Moonrise

by Mitchell Smith

  The old librarian, in description so many years later, had confirmed that dear one as his mother, at last.

  CHAPTER 11

  Someone was gently tapping the tip of her nose, and Patience slowly woke to it. Woke to hear someone calling, in the distance... chicken-birds clucking nearer… .

  "So fortunate, at least for the now." A high, chuckling woman's voice.

  Patience opened her eyes to see a low ceiling of clay and wattle-stick... then a hugely fat woman sitting half-naked beside her in a heap of marbled flesh, great bare breasts, and the tufted red plumage of a feathered kilt. The woman had pleasant brown eyes, a button nose... a small pursed mouth with a drift of down across her upper lip.

  "How... am I fortunate?" Patience wouldn't have recognized her voice; it sounded thin as string.

  "Fortunate that handsome Pete Aiken, spared by you, is Chad's sister's only son." The woman's small mouth hardly moved as she spoke.

  "All right," Patience said, though she knew none of them. "My .. . shoulder."

  "I fitted it more perfectly into place while you slept, then souped, and slept again." Fat hands and huge, white, bare arms mimed the adjustment, then bandaging. "— I strapped it tight, though not too tight. Gave it its best chance… but..."

  "But?" It seemed to Patience her voice now began to sound like hers.

  "But damage done. In-and-out of joint, tears matters."

  Patience lay still on what felt like stacked sheepskins. The hut held very little light. "Damage..."

  "The arm is breathing blood, but is a little cool; its message-strings are hurt."

  "How hurt?" Certainly now her voice.

  "Unlikely hurt to withering. Perhaps hurt to a little weakness forever."

  Patience stopped breathing, as if that might stop time for a moment. A left-handed woman — with a weak left hand. A crippled woman, crippled Person, with work still to do. "How certain are you?" The Shrikes killed their cripples...

  "Certain as I can be," the fat woman said. "And I am a Catanianite, a scientific doctor." She leaned forward, lifted Patience like a child, and presented a clay bowl to her lips.

  "I knew her son."

  "Whose?"

  "Catania Olsen's son. She was his Second-mother."

  The fat woman set the bowl carefully down, leaned forward, and hit Patience hard on her left shoulder.

  ... When she'd come fully conscious again, and could listen, the woman said to her, "Fatuous lies that claim acquaintance with Greats-from-God are unwise lies to tell."

  "That," Patience managed, "— is certainly true."

  "You know copybook fatuous?"

  "... I know the word very well."

  "Here," the woman lifted the bowl again. "Broth from an unfortunate sheep."

  Patience drank fat-thick saltiness — wondered for a moment where these tribespeople traded for their salt — and felt hot strength flowing down into her. When she'd swallowed several times, she said, "How long?"

  "Two days — now three," the fat woman said. "And surprised me it wasn't more. You have Moonriser blood in you."

  "Yes."

  "I smelled it on your breath, but of what part-fathering beast I'm not sure. An animal, or perhaps selected men — certainly more than one — groaned seed for the Talents to mix in your mother." The fat woman took the bowl away. "My name is Charlotte. Called Charlotte-doctor."

  "Thank you for your care," Patience said, and tried to ease her aching shoulder.

  The fat woman chuckled again, apparently very good-natured. "My care would have been to peg you to the ground, then slice you into pieces before the children — little pieces, one by one — and kept you shouting all the while. That would have been my care, except that Chad Budnarik fears his sister's tongue, if nothing else. And spared Pete Aiken is her son."

  "Isn't it remarkable," Patience said, "— remarkable that a woman's scolding may confound a brute?"

  "Said," Charlotte-doctor smiled, "as if you'd met War-leader Chad Budnarik. No better word for him than brute, though I love him dearly, and have since I was a child."

  Patience waited for another blow to her shoulder, but none came while she decided to guard her mouth. "Apologies," she said. That seemed safe enough.

  "Oh, it's lies that trouble me," the fat woman said, "— not truths." She held the broth-bowl for Patience's last swallow, then set it down... and with great effort, burdened by massive breasts, a huge sagging belly — slowly got to her feet and waddled away to a curtained entrance, her thick, white, dimpled thighs trembling beneath the hem of her red-feathered kilt.

  "The shoulder," Patience called after her — amused by the distancing of the question as she called it, "the" shoulder, not "my" shoulder. "When will I know how it does?"

  The woman turned ponderously back to face her. "Within one WT week, unbandage and sling it, exercise it gently. If you leave it longer, it may grow to the joint, to move never. — Then, after two weeks slung and lightly exercised, you will know what that arm will be forever."

  "... Thank you, Doctor."

  The woman left, billowing the entrance sheepskin so sunlight flashed in for a moment.

  Sliced, while she shouted. Patience lay thanking whatever Jesus or Weather Great for a so-far rescue. Content with lucky minutes, she drifted to sleep .. . and dreamed her Maxwell become a man grown, marvelous and fierce — though lacking humor — the son, truly, of six-hundred years of ice and sacrifice.

  ... When she woke, Patience knew it was night — the small hut now quite dark — and found she needed to shit. But find a possible pot how? She tried to sit up... and did, though that made her dizzy. She sat in cool darkness, taking deep breaths. A poop-pot — and her sword. What else could a lady require ? These savages would keep her Merriment... let its wonderful blade rust in their trophy hut.

  Really.. . really have to have that pot. Prompted, Patience rolled carefully off her pile of sheepskins, favoring the bound left shoulder absolutely, and began — not crawling — but hitching along naked over a rammed-dirt floor. Would have grimy buttocks and no choice about it. She scooted slowly along, then reached out with her right arm, feeling at the near corner for the thing — there must be one, though clean since there was no smell of it. She found that corner empty, then went along a wattled wall for the next.... Soon, would be just in time.

  Then, as if in a staged comedy, the hut's entrance hide was paged aside, and rich yellow lamplight came pouring in, with the silhouettes of two big men behind it.

  Patience saw herself as those warriors must see her — naked, pale, white-haired and scrawny... droop-breasted, bandaged, and crouched in the dirt like a caught cat. In that moment, came to her — not the immediately sensible thing of startled embarrassment and fear — but overwhelming bitterness at age and its changes, unfair to a degree that guaranteed cruel gods.... It was rage enough to leave her frozen where she was, instead of scuttling back to the sheepskins to try to draw one over.

  "Don't be uncomfortable. We'll close our eyes." A very pleasant voice, speaking quite good book-English — almost a Boston gentleman's voice for tone, though not for accent. Sounding from a shadow shape behind the golden glare of light, it seemed to Patience the careful speech of a man who'd taught himself improvement. "I am Paul French-Robin."

  "Our eyes are closed." Second voice — from the other shadow-man — not pleasant, sounding like a breaking branch, and speaking very poor book-English.

  "Can you get back to your bed?" First voice. "Shall I carry you?"

  "Our eyes still closed." Second voice.

  A situation gone from enraging back to comic. What on cold earth did not go that way? "... I appreciate 'eyes closed.' But I find I need a piss-pot."

  Silence. Warrior Paul French-Robin apparently confounded. Then Breaking-branch said, "Over there," and one of them — the lamp-bearer — stepped out into his lamp's light (glance averted from Patience), picked a fat clay pot from a corner by the entrance, sidled over and handed it to her.

  T
hen both men, kilted and feather cloaked, turned their backs — sight apparently the important modesty — and stood while Patience, shoulder aching, awkwardly perched, emptied herself fairly noisily while desperate not to laugh. That once started, there'd be no stopping it.

  Done, though with no wipe-leaf available, she scooted slowly back to her sheepskins — her ungainly shadow following along — and wrestled to pull the top fleece over her.

  The incident apparently dismissed, both men turned, came to her pallet and sat side by side, cross-legged, lamplight shadowing their faces and the raised feather-scarring decorating their bare chests and bellies.

  "Comfortable?" Paul French-Robin (the pleasant voice) smiled. This was a handsome man who knew it, tall, muscled, with a neat beard and long brown hair, glossy as oiled wood, lightly brushed with gray above his ears. Fine eyes, as deep a blue as blue could be. — And, as he'd spoken, every filed tooth still in place, a rarity among tribespeople.

  "I'm Patience Nearly-Lodge," Patience said. "— And grateful for your hospitality."

  "Yes," the handsome man still smiled, "— and cleverly put, from stupid young Pete Aiken to now. But I'm not yet convinced. I might still prefer you dead, Boston. And since it's a politic question, not a war one, it is under my hand."

  "Not so. A matter of war as much as anything." The second man, whose voice sounded splintered — ruined apparently by a blow across his throat — looked very nearly a Person of Boston's Guard, though Patience had smelled nothing but Sunriser-human from them both, with perhaps a faint scent of flowers from Paul French-Robin.... This second man might have been a dwarf, with a huge shaggy head, massive arms and legs so short in proportion — but a dwarf more than six WT-feet tall, with eyes an unpleasant light green, and a face, front, and forearms carved white by healed battle slashes. He wore two heavy hatchets, their long handles thrust through his kilt's wide belt.

  "Chad Budnarik?" It seemed a good guess, though the dwarf-giant didn't respond. Both Robins sat silent, staring at her.

  Patience scented from them all the complexities of men. The held juice of perhaps-soon-fucking, the sweat of mild effort, the harsh breath of meat eaters... and the far more delicate and difficult-to-be-sure-of odor of consideration, decision-choosing. All odors had been clearer to her when she was young, gift of the Talents. That gift now fading, with others. "— Perhaps," she said from her sheepskins, heart going thump thump thump, "— perhaps I can offer a suggestion that prevents what appears to be discord between you important Robins, which might injure the tribe."

  Silence.

  "I'm speaking," Patience said, "of a fortuitous escape." She tried a smile. "— In which case, no decision would have to be made, no disagreement caused among leaders. Also no anger from Boston if I die the city's friend, no strengthening of Boston if I die their enemy — which it happens, I am."

  "Fortuitous." Paul French returned her smile, but unpleasantly. "See?" he nudged the dwarf-giant, "— how richly Cambridge educates? Such learning in the Yard. See what a considerable thing she is, to show tribal fools and savages a way past their difficulties.... Perhaps she is considerable enough to lie staked before the children, and scream out life's lessons under the knife. Much to teach . .. much to teach, who could doubt it?"

  "Boston's enemy — how?" Certainly-Budnarik had no expression on his face, no expression in his eyes. The question might have come from a tree. A tree with filed teeth.

  "They've taken something from me," Patience said, "— something that was mine alone. And voted me exiled for protesting, though I was the Township's daughter, and Nearly-Lodge."

  "What thing?"

  "That is my business, Chad Budnarik-Robin — not yours." Patience's stomach turned in fear with that defiance, and she saw herself — after already toileting before these men — now vomiting mutton broth into their laps.

  Was that a smile from Budnarik? Perhaps almost...

  "A liar from a nest of lies," Paul French said. "Though there is charm here, bravery." He had an orator's, a singer's voice. "Might teach our children much of courage, while she dies."

  Budnarik cleared his throat. "And you roam our mountains — why?"

  "Going north and east, nothing to do with Robins."

  "But had something to do with killing River's King down in Map-Tennessee? And managed with Sparrows!... You understand that pigeons fly for tribes, as well as towns."

  "Yes, Commander," Patience said, sure of who he was.

  "But why? That fight — what business was it of yours?" A second blow to his throat would have left Budnarik unable to speak at all.

  "That king was Boston-crowned. His loss, their great injury."

  "And all that," Paul French said, "— which, by the way, left room on the Mississippi for a king we understand to be much more formidable — all that for some personal reason?"

  "All reasons are personal," Patience said, "— and mine more important than most."

  "You don't yet persuade me." Paul French smiled, apparently a habit of charming with him. "You don't persuade me that you bring the Robins anything but difficulty. You claim against your own Boston, but north to Boston I suspect you were flying. Flying until, apparently, you fell and took your injury.... I don't yet see the benefit in keeping you alive — and less than that in letting you wander."

  "Then if not for politic," Patience said — and noticed that arguing for one's life was excellent medicine; the shoulder hardly hurt at all, "— if not for that, then why not for your tribe's honor and given word? I've traded with your people, and been provided hospitality and food — salted food at that."

  "Traded, my ass," Paul French said, not smiling now, and using a very old copybook phrase. It seemed to Patience he'd read well, been very studious in whatever hut he'd grown sharing with newborn lambs, chicken-birds, and the skulls of Robin enemies. "To kill a boy —"

  "Young man," Patience said, "and hunting me, who had done no harm."

  "To kill Lou Pollano, then hold your hand from a second murder, and call that even? That is no fucking trading!"

  "But the second young man — Pete... Pete Aiken. He agreed to the trade, and that it was fair."

  "Agreed," Budnarik croaked, "with a saber at his neck."

  "But agreed — Pete's reasons his own, though it seems to me that a whole life left to be lived is considerable payment for a single Lou. Certainly seemed fair and square to him.... Do Robins now call one of their warriors Dishonorable-Pete, a welcher and exile and no Robin at all?"

  "'Welcher,'" Budnarik said, and shook his head, almost smiling.

  "You know the word, Commander?"

  "He knows the word, and we know the word," Paul French said. "I wonder how many fine old Warm-time words would be spouted if you're staked."

  "I'm becoming curious," Patience said to him, "why you're so willing to consider my death, an injured woman and your guest.... Is it possible a Boston pigeon flies to you, and to no one else among the Robins? You seem so to be their friend."

  "Nonsense — and desperate nonsense."

  "Also, I notice no scars on you but decoration. No sign you've fought the Guard when they've come this way to choose among your tribe's daughters. No sign you've ever fought at all.... Perhaps you're too clever a man to fight. Perhaps — so handsome — you have other interests."

  "Oh, I have only one interest now."

  "Still," Patience said, "'handsome is as handsome does,' such a perfect old phrase. And you do little boys, I would say, for preference. Do I smell a flowery scent?... Lilac?"

  Silence. The tribes, losing children to every winter, had little sympathy for those who made none.

  "— Of course, if I've offended (and though being a trade-guest), I will happily meet you with a sword, even weary, wrong-handed, and a woman."

  An unhandsome look. "... There would be no honor to me in that."

  "What you do not have," Patience said, "— you cannot lose, 'Lilac' May I call you Lilac?"

  French raised his fist to hit her
, but Budnarik reached to grip his arm — gifting Patience with hope even after both men rose, silent, took their lamp, and left her to darkness.

  ... Charlotte-doctor came lumbering with first light, found Patience lying awake, listening to village noises, and knelt ponderously to examine the shoulder's strapping, and scold her. "Sleep," she said. Then, "Raveled sleeve — raveled sleeve!" apparently an incantation, so not so scientific a physician after all.

  "I would rather be awake while I can."

  The doctor chuckled at that, chins wobbling. "Oh, I doubt I'll be carving you — and too bad; I'm wonderful with the little knives. But," a sigh, "likely not to be. A hostage held from Boston, if Boston loves you — or as a gift for Boston, if they don't. That's how you'll be kept."

  "... Not the best news."

  "Not the worst, either." Fat fingers fairly gentle. "There, that shoulder will do the best it can."

  "I believe I have Paul French to thank for holding me."

  "To thank for keeping you from my knives, yes. Sweet Chad would have killed you; believes you too dangerous to save — his grateful sister notwithstanding." Charlotte-doctor heaved to stand up. "Now, I'll bring you food. Then, sleep."

  When she was gone — allowing a glimpse of a sentry's shadow when the sheepskin swung aside — Patience lay considering bad judgment. Bad judgment such as deliberately angering Paul French, a man of politic — who likely had threatened only to discover what threats might produce — angering him in order to impress Budnarik, a man of action, with her cleverness and courage. And impressed him sufficiently that he decided her execution was advisable.

  A serious misjudgement, and barely survived. Which left the question whether it was a blunder from weakness and agonizing injury, or simply the deterioration of a Person bred to deteriorate early, so as not to become a threat to the Township. As, of course, she had become already — disobedient, prideful, and grasping of her child.

  Now, to be kept. Grim news, since tribesmen were experienced in holding those they wished held. She'd be fortunate not to be blinded... or kept cramped in a little wooden box with only room for huddled crouching, until, after months and years, she became a shrunken knotted thing — screaming with pain, occasionally — that whined when children poked sticks through the slit where gruel was poured in, and water.