The Horsemasters

by Joan Wolf

  “Finish those birds,” she ordered. “I am starving.”

  He laughed. “Sa, sa, sa. I am trying to hurry.”

  They cooked and ate their breakfast, shouldered their burdens, and again took up their journey.

  * * * *

  Once more they were finding their way along narrow animal tracks, keeping away from the river and the accustomed hunting places of the Tribe of the Red Deer. The overcast day made navigating through the forest more difficult, as they did not have the position of the sun to give them their direction. Ronan was an excellent woodsman, however, and was able to tell their direction from the bark of the forest pine trees. The brightest spot of bark always faced due south. Nel knew this, of course, as did all the members of the Red Deer tribe, but she could not read the trees the way Ronan could. When facing a quadrant of bright-colored trees, an expert was needed to distinguish the exact point at which the bark was brightest and so determine due south from southeast or southwest.

  It began to sprinkle rain in the middle of the afternoon. As there was no cave nearby, they decided to set up a tent before they were caught in a downpour. Once Nigak saw the preparations being made for camp, he disappeared into the forest to hunt. Ronan went to cut down some saplings to make a frame for the small tent skin he carried, and Nel built a fire under cover of the trees to cook the partridge Ronan had trapped earlier.

  They ate sitting under the canopy of the trees, and when the rain began to drip through, they moved into the small tent. Their sleeping skins covered all the floor space, and they had to crawl as there was not enough headroom in the tent for them to stand.

  Outside the night was wet and black, and the scent of pine hung heavy in the air unmixed with the smell of smoke. It was too wet for Ronan to build a fire to keep away animals. The forest rustled restlessly with the falling rain.

  “I don’t think the rain will ever make me unhappy again,” Nel said.

  Ronan was half-reclining next to her, propped up on his elbow, watching her with unreadable dark eyes, “Is it so?” he asked softly.

  She peered at him by the dim light of their solitary stone lamp. “Let’s say the marriage words to each other,” she said.

  “Now?”

  “Sa. Now.”

  “All right, if that is what you wish.” He sat up, frowning slightly. “I am trying to remember them,” he confessed.

  “I know them,” Nel said. “Shall I go first?”

  He smiled and held out his hand. “You go first.”

  Nel put her hand into his and said clearly, “This is Ronan, the man that I take for my husband. I ask the Mother to bind us together for the life of the tribe.”

  She waited a moment; then she turned her hand and squeezed Ronan’s fingers. “Now you,” she said.

  “This is Nel,” he said, repeating her words, the words used by the Tribe of the Red Deer, “the woman that I take for my wife. I ask the Mother to bind us together for the life of the tribe.”

  They looked at each other, holding hands and listening to the echo of the words still hanging in the pine-scented air.

  Ronan said, “I am so sorry I hurt you last night, minnow.”

  Nel shook her head. ‘It was not your fault. It is ever that way for a woman. Fali said that it is the Mother’s way of reminding us that the pleasure of mating is followed by the pain of childbirth.” Her fingers curled within his large hand. “You made me very happy,” she said.

  He held her hand hard and shook his head. “But I will make you happy tonight,” he promised. “I swear it, Nel. You must just trust me…”

  She was laughing softly. “Na,” she said. “You know how impossible it is for me to trust you.” She pulled her hand from his grasp and then reached up to cast both her arms around his neck.

  “Aieee,” he said, pretending to lose his balance and falling forward so that she ended up on the ground with him on top of her. She squeaked in protest, and he lifted his weight, bracing his hands on either side of her shoulders and looking down into her laughter-flushed face. “You are an impudent brat,” he said.

  “Perhaps,” she retorted, “but I am your brat, remember.”

  The laughter left his eyes to be replaced by a look of intense concentration. “Sa,” he said. “You are.” And he bent his head to put his mouth on hers.

  This was a much longer lovemaking than he had been able to manage the previous night. Tonight there was time for touches, for caresses, for finding out all the secret places of the other’s body. When Ronan fumbled at Nel’s shirt, she arched her back to help him push it out of his way, then reached up to him, cupping his shadowy face between her hands and drawing him downward. His mouth touched her breast. She buried her fingers in his hair to hold him there.

  In the dimness of the tent, they stripped off their clothing and learned each other’s bodies entirely by touch. At one point Nigak returned from hunting and tried to join in what he obviously thought was a game. Ronan snarled at him to get away, and he whined and backed out of the tent to go and find himself a dry spot somewhere under a tree.

  “Poor Nigak,” Nel said with a soft, unsteady laugh.

  “He’ll be all right,” Ronan said. “Nel. Now, Nel. Now.”

  She tilted her hips upward to meet him, to receive the power of him into her, to rock with him in the passionate, heaving darkness, until the world exploded into ecstasy for them both.

  They lay for a long time afterward, locked together, neither of them wanting to separate. Outside the rain poured down, but it no longer had the power to disturb Nel’s happiness. She went to sleep.

  Shortly after midnight the rain stopped, and the moon was shining brightly when Nel awoke with a start, aware that something had disturbed her. She looked toward the tent opening, expecting to see Nigak, and saw instead a very large cave hyena looking in.

  “Ronan,” Nel breathed, not taking her eyes off the hyena. It was so close that she could smell its foul breath.

  “I see.” His voice was as quiet as hers had been.

  Nel did not move. Cave hyenas were dangerous predators, and this one was far too interested in the tent and its apparently sleeping inhabitants. There was a sudden flash of movement as Ronan rose to his knees, simultaneously bringing forward his arm. The hyena shrieked as the spear pierced its chest. It staggered back, away from the tent opening, then collapsed in the bright moonlight.

  “Hyenas travel in packs. I had better build a fire in case there are any more about,” Ronan said, and he crawled out of the tent. Nel watched him bending over the hyena, preparing to drag it away from the tent. Once she saw Nigak join him, she closed her eyes and went back to sleep.

  * * * *

  The sun was shining when Nel awoke again, and it shone every day of their journey thereafter. As soon as they were through the Buffalo Pass, Ronan slowed their pace. Nel did not protest. Both of them knew that once they reached the valley they would be surrounded by the demands of other people, and both of them were in a mood to cherish this brief golden time they had to themselves. The summer days were warm, and it was delightful to splash in a stream, to hunt for birds, to gather and eat the ripe summer fruit, to make love endlessly in the glow of the golden summer sun.

  They avoided the caves of the Buffalo tribe, as Ronan had no desire to answer questions about its members who had defected to him, and they took their time in reaching the Altas.

  Nel felt the change in Ronan on the day they reached the first of the high mountain pastures. He was beginning to turn away from her, she realized. His mind was focusing on things that were not Nel. It was inevitable, she knew. They could not go through life in the kind of glorious isolation they had known these last ten days. She knew that, but the knowledge made her sad.

  Her melancholy mood vanished, however, as they began the real upward climb. Nel had lived among mountains all her life, but the Altas were like nothing she had ever known. The deep gorges, the violent torrents, the steep forests—all excited her awe, her delighted wonder. When
they reached the tarn at the top of the last valley, and Nel saw the majestic snow-capped peaks looming before her, she was quite simply dazzled.

  Nigak led them through the pass; he led them in fact the entire way to the Lake of the Eagle. Nel was enchanted with how much gentler the southern side of the mountains was than the northern side. This time of year, the high mountain pastures were filled with flowers, butterflies, birds, ibex, and sheep.

  “When does the snow begin to fall?” she asked Ronan, turning her face upward, like a flower, to the welcome heat of the sun.

  “It can begin as early as Buffalo Moon in the high passes,” he answered. “Our valley is below the treeline, so we don’t usually see snow until the end of Leaf Fall Moon.”

  When they reached the Lake of the Eagle, Nel looked with amazement at the seemingly impenetrable cliff behind which Ronan had told her the valley was located. She was even more amazed when Nigak ran right up to the cliff wall, then disappeared.

  “That’s how it happened the first time,” Ronan said as he followed the wolf, Nel beside him.

  Nel was silent as she entered into the passage behind Ronan, silent as she scrambled down the steep, rocky path, silent as she stepped at last from the confines of the wall and saw stretched before her the hidden, perfect beauty of the valley.

  Horses and antelope took mute note of the new arrivals, raising their heads from grazing to look, then lowering them serenely once again. The valley grass was even lusher than the grass Nel had seen outside the walls. Two golden eagles circled in the air, casting their shadow over the blue waters of the lake. More antelope were lying in the sun along the eastern wall, and with them were a few mares with their foals. Posted on high ground above the mares and foals, his splendid head moving watchfully from side to side, was a magnificent, long-maned white stallion.

  Nel let out her breath slowly and looked at Ronan. He was wearing his sternest look, which she knew meant he was deeply moved. “It is beautiful,” she said.

  He merely nodded. She leaned her head against his arm, and together they gazed out at the Valley of the Wolf.

  It was Nigak who alerted the tribe to Ronan’s coming. The wolf came cantering out of the passage and headed straight for the huts in the northwest corner, eager to see if everything was still as he remembered it. Fara and Eken were there with the twins, and Berta, Tora, and Tabara, who also had small children. Mait and Thorn were at their hut as well, as Thorn was making some new spear points for the men. It was the two boys who were the first to race toward the passage to greet their returning chief.

  Thorn was not surprised to see that there was someone with Ronan. After all, Ronan had told the tribe that he was going to fetch his cousin. Thorn’s headlong flight checked somewhat, however, when he realized that Ronan’s cousin was a girl. Beside him, Mait gave a startled exclamation as he too recognized the sex of Ronan’s companion. Both boys slowed their gait to a more dignified speed.

  When they were within earshot, Thorn heard Ronan say to his companion, “It’s the cubs.”

  “Ronan!” Thorn said in breathless greeting.

  “Why aren’t you two out hunting?” Ronan asked.

  “I was making some new spear points.” Thorn smiled radiantly. “I am so glad you have come home!”

  “Sa,” said Mait. “I, too, am glad.”

  “Life under Bror was that bad?” Ronan asked.

  “Na!” both boys protested at once.

  “That is not what we meant,” Mait said.

  “Bror is a good leader,” Thorn said. “But…but he is not the chief.”

  The girl gave a soft chuckle, and Ronan turned to her. “Nel,” he said, “here are Mait and Thorn, the two youngest of the tribe’s men.”

  Thus given permission by a formal introduction, Thorn at last looked at the girl.

  She was one of the most beautiful girls that Thorn had ever seen. He stared at her. “I am pleased to meet you, Mait and Thorn,” she said. Her voice was deeper than he had expected. She smiled at them. Her eyes were as green as grass.

  “W-welcome,” Mait said. He was staring at Nel with his mouth slightly ajar.

  “Sa,” Thorn said, quick to echo Mait’s courtesy, “welcome to the Tribe of the Wolf.”

  Two white-muzzled puppies came rushing up.

  Ronan said to the girl, “The pups are Nigak’s get.”

  “I can see that,” the girl said. She held out a hand and rubbed her fingers together. “Greetings, little ones,” she said. To Thorn’s utter astonishment, both puppies bounced right up to her and offered their heads to be scratched.

  “They are splendid,” Nel told the boys.

  Thorn said blankly, “I cannot believe they went to you like that.”

  “Nel has the Mother’s touch with animals,” Ronan said with a faint smile. “It was she who trained Nigak. She found him when he was a pup not much older than these two here.”

  “Is it so?” Mait asked the girl, “You took him from his mother?”

  The girl called Nel shook her head. “He was crying over the dead body of his mother when I found him. Her other pups had left her, but not Nigak. It took me one entire day to persuade him to come with me.”

  Thorn’s imaginative mind pictured the scene. His brown eyes brimmed with grief. “Poor Nigak,” he said.

  “I am thinking it was Nigak’s lucky day when Nel found him,” Ronan said.

  “Yours too,” the girl retorted.

  Ronan grinned.

  Thorn stared at the transformation that grin brought to Ronan’s thin-boned, arrogant face. It made him look lit from within. It made him look…young.

  Mait said diffidently, “Are you Ronan’s cousin?”

  Without answering, Nel looked toward Ronan. Following her lead, the boys also looked to their chief. Ronan said, “Nel is my cousin.” The smile was gone from his face. He was looking at Nel and not at the boys. He said, “And she is my wife.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  The subject of Nel was discussed with varying degrees of enthusiasm in all the tents of the Tribe of the Wolf that night.

  Berta and Tora were delighted to have another woman who worshipped the Mother added to the tribe. “It is not that I do not like Fara and Beki and Yoli and the others,” Berta confided to her sister as they worked together to clean away the remains of the evening meal. “But their ways are not our ways. It is good that this Nel has come.”

  “Sa,” Tora agreed placidly. The sisters were alone in Berta’s tent, where both their families had eaten dinner. Berta’s baby began to fuss, and Tora, seeing that Berta was still occupied, went over to the infant, picked her up and began to nurse her. The baby, as accustomed to her aunt’s milk as she was to her mother’s, fell instantly silent.

  “The married men are meeting this night,” Berta said, as she finished scouring the pottery vessels in which she had served the venison stew.

  “Sa,” Tora said again. “So Asok told me.”

  “What does Asok think of the horse-calling rite?” Berta asked her sister.

  Tora shrugged one shoulder carefully, so as not to disturb the nursing baby. “Asok was reared in the worship of the Mother, so the horse-calling is not strange to him. But he has been listening to Heno and the other men who follow Sky God, and I am thinking that he likes what he hears.”

  Berta finished with the pottery and put it away in its proper place. She turned to look at Tora. “Poor Ronan,” she said. “It is in my heart almost to feel sorry for him. Some of the men will be angry no matter which way he moves on this.”

  “We shall see how clever a chief he really is,” Tora said, and both women glanced at each other, their brown eyes brimming with secret amusement.

  * * * *

  Fara and Crim were not so pleased with the advent of Nel. They had eaten dinner alone in their hut, as Eken was spending the week in the moon hut.

  “I had so hoped that he would marry Eken,” Fara sighed. “She was hoping also; that is why she refused to wed any of t
he other men.”

  “I know,” Crim said. He was very fond of his sister-by-marriage. “What did she say when you told her?”

  “She did not say much. But she looked…stricken.”

  “Well, there is certainly no lack of men for her to wed in the Tribe of the Wolf!” Crim said bracingly.

  “I know. But she had set her heart on Ronan. He should not have done this to her.”

  “He did nothing to encourage her,” Crim pointed out fairly. “The wishing was all on Eken’s side.”

  “He should have told us he was married,” Fara said. “Then Eken would not have hoped.”

  “He wasn’t married,” Crim said. “I thought the same as you, and so I asked him why he had never mentioned his wife. He said he and Nel had spoken the words of binding only a half-a-moon ago.”

  “Then he should have told us he planned to marry.”

  Crim shrugged. “He had not seen Nel for three years, Fara. He probably did not know what would happen between them.” He added, as Fara made a discontented face, “You surely did not think a man like Ronan would live forever without a woman.”

  “Of course I didn’t,” Fara said irritably. “That is why I was sure he would marry Eken.”

  “Well, Eken will just have to marry someone else,” Crim replied. “Either Dai or Okal would take her in a moment, and they are both brave, well-looking young men.”

  “They are not Ronan,” Fara grumbled.

  “Neither am I,” pointed out her husband, “and you seem to be content.”

  “Oh…” Fara looked at him, and then she smiled. “But Eken cannot marry you either.”

  “That is so,” Crim said. “Poor girl.”

  His wife pretended to throw a cookpot at him, and, laughing, he ducked out of the tent to go to the married men’s meeting.

  * * * *

  Bror had been in Ronan’s hut many times, but he entered this time with unusual reluctance. There was a woman in Ronan’s hut now, a woman in Ronan’s life. Bror’s heart was sore as he thought that things between them would never again be the same.

  Bror had to duck his head to get under the hut door, and as he straightened he scanned the hut swiftly, searching for the intruder. His tensed muscles relaxed as he realized she was not there. Ronan glanced up from the leather pack strap he was repairing, smiled, and said, “Sit down, Bror,” gesturing to Bror’s accustomed place at the barely smoldering hearthplace, As Bror advanced, he continued to scan the room for signs of the new occupant.