People of the Raven (North America's Forgotten Past) (45 page)

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Authors: W. Michael Gear,Kathleen O'Neal Gear

BOOK: People of the Raven (North America's Forgotten Past)
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“Yes, what is it?”
“He said to tell you he loves you and is trying very hard to save you.”
“Save me?
Me?
” Ecan asked in confusion. “From what?”
Pitch walked around him and embraced Dzoo. She rested her chin on his shoulder and stroked his back, as though comforting him. In a soft voice, she asked, “You told her?”
“I did.” Pitch pushed away to meet her gaze. They just looked at each other. Each appeared relieved and happy to see the other.
Ecan frowned. How could she know what message he’d brought?
How can she know any of the things she seems to? Does she truly see the future? Or is there a spy in Fire Village? Someone carrying messages between her and …
He suddenly felt weak.
It was the only answer.
Dzoo said to Pitch, “Have they assigned you a lodge?”
“Chief Cimmis told me that after I spoke with you and the Starwatcher, I would be confined to—”
“No.You will stay with me.” She glanced at his arm. “I need to see to your wound. Your journey may have harmed it.”
He wet his lips nervously and looked around Fire Village. “Will they allow it?”
“Let us hope they do not interfere.” She gave Ecan a lethal glance, put her arm through Pitch’s, and started leading him toward her lodge. Just loud enough for Ecan to hear, she said, “What of the fetishes? Did you bring them with you?”
“Yes.” Pitch touched his belt pouch.
“What fetishes?” Ecan called.
Pitch looked like a boy with his hand caught in the berry basket. “I—I brought something for Dzoo. It’s actually hers to begin—”
“Hunter! Remove his belt pouch and bring it to me.”
The young warrior trotted forward, untied the hide pouch from Pitch’s belt, and handed it to Ecan. He jerked the laces open and pulled out a small leather bag painted with red coyote prints.
In less than three heartbeats, his hand stung, as though being bitten by a thousand tiny ants. Fearfully, he whispered, “Where did you get these?”
“You don’t know?” Dzoo asked.
“No!” Ecan hastily tied the bag to his belt and tossed the empty pouch back to Hunter. “Return this.”
Pitch stared in shock. “Starwatcher, you can’t take that! I’m a messenger! Under the protection of—”
“They do not belong to you, young Healer,” he said.
Dzoo challenged as she whispered, “Lift the sack to your ear, Ecan. Tell me what you hear?”
Ecan hesitated, searching her half-lidded expression for some sign of a trick. Pitch had a wide-eyed look, part wary, part fearful. Ecan lifted the sack, and never taking his eyes off Dzoo, listened.
Only the faintest of voices seemed to come from the bag, but voices nonetheless. The rim of his ear began to burn, prickling like his hand. A cold shiver, as if driven by a winter blackness, ran down his spine.
“I heard nothing,” he lied.
Dzoo’s lips parted, her eyes like the swells on a midnight ocean. “Did you hear your own voice, Starwatcher?”
“My voice? Don’t be ridiculous.”
She tilted her head, red hair spilling. “Then perhaps he’ll just let you die in peace. I thought he would want you, too.”
“What are you talking about? He? He who? And why would he want me?”
“I want my bag back,” Pitch said stiffly, and extended his hand.
Dzoo’s long hair fluttered around her shoulders as she released Pitch’s arm and walked toward Ecan. “Do they belong to
you
, Ecan?”
He opened his mouth to respond, but Hunter said, “Starwatcher? The chief is motioning you to the Council Lodge.”
Ecan shot a quick glance to confirm that Cimmis was waving. He started up the trail, but his steps faltered when a sudden dark sensation swelled from the bag and filtered through his chest. He looked down.
Whispers. I hear whispers. They’re calling my name.
In a series of flashes, he saw dozens of faces: some old, some very young. All had their mouths open: screaming or crying, he couldn’t tell. They reached out to him.
“Yes,” Dzoo said softly, her voice penetrating past the whispers. “They think you can save them, Ecan. They don’t know you, do they? And more important,
you
don’t know them.”
It required great effort for Ecan to walk all the way to the Council Lodge.
C
immis crouched before the fire that Kstawl had built in their lodge. Worried in a way he hadn’t been in years, he laced his hands over one knee and watched Astcat pace near the door. On the way back from the Council Lodge, wind had torn locks of hair loose from her bun; it hung around her face in glistening silver threads. She kept propping her walking stick, staring at the floor, then taking a step, turning, and walking back in the other direction.
“Mother?” Kstawl called from outside, then thrust her head past the hanging. She looked as if some terrible thing were about to befall her. “Old Woman North has convened the Council and demands your presence. She’s sending warriors to—”
Astcat turned. “Who is great matron? Me, or that vision-racked old hag?”
Kstawl’s mouth worked like a beached salmon’s.
From outside, White Stone’s voice called, “You are, Great Matron. I will take your regrets to the Council and inform them that you will call them at your convenience.”
Kstawl, looking slightly sick to her stomach, withdrew. Cimmis sat stunned, hearing footsteps beating a hasty path away from their lodge.
“As if I didn’t have enough to fret about!” Astcat snapped irritably.
“Please, don’t drive your soul away.”
“Drive my soul away?” She raised her thin arms. “As if that was my only worry!”
“My wife, please, your hold on your soul—”
“My soul will stay where it is for the moment.” She closed her eyes, looking pained.
“Why won’t you tell me the message? Is it so terrible that you—”
“I need to think about it.” She heaved a tired breath and looked at him. Love sparkled in those blue depths. “I wouldn’t hurt you for anything in the world. Do you know that?”
“Yes, of course,” he said shortly. “What does that have to do with the message from Ecan’s son? By Gutginsa, he’s just a silly little boy.”
As she walked toward him, the seashells on her cape winked in the firelight. “Apparently, that silly little boy has become a Dreamer.”
Cimmis shrugged, but dread knotted in his belly. The news must be bad or she wouldn’t be using this roundabout way of telling him. “Did he Dream our deaths?”
She stopped in front of him and lowered a hand to stroke his hair. In a tender voice, she said, “Not our deaths … yours.”
 
 
D
zoo slowed as she approached her lodge, turning so the sunlight filled her face. It burned in her red hair and turned her eyes into black pits. She fixed her attention on Hunter and Deer Killer, who walked behind them.
“Of the two of you, only Hunter has a child. A boy.” She smiled with deadly earnest. “And you, Deer Killer, you are thinking of marrying New Fawn.”
Pitch watched as both warriors swallowed hard and backpedaled. They wore expressions that were a mixture of loathing and horror.
“If you desire to sire children in the future …” Her voice dropped. “No, let’s say if you would ever even
enjoy
lying with a woman again, you will stay as far from this lodge as you can tonight.”
To Pitch’s astonishment, the guards almost shook their heads off their shoulders, nodding in agreement.
“Good,” Dzoo said simply. “The Singer and I are going to be mixing potions. Try not to breathe the fumes. Some … Well, never mind.”
Pitch followed her into the lodge, where a fire had burned down
to coals. Dzoo indicated a place by the hearth, where a roll of buffalohide made a cushion. “Let me check your wound.”
Pitch stopped long enough to glance out the thin slit at the door’s side. Both guards were well out of earshot.
“Hungry?” She raised an eyebrow and pointed to a carved wooden bowl beside the hides.
Pitch sat and exhaled in relief. As she dipped stew out and handed it to him, he took inventory of the lodge and related all the events leading up to his departure.
“He’s going to be great,” Dzoo said thoughtfully after Pitch told her of Tsauz’s flight with Thunderbird. “If this coming trial doesn’t kill him.”
Pitch ate a spoonful of sea lion stew, relishing the rich flavor. In addition to the meat, the stew contained red laver and dried skunk cabbage. It had been a long time since he’d eaten such a meal. But no matter how much he ate, his stomach squealed for more. “Forgive me,” he said, and awkwardly repositioned his injured arm. The sling had started to saw into his shoulder. “I know I’m not very pleasant company. The only thing I’ve had to eat in two days is dried packrat jerky. I’m starving.”
“Eat as much as you can hold, Pitch. Meanwhile, let me see that wound.”
“No, there are many things I must tell you.”
While Dzoo undid the sling, Pitch examined the beautiful painted leather dress she wore—the scarlet color was stunning. Her long red hair tangled with the tiny shell beads that covered the bodice.
Pitch gestured with his horn spoon. “We heard you were locked in the captives’ lodge.”
“I was.”
“Who gave the order to release you?”
“Cimmis, when it became apparent that I wasn’t interested in leaving.”
“How did they capture you?”
“They didn’t. I surrendered to them at War Gods Village.” She stared thoughtfully at his wound. “Sometimes, the choices we make condemn us either way.”
“Why didn’t you warn the people at War Gods Village?”
She stared at him, a terrible pain in her eyes. “I had to choose between Coyote and all those people. To defeat Coyote, I had to be captured, had to be brought here under constant guard.”
“He’s that dangerous?”
“Stopping him may be more important than defeating the North Wind Council.”
Pitch nodded, chewing thoughtfully. “What of Astcat? She wasn’t what I expected.”
“Astcat is not well.”
He swallowed a bite of sea lion and said, “I know she’s supposed to have blank spells where her soul flies away, but she seemed fine when I spoke with her. Alert, intent on hearing my words.”
“Then she’s having a good day. That is not always the case. How did she react?”
“With shock and dismay. But not with the vehemence I was expecting. In my dread, I thought she’d scream and have me thrown out, maybe even order my death.”
She studied him thoughtfully. “But you came anyway?”
“It is a matter of Power. How could I have refused?”
On the eastern wall, two sacred bundles hung from the lodgepole. He scooped up his last succulent bite of meat and studied them while he ate. The bundle on the left was decorated with red and yellow circles, imitating the pattern of the Star People in the Wolf Pup constellation. An eye glared from the center of the bundle, black and glistening as though alive. Beside it, Dzoo’s Noisy One bundle hung. The miniature face of her Spirit Helper covered the leather. The Noisy One had empty white eyes, a black circle for a mouth, and a squat, hair-covered body. The longer Pitch looked at Dzoo’s sacred Power bundles, the more he felt their souls creeping around inside him, testing him to see if he was worthy to touch them, whispering just below his ability to hear.
She followed his gaze. “Ecan had them returned to me. I think he was having bad dreams while they were in his possession.”
Pitch set down his empty bowl and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “Hallowed gods, that was good. Do you eat this way every night?”
“Living here is very much as I recall from my childhood. At dawn and dusk, slaves bring bowls of food, carry away waste bowls, deliver clean clothing, sweep and straighten the lodge. The only thing that’s really changed is they know the tribute is running out. They’ve been stockpiling it for many cycles, but it will be gone soon. Long ago, they wiped out the sparse resources on the mountain. Without tribute, they can’t survive here … . And the ghosts have changed.”
He reached for a seaweed cake. As he ate it, green crumbs trickled down the front of his white shirt. “How so?”
Her gaze fixed on the doorway. The curtain swung gently in the draught that constantly breathed up the mountain slope. “They used
to be happy ghosts, going about their days laughing and talking. Now they’re frightened. They roam the village at night, crying, screaming the names of people I suspect are long gone.” Dzoo turned to look at him. “You’ll hear them. Just wait. They wake me every night.”
“You often hear things I don’t.” He finished his cake and wiped his hands on his red leggings. “What about Astcat? If she agrees to this marriage, it will drastically change the balance of Power. Imagine what the other North Wind People will do if she goes through with it.”
“I suspect they’ll assassinate her.”
Pitch ate another cake and studied the doorway. Past the door curtain, he could see one of the guards keeping his distance in the gathering dusk. The man kept shooting owlish glances at Dzoo’s lodge, as if he expected grizzly bears to bolt from the door at any instant.
Pitch whispered, “Why do you think Thunderbird told Tsauz this was the only way?”
“It probably is.”
“If she marries him, will the Raven People be content? Or do you think they will still demand the deaths of the North Wind People?” His wife and son were North Wind People. Pitch had already begun to plan his family’s escape. They would flee southward, perhaps run all the way to the Elderberry People … .
Dzoo said, “I can’t say.”
He brushed at the green crumbs on his shirt. “You know that Evening Star is trying to save Ecan, don’t you?”
Dzoo nodded. “Tell me about Evening Star and Rain Bear, Pitch. Are they … together?”
He lifted a hand. “I think so.”
Dzoo closed her eyes for a moment, as though thanking the gods. “And the fetishes. Why did you bring them?”
Pitch let out a breath. The lodge smelled fragrant, a mixture of roasted sea lion and black seaweed. “Rides-the-Wind wanted me to ask you about one of the fetishes.”
“Which one?”
He held up his thumb and forefinger to show her the large size. “It’s obsidian—in the shape of a coyote. It took me a long time to determine the one that—”
“Contained the man’s voice?”
Pitch went numb. The hair on his arms prickled. “How did you know?”
Dzoo smiled. “I heard his voice the first time I touched the bag.”
Filled with dread, Pitch asked, “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because he was calling to you. You had to hear it for yourself, or it meant nothing.”
“Hallowed Ancestors, Dzoo,” he said loudly without thinking, then made an effort to lower his voice again. “What does it mean? Who is he? And how did his voice get into the Coyote fetish?”
She shoved long red hair over her shoulder, and the tiny lines around her eyes deepened. “Now you know why I have to hunt down Coyote. He has enough Power to capture souls and imprison them inside those fetishes. I just don’t know if it was in the past or in the future.”
Pitch sank back against the wall and rubbed his forehead. The orange gleam of the fire fluttered over his hand. “If we knew whose voice that was, maybe we could stop it from happening.”
A strange haunted smile touched her lips. “What if he deserves this fate?”
He just stared at her.
She smoothed her fingers over the soft buffalohide she sat upon. “Those fetishes are more than just magical stones. You know that, don’t you?”
It felt like an earthquake building in his heart, ready to shake his world apart. “Yes. And?”
Her black eyes flared. “That bag is an army of ghosts for the man who knows how to use it.”
Pitch had trouble swallowing. The fire’s gleam seemed to close in around him. “Rides-the-Wind thinks he’s the most Powerful witch to exist in a long time.”
“Very possibly.” She ran a hand through her long hair. “I haven’t had the chance to ask him.”
Fear swelled like a black bubble in Pitch’s chest. “Are you saying he’s here? In Fire Village?”

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