People of the Wolf (51 page)

Beneath the azure vault of the sky, the huge straight mammoth tusk jutted up from the center of the cairn the White Tusk Clan had built to support their totem. From the top, mammoth tails hung down in each of the cardinal directions, swaying in the breezes. Bright feathers in turn decorated the tails, flicking color about the polished white-brown ivory.

Large tents of cured mammoth hide sprawled across the grassy flats. Supported by split mammoth bone and propped by anchored tusks, the tents provided relief from the constant sun. Long hours of labor had scraped the once-thick hide thin to allow a translucent yellow light to filter into the interiors. Before the doorways, a shimmering cloud hovered. The gentle breezes couldn't keep the flies from collecting in tall pil-

lars, their myriad wings humming in a dirge fit to drive man and beast to insanity.

"We need more smoke pots," Ice Fire muttered under his breath. Black flies and mosquitoes as well as occasional hideous beasts—the gaudy yellow and black bott flies—all seemed attracted to this clan council.

"Seems the farther south we go, the worse the flies. Should have stayed down by the Big Water," Red Flint agreed, batting arms in defense. "Something about that salt water. The flies aren't as bad there."

Ice Fire rubbed his face, shooing the swarm before ducking into a smoky cook tent where the old women gathered around long pits laboriously excavated with their digging sticks.

"Safety." Ice Fire sighed, glaring at the swirling winged beasts beyond the opening. He looked around at the four mammoth tusks propped to support the low shelter. The heat from the fires ate into his backside. "Out there we're eaten alive. In here we roast."

"Take your pick." Red Flint laughed dryly, crouching down on his heels to avoid the heat and still remain in the protection of the smoke.

Ice Fire hated the sound of his cracking joints as he lowered himself.

"You've done well, old friend. This year you've returned the White Hide to the White Tusk Clan. How long since the last time?"

Ice Fire shook his head, white-shot hair hanging free over his shoulders. "More years than I have fingers on two hands. Where did we find honor? Only this year did these Enemy finally raise a leader who would challenge us." He chewed his weathered lip. "Even then, I could almost pity them. They're so few, we'll sweep them aside soon." He waved a callused and battered hand. "Look, look south. See those rocky hills up there? That's where they've run. I've been up there. Seen what the land is like. It keeps climbing. This river, so big and full of water, runs out of the ice that blocks the valley. That's where they've gone."

"You could pity them? They stole my daughter! You've seen how they desecrate those they capture! They're beasts!"

"Not beasts," Ice Fire corrected. "They've grown des-

perate. And that's a message in its own right. This broad valley is the last of their hunting grounds. They fight, but in the end they'll lose."

"Perhaps. It's the way, I guess. Like our cousins to the west." Red Flint pursed his lips, moving his fingers nervously. "You think we're going to be caught like that someday? Like these Enemy?"

Ice Fire spread his wide hands. "Once, I would have said we couldn't be crushed by anything. Now? I don't know."

Red Flint rubbed his hands together uneasily. "Have you sought visions of our fate? Do the Glacier People—"

"I've had visions. It's not the Glacier People. They, too, are running. Fleeing the disease that comes from the west. They're moving southwest along the southern salt water. They'll end up leaving in their floating trees. Finding a land that rises from the salt water."

"But what of us?"

Ice Fire shrugged. "Too many things can happen. The disease rises in the west. If we turn back? Well ... I don't see it all. The Watcher—"

"The old woman? The one who watched when you raped that woman.'' He glanced away at the look in Ice Fire's eyes.

"I met the Watcher."

"You . . ."

Ice Fire brushed his hair over his shoulder, staring into the smoky air. "She told me the world's changing, but we can save ourselves."

"How, Elder?"

"My sons are part of it."

"Sons? But you have no—"

"Two. Twins. Like the Enemy's story of the Monster Children—locked in constant battle. But someday soon, one will triumph."

"Which one? What does it mean for us?"

He waved it away. "I don't know. It's worse in my head than the way I tell it."

"Tell me what you've seen. Maybe I can help interpret the images." Red Flint edged closer, listening intently.

Hesitantly, Ice Fire explained, "There's a young man, tall, straight, bitter with anger. He leads our clan across the back of the world. Through rock and snow and ice into a different

place. Leads us to a great Dreamer and healer, who is me. I see myself, the angry young man, and ... a child ... all bound by red lines—like a web. And . . . and above, in the sky, a spider of stars holds the tendrils of web. We're drawn south by the sky spider. Unable to escape the web."

He shook his head. "I can't make it out. Sounds crazy. One vision shifting to another. Changing shape, changing existences in my head."

Red Flint ripped up some of the tussock grass. "Do our people follow the Enemy to this different place?"

"I haven't seen."

"It's a frightening thought."

"Visions are always frightening," Ice Fire agreed solemnly. There were so many things he could never tell anyone. Even his closest friends would think him mad. "I wish I'd never made that wretched trip twenty years ago. It seemed like I tore the world loose, sent it spinning like children fling dried buffalo-dung patties."

"Look." Red Flint pointed to a figure who raced across the camp. "It's Sheep's Tail."

Ice Fire stood, shuffling his leg to get the circulation back in it as he squinted into the bright light. Sheep's Tail's face twisted anxiously.

"So, young man, the Enemy have raided your village again and stolen another of your women?''

Sheep's Tail lowered his flashing eyes, jaw muscles jumping in embarrassment.

"What's happened?"

He looked up, a curious fire in his eyes as he addressed his words to Red Flint, the Singer. "Moon Water's back. Your daughter's safe. She just came in with Walrus's people. She escaped from the Enemy. She tells a strange story you should hear. The Enemy have a great new Dreamer. He's taken them underneath the world through a ghost hole to a land of riches beyond belief!"

Red Flint broke out of the group, running for where his daughter stood in the distance. She was being carried into his tent by a cheering crowd.

Ice Fire stiffened, bits of vision floating up from the depths of his mind so recently stirred by Red Flint.

"From under the world . . ."he mused. "I'd better hear this tale of Moon Water's."

He battled the flies that sought his warm blood on the way across the camp, seeing people huddled beneath the tents, swatting at the beasts with tail quirts, waving wormwood and sedge over their heads.

Moon Water looked young, gaunt, and flushed with pride as he ducked under the flap into the muggy interior of Red Flint's family tent. She glanced up, recognized him, and dropped her eyes before turning to embrace her father.

He strolled closer, and when Red Flint released his daughter, Ice Fire clapped the girl on the shoulder. "First, let me welcome you back to the people. You have shown courage and bravery worthy of our songs." Then he raised a silver-shot eyebrow. ' 'But I also hear you know of a ... a ghost hole?"

She flashed dark eyes at him and straightened, aware all eyes were upon her. "I not only have seen it," she began uncertainly. "I've been through it, Most Respected Elder."

He blinked, the import of her words sinking in. "Through it?" Slowly he settled himself to a rolled caribou hide, heedless of the flies that swarmed about. "Explain."

She nodded seriously, a shiver taking her at the memory. "It's a terrible place, Most Respected Elder. Things . . . ghosts, howl in the ice. The journey is long, days and days, and cold, and horrors hang in the dark waiting to grab the unwary."

"Yet you passed unharmed?"

"I ... maybe I showed courage to the ghosts. And pride and honor. Ghosts value such things."

He smiled warmly at her. "I'm sure they do. I didn't mean to mock your courage, Moon Water. You are very brave, worthy of every honor our people can bestow upon you. But tell me, what's on the other side of this ghost-filled place?"

Her face lit. "A valley like you cannot imagine! The game stands still while the hunter walks up to dart it. Buffalo, caribou, mammoth, musk ox."

"Stands still?" Red Flint cried, disbelief glinting in his sharp eyes.

She nodded. "The Enemy Dreamer said no man had ever been there."

"No man?" Red Flint shook his head. "The Enemy is tricky. Maybe they wanted you to—"

"No." Ice Fire held up his hand, bits of vision flashing in his mind.

In the silence, he turned, studying her where she looked triumphantly at Red Flint. A strong woman, this. Where was her like twenty years ago after his beloved . . . ? No, leave it. The dead are dead.

Moon Water edged forward slowly, then dropped to her knees before Ice Fire. "Most Respected Elder. Please, we must take the people through the hole before—"

"Yes, we must."

She smiled in sudden surprise. "We'll need to clear the Enemy out of the way first. Then we can—"

"Describe the Enemy Dreamer?"

"He is very young. Maybe nineteen Long Darks, with long black hair and an oval face. His eyes are large and filled with . . . with a strange light." After a moment's hesitation, she added, "Like yours, Elder."

Ice Fire filled his lungs, nodding. Even as the girl gave the description, the boy's face appeared in his mind, rainbow in hand, and a tremor shook him. To no one in particular, he murmured, "Come to me. Let us decide the futures of our people. Come to me, Dreamer . . . son."

Wolf Dreamer leaned back against the crusty rocks of the hot springs. He'd sought out a higher pool, hidden in the rocks above the falls. Small, it hid in dark shadows. Only a piece of Blue Sky Man shone over his head.

"Heron," he murmured painfully, "lead me. I must know what to do."

Fragments of his conversation with Raven Hunter echoed through his mind. He could see his brother's face—see the

controlled anger, the darkness of his soul. Blood whimpered in Raven Hunter's tracks. Souls cried in the vastness—their way to the Blessed Star People unsung. Pain—pain followed Raven Hunter. It twisted in Wolf Dreamer's thoughts.

Everything had come unraveled. His mind, so carefully ordered, had lost the silence—the peace. The One eluded him in the roiling of emotions, remembered words, which—like Raven Hunter's face—he couldn't vanquish.

Confusion roiled in his stomach, stirring his mind and soul with the blackness of defeat. He felt so tired and so desperately, barrenly alone.

Why did he have to mention Dancing Fox? '
'Sure you don't want me to send her to you? She'll willingly fall into your arms, you know. I can tell you honestly, she's most ardent on a man's staff. Most worth your
..."

Eyes squeezed tightly shut, he clamped his cupped hands over his ears, teeth gritted. Nothing stilled the voice repeating in his mind. A vicious thought speared him—a question of what it would feel like to love Dancing Fox. Flesh teased by the thoughts, he began responding, and cried out in horror.

I've seen the end of the People. . . .

"Heron? Help me!"

She appeared in his reeling thoughts, her face stiff, cold, blue in the light of the torch. Once again, he stared into her dying eyes, seeing the light of the soul fleeing the body.

"Bear Hunter?" her rasping voice called.

"Death," Wolf Dreamer whispered, Dancing Fox's image fading as Heron's haunting eyes became the total of his consciousness. "To love and Dream is to die." The beat of his heart pulsed through his body, as if pumping away the confusion.

"That's it, isn't it. Death is the end ... no matter what."

An ominous feeling of wrongness swelled around him. He fought it, centering his soul on the concept of death, remembering every line in Heron's still face—in the glazing of her terrified eyes. Opening his mouth, he began chanting the nonsense song she'd taught him. He forced himself to concentrate on the sounds, clarifying his thoughts, forgetting the bustling world of people chattering in the main pool far below. They depended on him—those that believed. Yet he'd