The Storyteller Trilogy

by Sue Harrison

  Then voices came to them, some loud, some lifted in mourning songs. Ghaden squatted on his haunches, and K’os moved to help with the food, pulling down water bladders, hissing when she noticed how many needed to be refilled. She handed the empty bladders to Daughter, gestured with her eyes to the ulax roof.

  As wife of the one who had lost his father, it was not Daughter’s place to fill water bladders. K’os was playing the wife’s part. When the chief hunter and the elders came inside, K’os directed them toward Ghaden and even accepted condolences from them, allowing herself to cry when their wives hugged her.

  Daughter glanced at Qung and saw the angry set of the old woman’s mouth, but Daughter merely closed her eyes in embarrassment and hoped Ghaden would not be dishonored by K’os’s actions. She was used to K’os’s need to center people’s attention on herself.

  Daughter bent close to whisper into Ghaden’s ear, told him she needed to go for water. He stood and, taking some of the bladders from her hands, went with her. Daughter saw the wide eyes of those in the ulax, the surprise of the men and women still on the roof.

  “We need water,” Ghaden said, and held up the flattened bladders he had clenched in his hands.

  Several women came forward, took the bladders, then Ghaden climbed back into the ulax, waited at the bottom of the log for Daughter, led her to that place where he had been sitting.

  “Sit beside me,” he said, his voice low and soft.

  “Qung needs help, husband,” Daughter told him.

  “There are other women here. She will have enough help.”

  Then he called K’os. She came over, frowned for a moment at Daughter, mouthed, “Water?”

  “Several of the village women are bringing water,” Daughter said.

  Ghaden pressed Daughter’s hand so she knew he wanted her to be quiet. “I need my wife with me,” he said in a firm voice. “But Qung is an old woman and she needs help.”

  K’os held out her hands as though to remind Ghaden that her fingers were crippled, but he kept his eyes on her face. “You are not the wife,” he said.

  Daughter held her breath. K’os tipped her head and made a smile over clenched teeth. “You are right. Your wife should be here with you. I will help Qung.”

  Ghaden squeezed Daughter’s hands, then turned to accept the sympathy of those who had come into the ulax. But Daughter’s breath came with such difficulty that it seemed as though someone had laid rocks against her chest. Yes, K’os would help Qung, and she would work hard, but Ghaden would live to see her anger, and K’os would strike at a time when neither Daughter nor Ghaden expected it. That was her way.

  You have lived through her vengeance before, Daughter reminded herself. Be concerned for your husband. There is nothing more important than that.

  She set her teeth in fierceness and drew into her mind the remembrance of that long-ago time when she and the grandfather had been adrift on the sea. He had been too sick to help her, and though she was only a child she had been the one who told their boat which way to travel. She had pointed out the mountain that marked the First Men’s island. She had been the strong one.

  PART THREE

  Chapter Thirty-two

  DAUGHTER’S STORY

  THE SEAL HIDE IQYAX cover was too close over Daughter’s face, and a storage pack pinched her feet, but since K’os lay in Seal’s iqyax without complaint, could Daughter do less? Besides, she had been the one who had asked to travel in her husband’s iqyax rather than with her father, and because Ghaden also wanted that, Seal had exchanged his larger boat for an iqyax of his own.

  Uutuk had always been the one whose wishes were ignored, and what woman expects anything different? After all, she was only a daughter, not a son who would become a hunter. So now, when one softly spoken wish had caused so many changes, she would die before voicing a complaint.

  They spent the first night on a wide, gray sand beach. It curled back so far into the foothills that it was nearly an inlet, a beautiful place with many birds and high drifts of wood brought in by the sea.

  “Why does no one live here?” K’os had asked.

  “Too far for water,” Ghaden told her, and raised a hand toward the hills. “Half a day’s walk. But it is a good first night’s camp when a man still has full water bladders from the Traders’ village. Sometimes, if you are lucky, you will even see a few caribou here.”

  Daughter began gathering enough driftwood to keep their fire strong throughout the night, for if there were caribou, there might also be wolves, or so it seemed in those stories K’os had told her. She had always been glad to be First Men rather than River, for the River People had so many animals they must worry about. Wolves and wolverines, lynx and foxes, moose and caribou, each able to do some kind of harm, large or small. And now, here she was wife to a River man and traveling with him to his village.

  After Ghaden’s return to the Traders’ village, they stayed to keep the second mourning. Ghaden had considered continuing that mourning into forty days as First Men often do, but K’os had convinced him that it would be better to go to the Four Rivers village where Cen’s wife lived, tell her what had happened, and stay with her for those forty days.

  “Until then, mourn him in your heart, as we all do,” K’os had said, and how could Ghaden disagree with wisdom like that?

  Daughter had hoped to spend the whole forty days at the Traders’ Beach. She had learned to love the old woman Qung and had wanted to hear more of her stories and enjoy Qung’s wisdom. But K’os was right. The weather would soon turn toward fall, and then the seas were less predictable. If a summer storm could kill someone like Cen who had traveled for many years, what hope would Ghaden and Seal have, cursed with wives in their iqyan?

  She dropped the last armful of driftwood near the blaze that Seal had started. He had a scowl on his face, and he was watching Ghaden and K’os. Suddenly Daughter realized that since they had beached the iqyan, they had been speaking the River language, which Seal did not understand.

  “He explains why there is no village on this cove,” Daughter said to Seal. “He uses the River language because it is easier for him than First Men, and also because he knows that you, being both hunter and trader, would need no explanation, that any man could see why there is no village, though the beach is good and driftwood is abundant, and even the trees that top the hills are straight and tall.”

  Seal puffed out his chest. “Yes, a man would see such a thing,” he said. He pointed his chin toward the trees and laughed. “But you think those are tall? Wait until we get into the River People’s country. Then you will see trees so tall that they block the sky. Is that not so, Ghaden?”

  Ghaden squatted beside Seal and, speaking in the First Men language, said, “It is true, wife. Those trees are so tall, their shadows blanket the earth. Under their branches, it almost seems like night even during the brightest day.”

  Daughter shook her head in disbelief. “I know what you say is true, but it is difficult for me to imagine it.”

  K’os had knelt beside one of the iqyan, was struggling to pull a pack of dried fish from the stern. When she finally managed to free it, she turned and said, “There are treasures in those forests. A healer can find many things to help others. I will teach you, Uutuk, and then the River People will be glad that Ghaden brought you, even if you are First Men.”

  Daughter knew K’os’s words were meant to encourage her, but they put a chill of fear into her bones, so that even her fingers and feet began to ache with dread. Later, after they had eaten and the darkness of night had cloaked their beach, she and Ghaden curled up together under their sleeping robes, and the touch of his hands soothed her, so she slept well with good dreams and no fear.

  Herendeen Bay, Alaska Peninsula

  602 B.C.

  “Enough of these stories about women!”

  Yikaas glanced up at the climbing log. He was not surprised to hear Sky Catcher’s protest. Who else caused him so many problems?

  �
�We already told you that we did not want to hear so much about Daughter. Almost everyone here is a trader or a hunter. Tell us a man’s story. We have all made the journey from this village to the mainland.”

  “Yes,” Yikaas said after Qumalix translated Sky Catcher’s words, “but what if you were a woman, lying in an iqyax, unable to see the sky? That is something to think about.”

  Many of the men mumbled their agreement. One shouted out, “No wonder women do not like to travel. It would be difficult not to be afraid.”

  “Ha!” said another. “If she trusts her husband she should be glad just to lie there all day, doing nothing, not even paddling.”

  Sky Catcher moved down the climbing log, crouched on one of the notches that still allowed him to be above the other men in the ulax. “You sound like you wish you were a woman,” he said to the hunter.

  Several men laughed. “Who has the penis in your ulax?” one First Men trader called out. “Your wife?”

  Qumalix leaned close to tell Yikaas what the trader had said, and Yikaas, angry at their foolishness, answered, “Man or woman, it is good to see life through another’s eyes.”

  Some of the men shouted their agreement, but others began to call out more insults, even to question the possibility of curses when a man tried too hard to understand how a woman felt, how she saw the world.

  “It is best to leave such things to storytellers,” the chief hunter finally told them, then said to Sky Catcher, “you need to come down and sit with us.” When Sky Catcher remained where he was, the chief hunter stood and stabbed the air with a finger, like a father scolding a child. “Now!”

  Sky Catcher scrambled from his place on the climbing log and sat down at the back of the ulax, but he held his mouth in a scowl and mumbled out complaints until Yikaas said, “Cen’s story.”

  Then the men shouted their approval, except for Sky Catcher, who crossed his arms over his chest and closed his eyes as though he planned to sleep rather than listen.

  The Bering Sea

  6435 B.C.

  CEN’S STORY

  For three days the sea controlled Cen’s iqyax. There were moments when the roaring in his ears seemed to diminish, and he began to hope that some of his hearing would return. But though he listened carefully each time the sea’s voice grew quiet, no other sounds came to him.

  His eyes could tell night from day unless clouds hovered too close. During those times of grayness, he almost believed that he was dead and traveling toward the spirit world, for what did any man know about that journey? There were shamans who claimed to have gone to that place of spirits, but they did not describe their journeys. Besides, Cen was a man who had learned not to trust too much in what others claimed, especially if what they said would bring them gain.

  He tried to keep track of the days that passed, to number them in his head, but without eyes and ears to set boundaries for his mind, his thoughts seemed to travel in devious paths and on foolish trails. He drank his water sparingly, limiting himself to three sips taken only after a long time of darkness, the end of a night. By that measure, it seemed that four or five days had passed, for he had nearly emptied one water bladder.

  At first his belly had been unable to hold in anything he ate, but the last dried fish had stayed down. He had enough fish yet for many days, though somehow the pack had allowed water in, and although so far the fish were only softened by the damp, he feared they would mold.

  He continued to sing to the Creator, the wind, and the sea, asking that the sea carry him to a good beach, but his throat was still raw, and the words scraped over his tongue like an adze. If the pain in his throat was any indication, his songs would not be pleasing to hear, and Cen wondered if it would be better to stay silent rather than give insult with his poor voice. But finally he decided that all things knew what he had gone through, and that the sea, hearing, might admire his courage and consent to guide him.

  During what he thought was the fifth night, Cen was suddenly awakened by something bumping against one side of his iqyax. His first impulse was to curl himself as tightly as he could, make himself small, giving whatever it was less chance to grab him with teeth or claws.

  The storm had not taken the long knife he wore strapped to his calf. He pulled it from the sheath, held it in his right hand, then fisted his left hand and slowly moved it out over the water. He held his breath, his heart thudding until the blood pounded in his veins. Nothing happened. He took a long breath and lowered his hand into the sea.

  “It is night, and so you try to trick me into thinking you are not there. You think that I cannot see you in the darkness. You are wrong. I know where you are. Do you see my knife?” He raised his right hand, flexed his wrist so that any light from the moon, if there was a moon, would catch on the obsidian blade. “My knife is hungry for the taste of blood.”

  He said those words once and then again, but still nothing happened, and because he could not hear his own voice, he wondered if perhaps he was speaking only in a whisper. He filled his lungs with air, shouted the words.

  Nothing.

  Again he lowered his left hand into the water and waited for pain, but there was only the cold of the sea.

  “What are you?” he demanded. “Fish? Otter? Seal?”

  Something touched the stub of his smallest finger, and he jerked away his hand. Something slapped against his iqyax. Through the thin skin of the cover, he felt it move, but not like an animal moves. His heart leaped for a moment in hope. Seaweed? That would mean he was near shore.

  No, he told himself. It was too solid for seaweed. Perhaps it was driftwood, carried by the same current that had claimed his boat.

  Gathering his courage, Cen again thrust his hand into the water, this time with fingers splayed, ready to clasp whatever had found him.

  It came into his hand, wet and hard and slimy. A limb from some tree. He tried to wrestle it into his iqyax, but the limb was heavy and nearly pulled him into the sea. He slid his knife back into its sheath, used both hands, leaning right as he lifted. He finally got it into the iqyax and settled it across the coaming, moved it until it seemed centered. He extended his left hand as far as he could reach and did not feel the end of the limb, did the same with his right. It was longer than a tall man, but only as big around as his wrists, and it smelled like cedar, the best wood for paddles, light and strong.

  A limb like that could be a good thing for a man to have if some wave were casting him against rocks, but it was too long. He would have to shorten it. Perhaps he could even use it as some kind of paddle, not a good paddle, but better than nothing.

  Of course, not seeing, not hearing, how could he know which way to direct his iqyax? Cen thrust that thought from his mind. The sea had given him a gift. Why see it as less than that?

  He had always made his paddles the measure of his arms outstretched, with the blade extending beyond. So he leaned forward, reached as far as he could with both hands, caught the place where his right fingertips touched. He used his thumbnail to gouge a mark in the sea-softened wood. The end of the limb widened out into branches like the bones of a hand, and suddenly in his mind he saw a new kind of paddle, the bellyskin that held his dried fish pulled taut over those fingered branches and tied in place to make a blade.

  A blade like that would not hold up against rock or strong currents, but in calm seas, it might be useful—if he knew which way to paddle.

  He moved his hands to the other end. The limb was twice the size of his wrist where it had broken away from the tree, that end still prickly with splinters. A good sign. Perhaps it had not been in the sea long enough to rot.

  What should he do? Cut off the stout end where the strength lay, or cut off the branches that might be useful as a blade? He considered his choices, then decided to cut the branch in the middle. The paddle part would be short, but he could bend close to the sea to use it, and then he would still have enough length at the thick end to push himself away from rocks and shallows.

  Twice
he measured the stick in hand lengths, then used his knife to cut at the center. The sea had stripped off the bark, and the wood was punky under his blade, but after he had carved a deep notch, he came to the heartwood, still dry and strong, fighting his knife with each cut.

  “Good, you are a warrior,” Cen said to the branch. “I need that in you. We might be small against this giant sea, but we both have strong hearts.”

  He turned the branch and again cut past the punk to the heart, continued until he was nearly through, then broke the branch in half. He whittled the cut ends smooth and slid them down into the iqyax. He was tired and needed to sleep. When he woke, he would cover the branch end with the seal belly from his fish pack. Then he would have a paddle.

  During that sleep Cen dreamed as a man who could see, and so when the sun woke him, prising his right eye open with strong light, he did not think it anything unusual to see that brightness, to shield his eye against it. Then he remembered where he was and what had happened to him. He opened his eye as wide as he was able, cried out against the pain of the light, then crowed in joy as he realized that he could see the brown and yellow hide of his iqyax.

  He forgot the caution that any man should use in recovering from wounds, and he pried open his eyelid to gaze at the sea. The fog had lifted itself into white clouds that stood as high as mountains above the waves, so it seemed to Cen that his iqyax had found a valley at the center of the sea, with white mountain walls and the water cutting a valley floor.

  His eye was still swollen enough that it did not stay open by itself, so Cen held the lid up with one thumb and, using a hand and the movements of his body, turned his iqyax in a circle, but there was nothing except the sea and clouds.

  He decided to finish his paddle, then set his course as soon as the fog lifted, for surely then he would be able to make out some dark edge of land, but if not, at least the stars would guide him, those few that might be strong enough to push their light through clouded night skies.