“That was close. You saved me from being squashed.” Shinoni shudders.
“You should be more careful. Your leg’s still weak.” Keena offers Shinoni her shoulder as they descend from their hillside perch. They move out onto the steppe, the clatter of the bison’s hooves still ringing in their ears.
“One of those young thunder hooves would’ve made a very good meal.” Shinoni pokes at a pile of still-steaming bison dung.
“Perhaps we should eat grass and twigs as they do,” Keena says.
“There’s meat here. We just have to find it,” Shinoni says. “See there?”
Swaying grass betrays the hiding place of a fat brown grouse. Its feathers have started to change to the white of the coming snows. Shinoni carefully draws her sling and fits a stone, letting it fly. Her deadly aim kills the bird instantly.
Shinoni limps to the place where the grouse lies, wings spread and feathers ruffling in the wind. “Ho. We’ll eat tonight. Thank you, bird, for giving yourself to feed us.” She picks up the bird and thrusts it at Keena. “Here, carry this so my hands are free for more hunting.”
“Where’s your wolf? She could’ve brought down one of the young thunder hooves. Won’t she provide meat again?” Keena yanks the dead grouse from Shinoni’s hand. Must she always be so bossy?
“She might, but we shouldn’t depend on her to feed us.” Shinoni steps closer. “What are you doing with the bird?”
Keena removes a leather tie from the top of her leg wrap and ties the grouse into a fold of her cloak, securing it to her waist with the leather strip. She rearranges her clothing to carry the bird and still protect herself from the biting wind.
“Krag, why don’t you just sew your clothing to hold it closer to your body, like I do?” Shinoni says. “It’s warmer if it doesn’t flap in the wind.”
“What’s sew mean, Kula?” Keena looks at Shinoni’s fitted leather leggings and tunic, which leave no skin exposed except her face and hands.
“Do you really not know how to sew?” Shinoni shakes her head. “We have tools that bind our clothes together around us. Krags don’t have this?”
“It’s not the Krag way.” Keena reties the laces on her leg wrap. “Let’s move on before some beast makes a meal of us.” She hurries down the trail, leaving Shinoni to catch up.
“We need shelter and a fire. Soon.” Keena glances around anxiously as shadows hide the trail and the stirrings of night hunters rustle in the twilight. “We should’ve taken the last cave, Kula. You’re too fussy.”
Shinoni sighs. The Krag girl is always worrying. “It was barely big enough for two of us, and there was no firewood nearby,” Shinoni says. “The ground’s rising here. We’ll find something soon.”
“Let’s hope we find something before something finds us,” Keena says.
The setting sun breaks through the clouds to throw a final splash of light onto the land before night descends. There on the hillside above them, a black crevice beckons.
“Ho, Kula, you were right.” Keena whoops.
“I know.” Shinoni grins.
The girls hug and rush up the slope, gathering kindling as they go. They build up a brush pile and start a fire with Shinoni’s firestones. The flames grow, filling the entranceway with a protective shield of warmth and safety.
Tewa joins them, dodging the flames. She stretches out near the entrance, tongue dangling as she pants heavily. Then she begins to lick dried blood from her snout and paws.
“Looks like the wolf has no meat to share from her hunt,” Keena observes. “Good thing you killed this fat bird, Kula.”
Shinoni beams at Keena’s appreciation of her hunting ability.
As Keena continues plucking feathers from the grouse, Shinoni picks up several of the most distinctive brown, grey, and white tail feathers. She tucks them into the thong that ties her thick hair at the nape of her neck. “Would you like me to put some in your hair?” she asks Keena. “The colour would look good in your braid.”
“Why would I put the feathers of a dead bird in my hair?” Keena asks.
“Why not? You wear the skins and fur of dead animals. The feathers look nice, and maybe you’ll get some of the bird’s skill in hiding.”
“Well, they didn’t help this one much with hiding.” Keena turns back to pulling the entrails out of the grouse, preparing it for roasting. Tewa moves closer to Keena and sits panting behind her, watching her every move with the carcass. When she’s done, Keena places the bloody entrails on the ground by Tewa. The big wolf gulps them down with relish, then continues to watch Keena.
“There isn’t much meat here to share with this big wolf,” Keena says.
“I don’t think she’s hungry. By the blood on her face when she came in, I think she’s already eaten but didn’t have enough to share.” Shinoni watches Tewa fondly.
Keena puts the gutted grouse on a stick and uses stones to prop it up close to the flames. She sneaks a peak at the feathers in Shinoni’s hair. “If you have some of those feathers left, you can put a few in my hair if you want.”
Shinoni knows she wouldn’t share her prize feathers with any of the Kula girls at her camp, but she really wants Keena to have some. She picks out three of the largest and softest feathers from the pile and slides across the floor to sit beside Keena. She works the feathers into her thick red braid, then admires her work. “They look very beautiful. In my band, women and men often wear feathers and other ornaments.”
“Like those teeth on your clothing?” Keena touches the fox and otter teeth on Shinoni’s tunic. “Do they mean you’ve already become a Kula woman?”
“Not yet. I have to go on a spirit quest first and have my first blood. My grandmother sewed those on to show I’m the shaman’s daughter and that I was training as her assistant to be a medicine woman.” She fondles the teeth as Reza’s proud face flickers in her mind’s eye. “She sewed a new ornament whenever I proved I’d mastered a new healing skill.” A tear slides down Shinoni’s cheek. “I’ll sew them on myself from now on. I hope someday soon I can go on my spirit quest.”
“I don’t know this spirit quest, but would it be harder than what you’re doing now? Perhaps you’re already on your quest. Surely you’re learning and doing more things than you ever knew or did before?”
“Perhaps I am.” She studies Keena as she pulls her braid forward to admire the grouse feathers. “When will you become a Krag woman? What must you do?”
“When I start to bleed, my band will drum and sing to welcome me as a woman.” Keena selects a twig from the brush pile and chews on it. “Then any hunter who’s shared meat with the band and has his own hearth can ask me to join him at his fire. He’d provide meat to my father and mother and ask them to let me come.”
“Can you choose who to go with? What if you don’t like the hunter who asks?”
“I’d tell my father I didn’t want to go with him and he’d refuse the hunter’s offer.” Keena reaches under her cloak and clutches the ibex-tooth pendant, Kreel’s gift to her from his first kill.
“So if you haven’t started to bleed and you hate Haken, why did your father let him take you away to his hearth?”
Keena stares stonily into the flames. “Haken killed the lion that was hunting my people. Atuk promised he could take some women from our band with him. He said women who chose to go with Haken, but Haken listens to no one. He insisted I be one of them.” Keena’s voice quavers as she spits out the words. “It was hard for my father, but he had no choice.”
“It was wrong to send you away with a man such as Haken,” Shinoni says. “You still want to return to your father’s hearth?”
“My father’s old and Haken has many hunters,” Keena says. “You saw what he does to those who stand in his way. He killed your people to get their hunting magic.”
Now Shinoni blinks back tears. “It was my fault. I did something that caused my people to die. I entered our sacred cave even though I knew only the shaman and hunters were allowed to
be there. My father took me back into the cave to ask the spirits to forgive me and allow me to paint the animals. Maybe the spirits are still angry with me, and the death of my people is my punishment.” She sobs. “It’s my fault, too, that Ardak and Rena and the small ones were killed by Haken.”
Keena wraps her arms around Shinoni. Their tears glisten like broken shards of quartz in the firelight. Tewa sits up, whining and looking from one to the other.
Keena is the first to speak. “You’re still alive, so perhaps your spirits are protecting you, not punishing you.”
“You must have a good father or you wouldn’t want to return to his hearth,” Shinoni reassures Keena.
“Haken’s the one who’s caused our pain. He’s the one to blame — not my father, not you.” Keena wipes her eyes with the back of her hand.
Shinoni clears her throat, anxious to change the subject. She rummages in her pouch and takes out her sewing kit. Tewa cocks her head, and perhaps sensing the change in mood, relaxes and moves back into the shadows. She turns in a circle before settling down to resume her sleep.
Shinoni feels the spirits of her mother and grandmother beside her as she touches the soft white rabbit fur that wraps the sewing kit. Grandmother made the kit for her mother and then gave it to Shinoni after her mother died. She opens it and takes out the bone needle and stone awl. “Look, Keena, these are the tools we sew with. Come closer and I’ll show you how it works.”
“I’m happy with the Krag way,” Keena says, but she wiggles closer to Shinoni. She leans over Shinoni’s lap to get a good view of the strange small tools.
Shinoni threads one of the narrow strips of sinew through the hole in the bone needle and shows Keena how the awl punches two small holes in the leather of her tunic. She pushes the needle through the holes, attaching some grouse feathers before tying off and knotting the sinew. “It takes longer to prepare and sew clothing, but it’s worth it.” She shows Keena the stitches on her leggings.
Keena runs her fingers over the raised pattern of sinew that tightly holds together the two sides of Shinoni’s deer-hide leggings. She fondles the ties on her own hide-wrapped legs. Her brow furrows and she purses her lips as she looks from one to the other. “I see that this sewing could be useful, but it would take a lot of time to do. Wrapping’s faster, and we can change the size and shape of the hides we wear when we need to.”
“Our way keeps out the wind and snow better, and once it’s done, the skins stay closed around us. Rips can be fixed quickly, too.”
Keena doesn’t seem convinced, so Shinoni puts away the sewing kit. She pats Keena on the back. “I can teach you how to sew your clothes sometime if you want.”
Keena takes the grouse from the flames. “Perhaps, but I think the way my grandmother taught me suits me better.”
Shinoni and Keena settle down to their meal. A chill wind from the high country dances across the cave entrance, outside the fire’s warmth. Its high wailing cry dares the girls to come out and be tested.
25
“HO, WOLF, WHAT’S YOUR HURRY?” Keena clutches her cape as Tewa pushes past her, knocking her sideways. Tewa sniffs the wind, muscles tense and tail high. Then with a yodelling yip she lopes down the hill and disappears into the steppe grass below.
“The wolf’s in a hurry. Do you think Haken’s close by?” Keena asks.
“She’ll warn us if there’s danger.” Shinoni checks her pouch to be sure her sling and knife are ready if needed. “She probably smells those thunder hooves and wants to fill her belly.”
Keena and Shinoni continue their journey at a brisk pace. Shinoni’s ankle has almost completely healed now. She used the wooden braces as fuel for their fire last dark time. She’s proud of the healing skills Grandmother Reza taught her. Maybe she will be a medicine woman, like Reza. Maybe a shaman, too.
The sun is high overhead when they stop to drink at a creek. The ice-cold water sparkles as it tumbles over grey and brown stones washed down from the glacier.
“Leeswi’s smiling. Maybe it’s a good day for us.” A playful breeze ruffles the feathers in Keena’s braid. “Let’s follow this stream until we find the river it flows from. Maybe that river will lead us to my family.”
Shinoni sniffs for danger. “It’ll be a good day if we avoid Haken. Perhaps he won’t follow us into the high country.”
“Haken came into the high country to take me from my home. He’s no stranger here.” Keena scans the area and shivers. “He knows this land better than I do.”
The dry grass behind them shakes ominously. Shinoni leaps over the stream, sling loaded and raised above her head. “Quick, Keena. Someone’s coming.”
Keena frantically sloshes through the frigid water, her short legs unable to make the leap. She crouches behind Shinoni and peers into the swaying grass. With a final crackle, the dry stems part and a large grey shape emerges.
Tewa pants heavily, her tongue lolling and sides heaving. The fur on her head is matted and blood oozes from a cut above her eye. She heads straight to the stream and laps the water in great gulps.
“It’s only Tewa, and she’s hurt.” Shinoni jumps back across the stream and examines the cut on the wolf’s head.
“You take care of her. You’re the healer.” Keena sits on the ground on the far side of the stream and removes her soggy foot wraps. She pulls out the wet moss lining and stuffs the hide wrappings with dry grasses. Her bare toes are freezing. She wipes her feet on her cloak before sticking them back into the grass-lined foot coverings. Keena clumsily reties the laces, her fingers numb and stiff from the cold.
Shinoni touches the cut on Tewa’s head, and a growl rumbles deep in the wolf’s throat. She withdraws her hand and stands up. “That’s not so bad, sister, but you should be more careful.” She jumps back across the stream to rejoin Keena, and Tewa follows her.
“You’re a good one to give advice on being careful.” Keena laughs. “Looks like she took on more than she could handle without her pack. Probably some big mother thunder hoof got upset when she tried to make a meal of her young one.”
“We’re her pack now, Keena.” Shinoni places one hand on Tewa’s densely furred back and the other on Keena’s broad shoulder. “We take care of each other.”
Shinoni, Keena, and Tewa move along a game trail within hearing of the running stream. The wind picks up, blowing their hair forward as it pushes them along.
“It is a good day. Leeswi’s helping us move quickly,” Keena says.
Tewa, who’s been bounding silently through the grass ahead of them, suddenly stops. She growls a warning.
Both Keena and Shinoni sniff the air but the wind’s blowing away from them. They can’t detect the threat picked up by the wolf’s much more sensitive nose. Tewa continues growling as she stares at a distant clump of trees.
“Something by that thicket has spooked Tewa,” Shinoni says. “Let’s get a look before we go any farther.” Shinoni moves off the trail, circling around, trying to get a better view.
“If the wolf smells whatever’s there, it can smell us, too,” Keena says.
“It seems your Leeswi isn’t helping us now. She’s carrying our scent in that direction.” Shinoni increases her stride, a deep frown creasing her brow. Keena trots to keep up.
Keena cautions Shinoni. “You shouldn’t question what Leeswi does, Kula. She gives breath. She takes breath. Don’t anger her again.”
In her mind’s eye, Shinoni sees the earth’s yawning mouth opening to swallow her on the day the ground shook. She smells again the stench of the earth’s bowels. “I’m sorry … I’m sorry,” she mutters into the wind above her.
Suddenly, the rattle of the grass dies down and Shinoni’s hair no longer blows past her face. The wind eases to a whisper.
Keena gasps. “You see, Leeswi’s chosen to help us this time.”
Shinoni and Keena clasp each other close in a hug before silently moving forward. They follow Tewa’s tail flag until they reach a large mound of earth juttin
g above the grass. A perfect vantage point to view the dangerous thicket.
“Look, Krag, what beast is that?” Shinoni points to what looks like an immense grey rock moving slowly in the grass beside the thicket, munching shrubs. There seems to be a smaller grey stone between the huge beast and the low trees.
Keena raises her head, testing the wind for scent. The beast also raises her huge head. Two curved horns sit on top of her snout, the one in front dwarfing the one behind. “It’s a big horn! She won’t eat us, Kula, but she will chase us down and squash us like bugs.”
Shinoni marvels at the size of the shaggy creature. She’s more massive than the huge thunder hooves they saw last sun time. The woolly rhinoceros snorts, shaking her head from side to side as she moves away from the thicket. Does she smell them? She’s wary, and Shinoni sees the reason. Following at the great beast’s heels is a much smaller version of herself. The calf’s tiny horn touches her mother’s flank as they walk together.
“I’ve never seen this big horn beast before. Why would she chase us down and crush us? We mean her no harm,” Shinoni says.
“Atuk says all big horns are bad tempered, and this one has a youngster to defend. My people hunt and kill them for food, but it’s dangerous and takes several strong hunters.”
“Well, then, it seems fair they’d see us as enemies and squash out our guts.” Shinoni scans the area. “You know this land better than me. Which way should we go?”
“It’s likely best to head away from the big horn,” Keena says. “There’s a line of hills over there and other rivers that flow from the high country.”
Shinoni, Keena, and Tewa climb down from the earth mound. They travel rapidly, putting distance between themselves and the danger they know lurks in the thicket, but heading ever closer to the unknown dangers in the new line of hills.
26
“DEATH BIRDS.” Keena points to vultures circling in the sky over the open grassland just ahead. They are near the crooked hills. The vultures dip and swoop, their giant wings black against the lowering sun. “Something’s injured or dying over there.”
Sisters of the Wolf Page 11