Call Down the Stars

by Sue Harrison

  Daughter shook her head in disbelief. “I know what you say is true, but it is difficult for me to imagine it.”

  K’os had knelt beside one of the iqyan, was struggling to pull a pack of dried fish from the stern. When she finally managed to free it, she turned and said, “There are treasures in those forests. A healer can find many things to help others. I will teach you, Uutuk, and then the River People will be glad that Ghaden brought you, even if you are First Men.”

  Daughter knew K’os’s words were meant to encourage her, but they put a chill of fear into her bones, so that even her fingers and feet began to ache with dread. Later, after they had eaten and the darkness of night had cloaked their beach, she and Ghaden curled up together under their sleeping robes, and the touch of his hands soothed her, so she slept well with good dreams and no fear.

  Herendeen Bay, Alaska Peninsula

  602 B.C.

  “Enough of these stories about women!”

  Yikaas glanced up at the climbing log. He was not surprised to hear Sky Catcher’s protest. Who else caused him so many problems?

  “We already told you that we did not want to hear so much about Daughter. Almost everyone here is a trader or a hunter. Tell us a man’s story. We have all made the journey from this village to the mainland.”

  “Yes,” Yikaas said after Qumalix translated Sky Catcher’s words, “but what if you were a woman, lying in an iqyax, unable to see the sky? That is something to think about.”

  Many of the men mumbled their agreement. One shouted out, “No wonder women do not like to travel. It would be difficult not to be afraid.”

  “Ha!” said another. “If she trusts her husband she should be glad just to lie there all day, doing nothing, not even paddling.”

  Sky Catcher moved down the climbing log, crouched on one of the notches that still allowed him to be above the other men in the ulax. “You sound like you wish you were a woman,” he said to the hunter.

  Several men laughed. “Who has the penis in your ulax?” one First Men trader called out. “Your wife?”

  Qumalix leaned close to tell Yikaas what the trader had said, and Yikaas, angry at their foolishness, answered, “Man or woman, it is good to see life through another’s eyes.”

  Some of the men shouted their agreement, but others began to call out more insults, even to question the possibility of curses when a man tried too hard to understand how a woman felt, how she saw the world.

  “It is best to leave such things to storytellers,” the chief hunter finally told them, then said to Sky Catcher, “you need to come down and sit with us.” When Sky Catcher remained where he was, the chief hunter stood and stabbed the air with a finger, like a father scolding a child. “Now!”

  Sky Catcher scrambled from his place on the climbing log and sat down at the back of the ulax, but he held his mouth in a scowl and mumbled out complaints until Yikaas said, “Cen’s story.”

  Then the men shouted their approval, except for Sky Catcher, who crossed his arms over his chest and closed his eyes as though he planned to sleep rather than listen.

  The Bering Sea

  6435 B.C.

  CEN’S STORY

  For three days the sea controlled Cen’s iqyax. There were moments when the roaring in his ears seemed to diminish, and he began to hope that some of his hearing would return. But though he listened carefully each time the sea’s voice grew quiet, no other sounds came to him.

  His eyes could tell night from day unless clouds hovered too close. During those times of grayness, he almost believed that he was dead and traveling toward the spirit world, for what did any man know about that journey? There were shamans who claimed to have gone to that place of spirits, but they did not describe their journeys. Besides, Cen was a man who had learned not to trust too much in what others claimed, especially if what they said would bring them gain.

  He tried to keep track of the days that passed, to number them in his head, but without eyes and ears to set boundaries for his mind, his thoughts seemed to travel in devious paths and on foolish trails. He drank his water sparingly, limiting himself to three sips taken only after a long time of darkness, the end of a night. By that measure, it seemed that four or five days had passed, for he had nearly emptied one water bladder.

  At first his belly had been unable to hold in anything he ate, but the last dried fish had stayed down. He had enough fish yet for many days, though somehow the pack had allowed water in, and although so far the fish were only softened by the damp, he feared they would mold.

  He continued to sing to the Creator, the wind, and the sea, asking that the sea carry him to a good beach, but his throat was still raw, and the words scraped over his tongue like an adze. If the pain in his throat was any indication, his songs would not be pleasing to hear, and Cen wondered if it would be better to stay silent rather than give insult with his poor voice. But finally he decided that all things knew what he had gone through, and that the sea, hearing, might admire his courage and consent to guide him.

  During what he thought was the fifth night, Cen was suddenly awakened by something bumping against one side of his iqyax. His first impulse was to curl himself as tightly as he could, make himself small, giving whatever it was less chance to grab him with teeth or claws.

  The storm had not taken the long knife he wore strapped to his calf. He pulled it from the sheath, held it in his right hand, then fisted his left hand and slowly moved it out over the water. He held his breath, his heart thudding until the blood pounded in his veins. Nothing happened. He took a long breath and lowered his hand into the sea.

  “It is night, and so you try to trick me into thinking you are not there. You think that I cannot see you in the darkness. You are wrong. I know where you are. Do you see my knife?” He raised his right hand, flexed his wrist so that any light from the moon, if there was a moon, would catch on the obsidian blade. “My knife is hungry for the taste of blood.”

  He said those words once and then again, but still nothing happened, and because he could not hear his own voice, he wondered if perhaps he was speaking only in a whisper. He filled his lungs with air, shouted the words.

  Nothing.

  Again he lowered his left hand into the water and waited for pain, but there was only the cold of the sea.

  “What are you?” he demanded. “Fish? Otter? Seal?”

  Something touched the stub of his smallest finger, and he jerked away his hand. Something slapped against his iqyax. Through the thin skin of the cover, he felt it move, but not like an animal moves. His heart leaped for a moment in hope. Seaweed? That would mean he was near shore.

  No, he told himself. It was too solid for seaweed. Perhaps it was driftwood, carried by the same current that had claimed his boat.

  Gathering his courage, Cen again thrust his hand into the water, this time with fingers splayed, ready to clasp whatever had found him.

  It came into his hand, wet and hard and slimy. A limb from some tree. He tried to wrestle it into his iqyax, but the limb was heavy and nearly pulled him into the sea. He slid his knife back into its sheath, used both hands, leaning right as he lifted. He finally got it into the iqyax and settled it across the coaming, moved it until it seemed centered. He extended his left hand as far as he could reach and did not feel the end of the limb, did the same with his right. It was longer than a tall man, but only as big around as his wrists, and it smelled like cedar, the best wood for paddles, light and strong.

  A limb like that could be a good thing for a man to have if some wave were casting him against rocks, but it was too long. He would have to shorten it. Perhaps he could even use it as some kind of paddle, not a good paddle, but better than nothing.

  Of course, not seeing, not hearing, how could he know which way to direct his iqyax? Cen thrust that thought from his mind. The sea had given him a gift. Why see it as less than that?

  He had always made his paddles the measure of his arms outstretched, with the blade extending beyond. So he
leaned forward, reached as far as he could with both hands, caught the place where his right fingertips touched. He used his thumbnail to gouge a mark in the sea-softened wood. The end of the limb widened out into branches like the bones of a hand, and suddenly in his mind he saw a new kind of paddle, the bellyskin that held his dried fish pulled taut over those fingered branches and tied in place to make a blade.

  A blade like that would not hold up against rock or strong currents, but in calm seas, it might be useful—if he knew which way to paddle.

  He moved his hands to the other end. The limb was twice the size of his wrist where it had broken away from the tree, that end still prickly with splinters. A good sign. Perhaps it had not been in the sea long enough to rot.

  What should he do? Cut off the stout end where the strength lay, or cut off the branches that might be useful as a blade? He considered his choices, then decided to cut the branch in the middle. The paddle part would be short, but he could bend close to the sea to use it, and then he would still have enough length at the thick end to push himself away from rocks and shallows.

  Twice he measured the stick in hand lengths, then used his knife to cut at the center. The sea had stripped off the bark, and the wood was punky under his blade, but after he had carved a deep notch, he came to the heartwood, still dry and strong, fighting his knife with each cut.

  “Good, you are a warrior,” Cen said to the branch. “I need that in you. We might be small against this giant sea, but we both have strong hearts.”

  He turned the branch and again cut past the punk to the heart, continued until he was nearly through, then broke the branch in half. He whittled the cut ends smooth and slid them down into the iqyax. He was tired and needed to sleep. When he woke, he would cover the branch end with the seal belly from his fish pack. Then he would have a paddle.

  During that sleep Cen dreamed as a man who could see, and so when the sun woke him, prising his right eye open with strong light, he did not think it anything unusual to see that brightness, to shield his eye against it. Then he remembered where he was and what had happened to him. He opened his eye as wide as he was able, cried out against the pain of the light, then crowed in joy as he realized that he could see the brown and yellow hide of his iqyax.

  He forgot the caution that any man should use in recovering from wounds, and he pried open his eyelid to gaze at the sea. The fog had lifted itself into white clouds that stood as high as mountains above the waves, so it seemed to Cen that his iqyax had found a valley at the center of the sea, with white mountain walls and the water cutting a valley floor.

  His eye was still swollen enough that it did not stay open by itself, so Cen held the lid up with one thumb and, using a hand and the movements of his body, turned his iqyax in a circle, but there was nothing except the sea and clouds.

  He decided to finish his paddle, then set his course as soon as the fog lifted, for surely then he would be able to make out some dark edge of land, but if not, at least the stars would guide him, those few that might be strong enough to push their light through clouded night skies.

  But by the time he had pulled the skin of dried fish from the bow of his iqyax, the light had drilled through his eye and into his brain, making his head ache so badly that he could do nothing but sit still and allow the iqyax to again choose its own path through the sea.

  He slept, and when he woke, it was night. The pain in his head had subsided into a throb that beat at the base of his skull and just above his ears, but it was a pain a man could ignore. Again he pried open his eye and looked out at the night. Fog lay wet and thick, even masking the sea. He lifted his head to the skies and saw a rift in the clouds, the clearing full of stars. Then he knew with great despair that he was far from land, that somehow he had been drifting north and west rather than south and east.

  “Well, then,” he finally said, speaking aloud so the sea would know he had not given up, “I will finish my paddle tomorrow and will start toward land. It will not be forever before it rains, then I will stop and fill my drinking cup, and I have enough fish to live for a long time.”

  He let himself fall again into sleep, hid his fear so deeply that it did not color his dreams.

  GHADEN’S STORY

  It was more than a moon before Ghaden, Seal, K’os, and Daughter arrived at Chakliux’s village. They had stopped to trade with the Walrus Hunters, though K’os had been concerned that she might again be claimed as slave. They had not recognized her, and Ghaden had seen the relief and anger that had warred within her when she realized that. Still, she had been careful, collected no plants for medicines if any Walrus women were nearby, and kept her misshapen hands carefully hidden, for they had changed little since those years she had been a slave.

  During their trading, she did not speak in the Walrus language, nor in River, only in the First Men tongue, and though she had kept her hair in braids once they left the Traders’ Beach, she had reverted again to the bun worn by First Men wives.

  It would not be so at Chakliux’s village. Ghaden had no doubt that they would recognize her. After all, they had known her always, and she had been wife as well as slave. Besides, he had to tell Chakliux that Uutuk was daughter to K’os, and thus sister to Chakliux. Except for the relationship of mother to child, what was more important than uncle to a sister’s son? If he and Uutuk had children, Chakliux would want to help Ghaden train the boys to hunt and fish.

  Ghaden’s memories of K’os from his childhood, when she owned his sister Aqamdax as slave, were memories of an evil woman who would betray anyone for her own gain. But how could he reconcile those memories with what he now knew of her? She was a very good mother to Uutuk, caring and concerned. Sometimes he saw a selfishness in her that most mothers did not possess, but she often gave Uutuk the best portions of food, and she treated her husband Seal with respect, though Seal was a weak man and did not always deserve K’os’s deference. Were his early memories twisted by anger and fear during that time of war? Perhaps. What child ever understands all that is happening around him?

  At least he owed K’os respect. She was Uutuk’s mother and had taught her well. Though Uutuk was a new wife, her skill with needle and awl, in storytelling, and in preparing food rivaled that of old women. She gave herself eagerly when they were in bed, and she was careful to follow the taboos she had been taught as a First Men woman. Though she still had much to learn about River ways, Ghaden had no doubt that she would make him a fine wife, even if they chose to live among the River People.

  But he also had no doubt that by claiming Uutuk, he would no longer find himself truly welcome in Chakliux’s village.

  He sighed, for a moment lifting the weight of sorrow that had invaded his chest since his father’s death. He wished he could ask Cen for advice. He wanted to live in his own village with Aqamdax and Yaa and their families, but he had made his choice, and he would not give up Uutuk even for his sisters. Perhaps once K’os and Seal returned to the First Men, Chakliux would allow Ghaden and Uutuk to stay in his village, but if not, there were other villages. Perhaps Cen’s wife, Gheli, would appreciate having Ghaden provide meat for her and her daughters now that she was a widow.

  Ghaden looked up. Uutuk was watching him. She would not worry so much if she knew how much comfort she gave him. Ghaden smiled at her, and she returned his smile.

  They would be happy no matter where they lived, but surely Chakliux would see that K’os was now no more than a harmless old woman, concerned only that her daughter have a good life.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  THEY TOOK THEIR IQYAN upriver toward Chakliux’s village and stopped for the night less than a half-day’s walk away. Ghaden wanted to go on, but he knew K’os was right when she cautioned that they should stop. It was a good place to camp, a clearing that both K’os and Ghaden knew, though K’os exclaimed at how much smaller it had become. In the years she had been gone, spruce and birch had crowded in on all sides.

  They put up a spruce bough shelter and re
moved the iqyan covers, then raised the wood frames high in the trees in hopes of keeping them away from bears and wolverine that might chew at the sinew that bound the joints or the blood paste that held the ivory wear plates in place where wood met wood.

  There would be damage, Ghaden had explained to Seal. Unlike the First Men’s islands, there were many animals in River country, and the small hungry ones could easily climb trees. Seal grumbled about that, but Ghaden ignored him. The man had traded with River People before. Perhaps he had not come this far inland, but he knew about the trees and the animals.

  “They give as much as they take, if not more,” Ghaden had said, then found Uutuk and went into the forest, where they sat watching, so Ghaden could point out the various birds and animals and explain their spirit powers.

  After a time, K’os came looking for them and took Uutuk to find medicine plants. For a little while Ghaden walked with them, but K’os picked so many different plants, told so much about each, that soon everything was jumbled in his mind. He wondered if Uutuk was remembering what K’os told her or if her attention was only a politeness. But later in the evening as they sat roasting two hares that Ghaden had taken with a throwing stick, he heard his wife ask questions and repeat information so that K’os could correct her. He was glad, proud of her. A woman with a quick mind usually made a good mother, and if Uutuk could learn to be a healer perhaps that alone would be enough to merit them a place in Chakliux’s village.

  As the sun was setting, K’os sent Uutuk out to collect more wood to get them through the night.

  “It is warm,” Ghaden told her. “Why worry about a fire?”

  “To keep away bears,” she said.

  He shrugged. There was always some worry about bears, but most of those that lived this near to Chakliux’s village were black bears and not likely to come too close once they smelled the smoke of a fire, even one that burned out sometime in the night. He supposed that K’os was more nervous about such animals now that she had lived so many years on a First Men’s island.