Star Path--People of Cahokia

by W. Michael Gear

  “I guess you’ll just have to find out. Day by day. Forever worrying.”

  “I’ll order it first thing.”

  “You’ll order it now.” The old woman raised her voice. “Runner?”

  Slender Fox heard someone enter the great room, trot across the matting.

  “Far enough,” the woman ordered before the newcomer reached her personal quarters. “You know the matron’s voice?”

  “I do, Lady.”

  “Go ahead,” the old woman told Slender Fox in a most agreeable voice. “Give the order.”

  Slender Fox, on the verge of tears, filled her lungs and called, “I want our granaries emptied. All of it. Every last kernel of corn, every rind of squash. The same for the local Earth Clans. We’re … we’re sending it all to Evening Star Town.” The words tasted bitter in her mouth. “A gesture of gratitude toward our good friend Matron Columella.”

  “Yes, Lady,” the eager voice called from the front room. “I’ll have our people on it by first light.”

  Slender Fox felt Sliding Ice’s body go limp against hers, felt his lungs pulsing, as if in silent tears.

  “Is that sufficient?”

  Silence.

  “Have I bought your silence?”

  She twisted her head past Sliding Ice’s, stared up at the darkness, and saw no looming forms. Her room was empty.

  Whoever had tied them had done so with expert knots. It seemed to take forever for Sliding Ice to wiggle free, help her out of the blankets. She pulled on her clothes and staggered out into the great room. Sliding Ice followed close behind her.

  Someone had tossed a couple of logs on the fire. The flames now leaped to illuminate her empty great room. Everything seemed in order except for the ceramic vessels around the fire. The stewpot lay canted, empty. The loaves of bread were gone, only crumbs left. A wet stain gleamed in the firelight where it looked like a dog had urinated on the dais that supported her litter.

  “I will find whoever did this,” she swore, fist knotted. “And when I do, I will hang them in a square and gut them slowly.”

  “I think I know that voice.” Sliding Ice looked sick in the firelight. “I think it was the Keeper.”

  “Are you crazy? If Spotted Wrist trapped us like that, he’d have hauled us up before the Morning Star and destroyed us. Besides, he’s the last person who’d want Columella’s storehouses restocked.”

  “No, I mean the old Keeper. Blue Heron.”

  Slender Fox pursed her lips. Thought it through. Yes, that’s why she’d thought the voice familiar. “That, brother, is a different thing entirely.”

  Twenty-eight

  The storm had rolled in at midday. A dark wall of clouds that had come sailing in from the northwest. It brought with it gusting winds, dropping temperatures, and unleashed sheets of cold rain that hissed as they slashed down on the river, the valiant Red Reed, and its exhausted crew. The camp that night was cold, miserable, and wet; a mixture of sleet and rain fell from low clouds.

  Despite the welcoming villages they passed, Night Shadow Star couldn’t forget the sight of those Cahokian warriors running along the shore, shooting, cursing. These were Spotted Wrist’s men. Warriors who didn’t stop just because the weather turned a little foul.

  In the last glow of twilight, White Mat had passed a substantial village set atop a low bluff, and a finger of time later, steered Red Reed into a sluggish brush-choked stream that entered the Tenasee from the west. Night Shadow Star wouldn’t even have noticed it, given that the mouth was partially obscured by willows and overhanging branches of water oak.

  Through the entire day, she’d felt Piasa’s Spirit lurking. Several times, she thought she’d seen his glowing presence in the depths, only to realize it was a trick of the storm light on the water.

  The Tenasee itself had changed character; the currents and eddies began taking a hand in slowing their progress, and once a log, bobbing just under the surface, had almost capsized the Red Reed.

  Usually White Mat spotted the danger by a careful reading of the water. Snags and obstacles beneath the surface, he’d shown her, could be detected by subtle upwellings and turbulence that betrayed their presence. For some reason this submerged log had waited until Red Reed was right over it to rise and knock the canoe sideways.

  Only the veteran hands at the paddles had saved them.

  Maybe it had been Piasa’s work, flipping the log up with one of his taloned feet in a jest to ensure they were paying attention. A reminder that the river could kill them as surely as the pursuing warriors.

  Throughout that long day, as the clouds moved in and the temperature dropped, she wasn’t the only one throwing anxious glances over her shoulder. They were all expecting to see a Cahokian war canoe appear around the last bend they’d passed.

  She shivered, cold to the core, as rain pattered down through the trees and onto her cloak. Her arms were going numb as they used the points of the paddles like poles to push Red Reed up the shallow channel.

  Not more than a bowshot up from the confluence was a gravel bar, and it was onto this that White Mat ordered them to set up camp.

  The cold rain had slowed, turned to a drizzle, but water dripped from the dark and shadowed branches that interlaced above them.

  Night Shadow Star, for once, was happy to huddle and shiver in misery and let the rest attend to the making of camp as they tugged brush out of the way and secured the canoe.

  I could quit. Surrender myself to Blood Talon. I wouldn’t have to paddle. Wouldn’t have to ache. All I’d have to do is share Spotted Wrist’s bed, and in return I could be warm, fed, and pampered again.

  “Not like being in a village,” Made Man told them wistfully as he built a lean-to, then went about procuring dry kindling from a pack. Using a bow drill, he managed to conjure a flicker of flame, feeding it more kindling.

  Meanwhile, Shedding Bird used a hafted stone celt to split some of the branches lying about, exposing the dry wood inside.

  The fire smoked, but managed to shoot out feeble light as they set to making camp.

  Night Shadow Star rubbed her aching shoulders. Another bout of shivering racked her body. This day she had blisters, but each time her protesting body had wavered on the edge of collapse, she’d forced herself to paddle harder.

  A hank of wooden beads had been bartered off to a passing fisherman for a catfish as long as her arm in addition to a sack of freshwater clams. Not much in the way of variety, but it would be filling. And hot. Mostly she wanted hot. Something to rekindle even the tiniest sensation of warmth in her belly.

  Mixed Shell, in the light of the fire, used a freshly struck gray-chert flake and began cutting strips from the catfish. The clams they placed at the edge of the fire to roast as the flames began to overwhelm the wet wood.

  “We need a plan,” White Mat said as he fixed his rain hat at an angle so the water dripped off the back. The man’s breath rose like a white fog in the cold air.

  “Can we outrace them upriver?” Night Shadow Star asked through chattering teeth.

  Fire Cat had draped a hard-smoked hide over his head and shoulders. Firelight gleamed in his dark eyes as he studied the fire. “Red Reed is smaller and faster in a short sprint compared to their war canoe. But I counted close to twenty of them. Working in relays, they can eventually catch us over the long run across open water. All they have to do is get close enough to shoot a couple of us down, and we’re out of the race.”

  “If they can find us,” Half Root said as she used a stick to turn the clams. She had hunkered down, tending the clams as an excuse to huddle over the flames.

  The first aroma of the cooking shellfish tickled Night Shadow Star’s nose, making her mouth water. She tensed her muscles, jaws clamped tight to stop her teeth from chattering. If she just demanded that they let her, she could take the fire for her own. She was Lady Night Shadow Star. A Cahokian noble.

  In the forest darkness behind her she could hear Piasa’s laughter. Her jaws were too co
ld to chance a comment. It would embarrass her too much if the others heard her teeth clacking like a sack full of rocks.

  “It’s hard to think they can catch us,” Shedding Bird replied as he propped sticks to support a length of catfish over the fire. “Red Reed’s one of the fastest canoes afloat.”

  “It’s not the canoe,” Fire Cat told him, “it’s the manpower. We can distance them with that initial burst of speed, but they have endurance on their side. They can pull a third of their warriors out, let them rest, and rotate refreshed warriors onto the benches. Once we’re spent, it’s only a matter of time before they overtake us.”

  “Then how do we deal with them?” Half Root flipped one of the clams, water spattering on her rain hat from the trees above.

  “We have to not be found.” Fire Cat extended his hands to the fire. Night Shadow Star could see the blisters. She wasn’t the only one who’d pushed as hard as she could.

  How did he do it? Every muscle in his body had to be screaming like hers were, he had to be just as chilled to the bone, and yet he sat poised like a statue.

  “The problem with that,” Made Man said, “is that there’s only this one river, and they know we’re headed up it.”

  “They even know where we’re going,” Night Shadow Star said between shivers as she watched the catfish begin to sizzle. “The only thing we can do is beat them to Cofitachequi. Get there before they do.”

  “Won’t work,” Fire Cat told her. “We made good time from Cahokia, and they had to have left at least a day behind us. They already caught us once, they’ll do it again. They’re faster. Just accept that.”

  “So, what do we do? Head back downriver?” White Mat asked. “It’s that or get caught, right?”

  “We could go back,” Shedding Bird said thoughtfully. “At the confluence with the Mother Water, turn upstream to the mouth of the Southern Shawnee River, take it up to its headwaters. You’d have to travel overland to the headwaters of the Tenasee. It would be longer, more complicated. Especially across the uplands.”

  “And maybe even more dangerous,” Made Man said. “Those people up there don’t take kindly to strangers. Let alone traveling Cahokians.”

  “Think tactics,” Fire Cat told him. “We’re going to have to play fox and rabbit with them. The only thing we have going for us is that they don’t know where we are. So put yourself in Blood Talon’s position. He knows we’re close, and he will have pushed hard today, hoping to make up that couple of hands’ time he was behind us. I’d guess he’s pulled in at that last village we passed just before dusk.”

  “We’re going to spend a really cold and miserable night because there’s a chance that he’s there. Blood and spit, I could sure enjoy being in a nice dry house this night,” Half Root groused. “But what about come morning?”

  “Come morning, we’re going to let them pass,” Fire Cat told them. “They’ll be on the river at first light.” He gestured around. “We’re out of sight, and they’ll be expecting us to have traveled ahead, to have made shore at the next village. Not to be back in the forest like this.”

  “I don’t understand,” Night Shadow Star said through her shivers. “Eventually Blood Talon will figure out that he’s ahead of us. He’ll lay a trap. Catch us on his own ground.”

  “That’s the tricky part,” Fire Cat agreed, looking around at the others. “But he’s a Cahokian warrior. Our advantage is that we have White Mat, Shedding Bird, Mixed Shell, Made Man, and Half Root. Not to mention Red Reed.”

  “Traders,” Night Shadow Star filled in. “People who know the river.”

  “Blood Talon doesn’t have a chance.” White Mat had a smug smile on his lips as he blew frosty breath into the firelight.

  Everyone noticed when Night Shadow Star’s shivering shook her whole body. This time she couldn’t silence the chattering of her teeth.

  “Come on,” Made Man told her, offering the first of the catfish. “You first. Eat up. To have come this far, given who you are, and to have done it without so much as a single complaint, you can crew on my boat anytime.”

  “Seconded,” Shedding Bird added solemnly.

  The food did help. And she knew they all let her eat the lion’s share.

  It was later, when the blankets were rolled out and she stared down at the sodden protection they were going to afford her for the night, that the cold and exhaustion finally caught up with her. Blood Talon was out there. She was as cold as she’d ever been. Feeling defeated. Tears finally came.

  “You all right?” Fire Cat asked, appearing in the night beside her.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever been this cold and miserable.”

  “Yes, you were. Once.”

  “When?”

  “When I pulled you out of the river after you tried to kill Walking Smoke.”

  “How did I survive?” But she remembered. His body, atop hers, his warmth driving the cold from her naked flesh.

  “Fire Cat…” She couldn’t finish—not when she’d been possessed by that image, where it led to in her fantasies. How it would feel if she ever had his body against hers again.

  “You’re safe,” he told her as he pulled her into his arms. “Cold as it is tonight? We need to sleep together, share the warmth. Trust me, those thoughts will be the farthest from our minds.”

  Which was a lie, she knew.

  She reached down, took her blanket, and doubled it with his. When he laid himself down, she curled around his back, snuggled close to his warmth as he pulled the doubled blanket around them.

  “Beware,” Piasa whispered out of the night.

  “Oh, go drown a fish,” she told the shadowy beast where it paced just beyond the fire’s light.

  But as she lay there with her body pressed against Fire Cat’s, her heart beat hard, a tingle began to warm her loins. Every fiber of her being was throbbing. What if she asked? Would Fire Cat be willing? Was he as acutely aware of her as she of him? Was he, too, lying there with his heart in his throat?

  And if he was, he’d never allow it to show. Yet again she cursed his incomprehensible sense of honor.

  It would be so easy if he’d just roll over, drag her close, and slip his hand between her thighs. That was all it would take.

  But he wouldn’t.

  So she spent that entire night too uncomfortable to sleep. The rough gravel poked up into her hips, shoulders, and thighs, which left her awake, frustrated, and longing to make love. If there was any consolation, it was that she was marvelously warm the entire time.

  Twenty-nine

  For the most part Fire Cat could cope with his physical desires. He’d been raised to be a war chief. Uncle had taught him to endure privation of every sort, be it cold, heat, pain, or the ragged edge of physical exhaustion.

  He had fallen in love with Night Shadow Star understanding the bitter reality of his situation. He had pledged her his service on his honor and the honor of his ancestors. He was Red Wing—and when one’s sacred word was given, that oath bound him until either it was rescinded by the person it was given to, or death.

  As it was, he understood that Piasa had forbidden Night Shadow Star and him from ever sharing their bodies, though neither he nor she understood the why of it all. Power had decreed that they live chastely, and somehow that single abstention apparently had saved the city of Cahokia. And supposedly later, it had allowed them to free her brother’s soul in the Underworld. Leave it to gods, Spirits, and Power to figure out how that balanced the scales of Cosmic Trade, but apparently it did.

  Several times Fire Cat and Night Shadow Star had teetered on the edge, hearts pounding, blood racing, as they held each other and stared into the other’s eyes. He’d seen her desire in the parting of her lips, the rising of her breath, the desperation with which she clung to him. Not that she could miss his own protruding arousal where she pressed herself against it. To tear himself away from her had been brutal.

  Nevertheless, he lived with the knowledge that at least he got to share his
life with her. Was able to watch her, enjoy her smile, and find ample satisfaction in his ability to make her already difficult life easier. Especially in view of her soul possession and the terrible strain it placed on her. That Power had chosen him to serve such a woman he considered a rare honor. That she understood and appreciated his sacrifice? That made any privation worth it.

  He had come so close to failing himself and her last night. Had she given him the slightest encouragement, he would have ignored the voice of warning in his head. It had been torture enough to watch her suffering from exhaustion and cold; he’d have given anything to have pulled her close and hugged her to him at the fire. But that would have embarrassed her in front of the Traders. He’d taken risk enough to suggest they share bedding.

  And I would have willingly condemned us to who knows what sort of disaster and tragedy. Sacrificed her future, perhaps even her life for a single night of sharing her body.

  Fire Cat kept running that thought through his head as he crouched in the brush just back from the bank and kept watch on the river.

  Beyond the gray screen of forest on the eastern bank, dawn was a dull gray glow in the east. The morning birds had begun to call, and fish jumped to leave rings out in the river.

  Fire Cat fought the urge to shiver; the morning chill seemed worse than last night’s, more penetrating, or else it was so deep in his bones it would take days to warm up.

  Slipping out of his and Night Shadow Star’s bed had been one of the hardest things he’d ever done. He could have spent eternity just being close to her.

  The memory brought a smile to his lips.

  What a fool a man could be when it came to a woman.

  His duty was here, watching. Their lives and success would depend on knowledge and cunning from here on out. The only way to avoid a run-in with Blood Talon was to know where the squadron first was. Understand that, and the key to avoiding him was suddenly feasible.

  “He’s going to be coming soon,” Fire Cat promised himself, checking to see that the breeze was still coming in off the river, that there was no way the smell of their small fire would carry to the Cahokians.