Children of the Dawn

by Patricia Rowe

  “What happened out there was not for nothing. Something very important happened—a man-thing, but I’ll do my best to explain it… ”

  Ashan sat with Tor on a ledge by the cliffs, watching the village. After all that had happened in the last three days, people were subdued as they went about their work.

  An argument by the oak tree got everyone’s attention.

  “No!” Weechul shouted. The other slaves stood behind her. She threw something down in front of Tsilka.

  “I won’t do it! Neither will my sisters!”

  People stopped what they were doing and listened.

  Fists clenched, Tsilka shook with anger.

  Weechul spoke loudly in a mix of two languages.

  “All you people, I have something to say. We will not do the dungwork of these women anymore. We will keep the village fire. That is more than most women do. We want to do it, for our tribe.”

  Tsilka sputtered, “You already keep the fire, or we beat you!”

  “Come on, Tor,” Ashan said.

  As Ashan and Tor hurried toward them, Tsilka picked up the hide thrown down by Weechul and thrust it at her.

  Weechul didn’t take it, and didn’t back up.

  “If you don’t chew this hide, I will—”

  “You will do nothing!” Ashan said.

  Tsilka whirled around.

  Ashan spoke loud enough for everyone to hear.

  “Keeping the fire is the work of four women. They will be known as Firekeepers. They will be no one’s slaves, and their little ones will be their own.”

  Tor said, “Brothers, we don’t want to fight. We already know why. Why should men care? It is only women’s work the slaves do. Let the women do their own work.”

  People agreed.

  Except for the Tlikit women. They lost their workers, and the little ones they’d been mothering. But there was nothing they could do.

  That night, the Firekeepers and their little ones slept together by the oak tree.

  Ashan said, “Someday, Tor, they should have a hut.”

  A few nights later, Elia died in his sleep.

  Shocked, Ashan found no cause. She told people there must have been something bad on the spear.

  Tor suffered terribly.

  So did Ashan.

  She’d made magic stones to protect the First Warriors. When Tor told her Elia would be going, she had planned to make him one too, but…

  A boy died because I didn’t find time to make him a rock. A brave, loyal boy… clever, funny, loved and loving…

  People mourned him. Elia had belonged to both tribes—the Tlikit by birth, the Shahala who had taken him in. They grieved as a whole village, not blaming, not asking what kind of spear killed him.

  Elia’s death had meaning. People always remembered the boy whose name meant Friend as the one who gave up life so his tribe could see that they must never do that again. It came to be told that he jumped in front of the spear.

  Because of Elia, no Teahra warrior would ever again raise a weapon against another. They were all one now: the People of Teahra Village.

  CHAPTER 22

  ASHAN SAT WITH TOR ON THE SLEEPING SKINS. SHE pretended not to watch Kai El on the other side of the hut as he made himself ready for his power quest.

  “Oh, Tor,” she whispered. “How can my baby be seven summers already?”

  Her mate shook his head. “I don’t know, but my stomach is still full from yesterday’s feast. And there are the gifts people gave him.” He waved his hand toward Kai El’s side of the hut.

  “It’s hard to believe,” she said wistfully. “We’ve been here for almost three turnings of the seasons. Elia’s been gone more than two.” She still thought of him often.

  Tor sighed. “Yes.”

  “In the homeland,” she said, “time flowed like winter honey. Here it rushes like the water in the Great River.”

  “Mmm,” he said, lost in his own thoughts.

  “I think it’s because I’m so busy. Even with Tenka, I’m so busy.”

  The Other Moonkeeper had her own hut now, and took some of the work from Ashan’s shoulders. People liked to talk to her about their problems. Instead of giving good advice, Tenka told them what they wanted to hear, but it seemed to make them feel better. She was good at storytelling, talking to girls when they made their first blood, and other work like that. It helped, but Ashan was busy all the time with spirit speaking, decisions, rituals, healing, magic rocks, and all the other demands of a tribe so large she couldn’t keep count. And her family, too.

  Ashan watched Kai El lacing his new moccasins. She swallowed hard. Yesterday a feast marked the day of his birth. Today he would begin his power quest.

  A power quest was like a door Shahala boys and girls passed through to get from one part of life to the next. With no food and only a little water, Kai El would go alone to a special place and wait, perhaps for several days and nights, for a spirit to reveal itself as his guardian. It would give him his own song, and his new name.

  He would be different when he returned, ready to join in the things of older boys. He would call her Mother instead of Amah, and she wouldn’t dare call him “her baby” again.

  Like every mother, Ashan had different feelings about it. She was proud of his strength and courage. She was sad, because after this he wouldn’t need her in the same way as before. And like any mother, she was afraid. Some did not return from a power quest. No one knew what happened to them. It was a sad thing for the tribe, worse than a baby lost in birthing—but it happened. It was a natural part of life. Easy to say, unless you were one of those unfortunate mothers.

  Ashan gazed at the little boy she loved so much. Her throat tightened. Tears filled her eyes.

  Kai El was tall for his age, with just enough baby fat to make him look squeezable. Thick black hair reached his shoulders. His soft skin was the color of sunset amber; an ochre glow touched his high cheeks. His black eyes sparkled with eagerness. Ashan was certain that her son was the best-looking child of Teahra Village.

  He loved laughing, but today he was serious.

  So grown up, she thought. It seems like only yesterday he was a baby, and we lived in the mountains, and…

  Her tears spilled over. To hide them, she got up, crossed the hut, and knelt by him. She had made him all new things: tough elkhide moccasins; lightweight deerhide cape, loinskin, and leggings. She fussed with his moccasins.

  “Ah-mahh,” he said, squirming.

  “Hold still. I want to make sure these stitches are tight.”

  Tor said, “He’s fine, Ashan. Spirits will be impressed by what they see.”

  She stepped away, sniffling behind her hand.

  Tor had something hidden behind him, and brought it out with a flourish… a traditional Shahala headpiece.

  Sucking in his breath, the boy looked at his father with wide eyes.

  “You made it from your horsetail rope,” he said in a voice filled with awe.

  Once common among Shahala men, horsetail ropes were becoming rare as they wore out and couldn’t be replaced. Ropes could be made of leather strips or plant fibers, but nothing matched the long strands of a horse’s tail.

  “Adah, you love that rope.”

  “I love you more.”

  Once white, now gray with age, made from the tail of the first horse he’d ever killed and lengthened with others over time, Tor did love the rope, so much that Ashan had once risked her life to save it from a river when he lay unconscious.

  But now his boy needed the protection it would give. Little ones didn’t take weapons on their power quests. To carry a weapon they didn’t yet know how to use might be seen as a challenge by an animal or a spirit who would otherwise leave them alone.

  To make the headpiece, Tor had straightened the twisted strands on a heated rock, and woven a strip for a base. One by one he tied lengths as long as his hand to the base, so thick he couldn’t get another one in. The stiff strands stood up on top, and trailed
down in back.

  With thongs and porcupine quills, Tor secured the headpiece in Kai El’s hair.

  “I give you the power of Kusi, the Horse Spirit, so you can outrun anything that tries to get you, or catch anything you want.”

  Kai El looked up and around, trying to see the headpiece, but he couldn’t. He ran his hands over the strands, his round face split by a smile.

  “Thank you, Adah.”

  Tor nodded. “You are lucky. Once every Shahala boy wore such a headpiece for his power quest, but you will be one of the last, now that all the horses are gone.”

  Ashan said, “You will save it for your first son.” She was serious, but it made Kai El giggle. A boy of seven summers couldn’t imagine having a son someday.

  She held out her open hand.

  “I have something for you, too. It’s a magic stone. Wear it all the time.”

  The Moonkeeper made a stone for every child’s power quest, to be worn on a thong around the neck. Spirits helped her pick the right one for each. As she shaped and smoothed, thinking about the child, the stone absorbed the power of Moonkeepers from the Misty Time. She scratched the name sign given at birth on one side. When the boy or girl returned, she would scratch the new name sign on the other. This showed that people changed their names, but were still the same people.

  The stone the Moonkeeper had made for her son was a flat circle, light blue because he said his eyes liked the sky when it was that color. Ashan had never worked so hard on a magic stone. She had pushed her power into it, gathering it up, sending it to her arms, her hands, and into the stone until the stone became hot, squeezing herself until she felt drained.

  Kai El took it from her, turning it over, fingering the lines of his name. He looked up, and love flowed between their eyes.

  “I like it more than anything!” He put the thong over his head. The blue stone lay against his chest.

  “How do you get magic into stones?” he asked.

  “I’m the Moonkeeper—I just do it. The magic works, especially for you.”

  Teary-eyed again, Ashan embraced him. He allowed it for a moment, then wriggled out of her grip.

  “I’m ready to go.”

  Ashan looked at Tor. He nodded. They went with their son to the edge of the village. She pointed in the direction Colder, toward the lands of their ancestors.

  “Walk into the hills. You’ll be drawn to a sacred place, and you will know when you have reached it. It will be higher than the places around. That’s all I can tell you.”

  In the ancestral homeland, seekers had gone to the top of Kalish Ridge to meet their guardian spirits. In the new land, the Moonkeeper had not been shown such a spot, so she let seekers find their own.

  “When you get there, pray for your guardian spirit to come. Then wait. It may take time, but your guardian won’t let you die.”

  Well… there had been the occasional little one… but why remind Kai El?

  Tor said, “Stay awake. You don’t want to miss the spirit if it comes in the dark. And don’t leave just because you get hungry. Hunger helps.”

  “I wouldn’t do that,” Kai El said. “You have raised a brave son.”

  “I know,” Tor said. “You make me proud.”

  “You make your people proud,” Ashan said, speaking as the Moonkeeper.

  Kai El left them. The sunshine gleamed on his hair. Watching him climb up through the cliffs, Ashan’s chest hurt; it was hard to breathe. Tears ran down her cheeks.

  Tor said, “I wonder what his new name will be?”

  “Oh, Tor, how can you think about that? No food, no weapon, just enough water to keep him alive. That’s all I can think about. It’s hard.”

  “You did it. I did it. Everyone does. It is hard. It’s supposed to be hard. Little ones have to learn courage if they are to survive and grow up and become useful to the tribe.”

  “I meant hard for me. I never realized how much harder a power quest is for the mother than it is for the child.”

  “Oh,” Tor said, understanding. “Just remember how smart he is. Remember all the things you taught him when you two were alone in the old man’s cave. I know he won’t forget.”

  CHAPTER 23

  KAI EL’S POWER QUEST WAS THE MOST EXCITING THING that had ever happened in his life. They said something would happen out here, but what? They said he’d be different when he returned, but who would he be?

  Soon he would know!

  Proud, brave, feeling very grown-up, the son of Ashan and Tor strode across the prairie on a summer morning so fine that he sometimes forgot the seriousness of his quest.

  He felt a bit of fear following him like a shadow, though he wouldn’t have admitted it. He could never catch it when he whirled around, so he just laughed at it. But he wished they had let him bring a weapon. Maybe most little ones didn’t know how to use weapons yet, but he did. He felt better after he picked up a hefty stick. Now he could bash any bad animal that tried to get in his way. And it was a good walking stick, too.

  Flat prairie gave way to low hills. The sun was high in the hot blue sky. After yesterday’s feast to celebrate the seven summers of his life, Kai El still wasn’t hungry. But he was thirsty, and a bit tired, so he stopped for a drink and a rest.

  Amah said he’d feel something to tell him which way to go. He hadn’t felt anything yet. What would it be?

  “Be alert, and you will know,” was all she would say.

  Kai El knew that some little ones never returned. Maybe they never felt the thing that told them which way to go, so they just kept walking until they fell over and died.

  If little ones are so important to the tribe, why aren’t we given more help for our power quests? he wondered.

  After more aimless walking, he worried about what he should do if he never felt the thing that would tell him where to go. Then he thought he heard something. Standing still, he emptied his mind. An invisible whisper tugged from the direction Where Day Begins. He went that way, and the pull strengthened. He climbed up a long slope that ended in a steep decline.

  The little boy sat at the edge of the drop-off, the late sun warm on his back. A breeze feathered the strands of the magnificent horsetail headpiece. Higher than the surrounding lands, he could see forever in all directions: hills behind hills, then distant mountains.

  He noticed a slight heat rising into his bottom. He closed his eyes and put his hands flat on the ground. Yes, it was really there. The air around him had a mild sting. And a smell like after a thunderstorm, though the sky had been blue for days.

  Kai El knew that he had found sacred ground. He stood, crossed his hands on his chest, and announced himself to the spirits of the place.

  “I am Kai El, Sun River. I have come to meet my guardian.”

  Sensing approval, he claimed the spot by kicking a circle in the tall yellow grass all the way down to dirt. He got inside the circle to wait.

  Kai El said prayers as the sun went down, speaking in a loud voice—if bad animals were waiting for dark to attack him, they would hear the voice of a large man and leave him alone. After thanking the Four Directions for another day, and for guiding him here, he prayed to his unknown guardian.

  “I don’t know you, but you know me. You have waited since I was born. Now I am ready to meet you.”

  Ignoring his powerful hunger, he drank water. Night came. In moonless black Kai El tried to keep his mind empty, open and ready for his guardian spirit. He should stay awake, they said—that was easy. Scary sounds filled the star-pricked night: birds, bugs, coyotes, wolves, and who knew what else. The skinny moon rose just before morning. He drank, stood, stretched, walked around inside his circle. Stood at the edge aiming a yellow stream out. Prayed again. Sat back down. Fell asleep in the sun for a while. Night again. Harder to stay awake, even with the noises. Another day. Hunger had stopped bothering him. Strange thoughts wandered through his mind. His eyes and ears played tricks on him, seeing and hearing things that weren’t there. But none of the re
al or the unreal was his guardian spirit.

  Night came for the third time. Lying on his back, arms crossed behind his head, one leg straight out on the ground, the other knee cocked up, Kai El stared at the sky. Instead of standing still, the stars swirled and swooped, trailing sparks. He tried to use his gaze to stop them, but it didn’t work—his eyes watered with the effort. He squeezed them shut. Blinked. Opened them—

  In the center of a golden glow, a red-tail hawk perched on Kai El’s raised knee. Wings folded, shoulders hunched, the bird stared at him with fierce eyes and stern beak. Kai El didn’t feel its weight, or the talons digging into his legging, but its stare bored into his forehead. He did not move.

  “Skaina, Hawk Spirit,” he said. “It is you.”

  He heard wind as the hawk must hear when it flew. The bird cocked its head and spoke in his mind.

  I have always been your guardian. Now you know.

  “I am honored.”

  The red-tail hawk was a magnificent animal. Kai El had felt like a hawk sometimes, his heart and thoughts soaring free, as if nothing could hold him back.

  Beyond the wide glow cast by his guardian spirit, the stars were crazier than before, twirling, sweeping across the sky, as if they were birds. Kai El couldn’t feel his body.

  Listen…

  He heard drums and singing; saw a shadow-boy dancing in the glow; and it was he. He listened to his other self. The song became part of him.

  “With the eyes of the hawk, I see what others can’t. With the heart of the hawk, I have the courage of ten men. With the wings of the hawk, my spirit soars.”

  That is your power song. There is no other like it. Spiritswill know who you are when you sing it, and all creatures will be warned of your power.

  Hot tingles passed between the spirit and the boy, rushing through him, filling him up. In that moment, he knew Skaina’s love, and love was born in him.

  “What name have you chosen for me?”

  What name do you wish?

  Kai El didn’t know that it mattered.

  “Any name you give me, Skaina… that is what I wish.”