People of the Fire (40 page)

 
          
 
"Yes."

 
          
 
Little Dancer came to squat next to him, hands
locked in his lap, watching the men and women picking through the hides,
lifting the edges to pour the harvest into a skin bag.

 
          
 
"Blood Bear is my real father, isn't
he?"

 
          
 
Two Smokes froze in mid-gesture. Stunned, he
looked over at the boy. "Where did you hear that?" Little Dancer's
wry smile didn't reassure him.

 
          
 
"One of the problems of living with Red
Hand people is that they know the history. Clear Water married Blood Bear. When
her bleeding missed, she left with you for the plains."

 
          
 
"Yes, that's the way it was." He
felt old.

 
          
 
"Then Blood Bear is my father?"

 
          
 
"He is." Two Smokes winced at the
censure in Little Dancer's voice.

 
          
 
"Why didn't you tell me before? You're
the
berdache
, the man who lives between the worlds. A
berdache
understands and mediates. He knows both
sides." A pause. "And you didn't tell me."

 
          
 
Two Smokes looked over, seeing this young man
who had once trusted him so thoroughly. "Would it have done you any good?
Would it have made things easier for Hungry Bull?"

           
 
Little Dancer sniffed, vision drifting to
where Hungry Bull laughed and prodded Three Toes in the ribs over some gibe.
"No. But . . ."

 
          
 
"But you hate to find out from someone
else."

 
          
 
"It's like . . . well . . ."

 
          
 
"Like you've been cheated somehow. Like
the Trader took a dozen finely tanned robes and left you with a pack of rotten
jerky."

 
          
 
Little Dancer grabbed his knees in the circle
of his arms and leaned back, sitting down. "That's how it is."

 
          
 
Two Smokes exhaled softly, resettling his game
leg. "That's how it is, all right. But I didn't know what else to do. Now
that you've met Blood Bear, you know another reason I, for one, never told
you." Two Smokes shook his head. "I heard tell that when he left, all
he could talk about was his 'stolen' child. How he'd get his child back.
Curious, isn't it, that all he took was the Wolf Bundle? He never asked about
you. He assumed the stories were true that you were dead.

 
          
 
"Then, that day he raided Heavy Beaver's
camp, he had a chance to kill me—but the Wolf Bundle was more important than
killing the man who'd run off with his wife."

 
          
 
"You were
berdache
."

 
          
 
"I was
berdache
... but I slept with Clear Water. Oh, yes. Don't look at me like that. I loved
her. I don't know, maybe I loved her as a man would love a woman. Maybe I loved
her as one woman to another. That doesn't matter. All that counts is that I loved
her. After
Five
Falls
died, I thought I'd never love again."

 
          
 
"Love's a funny thing."

 
          
 
Two Smokes grunted. "You want to tell me?
I suppose you're literally on fire inside, hardly waiting for the opportunity
to sneak away into the bushes to pump Elk Charm full of your semen?"

 
          
 
He got a hot look in return.

 
          
 
"Oh, come on, Little Dancer, you're not
exactly fooling anyone. Three Toes and Black Crow laugh behind their hands.
Meadowlark and Makes Fun wonder quietly among themselves if you aren't too young
to understand what you're meddling with—but that's the Short Buffalo People's
beliefs at work again. And Hungry Bull is so lost in Rattling Hooves' embrace
he could care less."

 
          
 
"And what do you think?"

 
          
 
Two Smokes waved at a buzzing fly, seeking to
grab it out of the air. "I think you're old beyond your years. I think I
know what White Calf saw . . . why she stopped worrying about Elk Charm and let
you go."

 
          
 
"And what was that?"

 
          
 
"That you can't help yourself." He
met the young man's hot gaze, and shrugged. "You asked what I thought. I
told you."

 
          
 
"I guess I did," Little Dancer
relented. "But she's so . . . I don't know. Thoughts of her fill my life.
She's easy to be with." He plucked a rock from the ground and sent it
sailing off into the
rabbitbrush
. "I don't have
to worry around her."

 
          
 
Below them, the rest of the band began moving
the pile of hides to another tree, spreading them around to catch what they
could knock loose.

 
          
 
"And you think if you bury yourself so
thoroughly in Elk Charm, the problem of the Dreams, of the voices and Power,
will go away like a water puddle on a hot day?"

 
          
 
"That would be nice," he admitted.

 
          
 
Two Smokes snorted a laugh. "If only it
could be so easy."

 
          
 
They sat for a moment in silence, watching the
men beat the branches on the new tree, nuts, cones, and needles raining down on
the hides below.

 
          
 
"Why didn't you ever go back to the Red
Hand? You told me once that maybe someday you'd tell me."

 
          
 
Two Smokes considered. "I swore on the
Wolf Bundle that I'd take care of you."

 
          
 
He smiled, remembering that day in the hot
sun. He'd been holding the infant while White Calf did something, went looking
for food or some such. And he'd sworn to care for the infant—unaware he'd done
so on the Wolf Bundle until too late.

 
          
 
"Was it worth it?" Little Dancer
wanted to know.

 
          
 
Two Smokes remembered all the suffering, the
insults, the pain of being raped by callous men, his arms and legs held while
they brutally took him from behind. Their laughter at his debasement echoed
hollowly. He remembered the pain from the beatings goaded by Heavy Beaver and
the final days when the Wolf Bundle was defiled. He relived the time of Sage
Root's Curse up to the moment that White Calf had come. And since then? Had
anything been easier?

 
          
 
"Yes," he reflected. "Because
for a while, I got to feel the Power." It had always been there, warm,
extending its glow to him day after day—until Heavy Beaver had offended the
Bundle almost beyond repair. For those memories, an entire life of horror could
be endured.

 
          
 
"Me, I'm glad I'm shut of it."

 
          
 
The words stung him. "Don't say
that."

 
          
 
"Well, I am." Little Dancer braced
himself, crossing his legs at the ankles. "I've found what I'm looking
for. Here"— he waved at the peaceful valley—"is everything we need.
Food. Protection. Here I'll watch my family grow. Heavy Beaver's far away in
the plains to the east. Blood Bear's in the high country. What reason would
they have to come bother us? No, I'm through with Power and all the trouble and
circles and . . . and ... I'm just through with it."

 
          
 
Two Smokes smiled ironically. "The
problem with Power is that you never know." We will see, boy. We will see!
Then he changed the subject. "And speaking of this woman of yours, are you
letting her do all the hunting for packrats?"

 
          
 
"We found a couple of nests up there. She
wanted to look a little further."

 
          
 
"Then you'd better take your fire sticks
up. You know how to do this?"

 
          
 
Little Dancer gave him a skeptical look.
"What's difficult? I make a fire and we set the
midden
to burning. When the packrat runs out, we bash him with a club."

 
          
 
"But you have to be very, very
fast."

 
          
 
Little Dancer grinned. "I'm like
lightning. And Elk Charm, she's even quicker."

 
          
 
With that, he jumped to his feet and strolled
over to his pack. As Little Dancer fished for his fire sticks, Two Smokes
whispered to himself, "I hope you're right, little friend."

 
          
 
He watched Little Dancer start back up the
slope, a smart, proud young man who thought he could handle anything.

           
 
Young men jumped, their greased bodies
catching the firelight that accented the swell of muscles and body paint. The
bonfire in the middle of the camp snapped and popped, sending spirals of sparks
high into the
midnight
sky. Beyond the illuminated confines of the camp, the grandeur of the
Starweb
could be easily seen—but not here, not where so
much light filled the air.

 
          
 
Around the circle of lodges, women watched,
some chanting with the Singer, some just looking on, faces impassive. They
stood, mute, buffalo robes pulled tightly over their shoulders. Women of every
size and build stood there—tall, short, some thin, others fat—the spoils of his
renewal of the People.

 
          
 
Heavy Beaver sat on a white buffalo robe, each
of his seven wives behind him. Two Stones, Elk Whistle, and Seven Suns sat
watching to either side and slightly to the rear. Before him, planted in the
ground, stood a long pole decorated with raven feathers and antelope-hoof
rattles: his insignia. It went where his lodge went. Among the Cut Hair, the
Fire Buffalo People, and the White Crane, that standard had brought fear.

 
          
 
This celebration, this night of Blessing,
marked the reunification of the People under Heavy Beaver's leadership. He
smiled happily up into the darkness, imagining his mothers severe face. I did
this, Mother. You were right, like always. All it took was discipline—and
desperate people in need of what you taught me. When my young men had nothing
left to lose but their lives, they managed wonders. All I had to do was Dream
the new way. Mother, you saw so well.

 
          
 
That flow of pride welled up in him. The
whirling leap of the dancers reflected the ecstatic gyrations within his own
breast. Through his vision, he'd re-formed the People. Against bands of
warriors sent to stop him, his young men had always prevailed, believing
themselves invincible. Among peoples who had never seriously warred, Heavy
Beaver had sent fanatics willing to kill to the last man. Against his berserk
young martyrs, no one could provide more than a token resistance.

 
          
 
The beat of the pot drum, and the rising and
falling of the chant, swept him away. This night throbbed of life for him. What
he watched was a celebration of his moth, n and

           
 
You saw this, Mother. You 're the real leader.
I only used the strength you taught me. He cocked his head slightly. If he let
his imagination drift a little, he could make out his mother's voice in the
chanting of the Singers. The cadence of the booming pot drum might have been
her very heart, speaking to him.