by Dana Fredsti
Like the dockworkers, the Cahokian custom officials wore little, though they boasted bright red woven capes and necklaces of authority. While most inspected the arriving cargo, one stood by the gate with a circle of guards, each armed with a rifle and a brace of pistols.
The custom official looked dubiously at Rockwell and his entourage. Clearly their job was to keep the riffraff out. Neither he nor his guards seemed to regard Feeds-the-Crows with much warmth, either, but he stepped up and did the talking for the group anyway.
It didn’t seem to be going well.
“Told you this was a bad idea,” Shanks muttered.
“You just stand there humble-like and keep your trap shut,” Rockwell growled under his breath.
Sensing a fight might break out at any moment, Blake looked sidelong to see if this could be the right time to escape. The only flight options were back into the river or up to the heavily guarded city gates. He had no idea what language they were speaking, or what was being said, until Feeds-the-Crows pointed to Harcourt, and apparently said the magic word.
“Anagalisgi.”
That broke the ice, and then it was just a matter of them being checked for more weapons and contraband before the official handed them a thin bar of copper. It had been engraved with intricate designs of a bird-man figure, along with lines of text written in some strange variant of Roman lettering.
“Your pass into the Sacred District and the palace,” the officer said, pointing toward a towering green ziggurat perfectly framed by the gateway. The colossal terraced mound looked to be about ten stories tall, and lay about two kilometers to the north.
The border patrol guards stepped aside as their superior waved the group on. As they passed through the landing’s fortress gates, the officer signaled to a teenaged boy, who quickly ran up. The man whispered a message into his ear and the rangy youth nodded before running off again.
“That went well,” Blake said.
“Yes, thank you, Crows,” Shanks grumbled. “Right out of the frying pan into this great lovely fire.”
“Shut your braying donkey face before I box your ears in, dough-head,” Rockwell growled. “What are you bellyaching for, anyhow? Did you see how quick that jumped-up redskin let us in once Crows told him ’bout the electrickery? We’re headed for the big time now, boys. Off to the palace!”
A mercantile district spread out before them, its main streets thronged with people and animals. Faces of every hue passed them, dressed in a variety of mixed-and-matched styles, speaking a dozen languages or more—their implants could only make out a fraction of them.
Clusters of earth mounds rose above the crowds and buildings, some topped with still more structures, others blazing with ceremonial fires. Teams of builders swarmed around new construction. They were in a true cosmopolitan metropolis, a growing, vibrant city. Even Blake was impressed.
What year is all this from? he wondered. And just how big is this shard?
Alongside the multitude of human pedestrians and porters, horses, riding-lizards, and oxen passed still more curious beasts of burden—mastodons, turtle-shelled armadillos the size of igloos, and full-bellied dinosaurs that looked something like giant horned toads, bristling with sharp points along their flanks. All of them were decorated with painted designs, with elaborate saddles for riders or rope nets heavy with cargo.
Shops, workshops, and patios lined the wide boulevard. The sounds of blacksmiths, potters, carpenters, and other artisans competed with the ruckus of construction teams, the cries of vendors, and haggling of merchants. The storefronts ran the gamut from simple open-air markets and outdoor drinking tents to fancy shops and restaurants of brick and timber. Multilingual signs abounded, advertising in both text and pictographs.
They moved out of the mercantile quarter and past blocks of tight-packed neighborhoods. Most were native Cahokian, timber houses constructed and decorated in a hybrid architecture of native American and European. Heavenly smells of frying corncakes, fish, and venison came from the kitchens, along with aromatic stews of squash and peppers simmering in pots. Here and there they passed the outskirts of more communities, from different native tribes as well as European settlers—French Creoles, Spanish, Yankees, and English, clustered in their own barrios.
The road ahead split to loop around a perfectly circular court, more than a hundred meters across, ringed by dozens of tall standing totem poles. The space within was covered by a layer of fine white sand that gleamed like bleached bone. As crowded as the thoroughfares were, no one dared step near it. They continued around with the flow of traffic, and soon came to a high palisade wall surrounding the inner city.
The defensive wall, studded with fortified bastions at regular intervals, stood as tall as the totem poles, ten meters high, made from tens of thousands of logs, each nearly a meter in diameter. Rockwell flashed their pass, and the soldiers waved them on.
They went through a narrow gap between twin objects guarding the southern entrance—one a giant conical mound, the other an enormous stepped pyramid—and then found themselves entering the city’s grand plaza. The wall enclosing the inner city radiated out from either side of the south gates they had entered and then became fairly square on the other three sides.
Blake tried to estimate the size of the central precinct. It covered scores of acres—no, bigger than that—at least two hundred acres if it was an inch. He had been to Rome after the war. This was easily five times as large as St. Peter’s Square.
Aristocratic neighborhoods of fancy houses and other important-looking buildings clustered along the flanks, along with more earthen mounds and cones surrounding some kind of sports field or parade ground in the center. But the most impressive structure by far lay straight ahead of them—the multi-leveled Royal Palace of Cahokia, dominating the whole northern end of the inner city.
“I never thought I’d look on any work as mighty as those I saw in Egypt,” Cam mused aloud, “but this palace is even broader than the Great Pyramid itself.”
Blake nodded, also impressed. “Bigger than my kingdom’s Buckingham Palace, too.”
“Egads, you’re right,” exclaimed Harcourt. He looked personally offended at the thought.
They continued across the plaza, past nobles and their retinues, message runners and servants on errands, haughty city officials, and merchant caravans. A sporting event was commencing. Parades of athletes carried spears and thick plate-sized stone disks to the playing field and its crowds of eager spectators.
Finally they arrived at the palace.
After showing their pass at the lowest foot of the stepped pyramid, the Palace Guard collected their weapons, searching them for hidden ones. They climbed up the long broad steps to the middle tier’s plaza, where more soldiers stood on guard and a great number of Cahokian and foreign nobles milled around the edges of the terrace, admiring the view.
In the cool shade of a luxuriously decorated woven canopy, another official wearing eyeglasses sat at a table. An older man, he was dressed much like the border officials, though his fine-beaded cloak and jewelry were more splendid. He sent away a pair of disappointed merchants and waved Rockwell and his group forward, calling out something in Cahokian.
“The Sun Raven is not seeing petitioners today,” he tersely repeated in English and French. Rockwell stepped up and spent a few fruitless minutes pleading their case.
Cam nudged Blake. “That woman is watching us,” he said, nodding toward a noblewoman currently standing amid the other ladies of the court. Blake peered in her direction as inconspicuously as possible. She was a young Creole, he guessed, her sleek, pomaded hair in a stylish Roaring Twenties cut, dressed in a white wrap of cotton that flowed around her body like silk, accentuated by a scarlet headscarf.
She looked like something out of The Arabian Nights.
Laughing with a trio of other women, they appeared to be in their own little world, enjoying the view and chatting about nothing—but she clearly had her eye on the three of them.<
br />
Do I know her? Blake wondered. She looked familiar, but he’d be damned if he could figure out who.
If she spotted them spying on her, she gave no sign of it, but she nonchalantly left her friends and strode over to the court scheduler, lightly touching his shoulder as she bent down to whisper in his ear. Then, gracing them with just a flash of dazzling smile, she went back to her friends. Clearly, she was used to being looked at—she made an exquisite art of it.
“You’re in luck after all,” the official said without explanation. “The Sun Raven has deigned to see you.”
A squad of the palace guards escorted them up the long high steps to the final terrace. As they ascended, Blake surreptitiously leaned toward Harcourt.
“I’ve been meaning to ask you,” he said under his breath. “Was any of that electricity song-and-dance you gave Rockwell true?”
The professor paused thoughtfully, as though he had never stopped to consider such a question.
“I only ask,” Blake added, “because our lives probably depend on it.”
Harcourt opened his mouth to reply, then shut it again.
Blake was not reassured.
39
Early the next morning, before the first light burst out over the mountains, the chieftain Isonash hurried across the village, making his way as fast as his old legs and walking stick allowed. Though he had called for this gathering, he was unhappy about it. Bad enough that the meeting could not come to him, but he had to get up early to make amends to the kamuys, the gods, for the poor manners of his guest the night before.
His people had many gods. Their spirits dwelt everywhere, and in everything. He had made his apologies to the mother-goddess of his hearth fire and the other gods of his house, the spirit of its door, the sacred eastern window, and its divine hedge of inaw. He berated the god of the porridge for making the woman ill, explaining to the god of the earth that the fault for the desecrating gruel so unceremoniously spewed upon the ground of the village lay with that god, not humble Isonash, set-upon host to a crazed foreign woman with no manners.
Lastly, he thanked the Atuy-Siwnin Wenkamuy, the sea-blue demon of the mountain, for his daily forbearance in not raining down wrath and pestilence upon their little kotan, their village.
When he came to the house of Harukor, the hunter’s young wife was waiting for him at the doorway. She greeted him modestly and bade him come inside. The rest of the men and elders were waiting, as well, crowded around the hearth. Harukor’s wife sat in the corner and made herself very quiet. Isonash took his place of honor at the head of the fire pit next to Harukor, and made the briefest of necessary ritual greetings, eager to proceed to the business at hand.
“The youngest of you will not remember this,” he began, directing his attention to Harukor’s two sons, “for it was before you were born, before the Day of the Lightning-Dance, the Time of the Coming-and-Going, when many old things disappeared and many new things appeared. We were here for a hundred thousand years before the Shamo came up from the south in their ships. They were strong and cruel, with many strange ways and most ignorant of the land and the gods. In those years before the Lightning-Dance, the People became slaves of the Shamo in all but name, and the People and the land—who are one—suffered much under them. The gods were greatly displeased.
“But the People did not neglect to honor the gods, and remembered their manners. So one day, when your father, mighty Harukor, was but a crying stripling, and I a young hunter, the gods struck down the prideful Shamo. The power of their mighty lords in the south, across the great water, disappeared in a single day, and only the tribe of the lone Shamo lord Matomai remained here in our lands, far to the south of us.
“Matomai did not escape his punishment, for the gods sent enemies to attack him from across the seas, from the cold lands where no trees grow. The gods rewarded the People, sending much wondrous new game to hunt, and great sea monsters to protect us from any more ships of the south. And so all the kotans of all the People have thrived these five and twenty years, thanks be to the gods.”
“Kamuy Renkayne,” the men echoed reverently. Thanks be to the gods. Isonash nodded, then heaved a sigh.
“Know that all things change in time. Now there is trouble again. Some of you have heard this, what the neighboring kotans across the valley have said—that the Shamo have beaten their enemies and grown again in strength. That now they have returned to our shores. Already they have recaptured the Lake People of the western hills, and the People of the smoking mountain. I think what they say is true. This is a serious matter, and we must think on it.”
He allowed that to set in, then continued.
“We must also speak of the two found yesterday by Harukor’s band, for they bring many questions. Who are these strange women? Where did they come from? Do they mean us good, or harm? What shall we do with them?” He stretched out a hand. “Harukor, speak.”
The hunter cleared his throat, stroking his beard thoughtfully.
“They are sisters, I think. When we first saw them, we took them for Shamo spies, but they were only strange women, bathing in the hot spring by the split creek. We surprised them. They were crying, upset about some women’s argument, but when they saw us they were very brave. Yet silly. You all saw their strange clothes are very fine, but they wander the land like lost babies. They bathed without a fire, or furs to dry them, and they carried no food or tools. Only a single arrow and no bow.”
The others chuckled.
“Here is a mystery,” Harukor continued. “They look neither like Shamo nor the People. Their tongue is strange, not the Shamo tongue, not any language of the North or the West. I inspected the backs of their necks for a third eye, or a second mouth, but found neither. So they are not witches.”
“Perhaps they came from the water,” Turushno interjected. “River kamuy, come here from the land of the gods.”
“Or evil ones of the forest,” another said.
“In my grandmother’s kotan, an owl took human shape and lived among them,” the hunter Makanakkuru mused. “The younger sister, I think she could be a fox, and the older sister a swan or a crane.” The others clicked their tongues in agreement.
“It makes sense,” Isonash said. “The one is wild and reckless, the other strives to be very polite, but neither knows how to be human. Then again, perhaps they are simply travelers from a distant land, unfamiliar with our ways.”
“So I thought, too,” Harukor said, “but hear this. When we returned yesterday, I sent young Chikap out to follow their trail. It was easy. He tracked them to their camp, a lean-to at one of our deer-traps—they made no effort to hide it—and from there, all the way down to the cave of the spotted seals.”
“No sign of a boat or a sea vessel?”
“None. What’s more, he says their tracks went back into the cave itself.”
Isonash considered this new information. Caves were gateways to the land of the gods. If these women emerged from there, it was clear they were no mere travelers.
“Ah! Do you think they are just seal-kamuy?” Makanakkuru asked. “I wonder if seal-women make good wives?” He appeared to be putting much thought into the question.
“Perhaps we could keep them?” another added. “They would look pretty if they tattooed their lips.”
“Perhaps they are wives already, who have escaped from their husband,” Turushno said, always the one to see the danger in any situation. “If so, he may come from the land of the gods looking for them. He would be very angry.”
Isonash clicked his tongue.
“Turushno speaks rightly. Whatever they may be, we should be very careful with these women, and treat them well. If no one comes to claim them in a few days, we should return them to the land of the gods.”
The others sat up at this. They and their neighboring kotans returned bear-kamuy to the land of the gods every year—but never a spirit in human form. The killing of a bear to release its spirit was no easy thing, involving restr
aints, shooting many arrows and sometimes the pressing of its neck between heavy logs so they could slit the throat and drink the blood. Sending a bear spirit home meant a great feast of bear meat and blood, stewed and roasted on skewers, since its earthly flesh was left behind, a gift for them.
But kamuy in the shape of human women?
“How… would we do such a thing?” Turushno asked. Isonash understood his apprehension.
“We will invite everyone, all the neighboring kotans, to a great feast in their honor, and after celebrating them with food and drink, we should send them off gently. Poison first, I think. Then strangling them to be certain.”
The others sat thoughtfully, but then clicked their tongues.
It was a good plan.
40
The throne room was designed to impress, and it succeeded. As dark and spacious as a theater, with light from dozens of stained-glass oil lanterns that only reinforced the atmosphere.
They illuminated rich mosaic murals on the walls, scenes of divine figures, lush depictions of the land—the great river, forests, hills, mountains, and city—and faces of the various peoples and races of Cahokia. Each mural glittered with gold and silver, and thousands of tiny pieces of shell, stone, metal, glass, and gems. The music of flutes and lutes accompanied their arrival.
Banks of courtiers stood in attendance on either side of the great throne, with servants along the walls. As with the city below, the court included a variety of ethnic groups and fashions from both European and native American strands. Somehow they all formed a cohesive, cosmopolitan whole, Blake thought. The royal guards looked a lot like Greek Hoplites with their red cloaks of office, helmets, swords, and armored chestplates, though with one significant difference. Each stood at attention holding the same Tommy guns as the gangsters across the river.
As the music came to an end, one of the women came forward and sat on the steps to the throne. With her head bowed modestly and the hood of her wrap veiling her face, it was impossible to tell if it was the same beguiling creole woman they had seen on the terrace, though the skin of her hands was the same shade. Moving together on some unseen signal, the honor guard brought them before the throne.
