Exile's Challenge (32 page)

Hers were the hands that plied the needles, delicate as they were firm, stitching the ugly gaps the wolverine had imparted even as Morrhyn fed Davyd some palliative that lent his eyes a dreamy look and left him sighing as the bone pierced his skin.

“He'll sleep now.” Morrhyn set compresses of herbs over Lhyn's handiwork, fixing them in place with lengths of cut cloth. “He'll feel no pain. Save …” He looked at the young man's face and grimaced. “… perhaps when he wakes and sees himself.”

Arcole said, “He'll be no pretty sight,” his voice grim, “and I'd know who stranded him there.”

“Come tell me.” Morrhyn gestured that they quit the lodge, pausing to glance at the waiting women. “Shall you stay with him? One, perhaps?”

Lhyn ducked her head. “I'll see to it.”

Morrhyn smiled at her, and Arcole saw flash between them a lifetime of possibilities now burned down like the ashes of an old fire to friendly embers. He felt Flysse's hand in his and clutched it tight. God, but it was as if his own son were wounded: he had not properly realized until now how much he cared for Davyd.

Outside the lodge the People waited in the afternoon sunlight, silent as Morrhyn emerged. The wakanisha raised his hands and said loud, “He'll live. He sleeps now, but he'll live and there is no more you can do save thank the Maker for his survival.”

There came from the crowd a murmur of gratitude, of relief, and it began to drift away.

Taza went with it, cursing the news even as he parodied a smile and his mind raced. Davyd could not have named him, nor Morrhyn dreamed his guilt, else he'd surely be taken. Why not? More,
how
not? His smile grew more genuine as he thought on the possibility that his deeds were somehow concealed, as if some power protected him. Yes, he decided, he would bluff it out. Bluff it out and win.

“There were tracks,” Tekah said, “another camp. Who built that, watched Davyd.”

Rannach glanced at Morrhyn, anticipating the wakanisha speak, but Morrhyn only nodded and held his own council, so that Rannach felt impelled to say, “We cannot be sure it was Taza.”

Yazte said, “He was gone from camp. By all accounts, for all the time Davyd was missing.”

“And he brought Davyd's horse back,” Tekah said. “The horse would not have strayed far from the wood.”

“Save it scented the wolverine,” Rannach said, “and was panicked.”

“Then it would surely have run for home,” Tekah said. “Not gone away to the northwest.”

Rannach nodded, his face thoughtful. He looked to Morrhyn, who in turn looked to Kahteney.

“What do you think, brother?”

The Lakanti Dreamer shrugged, his eyes troubled. “I wonder what to think. I think that we should have dreamed of this—foreseen the danger But we did not! And is Davyd all you believe him to be, then surely we should have dreamed warning.”

Morrhyn said, “Perhaps,” and stared into the fire.

The rest—Rannach and Tekah, Yazte and Kahteney, Arcole—waited on him, on his response. He was, no matter his protestations, the Prophet, and they hesitated to foreguess him.

There was a long silence before he spoke again, and when he did his words were somber: “What you say, brother, is right—we
should
have dreamed the danger.”

It was a warm night—the climate here in Ket-Ta-Thanne kinder than the lost homeland, the Moon of the Turning Year delivering soft promise—save it seemed a wintry gust blew over them all. And when Kahteney spoke it was as if the wind grew colder still.

“But we did not, and Davyd might have died. How can that be?”

Morrhyn sighed. Why was it always him to whom they looked for answers? He was only the Maker's tool, not some oracle. He knew only so much as the Maker allowed him, and in this matter, he knew nothing: he could understand it no better than Kahteney But they looked to him and imposed on him a duty he could not refuse, and so he said, “Perhaps our dreams were clouded.”

He had sooner not said that, not least for the widening of the eyes studying his face, the trepidation there. He had sooner given some easy answer, but he could not: only speak the truth that had gnawed at his mind since first Davyd was too long away.

Kahteney said “The Breakers?” in a voice that barely succeeded in rising above the fire's crackling.

Morrhyn shrugged and told the truth: “I've not dreamed of them; but …”

“Here?” Kahteney's voice was urgent. “Surely not. How might they find us here?”

Morrhyn saw Rannach's eyes dart wide, his hand lock instinctively around the hilt of his knife. Yazte made a sign of warding; Tekah whistled between his teeth and stared at the night as if he expected those creatures to come howling out of the shadows.

Morrhyn said, “The Maker willing, they'll not; cannot.”

Kahteney said, slowly, “But you wonder?”

Morrhyn shrugged again. “Our dreams were clouded, no?”

Kahteney nodded; none others spoke.

“I do not say this is the Breakers' doing,” Morrhyn said. “Only that we failed to dream of Davyd's danger. Which is not a thing I can properly understand.”

Tekah said, “Taza!” And then lowered his angry face, abashed to have spoken out of turn.

Kahteney nodded slowly, carefully, looking the while through sidelong eyes at Morrhyn. “It might well be. Surely he's somewhat of the gift; save …”

“As we've agreed,” Yazte declared loudly, “Taza's the gift, but not the sight of it. Could he cloud
your
dreaming?”

Morrhyn said, “Likely not; save he was aided.”

“Maker!” Yazte's voice was suddenly no longer fueled with tiswin, but only solemn. “What do you say, Prophet?”

They waited on him in uneasy silence. All around, the great camp went about its nocturnal business; fires painted patterns of shadow and light over the massed lodges; cook-fires scented the air; children called to one another, and dogs barked, horses whickered. Folk came to inquire after Davyd, answered by Lhyn or Arrhyna or Flysse, who waited tenderly patient on the wounded man. Those who saw the faces of the akamans and wakanishas assumed they discussed Davyd's condition and politely avoided that solemn circle. It seemed to Morrhyn that they sat within a vortex of cold, as if some great battle approached.

Then Morrhyn said, “I suspect this is a thing of importance, and we should not discuss it alone. Rannach …?”

The Commacht akaman nodded. “Yes. Kanseah should be here; and Dohnse, I think.” He looked to Tekah. “Do you ask them attend?”

The young Commacht sprang to his feet and was gone. Silence fell, and Morrhyn wondered what might be unleashed here. He stared into the flames, uneasiness growing.

Then Tekah came with Kanseah and Dohnse, the Naiche and the Tachyn somber as their escort, their faces grave as they took places about the fire.

“Welcome,” Rannach said, and grinned dourly, “though I think what you'll hear might not be so welcome.”

Dohnse, the older of the two, shrugged and took the cup Arrhyna offered him. Kanseah smiled nervously, his eyes downcast.

Rannach said, “We deemed it best you hear all this, that you speak on behalf of your clans.”

Kanseah nodded. Dohnse said, “My clan is the Commacht.”

“Even so,” Morrhyn said, his voice gentle, as if he'd avoid the risk of hurt or insult, “you were once Tachyn, and they may have something to do with this.”

“The Tachyn are no longer.” Dohnse made a dismissive, chopping gesture. “Those people who went across the mountains with Chakthi are Tachyn. There are no Tachyn in Ket-Ta-Thanne.”

His voice was flat as a knife's blade and no less edged. He faced Morrhyn as he spoke, and his eyes held steady on the wakanisha's. In them Morrhyn saw pain, old suffering held in careful check.

He smiled and reached out to touch Dohnse's wrist. “You are Commacht, brother, and the clan honored by that choice. But even so, best you hear this.”

Dohnse nodded and Morrhyn turned to Rannach, motioning that the akaman speak.

Rannach outlined what they had already discussed, Morrhyn and Kahteney adding their pieces. Then Rannach asked that each present speak his mind.

Yazte was the first. He said, “I do not understand this
clouding of your dreams, but the rest seems obvious to me—Taza followed Davyd and stole the horse, wrecked the camp.”

“We cannot know that,” Kahteney said. “Not for sure.”

“We can question him,” Yazte said.

“Perhaps that might decide the one thing,” Morrhyn said. “But the other? This obfuscation frightens me.”

Morrhyn saw Kanseah glance up at that, the Naiche's face stark-planed, as if some supporting rock were snatched from under him. But he said nothing, only waited on the others.

Rannach said, “Did Taza look to slay Davyd, then he must answer for that crime; but I am not a Dreamer and I cannot speak on the other matter.”

Morrhyn nodded. “Perhaps it were best we leave that aside for now. When Davyd's recovered, Kahteney and I shall speak with him. Do we, all three, dream together, then perhaps we can find an answer.”

“And Taza?” Rannach asked. “Until we hear Davyd's side, can we properly accuse Taza?”

Past the circle of the fire's light, where close-packed lodges spread darkness over the ground, Taza stroked the neck of the yellow dog that lay beside him in the shadows. It was easy to eavesdrop on folk who assumed customary privacy; they did not anticipate anyone would intrude so. That was the way of the People: to live close but grant personal freedom through application of discretion. Because, he thought—not stopping to wonder if that voice was his or some other's—they are fools.

He felt his confidence, his strength grow, like sap rising from the ground in the New Grass Moon to fill the withered limbs of winter's trees, rendering them strong again, mighty and spreading.

Fools to think they might talk about him and he not think to listen. And the wakanishas' dreams were clouded? He chuckled into the yellow dog's hair. He'd show them! He'd show them he
was
a Dreamer, powerful as any of them; mightier than that weakling outcomer Davyd. And was there some other power lent him strength, then he'd take it all, and …

He eased back as he saw Tekah rise, Dohnse with him. Tekah would kill him on suspicion alone—the fool was besotted with Davyd—and Dohnse was a turncoat Tachyn who'd surely slay his own mother to please Rannach and Morrhyn.

Inside his head the voice he did not know was not his own urged caution, and so he slid loose from the yellow dog and crawled away, back to his bed, where he feigned sleep until they found him.

“I'll not pretend I like Davyd,” he said. “That should be a lie, and I know I cannot lie to you.”

Save I am protected and you are fools
.

“Where were you?” Rannach asked. “By all accounts, you quit camp not long after Davyd. And you brought his horse back.”

“I went out hunting. I thought to bring some game in—to ease the burden of my people.”

And you cannot gainsay me
.

“And the horse?” asked Yazte. “How do you explain that?”

“I found it. I found it wandering loose and frightened and I brought it back.”

“Save Davyd lost it in the wood, and you found it—you say—far from there.”

Prove me wrong, my fat akaman If you can

“I found it where I found it. I do not know how it got there: only that I found it there.”

“There were tracks,” Rannach said slowly. “In the wood. Someone followed Davyd there, and stole his horse to leave him stranded with a wolverine.”

Taza nodded gravely. “I had heard that, and I thank the Maker he lived. He must be blessed to have survived.”

Morrhyn said, “Yes: I believe he is.”

Taza said, “The Maker be praised.”

You cannot see me, eh? You are the Prophet, but you
cannot
see me
He felt the power grow in him, still unaware—uncaring—of where it came from; knowing only that it was there and hid him as if he were one of the Shadow People. He held
his eyes firm on Morrhyn's, challenging the wakanisha to deny him, to doubt him.

Morrhyn said, “I think the Maker holds Davyd for a special duty.”

Taza shrugged.

“Does that offend you?” Kahteney asked, and Taza heard scarce-hidden animosity in the Lakanti's voice.

He said—honestly—“I believe I might be a great Dreamer if you would only agree.… Give me the pahé and …”

Kahteney cut him short. “You are not ready. You've lessons to learn yet.”

It was hard to stifle the gust of naked rage that flared at that, but the newcome power invested him and taught him caution, dissimulation, and so he beat down the flames and answered as calmly as he might, “Perhaps, and it is your decision. I can only obey.”

Until I own power greater than yours and teach you the lesson of denying me

“And you did not steal Davyd's horse?” Yazte asked.

Taza shook his head: “No.”

Fat fool You and all these others

Morrhyn said, “This proves nothing; it gets us nowhere.”

“Save we question Davyd,” Kahteney said.

Who never saw me or knew I was there, new-come fool that he is

Aloud, he said, wrapping hypocritical dignity around himself like a concealing blanket, “It is not for me to say this, but … you accuse me of things I have not done. I am innocent, but you presume me guilty. So, I say to you—let Davyd be full healed and he accuse me. And then let the Matakwa decide.”

Yazte said, “We are like the Matakwa. We are all here.”

Taza said, “Not the Grannach,” wondering the while just why he spoke the words—as if they were not entirely his own, but set on his tongue by that other voice, that power that filled him. “Am I to be judged before all the People, then let it be in the old way; properly.” He stared at Rannach. “As was the akaman of the Commacht. Would you deny me that right?”