by neetha Napew
“Lorak is very angry. He curses your name. But do not be concerned. I will kill him, as I have killed Sondahr. For you. To make her pay. No one may insult Navahk and not suffer Naiapi’s are.”
He froze, startled. “You .. . killed Sondahr?”
“With this!” she boasted, holding out her palm so that he might see the tiny skewers of bone that had been soaked in water until they were pliable, then bent into tight circles and allowed to dry. “I put them in her meat, just so, so they would not take long to open, like this.”
Her hand closed into a fist, then opened sharply. “Her belly was pierced in many places. Her pain was great. She asked to die. Pomm is magic woman in this camp now, at Sondahr’s request. And also at Sondahr’s request, it was Pomm who took her life, quickly, as though she could not wait to do it, with a blade carved of mammoth tusk provided by Sondahr herself. But it is Naiapi who killed her, in the way my father taught me long ago to kill wolves and leaping cats so that their skins may be taken whole and without blemish. The woman of Torka would not do this for you. She could not please you as Naiapi would if—“ He heard the longing in her voice. “She pleases me,” he interrupted coldly, and smiled when he saw the misery in her eyes. “And soon she will please me more.”
lana sat in Torka’s pit hut with Summer Moon in her arms. The baby, Demmi, suckled fretfully at her breast. It had taken her hours to quiet Summer Moon, and even then lana had been unable to lull her to sleep until she had allowed the child to hold Lonit’s bola. lana’s own thoughts had been so troubled that she had lain awake, her mind drifting, as it so often did, through broken fragments of the past, lingering over memories of her murdered husband and children, remembering all the gentleness and kindness that she had found in Torka’s camp.
The happenings at the feast fire had so shocked and appalled her, she had willed herself not to see them, not to acknowledge them as reality. Torka and Karana had not been beaten and driven from the camp. No. They were only hunting and would come back soon, as would Lonit. They would come back and, if the day were warm and the wind strong enough to keep the blackflies from settling, she would take the children out into the sun, and together with Torka, Lonit, and Karana, she would bathe with them in the sweet waters of the warm springs and Who was the man standing in the entrance to the pit hut? He had drawn the door skin aside as though it were his right to do so. Snow and wind blew in as he stood in the opening. She could see the light of dawn behind him. It was snowing outside. Where was the sun? The wind was very strong, but even if it were not, blackflies would not be pests in the snow, and the springs were warm, so warm.. ..
Confused, she closed her eyes. Behind her Aliga stirred upon her own pallet and moaned softly as she readjusted her weight beneath her sleeping furs.
“I have come for one of the children, woman. Which one you yield is up to you,” informed the intruder.
lana did not like the sound of his voice. It purred deep at the back of his throat, like a lion threatening. She drew the children closer. She remembered him now. She feared him now.
He was advancing toward her, smiling, showing sharp white, pointed teeth. What did he want with her children? lana looked into his eyes and knew the answer.
She sat up, pulling Summer Moon up with her, drawing the bed skins around them both. The child made soft noises in her sleep. And suddenly, for the first time in many years, lana’s thoughts focused with exquisite and brutal clarity. She knew exactly where she was and what had happened to set her alone in the pit hut with Aliga and the children. The man who was coming toward her had ordered the banishment of Torka and Karana, and what must surely be their deaths. He had taken Lonit to be his woman, but not before he had allowed the other women to abuse her and had caused the children to scream.
Her arms tightened protectively around Summer Moon and Demmi. She would not allow him to make her babies scream again. He would have to kill her first. But if she died, she would never see the little ones again, unless he killed them, too, and their tiny spirits followed her to walk the wind forever.
“No!” her statement was emphatic. It had been so long since she had spoken except to croon or whisper soft words and baby stories to the children, that her voice sounded as though it had come from the throat of a stranger. And in a way it had, for the sad, dull, vacant look was gone from lana’s eyes.
“You will not hurt my children .. . not as long as I live,” she warned him.
“Then you will not live long, Madwoman,” he promised.
Shame filled her. Is this what he thought of her—what they all must think of her—that she was mad? Mindless? Is this what she had been all of these long years—useless except as a dull-eyed caretaker for another woman’s babies, and in the end not even good for that because when danger threatened, she retreated into herself, aware of nothing but her desperate need to avoid confrontation with the realities of her life?
In the darkness Navahk failed to see the change in her. He dared to come closer, snarling at her, wanting her to see the intent in his eyes to maim or murder the children, taking pleasure in her fear.
But she was not afraid. She moved so quickly that he had only a second to react as she leaned back and with a grace, power, and dexterity that she had forgotten she possessed, gripped the braided leather thong in her right hand. As she had seen Lonit do a thousand times, she gathered the ends of the four long, shell-weighted thongs in the other, stressed the cords taut, then swung them high. She whirled the bola until the thongs sang and whirred, and the shells flew round and round as she released them in a deadly, spiraling arc.
Navahk jumped to evade the weapon but not fast enough. He went down flat on his face, unconscious before he could utter a cry, with one shell embedded in his eye, the thongs of the bola looped about his neck, his right eardrum bleeding.
Grek awoke to the sound of wind and the sting of snow hitting the exterior walls of his pit hut. He could not hear anyone stirring within the encampment. He sensed the rising dawn but lay still for a moment, knowing that people would be staying within their shelters today, sleeping off the results of the previous night’s drink and talking low about the happenings at the feast fire. The memories disturbed him. Not even the good feeling of Wallah lying warm against him could soften his misgivings.
Carefully, not wishing to disturb his woman, he rose and reached for his winter boots. They were gone—both pair. Startled, he squinted into the shadows, noted that Naiapi was not there, and knew that Mahnie was gone before he saw that her bed furs were missing. He cursed quietly; he knew where the girl had gone—and with his winter clothes!
Wallah stirred. “What is it?” He told her.
She looked around, her mind groping against panic. “Naiapi did not come home last night. Many of the women spent the night with Sondahr, chanting with Pomm to strengthen her healing powers. Even some of the girls were invited to go. Mahnie must have followed Naiapi onto the Hill of Dreams after we were asleep. You know how curious and willful the girl is, and—“
“You know better than that. Mahnie wouldn’t follow Naiapi anywhere. She’s gone off after Karana. Name me Fool for telling the child where the others had left him! But why would she take such a risk, and in weather like this? I know she’s moon-eyed for the youth, but he’s so much older and has never said more than ‘go away’ to the child in all the years of my remembering!”
Wallah was sick with apprehension. She noticed her misarranged belongings. Insight struck her deeply as she saw the opened flap of the sheepskin sack in which she kept the supplies of skins that every woman kept for her bleeding times. She folded her sleeping furs aside and went to check the sack. It was as she expected. “She is no longer a child.”
He growled, understanding and yet not understanding at all. “Only a child would do such a foolish thing in this weather!”
Wallah looked at him. “This is a bad camp.”
Grek nodded a silent assent as he pulled on his summer boots and both his lightweight summer tuni
cs, grumbling with annoyance because Mahnie had taken his favorite winter coat as well.
He had just stepped from his pit hut when he saw Lonit stumbling down from the Hill of Dreams. He could barely discern her form. The wind was blowing hard, driving snow in thick, oblique sheets of white. If it snowed any harder, he would be unable to find the lake, much less follow his daughter. Her tracks must have been buried long before now. He turned, took up two of his spears, and would have jogged on toward the break in the wall of bones and out across the stormy tundra in pursuit of his child had Lonit not staggered and fallen.
As she got to her feet, the heavy drape of dark fur in which she had been wrapped against the cold fell away. She seemed not to notice as, with her black hair whipping in the wind, she staggered on, naked, hurrying toward her pit hut, an unlighted torch held as a weapon in her hand, her steps betraying her pain and the urgency of her errand. Grek squinted in amazement.
He was no magic man, but he knew that something was wrong. Why was Navahk not pursuing the naked woman? And why was she carrying the torch as though she intended to kill somebody with it? Grek was a big man, and his stride was long if not graceful. Instinct set him to the chase, but although Lonit was running stiff with cold, half stumbling toward her destination, she was nearly to her pit hut before he caught up with her.
“Woman of Torka, what—“
She wheeled, straining against the broad, strong hand that curled around
her upper arm. “Navahk is going to kill my children! He is—“
He was shocked to see her swollen mouth, blackened eye, and bloodied nose. And he had not known that a female could be so strong, for before her statement was complete, she had broken away from him and entered the hut.
Grek would have pulled her back by her hair, but his ungloved fingers were stiff with cold, and the long strands slipped through them before he could manage a grip. Then the anger was back. What was he doing? If Navahk was going to kill the children of Torka, was Grek going to stand back and once again allow the magic man his way? Would he stop the mother and thus sanction the murder? No! With his spears at ready, he entered the hut, ready to kill the man who had plagued him for so long.
But Navahk lay sprawled and bleeding from a head wound that had stained the clean expanse of furs that covered the hide floor of Torka’s domain. The thongs of Lonit’s bola were wound about his head. Blood and eye fluid darkened the fine pelage of the furs, and dark veins of blood ran from his ear.
Lonit stopped abruptly in front of Grek. He nearly knocked her down trying to arrest his own forward momentum. No lamp or fire burned to light the deeply shadowed interior, but Grek and Lonit clearly saw the prone and motionless figure of the magic man, with the madwoman, lana, sitting before him with Lonit’s children in her arms.
“lana?”
Grek heard Lonit’s tremulous, whispering query, and to his amazement, the madwoman smiled. Even in the dark he could see the change in her. She sat erect. Her eyes were bright, her face radiant.
“He came to kill our babies. This woman could not let him do that. lana hopes that Lonit will not be angry that lana used her bola and set its spirit free to hunt ... a different kind of bird.”
“Is he ... dead?” breathed Grek.
Lonit did not hear him. She stepped around the motionless Navahk and, with a sob, embraced lana and her children.
“Oh, lana, if Navahk has brought your spirit to live again within your heart, to speak again as a woman to another woman, then in his life he has done at least one good thing!”
“I will kill him now and have done with it,” said Grek.
Lonit whirled, her battered face intense. “One man may not take the life spirit of another! That is the way of Navahk, not of Torka’s people!”
“I am not of Torka’s people. And if that man awakes with a memory of what has happened here, not one of Torka’s people will be left alive.” He saw fear in the women’s eyes and in the face of the child whose name was Summer Moon. Then, as clearly as if the wind had just blown the sky free of storm, he saw the way that he must follow. He actually smiled, he liked the route so much. “All right. So be it, then. Let him lie. Dress yourself and your children, women of Torka. Gather up your warmest furs and whatever you must carry from this camp to maintain another—but nothing too heavy, nothing that will slow our steps. We will go from this place together. Grek will see you safely to your man and to the boy Karana. They were alive when I left them. If we hurry, you and I—with Wallah and Mahnie—we will see to it that they stay alive. This man will be of Torka’s band. Together we will go far from this camp, and let others follow the way of Navahk and live with fear forever!”
PART VI. THE CORRIDOR OF STORMS
The child hunched within the tall, sheltering grasses of the lakeshore. Its fur was thick now, its undercoat so downy that the wind could not have penetrated it, even if the child had risen and walked out into the savage beat of the rising storm.
The world beyond the grasses was white: white sky, white land. But within the windbreak of the grasses the world was still gold and russet with the bent, dry stalks of autumn, although upon the ground little frozen rivers of granulated snow intruded here and there wherever the breath of the wind managed to find a break in the grass.
The long, clawed index finger of the child disturbed the delicate, lace like patterns of the fine, dry snow as it remembered another snowfall, another nest of grass, within a distant willow grove where Mother Killer had first come to leave it meat. That all seemed so long ago, so far away.
Frowning, the child stared at the unconscious young beast it had dragged to shelter within the grasses. It leaned close to his face, sniffed at his nostrils.
Yes. Like the other larger, older beast it had left undisturbed by the lakeshore, he was still breathing. The child’s head cocked to one side. Its finger slowly traced the hideous, bloodied features of the creature. He looked so much like Mother Killer, yet the child perceived that he was different. He had the face of youth, not of maturity. His body, when erect, would be taller, more muscular. The tattered, bloodied skins that covered the beast were not white, but his face was somehow the same face as Mother Killer. So the child had dragged him off, to kill him ... to feed upon him ... to tear off his underskin and dance within it.
The child was not particularly hungry, however, and this wounded, murmuring beast was not Mother Killer. Moreover, there was something disturbingly familiar about him, something that robbed the child of its desire to kill him. Now and again he opened his eyes and stared up sightlessly out of troubled dreams. His eyes were glazed, dull, and unfocused. The child watched him, remembering.. ..
Only a few hours before, the child had been eating a still-twitching ptarmigan within a grove of stunted trees, close to the massive circle of piled bones in which the beasts encamped. It had been spitting feathers and sucking blood, scenting the dangerous smell of the beasts’ fire. Its broad, infinitely sensitive nostrils had picked up vague inferences of the smell of Mother Killer, but there were other odors, foul and repugnant, of Man and the dried skins of dead animals, of cooked meat and congealed blood, of burned fat and ashes, and overriding all, the smell of the accumulation of mammoth bones and tusks, ancient and new. It was a place that reeked of death.
The child had listened to their strange hangings and clappings and whistlings, and to the even stranger howling of their voices. A little while later, with all but the head and feet of the ptarmigan consumed, the child left its hiding place to follow a fire lit procession of beasts who seemed to be driving Mother Killer before them.
As the child had trailed them, its fears of the beasts had been confirmed: The one it had thought to be Mother Killer and another taller, older beast that covered itself in the maned skin of a lion were beaten, pummeled, shouted at, and forced to their knees. The child had smelled their blood and their anger and their fear as it saw the ugliest beast that it had ever seen posture over them in the feathers of a bird, then kick them until
they collapsed into two silent, bloodied heaps. Terrified of being discovered, the child had remained hidden until the last of the beasts had walked away, leaving a sharp man stone and flying stick behind. If they savaged one another, what would they do to one who was not of their own kind?
So the child had stayed under cover of the grasses for a long time, recalling the death of its mother, longing for her as it remembered what it had seen the beasts do to the great tusked ones that had been driven into the bog of the distant lake within the far hills. The beasts, especially Mother Killer, had killed not only for meat, but for the obvious pleasure they took in the killing. Later the child had fed upon the bones and remnant flesh of the mammoths that the beasts had not carried away, sating itself before leaving the killing site to pursue Mother Killer, certain that Mother Killer had intentionally left enough meat on the dismembered bones of the dead mammoths for it to feed upon. Its strength restored by meat and blood, the child had moved quickly in the depth of night, to shelter within the grasses and scrub growth that surrounded the lakeshore where it hunkered now. It had rested and slept, dreaming of far lands where it had once lived with those of its own kind, carried in the arms of its mother beneath the vast black skin of the night. Although it was a mere babe at that time, the child clearly recalled seeing soft, frightened eyes staring up out of the shadowed shrubbery, eyes filled with starlight, afire with wonder .. . . exactly like the eyes of the beast staring up at it now.
Eyes that were clear of dreams, eyes that focused upon the face of the child and filled with terror.
It smelled the rank, sudden rush of the beast’s fear. As it grimaced in revulsion, its broad, nearly seamless lips pulled back, revealing broad teeth and massive, stabbing canines.
The beast’s face twisted in horror. His mouth pulled back, showing his own small, even, useless teeth as he bolted upright, screaming: “Torka!”
Startled by the strange, unexpected cry of panic, the child jumped aside as the beast ran past, frantically elbowing its way through the grasses and into the snow-driven world beyond.