"It's too painful to go back there an ymore, so they sleep outside ,"
Tesa signed . " When the chick re tu rn s, they give him his hatching cloak , and they move back in until the yearling gets established in a
coho rt group his own age . But if the chick dies on the flyaway, they hang his hatching cloak outside an d let the whole thing decay."
"Well, we have plenty of room for you here, Tesa."
Tesa gave her a small, tired smile . " I didn ' t think you'd leave me sleeping in the water on one leg. I came to ask for a diffe re nt kind of
favor."
"What is it?"
"First, what will happen to me now that Sailor has left?" Meg sat back . "
Well, we didn ' t know when that might happen , so we couldn ' t make definite pl an s, but ..." She
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smiled, wanting Tesa to know she was looking out for her best
interests . " We thought you might be ready to go home. You dese rv e a break an d you ' ve put your surge ry off for so long. Once you have that done , well, you could go to the Ashu Miza ri as you had o ri ginally pl an ned , or ... perhaps come back here as a diplomatic liaison."
The young woman nodded, but seemed to draw away. "Tesa ," Meg as ked , " what do you want to do?"
Tesa looked at her with that long gaze she'd picked up from the Grus. "I don't
know what I want. I feel overwhelmed. Right now , the thing I want most
is to go off by myself, have a sweat bath , an d pray for answers."
Meg knew little about Tesa' s spi ri tual beliefs; however, as a religious
person herself , she had to respect Tesa ' s needs. She wasn ' t su re how she felt , though , about her going off alone. "Can't you build a sweat bath here on the knoll? There ' s plenty of room , an d Thorn and I would respect your p ri vacy."
Tesa shook her head. " I need to be away, to find my answers, to build
my lodge-maybe to even ask for a vision."
Meg felt a twinge of alarm. Didn't Indian visions sometimes require
fasting and hallucinogenic drugs or self-mutilation? "Well, I don ' t
know, Tesa ..."
The young wom an fixed her with an intent gaze. "I haven't been able to
practice my religion since I left StarBridge." Meg felt mo re comfo rt able knowing she ' d practiced her religion at StarBridge . Rob Gable wouldn
' t have tolerated anything harmful . " How much time are we talking
about?"
"Four days ," Tesa signed. "Four is an impo rt ant number to my people."
"How far will you be going?"
"To a forest I visited the other day with Sailor."
That couldn' t be too bad , Meg thought . They 'd been able to go and
come back in the same day. "Will you take your voder with you and pay
attention to it , even when you're praying?"
Tesa looked surpri sed . " Oh, sure . That ' s a reasonable request . And I '
m not foolhardy, Meg. I ' ll keep the sled hove ri ng, just in case ." She smiled confidently.
Meg still felt a little uneasy. " I'd feel be tt er about this if Thorn were here ..."
Tesa re acted strongly . " My re ligious practices are none of Thorn ' s business ! He's an agnostic , what re spect could he
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have for my spi ri tual needs ? Besides, you' re his superv isor, why--"
Meg held up a hand to interrupt. " We we re never much for rank around
here , Tesa . I like to get eve ry one ' s opinions on things of importance."
Tesa seemed concern ed . " A re you going to ask eve ry one on the Crane if I can do this?" Her signs were subdued, not angry .
"Well, no. It's really none of their business , either. Or Thorn ' s."
Frankly , it wor ri ed her to have Tesa go off alone--but she ' d al re ady done that many times with Sailor and had taken small jaunts on her
own , alone . She knew the young woman was expe ri enced and
levelheaded . " All ri ght, Tesa, it's all ri ght with me . But don ' t forget about the voder, or the sled."
The young woman seemed to deflate with relief. " Thank you, Meg . When I come back , I'll know what path I've got to take."
Meg watched her leave and noticed an added lightness in her step. Thorn
will probably be furious when he gets back, but that ' s too bad. She dese rv es this small request.
And when she gets back, Scott' s ghost teased , she'll have all the answers.
It was hard for Tesa to leave Taller and Weaver. After Sailor ' s depa rt u re, the flock came to offer good wishes and assurances that Sailor ' s
flyaway would teach him the things an adult had to know . The avians
told funny sto ri es of gentle mishaps, and narrow escapes that were
never really dangerous. Their conce rn was touching , especially since they t re ated Tesa no differently from Sailor's biological parents. After
they left, Tesa packed and t ri ed to explain why she needed time alone.
Taller and Weaver accepted her news with good grace, but it was clear they
had hoped she would stay with them.
" I'll be back in four days ," she promised. " Perhaps we'll take a trip then ," Taller suggested.
"I'd like that," Tesa signed . She wanted to see a lot mo re of T ri nity befo re she'd have to leave . The Grus seemed as reluctant as Meg had to
bid her fa re well when she signed goodbye and headed toward the
dark forest where , only two days ago, she and Sailor had had their
strange interaction with the Aquila.
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Thorn wondere d if his own good sense hadn't been disto rt ed by Peter '
s di re predictions. He sat at the river' s edge whe re Black Feather ' s flock should have been , and wasn ' t, and wonde re d why these avi an s were so late retu rn ing , and where the hell his partner was.
Bruce had told him that Peter wasn' t expected back on the Crane until
tomorro w , that he was mapping ground coordinates for satellite su rv
eys . That was one of the easier things about working with scientists .
Research required large amounts of uninterrupted time, so
investigations weren't as difficult as they had been on other jobs . But
this job had its own problems.
It wasn' t anything like tracking down illegal impo rt s of protected
wildlife on Ea rt h , or setting up elaborate stings to stop the poaching of ra re c re atu re s , though it had seemed similar enough when they ' d been recruited.
Well , if Peter wouldn ' t answer a signal , and he hadn ' t since the day befo re yesterday , Thorn could go looking for him, but that was a very time
- consuming prospect . It would probably be mo re efficient to go
looking for Black Feather . Thorn could check out the two nea re st
roosting sites, and that would only take a day or so . Peter had
probably gone looking for the tardy flock himself.
If Thorn found the flock, he could talk to the avi an leader, ask if he ' d found an ything unusual in his travels . Thorn had spoken to Black
Feather before , with Taller present . Taller's son was tolerant of hum an s an d t ru sted his father's judgment. Then , if Peter had gone looking for the avians himself, Thorn would find him an d give him hell for igno
ri ng his signal.
Thorn re called Peter ' s wa rn ing with an uneasy d re ad. He'd felt a ter ri ble fo re boding since then . It's Trinity, he thought, looking at the clear -
ru nning ri ver . It wakes up that ancient part of you that can instinctively save your life if you' d only listen to it . He shive re d suddenly in the still , warm air.
Actually, that hadn ' t been his thought at all. That had been something Scott had said to him a long time ago.
He piloted his sled along Black Feather' s migrato ry trail. Tesa inhaled air that felt like fire ,
as the steam from the hot rocks filled her up an d pou re d out of her as ri vulets of sweat st re aked her nude body . It had taken her hours to const ru ct her
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small beehive - shaped hut , to find twelve flexible saplings to take the place of Earth ' s white willow t re es , an d pl an t them secu re ly in the forest soil. The saplings were joined to make a squa re at the top that
represented the universe - no rt h , south, east , and west. She couldn ' t cover the exte ri or with bl an kets, so she ' d used autumn - colo re d conifer boughs.
In the center of the tiny lodge she'd brushed away the forest floori ng an d
scooped out a hollow for the rocks , just the way gr an dfather Bigbee had taught her. The shallow depression re presented wakicagapi-all the dead loved ones. The scooped-out soil was patted into a path leading to
the sweat lodge, a path for spi ri ts, and as she shaped the li tt le ri dge, Tesa had hoped that Sco tt and Water Dancer would join her in the inipi, the sweat bath.
She'd found the stones all over Tri nity du ri ng her t ri ps with the Grus.
They we re different from the stones on Earth, but they had one thing in
common-they had designs on them only avi an s could see . She'd built
her fire in the old way , the patte rn of the sticks and logs representing the universe and her pa rt in it. When the rocks were hot, she'd carried
them into the lodge with a forked stick an d placed them into the hollow,
first the gr an dmother rock for the ea rt h , then four rocks for the universe, then the gr an dfather stone on top for the sky.
She'd burn ed her sweet grass and lit her pipe filled with re d willow bark
fr om Ea rt h as she watched the smoke ri se. Taking a dipper she'd
made, Tesa had filled it with cold water from the soft - sided, woven pail
Weaver had made her an d thrown the water on the rocks . Now the
steam filled her every cell.
Eve ry thing she was doing had been done for thous an ds of years -
but not here . On T ri nity , this oldest of ceremonies was new .
Splashing more water on the rocks , Tesa endured the pu ri fying
steam , waiting befo re she would lift the flap the first of four times , an d sign mitakuye oyasin-all my re latives.
Even as she signed the prayers, following the an cient ri tes, eve ry thing she was doing was tying her to T ri nity. The rocks, the soil , the
saplings , eve ry thing in the lodge was fr om the World . As she inhaled the breath of the rocks that cu re d ills an d eased pain , she prayed for an swers . The heat surrounded her, and as she bent over the dipper ,
she saw her face in the water . Thinking of her dreams , she felt uneasy.
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The dreams had not cared where she slept. They were always just behind
her eyelids , waiting for her consciousness to slip away. The pa rt of her as old as mountains - her instinct, her nagi - was try ing to guide her .
Tesa breathed deep , clutching her pipe and closing her eyes, and bid
the dreams come.
By the time Thorn approached Black Feather ' s nearest roosting site ,
it was nearly dusk. He came in high over the staging area and felt a stab
of disappointment when he didn ' t see any b ri ght flashes of white. He circled and pulled up his binoculars, t ry ing to identify a huge flock of
small , greenish avians.
He recognized the carrion birds, a species not often seen in Taller's territory.
In fact, he'd never seen more than twenty of them, but the marsh was
crawling with them, so many they appea re d like a swarm of i ri descent beetles.
Finally they noticed him and, startled, lifted off the ground in a great green
cloud . He passed through them cautiously as they examined him. They
circled in mass, then prepared to settle down again.
But not before Thorn saw what their bodies had been hiding. Thorn grabbed
hold of a handgrip in stunned horror. The picked remains of Black Feather's
flock lay in clusters of bones and drying sinew. Even as the carrion birds
settled down, Thorn recognized what made this very wrong picture even
more wrong.
There were no feathers. If the flock had been felled by a sudden disease, or
a natural toxin, or even if they'd been wiped out by Aquila, there would be
feathers, like snow, littering the grass, blowing around. But there were so few
you could count them. The entire flock had been killed and skinned, quickly
and professionally, then left for the elements to clean up.
Thorn felt naked sitt ing out in the open , an easy target for some smug
killer who could , with a modern weapon, stop the elect ri cal cur re nt that kept his body running-giving the car ri on birds yet another meal.
As he filmed the gri sly scene , his biologist ' s mind wondered a little hyste ri cally if there would be a population surge of carrion birds
because of the sudden wealth of food. Thorn descended and skimmed
the ground , his mind careening wildly.
He aimed for a tight g ro up of stunted trees , w an ting to get 191
under cover . He hovered the sled , yanked off his nullifiers, and
listened for a long time . The only sounds were the softthroated cooing
of the carrion birds an d the endless whispe ri ng of the wind . He slid cautiously off the sled.
This was a good van tage point . He couldn ' t be seen from above or
from the site of the a tt ack.
As he walked toward a natural opening in the trees, something t ri pped
him. Thorn caught himself, spinning to make sure nothing could take
advantage of his accidental misstep. He glanced at the thing that had
snagged his foot, seeing something half-submerged in the brackish
water , covered by a blanket of tall grass. He le an ed toward it, and something p ri mal in his mind screamed at him to run, get the hell out
of there.
He pulled the grass away and stepped back in shock as he looked into
Peter Woedrango's face. The rich, dark skin was gray now, the black,
laughing eyes, sightless. After a moment of stunned anguish , Thorn ri
pped more grass away, wanting to know what or who had killed his friend,
his partner.
It had been a modern weapon , he was sure , even though whoever had done it had tried to make it look like an animal attack. The surprise on
Peter's face was typical of the short blast that shut a body off without bursting
a capillary. The weapon could've been Terran, but that didn't matter to him at
this moment . What mattered was that Peter was dead , and Black
Feather ' s flock was dead.
He was cold and sick inside, looking at his friend, wanting to gather him up
and take him back. But he needed time to think. He'd find the Demoiselle
and pack Peter into its emergency vacuum suit, then chill the body to stop
the decomposition. Then he'd come back tomorrow, maybe with Bruce, to
bring Peter and the Demoiselle back to camp. And he would watch Bruce '
s face when he saw the body. Peter had been his friend, too, especially
after Scott died. What kind of a man could let his best f ri ends be killed
just to make money?
Thorn stared long and hard at Peter 's body, as though remembe ri ng
how it looked would motivate him to go on. He stared at the gaping
wound whe re Peter ' s heart an d lungs had been , where his soft org an s had been to rn out an d consumed in a way only the great raptors
could do. Like Prometheus, he thought bitterly, only yours won ' t regenerate , old buddy. But
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; Thorn wasn' t fooled . He knew the Aquila had come only after Peter was
al re ady dead . There was no spilled blood anywhere, only some that
had seeped out of his torn organs and mixed with the marsh water in
the cavity left behind.
The Aquila weren' t Death he re . That title belonged to another species.
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CHAPTER 17
The Flyaway
Sailor stood hock-deep in the river's swirling water, feeling, for the first time
in his life, lonely. He dipped his head for a drink, then tilted it up, feeling the
cool water slide down his long throat. Well, he wouldn't be lonely, he
thought, once he found Black Feather-or at least, not as much.
What is it about this river, he wondered, that only the wrong people show
up? The last time he'd been here, Relaxed had been hiding on the far shore,
watching Good Eyes. He was always spying on her, but whenever Sailor
told her, she merely waved at Relaxed, then ignored him. To Sailor, Relaxed
seemed like a predator, always watching, waiting for you to be careless.
Two days ago, when Relaxed had been at the river, Sailor had said nothing.
If he'd told Good Eyes, she might have wanted to speak to the human male.
Sailor was already feeling the pull to leave, and the time he'd had left to
spend with Good Eyes was short enough. He'd had no desire to share it.
So, he'd suggested they go eat black nuts. Thinking of what had happened
then made his feathers stand up, so he shook himself, wagging his tail so
that everything fell into place. He
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was acting like a baby, letting these memories clutter up his mind and make
him lonely and depressed. He was on his flyaway now, learning things that
would make a difference to him, to his people. But where was Black
Feather?
Lifting out of the water, he flew to the opposite shore, near Relaxed's hiding
place, landing near some Travellers who were squatting on the dark soil of
the bank, preening. Maybe they had seen Black Feather. Sailor edged
nearer, hoping to speak to them.
Finally, two of the avians, elders by the look of them, stopped grooming and
addressed the young Grus. They knew who he was, they said. They told
him, in their truncated language of bill-clapping, that they had wanted
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