People of the Owl: A Novel of Prehistoric North America (North America's Forgotten Past) (35 page)

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Authors: Kathleen O'Neal Gear,W. Michael Gear

BOOK: People of the Owl: A Novel of Prehistoric North America (North America's Forgotten Past)
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“Who are you to give someone in Alligator Clan an order?”
“I am Owl Clan’s Speaker. I stand in the Council and know its wishes! If you push this thing, it will be between your clan and mine. Do you want to come and explain that to the Council?” Salamander crossed his arms.
Saw Back picked up a pointed paddle engraved with alligators and stepped up to Salamander. “You’re the smallest whelp in the litter, Mud Puppy. I don’t care that you were made some Speaker! You’re barely off the nipple yourself, and you want to give
me
orders?” He smiled as he gripped the paddle. “Move out of my way!”
“Go ahead. Strike me, Saw Back. Do it right and break a couple of bones. Better yet, kill me.” Salamander took a step forward,
aware that the youths were watching, waiting, a keen anticipation in their eyes. “Deep Hunter will be so pleased when he has to defend his clansman in the Council. You see, it’s not just me, but the very notion of a warrior striking a Speaker. It sets a precedent that the Council can’t allow, no matter what they think of me.”
Saw Back stared at Anhinga, taking in her perfect body. “I think after I smack some manners into you, I’ll break your wife in for you.”
Salamander took another step forward, crowding him. “No, you won’t.”
“Why?”
“Because your mother will be crying as she burns your bones.”
That brought laughter from the youths. They were crowding around now, that hunter’s gleam in their eyes. They were primed to fight, to kill.
Saw Back had to take a step back to tap his chest. “You’d kill me? Here are my souls, Mud Puppy, come and take them.”
“I am Salamander,” he replied calmly. “As long as you do not defy the Council, I won’t take your souls. But if you push this thing, I will. Not tonight, but sometime when—”
“He’s getting away!” Needs Two, another of the Alligator Clan hunters called as he looked over his shoulder. Jaguar Hide’s rapidly moving canoe was halfway to the channel.
Anhinga backed away. From the edge of his vision, Salamander watched her pick up one of the pointed paddles. The way she held it assured him she hadn’t considered using it in the water.
A handful of young warriors eased off to one side and bent to shove one of the canoes out.
“I said,
leave him alone
!” Salamander pointed a finger at them. “As a member of the Council, I
order
you.”
Saw Back made a face. “You couldn’t—”
“
Fool!
” Salamander shouted into his face. “The Council could care less what
I
order, but as a Speaker, it would make an exception. Would Deep Hunter want it whispered around that a Speaker can be disobeyed? This isn’t about
me,
Saw Back!”
“He’s almost to the channels!” Needs Two cried as he hopped from foot to foot, unwilling to take action on his own.
“Well?” Salamander cried, walking between them, his hands waving. “What is it? Are you going to attack me? Are you going to throw a burning ember into the tinder of clan relations? Why don’t you run and ask Deep Hunter if he wants a fight with Owl Clan? That wasn’t in the orders, was it? No, just go kill Jaguar Hide! But Owl Clan has made a bargain since that order was given.” He thrust a
finger at Anhinga. “You would kill my wife’s uncle! I would have to seek retribution!”
They looked confused, half of them fingering their darts as they glanced out to where Jaguar Hide’s canoe slipped into the channel, vanishing behind the bald cypresses.
Salamander gave a frustrated sigh, hoping that fear sweat hadn’t broken out on his hot face. “All right, get off the island. I have things to attend to with the Serpent. This woman must be cleansed.” He made shooing signs with his hands. “Stop pestering me, and think about your actions before you go against the Council.”
“I’ll leave in my own good time,” Saw Back insisted.
“Hey,” Sour Mouth, another of the Alligator Clan youths called. “Come on! He’s made it into the channels!”
Salamander smiled as they turned, trotting for their canoes.
“Why didn’t you fight them?” Anhinga asked. The paddle was clutched in her hands, ready to be swung at the nearest foe. Her eyes were on the two canoes lancing out into the lake, hot in pursuit of her uncle.
“We couldn’t have won.” Salamander shrugged. “All we needed to do was give Jaguar Hide time to get off the lake. He’s in the channels now. In a finger’s time, it will be dark. Long before Saw Back and his warriors could possibly catch up.” He paused. “Sometimes the best way to win is by not starting a fight in the first place.”
She gave him the same disbelieving look she’d been giving him all day. “How did this happen to me?”
“I cut you free one night and started it all,” he reminded.
“But why did you offer to marry me? It wasn’t your place.”
“Because, I think
he
wanted me to.”
“Who? Who wanted you to?”
He turned again, looking at her. She stood half a head taller than he did, her body a slim silhouette against the darkening sky. Her long legs, the curve of her hips under the kirtle, and her round pointed breasts were softly bathed by the twilight.
“Has anyone ever told you that you are the most beautiful woman in the world?”
She just stared at him in wonder.
“
D
oes it make any sense that your people could drag me right up to the front of your Men’s House the last time I was here, but this time I have to be cleansed?” Anhinga demanded, her hands clenched in her lap as she stared at Salamander’s lean form across the fire.
“I have never thought of it that way,” he answered, a puzzled frown on his forehead.
The fire burned before a low hut made of woven palmetto leaves. It stood beneath the sweetgum, having sheltered countless travelers and Traders. This, Anhinga had learned, was to be her bridal home during the cleansing of her souls.
Around them a halo of insects insisted on swirling, most of them to be eventually sucked into the flames. In the night sky, a thin sliver of Father Moon shone between the clouds and cast patterns of silver across the blackness.
“I could have brought all kinds of evil into Sun Town. Believe me, for all the terrible things I wished on your people, they should have died of a terrible wasting disease, their muscles turning to pus, their skin becoming a mass of boils.” She glared her hatred at him.
His large dark eyes seemed to swell, and her souls stumbled. What was it about him? His people considered him some sort of comic fool, but when she looked into those eyes, it was as if they drew her souls down into their brown depths. He made her skin shiver with a curious excitement that she couldn’t understand. Was
it because she was destined to kill him? Is that what made him such a novelty?
“If you hate us so, why are you here?” he asked softly. The fire popped, sparks rising between them.
“My uncle wants peace.” She could see he didn’t believe her so she countered, “Why, in Panther’s name, did you cut me loose that night? I was your brother’s property.”
He took a deep breath. “For the same reason that you came back. We are tied by Power. You and I.”
She bit off a bitter smile before it could touch her lips.
Yes, bound by Power! It has brought me here to destroy you, fool!
Aloud she said, “You took a great risk setting me free.”
“Yes.” He shrugged, looking curiously vulnerable as he eyed the fire. “The vision isn’t clear yet, but you should know that you’re not the only one trying to destroy me.”
By Panther, does he hear my thoughts?
“I don’t know where Masked Owl is taking us, or how it is supposed to end. All I have is my wits, but everyone else has theirs, too.” His smile went crooked. “However, until they destroy me, I shall do my best to care for you. I don’t understand the balance of it, but for all that White Bird would have done to hurt you and demean you, I shall do everything the opposite.”
She frowned, unable to see the sense in that, but willing to accept its oddity given the alternatives. “I still don’t understand why you spoke out. You could have let the others find a husband for me. Perhaps Deep Hunter, or that Mud Stalker.”
“I told you.” His eyes had become passive again. “We are tied. When I recognized you, I knew that was why he asked me to free you. So that you could come back. You came here to marry White Bird, the man who captured you and hurt you. You were meant for me. I realized that in a flash of understanding.”
“But I still have to undergo this cleansing?”
He nodded. “It would be most unpleasant if you didn’t.”
“It was
most
unpleasant the
last
time I was here.”
For a long time, he said nothing, just stared into the fire.
“I heard that you are already married.”
His smile might have been a ghost. “Yes, to two women in Snapping Turtle Clan. Pine Drop and Night Rain.”
“So, I am a
third
wife?”
He steepled his fingers, brow lining. “This will be difficult. Among my people, a man goes to live with his wife, in her territory.”
“Among mine, too. So, what is my territory? This little heap of mud in the middle of a lake?”
“For the next six days it is.” He seemed oblivious to her anger. “After that I will build you a house in Owl Clan territory. I know just the spot. You will appreciate it, my brother’s bones were burned there.”
Owl Clan territory? Good, things were beginning to look up. It would place her in the middle of the enemy, in a position where one day she could drive the terrible dagger of revenge into their hearts.
“I will work the rest out with my other wives.” He mused, seeing it all in his souls. “Which will be interesting in its own right.”
“They will not resent me? Try to make me miserable for taking you away from them for part of the time?”
Amusement, like faint and distant lightning, flickered in his face. “I could be wrong, but I doubt it. Like you, they were not particularly pleased to marry me—especially after my mother’s souls began to loosen. I imagine that the nights I spend with you will relieve them. Perhaps, after you come to discover your situation, you may be just as grateful for them.”
She took a deep breath against the tightening she felt in her chest. Tonight she should be bedding her enemy, taking the first step on the long passage to final revenge on Owl Clan. Instead, she was here, removed from Sun Town by their silly fears of spiritual infection, talking to this unusual boy. The top of his head only came to her chin. Unlike Mist Finger or the others of her suitors, he was mostly thin bones. Hardly the ideal of the young warrior-hunter that had filled her fantasies.
Wait until he’s asleep, steal a canoe, and head south.
“And do what?” she asked aloud, eyes fixed on the fire. He seemed not to hear as she imagined her uncle’s face, saw the expression of disappointment in his eyes. It had been bad enough during the months that she healed in the Panther’s Bones, living amidst Mist Finger’s, Right Talon’s, Cooter’s, Spider Fire’s, and Slit Nose’s families. What made her think that after this second failure, it would be any easier?
Armed with the stony beating of her heart, she stood. He was watching her as she stepped around the fire and reached her hand out to him. When he took it, a curious tingle ran through her. His eyes seemed to grow as she pulled him to his feet. For a long moment she looked down into his fascinating eyes, seeing the growing desire.
She held his hand as she walked to the small shelter, ducked inside, and loosened the knots that held her kirtle. The fabric slipped smoothly over her hips to settle beside the moss-covered bed.
He had frozen, mouth parted, his eyes fixed on her body where the fire cast its feeble light. The vein in his neck was pulsing, his chest rising and falling. When she untied the knot that held his breechcloth, it fell away to reveal him, taut and ready.
Her own heartbeat had begun to pound, a warm sensation spinning itself inside her hips. She lay back on the bedding, watching him with a building anticipation. The faint firelight played across his thin body as he lowered himself, his skin sliding warmly across hers.
Instinctively, she wrapped her arms around him and felt the life burning brightly within him. Her breasts tightened as his chest met hers. She was leading him to her, thrilled as his penis slid inside her.
She was thinking about how she was going to kill him when the liquid waves of ecstasy burst through her pelvis. She gasped, taken completely by surprise. Nothing in the naive experimentation of youth had prepared her for the likes of this.
Moments later, he, too, shivered and tensed, a strained sound choking in his throat. Then his arms cupped her shoulders and he buried his face in her hair.
A
top the thick thatch of the Women’s House, the rain sounded like a continuous whisper rather than a drumming. The runoff beat a staccato as it spattered into pools of water that in turn dribbled off to the sides of the Mother Mound. The building was large, filled with baskets and pots that contained the ceremonial items provided by each clan for its women. Each moon, when a woman’s cycle came full, she came here, to attend to herself through the menstrual period.
The time she spent in seclusion with her sisters provided a respite from the never-ending trials of life. She had time for reflection, attention to the spirits, and a break from the normal routine of running a household. Children, husbands, and relatives could not constantly pester or demand her attention. Here, surrounded by women, she could catch up on gossip, hear news of other clans, build friendships, and strengthen ties with friends and acquaintances. The walls of clan politics tended to soften. Negotiations took place, and problems could be solved in a more relaxed environment, woman to woman, without the pressures of others bearing down.
Night Rain had put off leaving for the Women’s House until the
last moment when she discovered herself spotting. Like her sister, she had suffered intermittent cramps for the last several moons. Even the swelling and tenderness in her breasts wasn’t an indicator. She should have known, however, from the moods, and the fact that her cycle had begun to coincide with her sister’s.
She removed her bark rain hat as she stepped into the low doorway. The building, large and rectangular, was oriented north-south atop the low mound. The doorway opened to the west, while on the east, two large windows were situated so that the first rays of the morning sun shot light into the two rooms, one for the Northern Moiety, the other, hers, for the Southern.
She nodded to the clusters of women who sat in clan areas along the walls. They were working at tasks, making beads, others twining cord. Some ground pieces of hematite against slabs of Swamp Panther sandstone in the endless process of crafting net sinkers. They nodded, smiling and waving as Night Rain crossed the room. She rounded the small central fire and located Pine Drop where she sat on a furry buffalo hide, the hair flattened from long use. She lowered herself onto the space her sister opened for her and placed her sack of provisions and her rain hat to one side.
“I thought you’d be following close behind me.” Pine Drop smiled. “I take it you left a stew for Salamander?”
Night Rain snorted. “Why? He’s still over building a house for that wild Swamp Panther woman. I swear, I hope she chokes on the Serpent’s cleansing. I don’t trust her. She’s evil. And why, Sister, do you care if he eats or not? He and that barbarian are the talk of Sun Town!
We
are mentioned by everyone! You should hear the things they’re saying. That somehow it was
our
fault. That we couldn’t conceive, that you were off with Three Stomachs, that we hurt his feelings so much he had to go to a barbarian for companionship! People are laughing at us and not just him!”
Pine Drop stopped short, a pale look washing across her face. She had been grinding ocher on a sandstone tablet. Beside her sat a small pot of grease with which to mix the bright red color. “I should never have listened to Uncle.”
Night Rain cocked her head. “What’s wrong with you? For nearly half a moon, you’ve been different. Something’s changed.”
“Nothing has changed.”
“Yes, it has. You haven’t spoken a single word to Three Stomachs. What did he do to you?”
Pine Drop widened her eyes expressively. “As you can see, Sister, he did nothing to me. I should be happily at home, delighted with
the notion that my moon was late, assured that I was pregnant. Yet, here I am, taking my share of absorbent from the pot, trying to figure out why I’m barren.”
“You’re not barren. It just hasn’t taken is all.” Night Rain resettled herself, reaching into the sack she had brought. From it she took root cakes, dried fish, and smoked deer meat to put into the stone bowl her lineage left for storage. She slipped out of her shawl and massaged her breasts, wincing at the ache. “Snakes, why has my moon come to be so miserable?”
Pine Drop stared at the smoking fire pit in the center of the room. A flame flickered in halfhearted effort as it slowly chewed at the bottom of a blackened log. “I don’t know. I just wonder, is all.”
Night Rain perked up at that. “Yes?”
Her sister shook her head. “I never had these problems, the unending cramps, I mean, until I started coupling with Three Stomachs. It’s as if …”
“What? Snakes! Don’t drag this out. Tell me.”
Pine Drop tilted her head, asking in a whisper, “Do you think we’re being punished?”

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