My Sister the Moon

by Sue Harrison

  “The oldest son, the one with the scar, is looking for a wife. He has many things to trade.” When Kiin did not answer, Qakan bellowed, “He would be a good husband for you, and he would make me rich with furs and ivory.” Then Kiin felt cold water dripping on her neck. She looked up and saw Qakan’s paddle over her head.

  “Do you th-think he would b-be happy if you hit me?” she asked.

  Qakan lowered the paddle into the water and gave the ik a strong thrust that pushed it close to the three men’s boat.

  “I am trying to help you,” Qakan said to her.

  “You are t-trying t-to help yourself, Qakan,” Kiin answered. “If you w-w-wanted to help me, you would have left me alone so I could be w-wife to Amgigh.”

  “Amgigh,” Qakan said and spat into the water.

  Anger knotted in Kiin’s breast, and for the first time since they had met the Walrus men, Kiin felt her spirit move within her. “Wife to Amgigh,” its voice echoed, and a pain squeezed Kiin’s chest so tightly she could not breathe. No, Kiin told herself, I cannot be Amgigh’s wife. Not now. And she sat without paddling until the pain left her.

  But then looking ahead at the Walrus men she thought, What if the scarred one asks for me? He, too, is a good man. Is it right that I curse him? No, I will escape. Somehow I will escape. The child and I will live alone and curse no one.

  They paddled until it was nearly night, then hauled the iks ashore and made two lean-to shelters, one for the Walrus men and another for Kiin and Qakan. Kiin prepared food for the men from their stores and from Qakan’s, then she went into a shelter, huddled under some of Qakan’s furs and listened to the strange rhythms of the Walrus tongue as Qakan and the three men talked long into the night.

  Kiin fell asleep before Qakan came to their shelter, and in the morning when she awoke, she saw that Qakan’s eyes were open, his mouth pursed into a small, tight frown. She knew the look. He was afraid. Not angry, not pouting, but afraid. It was the look he had each time their father took him on a hunt. But Qakan avoided her eyes and so Kiin did not ask him what was wrong.

  They ate, then launched their boats, Qakan and Kiin again following the Walrus men. A cold north wind began to blow, and Kiin saw the wisdom of the hooded parkas the Walrus men wore. She tucked her hair into the collar of her suk, but the wind pushed through her hair and into her ears until Kiin’s head and neck ached with the cold.

  A fog hung over the water and the wind pushed it in toward the beaches, but Kiin could see cliffs, and at one place they passed a great mound of blue ice. During the morning, the Walrus men kept their ik close to the shore as Qakan did, but then they suddenly turned, paddling north into the wind, and Kiin, surprised, looked back at Qakan. Qakan, too, paddled to turn north, but Kiin saw the fear in his eyes.

  “It is shorter,” he said to her. “Last night they told me it would take only the rest of this day and night and perhaps another day to reach their village if we go this way.”

  Kiin felt anger beginning in her chest. Qakan should have told her. The ik’s seams were weak. At least she could have spent the night sewing, strengthening the weak places with sinew thread and patches of sealskin.

  “You should have told me,” she said, and her anger made her voice strong so that she did not stammer on the words. “Our ik is weak. If the waves grow…”

  “Shut your mouth!” Qakan said.

  Kiin turned and looked at him, her anger suddenly, even in the north wind, making her cheeks hot. She turned and laid her paddle in the center of the ik and said, “You paddle. At least I can stuff the seams with fat.”

  Qakan opened his mouth, but said nothing, and finally he looked away from her and paddled, his eyes looking right or left, not at Kiin.

  For a moment Kiin watched him, then she said, “If you see a leak, tell me. I will bail.” Then she began repairing the ik.

  There were no mountains, only the sea. Kiin remembered her sadness when she could no longer see Tugix. But there had been another mountain and another. And as they passed, Kiin had prayed to each mountain’s spirit, had asked the mountains to take her prayers for protection back to Tugix, back to her people and to Amgigh and Samiq.

  Now there were no mountains to carry her prayers, and so Kiin whispered to the sea, sending her requests on the waves. And she hoped that the sea spirits did not look too closely at their poor ik. The tattered covering, the gaping seams would be an insult to the sea animals, to the ones that had given themselves so the ik could be made. So even as she worked, sealing seams with fish fat, tightening stitches with sinew thread, she waited, expecting some sea animal to come under the ik and bite holes so she and Qakan would drown.

  But no sea animals came, and when Kiin had repaired all of the seams she could reach, she began to paddle again. For a short time the fog lifted, but then the sun was setting and darkness came. Kiin heard Qakan’s breathing, even over the noise of paddling and the sea, long sighing breaths, then short, quick breaths, sometimes moaning, as though his fear spoke in a voice of its own.

  When Kiin could see nothing at all, when she no longer knew which way to direct the ik, one of the Walrus men began a chant. Something to sea spirits, Qakan told Kiin. And then Kiin followed the sound of his voice, the darkness and cold pressing in against her eyes like wet fur.

  They came to land at dawn, ate and rested, then started again without sleeping, and it seemed to Kiin that her arms moved only because they had paddled so long that they knew nothing else to do. Muscles in her shoulders and back burned, and cramps knotted in her thighs. She said nothing, but Qakan never stopped his whining, and finally his voice became like the high singing of the wind, something Kiin chose not to hear.

  They followed the land again, so Kiin no longer feared sea animals, but she tried to watch for rocks. The land was flat, though in the distance there were mountains. Kiin could see them when the fog lifted—white-capped clouds on the edge of the horizon.

  They paddled through that day until the sun was only a red shadow in the darkening sky, and Kiin watched the Walrus men to see if they would stop to sleep. How could she paddle for another night? How could she keep her arms moving?

  Then the man with the scar called to Qakan and pointed to a projection of rock that reached out from the shore. Qakan brought the ik alongside the Walrus men’s boat and spoke to them. Again the Walrus men took the lead, their large, heavy ik skimming the water with an agility that surprised Kiin. “They p-paddle it like an ikyak,” she said to Qakan.

  “They are too stupid to make ikyan,” Qakan replied.

  “Each t-tribe is d-different,” Kiin said.

  But Qakan shrugged and said, “They say we must watch for rocks under the water.”

  Even though it was nearly dark, Kiin could see boulders under the waves, some very close to the surface. There were occasional jagged triangles of floating ice, thin and easily broken with a paddle, but a sign of winter. The seas near the island of the First Men did not freeze, but Qakan had told Kiin that in winter the Walrus People’s sea became ice.

  “They said their village was at the next cove,” Qakan called to her.

  Something in Kiin grew tight and cold, and her teeth began to chatter, but she kept her eyes to the sea, watching for rocks, thrusting her paddle against them to protect the ik.

  When they rounded the point, the rocks were smaller and flatter. Kiin looked up and realized that they were in the cove. A shiver of nervousness made her fingers tingle. The cove water was frozen, but the ice was thin, divided by a path of open water that led to the beach.

  Then Kiin remembered something she had heard long ago, something her father had said after a trading journey. That some tribes call the Walrus People Ice Hunters, because in winter they hunt through the ice. Kiin looked toward the beach and wondered if the Walrus People lived in ulas, but in the growing darkness she could see only the red coals of a fire on the beach.

  “The men meet on the beach,” Qakan said pointing to the beach fire. “That is where I wi
ll do my bargaining. Most of the men will have painted faces; it is a sign of their manhood. Do not ask a man about his paint, what it stands for. It is something sacred between him and the animals he hunts.”

  “Where are the women?” Kiin asked.

  “They meet together each evening also. In the long house.”

  “What is a long house?”

  “You are stupid, Kiin,” Qakan said, “and you ask too many questions. Be quiet. The Walrus People like quiet women.”

  Qakan’s words made Kiin angry, but she said nothing. He taunted her to make her angry. He always had. Qakan seemed to be happy only when others were unhappy.

  They guided the ik toward the beach, and Kiin could see that a large number of men stood by the beach fire. The three Walrus men pulled their boat ashore, and Kiin could hear their voices, loud with excitement, the men pointing toward the ik. One voice rose above the others, the father’s voice, and at his words Qakan laughed.

  “He says a rich trader has come,” Qakan said and laughed again. “He says the trader has a beautiful woman to sell.”

  A shout went up from the men on the beach, and Kiin’s stomach twisted.

  “You will bring me a good price,” Qakan said. “It seems they are anxious for wives.”

  The ik was near the shore, but Kiin could not bring herself to look at the waiting men. Instead she jumped from the boat and guided it toward shore while Qakan paddled. But three, four of the Walrus men pulled off their fur leggings and waded out, breaking through the ice and into the water. Two grabbed the bow of the ik; the third lifted Kiin out of the water and carried her to the beach.

  His arms were thick and hard around her belly, and Kiin’s heart beat so fast she could not breathe. He was a huge man, much taller than any of the others. His face was unpainted, but he wore a labret through each cheek. He hoisted her up so she was sitting on his left shoulder. Kiin clung to the hood of his parka and looked down at the men around her. In the darkness all she could see of them was their wide smiles, their square, white teeth.

  The man who held her shouted something at the other men and then he began to dance. Kiin bounced with each of his steps, and she wished she was a child so she could scream and cry for the man to put her down.

  The Walrus men were all around them now, all dancing. Some had pulled off their parkas and one man, one who had helped pull the ik ashore, danced without parka or leggings, only a short apron covering him.

  The man who held Kiin was singing, and she clung more tightly to his parka, leaning down to encircle his neck with her arms, and he shouted something in her ear, whether to her or the others, Kiin did not know, but the noise and the bouncing was beginning to make her sick. She searched for Qakan among the crowd of men, and finally saw him leaning against the ik, a smile on his face.

  “Qakan,” she called to him. “Qakan I am s-sick. Tell them to-to let me down.”

  “Laugh,” he called to her. “Laugh or they will not want you. The Walrus People like women who laugh.”

  Kiin clamped her teeth together to keep from vomiting. As the man continued his dance, a slow moaning cry pushed up from Kiin’s stomach into her throat. Suddenly he stopped, and as if she were a child, he pulled her from his shoulder and set her down.

  The men stopped dancing, but orange shadows from the fire curled over them so it seemed they still moved. The giant asked Kiin a question, and she shook her head. The man called over his shoulder to Qakan.

  Qakan stalked to the center of the circle. “Stupid woman,” he said to Kiin, but showed a smile to the men, patting Kiin’s shoulder and stroking her suk.

  As he spoke, Kiin studied the faces of the Walrus hunters. They were handsome men and all seemed to be tall. Most had long hair. One man’s hair hung over his hood to the center of his back. A few had paint on their faces, but most did not. One man had black lines on his chin like the tattoos of the Whale Hunters, and suddenly an image of Samiq’s face, marked with tattoos, came to Kiin, and with the image, a feeling of hopelessness, a realization of how much Samiq’s time with the Whale Hunters would change him and how far away Kiin was from her home.

  Qakan was still talking to the Walrus hunters, the men leaning forward, sometimes volunteering a word, Qakan correcting himself with a short laugh edged with irritation. But finally he walked behind Kiin, patted her shoulder, and suddenly he jerked up her suk.

  Kiin gasped and tried to pull away from him, but her arms were caught in the sleeves, her head buried in the suk. He pulled the suk off, and Kiin stood shivering, wearing only her apron. She wrapped her arms over her bare breasts as Qakan threw the suk to the nearest man. He told the man something, and the man began to study the seams of the garment.

  “I told him you made it,” Qakan said to Kiin, one side of his mouth raised in a smile.

  “But Ch-Chagak…” Kiin began, then stopped, ashamed for what her brother was doing. “You-you are full of lies, Qakan,” she said, struggling to control the trembling in her voice.

  She knew the men’s eyes were on her, appraising her body, but she had expected that. What man would take a woman as wife if he had seen her only bundled in a suk? Perhaps under the suk she was marked by some spirit, shown to be cursed. But Kiin knew her curse was something the men would see as a blessing, and something that she, since she did not know their language, could not explain.

  The man with the labrets suddenly pointed to Kiin and said something. He was holding Kiin’s suk and he threw it to Qakan.

  “He thinks you are cold. He thinks you should have your suk,” Qakan said, but he again moved behind Kiin, and this time he grasped her arms, holding them away from her body. He said something and some of the men laughed. Kiin tried to pull away from him, but he jerked her arms behind her back and held them at the wrist with one hand, then reached forward and squeezed her breasts.

  Kiin’s breasts were sore from her pregnancy, and she winced at Qakan’s touch. “Let m-me go,” she hissed, but Qakan laughed and said, “I told them you will make a good mother.” Then he patted her stomach and said something else, something that made the men gasp, and some stepped forward, bending to look at Kiin’s belly.

  Then the men were smiling, their voices louder, higher. Kiin suddenly jabbed Qakan in the stomach with her elbow. He let go of her, and Kiin spun, grabbing the suk from his shoulder. “D-d-did you tell them it was your ch-child?” she said to him. “D-did you tell them you are b-both its father and uncle?”

  The Walrus men were laughing. But Kiin saw the anger in Qakan’s eyes. “Why are you an-angry?” she asked him. “You will get more for me now. I have shown my strength.” She squatted on her heels, and pulled the suk on over her head.

  “You stupid woman,” Qakan said and lunged forward, catching Kiin by the hair, but suddenly one of the men who had brought them to the village was beside Qakan, catching Qakan by his hair. It was the father. He said something low and hard, and Qakan let Kiin go. He asked Qakan something, and Qakan, rubbing his head, said to Kiin, “Go with him. He will take you to the women.”

  The man led the way up the beach and Kiin followed.

  Beach shale gave way to gravel, the gravel to grass. A path wound around a hill until they came to a valley, and even in the darkness, Kiin could see twelve, fourteen mounds, like long ulas, except the roofs were not sod, but scraped hides, peaked in the center. Light from inside the mounds lit the skins so each looked like a small glowing fire on the valley floor. The mounds were arranged around one very long ulaq, this one only dimly lit, and Kiin wondered if these people had a shaman or a powerful chief who lived there.

  The man beside her pointed to a ulaq near them and said something, then grasped her hand and pulled her with him to the place. A sudden fear rose up inside her, and she wished she understood his words.

  What if he were taking her to be his wife? How could she give herself to any man when Qakan had cursed her? How could she give herself when she knew the man taking her would be cursed?

  As they neared
the ulaq, Kiin could see a rectangular opening on one side. A flap of woven grass covered the opening. The man opened the flap and a woman’s voice greeted him. Then a second woman’s voice.

  He pulled Kiin inside, and she saw that two old women sat cross-legged, facing each other, a grass mat draped over both of their laps. Each woman was sewing a pattern at an end of the mat. Their needles were threaded with long strands of colored sinew. Both women had the white hair of the very old; both had round faces; lines spread from the corners of their eyes and mouths. They wore hooded parkas as the men did, but these parkas were decorated with strips of fur at the wrists, and the fronts were colored with bright shell beads in a pattern of triangles.

  The man said something and one of the women laughed, her mouth opening to show that she had no teeth. She held up her needle and the other woman leaned forward and bit off the strand of sinew dangling from it. They rolled the mat, and the man helped them stand. Then they scurried around the large room of their ulaq, pulling out furred hides and containers filled with roots and dried meats, all the time looking at Kiin and whispering to one another. The man shook his head and laughed, saying something to Kiin, and the old women looked up and joined the laughter.

  The man laid his hand on Kiin’s shoulder. “You are safe here,” he said in the First Men’s language, and Kiin stared after him, her mouth open in surprise as he left the ulaq.

  A short time before, Kiin had been afraid he would take her as wife, but now, without him, she suddenly felt alone. She stood, her eyes on the door flap, willing him to come back, but finally she turned and faced the women.

  They were spreading out a floor mat. “Sit down, little one,” said the woman with teeth, and she, too, spoke in the First Men’s tongue.

  The women began to giggle, a silliness in the laughter, like the laughter of little girls, then the toothless one said, “Long ago my sister and I were born to the First Men. We, too, once came as brides, and we, also, each carried our firstborn when we came.”

  Kiin’s eyes widened and she placed her hands over her stomach.