Bonesetter

by Laurence Dahners

  Gray light was filtering in from outside the door flap of the cave when Pell was finally ready. As he and Gontra stepped outside Gontra asked, “Why do you have these skins hanging over the mouth of the cave Pell? They keep you from being able to see outside. What if a big night cat were to creep up on you, you wouldn’t even know it was there!”

  “It keeps the wind out, Gontra. With the flap there, it stays warmer in the cave. Besides there is too much smell of smoke and fire for the big cats. I don’t think they would try to come in.”

  Pell looked Gontra over critically. It didn’t look like he had gotten much sleep during the night. There were gaps in his furs that must leave him cold. Especially Gontra’s legs, they were nearly uncovered! Pell went back into the cave and found an extra set of the winter leggings they had learned about from Manute. Pell brought them out and tried to put them on Gontra. At first Gontra didn’t understand their function, then he said he didn’t need them. But, when Pell finally got them on him and he felt the warmth they provided, he pronounced them wonderful and thanked Pell effusively.

  They set out and Pell handed Gontra some spirit meat. Gontra took it, saying, “What’s this?” He held it up to his nose to smell it. “Hey, is this meat? Oh it must be some of that ‘meat that doesn’t rot’ that they said you had at the trading place. Everyone was pretty amazed by that stuff. Huh, I was sure you wouldn’t really have any left, but I guess Denit was at least right about your still having some.” Gontra consumed it hungrily, then was astonished when Pell gave him some more. “Thanks, Pell. You really should keep some for yourself you know.”

  “I’ve got plenty.”

  “Well, if you don’t mind I’ll just save this for Tonday and Tila. Especially little Tila, I need her to be as strong as possible going into winter. Even strong, this is going to be a hard winter for her. Better, now that Denit is gone though. He’d already been restricting meat for the little ones. Said they didn’t need it as badly as ‘hunters’ did. The women either. I think they need it just as bad as we do. What do you think?”

  Pell found himself bemused by the usually taciturn Gontra’s rambling orations. First last night, now again this morning. “Yes, I think they need meat just as bad as the hunters. But you don’t need to save that for them. I have more in my pack.”

  “Really?! That’s great!” Gontra said, getting it back out of his pouch and hungrily gnawing the remainder of the tough piece of spirit meat. “Tando must be a really great hunter—like they were saying last night. He was always good, but I thought he was done for when he broke his wrist. The spirits you used to fix his wrist must still be there, helping with every throw of his spear. It almost makes me wish I’d broken my wrist instead of just my finger.” A bemused expression crossed his face. Pell could see it as they had finished wending their way down the narrow path out of Cold Springs Ravine and were now walking side by side out into the big valley. “I wonder if I throw better since you fixed my finger? Not that I’ve had much of a chance to throw a spear in those abortions that Denit called ‘hunts’.” He brightened, “Now that he’s gone I’ll bet I do better at hunting too, just like Tando.”

  Pell found himself irritated at the way that Gontra assumed that any successful hunting had been done by Tando, even if Gontra was ascribing Tando’s success to Pell. Abruptly, he realized that he and Tando’s most recent trapline had run down the small valley just to their left. “Gontra, I’m going to take a little detour here. I’ll meet you at that lone tree up there when the sun has moved a hand. You can go down to the water there and see if you can spear a fish while you’re waiting.”

  “No! Pell, I want to keep moving. If we keep up this pace we can make the whole trip by midafternoon.”

  “So it’ll be dark when we get there, you know the paths close to the cave like you know the back of your hand. This is important.”

  Gontra acquiesced, though in a surly fashion. Pell thought he had responded like a child would to an adult who told him to behave. Pell hiked up the little valley looking for the limestone marks that he and Tando had been using to mark their traplines. The marking system had become necessary so that they wouldn’t lose trap sites, especially when one of them laid the traps out and the other picked them up. Soon he was on the line and excitedly remembered that this part of the run he had laid out with some traps for larger animals. The first trap was empty. The second had had something in it but it had been discovered by scavengers and there was little left but blood and disturbed earth. The third and fourth were also empty and the noose for the sixth had been knocked loose and hung limply off to one side of the path. Pell’s heart began to sink. He needed to rejoin Gontra. He decided to check one more before heading on to the meeting site.

  Gontra was sitting at the edge of the river, peering sullenly into the water when Pell threw the young boar down by his side. Pell had found it recently snared and in good health. The noose was snug about its neck and it had obviously struggled for a bit from the looks of the torn up dirt and foliage in the area. Trapped, panting and spraddle legged; it seemed almost to be waiting for Pell’s spear. It had succumbed to his first thrust and its bristly coat didn’t show the noose marks that might give away Pell’s departure from standard hunting techniques.

  Pell had carefully and noiselessly padded up and Gontra had startled admirably when the boar thumped down at his side. “It’s a good thing I’m not a lion Gontra, I’d be having you for dinner.” He chuckled, “Instead, I brought you some dinner! Is having this boar to take to the Aldans worth a little delay?”

  Gontra goggled at the boar in quite a satisfactory manner. “Spirits, Pell. This will be wonderful! We haven’t had this much meat for weeks! How did you kill this boar without other hunters to help you trap it?”

  “I just commanded it to hold still while I ran my spear through it,” Pell said, reflecting that that lie was actually somewhat close to the truth.

  They set about cleaning it and after putting the cleaned stomach, intestines, heart and liver in Pell’s carry pack, set out again with the boar itself draped around Gontra’s neck. Despite Gontra’s greater size, he tired often while carrying the boar. They took to trading it back and forth, with the other carrying the pack. Pell was surprised to realize that he was carrying the boar farther and easier on his turns than Gontra was, but then, Gontra hadn’t been eating as well as Pell had. At one point, as they stood face to face to shift the boar from Pell’s shoulders to the Gontra’s, Pell realized that Gontra really wasn’t taller than Pell any more either. After years of looking up at Gontra and considering him to be a large man, this was a startling insight. Pell was bigger than he was now. Despite Gontra’s weariness, they made good time along the flats bordering the great river. By late afternoon they were in country familiar to Pell as they neared the Aldans cave.

  Huffing up a slope with the boar about his neck, Gontra turned to Pell and said, “Now, if you’d planned this better, you would have had this boar meet you to be killed right about here. Then I wouldn’t be worn out from carrying it.”

  Pell laughed, thinking wistfully how nice it would be if he actually could just summon animals to be killed wherever he wanted.

  It was after dark, but just barely, when they arrived below the cave, at the creek’s side. The moon had risen, a brilliant auroch’s horn shape in the sky. It cast an eerie blue glow over the landscape where it struck, but ominous shadows lay elsewhere. They could see the glow of the fire flickering inside the cave when Gontra stopped and turned, letting the boar slide down off his shoulders to thump into the dirt at Pell’s feet. “I think you should wait here Pell. So that they don’t get hit with too much at once, I’ll go on up and let them know that Belk and I aren’t dead.”

  They stood for a moment in silence and Pell heard the women wailing inside. “Yeah, I think that Pont’s gotten them pretty worked up by now. Go on ahead. Call out when you want me to come on up.” Pell sat down on the boar’s carcass, thinking again just how little he wanted to be amo
ng the people in that cave, especially to be recognized as the one who’d killed their hunters.

  Gontra walked up the path a ways then stopped. “Pell, come with me,” he whispered, “I can’t face Fellax and Ontru alone.”

  A cold dread seeped over Pell, but he climbed to his feet, hoisted the boar to his shoulders and started up the path behind Gontra.

  Too soon came the sight of the pitiful group huddled about the fire, most of them wailing. Pont, his back to Gontra and Pell, was gesturing animatedly, though Pell could not understand what he was saying. With a little surprise, Pell observed that they all had their furs about them, even though they were close to the fire. Then he remembered how this cave had always been cold in winter, even with a fire. The fire had to be built near the entrance or it choked the cave with smoke, not having an exit hole such as he had built into the wall of the Cold Springs cave. The entrance was wide and couldn’t be closed off like the Cold Springs cave could with its large leather flap. Thus the wind swirled freely through the cave, cooling everything not directly struck by the heat radiating from the fire. Pell looked at the scene and the people in it, thinking fondly of some, like Lessa, the healer’s mate and Lenta, Belk’s woman, both of whom had been kind to him as a boy. He dreaded meeting again with Pont, or with Fellax, Roley’s imperious first wife. For a moment he considered just throwing down the boar and leaving, but instead he merely shuffled to a stop. Gontra turned and saw Pell falling back. With a hand gesture he motioned Pell to keep coming. As Pell resumed moving, there was a shriek from fireside and Lenta rose, pointing to Gontra and saying, “Tonday, I, I… see Gontra’s spirit!!”

  Tonday burst to her feet, looking wildly about, face streaked with tears as Gontra stepped fully into the light. Gontra surveyed the scene, then said “No, this is not my spirit, I am truly here!” He stepped forward, throwing his arms about Tonday, then reaching out with one hand to Exen.

  Pont reacted almost angrily, “No, I saw you crushed by the rocks!” Somehow Pell was not surprised when, almost without taking a breath, Pont changed his tone completely and proclaimed in his most sonorous tones, “Never have my requests to the spirit world been answered so quickly. Gontra! Back from the dead! Gontra, how do you feel?!”

  Gontra did not respond at first and for a moment Pell feared that Gontra would go along with the healer’s preposterous claims, as he had when Pont claimed the spirits reduced Gontra’s finger dislocation. Then Gontra took a deep breath and turned on the healer, “You! You didn’t ‘see’ me crushed. You were running like a frightened doe!” He turned to the others. “Our ‘Medicine Man’ Pont didn’t even check on the rest of us to see who was hurt, or who might need help. No, he ran back here as fast as his little legs would carry him.” Pell winced. An insult regarding the healer’s small and bowed legs had not been uttered aloud since Pont’s childhood when they had been a common source of taunts. No one would have dared Pont the Medicine Man’s wrath before now. “Pell, whom we were about to attack, was the one who came to help us. He came to heal us from our injuries, injuries inflicted by rocks that the ‘Trap Spirit’ cast down on us. Rocks which the Trap Spirit cast upon us when Pell asked it to protect him from us. While our own ‘healer’ ran, actually scurried like a lizard into a crack, Pell, who has become known as a great ‘Bonesetter’ in his region, came to us, to aid us—to aid those who had been about to raid his tiny tribe for food.”

  Pell missed Gontra’s next words in his consternation over the continuance of the “Trap Spirit” explanation of what had happened. Hadn’t Gontra been listening when he explained that the trap was only a device? Then he remembered acceding to requests that he pray to the “Trap Spirit.” He was brought back to the present by the women’s cries, “Us? Did the others survive then? How are the others? Where are Roley and Denit? Is Belk OK as well?”

  Gontra looked about wildly a moment, making shushing motions with his hands. As he looked back over his shoulder toward Pell, the group discerned Pell as a shadowy figure. Gontra finally said, “Belk survived but he is badly hurt. The Trap Spirit took the lives of Roley and Denit in payment for their attempt at attacking Pell.”

  Lenta leaped to her feet, apparently thinking the figure in the shadows was Belk. She ran towards Pell, shrieking Belk’s name as she ran. Pell stepped forward into the light so that she would be able to see that he wasn’t Belk. The group about the fire was startled at the apparition before them. They recognized Pell’s face, but, because of his tremendous summer growth spurt, Pell was much larger than they remembered him. In fact larger than anyone in their tribe except for the massive Roley. The boar draped over his shoulders like a huge cowl markedly emphasized this startling first impression. Having initially surged forward, they now drew back and shrank in among themselves, some gasping in fear.

  Pell, having spent most of his life in subjugation to these same people, was surprised by their frightened expressions. He could, however see that they were thin and hungry looking—appallingly so. In response to his recognition of their hunger and, in hopes of influencing their opinions positively, he swung the boar down off of his shoulders and carried it to them. “We’ve brought a boar,” he said.

  The eyes of the group flashed up and down, from Pell to the boar and back again. Gontra roared, “Pell, brought you that boar—after hunting it down, by himself, in just an hour or two. He has become a mighty hunter, as well as a powerful bonesetter, and, the shaman of the Trap Spirit!”

  Several of the group about the fire prostrated themselves before him. Pell started back, then knelt, urging them back to their feet. “Lenta, get up, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean for Belk to get hurt. I think he’s going to be OK,” he whispered, grasping her arm and urging her to her feet and back to the heat of the fire. He couldn’t quite bring himself to say that he hadn’t meant for Denit or Roley to be hurt, but he did help Ontru, Roley’s lesser wife, back to her feet. He saw that Fellax, Roley’s first wife, remained on the far side of the fire, fixing him with a fierce and angry gaze. There would be no prostration from Fellax he suspected. He looked about at the children, who looked fearful, and the women, who ranged in expression from awe, to fear, to hate. Exen glowered at him from across the fire, where was the healer?

  Suddenly Pont struck from behind! The healer pounced from Pell’s left rear quarter, wrapping his left arm about Pell’s neck and surging around with his right to thrust his wicked flint knife at Pell’s chest! The world moved slowly as Pell’s own right hand flashed out to block, then grasp the healer’s forearm. Pell was distantly surprised when the knife’s approach stopped—then he forced it away. Pell mused to himself that Pont must have weakened—he had always been so much stronger than Pell was. Pell grasped Pont’s choking left forearm with his own left hand, pulling it away, not easily—but again, he was astounded that it was even possible. The struggling healer’s legs beat a tattoo about Pell’s waist and Pell staggered about while the others looked on in horror. Gontra had stepped toward the fighters as if to intervene, then, realizing that Exen looked as if he were about to help Pont, turned instead to confront his own son.

  Suddenly Ginja burst out of the dark, knocking Pell and the healer to the ground beside the fire. As they were bowled apart, Ginja leaped onto Pont, snarling, slavering and as the healer rolled away, instantly attacking the medicine man’s throat. Somewhat to his own wonderment Pell found himself exclaiming, “No! Ginja! No!” His own hate for the healer and deep-set wish to see Pont dead, subjugated by his lifelong understanding of the tribe’s need for every man it had. Nonetheless, Pell kept his grasp on the wrist of Pont’s knife hand, preferring that Ginja kill the healer rather than see that knife buried Pell’s his best friend’s furry coat. After a moment Ginja, still snarling, slowly backed away and Pell looked up into the ashen faces surrounding the fire—faces which were cowering fearfully away. The healer grasped his neck with one hand, trying to stanch the flow of blood from his wounds as Pell wrested the knife from his hand. Having wrenched Pont’s knife fre
e, Pell slowly stood, panting, wondering if Pont had another knife hidden about him somewhere. Pont cowered a moment, fully expecting the knife to fall on him, then… the healer groveled at Pell’s feet, begging for his life.

  Pell paused, having not initially considered sinking the knife into Pont when he had wrenched it from his grasp. His thoughts turned first to the needs of his old tribe for another hunter and a medicine man, miserable though he was beginning to realize that Pont was at both of those roles. Then he remembered the healer’s lifelong vindictiveness. If Pell let him live this time, wouldn’t Pont simply sink a knife into Pell by complete surprise on some later day? Wouldn’t it really be better to have Pont gone so that Pell could go on without worry—even if it were a hardship for the others—others who had cast him out to fend for himself? For a moment the knife rose, nearly of its own accord, then Lessa was there, on her knees, clinging to Pell’s right arm, begging for her man’s life. And Pell remembered Lessa’s many kindnesses when Pell had been a child. His arm slowly, slowly dropped.

  He looked into Lessa’s fearful eyes, “I must sleep here tonight, if I let him live, how will I be sure he won’t knife me in my sleep?”

  In a craven display that turned Pell’s stomach, Pont began shrieking his purity of thought and future deed, but Lessa, staring clearly into Pell’s eyes, simply said, “Tie him up.”

  Pell was startled. He had never seen anyone tied, though he had heard of it. “I wouldn’t know how.”

  Gontra stepped over and said, “I can tie him. I’ve seen it done.”

  Pell looked at him, considering, “What if someone cuts him loose in the night?”

  Gontra pondered a moment, then, “We’ll place him at the back of the cave. You and I will sleep between him and the others, so that anyone going to him will have to step over us. If we lay dry twigs about him, they’ll snap if someone does manage to step over us.” He looked down at the sniveling Pont, considering for a moment. Then he looked back up, “On the other hand, you’re probably right. Better to kill him now. We can’t do this every night.” Gontra reached for his own knife.