by Sue Harrison
He decided to leave a false trail, abandon his yoke at the end of it, then return to the path. If he hurried, he might make it over the crest of the second hill before he was seen. He cut into the grasses, again made a wandering trail, like an animal who in hunting or fleeing finds wisdom in crooked ways.
Finally he dropped the yoke, started back toward the caves, but then he began to imagine himself there, safe, but slowly dying of thirst as he waited out the Bear-god warriors’ stay in his village. He could envision his thoughts centered on the yoke and its burden of sweet water, cupped in the fat bellies of those gourds. He could see them mock him in his dreams, those gourds, water-rich and slick with moisture.
He returned to his yoke, cut away one of the clusters of bottle gourds, and, clutching it to his belly with both hands, scurried back toward the path. The gourds slowed him a little, but at least with the water, he could stay in the caves for a few days without venturing to the springs.
He crouched low amidst the grasses, and at the crest of the second hill he looked down toward the village, stifled the groans in his throat as he saw flames rising from many of the huts. He trembled in his helplessness and clutched his armful of gourds more closely, then again started toward the caves.
He had taken only a few steps when he stopped in horror. Bear-god warriors were ahead of him on the trail. His fear was so great that his bladder spilled out its load of water. He did not allow himself time to feel ashamed, but a thought sped through his mind: amazement that he, an old man who belonged to no one and had no one to claim, would want so desperately to live. He turned the other way, toward the burning village, stopped short of Fire Mountain Man’s iori—it, too, now in flames—to run the overgrown path to the boatmakers’ beach, where the River Oi emptied into the sea.
As he ran, a voice in his mind chided him. You are foolish. Why come this way? The Bear-gods will be here, too. Better to fight and win yourself some glory to take with you to your death.
But whether because the entrance to the path was overgrown with hemp or because the Bear-god warriors had already been there and left, when Water Gourd came to the first hut, he found it empty. He crept quietly among cedar and nutmeg trunks, some still whole, others scarred with flame where the craftsmen had begun their work of hollowing and shaping. Smoke blowing in from the houses burned his throat and pulled water from his eyes, and the screams of fear and fighting tore at him like claws.
He hid in the darkest corner of the hut, farthest from the open side that faced the estuary. The builders had set the tree trunks they were shaping nearest the hut’s entrance. They claimed it was good for those trees, as the fire chewed them hollow, to look out at cool water. Then as boats they would leave the land more willingly, go where their paddlers directed.
Water Gourd had heard stories about boats left onshore for a night that grew roots and bound themselves again to the land, stranding paddlers and hunters so far from their village that their families never saw them again. The best boatmakers not only burned out the land-heart of the tree, but gave it a vision of other possibilities. What hunter wanted to be trapped in some foreign land by the whim of a tree, not quite boat?
Water Gourd hunkered down on his knees, his arms still hugging the gourds. Their weight unbalanced him, but he did not want to set them down. They were one more wall between himself and the Bear-god People, perhaps even had some small power of protection. If water would protect anyone, why not him? He had always honored the spring with his gratitude, with clean hands and grass-wiped feet. But the gourds contained only a small amount of water. Enough to keep a man through four, perhaps five days, but not enough to douse the flames should the Bear-god People decide to burn this hut.
Suddenly, through the soles of his feet, Water Gourd felt the pounding of the earth, and he knew men were coming. He rolled himself into a ball and, taking his water with him, broke out through the thatching of the hut’s back wall. Humped around the gourds like a beetle, he crept through the undergrowth away from the hut, toward the estuary that angled up from the sea like an arm bent at the elbow. Boats lay on the shore, new boats, those nearly finished, hauled for testing balance and buoyancy to this gentler, shallower water. Most had no outriggers and lay with backs up, oiled wood glistening. But one had its outrigger log attached with sturdy poles, and the bow close to the water as though its maker had been ready to launch it. Inside was a paddle, a worker’s rush fiber shirt, and two deerskin blankets, humped as though they covered supplies.
The old man threw in his water gourds and, using all the strength in his ancient arms, he pushed the boat into the estuary, praying that the boatmaker had done his work well. Water Gourd could swim, but why pit himself against those sea gods who find sport in grabbing ankles, hauling people into the depths?
When the water reached the old man’s knees, he climbed into the boat, grabbed the paddle, and quietly pushed away from the shallows. The boat was steady, the outrigger stable. He pushed again, this time almost losing his paddle as the land fell away, and the estuary grew deep. He crept forward a little ways in the boat, tucked his heels under his rump, his knees widespread for balance, but as he continued to paddle, the tree boat started to circle, so that he was gaining no real distance from the shore. He thought he might be safe if he could get the boat from the estuary into the river. The growth of trees, vines, and moss was so rich and thick that he could hide himself under the branches that arched to dip their new spring leaves into the water.
As a young man, he had been harpooner rather than paddler, but still he knew that to keep going straight, he must paddle with equal strength on both sides of the boat. He scooted himself to the other side, earning splinters in his knees. But he ignored the pain and thrust his paddle into the water two times, then lifted it to the other side, again paddled twice. He went back and forth, until blood from his knees dyed the raw wood crimson, but finally the boat was at the center of the estuary. He turned it, headed against the current, up toward the river, but each time he switched sides, he lost whatever distance he had gained.
He tried three strokes, then four, and found he made headway with that, though the course he took was no longer straight. Each time he lifted his paddle, he looked toward the shore, sure he would see Bear-god warriors watching him, perhaps even launching one of the other boats to follow him, but no one came, and finally, as the thick black smoke from the burning village billowed up through the trees and curled down to the estuary, Water Gourd’s boat entered the river.
He closed his eyes in a moment of gratitude as the shadows of the trees welcomed him, then he found a snag, an upended cedar with roots and earth woven into a circle, the weight of it compressing the bank so that the tree had slid, roots first, into the water. The old man maneuvered the boat until it was upriver from the snag, then he turned it and used the paddle like a fish uses its tail, allowing the current to move the boat, the paddle to direct its path until the bow snugged itself into the interstices of the root mass.
Then Water Gourd, peering out through the tunnel of trees, could only wait while the smoke filled the estuary and blocked his vision of the sky.
CHAPTER TWO
SOMETIME DURING THE NIGHT, Water Gourd fell asleep. It was a sleep visited by demons, and when he finally managed to awaken, it was still dark, still night. The smoke from the village had dissipated, and he could see stars in that circle of sky afforded him from his seat in the cedar log boat.
The tide had come in, and the river had risen so that the bow of his outrigger was not wedged as tightly in the roots of the fallen tree. The bumping of the boat—away from the root mass and again into it—had brought him back from his terror-filled dreams. The wind had gathered strength, and he could hear the rattle of leaves above him, spinning their tales to one another.
Did they tell stories of women raped, babies killed, old men tortured? Most likely not. Why should they care about that? Surely the trees hated his people. After all, what cedar, what nutmeg would choose to leave the
close green forest to be gutted by the fire and knives of boat builders? Maybe the trees around him celebrated, as did the Bear-god warriors, rejoicing at the deaths of the Boat People.
Water Gourd wished he could close his ears to the noise. He shut his eyes and curled into a ball at the center of the boat, his gourds, still cold and damp from their bellies of water, cradled in his arms. Although the night air was warm, the mists rising from the river hovered over him until they had worked their way through his skin to his joints, until he ached with the damp as though winter had suddenly come upon the land, disrupting the gentle weather of spring, the cycle of the seasons suddenly and inexplicably forgotten.
The boat rocked up, then bumped ahead, rocked again and jerked back. The motion settled behind Water Gourd’s ears in an ache that tensed his muscles into pain. The splinters in his knees throbbed, and new dreams invaded his eyes—monsters that were half demon, half bear. They laughed at his fear, his mourning, and blew with fetid breath to coax new life into the fires that had destroyed his village.
Then suddenly the boat tipped and swirled, and, as though a hand had gripped the stern, it pulled away from the circle of roots and was thrust violently upriver.
What giant had captured him? Water Gourd’s panic propelled him to sit upright, hands clasping the outrigger poles. Then he saw the trees sway, though there was no storm. He felt the earth buckle, and suddenly the river spewed him out into the estuary, sending his boat ahead so quickly that Water Gourd nearly tumbled backward. He heard a thin wail, and at first thought it came from his own mouth. Again the sea shook, waves came from both shores, picked the boat up, and thrust it from the estuary into the sea. Again he heard the wail, but this time he knew it was not from him, for he had clamped his teeth tightly together to keep from biting his tongue.
It was the boat; it had to be. The tree part of it was not quite dead, and as they sped out toward the sea, it called to its brother trees in fear.
“It will save you some burning and scraping,” Water Gourd shouted to the boat over the tumult of waves.
If he could convince the tree that it was better off in the sea, it might not dump him in its effort to return to the sanctuary of river and forest. He reached for the paddle. Perhaps if the boat saw that he, too, wanted to remain in the river, it would help him. He thrust the paddle into the water, thrust again and again until he had managed to turn the boat toward the estuary. A wave caught him and pushed him forward, and he dipped his paddle, working as hard and fast as he could. A second wave took him and a third, until finally he felt the contrary current of the river. Though it was dark, with the eyes of his memory, he saw the green river water mingling with the blue sea, swirling into a dance that would complete itself out past the estuary in a place where fish fed from the river’s generosity.
Water Gourd paddled, blessing arms kept strong by carrying water, cursing muscles pulled long and stringy by old age. Two strokes to counter the river’s flow, two to pull the boat forward, then the shift to the other side to wield his paddle between the outrigger shafts. Two strokes to straighten the bow and two to regain the ground he had lost in shifting his paddle. He counted his strokes, singing them under his breath like a chant, and he nearly wept with joy when he regained the entrance of the estuary.
Then, above the sounds of river and sea, of his chanting and the splash of his paddle, he heard voices. His heart clenched like a fist, and for moment he did not have the strength to lift the paddle, but merely kept it in the water, the blade turned flat against the side of the boat.
Bear-god warriors. He saw their torches lining the banks of the estuary, saw one then another lift his fire until they cast light in long sheaths across the water to his outrigger. They lifted their spears, threw. The spears were thrusting lances, not so good for distance. One fell into the estuary, but another thwacked hard inside the boat, cutting a gouge into Water Gourd’s thigh before the tip embedded itself in wood.
He knew then there was no hope. He raised his paddle and brought it into the boat, laid the blade over his belly. Better to take a spear in chest or throat and have his life end suddenly than to suffer a gut wound. He felt the river current thrust him toward the sea, but then the boat turned sideways and a wave brought him back. The Bear-god men threw more spears as sea and river played with his boat, like children throwing a pig bladder. A spear clattered against the outrigger and one landed in the bow. Water Gourd pinched his fingers over the oozing wound in his thigh. It was not a terrible cut, shallow and less than a handbreadth in length, but it hurt.
Suddenly the earth heaved again. Water Gourd saw it first in the flames from the Bear-god torches, the light moving in odd circles, one torch dipping down until it had extinguished itself in the water. As though the river were inhaling, the boat was suddenly sucked far into the estuary. He closed his eyes, tried to prepare for death, but then just as unexpectedly, the river exhaled and thrust the boat and Water Gourd out into the sea, past the waves that would return him, far beyond the reach of any spear.
The torches were only tiny needle pricks in the night, and in his relief Water Gourd began to laugh. Better to drown than face the tortures the Bear-gods would inflict. At least he could throw himself into the sea and have it done quickly.
Or better yet, he would wait until morning, rest a little, then turn his boat toward the next village, warn them that the Bear-god warriors were coming. They might see him as a hero and, if they were successful in fending off the attack, would welcome him in their village. Surely they would want him as one of their wise elders. Perhaps he would even find himself a wife and get himself sons in his old age. Hadn’t his own grandfather once put a son into the belly of a young wife?
Water Gourd lay back in the boat, retrieved the woven rush shirt that the builder had left in the stern, and pulled it on over his head. He tried to sleep, but the dreams returned, and he blinked himself awake, sat up.
The moon had risen, lending light, bouncing it from wave to wave. The wind cut across the water, not strong, but cold enough to raise the flesh on Water Gourd’s arms. His eyes fell on the bundle of supplies in the bow, and he remembered that it was covered with deerskin blankets. He crept forward, but suddenly the top blanket began to move, raising itself as though it were alive.
Water Gourd had once seen a deer that had been chased into a river, and he had not forgotten how hard it struggled to get back to the sure footing of land. Perhaps this blanket, too, wanted to find its way to shore. He thought for a moment of plucking it up and dropping it into the waves, but he was cold. How foolish to throw away a blanket just because it had a little life of the deer still in it! Better to wrap it around himself, subdue whatever weak power it claimed by sitting on it.
He clutched the blanket in one hand, and with a quick jerk flipped it up and swaddled it around his legs.
The blanket settled around him, warm and still. Water Gourd nodded his approval. Even an old man had more power than a deerskin blanket. But suddenly the boat again started to wail, more loudly this time, so that Water Gourd lost his temper.
“You want to go back and be captured by the Bear-god men?” he shouted. “They know nothing about boats. They wouldn’t take care of you. They would let you rot.”
The wails continued, louder now—surely not the sound a tree-boat would make. Then Water Gourd’s old ears remembered the cries of his sons when they were babies. He leaned forward, groped under the other deerskin blanket until his hands came upon flesh—warm and soft and round. A child!
He felt until he found the head. The boy was well-haired, his mouth filled with small, hard teeth. Water Gourd pushed his hands under the baby’s shoulders, lifted, prodded, and pulled until he managed to get it to his lap. Two years, perhaps three, he thought, for the number of teeth in the child’s head. The baby rooted and thrust against Water Gourd’s chest.
“I am not a woman,” Water Gourd said. “I have no milk.”
The child’s cries grew more frantic. Water Gourd twist
ed one corner of the blanket and thrust it into the boy’s mouth. He began to suck, and his wailing stopped. Water Gourd patted the baby’s back, mumbling his consternation. The boy’s mother must have hidden him in the boat when the Bear-god People attacked. The baby jerked the blanket from his mouth and began to fuss again.
Water Gourd sighed and pulled the plug from one of his gourds, took a swallow of water. He sucked out another mouthful, then lowered his head to the baby’s head, pressed his lips to the baby’s lips and released a stream of water. The child choked at first, but then he drank, and Water Gourd chuckled to himself at his own cunning. After several mouthfuls, the baby seemed content, and Water Gourd leaned forward, opened the pack of supplies that had lain under the boy in the bottom of the boat.
There was a heavy pot, the kind women store food in, also a few of the small soft skins mothers use to pad their babies’ bottoms. A woman’s knife and three full bottle gourds. A packet that was probably a good luck charm for the baby. A small one, it was, smaller than most women carry for their sons.
Water Gourd’s stomach suddenly lurched, and he fumbled at the skins that swaddled the child, worked his way through them until he could feel the baby’s soft, damp rump. He thrust a finger between the baby’s legs, then withdrew his hand, moaning softly.
What had he done to deserve all the curses that had befallen him? He thought back through his life, to the sons and wives he had outlived, to the lazy niece he depended on for food. And now this. The baby was a girl. A worthless girl.
Surely there was no hope. What sea animal coming upon them would allow them to live—an old man who could no longer throw a harpoon, and a baby who would curse the very wood of their boat with her urine?
Water Gourd set the child away from him, back into the nest her mother had made her in the bottom of the boat. He turned his back and did not allow himself to think about her as he watched over the bow, looking east, waiting for morning.