A Woman of the Iron People

by Eleanor Arnason

  Nia felt even more surprised. Her mouth hung open. Her hands stayed where they were, on her thighs.

  He went on. “We have talked it over, the three of us. If you are interested, we will draw straws. The one who gets the long straw will go to meet you. This area would be good. There aren’t likely to be any other men around. Or women. It’s easy to get distracted in the time for mating, and this is something that ought to be done the right way. Carefully.”

  “No,” said Nia.

  Inzara made the gesture of inquiry.

  “I have done too many strange things already, and I’m getting old. I don’t think I want any more children.”

  “You have children already? Are there any daughters? How old are they?”

  Nia made the gesture that meant “stop it” or “shut up.”

  “Why?” asked Inzara.

  “This is crazy. Men don’t pick the women they mate with. Men don’t care who their children are or what the children are like.”

  “What do you know about men? What does any woman know? You sit in your villages! You chatter! You gossip! You tell one another what men are like. How can you possibly understand anything about us? Have you ever spent a winter alone on the plain?”

  “Yes,” said Nia.

  He barked, then made the gesture of apology. “I was forgetting who you were.” He paused and frowned. Then he spoke again. His voice was deep and even. He didn’t sound the least bit crazy. “Tell me where you will be, Nia. Do you really want to mate with whatever man comes along? He might be a little man. He might be old or crazy. Who knows how the child will turn out?”

  Nia looked at the bird cooking above the fire. The skin was turning brown. Liquid fat covered it and it shone. She turned the bird, then looked at Inzara. “I told you, I don’t want any more children. Also, I am tired of doing things in new and unusual ways. I want to be ordinary for a while.”

  Inzara made the gesture that meant “that isn’t likely to happen.”

  “Also, I don’t like other people making plans for me. I do what I want.”

  “And you want to be ordinary,” said Inzara. He stood up and stretched. Hu! He was enormous! His fur gleamed in the firelight. So did his jewelry. “Will you take me across the river?”

  “Why do you want to go?”

  “The hairless people have built a village south of here on the Long Lake. I want to see it.”

  “Why? You won’t be able to go into it.”

  “Will the hairless people drive me out?”

  Nia thought for a moment. “No.”

  “I can endure people. Look at me now. I’ve been sitting and talking with you, and it isn’t the time for mating. If the village looks interesting, maybe I’ll go in. Ara wants information. I am the one who gets along with people, so I am the one who came. But he’s the one who’s curious.”

  They ate the groundbird. Inzara took a blanket and went around the house. He slept on the ground next to his animal. Nia slept inside. She dreamt about the village of the hairless people. She was in it, wandering among the big round pale houses. Inzara was there, and other people she did not recognize. Some of them were real people, people with fur. Others were like Li-sa and Deragu.

  In the morning she took Inzara across the river. “There is no good trail along the river. You will have to go west onto the plain and then south.”

  He made the gesture that meant he understood.

  She went back to the house of Tanajin.

  More days went by. There was a lot of rain. Leaves fell. The sun moved into the south. When it was visible, it had the pale look of winter. It was growing hungry, the old women used to say, though that made no sense to Nia. The sun was a buckle. Everyone knew that. The Mistress of the Forge had made it and given it to the Spirit of the Sky. He wore it on his belt. How could a buckle grow hungry?

  There was no one to answer her question.

  A group of travelers came out of the west: Amber Women, returning home. They were quiet and they looked perturbed. Nia did not ask why. She ferried them. They gave her a blanket made of spotted fur and a pot made of tin.

  The weather kept getting colder. There was ice in the marshes now. It was thin and delicate, present in the early morning and gone by noon. If she touched it, it broke. Aiya! It was like the drinking cups of the hairless people or their strange square hollow pieces of ice.

  The sun moved farther into the south. The sky was low and gray. One morning she heard thunder, but saw nothing.

  Another island, she thought. Going up or coming down. How many were in the lake now? Where did they go when they left?

  Inzara returned. He built a fire. She went and got him.

  “I couldn’t do it. I saw their boats and their wagons. I knew my brother would want to know more. But I wasn’t able to force myself to go in. Even after the man without hair invited me.”

  Nia made the gesture of inquiry.

  “The one I met before. Deragu. He found me on the bluff above the village. We talked. He said other people—real people—had come and looked at the village, but not come in. Not many. Three or maybe four. He asked me to give you a message.”

  “Yes?”

  “Come to the village for the winter. You gave many gifts to the hairless people, he said, especially to him and Li-sa. They have given you little. This makes them uncomfortable, he said. A wagon will not move in a straight line if the bowhorns that pull it are not properly matched. A bow will not shoot in a straight line if the two arms are not of an equal length.”

  Nia frowned. “I don’t remember that I gave them anything important.”

  Inzara made the gesture that meant “that may be.” “An exchange is not completed until everyone agrees that it is completed. It’s hard to say which kind of person causes more trouble—one who refuses to give or one who refuses to take.”

  Nia said nothing.

  Inzara went on. “I mated one year with a woman who did not like taking. It almost drove me crazy. Everything I gave her was ‘too much’ or ‘too lovely’ or ‘too good’ for her. As for her gifts, which were just fine, she said, they were ‘small’ and ‘ugly.’ I wanted to hit her. I got away from her as quickly as possible.”

  Nia grunted.

  Inzara said, “I knew the woman’s mother. She had eyes like needles and a tongue like a knife. Nothing was ever good enough for her. I think the woman learned to apologize for everything she did. Hu! What an ugly habit!”

  They reached the eastern shore of the river. Inzara helped her pull the raft up onto land. He took off his necklace of gold and amber and held it out. Nia thought of saying it was too much to give in exchange for a river crossing. But Inzara looked edgy, and she didn’t want to argue with him. She took the necklace.

  He mounted his animal and gathered the reins. He looked down at Nia. “I used to think that nothing frightened me except old age. But the village back there frightened me.” He waved toward the west and south. “I’m angry with myself and restless. I’d better get going.” He tugged on the reins. The animal turned. Inzara glanced back. “Maybe I will come again in the spring. Or maybe Ara will come. The village won’t frighten him. And Tzoon is like a rock. Nothing ever bothers him.”

  He rode off. Nia put the necklace on. It was fine work. The amber was shaped into round beads, and the fish was made of tiny pieces of gold, fastened together. It wiggled like a real fish.

  She walked back to camp.

  The next day snow fell: large, soft flakes that melted as soon as they touched the ground. She packed her belongings and cleaned the house. She left a bag of dried food hanging from the roof pole. People might come. They might be hungry. She left a cooking pot, a jug for water, and a knife.

  After that she took a good look at the bowhorns. Their hooves were healthy. There were no sores on their backs. They walked without favoring any foot or leg. Their eyes were clear. So were their nostrils. She found no evidence of worms or digging bugs.

  Nia made the gesture of satisfaction.
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  Her hands were not entirely empty. She had three animals and food and the metal-working tools, which Tanajin had left. It was more than she had taken from the village of the Copper People. More than she had taken from her own village when she left the first time or the second time or the third.

  The next day she crossed the river. She had to make two trips. The first one was easy. The air was still. The sky was low and gray, but nothing came out of it. She took two of the bowhorns and tied them on the western shore, then went back.

  She loaded the rest of her belongings and led the third bowhorn onto the raft. It snorted and stamped a foot.

  “Be patient! Be easy! The others gave me no trouble.”

  She pushed off. Snow began to fall. The flakes were big and soft. They drifted down slowly. By the time she reached the first island the eastern shore was gone, hidden by whiteness. She crossed the island and loaded everything onto the second raft.

  The snow was staying this time, sticking to bare branches, sticking to the gear the bowhorn carried: the bags and blankets. There was snow on Nia’s shoulders and snow on the rough bark of the logs that made up the raft. All around her flakes of snow touched the gray surface of the river and vanished.

  Aiya! The whiteness! It hid the island she had just left, and she could not see the island that was her destination. Nia swung the paddle and grunted.

  They landed at the far southern end of the island. Nia pulled the raft up on land, then looked at it. She ought to bring it upriver to the proper landing place. But that would take time, and the storm was getting worse.

  “Let others deal with this problem,” she said.

  She led her animal across the island to the final raft.

  That crossing was easier. The channel was narrow. But the snow kept getting thicker. It covered the raft and the bowhorn and Nia. Even the paddle was covered with snow. When she lifted it and swung it, pieces of snow fell off. They made noises when they hit the water.

  A poem came to Nia. She didn’t know if she’d learned it as a child or made it up right here in the middle of the river.

  Why do you come,

  oh, why do you come now,

  O people of the snow?

  People in white shoes,

  why do you bother me?

  She reached the western shore and led the bowhorn off, praising it for good manners. It snorted and flicked its ears.

  “I know. I know. You wanted to make trouble. But you held yourself in check. That’s worth praising. It’s over now.” She looked at the river: the gray water and the falling snow. “We’ll pull the raft up onto land, and then we will go and find your companions. And in the morning we’ll go south.”

  Appendix A

  A note on pronunciation

  I was raised on the Wade-Giles system of transliterating Chinese, but have converted to Pinyin in this novel.

  Lixia is pronounced Lee-sha.

  Yunqi is pronounced Yoon-chee.

  The word zi, which means “sage,” is pronounced zee.

  Zhuang Zi (Chuang-tzu in the old system) is pronounced Juang-zee.

  The rest of the Chinese names are pronounced approximately the way they look.

  The native i, like the Pinyin i, is long.

  The native a is usually pronounced ah as in father.

  Nia is pronounced Nee-ah.

  In is pronounced inn.

  Ar is pronounced as in car and far.

  Inzara is pronounced Innzarah.

  Ai is pronounced as in hay.

  U is pronounced oo.

  Nahusai is pronounced Nahoosay.

  E is usually the vowel sound in air or care.

  Gersu is pronounced Gairsoo.

  O is the sound in Oh and Oklahoma.

  Yohai is pronounced Yohay.

  The sound spelled kh in the language of the Copper People is pronounced like the ch in Bach.

  The natives all speak the language of gifts, but their pronunciation varies.

  Nia can say g but not k. This is why her version of Derek’s name is Deragu. There is no sh in her language. Lixia becomes Li-sa. The oracle can say k and sh, but not p. The native animal that Nia calls osupa is osuba to him.

  All the native languages are accented. Usually the accent falls on the first syllable.

  There are three native gestures that could be translated as “yes.”

  One is the gesture of affirmation, which means “yes, that is so.”

  Another is the gesture of agreement, which means “yes, I agree with you.”

  The third is the gesture of assent, which means “yes, that should, can, or will be done.”

  Appendix B

  Starship Design by Albert W. Kuhfeld, Ph.D.

  For a reaction drive to push a ship near light-speed, the reaction mass itself must travel at relativistic velocities in a jet so hot no material substance can withstand it. Only a force field can handle the job.

  Magnetic fields are the best-trained force fields we know: They’re used in laboratories everywhere to control the paths of charged particles. Nuclear fusion is nature’s way of making hot ions. A magnetic-mirror fusion reactor, with a leaky mirror to the aft, would create a rocketlike nuclear exhaust.

  The reaction Li7+ H1= 2 He4 releases 17.3 MeV, with no neutral particles to carry off energy in random and uncontrollable directions. It’s one of the more enthusiastic reactions of starbirth—any technology with fusion power should be able to handle it.{Harwit, Martin, Astrophysical Concepts (New York: John Wiley Sons, 1973) pp. 335–43.}

  Lithium hydride has a specific gravity of 0.78 and a melting point of 689 Celsius. Living quarters built inside a large chunk of this solid fuel are protected by sheer mass against most of the interstellar dust and gases. Hydrogen atoms make good shielding against neutrons, while magnetic fields steer away interstellar ions.

  17.3 MeVe, evenly divided between the two product nuclei, works out to about 22% of the speed of light. The (nonrelativistic) equation for ship velocity is m dV + vedm = 0, which integrates out to V = ve ln(mo/m).

  To reach 10% of light-speed, the ship would have to burn 37% of its mass; for 20% c, 61% of the mass. If you then slow back to zero, you will burn 61% and 85% of the mass respectively. 15% of light-speed would be a reasonable compromise. At 100% efficiency, accelerating to 15% of light-speed and then decelerating to rest, the ship would arrive with 25% of its starting mass, having used 75% as fuel and reaction mass. (Errors introduced by ignoring relativity are minor compared to those caused by assuming complete efficiency. Time dilation effects are only about 1%.) It takes less than two months at one gravity to reach 15% of light-speed. Even at a fraction of a g, the majority of the trip could be spent coasting.

  (The rocket exhaust is powerful alpha radiation. This is an ideal vehicle for leaving your enemies behind, but be careful where you point the thing if you hope for a welcome upon your return.)

  A ship traveling the 18.2 light-years to Sigma Draconis at 0.15 c would take 122 years, one way. It has to refuel (hope for a planet with a water ocean to supply lithium and hydrogen!) before returning. The round trip could barely be made in 250 years; with study time, more would be probable.

  Most of the ship is fuel, a giant lithium-hydride cigar—white when pure, but who knows what impurities will creep in (or be found useful)? The long axis points in the direction of travel, to minimize cross-section and put as much mass as possible between the crew and anything they collide with. (At 0.15 c, cosmic gases become low-energy cosmic rays: grains of dust make large craters where they hit.)

  Well ahead of the cigar is a repairable “umbrella” shield—very little mass, but enough to vaporize cosmic dust, spreading it out so it’ll cause less damage to the main body of the ship. The living quarters are inside the “cigar,” protected from the hazards of travel. Spiral tunnels wind forward and aft to the end caps; since radiation travels in straight lines, a spiral tunnel blocks it effectively.

  A fusion rocket is behind the cigar, built of magnetic field
s controlled and confined by superconducting magnets. There are many magnetic mirrors in series, so a particle leaking through one mirror finds itself confined in the next chamber. The fields move the ionized gases along in a manner similar to peristalsis with regions of high and low magnetic field sweeping aft. Ionized particles are held in the regions of low magnetic field by the stronger fields before and behind, compressed to greater and greater densities until they fuse. At this point the magnetic fields to the rear open up into a rocket nozzle of forces.

  The rear-end cap slowly chews its way up the length of the ship, feeding fuel into the engine. The amount of lithium hydride before and behind the living quarters is chosen so the engine uses most of the rear fuel accelerating: then, as the ship nears its destination, the end caps are released and the ship reversed so the forward section (now needed more for fuel than shielding) docks into the engine. The umbrella shield is discarded as excess mass, and will be rebuilt during refueling.

  Deceleration poses an interesting problem, since one can hardly put an umbrella shield behind the main engine. But the hot breath of an engine like this should sizzle nearly everything within a light-day of the nozzle into ionic vapors—and the engine’s magnetic fields protect the ship from ions. An arriving ship appears as an enormous dim comet, with tail pointing along its path rather than away from the sun—and like comets of old, it can be an omen of change.

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