The bird-woman gave a dry little laugh. "We are glad you think so."
"I stumble over my feet again," Firekeeper said, "but then where these things are concerned I am a pup beginning to walk. I will make no excuses, but try to remember my manners. I am called Firekeeper. This is Blind Seer. May we ask what to call you?"
"She reminds us of our manners," shrieked the eagle-headed maimalodalu, the one with the snake's body and human limbs.
To Firekeeper's surprise, this one's language was that of the yarimaimalom, though those with human mouths had spoken Liglimosh—a thing she had not thought about until now. She said nothing of this contrast, for the eagle-headed one was continuing.
"Prettily done, Firekeeper. We have had warning of your coming, but you have had little warning of us. Perhaps you are not the only one who should be shamed."
The eagle head turned to look at Firekeeper sideways, after the manner of birds. "I am called Sky-Dreaming-Earth-Bound, but Sky is enough."
One by one the others introduced themselves, and Firekeeper realized that she could understand them all, no matter their manner of speech. Moreover, they could all understand each other and those with human facial features could, like Firekeeper herself, speak the language of the yarimaimalom.
It seems, Firekeeper thought, that the Liglimom could have found the translator they desired closer to home, but I do not think they would have welcomed these creatures. The
maimalodalum are too great a reminder of what their ancestors were willing to do to gain power.
Introductions completed, all settled comfortably onto the clean stone floor of the tower. Integrity and Tenacity also remained, and their two puppies ran out and about, calling everyone "aunt" or "uncle" with joyful lack of discrimination as to species. Firekeeper decided that this was the guide to follow and again felt ashamed.
I have long shouted my wolf's heart is trapped in a human body. How could I have been so quick to judge by appearances? The maimalodalum all have thinking minds and faithful hearts—though perhaps some are more pleasant than others.
She looked to where the puppies played tag around the gathered creatures, to where Tenacity and Integrity lay side by side.
And I think the Wise Wolves did not tell me all the truth. Here is proof that their tainted do still breed, but these pups show this can be done safely. Perhaps this island is where custom ends and something else rules.
The human-wolf-jaguar turned out to be named something like Defier-of-the-Deities. Firekeeper could not quite make sense of the term, for neither the Royal Beasts nor the humans she knew best had deities who could be defied. She decided that "Questioner" or "Challenger" might have been this creature's name had he not been born where gods were believed in, and the maimalodalu agreed.
"Call me Questioner, if that is easier for your mind," he said. "I have been called worse."
There was a smattering of what, despite the many different-shaped throats and noses that shaped it, was clearly laughter.
"Once we learned that you had been told the tale of the maimalodalum," Questioner said, "we knew you would ask the Wise Wolves if the tale held any truth."
"We?" Firekeeper asked. "Who is this 'we'?"
Questioner's ears flattened in annoyance.
"Little Two-legs, do you think you have gone hither and yon unwatched, unobserved? Even as the Liglimom find you unsettling, so do we. Truth the jaguar is nearly mad from her inability to read anything of the future where you are concerned. When she learned—a raven bore her the tale—that you had been told of the maimalodalum, for once her visions were clear. You were to be told the truth of the tale, but only in the right place, where you could not deny the uglier realities. You accepted those realities far more immediately than any of us had thought one so filled with hope and desire could, but still we felt you must see us."
Firekeeper's mind was trying to hold on to a handful of thoughts at once, each as confusing as the other. She spoke the simplest.
"Raven told her?"
"The ravens are interested in you," Questioner replied. "They rather like you, in fact. They knew Derian would bring you news from the mainland and worried it would trouble you. They thought to offer counsel and so listened to your conversation in order to know what to say."
Firekeeper doubted this altruism, but didn't press for another explanation. The yarimaimalom had permitted her to come into their sanctuary, but they had protected themselves from possible betrayal by spying on her. Very well. It was a wise precaution.
"I trouble Truth's visions?" Firekeeper asked. "Just me or all three of us newcomers?"
"You mostly," Questioner replied, "as I understand it. However, the more closely anything is connected to you, the more muddled the visions become. Therefore, Blind Seer is as hard to read as you are. Unless the matter deals with horses, so is Derian."
Firekeeper felt a touch of longing to see Derian; then she thought of her current company and was glad he was spared this shock. At least she and Blind Seer could understand what was said here. Derian would be at least half deaf.
Almost unbidden the next words came to her lips.
"Questioner, you called me 'Little Two-legs.' No one calls me that but my close kin, and few enough among them have used the name these last years since I am grown. Your voice troubles me. I think I know it, but I could not."
Questioner looked at her, his ears speaking wolf, his eyes wholly human. His eyes were blue, Firekeeper suddenly noticed. The realization made her feel very strange.
"Many years ago," Questioner said, his tone detached, "a maimalodalu thought he could do what no other had done since the days when yarimaimalom made treaty with humans and so exiled themselves from others of their kind. He thought he could explain our customs, reopen contact. He thought because he questioned, he could answer questions. He was wrong."
"You?" Firekeeper said. "You came north?"
"It was a long journey and a hard one. I found little welcome and less liking for the message I carried, but there were exceptions. One of these was in a place you and Blind Seer know well, a territory west of the Iron Mountains where the wolves watch against the coming of humans."
Blind Seer said gape-jawed, "Our home territory?"
"Just so," Questioner replied. "Chance was with me when I came to that place—chance or the will of the deities. I arrived soon after humans had made the crossing from the lands to the east. The Royal Wolves were crazed with fear, dredging up from half-remembered legends what little they knew about humankind. They might have slain the humans out of hand, but I convinced them to do otherwise. I told them how to the south we lived peacefully, even profitably with humans. My words blended with the Royal Wolves' own reluctance to kill for no reason, and so the humans lived."
"None still reside within that pack who can give lie to your tale," Blind Seer said, his hackles rising. "Though I do recall we have met one who was of the pack in those days."
"Speak with this one," Questioner said. "The tale will be the same."
Firekeeper stroked Blind Seer along his back as if she could smooth away his worries along with the roughness in his fur.
"Dear heart, I have memories… dreams all but forgotten until we came to this place. I cannot say the truth of the dreams, but I feel I have heard this voice before."
"These maimalodalum want something of you," Blind Seer rumbled. "I smell it on them. Always others want something from you. Always they give nothing back."
Firekeeper shook her head. "I will not argue that thanks have been slender and grudging, but the Royal Wolves have always given me life and home. The humans gave me life. I owe for that."
"For how long?" came the frustrated growl.
Questioner interrupted with understanding gentleness, "For as long as she cares to pay the debt, Blind Seer. I will not deny that we here have our hopes for Firekeeper, yet I will hold back any account of my tie to her past if you think that all I do is seek to put her in my debt."
Blind Seer replie
d, "That is something only Firekeeper can decide."
"Then I must know," Firekeeper said. "As for debts, Questioner is right. I pay, but I choose to pay. Wolves make a pack and grudge nothing, not even life, to the pack. I would be a wolf in this at least, so tell me what you can, Questioner."
Blind Seer turn his head to lick her hand.
"As you will, Firekeeper. Only I would hear more howling of your praises when you have run hard on another's hunt, that is all."
Firekeeper said nothing to this, for she had no answer.
"Tell on, Questioner," she said. "Please."
Fur over the human face, even fur short like that of a cat rather than long as on a wolf, made expressions harder to read, but Firekeeper thought Questioner looked a little wistful as he cast himself into memory's stream.
"The stay with your pack was a good time for me," he said, "among the best in my journeys. The humans had many among them with talents, and I taught the wolves and the other Royal Beasts how this might facilitate communication between ourselves and them. This group of humans were very determined to have nothing to do with those to the east, at least until they could treat with them as something other than petitioners. Then, too, it was clear that beyond talents these human settlers had no magic among them. Thus the Royal Beasts were assured that the humans could be chased away—or slain—if they violated the treaties made between them and the Royal Beasts.
"I have no idea how the fire that destroyed the settlement started. The humans had built many fires within their homes and these homes were constructed mostly of wood, rather than of clay and stone as is the case here. At the time of the fire, I had gone further west, hoping to build upon my success with your home pack. When news of the fire reached me, I returned only to find all but one small girl-child dead."
"Me," Firekeeper said.
"You. Your mother had rescued you, then she died trying to rescue your father, but not before she begged the wolves to care for you."
"My parents," Firekeeper said. "I don't remember them. Do you… "
"Their names were Donal Hunter and Sarena Gardener," Questioner said. "Donal had the talent for understanding animals. It is a great talent, for usually a mind can only understand a single type."
"As with Derian and horses," Blind Seer said.
The blue-eyed wolf leaned closer to Firekeeper and she knew he could feel her fighting down tears. To the best of her knowledge she had never felt more than the most abstract interest in these humans. Her mothers and fathers were all wolves, but now the tears were welling in her eyes, sobs choking at her breathing.
Questioner politely pretended not to notice, but went on with his gentle telling.
"Sarena had the talent for making plants grow. Apparently, this talent ran very strong in her family, and in her own way she was as special as Donal. They were among the first the wolves approached, for Donal had already sensed that there was something odd about the territory.
"Donal might have stumbled on some version of the truth," Questioner went on, "for he was sensitive to animals, but he was—as his name states—a hunter. Wolves, bear, and puma may all live in the same forest, but this does not mean they don't squabble when their interests overlap. If not informed that his competition was different from what he was accustomed to, Donal would probably have felt that what existed was a structure in which he and his could have competed as pumas and wolves compete. He would have, of course, been wrong."
Firekeeper knew the old tales of how humans and Royal Beasts had clashed. Tears rolled down her face as she struggled to balance this sudden, shocking grief against the need to learn more. Only if she learned more might she glimpse the past from which she had been so long isolated.
The heartrending pain of sorrow seemed a high price to pay for something she had done without so long and so well.
Or did you? Firekeeper asked herself. Haven't others commented about the violence of your nightmares? Those are not usual, nor are these holes in memory. Walk forward into the tangle. If the underbrush has thorns, pull them out and clean the wound.
Questioner went on. "Donal Hunter didn't like learning he was not the greatest predator of them all. He'd been spoiled by hunting Cousin-kind, and among them had taken his share of wolves, bears, and wild cats. However, Donal also was no fool. He knew the difference between true rivals and false, and so made his peace. It didn't hurt that Sarena encouraged him in this course, or that while Donal felt pride in his kills, he did not need to kill in order to have pride.
"But we never had the chance to learn what we might have built through our association with the settlers. Fire took them and their dreams, leaving only ashes and one small child. The wolves were determined to honor their promise to Sarena that they would care for you, but though they struggled to feed you, your injured body would not thrive.
"They brought you to me, for though I am as you see me, to their eyes I was closer to a human than any other they knew. Moreover, I had gained at least some knowledge of humans from observing the Liglimom. I examined you, and knew as the wolves had done that you were dying. You had swallowed smoke. You were weakened from hunger, for your throat was raw.
"Sarena had liked to hear about Liglim, and in return had taught me much about plants she used for healing. Combining her knowledge with what I already knew, I made medicines for you. I also fed you on sweet, soft things from which you could take nourishment. A wolverine, oddly blessed with a talent for healing, came and aided you further.
"However, you would not thrive. Autumn passed into winter, winter into spring, and still you would not live. The wolves brought you the best kills from their spring hunting, but you would not eat. Your heart was sick with pain and your soul cried out to be permitted to follow those you loved. In the end, I had two choices. I could let you die, or I could make you forget."
Questioner sat back on his haunches and for the first time Firekeeper realized that his forepaws were—like the rest of him—hybrids. They possessed pads and claws, but the toes were long and one stuck out to the side. It must take skill to run on those hand-paws without harming the fingers, but not only had Questioner done so, he had gone upon them to what must have seemed the ends of the earth—and come back once more.
"I wanted you to live, Little Two-legs, at first because in you I saw one who might bridge the world of the beasts and the world of humans. We cannot remain separate forever, no matter what many of both types think. Later, though, after I had spent long moons nursing you, I grew to care for you. A soul who could love as deeply as you could deserved a greater reward for love than death.
"We told you how we can sense magic but not do it ourselves. This is true, but this does not mean we are without talents ourselves." At this Questioner gestured, and Firekeeper noticed how the golden yellow light that illuminated the room came from translucent blocks set in the wall. "Sky can sense energy and awakened the power that exists in those blocks both to gather light from the sun and hold it, and to release it again when darkness comes.
"I have a small gift for persuasion. I used this gift on you. I took great care not to change you from what you were, but instead took you down a trail that might twist around itself and lead you into life. You see, Firekeeper, you were not bitter in your grief. You did not begrudge any others life—only denied your own right to live. I merely invited you to see yourself as that other—to become a wolf, for the wolves wanted you for their own and you already loved them."
Firekeeper felt her lips move, almost involuntarily, quoting words heard in a dream. " 'If the wolves are to live, then I name you a wolf. Be a wolf. Forget that you ever were human. Your heart is a wolf's, your appetites a wolf's, your memory a wolf's. Strange wolf you may be, but if only a wolf may live, then you must be one.'"
Questioner gave a slow smile. "Are those the words? It has been many years. I had forgotten them."
"Those are the words," Firekeeper replied. Her voice grew tight. "Does that make all my life since a lie? You made me think I a
m a wolf when I am really human."
Sky turned that overlarge eagle head and stared at her. "A life is not some abstract thing, Firekeeper. A life is a mosaic, crafted from the tiny pieces of what you do each day, every day. You have lived as a wolf, followed the codes and creeds of a wolf, honored wolves and sought to do them honor. Were those actions lies?"
"No!" Blind Seer half rose in indignation. "Firekeeper knows so little of lies that they shock her when she realizes how easily others use them. Nothing she has ever done was less than truth."
"Put down your hackles, wolf," Sky replied mildly. "I offer no threat to your loved one."
At Sky's words, and even more at Blind Seer's defense, Firekeeper felt a wash of relief, yet despite this she knew that she would continue to be haunted by a sense that she should belong to one world or other—that this living in between was somehow a defilement of the natural order.
Yet, silly pup, Firekeeper chided herself, how can you think so with the maimalodalum gathered before you. If ever there was proof that a life can be lived outside the forms you have known, it is here. Sky speaks wisdom. You are a puppy fighting your reflection in a puddle, but the water from which your enemy shines back is nothing other than your own fears.
Blind Seer let his hackles fall smooth, but Firekeeper could tell he remained unsettled as he turned to the human-jaguar-wolf.
"Questioner, you did not stay in the north," Blind Seer growled. "You came back to Misheemnekuru. Why?"
Questioner's snort was human. "Was I thrown out by your forebears, is that what you mean? No. I left of my own will. I could see that except in a few places I did more harm than good. Firekeeper was alive and learning to live. She no longer needed me.
"Before I left, I taught the wolves a few skills I thought might benefit her as she grew—something of tanning, of the use of a knife, of how to explain striking fire from flint and steel. I was not very good at these skills, but Donal had enjoyed showing me the tricks of the human hunter, and I had often spoken with him while he worked. He was more at ease with me when his hands were busy."
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