Bonesetter 2 -Winter-

by Laurence E. Dahners

  “Oh Pell,” Donte said, a rasp in her voice. “I’m so glad!”

  Donte picked up her basket and they continued on their way back to the Cold Springs cave.

  When they arrived back at the cave, Pell saw Gia talking to Manute, Deltin, and Boro just outside of it. Pell felt surprised to see that Boro already looked healthier, though it’d only been a few days since Pell had last seen him. He wondered if it was only the fact that Boro had been eating better or whether it had as much to do with the death of Boro’s tormentor, Denit. Pell remembered feeling sick after Denit had bullied him.

  Donte abruptly put down her basket and ran to hug Gia. Pell bent and stacked his basket on top of hers and then picked up both to continue on to the cave.

  He didn’t feel at all comfortable dealing with all these emotions.

  A little later, Pell sat with Donte and Gia splitting grapes and picking seeds out of them so they could be dried. Gia suddenly said, “What’s this under the grapes in your basket Pell?” She dug under them a little more, then pulled up the grouse Pell had hit earlier. He’d forgotten tossing it in the basket and then putting his grapes in on top. Gia said, “A grouse! I love grouse!” She turned to Pell, “Have you figured out a way to trap birds?” She held the grouse up and looked at it, then turned back to Pell, “It doesn’t have a narrow neck. How did you get the noose to catch behind its head? I’d think you’d have the same problem as with fish.”

  Pell said, “Um, I threw a rock at that one.”

  Gia said, “Oh! Aren’t birds really hard to hit with rocks? Manute says it’s not really worth trying…”

  Gia kept talking, but Pell wasn’t really listening. He was still thinking about the idea of trapping birds and fish. Gia lifting the grouse out of a basket had tickled something in his mind.

  Gia said, “Pell?”

  “Huh?” Pell responded breaking off his thought about baskets and traps. He hadn’t been getting anywhere with it anyway.

  Gia repeated, “I thought you did your hunting with traps. Do you use a spear or a rock very often?”

  “No, not very often.” More like never! Pell thought to himself, not wanting to admit to her that the grouse she held in her hand was the first prey he’d ever killed with a throw.

  Gia waved a hand out across the small clearing in front of the Cold Springs cave. “Why don’t you knock down a couple of those grouse, and we’ll have enough to have grouse for our evening meal.”

  Pell looked where she had pointed, seeing a number of different birds including a few grouse pecking at the ground in one area. He’d seen birds there before and now, suddenly wondered why. Glancing at Gia, he said, “Why do birds seem to gather in that same spot so often?”

  Gia laughed, “Because, that’s where your mother and I thresh and winnow the grain. I thought you were going to learn the women’s tasks too? Did you think that harvesting the sheaves was all there was to it?”

  “Um,” Pell said, embarrassed, “I guess I didn’t think about it very much. I kind of wondered why the sheaves we cut in the field didn’t look like the grains you actually cook, but Donte pulled the head of a stalk open and pointed the grains out to me. I suppose you’re going to tell me that there’s a lot of work involved in getting the grains out of the head?”

  “Yes,” Gia snorted, “we beat the heads of the stalks with a flail to knock the grains loose from the chaff. It’s hard work! Then we have to toss it up in the air on a windy day so the wind will blow the chaff away leaving only the grain.”

  “Oh,” Pell said, “I guess I should help you do that the next time.”

  “Of course you offer now. We thrashed the last of the sheaves while you were off picking grapes!”

  “Oh,” Pell grinned somewhat sheepishly, “maybe next fall then?” He looked back out at the grouse, “Still, I don’t understand what that has to do with the birds gathering there?”

  “We spread skins to catch the grain when it falls free from the sheaves by the flail, but they don’t catch all the seeds. Your friends the grouse are eating the ones we missed.”

  “Ah,” Pell said in sudden understanding. The fact that trapping mostly brings in small skins that aren’t as good for catching the grain probably has something to do with it too.

  “Well?! Aren’t you going to do something about those grouse that are eating all of our grain?”

  “Oh! Okay,” Pell said getting up. He picked up a couple of stones, thinking that he really didn’t want to throw them in front of Gia and have her see him miss. Then he realized that as soon as he threw the first one the birds would all be gone anyhow. Hopefully, she’d think he only missed once, rather than realizing how bad he actually was. On the other hand, he thought as he got closer, maybe I’ll make a lucky throw like I did earlier?

  As Pell approached, the birds began acting nervously, bobbing their heads up to look at him more and more frequently. He decided that he’d gotten as close as he could and focused intently on the big grouse that was closest to him. He cocked, stepped, and threw in one smooth motion. He missed, his aim a little high, but, trying to flee, the grouse lifted right into Pell’s stone. It flopped over, instantly dead. In a whirring of wings, the rest of the birds exploded outward, disappearing in all directions and sparing Pell the possible embarrassment of missing on a second throw.

  Pell heard Gia and his mother excitedly applauding behind him. He walked to get the bird, not trusting his face to hide his own astonishment if he looked back their way. How did I get so much better at this? Is it really just maturity and that little bit of practice this afternoon? Could a spirit actually be helping me? Or, he thought trying to be more realistic, have I just had a few lucky throws all in a row?

  That night, as they ate their birds, Gia said, “I love grouse. It’s too bad we’re done with threshing. If I’d known Pell was such a good throw, we could have been having him kill us a grouse every afternoon after we threshed!”

  Startled by that idea, Pell felt relieved that the threshing was done so Gia wouldn’t see him fail the next time he tried to hit a bird. Mentally, he recommitted himself to practicing his throwing before Gia asked him to try again.

  Then Donte winked at Pell and said, “I’d be willing to throw out a little bit of our threshed and winnowed grain if Pell could feed us like this every night.”

  A stab of worry shot through Pell as he thought not only of the embarrassment, but also of the wasted grain.

  Later, as Pell lay down to sleep, something about the idea that they could lure birds to grain kept running through his mind. Birds didn’t follow narrow paths where you could hang a noose to snare them. Somehow, even if birds came to grain, he didn’t think there would be a way to get a snare successfully around a bird’s neck, but perhaps he should try. A failed snare would be less embarrassing than throwing stones that missed.

  ***

  To Yadin’s surprise, the Aldans invited him to eat with them that night. He certainly didn’t expect a group that was starving to even offer, but then thought that perhaps they hoped he brought food with him. He said, “I’m sorry, I have nothing to offer other than a few roots and a little grain. I brought some meat with me when I left the Oppos, but it’s gone bad.”

  “That’s okay,” Gontra said, “we have plenty.”

  Although Yadin found this almost impossible to believe, he did stay to eat. He didn’t really have a place to go and would appreciate a warm place to sleep even if they didn’t have much food. He contributed some of his roots and grain to the meal as a friendly traveler should.

  To his astonishment, the meal served by the Aldans was a heavy stew. It had the roots and grain he’d expected, but also had large portions of meat! How could they be so thin when they have so much meat? In a stew, it was hard to tell what kind of meat it was so he lifted a bit of it and asked Exen, “Is this boar?”

  Exen shrugged, “I don’t know what kind that bit is. Rabbits, squirrels, and some goat all went into the stew.”

  Yadin blinke
d. Small animals were notoriously difficult to hunt. They were so quick that they easily avoided a hunter’s spear. You could occasionally get lucky enough to hit one with a rock if you threw well, but having both a rabbit and a squirrel would be really… unusual. Even more surprising would be a goat. The nimble animals easily climbed paths where hunters couldn’t go. It was rare to see them down on level ground, but Yadin supposed that it must happen occasionally. To Exen, he said, “Tell me how you got a goat! That must be quite a story.”

  Exen grinned at him, “Ah, to be able to hunt goats, you must learn how to hunt like Pell. You’ll have to ask him.”

  Yadin said nothing for a few minutes while he considered. Then he said, “So, you’re saying that you have so much meat tonight because of what Pell taught you?”

  Exen nodded, “If you’d come a few weeks ago, you would have found nothing but roots and grain in our stew.” He lifted an eyebrow, “And we’d have been loath to share even that with you.”

  Across the fire, Gontra said, “Yadin, I hope you’ll be willing to tell us a tale. It’s traditional here for travelers to tell a story.”

  It was traditional in the Oppos tribe also, so Yadin had feared this request. “I’m sorry, I’m a poor teller of tales.”

  “Don’t worry,” one of the women said. Yadin thought she’d been introduced to him as Lenta. “Lessa is our storyteller and she’s good, but we’ve heard all her tales over and over. We’ll gladly take your poorly related account over hearing one of hers again.”

  Lessa, Yadin knew, had been mated to Pont, but had chosen to stay behind when he’d left. She thumped Lenta on the shoulder. “Ha, see if I ever tell a story again to such ungrateful listeners!”

  Lenta grinned at her and shrank away as if injured, “No! We love your stories…” She trailed off, then nudged Tonday and continued in a loud whisper, “When there’s nothing else to be heard.”

  Eventually, Yadin found himself telling the tale of a particularly lucky hunt the Oppos had had when they’d come upon two moose who’d locked horns while battling one another. The hapless animals had been relatively easy to spear because, even while the hunters surrounded them, they seemed to be mostly focused on one another. Because he had little talent for it, he rarely was asked to tell stories in the Oppos and he could tell this one had a wooden feel to it, being more of an interesting anecdote than a real narrative.

  When Yadin had finished his story to a smattering of polite applause, he asked, “Will one of you reciprocate with a story of your tribe? I’m sure even your worst story would be better than one clumsily told by a poor storyteller like myself.”

  To Yadin’s surprise, they all now entreated Lessa to tell a story. She drew herself up in mock anger, “What?! This soon after Lenta mocked my storytelling!”

  Lenta threw her arms around Lessa and begged, “You know I was only teasing! You’re our best storyteller and you have to honor our guest with a tale.”

  “Well,” Lessa said consideringly, “I have been thinking of a first telling of the story of Pell’s return…”

  “Yes!” the Aldans chorused, many of them actually applauding, even though they hadn’t even heard the story yet.

  Yadin thought to himself that he should be offended by the fact that they’d applauded more for a story they hadn’t heard yet than they had for the one he’d just finished telling. However, he realized that hearing the “story of Pell’s return” fit perfectly into his mission. He said, “I’d love to hear it. Please do.” He watched with interest as the Aldans settled in to listen, eyes shining and obviously anticipating an evening’s entertainment.

  He soon learned why. Lessa proved to be a master storyteller. She started slowly with a description of failed hunts and burgeoning hunger. It seemed she shared Exen and Gontra’s low opinions of the previous headman and his son. When she told of the expedition they’d led to kill Pell and take his food, it sounded less like a desperation ploy than an evil undertaking. Next she described how her husband Pont and Exen had been the only two to return from the ill-advised quest. She gave a heart wrenching description of the angst in a tribe that thought four of their six hunters had been killed. She described a tribe, already hungry, that thought its only two hunters were one barely more than a boy and the other a medicine man.

  Her voice filled with bleak tones that raised the tension of the story to what seemed to be the breaking point.

  Yadin had to tear his eyes away from Lessa to relax his own clenched stomach.

  Now Lessa’s story turned to the arrival of Gontra followed immediately by Pell.

  A Pell who’d grown and filled out so much over the past summer that his presence was hard to reconcile with the scrawny boy who’d been cast out of their tribe.

  A muscular Pell, who stood before them in the firelight easily holding a large boar pig draped over his shoulders like a tremendous cowl.

  A Pell who had a large wolf standing at his side!

  Now, the tension throbbed, not from the disasters which had befallen the tribe, but from this young man, so tremendously changed from what they’d known. A clumsy boy cast out for being useless, who suddenly seemed more capable than all the other Aldans’ men put together.

  Lessa suddenly expanded the tension even farther by describing how her own husband, Pont, had attacked Pell. Then the tension dropped as Pell resisted the attack with, by Lessa’s description, little effort. The tension dropped further as Lessa described how the tribe had begged the boy they’d cast out to help them. She told of him agreeing, then driving them mercilessly to enclose their cave with sticks and mud.

  Lessa brought humor into the story by telling how Pell had gone out hunting and returned carrying tubers. She looked at Exen as she related that Exen had called Pell a mighty “tuber hunter.”

  The tension ratcheted back up as Lessa told the tale of Pell’s hunt the next day. How he’d returned with a deer, but that there was a lion following him. Yadin expected that the story would now turn into an amazing escape from the lion, but to his utter astonishment learned that Pell had called for people to bring him fire and proceeded to drive the lion away from his kill with torches!

  The denouement came with some lighthearted laughs over the discovery that the deer actually had several small animals stuffed into its abdominal cavity and finished with Exen begging Pell to teach him how to “hunt tubers.”

  Yadin found himself applauding enthusiastically with the others. He recognized Lessa to be a gifted storyteller. Doubtless she’d embellished the story heavily to make it so interesting, but, wow, what a story! He turned to Exen, thinking that, since he’d been the butt of some of the funny parts, the young man would surely tell him what parts were true and which ones weren’t. “Exen,” he said, lifting his chin, “how much of that fabulous tale,” he nodded his head toward Lessa, “is true?”

  Exen turned to Yadin, his eyes shining, “Every bit.” The young man shook his head as if amazed himself, “Every last bit.”

  Chapter Three

  Pell woke in the middle of a nightmare. In the dream, he was trapped again in the tunnel in the brush pile. It was the same tunnel where he’d later trapped a pig. Ginja had crawled in after the pig and been trapped as well which had led to the young wolf’s becoming his friend. Sharp spikes of wood protruding out into the tunnel at an angle had trapped him. In his dream he couldn’t get free, though in real life he’d been able to reach the spikes with his hands and push them out of the way. In the dream, as soon as he got one spike free, a different one stuck into him.

  For a moment he lay there thinking it was just another nightmare. Something he wouldn’t be able to remember in the morning. But then he started thinking about how, in his dream the branches surrounding him weren’t as random as they had been in real life. They almost seemed… woven.

  Woven, like the tall narrow basket Panute had been weaving the other day.

  Pell lay there, excitedly contemplating the possibility of weaving a long narrow basket like Panute
had been weaving the other day. He remembered thinking that the “stakes” sticking out of the end of the basket reminded him of something. Now he realized that they reminded him of the sharp branches in the tunnel. They had pointed towards one another at the mouth of the basket and would have prevented a small animal from climbing in.

  But, if they were pointing the other direction…

  Then a small animal, or a grouse could readily get into the basket, but wouldn’t be able to get back out!

  Or a fish either!

  If Gia had already made any of her lamps for the Cold Springs cave, Pell would have gotten up then, in the middle of the night, to start sorting through the baskets to see if they had one that would work. As it was, he lay there thinking about it until dawn’s light started creeping in around the edges of the flap over the cave’s opening.

  As soon as he saw that light, he got up to put wood on the fire. Gia rolled over to look at him muzzily, “Are you going to cook the breakfast this morning?”

  “Um… I can,” he said, wanting to show he was willing to do “women’s work,” but feeling desperately frustrated not to be able to work on his new idea right away. “I, uh, had an idea…”

  Gia gave him a sleepy grin, “And you want to work on it right away. Don’t worry, I know what that’s like. I’ll make our meal.”

  Donte sat up, “I’ll help! Anything to keep Pell from cooking, he’s terrible.”

  “I…” Pell began to protest, then thought better of it, “am a terrible cook.” He gave them a sad look, “My mother failed to teach me any better.”

  “Sure,” Donte said with a laugh, “blame it on your poor mother. It’s always the parents’ fault, isn’t it?”

  Pell knelt and gave his mother a quick hug, “No, it’s not. I didn’t have any interest until I was cast out and had to cook for myself.”

  With more light from the fire, and Gia and Donte committed to preparing the food, Pell went to the area where they’d been storing the baskets they’d been making. He picked out the ones that were more enclosed, leaving behind the shallow ones that they stored much of their food in. Taking several of them, he carried them outside where he could look at them in better light.