The Storyteller Trilogy

by Sue Harrison

  “She’s his mother. He sees nothing beyond that. He will never see beyond that.”

  Aqamdax settled herself on a pad of fox pelts and picked up the mat she had been weaving. “I hope that Cries-loud soon fills your belly with a child, Yaa,” she said, her head bent over her work. “It’s time you became mother to someone other than your husband.”

  Chapter Twelve

  THEY WAITED THROUGH TWO days of sleet and rain. On the morning of the third day, the new spring sun returned to burn through the haze, lifting the cold from the earth in great clouds of fog. They began walking, four men, four dogs, and K’os.

  By midday they had left the familiar spruce woods for dense alder thickets. Branches caught in the dogs’ packs and plucked at parkas, scratched faces until Wolf Head led them to the edge of the river, to that path of mud cleared by the ice and debris of spring breakup.

  By night, they had come to the strip of tundra that was the buffer between the North Sea beaches and the forests, felt the teeth of winter gnashing in the wind from that sea, saw distant mountains of ice, white peaks created by wind and waves, now diminishing each day under the onslaught of the spring sun.

  Wolf Head did not seem to worry much about K’os. After all, she was old. What harm can an old woman do? K’os kept a smile hidden in her cheek as she fostered that opinion. She stopped often as they walked, complained about her feet and her back and the load they made her carry.

  She had nothing against the brothers Squirrel and Black Stick. Squirrel had been well named. He was small and quick, with dark, round eyes and a hank of black hair that hung down over one side of his forehead. He spoke in a high, chattering voice, and was usually ignored by his brother. Like Squirrel, Black Stick was short, but he was thick of bone, with a sturdiness that made K’os dream of sharing his bed.

  But Cries-loud deserved more than her indifference or her daydreams. Sok’s son. Chakliux’s nephew. He called himself husband to the young woman Yaa, though they had not celebrated with a marriage feast. He wouldn’t get much out of Yaa in his sleeping robes, proud as she was, an old woman in a girl’s body. Perhaps, for all that Sok had done for her, K’os should teach Cries-loud the joy of taking a woman who appreciated him.

  When they made camp, Wolf Head told K’os to stake the dogs and feed them. Then he sent her to gather wood for their fire, not an easy task at the edge of the tundra, and for all her work, she brought back only sticks of willow and alder, which would burn slowly with acrid smoke and give little heat, less light. They would probably have her gathering heather during their next day’s walk, that and tundra willow. How else could they have a fire? She carried her load of wood back to camp, saw that men had put up two lean-tos, open sides facing one another. She dumped her wood and laid a fire between the lean-tos, used a fire-bow and club grass fluff to get a flame started.

  She warmed herself by crouching close until Squirrel ordered her to get more wood before the short spring night darkened around them. She hissed at him and stayed where she was, hands cupped around the tiny flame. Cries-loud came to her, grasped her shoulders from behind, and pulled her to her feet.

  “Go now as you are,” he told her, “or go bloody from my walking stick.”

  She lifted a hand to the side of her face, cowered as if she were afraid of him, and left the warmth of the fire. When she had gathered another armful of sticks, she returned to the camp, saw that Cries-loud had stood at the back of one of the lean-tos to watch her as she worked.

  “Do you need a woman tonight, Tigangiyaanen?” she asked him, keeping her voice low so the others would not hear.

  He laughed. “My woman, yes.”

  K’os snorted. “She’s a child. What does she know about pleasing a man? When you take her to your bed, how long does it last for you?” She snapped her fingers. “That long?” she asked.

  She walked past him, dumped the load of wood, and without being told returned to the thickets to gather more. At least there was a good supply of ice-broken limbs on the ground, scoured by the dry winds of a cold winter, so they were not as green as they might have been. She brought in three more armfuls, enough for the night, and each time she gazed boldly into Cries-loud’s face, and if she spoke to him, she called him Tigangiyaanen.

  Finally, as she brought the third armful, Wolf Head told her to sit down and eat some of the dried meat Gull Beak had given her for the trip. She chose to sit beside Cries-loud, and as she ate, she spoke to him boldly as if she were not a slave.

  He ignored her and tried to begin a conversation with Black Stick or Squirrel, but they were tired, and only grunted at him. He asked Wolf Head questions about the Walrus Hunters, and once or twice Wolf Head answered. At those times, K’os listened also. She hadn’t yet decided whether she would stay with the Walrus. At least with them, there was less chance of being killed for running away. She was only an old woman. Who would care if she left? One less person to feed.

  But if she had tried to leave the Near River village, Wolf Head would have come after her, would kill her in revenge for the loss of his son. Better alive and a slave than to die under Wolf Head’s knife.

  From what Wolf Head said about them, the Walrus seemed to be a good people, full of laughter and joking. If so, she would not bother to tell them that Cries-loud was Sok’s son. Why cause problems when she might decide to stay with them? She would work her way from slave to wife and from wife to healer. Once she was their healer, there would be no limit to what she could do. In sending her away, Chakliux had given her more gift than he realized.

  The fire, though smoky, warmed her, and the food comforted her belly, so that she began to relax, and she allowed herself to dream of weapons she might use to kill those who needed killing. Lost in her dreaming, she nearly missed Cries-loud’s question.

  “I’m sorry,” she said to him. “I wasn’t listening. What did you say?”

  “Why do you call me Tigangiyaanen?”

  “You’re a man now,” she said. “You should put away your boy’s name. Who better deserves to be called a great hunter, a strong warrior? Squirrel?” She covered her mouth with her hand, but fanned her fingers so he could see that she was laughing.

  He smirked. There was an innocence about him that appealed to her, but with his mouth in a half-smile, he looked too much like Sok.

  “Think about it. A new name is always a good thing.”

  She took another bite of dried fish. It filled her mouth with the woodsmoke smell of a lodge.

  “No,” Cries-loud said. “I will keep the name I have. My mother gave it to me.”

  “And you would honor her, the one who killed your own grandfather?” She snorted. “There are those who deserve honor and those who do not.”

  He looked into her face, and she was suddenly uncomfortable under his gaze.

  “Perhaps you are right,” he said, “but I need a person of honor to give me that name. I’ll ask Chakliux.”

  She gritted her teeth and turned her left side to the fire. “Rather you should name yourself,” she said. “And while you are thinking of a name, think also on this riddle.”

  She glanced back over her shoulder at him, and saw she had his interest. Riddles were a game played often among those people who had lived in the Cousin River village. More than a game, riddles could teach, but they were also a way for women to say what needed to be said when men were too stubborn to hear the words outright.

  “Look, what do I see?” she asked.

  “It falls in autumn, taken by the wind,

  but the tree still lives.”

  “A leaf,” Squirrel said, interrupting their conversation.

  “That’s a simple one,” Black Stick told her, curling his lips into a sneer.

  “And so you are right,” K’os said, but she looked hard into Cries-loud’s face. “The wind is always simple, nae’? And we always understand where it comes from and whence it blows.”

  For a moment, Cries-loud’s eyes widened, then he feigned indifference. Did he unde
rstand that the riddle was about his mother, Red Leaf? K’os was not sure. But there were still at least two days’ walking to the Walrus village, probably more.

  Perhaps during that time, she would tell him that his mother once lived in the Four Rivers village, and that she had been wife to the trader Cen. K’os might not let him know that Red Leaf was dead. But she would probably tell him that he had a sister there, Sok’s daughter. The girl would have five or six summers by now. If Cries-loud knew about her, he might decide to visit the Four Rivers village.

  What a delight if Sok found out that Cen had taken Red Leaf as his wife after Sok had driven her away to die. How would Sok feel if he knew that Cen had claimed Sok’s daughter as his own? And what would Cen do when he discovered that Red Leaf was the Near River woman who had killed Daes, the woman Cen had loved above all others? K’os smiled as she thought of Cen raising Red Leaf’s daughter as his own, the girl given Daes’s name. Surely that name did not rest easily, bestowed as it was on Red Leaf’s daughter. Too bad Red Leaf was dead. She deserved the agony of Cen’s anger when he finally knew the truth.

  K’os swallowed her smile and called out to Wolf Head, “Which lean-to is mine?”

  “You will sleep here with me,” he said to her.

  She gave him no argument, though her night might be better spent with Squirrel or Black Stick. It was easy to win boys with new pleasures.

  She crawled on hands and knees to the back of Wolf Head’s lean-to, said to him, “Unless you want me near the front to tend the fire.”

  “I will take care of the fire,” he told her.

  “And have the warmest place to sleep,” she muttered under her breath.

  “I’ve heard enough of your complaints today, woman. It’s your fault that we had to leave our warm lodges and take you to the Walrus.”

  He pulled a rope from his pack, bound her ankles a handbreadth apart to hobble her, then tied the other end of the rope to his left wrist. Once they lay down, she brazenly reached over to pat his groin. To her surprise, she found that his penis was full and hard.

  He slapped her hands away and said, “Some things a man cannot control, but there are always choices.”

  “What will it hurt?” she asked. “Surely you have heard that I am good at pleasing men.”

  “I’ve heard the stories. Who has not? But you were wife to my son. There are taboos.”

  “Once, long ago, you told me you had no son.”

  “Once, long ago,” he said, “I was wrong.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  THE WALRUS VILLAGE WAS set near the sea, and during their last day of walking, Wolf Head led them across the wide silt plain. It was soft and wet underfoot, full of hidden rivulets, cold water seeping from the ice that had been driven ashore during winter—thick gray and blue slabs ramping and grinding themselves into hills and mountains, now rotting in the sun.

  The silt held secrets, bubbling springs and sinkholes that would drop them suddenly to their knees, suck them down until they had to fight their way out. The dogs whined under their breaths as they walked, and K’os wished for a cold north wind to freeze the ground. But the wind blew from the west and by midmorning brought rain. Then K’os’s wishes changed from thoughts of firm ground to a longing for one of Aqamdax’s fine waterproof gut parkas. When Aqamdax had been her slave, K’os had owned several.

  How much their lives had changed from those days, K’os thought. Now she was the slave, and Aqamdax was wife, her husband leader of the elders. Their village was strong with the hunting prowess of the Near River men, and secured by the wisdom of the Cousin River People. Who else but Chakliux could have convinced two villages that had nearly destroyed one another to come together as one people and live in peace?

  Then, in her wish-making, K’os realized that she held one desire above all others: to return to that day long ago when she had found Chakliux as a baby, abandoned on the Grandfather Rock, given to the wind because of his bent web-toed otter foot.

  If she had known then what her life would become, she would have left him to die.

  Her right foot sank into the mud, and she faltered, catching herself on hands and knees. The men did not offer to help her, and she fought against the weight of her pack. When she regained her feet, she set her mouth firmly, rolled her tongue over the curses that she did not allow herself to speak, and lived again in her thoughts.

  She had heard stories of shamans who were able to visit the moon and had ways to kill people with words alone, but she had never heard of anyone who could return to days already lived. So there was no hope of changing what had happened with Chakliux. Perhaps what she really wanted was another chance to raise him, this time with the wisdom she had garnered during her long life.

  She wiped her face, sluiced away the rain. Fog hovered on the horizon. She blinked and looked again. Fog or smoke? Were they that close to the Walrus village?

  She quickened her pace until she caught up with Black Stick. He was walking with his head down, the back of his hood taking the brunt of the rain.

  “My eyes are old,” she told him. “Do I see smoke or only fog?”

  He looked up, and after a moment he stopped, frowned, then called to his brother. “Squirrel, is that smoke?”

  “It’s the village,” Wolf Head shouted back. “We’re almost there.”

  Then K’os began to shiver, her teeth clattering so hard that the curses she had held silent began to bleed out from the corners of her mouth. The cloud of her breath turned dark with whispered hate, and her words spun in the wind until they reached Wolf Head’s ears.

  He strode back, fisted a hand, and shook it in her face. “If your curses continue, I will kill you now, no matter what Chakliux wants.” He made a sign of protection against her, then fell back to walk behind her.

  K’os raised a mittened hand to her lips, pressed against her teeth until she was able to force the curses down her throat. Then, to battle her unease, she fixed her mind on the possibilities that would be open to her in a new village.

  The Walrus lodges were stone and hide, set with their backs toward the sea on bluffs well up from the beach, away from the reach of waves. Wolf Head told the others to wait as he went on alone. K’os’s heart rattled like a stone caught in the cage of her ribs. She had been sure she would be able to lure one of the boys to her bed during this journey and prise his loyalty from the others, thus giving her a chance to escape if she needed to. But Wolf Head had been cautious and kept her tied each night.

  The three boys stood together in the rain, their hands clasped around their throwing spears. K’os huddled behind them, in the lee of their bodies, struggling to keep the dogs from each other’s throats. She noticed that Cries-loud and Black Stick looked like men, while Squirrel still had a boy’s thin shoulders and meatless legs. Squirrel and Black Stick clutched their spears to their chests, but Cries-loud held his weapon casually at his side, as though he often came to new villages and was not afraid, ready for either friendship or enmity.

  Black Stick made a nervous dance, shifting from one foot to the other, and Squirrel squeaked out complaints in words that broke in mockery of the man’s voice he would someday own.

  K’os sidled close to Cries-loud and asked, “Did you figure out my riddle?”

  “Your riddle?” he asked, his words edged with irritation. “We have no time for riddles.” He turned and looked at her, then sighed and said, “It’s about my mother.”

  “You do not care that I know where she went when she left the Cousin River village?”

  “I have a wife now. I don’t need my mother.”

  “But what about a sister?” she asked him. “It’s always a good thing for a man to have a sister.”

  “My sister is alive?” he asked.

  “Last I knew,” she said. “A man who lives in the Four Rivers village has claimed her as daughter. Perhaps you remember him. His name is Cen. He’s a trader.”

  “Cen?”

  K’os laughed. “You’re surprised?
” she asked. “Your mother was no fool. You could learn from her. Cunning like the wolf. You wonder how I know? When Chakliux drove me from your hunting camp, I walked to the nearest village. Think for a moment. What village would that be?”

  “The Four Rivers village,” he said softly.

  “Don’t listen to her, Cries-loud,” said Squirrel. “She lies. Everything she says is a lie.”

  Cries-loud opened his mouth as if to reply, but he said nothing, and finally turned back to watch the village.

  K’os spoke into the side of his hood, leaning close so Squirrel and Black Stick could not hear what she said. “You remember Cen?” she whispered.

  Cries-loud spun, and she saw by the set of his jaw that he was angry. “I don’t believe you. Why would Cen take her as wife? She killed Daes, the woman he loved, and she tried to kill his son Ghaden.”

  “Cen is a trader,” K’os said. “Think how many women he sees, how many villages he visits. Why would he remember what Red Leaf looked like? The last time he saw her in the Near River village, no one knew she was the killer. He had no reason to remember your mother’s face.”

  “He would remember her name.”

  K’os laughed at him. “In the Four Rivers village they call her Gheli.”

  “So she’s not dead,” Cries-loud said softly. And though K’os knew he was speaking to himself, she answered.

  “She wasn’t dead.”

  The anger in his eyes was replaced by dread, and he was suddenly still.

  “She died,” K’os said, and found her heart lifted by the pain in Cries-loud’s face. “While I was still living in the village, she died.”

  “How?” he asked.

  Almost, she told him. The words—an illness of belly and bowel—were already sliding up her throat. But she caught herself, held them back. Cries-loud would think of poison, and he would blame her for the death. Instead she told him, “From childbirth and an illness that followed.”

  “The birth of my sister?” he asked.