People of the Wolf (63 page)

"I'll need to talk to my warriors."

He nodded, arms spread wide. "You might want to argue with some haste; this looks to be a bad storm. If you could fight it out in a hurry, we could be pitching camp and cooking food for all before it gets really bad."

She laughed and nodded, holding his warm eyes. "I'll argue fast, Ice Fire." She wheeled and trotted up the trail.

Eagle Cries and the rest watched from outside the camp, huddling close in the growing cold, fingering darts as they stared through the haze of blowing snow at the Others staring back, fingering their darts in return.

Inside the main lodge, the leaders of both tribes sat together around a large fire, the flames flickering golden across their wary faces. Rich aromas of caribou steak and sweet boiled roots filled the smoky air.

Singing Wolf tilted his head to stare through the partially open door flap at the evil night. "They'll freeze out there."

Dancing Fox took another bite of the roasted caribou, chewing it thoughtfully. "Maybe it'll cool some of their anger."

"Anger cools slowly," Ice Fire admitted unhappily as he wiped greasy fingers on his long boots. He shot a quick glance at Red Flint, who glowered around the lodge.

The old Singer grunted, casting surly eyes on Singing Wolf. "Some of us bear too many, scars."

"We all bear scars," Singing Wolf remarked mildly. He wiped the grease from his mouth. "I, for one, took the heart of a warrior of your people and placed it in the Big River so it would go to the Camp of Souls under the sea."

"You ..." Red Flint swallowed hard. His eyes shifted away and he got to his feet, walking to the flap, crawling out into the snow beyond.

Singing Wolf closed his eyes and sighed. "I fear peace will not come easily." He shook his head. "It's been a long time since I was warm. If you'll excuse me, I'm taking this opportunity to sleep without my teeth chattering like gulls' beaks."

"Sleep without fear,
friend,"
Ice Fire assured.

For long moments-after Singing Wolf rolled in his robes, Dancing Fox sat staring into the fire, a prickling awareness of the Others' Most Respected Elder obsessing her.

"You surprise me."

She looked over at him, experiencing that same tingle when their gazes touched that she had all evening. "Why?"

"I don't expect such poise and intelligence from a woman so young."

"I'm not young anymore." She rubbed her eyes, feeling the incredible mantle of responsibility weighing on her shoulder. "I was young once, three years ago—an eternity."

He paused, fingers tapping lightly on the hides the women had laid over the floor. "I'm surprised a man hasn't made a wife of you. Your beauty takes a man's breath away. When I look into your eyes, I see strength and soul." He paused, unsure for the first time since she'd met him. "You have a lover?"

She smiled wryly, curiously unperturbed by his forward

question. "I loved once. It seems a Dream has stolen his soul more completely than I ever could have."

Ice Fire smiled wistfully. "Wolf Dreamer. Heron must have led him to that."

She studied him speculatively. "What do you know of Heron? Of Wolf Dreamer?''

He leaned back, face going serious. "I ... met him in a Dream. You see he's . . . my son."

She straightened. "You're his father?"

The edges of his lips twitched. "Yes, his and Raven Hunter's. That's why I couldn't let him die—despite what he'd become." His eyes nickered to hers. "Is that a terrible weakness? That I couldn't kill my son?"

She thought about it, a tenderness in her breast that he would confide in her. "No, I don't think so." She shifted, reclining, pulling her hair to the side. "All of us, all people, have to cherish our children. They're the future."

He played with a frayed corner of the white fox cloak. A corner—she noted—that had become smudged from fingering, the hair mostly gone, worn away. More than anything else, the action made him less powerful—a frail human like' herself.

"The future," he repeated. "Yes. That's why I couldn't watch Raven Hunter die—no matter that he'd earned it."

She inspected him, the wariness back. "For the mutilations and retaliation?"

At her cooling tone, he looked up. For a moment, he searched her eyes, then shook his head slightly. "For being what he is." He paused. "Let's see, how do I explain." His hands molded the air before him. "A man, or woman for that matter, is body and soul; agreed?"

She nodded, waiting.

"The body can be flawed. Maybe born without fingers, maybe it's not strong enough to stand the cold, or it coughs and dies, or it's stillborn." He shifted again, straining for the right words. "It's the same with the soul. In Raven Hunter's case, something is missing. He's preoccupied with himself . . . with this obsession for Power. And the problem is that he has glimpses, visions of what could be. Only he doesn't have the ability to extend that part of soul and share the identity. Understand?"

"Share the identity," she mused, bracing her chin on her palm.

"Yes," he whispered, handsome lines of his face puckering. "A healthy soul can extend itself, put itself in the place of another creature's experiences. From that comes wisdom. I learned it long ago." He stared at the fire, a sadness deep in his eyes. "Raven Hunter, however, has none of that compassion, that extension of the soul."

She reached over, touching his shoulder, meeting his eyes as he looked up. "But you saved him anyway?"

For a long moment, they stared into each other's eyes. He lifted an eyebrow._ "I'm not all that compassionate." He looked around, seeing Singing Wolf's slack face in the back where he slept soundly. "Perhaps I'm as much a monster as Raven Hunter. I provided him with the opportunity to steal the White Hide."

She started. "You let him steal the ..."

Ice Fire lifted a shoulder. "It's a means to an end which needs to be met." He gestured, mouth working, a conspiratorial light in his eye. He lowered his voice and she bent closer. "You must tell no one. Not your people, and especially none of mine. I've seen where my son Wolf Dreamer is going. I know the future of the People is in the south. And I know we were one, once, long ago. I don't know why, but somehow, I was set up. My wife died. My life changed. I loved her with all my heart. And when she'd been taken, I left. Just like that. Men who've been hurt terribly, they do strange things sometimes. We were camped along the salt water at the time, down where the land bends south, where the southern sea is only a month's journey away. That camp's under the water now, long buried, but something drove me east along the coast."

''
Something
drove you?''

"At night, Dreams haunted me. My wife filled them, and I felt the presence of another woman. Like me, her soul cried out over the loss of a loved one." He studied her. "I don't know if you can understand, but I thought it was a Spirit Woman—to take the place of my wife." He swallowed. "Then, one day, I awoke, and the Dream was powerful. I walked in a daze, hearing a calling—a powerful calling. It stirred me and I felt desire for the first time since my wife

had died. And then I saw her. Beautiful." He reached up, gently touching Fox's long hair, a reverence in his eyes as he ran his fingers along her face.

"I knew it was the Dream woman. I ... I stalked her, afraid she'd disappear into the mists, back into the sea. That fear drove me to a madness, and when she saw me, and ran, I chased her down." His hands knotted and he closed his eyes. "I took her there on the sand, the Dream pounding in my ears. With each movement of my body, the Power built until my soul sang and seemed to explode with the glory of it.

"And I came to, lying there on her, totally spent. And I looked down into her eyes and saw pain and hurt and disbelief all rush up at me."

He frowned at the fire. "And I realized what I'd done. The edges of the Dream were there, the Spirit Woman watching from someplace else through a Dream. And I knew it wasn't that girl, so beautiful, so vulnerable. When I looked into those shattered eyes, I knew I could have loved her. That she could have loved me. Only Heron's Dream changed it. It -wasn't supposed to have happened like that. And the children that rape bore were different, changed by the violence of their conception. Circles within circles, everything changed and no reason why. Like a spiral, which is the outside and which the in?"

She stared at him, soul drifting in his soft eyes. "And you think it would have all been different without Heron?"

He nodded miserably. "The woman on the beach and I, we were to love, to unite the People. Instead, so many died. Raiding began because I wasn't the one to return with a wife of the People—to link our clans which had been split so long ago."

"Perhaps Heron had her reasons. I hear she was driven by things beyond her, too.''

He nodded contemplatively. "Maybe."

"Didn't you tell your—"

"I've told no one the whole truth. Oh, Red Flint knows some of the story. But not the Power of the symbolism. He doesn't know how important it is for us to go south. If he did, he'd probably kill me on the spot and assume the Most

Respected Elder robe, despite the fact that visions scare him to death."

Dancing Fox touched his hand, feeling his fingers twine strongly with hers. "Why did you tell me?"

"I don't know." He focused on the fire a moment, then asked, "Tell me about you? What drives you?"

"The survival of my people."

Ice Fire's eyes deepened and she seemed to fall into them. "And what would you give for that survival?"

"Anything."

"I know a way."

She probed his gentle expression cautiously. "Tell me about it."

' 'Will you trust me? Take me and a handful of my young men to your camp beyond the Big Ice to get the White Hide back? If your people were to return it as a gesture of goodwill, and my clan were to offer gifts of clothing, food, and new shelters, we might be able to forge a new people."

"Or reforge an old one?"

He smiled, squeezing her hand. "Yes. Then you think we could share the south together?"

"Together." The word rested easily on the tip of her tongue. "I've been alone for so long, I'm not sure what that means anymore."

His warm smile caressed her heart. "Nor do I, but it's part of the Dream. A chance to reunite that which should have never been sundered."

She peered into the fire, watching the rose-amber flames lick at the rocks lining the pit. Slowly, her eyes shifted to rest on their entwined fingers. Noting her gaze, he hesitantly brought his other hand over to turn up her chin and meet her eyes.

Do I trust him?
She looked hard into his eyes, trying to read his soul.
How many times have men made promises to me? He has a new land to gain. And the People? Can we stand against them in the end? His warriors look healthy, strong, eager for war. Can our young men stop them?

A grim reality blocked her thoughts.
What choice do I have? And yes . . . despite my fears, I trust him.
Her heart raced.
Fool!

"It won't be easy," he warned, seeing her caution. "I think we both know that."

She nodded. "I'll take you—and only a handful of your young men—to the People. Call it a test of your resolve. But Raven Hunter will be there."

"Yes." He nodded soberly. "I've been preparing for that final confrontation."

"It will be ... cataclysmic." She stilled, tensing.

He nodded soberly, meeting her eyes. "You know what's coming, then?"

Her teeth ground hollowly as she nodded. "Not completely."

He began to say something and hesitated, seeing her stiffen. "I wish I knew which of them is stronger."

Wolf Dreamer resettled his legs, easing the cramp. His mind continued to replay the scenes of joy and release as he'd led the People from the cleft in the ice. Little Moss had danced out of joy—an expression of the One not even the young boy understood. Shouts and cries had carried sharply on the cold air, people hugging each other, laughing, some with tears tracing down wrinkled brown faces long etched by sorrow and hardship.

He'd led them, climbing up out of the valley, the first to see Jumping Hare as he came streaking down the slope, his arms waving wildly, face radiant.

So much joy after so much suffering. A spiral, a circle within a circle having no distinction between the levels. All things came around, changing, moving down the spiral of life. Despair's time had passed for this cycle. Only challenge remained—until the next curve of the spiral.

And how could anyone forget the shining relief in One Who Cries' face as he ran to his wife that day, stopping,