People of the Silence (18 page)

Her brow wrinkled as she recalled the argument Cloud Playing and Webworm had been engaged in the morning they’d left on this journey. Half of Talon Town had come running at the sound of loud voices just outside the walls. Night Sun had stood numbly, watching the disagreement progress to a shoving match—which Cloud Playing won by accident. She’d pushed Webworm backward and he’d tripped over a rock and fallen to the ground. As onlookers burst out laughing, Cloud Playing had stamped away. She’d been silent and moody for two days afterward. She’d only begun to brighten late last night as they’d sat around their campfire talking of old times—times when they’d both been happy. Why had they been arguing?

Six summers ago, Webworm had asked to marry Cloud Playing, but neither Night Sun nor Crow Beard had approved. Since the deaths of her family, Cloud Playing had been very lonely, accompanying Night Sun on her Healing rounds, carrying the pack of sacred herbs, roots, and tools. The argument hadn’t been over Cloud Playing’s other “prospects,” had it? Webworm had a reputation for jealousy.

Hallowed Ancestors, I hope not.

Over the past two summers, Cloud Playing had become Night Sun’s best friend and closest confidante.

Despite the fact that Night Sun possessed considerable power and wealth, for most of her life her soul had been completely empty. A cavernous darkness lived inside her—as it had all the women in her family. Her mother and older sister had both spoken of that darkness as if it were a terrible ghostly lover; a specter whose shadowy arms often tightened around them until they felt so alone they wished to die. When the daily misery of Night Sun’s wedded life became too much, she understood—and feared—what they had experienced, because the desperation turned her into a violent stranger.

A tall willowy woman of forty-four summers, gray glinted in Night Sun’s black hair as it fluttered about her triangular face. She brushed the hair away and tipped up her pointed nose to sniff the air. Cedar smoke rode the wind. Her black dress whipped about her red leggings, creating a pleasant sound.

As she rounded a bend in the trail, she saw Deer Mother Village. The square dwelling had been built beneath the overhanging canyon wall. Just beyond, the canyon turned shallow, the rim sloping to sage flats. Few families dared to stay in such isolated areas. With the raiding, it took real bravery, but these people of the Coyote Clan had always been brave. They had survived here for centuries—though only about ten members remained.

For that very reason Night Sun visited here once every four moons—always during the full moon. She feared that this small village might not exist much longer, and despite her dislike of the village Matron, Sweetwater, she loved the five slaves. They always greeted her with such affection.

“Mother?” Cloud Playing called. “There’s someone coming.”

“Where?” Night Sun shielded her eyes against the slant of sunlight, but saw nothing.

“Wait. He just vanished around the base of the rise. You’ll see.”

A breathless silence had gripped the desert. Birds sat fluffed up in the spiny arms of cacti, or huddled beneath rock overhangs. Coyotes quietly loped through the drainages, hunting mice and rabbits. Eagles circled through blue skies.

An old man appeared on the hilltop and waddled toward her. He wore a tattered gray cape and worn moccasins. When he met her, he murmured, “May the Blessed thlatsinas look over you this day.”

“And you also, Elder.”

He dipped his white head and continued on.

Night Sun followed the trail up the low hill. By the time she reached the top, she was panting. She untied the water jug from her belt, removed the ceramic lid, and drank deeply. Each swallow went down crisp and cold. She silently thanked the thlatsinas.

Water was the most precious of all resources in this high desert country. People filled jugs from potholes in the rocks, or larger sinks in the canyon bottom freshened by rain and melting snows. In the heat of the summer, when no reliable surface water could be found, people scooped out holes along drainages. Sometimes, they filled. Sometimes they remained dry and dusty, as empty of water as the supplicants were of hope.

Night Sun tied her water jug to her belt again and gazed back down the hill.

Cloud Playing had stopped to speak to the old man. Wind Baby billowed her blue dress around her legs. Her voice rose in soft lilting tones. The man answered, but Night Sun caught only a few words.

Cloud Playing smiled at something he said. She was a pretty young woman, with brown eyes and red-brown skin. Four black spirals tattooed her pointed chin—the mark of all the women in their family. Night Sun had them on her own chin.

Cloud Playing patted the old man’s shoulder and unslung her pack. She rummaged around inside and handed him something, then ran up the hill to Night Sun, the pack swaying on her back.

Cloud Playing said, “He’s from Yellow Moth Village in the south. He says the Mogollon raided there three moons ago.”

Night Sun looked down the trail after the elder. The fact that he walked alone, and his ragged appearance, told her a great deal. “Was his family killed?”

Cloud Playing nodded. “He says he thinks he has a great-granddaughter in the Green Mesa villages. He is on his way there. I gave him jerked venison for the trip.”

Night Sun smoothed her daughter’s hair. “Thank you. I should have asked. It’s a long journey for such an old man.”

“He has nowhere else to go, Mother. I pray his relatives are still living in the Green Mesas.”

She didn’t wish to dwell on sadness, not today. It would make her think of her despicable son, Snake Head, or worse, her husband Crow Beard. Crow Beard had been cruel to her the morning she and Cloud Playing had left—accusing her, once again, of infidelity with one of his slaves. She shifted the pack she carried and let out a breath. If Crow Beard so much as suspected her of smiling at another man, he punished her with silence. He couldn’t cast her out, because she owned everything, his chambers, his lands, even his children. But he could make her feel like an outcast—and did it with great skill.

As she walked down the rise, she heard a shrill voice Singing the Mogollon Migration Song, the sacred Song about the Hero Twins’ destruction of the second underworld.

They went out,

Now they went,

They crushed, crushed, crushed it,

they killed all the people,

all the people are dead,

Now they cry,

they cry and cry …

A sharp voice split the silence: “Shut up that Singing! You hear me, Catbird?”

A sullen, “Yes, sister,” drifted on the wind.

Night Sun saw the six-summers-old slave girl come from behind a fallen boulder; the stick dragging behind her was making wavy patterns in the dirt. As she looked up and saw Night Sun and Cloud Playing, her mouth gaped, revealing missing front teeth. The girl shouted: “Mite! They’re here!”

“Who?”

“The Blessed Night Sun and her daughter! Just as Mother said!” Catbird threw down her stick and raced up the trail, her brown dress flying about her legs. She threw her arms around Night Sun’s waist with such strength it made her stagger. “Mother said you were coming. She told us last night! Oh, she will be so glad to see you. She’s having the baby!”

“The baby?” Night Sun felt weak. “But it isn’t supposed to be coming—not for another two moons.”

“Just the same, she’s having it.”

Night Sun disentangled herself from the child’s grasp and hurried down the sandy slope.

Mite stepped out of the house. Sixteen, and plump, she filled her faded green dress. She had her black pigtails tied together at the nape of her neck. “Thank Wolf,” she said. “I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you.”

“Is your mother all right?” Night Sun asked as she approached the low doorway. The dwelling had no more than eight contiguous rooms, including a granary, and storerooms built like human swallow’s nests into the overhang. The layered sandstone construction of the wall could be seen through gaps where the plaster had spalled off. Two paintings of the Humpbacked Flute Player, one male, the other female, adorned the dwelling. The twin images of fertility added to the ironic neglect of fields, people, and structures.

A framed ramada stood in the flat that served as a plaza. Corn shucks and shreds of juniper bark rattled in the wind. Four young women sat beneath the shelter, grinding corn. To the right of the plaza, a small kiva had been dug into the ground, the roof sagging around the two legs of the ladder that stuck up from the roof entry. Soft male voices carried from inside. The familiar songs pled for health and well-being, imploring the female Flute Player to ease the labor and allow a healthy birth.

“I’m not certain.” Mite’s shoulders slumped, mirroring the worry in her plump face.

Night Sun ducked inside the living quarters. The sloping rock of the overhang itself served as the roof, leaving just enough space to stand up. The villagers mixed their clay with local dirt before plastering it on the face of the building, which made the village almost invisible. Except for the three small windows and single doorway, it seemed to be part of the golden canyon wall.

Night Sun blinked in the dimness. A fire crackled in the pit in the middle of the floor. The paintings covering the walls jumped out at her. Half-beast, half-man, the thlatsinas Danced around the room. The White Wolf peered directly at her, ears pricked, a rattle in one hand, a dancestick in the other. He had his teeth bared, warning all those who dared enter with evil thoughts to cleanse their hearts before taking another step.

Night Sun breathed deeply of the smoky air. A blue haze moved over the ceiling, trawling for the window, where it seeped outside. Next to the door on Night Sun’s left sat a water jar, clay cups, pots of dried meat and cornmeal. A pile of juniper wood stood stacked along the wall to her right. And … an old woman. She crouched there on a folded blanket, her gray hair awry, eyes dark and foreboding.

“Sweetwater? Are you well?”

“I’ve been better.” Perspiration matted her gray hair into tiny curls across her wrinkled forehead. Her black eyes glistened like obsidian beads. As Matron, she owned the lands and almost all the possessions in the village, including three of the five slaves.

Along the north wall, straight ahead of her, Star Hunter lay on bulrush sleeping mats, a red blanket covering her swollen belly. In her bloated face, her eyes had sunken into twin blue circles. Soaked black hair spread around her.

Night Sun leaned out the door, and called, “Cloud Playing, where is my pack?”

“Oh, Mother, forgive me,” her daughter answered, unslinging it and handing it over. She and Mite had been speaking in low voices. Mite’s expression had turned grave. “I was talking with Mite, and I—”

“Do as I say, quickly. Get a pitcher and fill it with water. Pour half into a pot and set it to boiling, then fetch me some fresh yucca roots. I don’t care how far you have to go to find them, do it, and do it now.”

Cloud Playing said, “Yes, Mother,” and ran back to Mite and Catbird, relaying her instructions. All three split in different directions.

Night Sun ducked inside again, removed her cape and tossed it on the floor, then set her pack down beside the water jar and cups. She unlaced the pack’s ties, pulled out a bag of dried mugwort leaves, dropped a pinch into a clay cup, and poured water over the top.

As she set the cup at the edge of the fire to warm, Star Hunter opened her eyes. “Hello, Blessed Night Sun.” A soft smile lit her face.

“Hello, Star Hunter. I wish you’d sent word to me. I could have been here before dawn.”

“Birthing always takes me so long, and I knew you would be here sometime today. You’re never late.”

“Besides,” old Sweetwater’s reedy voice broke in, “she doesn’t need you! The child is going to die. It’s too soon for it to be born. It should die. If it lives it will be a weak and worthless slave.”

Night Sun glared at the old woman. Sweetwater knew better than anyone how much Star Hunter loved this unborn child. From the first moon she had realized her pregnancy, she had been convinced it would be a boy—her first son. She had been weaving blankets and clothing, tanning rabbithides and sewing tiny moccasins. Four moons ago, Star Hunter’s husband, Whitetail, had showed Night Sun the little bow and arrows he had constructed for his son.

Night Sun went to kneel by Star Hunter’s side, feeling her fevered cheeks and forehead. Star Hunter leaned into the coolness of her hands. Firelight flickered over her face. “The child may die,” Night Sun said straightly, “but I will try to save it. When did the pains begin?”

“Last … night. Late,” Star Hunter replied.

“She took a fall yesterday,” Sweetwater said. “A bad fall. The gods tripped her. It was twilight and she went to dip melt water from the cistern in the sandstone. She tripped over nothing! And toppled face-first across the stone. It’s little wonder she’s birthing today. The gods wished her to lose the child. It probably has a very bad speck of dust in its head.”

Wickedness, bad dreams, and evil acts came from a tiny grain of dust that Spider Woman placed in the back of a baby’s head just before birth. It remained there forever.

“Have you checked the baby’s position?” Night Sun asked.

“Why should I? The sooner it dies, the better.”

“My mistress,” Star Hunter said, “will not even let my daughters touch me. I had a lonely night.”

“Well, I’m going to touch you. Let me see how the baby is lying. Raise your knees.”

Night Sun pulled the red blanket away from Star Hunter’s bulging belly and gently probed inside. “The child hasn’t turned. Its head isn’t down,” she said, and tried not to show her alarm.

“I know.” Star Hunter reached out and clasped Night Sun’s arm, tugging feebly. “I’m sorry. It’s my fault.”

“It’s no one’s fault. Your fall was an accident.”

Sweetwater said, “The gods did it!”

“My gods are not so cruel,” Night Sun replied. “I’m sorry if yours are.”

Sweetwater’s ancient eyes slitted. “Are you saying that you don’t believe—”