Tsuga's Children

by Thomas Williams

  15. The Village of the Chigai

  Arn and Arel gathered wood so that Runa could make a fire to warm Amu, whose breath came in short, shivery gasps. Runa had made him a bed of pine needles covered with his sleeping-skin, then her own sleeping-skin over him to keep him as warm as possible, though he shivered badly whenever he awoke. The arrow had pierced his lung without having cut any of the major veins or arteries, so there was one chance in a thousand that he might live.

  When Arn and Arel had gathered a large pile of dry pine branches, the only wood there was in that part of the forest, Arn said, “I must follow the Chigai and find Jen.”

  Runa looked at him gravely, for a long time, before she nodded her head. She was a person who was hard to please, Arn knew. She would think and then give her judgement, and now she had judged that his course, though it might seem impossible, was the right one.

  “Arel will go with you,” Runa said.

  Arn could not understand that at all. He was fairly certain he would be scented by the half-wolves as he followed downwind.

  “Arel knows where they will cross the river of the handeh, so you can make a circle and not be upwind. And she has the forbidden gift, which might help you.”

  Arel gasped when her mother said this.

  “I knew it when you were a baby, Arel, when birds spoke to you in your crib. And though you seem pale and weak, you are not weak.”

  “I’ll help find Jen,” Arel said.

  After they had eaten at midday, Arn and Arel left Runa and Amu and began a circuitous journey toward the northeast. Amu had awakened enough to take some hot soup and to say goodby to them. Arel was crying as they left, but quietly, to herself. Amu had thought they were going toward the western mountains and safety. Now she turned again and again to see the small camp in the forest grow smaller and then, after a hundred yards, disappear behind them.

  All afternoon they made their circle, coming finally to what they hoped was the edge of the meadow not far from the winter camp. The snow had thinned; occasionally in an opening where a tall tree had fallen they had been able to perceive a faint shadow to tell them where the sun was, and their direction. They followed the edge of the meadow then, going directly east until they could see the hogans and drying racks of the winter camp. No smoke rose from the hogans, but they didn’t dare go near. They followed the river upstream until, just before dark, they found the crossing place—a series of stepping stones across a wide, shallow place in the river.

  The stones were covered with unbroken snow; either the Chigai had not yet come to the crossing or they had crossed somewhere else. Darkness was falling quickly. Then Arn had a thought: Runa might have guessed that the Chigai would come back to finish what they had started, and that was why she had sent Arel with him. Amu could not be moved, and she would stay with him to meet whatever fate would come.

  Although the fight in the forest had been confusing, Arn thought there had been three other Chigai beside Lado and the one Runa had killed. Then there was the one who had picked him up and whom he had stabbed deeply with his knife. That one would be sore. There were four of them left, one wounded; even so, they might have gone back.

  But as darkness fell, shade by shade across the snow and the dark moving river, they heard voices coming from the forest. Quickly they went back on their tracks until they found some low junipers to hide in. Three large men came tramping out of the forest, all armed with bows, axes hanging from their belts. One carried a bundle over his shoulder which might have been Jen. They stopped on the riverbank, brushed away the snow and sat down. No half-wolves were with them. Arn and Arel could just hear their words.

  “You sure Lado got him?” one said. He was the one with the bundle, which he had roughly dumped in the snow.

  “Stop asking that, will you?” another said. “I saw the arrow hit him in the back. I even heard it hit. I saw him go down.”

  “Lado was a good shot,” the third one said.

  “Not as good as that woman.”

  “Now it’s dark and well have to sleep in the snow; we shouldn’t have waited for Gort,” the third one said.

  Then a fourth man came slowly along the trail, limping badly and using his bow as a crutch. He mumbled and cursed as he limped up to the others, one leg stiff and his pants dark and shiny with what looked, even in the dim light, like blood.

  “Teach you to pick up strange little kids, Gort!” one of the others said, laughing.

  “I just want to live long enough to get my hands on that kid again,” Gort said as he lowered himself to the ground with a moan of pain and anger. “I should have stayed long enough to finish him off.”

  “Except the woman had you scared blue with that quick bow of hers.”

  “Did you see her center Lado in the neck?”

  “Listen,” the first Chigai said. “We’ll have to tell Mori we got both of them or he’ll flay us alive. He’ll hang our pelts on the hide stretchers. We’ll say we killed the other two kids, Amu and his woman, all right?”

  “If he finds out, we’ll pay for it later.”

  “Well, we got one live kid anyway.”

  “And we lost three wolves, Lado and Tromo, and Gort’s all chewed up. If those people fight like that …”

  “Shut up,” Gort said. “Just shut up and build a fire. I’ve got a chill. He stuck me deep.” Then Gort gave a hard low moan of pain that chilled Arn because he was responsible for such hurt.

  But Jen was alive, and the Chigai had been told, evidently, to keep her alive.

  The men went to the edge of the trees to gather wood for a fire, then brought their branches and sticks back to where another chopped and split them with his ax. Arn knew they must have crossed his and Arel’s tracks several times, but none of them took notice. They were not good hunters. The way they clumped and stumbled around, they seemed not to care about the earth beneath them and what it might tell them. They had lost all of their half-wolves, too, so they would have no sentries who could read the wind.

  Soon a large fire was blazing on the riverbank. Arn saw that in order to keep it going, the men would be scouring wider for wood. He tapped Arel on the shoulder and motioned for her to follow. In the dark they went back down the river until they found a depression in the bank covered with a roof of junipers. From here they could just see the fire and the men’s shadowy forms as they crossed in front of it.

  Once they settled into their little cavelike place and felt around them to see what room they had, they undid their packs and got out their sleeping-skins of wolf fur, then had something to eat—jerky and dried fruit, washed down with water from the river.

  “We’ll wait until they go to sleep,” Arn said. “I’ll stay awake and you can sleep, Arel.” She was shivering, so he wrapped both their sleeping-skins around them. Arel’s arms slipped around him and her head lay against his chest. Her dark hair smelled of woodsmoke. As his hand smoothed her hair down into her collar he felt a surge of care and tenderness for this young girl who had so bravely agreed to leave her father and mother and come with him. Her arms squeezed him, as if to thank him for smoothing her hair, and soon she had stopped shivering and was asleep.

  He woke, not remembering how he had fallen asleep. He had the heavy feeling in his eyes that meant much time had passed, though he didn’t know how much. He was no longer sitting up, but had fallen back against the sandy bank. Arel murmured in her sleep as he sat back up again; then she made a small whimper at an unhappy event in her dream.

  “Arel,” he said softly. “Wake up.”

  Her arms squeezed him and her head snuggled down, wanting more sleep. The clouds had thinned, he noticed, and a moon rode faintly behind them.

  “Arel,” he said. “I think it’s near morning. Wake up.”

  “What?” she said in a small voice that was submerged in the skins and the fur of his parka. “Yes,” she said, coming awake. “It’s Arn,” she said, as if she were talking to someone else. “Warm Arn.” Her dark eyes, now wide awake, looked
up at him. He could just make them out, black in her face that was as pale as the moon.

  “I’m going to see if they’re all asleep,” he said. “Maybe I can cut Jen loose.”

  “I’ll come with you,” Arel said.

  “No,” he said, thinking only that Arel was so small and pale.

  “I have a knife, and I can run, too,” Arel said. “I can move without making any noise, and I came to help you and Jen.” Arn realized how little he wanted to approach the Chigai alone on this cold night. His feet were damp in his boots, and that small chill seemed to go all through him. “All right,” he said, “but let’s be slow and quiet. We’ve got to make sure they’re all asleep.”

  They covered their packs and Arn’s bow and quiver with the sleeping-skins and crept out into the snow, going up the riverbank. The soft gurgling of the moving water would help mask whatever noises they did happen to make. The snow was still fluffy and quiet, but it hid stones and sticks that they might kick or step on. They tested each step with a tentative pressure before putting their full weight down.

  The fire had embered but still threw enough heat to let the Chigai sleep. The four men lay around the fire on mattresses of evergreen boughs. Near one of the men was a bundle that might be Jen, so they made a circle around to that place, listening to the sleeping breaths, then crawled slowly up to the skin-covered bundle. Breath had frosted an opening at one end. In the diffused moonlight Arn could see the leather thongs that bound it. He put his mouth to the frosted breath hole and whispered, “Jen, is that you?”

  The bundle moved convulsively and a soft sound came from it, a sob that was Jen’s.

  “Don’t make any noise at all now,” Arn whispered. “I’m going to cut you loose.” His knife slit the thongs, from top to bottom, without a sound. Then, as he was trying to unroll the stiff skin in order to free Jen, there was a ragged, triumphant shout and big hands grabbed him and threw him over on his stomach.

  “Did you think I could sleep with all the holes you put in me? I’ve got you now, you little rattlesnake, so enter the blackness!” It was Gort’s voice. One hand pressed Arn’s back, squashing him against Jen, while the other reached for ax or knife.

  But then Gort gave a cry of pain and let him loose. “Owl Another one!” Gort yelled. He had Arel by the ankle and pulled her roughly into the pile made by Jen and Arn. “I’ll skewer the whole mess of em!” Gort yelled, his knife raised. But Arn still had his knife in hand, and he stabbed Gort just above the knee. The point of his knife stopped on bone. Gort howled. Before he could stab down with his long knife the other Chigai pulled him, screaming and bleeding from his new wounds, over onto his back.

  “Enough!” said the one who was evidently the leader of the group. He turned to the three children, his broadax raised, and said, “Put your weapons at my feet.”

  Arn and Arel gave up their knives, then were searched and tied together on a three-foot thong with loops around their necks.

  “So,” the leader said. “We’re in luck—all except Gort, that is!” The three unwounded men laughed loudly.

  “I’ll kill them!” Gort said in a voice tight and husky with pain.

  “Mori wants them alive,” the leader said.

  “I’ll kill them before we get back!”

  “You do, and Mori will have our hides drying on the racks,” the leader said. He looked to the east, where the sky had begun to show the cold light of a winter day. “We’ve nearly a day’s journey home. Mori will be pleased, now. We didn’t kill the woman, but we can say we did. Better one lie than three!”

  “I’ll kill them!” Gort howled as he tried to get to his feet.

  The leader knocked him back down with the flat of his ax. “We can’t wait for you this time, Gort. The way you’re bleeding, I doubt if you’ll make it anyway.”

  The light had grown. Gort stared at the three men, who looked back at him indifferently. His rough face grew pale and gray as he understood. Hatred seemed to run in waves across his forehead and eyes and jaw. He looked colder than the eastern sky. But he said no more.

  Jen had got herself loose, but before she could move, one of the men had tied a loop around her neck. He tied the three children on one thong, so that he had them on a leash.

  “Are you all right?” Arn asked Jen, but heard no answer because he was slapped so hard he fell to his knees and could hardly see.

  The men ate breakfast, each with a hot chunk of broiled meat impaled on his knife. Juice dripped down their chins and cheeks as they gnawed. The children were offered no food, but the man who held their leash allowed them to drink from the river as they began to cross it on the stepping stones. Jen had time to nod to Arn and Arel, to signal that she wasn’t hurt. But when Arel began to speak to her the man raised his hand threateningly and she remained silent.

  Back at the fire, Gort sat alone, tilted to one side from the pain of his wounds, and watched them go.

  All that day they walked toward the east, through forest and swamp and meadow, until they stopped on a small rise and looked down across a wide field at the village of the Chigai. The field was crisscrossed by fences made of saplings and stones, some of the enclosures trampled into mud, others still white with snow. The village itself, which looked huge, endless in its buildings and pens to Arn and Jen, gave off a steady and distant sound that grew louder as they approached. Before they knew what the sound was, it made them tremble. It was not human, but contained in its hoarse breathiness an emotion that humans could feel, and that was the fear of death.

  “An east wind tells them the news,” one of the men said. “They can smell the blood of their own kind.”

  “Roasts and ribs,” another said. “That’s all it means to me.”

  “You can smell the stench of the slaughterhouse, can’t you?” the leader said.

  Then they began to breathe it in the air, the sweet odor of carrion that seemed to coat their mouths and nostrils with a syrup, it was so smooth and pervasive.

  “I get used to it in about a minute,” one of the men said.

  “I still prefer a west wind,” the leader said.

  As they came closer to the village, the lowing of fear and the stench of rotting flesh grew. The sun was setting, its rays red upon the poles of the stockades and the roofs of the wooden buildings. Beneath their feet the earth turned into deep, silky mud as they came up to the first tall gate in the barricade of vertical logs that surrounded the village.

  As they approached the gate they saw a flurry of movement through the cracks in the barricade—gray fur, dark eyes and white teeth as the nearly hysterical howling of the half-wolves began. The fat red face of a man peered over the top of the gate. His mouth opened and closed upon yellow teeth, but nothing could be heard but the howling. The face disappeared and the wolves’ howls turned to cries of pain and fear as a whip cracked and thudded among them. The face reappeared. “Now,” it said. “What do you want?”

  “We’re a patrol and we have prisoners for Mori,” the leader said.

  “If you’re a patrol of Chigai, where are your wolves?”

  “Dead, all three of them.”

  “To catch three children?”

  “Never mind your stupid jokes, sentry. Just open the gate and keep your wolves back,” the leader said.

  The sentry sneered and climbed back down from his perch, and the gate swung open. The cowed half-wolves snapped their teeth and whined at them as they passed on into the village. The lowing of the cattle was like a harsh wind. Both Jen and Arel put their hands over their ears to try to keep out that long moan of helplessness. The mud of the streets sucked at the children’s boots as they walked. From doorways and windows people stared out at them, their expressions closed and fearful, though their eyes seemed to widen slightly at the sight of children on a leash. But then their faces closed again, as if to say it was none of their business.

  The moaning of the distant animals was a pall over the village, and the heavy odor of blood seemed almost a cause of the d
imming of the light as the sun went down. They passed many buildings that were shuttered, many that stood touching each other, as if crowding together, crouching in the dark, walled village against some enemy from outside. The houses stood in the trampled mud, their doorsills crusted with it. Reddish light from torches or fat-burning lamps shone from inside some of the houses.

  They were taken to a large building in the center of the village. Logs had been placed in the mud in front of it to form a corduroy road for several guards to stand on. Torches flamed smokily on each side of the wooden doorway. The leader identified himself, and the thick doors opened on squeaky iron hinges to reveal a short hallway that led to another door guarded by two axmen who were so tall their heads nearly touched the ceiling. In the torchlight they seemed all hair, their own and that of the shaggy cattle skins they wore, all bound by leather belts and straps. The leader made a sign and one of the guards struck the door with the poll of his ax, a sound that rang of struck metal.

  The door was opened from the inside by another guard. Inside was a large hall with a fire burning at its center, the smoke rising into a high ceiling gabled with log rafters. Around the hall on its dirt floor were stone benches and chairs where men sat, the highest chair a throne on which sat Mori in a cape of black cattle skin, his great arms gleaming. He motioned the party forward.

  “So you’ve brought me three little yearlings, have you?” he said to the leader. “Now, that’s well done, so I won’t skin you alive. But where is Lado?”

  The leader’s voice was shaky as he addressed Mori. “Sir, Lado is dead with an arrow through his neck.”

  Mori’s eyes widened. He seemed to hesitate and get his breath before he spoke again. “And I believe there were two other men with you, and three wolves.”

  “Tromo is dead of an arrow. Gort was wounded by this one’s knife.” He pointed to Arn. “And this one stabbed him once, too.” He pointed to Arel. “We had to leave him behind.”