The Feverbird's Claw (8 page)

Finally an elder spoke rapidly, shaking her fist toward Moralin. Another shouted. Moralin felt the heat of the fire on her scalp and smelled smoke and meat and skins, but it all seemed unreal. One part of the circle bulged, and Figt was pushed into the center. She stood swaying slightly before the elders.

Moralin leaped to her feet, stunned with hatred. She forced herself to not look away from the fevered glare in the eyes of her old enemy. Around the circle people shouted opinions and comments. When the old woman raised her hands high, the murmurs died away. She said something in the voice of whitest doom.

Green Cloak spoke next, but his accent was so terrible Moralin would not have recognized the Delagua words except that he said each one so slowly. “You are brave. You are The People now.” He gestured to show what he meant by
The People.
Arkera. He was trying to say, “You are Arkera now.”

Her head buzzed. “No,” she said softly. “Let me die.”

Back in the hut she refused to raise her head from the blanket. Starvation was not a fighter's death, but it was her only choice. How much did it hurt to die that way?

She wondered, again, if they had killed Song-maker. If his people walked the whole flat earth, did they also walk the round sky? It was a comfort to think that perhaps he would appear again to guide her through the strange world of the afterdead.

What about Figt? Whatever the man in the green cloak said had made the girl hang her head with a look even Moralin could tell meant shame and suffering. Perhaps Moralin would have another chance to fight her enemy after death.

For a week Moralin hardly moved. They poured water into her mouth, but they could not make her eat. At first hunger clawed her stomach, but then it went away. She dreamed her life was a huge yellow eye that was slowly closing. Let the dim light leach the red from her blood. Let her teeth darken. Even prayers could do no good in this wretched place so far from the lands the Great Ones watched over.

Outside the hut she heard the musical sound of oil being poured into clay jars. She could smell fish, probably strung to dry. Inside the hut she heard the whisper and scurry of small animal feet, but she did not see any living things except the women who forced water into her throat, the girls who placed gourds of food near her and rushed away.

One day she slipped into a half-waking state in which she mostly imagined herself back home. White beetles scurried over her hands, and she welcomed them because they spoke to her of death. Once, when she was a little girl and standing with Grandmother in the temple, she'd been frightened by a ghostly figure woven into the tapestry.

Grandmother had turned quickly away. “Such come for us when we die. It's forbidden to look upon them except on tapestries.”

“Is it a spirit?”

“No. Only a priestess wearing a dui-dui.”

As she got older, she had learned that priests came to the house on the day after death. Sometimes, depending on the time of the moon, the priests carried salts. Other times they carried only jars of spices, beeswax, frankincense, and the golden tree sap that came from a faraway golden city. No one else entered the room. Every time day and darkness came and went twenty-five times, the moon shut its evil eye for three nights, now helpless to steal people's spirits. On the first dark night, the city fell silent. People hid in their houses while priestesses in dui-dui clothing carried the bodies to temple safety. But Moralin would have no one to carry her. Her only hope was that the beetles might whisper of her death to a passing feverbird, and thus the news would finally reach Cora Linga at the temple.

One of the beetles stood near her head. At the tips of its feelers were two orange spots that looked like disapproving eyes. Mother's eyes. “Moralin, why are you sulking?” That's what Mother would say if she were here. “You dishonor the Great Ones when you give up.”

“I want to be home,” Moralin whispered. “I want to be home.”

The orange eyes reproached her. “Do your duty, child.”

She turned her head away. How many times had she heard those words? Grandmother said every Delagua was responsible for acting honorably. That was why Mother lived obediently in the house of her husband's family even though her husband did not live there. That was why Old Tamlin had his own house and days full of responsibilities.

Even shadows patiently labored long, hard hours and slept on mats in underground rooms. They appeared happy to trade their work for food and shelter. She could certainly be as dutiful as a shadow.

So she was not supposed to die. What, then, must she do?

“The Great Ones help those who use their own strength,” Grandmother often said.

“When you are confused,” Old Tamlin said, “begin by listening.”

She looked back, but the beetle was gone.

The next morning Moralin listened. Someone was pounding grain. Someone else was sharpening a knife. Eventually three men began to argue. She heard the word “skulkuk.” One of the men kept repeating something. She recognized one of his words from what Song-maker had told her. Young.

If the skulkuk they had taken was young, imagine one full-grown. Why would they risk bringing such a thing into the village?

She shook her head. They were Arkera. Their ways couldn't be understood. After all, why had they carried Salla when they killed the two other girls? Why bring Moralin herself to be a thorn in the flesh?

But girls were not as powerful as that creature. It made no sense to bring something here that had the strength to destroy everything.

Why? she asked again. Why? Why?

That day she stretched her fingers to the food the young girls brought. She listened longer, but by night she still had no answers.

In the darkness she startled awake panting with fear. Once again she saw the skulkuk as she had seen it that day: the wings and clawed feet and webbed red skin. Then a thought came, slamming her with such force that her weak hand flew to her chest.

The Arkera wanted a skulkuk because only something with wings could lift up and over the walls of a city. They wanted a young one because they believed they could train it to do their bidding. They also wanted highborn Delagua who they arrogantly believed might become Arkera: Salla because she was soft and weak, Moralin because they admired her bravery and thought she had Arkera courage.

Delagua could help them learn the secrets they needed for a successful attack. They were willing to risk everything to have a chance to pull down their old enemies.

Fear pounded on her as if she were a drum. What was she doing, dying in here? She must save her people.

The next morning she woke to feel something tugging at her hair. She moved her head very slowly and instantly heard the sounds of skittering feet. A small gray wood animal quivered near the wall of the house, waiting for the slightest motion from her. After the pulsing of her heart stopped, she was amused to see its twitching watchfulness. She inched her fingers toward a yellow seed left in the gourd where her food had been. In a quick motion she tossed the seed toward the animal. The creature flicked away. But when Moralin closed her eyes again, then opened them quickly, the seed was gone.

After that she saved a bit of whatever food the girls gave her. A little at a time she regained her strength. She coaxed the wood animal closer. As she watched the animal nibble on the bits of food, she thought she must try to be like the wood animal to the Arkera.

Most of the girls dropped the gourd and left, but one hovered near the door to watch her eat. Moralin said
Jaysha,
the Arkera greeting. The child gave her the briefest smile, fish-quick and gone. The next time she came she told Moralin her name was Ooden.

They started by pointing. At first everything made Ooden smile shyly. But Moralin was determined, and she learned rapidly. “Eye.” “Head.” “Nose.” Ooden's hands fluttered, acting out something deep inside that could rise out through the head. “Spirit?” Ooden took a stick and drew a family.
Amma
—that was “mother.”
Abbat.
“Father.” “Brother.” “Sister.” Moralin slowly became used to studying the little girl's face and not looking away.

“Can I leave here?” Moralin walked her fingers along the ground.

No. Ooden leaped up to block the doorway, showing that the warriors would come with their sticks.

“Pot.” “Stream.” “River”—a little to the east. Using gestures, Moralin managed to describe reeds that she had seen by the stream. When Ooden brought the reeds to her, she wove them into a small cage.

The next time the tiny animal sat nearby, nibbling at a bit of fruit, Moralin scooped it up into the cage. From then on she had something to talk to during the long, boring stretches when she was alone. She stroked its smoke-gray softness. She spoke to the animal only in Arkera. At night she drifted to sleep saying Arkera words. One night she dreamed in Arkera and woke smiling.

W
HEN THEY RAN OUT OF THINGS TO POINT
to in the hut, Ooden brought something new with her each time. Or with her finger she made pictures in the dirt. Something to do with
amma
and
abbat
? Moralin felt a surge of satisfaction the day she figured out a word that Ooden often said. “Ancestors.”

Words of movement and being were harder. Ooden acted things out. Words built on words. Once Moralin had learned “beast” and “warrior,” Ooden taught her “fear” and “courage,” giggling as she acted out the menacing beast and brave warrior.

Other words were exasperating. “Bad” was easy. But what was this other one? Worse than bad? “Evil?” Many phrases Moralin couldn't translate precisely but gradually thought she understood. “I like it.” “I don't like it.” One phrase seemed to be used the way the Delagua said, “Mark it well.”

Moralin began to put words into sentences. Experimenting. “Girl grows into woman,” she said. Ooden clapped her hands with excitement, then offered a small correction. Moralin tried again.

Ooden kissed her on both cheeks. “This girl now has it exactly right.”

One day Moralin pointed at the designs painted on the girl's stomach. “What are these?” At first, Ooden just giggled. When Moralin coaxed, Ooden gave some brief explanation. The only words Moralin recognized were “plant” and “work.” She sighed and gestured for Ooden to try again.

“Very soon …” Ooden rattled on. “Moon.” “Fire.” Ooden pulled out her bottom lip between two fingers, tugging at it. “Courage.” Was she talking about some kind of ceremony?

Moralin pointed at herself. “Can I”—she gestured to show that she meant “go through,” in Delagua, she finished—“this initiation or whatever it is?”

Ooden frowned. “The ancestors don't like that.”

“But …” Moralin groaned with frustration. Sometimes she thought she was doing so well, and then she remembered everything she didn't know. Finally she simply said, “Give it to me?” The girl's eyes flicked to her face and then away. She stood up and ran out.

Ooden did not come back. Moralin missed her quick smile and hopping ways. Now that she had decided to live, she ached to see sun, to bathe in a stream, anywhere, even without soap. Her skin itched. Her hair felt heavy and dirty. Three other young girls brought food, and she spoke to them, even though they laughed at her mistakes. Their voices reminded her of the Delagua girls who teased her while their mothers and grandmothers were weaving together. “Are you a boy?” they would ask in soft, mean voices as she stood awkward and impatient at the loom. “Ask your mother to check.”

On a warm night Moralin lay awake for a long time. She thought she heard the moans of the skulkuk, far off, but perhaps it was someone blowing a shell. The pongas began thrumming again. By now the wood animal was so used to her it hardly moved when she stroked its silk fur and tickled its nose. She took it out of the cage and let it run up her arm, laughing at the feeling of its tiny star-shaped, straw-scratching feet on her skin. Finally she fell asleep thinking of Song-maker's lessons long ago. “I ran. Thee ran. You ran. She ran. He ran. They ran. We ran.”

She jerked awake when someone touched her shoulder. It was Ooden. The upper part of her face was painted red. A red line ran from under her nose to her chin.

Ooden held her finger to her lips and beckoned. Moralin stumbled out of the house. The moon was a red bowl in the sky, huge and soft. The pongas were loud, and fire crackled and leaped.

All the people, even the babies, were painted with red, yellow, and black designs. Moralin followed, and Ooden slipped close to the fire, where she stood silently along with eleven other girls. People began to trill. An old woman stepped forward. She spoke softly to each girl, then bent and scooped something out of a basket. It seemed to pour itself down her arm, rippling like a lake's wavelets. Moralin licked her lips. Manage your fear.

The woman stretched her arm into the air. The snake writhed and wrapped itself around her hand. Its black eye glared. The woman handed the snake to one of the girls. The girl lifted it high as the old woman chanted: “I speak for this child to our brother snake, sister snake. One who …” Moralin frowned at the words she didn't know.