. Why risk attacking us indirectly by taking Meavu? Is this of the spirits? Or real men, dressed as White Ghost Ravens? It makes no sense.”
“I want my Meavu back, my daughter, my daughter,” Yural sobbed. “Surely, she hasn’t been taken from me forever. I would feel it in my spirit if she had gone Between. She hasn’t. We must find her.”
Rika moved to stand by Yural, wrapping her arms around the older woman.
“I’ll go to the Raven camp,” Attu said, “with Rovek.”
“I must go with you,” Ubantu said, moving to grab his spear and set out immediately.
“No, Ubantu,” Ashukat came into the clearing and met Ubantu’s fierce gaze. “You are furious, and that might be exactly what Kagit wants. You need to listen to your son’s advice. He needs to go, talk with Kagit, and see if the man somehow gives away that he’s done this horrible thing. I’d come with you also, but...” Ashukat’s words trailed away. The old man hadn’t been able to enter the Raven Clan’s camp since they left the night of the feast. Every time he’d tried, he’d become ill, his head pounding and his stomach roiling long before he came close to the Raven dwellings.
Ubantu opened his mouth as if to protest, but Yural put her hand on her man’s arm. “Let him try, my hunter. He is right.”
Ubantu thrust his spear butt into the ground so hard Attu thought he would break the shaft. But he nodded, the quick hunter’s nod of agreement.
“Can you handle it, Rovek?” the Seer asked. “And not give in to your own anger?”
Rovek stood tall. “I will do what it takes to get Meavu back, to find out who’s done this thing and get her back from them, be they in the Here and Now or in the world of Between. And I will not lose my hunter’s patience.” He set his lips in a thin line, his face now a mask.
“Good,” Ashukat said.
Attu and Rovek left for the Raven’s camp.
Attu was stunned to see that since the last time they’d been in the Raven Clan’s settlement, three new storage houses had been built. Each stood well away from the cedar houses, their frames resting high in the air, supported by poles sunk into the ground. So high up, the Raven’s food would be safe from the most determined bear.
Rovek startled beside Attu. Kagit had appeared, where a moment ago the clearing had been empty.
Attu felt a deep stirring of dread in his chest. How he hated the man.
“Why you here?” Kagit asked, not bothering to greet them.
Attu explained Meavu’s disappearance. Kagit’s response surprised them both.
Ka
git whistled sharply, and his men came running, dropping tools and grabbing up weapons they had left near where they were working.
“This not Raven spirit,” Kagit said. “This Eagle spirit. He makes... no...” he paused. “He work to harm,” and he motioned to indicate the people of his Clan, “by harm Nuvik, harm all. Raven stop him. Eagle not take what Raven’s. You not Raven...yet.”
“Seers not worship Eagle, but value it,” Attu said. “Why Eagle spirit take Meavu?”
“Storyteller tell. Eagle spirit and Raven spirit enemies. Eagle spirit must be stronger in camp of Seers than we thought. It fight Raven spirit whenever can. Must can among few Seers still...” Kagit paused, then scowled, and in his own tongue gave curt orders to his men. Some jumped in large canoes, some headed back up the trail. “Ravens find girl. You call, Meavu?” Kagit asked.
Attu and Rovek nodded.
Rovek stared at Kagit, a look of fascination warring with fear on his face, but he held the man’s gaze.
“Kagit see Meavu. Pretty for Nuvik. No evil. Yes.” He smiled.
Attu felt his spirit go cold within him.
Yet Kagit seems to be on our side in this. Why is my spirit warning me? Is this a trick? But don’t we need all the help we can get to look for Meavu? And Kagit seems genuinely upset...
Kagit turned and strode toward a canoe.
“The Ravens are coming,” Attu shouted as he and Rovek neared camp.
The Clans came running, hunters and women alike grabbing up weapons as they entered the clearing where the hunters stood.
“We will fight them,” Paven said. He stood in the doorway of his shelter, leaning heavily on his spear.
“No, they’re coming to help in the search, Father.” Rovek explained what Kagit had said about the Eagle spirit taking Meavu to harm the Ravens by hurting the Nuviks. Attu stood silent, his hands trembling.
“Not Raven... yet,” Ashukat repeated. Several of the hunters popped their lips.
“Not Raven. Ever,” Ubantu said, and most of the hunters struck their spear shafts against their chests. “But we will allow them to search with us.”
“You must also search their camp,” Ashukat said. “I don’t believe in this White Ghost Raven, White Ghost Eagle battle that Kagit says is happening. The spirit world does not work that way, into the physical world like this. Spirits bringing illness? Yes. Or contention between people? Yes. But this...” Ashukat’s voice weakened, and Attu turned to see him sitting down on a nearby log. He put his head in his hands.
Rika looked toward the Elder. “I’m beginning to think Ashukat is ill with something other than Limoot’s doing. How could anyone be powerful enough to affect him at this distance from the camp? Could it be the Raven spirit alone?”
As she spoke, the sky was suddenly filled with the cawing of ravens, circling overhead.
Attu shivered, then turned to find Ubantu and Rovek. “We will search Kagit’s camp. And if Meavu’s there, we’ll find her. After that? Who knows what will happen.”
Chapter 19
Kagit had welcomed their search. Attu was shocked when the Raven leader told his people to open their doors, large storage boxes, even the food caches high on the poles near the edge of camp. Attu, Ubantu, and Rovek looked under the great canoes and in every place a person could be hidden. There was no sign of Meavu, nor was there any indication among any of the people that she had been in their camp recently.
Attu left the Raven settlement feeling hopeless.
“It has been three days, Ubantu,” Paven said. They sat around the evening fire. The camp was still. No women chattered about the cooking, no children played in the shadows.
“We must go hunting again,” one of the Seer hunters said. “We’re running out of fresh meat. Some can stay and continue searching, but-”
“No more searching,” Ubantu said.
Attu’s chest tightened at his father’s words.
“Meavu would never wander too far from camp,” his father continued. “If she had been hurt and was lying in the Between of sleep somewhere nearby, we would have found her by now.”
How many times had someone said those very words in the last two days? Attu felt his heart breaking. We may never find her. We may never know what happened.
Rika walked into the firelight and sat down beside Attu. She covered him with the fur she was using against the freezing night air. He sat, silent tears falling.
“Yural still will not eat or drink,” Rika said in response to the unspoken question of the group. “She’s praying to her name spirit and to Meavu’s, calling upon the ancestors in the Between to intercede for her.”
“She insists Meavu is still alive,” Ubantu said. “She said she doesn’t know what’s happened to her or where she is, but she says Meavu lives. She can’t believe her daughter may have gone Between.” Ubantu covered his face and sank lower in the furs.
Attu had never seen his father look so defeated.
A sharp wind stirred the embers, and sparks flew up into the black sky, disappearing into the darkness.
“Yural, you must eat,” Rika coaxed the next day as she and Attu sat with Yural.
“No.” Yural turned her back to the shelter entrance and continued running her fingers over and over Meavu’s necklace. The sound of the jangling bear teeth and claws seemed to comfort Yural. It made Attu want to scream in frustration.
“The waves are gentle on the beach. We can walk along the shore-”
“No.”
“We can walk to the stream and gather water. You can bathe and wash your hair.”
“No.”
Rika touched Yural’s hair, brushing the unkempt braids out of her face.
Yural rocked back and forth, humming a song she used to sing to Meavu when she was just a poolik riding in Yural’s hood across the Great Frozen.
Attu remembered his sister as a baby, her lusty cries, her eyes as he had held her shortly after Yural had given birth. When he’d looked into Meavu’s bright eyes for the first time, he had immediately felt something tug deep inside himself, and a fierce need protect her had washed over him.
When Meavu was a toddler, he would return from the hunt with his father, and Meavu would run to him first. He would pick her up as she ran into his arms and swing her high in a circle, making her squeal with delight. Then she would run to her father, and he would lift her up, high over his head and toss her into the air and Meavu would squeal again, then laugh with glee as they showed her the game they had brought home.
Yural and Ubantu would speak the traditional words of the hunter giving the meat and his woman receiving it, and soon their snow house would be filled with the most excellent smells of Yural’s cooking. The family would gather around the nuknuk lamp as she worked and Attu would tell of the hunt, making it into the most daring adventure he could, embellishing the story to everyone’s delight, just to see Meavu’s reactions as he told of the danger and the excitement of their latest hunt. Soon, his mother would serve the meat and they would laugh and talk long into the darkness of the Nuvik night.
Attu watched his mother now, her face blank, her mind elsewhere as she hummed and rocked and stroked the necklace.
“I can’t stand seeing her like this any longer,” Attu mumbled to Rika. He fled the shelter.
“How is Yural?” Rovek was sitting on a large rock near the skin boats as Attu approached, paddle and gear in hand.
“Not good.” Attu reached up for his skin boat, stored upside down on a raised rack with the others to keep them dry and to deter small animals from chewing on the fat-soaked hides.
Rovek jumped off the rock and helped him set the craft gently on the pebbled beach. “Going fishing?”
“Yes.” Attu studied the young hunter. He looked terrible. Since Meavu’s disappearance, Rovek had hardly spoken, but had driven himself to exhaustion looking for her, continuing to search on his own after everyone else, including Attu, had stopped looking.
“It’s not your fault Meavu is gone,” Attu
said.
“I would have protected her!” Rovek’s face twisted. “But I didn’t have the chance.” He looked away and brushed his eyes.
Attu pretended not to notice Rovek’s tears. “I know you would have died trying to save her, and not just because you care for my sister.” Attu moved to ready his skin boat. “You are a true Nuvik hunter. That’s what’s so frustrating. None of us saw what happened. None of us knows what to do now.”
“Two more hunters swear they saw a White Ghost Eagle last sun, beside the river, but there were no tracks, no feathers left behind. Have you seen anything?” Rovek looked anxious.
“No. I haven’t. I’m used to hunting prey that can be stalked. But how do you hunt a ghost? And what would I do if I found one? Could I grab it and shake it, and make it tell me what it’s done with Meavu? This is all so crazy.”
Attu moved to settle more gear into his boat. “Our fresh meat is almost gone, and I’m tired of eating dried meat, fruit, and nuts the women have gathered. Come fish with me for sunset fish up the small river. Your father would like fresh fish, I’m sure.”
“Father is well enough to do his own fishing now, if he would just learn to use the skin boats.”
Attu agreed. He’d seen Paven yesterday, walking without his crutch. He limped, but didn’t seem in any great pain. He’ll be ready to leave with us as soon as the ocean calms down from the winter storms, or we could leave him to fend for himself until spring, when he can head east... but what about Meavu?
Attu realized Rovek was still speaking. “He grumbles about everything. He’ll complain, even about a fresh fish meal. But I’ll come with you.” Rovek walked to where his own skin boat sat on the rack.
“Go get your fishing tools. I’ll get the boats ready.” Attu lifted Rovek’s skin boat as Rovek crunched up the rocky beach to his shelter.
“We’ll use the small nets to catch some bait,” Attu called after him. “You don’t need to bring any dried meat.”
Rovek nodded and continued up the beach, disappearing around the edge of the embankment.
