The Storyteller Trilogy (43 page)

Two times, he almost crossed that river, almost decided to go into the village, but as he moved his paddle to the left side of his iqyax, as he leaned into a turn, he remembered the villagers’ accusations, their anger, and reminded himself that he would never win his son back if he died. And though, as a spirit, he might have some chance of revenge, it was better to stay alive and seek revenge as warrior, and have the joy of teaching his son to hunt and trade.

The people of the Cousin River Village would welcome him. They always had. Since it was late summer, they might yet be in their fish camps near the river.

Though they shared grandfathers with the Near River People, anger often seemed to fuel skirmishes between the two villages. He might find Cousin River men who would help him get his son and earn his revenge. He had last visited that village two, three summers ago. The woman K’os had welcomed him into her lodge. She was a healer, and her husband was chief hunter, though he was growing old, losing the respect of the young men.

If K’os was still there, he would visit her first. She was always greedy for trade goods, and he had many fine things from the First Men that she would like.

He heard several village dogs begin to bark. They might have heard his paddling, but the river was so wide he did not think so. Most likely they saw a porcupine or an owl, but he paddled more quickly in case some hunter was aroused by the noise.

He paddled hard until he was well past the village. He would not stop until morning, and then only for a short rest, a bit of dried fish. He did not want a Near River hunter to see him and decide again to take revenge for Tsaani and Daes.

Dogs. They were fighting, biting Aqamdax’s arms, flinging heavy bodies against her legs to bring her down into their teeth and jaws.

She woke with a jerk, breathing heavily until the dream left her. She lay still and finally realized that Sok’s arm lay across her belly. She wished he would not sleep with her until she had her own lodge. She could not bear the sorrow in Red Leaf’s eyes each time Sok touched her.

She had tried to tell Red Leaf that she had no true feelings for him, that she would do nothing to win his favor, but Red Leaf had begun to scream out Sok’s virtues, listing, as far as Aqamdax could understand, his skills and strengths until her shouts filled up the lodge and pushed Aqamdax outside. A group of women had gathered there, hands over mouths, but she was used to being scorned by women, and so held her head high, walked to the village hearths, stirred boiling bags as though nothing had happened.

Across the lodge, Red Leaf sighed and murmured in her sleep. Sok groaned and lifted his arm from Aqamdax’s belly. She pushed herself away from him, turning her back. She had not slept well since she had been in this village. She woke during the middle of each night and lay with worries weaving themselves into her thoughts until it was time for her to stoke the morning fire and bring in wood.

She had lost count of the days she had been here. More than ten, she was sure, but not yet from full moon to full moon.

Each day, Chakliux taught her more of the language. He seemed to know which words she should learn first, but she still had to think of each phrase in her own language before she could remember the River People word. It made her thoughts slow and her speech cumbersome. Red Leaf was no help, and seemed to rejoice in confusing Aqamdax’s attempts to learn. Sok was impatient, but his two young sons had begun to treat her like a friend, laughing at her mistakes but also helping her correct them. She had already begun each of them a caribou gut raincoat, though Sok had expressed his doubt about such a coat’s worth to a River boy and Red Leaf had reacted in anger.

She had also woven Red Leaf a gathering basket, but Red Leaf had tossed it away, crushed it disdainfully under her heel.

Aqamdax told herself things would get better. Soon she would be able to speak the River People’s language well enough to tell stories, and Sok had already given her the caribou hides she needed to make a lodge, though she was not at all sure how to do such a thing. She hoped there were women in the village who would teach her.

They seemed to treat her well when she took her turn at the cooking hearths. One woman—her name was Happy Mouth—even sought her out, chattered away in bright words that Aqamdax only vaguely understood. Still, Happy Mouth’s acceptance gave her hope that other women, too, would someday count her as friend.

Aqamdax turned her head so she could see the smoke hole. It was very dark, a night of new moon, but soon the sky would lighten and then she could get up. Remember, she told herself, you will not be here forever. Someday, one of the First Men will come to trade.

Then she would go back with him, to her own people, to her own village, and again be storyteller.

Dogs barking woke him. Ghaden reached out for Yaa, stroked the soft mat of her dark hair and stuck his thumb in his mouth. He felt Biter move beside him, heard the low rumble of a growl in Biter’s throat. He laid his hand on the dog’s back, but Biter rose stiff-legged and moved toward the door. Ghaden waited, his breath in his throat.

It might be her. He knew that she would come for him. Biter could protect him from people, but what about ghosts? What did ghosts do? Did they turn people into ghosts? If he were a ghost, would he still live in this lodge with Yaa and Brown Water and Happy Mouth? Could he play like other boys or would he have to float around like smoke? Worse, would the ghost kill Biter?

He heard the dog growl again, so he shook Yaa’s arm until she woke up.

“What?” she asked, her voice full of sleep. She was cross with him, he could tell, though in the dark he could not see her face.

“Something’s outside,” Ghaden whispered.

“Just dogs barking. Go to sleep.”

She flopped back down into her sleeping robes, but Ghaden leaned over her and said, “It might be the ghost.”

Yaa sat up. “What ghost?”

“The one who came with the hunters. The one who lives with the otter man.”

“The First Men woman?”

“She’s a ghost.”

“Ghaden! She’s a woman. She’s just like us. Well, almost like us.”

Ghaden felt tears closing up his throat. Yaa didn’t like him to cry, so he shut his eyes tight and tried to hold the tears inside.

“Ghaden,” Yaa said softly, “why do you think she’s a ghost?”

“She’s my other mother,” Ghaden said, but when he spoke the words, a sob came with them. He clamped his mouth shut in the bitterness of knowing that Yaa could tell he was crying.

“Sh-h-h,” she said. She sat up and pulled him into her lap. Biter came to them, stuck his nose into Ghaden’s face and licked away the tears. “Don’t worry, Ghaden,” Yaa told him. “She’s not a ghost, but even if she is, you’re safe with us.”

In the morning Yaa left Ghaden in the lodge and went to the cooking hearths. She walked past the place where Sok’s Sea Hunter wife was to put her new lodge, hoping to see the woman working there. Several elders were digging a circle into the earth with broad slate blades. Usually the women did that, but many were still with their families at summer fish camps, though they would return to this winter village before they left for fall caribou hunts.

Yaa could barely remember the last time she had been on a caribou hunt. That was when her father was still strong enough to hunt, but then he became old, and now with no man in the lodge, they had to depend on Brown Water’s married son to provide caribou meat, though she and her mother and Brown Water had been able to do their share in catching and drying salmon for winter food.

She walked slowly past the lodge site, finding reason to stop and tighten the rawhide that laced her boots from insteps to ankles. She did the left boot, then the right, but still the Sea Hunter woman did not come. She stood and watched the elders until Blue-head Duck stopped digging and scolded her, telling her she was lazy. Then she hurried to the hearths, chose a cooking bag and emptied Brown Water’s meager contribution of dried salmon and a handful of fresh blueberries. She fed one of the fires, then used a willow loop to pull a cooking stone from the coals. She carried it to the cooking bag, dropped the stone and watched it sizzle its heat into the meat and broth.

She was disappointed that the Sea Hunter woman had not been working at her lodge. She must mostly stay inside, Yaa thought, for she seldom saw her. Well, as second wife, the Sea Hunter woman would have to do what Red Leaf told her, just like her own mother did what Brown Water said.

Yaa stirred the cooking bag again and looked up at the sky. Brown Water had told her to stay here until the sun was two hands past the tops of the northeast trees. She held a hand up to the edge of the trees. One and a half. She fed two of the fires, adding the wood where it would least disturb the coals. She didn’t mind hauling wood and feeding fires or stirring the food, but she didn’t like to carry hot rocks and drop them into the cooking bags. Even the most carefully chosen rocks—smooth and round—sometimes cracked into pieces when you added them to the meat. There was always the chance a sliver of stone would fly up and cut hands or face. Best Fist had a scar above her left eyebrow where a rock had cut her last year. Then, of course, someone had to try to find all the pieces of rock and get them out of the food. Yaa had had to do that more often than she liked to remember. Still, as careful as she was, Dog Trainer had once chipped a tooth on a piece she did not get out.

Yaa moved to the next cooking bag. For the moment, she was alone at the hearths, although since the fires were burning so well, she knew other women had recently been there and would probably return soon. She stirred the meat, felt the heat rise, but knew it needed another stone. She was lifting the stone with the willow loop tongs when she saw the Sea Hunter woman walking toward her. As much as she wanted to look at her, Yaa made herself keep her eyes on the rock until she got it to the cooking bag. She dropped it in, then looked up and greeted the woman.

The Sea Hunter woman smiled at Yaa and held up a caribou cooking skin, pointed at the cooking bags with her chin, then at the skin so Yaa knew she wanted some meat to take back to Red Leaf’s lodge.

“Red Leaf tell … come … take.”

It seemed as though the woman’s broken speech stole Yaa’s words, and she could only nod. The woman brought the skin and Yaa filled it.

The Sea Hunter woman thanked her, and Yaa inclined her head, then went back to stirring. The woman had turned away before Yaa thought to call after her: “I am Yaa. My mother is Happy Mouth. My brother is Ghaden.”

The woman turned. “No speak,” she said.

Yaa laid a hand on her chest. “Yaa,” she said.

“Aqamdax.”

Yaa lifted her chin toward the woman. “Aqamdax?” she asked.

“Yes.”

The woman walked away. Aqamdax, Yaa thought. It was a word she did not know. A Sea Hunter word, no doubt, and hard to say, the last part more like a choke deep in the throat than a sound. No wonder the people did not say her name.

Daes had had a River name. Perhaps this woman, too, after living in the village for a time, would take a name everyone could say. Then, thinking of Daes, Yaa realized how much this new woman looked like her. Of course, it was the same among many people. The hunters of the Cousin River Village, when they came here to trade, all seemed to look much alike.

Daes had kept her hair long, seldom binding it back from her face. She cut it in a fringe across her forehead, as did this new First Men woman. Suddenly, Yaa stopped stirring. No wonder Ghaden did not want to go outside. Aqamdax
did
look like Daes. Ghaden probably thought she was his mother’s ghost.

THE COUSIN RIVER FISH CAMP

K’os rolled her sleeping mats into a tight bundle and secured them with a braid of babiche. She hated the long three-day walk to their winter village. They would stay there only a moon, then leave on a caribou hunt, and what was worse than that? Piling rocks and rebuilding brush driving fences to direct the caribou to the hunters. Then butchering and hauling, most of which the women did.

For the past few years she had chosen to remain in the winter village, had found a young woman willing to go with her husband, do his work in hopes of becoming a second wife. She certainly did not mind having another woman warm Ground Beater’s bed during the caribou hunt, but second wife? No. Why chance that Ground Beater would be influenced by another woman’s needs, by her wants, or by her father’s ideas? K’os always saw they were paid well in meat, and even a few necklaces, but also always found reason for them to return to their mothers’ lodges.

This year, though, she had no husband, and that meant she had to go on the hunt again. She would do her share—build fences and butcher and skin—but all the while she would be watching.

This year the young hunters had chosen to break with tradition, and she was afraid that without her there, they might allow the elders to convince them to return to their spears and spearthrowers without the chance of proving that their bows and small-bladed arrows would work as well, perhaps even better.

She added her rolled sleeping robes to the pile of her belongings. Her two dogs would take the caribou hide tent, her bedding and her cooking utensils. She would carry her medicine bag, the plants she had gathered and dried, as well as the few weapons she owned.

She shaded her eyes from the sun and looked across the camp. There were few families left, so it was easy to see that Tikaani’s tent was still up. His sister was slow. K’os took two dried fish from a sael and gave one to each of her dogs. Most of the elders thought dogs worked better on an empty stomach, but she had always fed dogs well and never had trouble with them.

Dogs and men were much alike: mean when their bellies were empty. She laughed and sat down on her bedding roll. She pulled out a fish for herself and began to eat, her back to the summer camp so she could look down the path that led from the river.

She thought at first she was seeing a vision—the body of a bear with the head and beak of a giant eagle. By the time several of the elders found courage to go forward and meet the strange beast, she realized it was only a man carrying a large pack and a skin-covered boat. A Sea Hunter trader this far from the sea?