Call Down the Stars

by Sue Harrison

  He walked until he came to a path that angled up from the river, a woman’s trail that led to traplines. He cut up to the path, then stopped and put on his snowshoes. He trudged through the snow, loose in the shelter of willows and alders. He did not plan to go far. The walking was too difficult for Biter, but each of his steps seemed to lead to another, and finally Ghaden realized that he was walking only because he did not want to stop.

  He turned and looked back at Biter. The dog was struggling, walking with his head down, tongue out. Ghaden crouched beside the dog, flung an arm around his neck.

  How often had they sat in just this way, Biter’s warmth and strength a comfort to a little boy afraid of so many things?

  “I will never have a better dog,” he told Biter. Biter wagged his tail, and Ghaden said, “I don’t know where dogs go in the spirit world.” His throat closed around his words, and Ghaden had to stop, take a breath. “But if you can, wait for me.”

  Biter whined low in his throat, and Ghaden knew that the cold was making the animal’s legs ache. Had Ligige’ herself not complained of the cold, what it did to her knees and ankles?

  Enough waiting, Ghaden told himself, and for the last time, he leaned his head against Biter’s neck, buried his face in the soft fur there. Yaa had promised that when Biter died, she would make a parka ruff for Ghaden from the dog’s fur. At least that would be a comfort, and perhaps also give Ghaden some of Biter’s strength.

  Biter was too old to run ahead of Ghaden on the trail, giving opportunity to use a quick spear from behind. The easiest way to kill him would be to cut his throat and hold him as he died. Ghaden pulled his sleeve knife from the sheath on his arm, moving slowly so Biter would not jump away. Ghaden clasped the blade tightly, prepared to sink it deep, but suddenly Biter leaped up, his eyes fixed on something hidden in the brush. The whine in his throat changed into a deep growl, and the dog jumped away.

  Ghaden lunged forward, trying to catch the braided babiche cord that was around Biter’s neck, but, hampered by his snowshoes, he came up with only a handful of fur.

  As though his legs were suddenly young again, Biter jumped through the snow, his frenzied yips laced with howls and cries. Ghaden followed the dog into a thick growth of black spruce. Two ptarmigan flew up from their hiding places in the snow, startling Ghaden into covering his face with his arms. Then he heard a growl—not dog, but bear—and he stopped, shifted his knife into his left hand, and pulled out one of his spears. He moved his head until he could see the animal through the trees, a glimpse of dark fur. Biter was still barking, and Ghaden slowly walked forward, pushed his way through a tangle of alders, then stopped in surprise.

  It was a brown bear, the largest he had ever seen.

  The warmth of the day must have pulled the animal from its winter den, Ghaden thought, though it was early yet for bears to be out. It stood as tall as two men, as wide as three, and was angry, as bears often are in late winter, their bellies empty, and the rivers still too thick with ice for fishing, winter berries stripped by children from the village.

  If Biter had not alerted Ghaden, the bear would have come upon them as they sat together in the snow. Then what chance would they have had?

  Like all River dogs, Biter had been trained in hunting bear, but the River hunters took black bear—smaller and less likely to attack, more predictable in their actions. Brown bears, twice, even three times as large as black, showed no fear of men, and why should they? What man, even armed with spears, knives, and a bow, had a good chance against such an animal, especially if it was hungry or protecting cubs?

  The bear was distracted by Biter’s barking, and at first did not see Ghaden. It lunged toward the dog, but Biter jumped away.

  Ghaden gripped his spear, and when the bear reared up, erect on its hind legs, he aimed for the heart, threw. The bear caught sight of the spear in its flight and thrust out a paw, the animal’s brown and yellow claws as long as Ghaden’s fingers. The point penetrated the right front leg, and the bear screamed, turning its attention from Biter to the stone spearhead that jutted from the inner side of the leg. Biter scooted around behind the bear to rip at the animal’s hamstrings.

  “Get away, Biter!” Ghaden shouted.

  A dog so old was not quick enough to lunge in and bite, then escape beyond reach of the animal’s claws or teeth. That Biter had been able to evade the bear during the first attack was surprising enough. Ghaden called again, but Biter continued to bark and lunge.

  Escape, Ghaden told himself. Go now. What more honorable way for Biter to die? But Ghaden could not make himself leave.

  The bear broke off the spear’s wooden shaft, bit at the spearhead, lacerating its tongue and coloring its muzzle with blood. The animal turned, swatted again at Biter. Ghaden, heart pounding, threw his other spear. This time the weapon hit solidly just below the animal’s breastbone.

  Ghaden waited for the bear to drop, but it merely grunted and gripped the spear with both paws, raised the butt end to its mouth, and jerked until the spear was free.

  The bear looked at Ghaden, its eyes as wise and knowing as a man’s, then stepped forward and crushed the spear into the snow.

  Ghaden moved his hands to his bow, pulled the tie string to release it from his back, jerked arrows from the sheath. The bear dropped to all fours, and Ghaden’s breath caught hard, closing up his throat, so that blackness began to draw in from the sides of his eyes.

  The animal was going to attack. What could an arrow do against a bear that even spears would not kill?

  Suddenly Biter jumped from behind, set his teeth into the back of the animal’s left leg. At first the bear merely shook the leg, but Biter braced his feet in the snow and began to jerk his head side to side. The bear stopped, and Ghaden nocked an arrow, let it fly.

  It took the bear in the left shoulder, and before the animal could turn toward the pain, Ghaden released another. It found the bear’s neck.

  The bear roared, broke off both shafts with one swipe, then he twisted and raised a paw, brought it down hard on Biter’s head. The dog yelped, released his grip, fell to the snow, and lay kicking, keening out a thin, high wail.

  Ghaden aimed the third arrow for the bear’s eye, waited to release it until the animal turned back toward him. But he missed his mark, and the arrow glanced off the bear’s skull, leaving a bloody furrow. Then the animal was running, and there was no more time for arrows.

  In deep snow, even with snowshoes, Ghaden had no chance. He dropped his bow and drew his knives, the sleeve knife in his left hand, the long-bladed hunting knife he kept strapped to his leg in his right. He rolled himself into a ball, shrugged his pack up over the back of his neck, and waited for the attack.

  Ghaden felt the claws rake through the tough caribou hide of his parka, through the inner parka and into his skin. The bear’s mouth smelled of rotten meat, of long winter sleep, of fresh blood. The animal’s teeth scraped Ghaden’s shoulder, then clamped over the pack on Ghaden’s back. The bear reared and jerked the pack hard enough to break its straps.

  All things around Ghaden slowed. Even the wind’s voice dimmed, and Biter’s whines were a distant sound, lost in the branches of spruce and alder. He had heard stories of hunters who, attacked by a bear, had pretended to be dead. But this bear was hungry, and even if it thought Ghaden were dead, the animal would eat.

  Ghaden turned his head and saw through the ruff of his parka that the bear was still battling the pack. If he had any chance to save himself, he must do it now. He no longer had his bow, and his arrows lay scattered in the snow. Even if he managed to bury both his knives deep in the bear’s neck, slice the huge vessels that fed blood to the head, the animal would take too long to die.

  With the bear weak from blood loss, perhaps Ghaden would have a chance if he ran. The animal had its back to him, but was so close that Ghaden could hear the grumble that came from its throat as it ravaged the pack. Ghaden, jumped up and began running through the snow. The ice crust caught at his snowsho
es with each step, clutching as though to hold him back. With every breath he gasped in a mouthful of cold air until his lungs burned.

  He saw the river through the trees and began to hope. Then, suddenly, a rip of heat, pain. The bear’s claws gouged into his side. Ghaden turned, felt the teeth again, this time in his left arm. He plunged his hunting knife into the animal’s throat, bore down on the haft, cutting a bloody trench into the animal’s neck.

  The bear slammed a paw against Ghaden’s shoulder, and Ghaden was suddenly flying through the air. He landed against a large spruce, heard the pop of his ribs, felt pain like a blade slice into his side.

  Ghaden reached for the tree’s lowest branches and clamped his legs around the bole, his snowshoes scraping and clattering against the rough bark. The animal’s breath was on the back of his neck, but Ghaden could not pull himself up. He braced for the death blow, then heard the tortured cry of a dog.

  Though he should have been trying to climb, Ghaden could not help but look, and he opened his mouth in disbelief when he saw Biter standing behind the bear. Flesh torn from the top of Biter’s head hung in a bloody flap over his left ear, leaving his skull bare.

  The dog’s shrieks were terrible, and even the bear stopped, stared, but then it dropped to all fours and attacked, flipping Biter to his back, raking claws into Biter’s side. Biter whipped his head to find purchase on the bear’s throat. The bear reared, and Biter hung on, rending the flesh as the bear tried to shake him loose.

  Blood poured over Biter’s fur, and the bear’s roars rebounded from the trees, so it sounded as though many animals fought. Ghaden saw his bow in the snow and, dropping from the tree, scuttled over to it. He nocked an arrow and took aim, screamed at the pain when he drew back the bowstring.

  The arrow lodged in the bear’s left eye. The animal opened its mouth and a flow of blood gouted out, slicked Biter’s fur. The dog released his grip and fell to the ground. The bear cocked its head and batted at something Ghaden could not see, then it slowly toppled, crushing Biter into the earth.

  Ghaden waited for the bear to shake itself back to life, but it remained where it was, and finally Ghaden took another arrow, released it into the animal’s neck. The bear didn’t move. Ghaden walked close, prodded it with the end of his bow. The bear was dead.

  Ghaden’s ribs pained him with each breath, and his left arm dripped blood, but he set his right shoulder against the carcass, took in as much air as he was able, and heaved the animal to its side, enough so he could get Biter out from under it.

  Biter’s eyes were open, and Ghaden knelt beside him, lifted a hand to push the dog’s scalp back over the dome of his skull. Ghaden stroked his muzzle and began a quiet song of praise, something sung to honor warriors. For one quick moment the dog’s spirit rested in those open eyes, looked out at Ghaden. Love there. Love.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Herendeen Bay, Alaska Peninsula

  602 B.C.

  “A SAD STORY,” QUMALIX SAID, but she laid a hand against her belly as if she had just eaten her fill of a good meal.

  Yikaas shrugged. “What better way for a brave dog to die? Besides, he was old.”

  “What happened to Ghaden?”

  “According to most storytellers, he had broken ribs, and he carried the scars of the bear’s claws and teeth all his life. He must have been a man who understood how to show respect. A bear that powerful would have cursed him had he not followed all the taboos.”

  “Taboos? What taboos?”

  Yikaas was surprised by her question. Anyone who did not respect a brown bear was a fool. “The same that all people follow,” he said. “A hunter can scarcely say the animal’s name, and as a woman, even though you are a storyteller, you dare not. Only an old woman is allowed to eat bear meat, and then just certain parts. The hide must be scraped out by a man, and left to hang for a summer or two before it can be used. Some people cut it into little pieces and bury it. That’s how much life is in the animal. Even the hairs can curse you. The First Men do not know these taboos?”

  “On the island where I live there are no …” Qumalix paused. “Large animals,” she finally said. “Perhaps the hunters who live on the Traders’ Beach know about taboos. I have heard them say there are such animals in the mountains here, and some that even live beside the streams.”

  “You have no bears on your island?”

  “None.”

  “Caribou?”

  “No.”

  “What do your men hunt?”

  As soon as he asked the question, Yikaas realized it was a foolish one. The First Men were sea hunters. They took seals and sea lions and walrus and sometimes even whales.

  “Our hunters take sea mammals.”

  There was no hint of derision in her words, and he appreciated the gentleness of her answer.

  “But tell me more about Ghaden,” she said. “What happened to him after the fight?”

  “Ghaden’s sister scraped out the dog’s skin, and for the rest of his life, he wore Biter’s fur as trim for his parka hood. The old ones say that the dog continued to protect him, for Ghaden lived long and became chief hunter for his people.”

  Qumalix stood up and shook the sand from her sax. “That’s a good ending. Too many stories end with sadness.”

  Yikaas shrugged. “Any story can end with happiness or sadness, depending on where the storyteller chooses to stop.”

  She smiled. “I see why they chose you as Dzuuggi,” she told him. “You should tell Ghaden’s story tonight. The men will like it.”

  “And not the women?”

  “The women, too, but men are more difficult to please.”

  She spoke a few words in the First Men tongue, then switched to the River language to say, “Those are the First Men’s words of leaving. I said, ‘I am going now.’”

  Yikaas repeated the phrase, purposely twisted some of the sounds. Qumalix cocked her head and said the words again. Yikaas hid a smile in his cheek at her patience, for she corrected him until he had them right.

  As the next long day colored toward night and its promise of brief darkness, the people left their fishing, and those hunters who were not out in iqyan joined the women and children in the storyteller lodge. This time a hunter from another First Men village spoke first. He wore a whaling hat, brightly painted in reds and blues, with eyes drawn on each side and a long prow that extended beyond his forehead like the snout of an animal.

  He did not have the River tongue, so Qumalix translated his words. Yikaas felt like a young man sharing his wife for the first time, and his skin prickled at the thought of the hunter’s words flowing from Qumalix’s mouth. Finally he could no longer watch, but had to close his eyes and only listen.

  The stories were about hunting, and Yikaas waited in hope for the man to boast of his own success, but he seemed to have no faults, telling only the stories of others and telling them with great respect.

  Some of the stories were funny and made the people laugh; others brought tears. If Qumalix paused in translating, Yikaas found himself holding his breath until he heard what was going to happen next. But even so, the Sea Hunter’s success with his stories grated as harshly as lava rock against Yikaas’s spirit.

  Between stories, he thought back over all the tales he himself told. Most were about people who lived in ancient times. Sometimes those stories were not much to hear, but what Dzuuggi could allow that knowledge to die? None of his stories were funny, but it would be good to have tales that brought laughter rather than only solemn agreement or careful thought. Kuy’aa should have told him such stories; surely funny things had happened to River People, too.

  At least the Sea Hunter man spoke only in his own voice, did not send his words to the top of the lodge to echo from the smokehole, did not speak harshly to mimic a hunter or raise his voice to show he spoke for a woman. These were all things that Yikaas did and did well. And there were no riddles. Of course only River People made riddles, but these Sea Hunters might enjoy them, to
o. They were thinkers. Their silence proved them so, and often they said something very wise, words that Yikaas took into his heart to remember.

  Finally the Sea Hunter’s stories ended, but before he left the center of the ulax, he reached into a pouch that hung at his waist and pulled out a necklace of bird bone beads, handed it to Qumalix. Yikaas had to turn his eyes away from her joy. He wondered if such giving was customary among the Sea Hunters. If so, his rudeness was already noticed. It would do little good to give her something now. Better to wait until all the storytelling was over, then give her a large gift, something a woman would value. He could ask Kuy’aa what that might be. Perhaps Qumalix would like one of the parkas he had brought to trade.

  Kuy’aa was sitting beside him, and she bumped his arm to call him from his thoughts, then pointed with her chin toward Qumalix. Qumalix gestured for Yikaas to join her, and he made his way to the center of the ulax, took his place beside her. She spoke for a moment to the people in the lodge, then leaned close to whisper that she had explained about Ghaden’s story, and they were ready to learn about this man and his brave dog Biter.

  Yikaas used his voices to tell the story, and though he had no jokes, the people laughed when the dog’s barks came from the ulax roof. Even Qumalix laughed, hard enough that she had to stop in her translating, and Yikaas thought that she might be showing a little more joy in his stories than she had with the Sea Hunter’s tales.

  He wondered for a moment what it would be like to have Qumalix as wife. She was good to look at, and they could share one another’s stories, but he reminded himself that most Sea Hunter women would rather be wife to a First Men hunter than a River man. River People and First Men looked at life so differently. Then he remembered the stories of Aqamdax and Chakliux. What man and woman had ever been happier together? And Aqamdax had been Sea Hunter, Chakliux River. Perhaps their differences had not mattered so much because they had both been storytellers.