People of the Longhouse (35 page)

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Authors: W. Michael Gear

Tags: #Fiction, #Historical, #Native American & Aboriginal

BOOK: People of the Longhouse
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G
reen water had been rippling by all night, scalloped here and there with starlit foam that spun off the paddle strokes of the warriors. Gannajero sat in the bow of the lead canoe, snarling at anyone who dared to speak to her.
Wrass, and three children he did not know, rode in the second canoe. Four warriors dipped their paddles and drove their canoe forward. They were moving swiftly, heading south into the lands of the People Who Separated, a group of rebels who’d broken away from the People of the Dawnland many summers before. The banks were thick with dark green holly. Just beyond them, leafless birches and elms grew. They cast cool, wavering shadows across the leaden river.
Wrass repositioned his hot cheek on the gunwale. His headache caused tears to constantly leak from his eyes and silently fall into the river. Before Gannajero had separated them, Zateri had thrust strips of birch bark into his hands and told him to chew them. They’d helped a little. When he could keep them down long enough. He’d thrown up so often his throat was raw and swollen. And he kept having blackouts—long periods where he couldn’t remember anything.
A warrior waddled down the canoe, making it rock from side to side. Water sloshed, and whitecaps bobbed away. The man knelt beside Wrass. “You let them catch you, didn’t you?” he hissed. “To distract
them from hunting the other children? You’re a stupid boy. You could be halfway home by now.”
It took a gigantic amount of strength to lift his eyes to the man. “Who are you?”
The stars’ gleam cast a pewter glow over the warrior’s pudgy, florid face. He’d taken off every ornament and piece of clothing that would have identified his clan or People, and wore a plain elkhide cape and black leggings. Wrass tried to focus on him, but he was blurry, his face striped with the dark shadows of the passing trees.
“Gannajero says if you’re not better by the time we make camp tonight, I have to kill you.” He sounded unhappy about it.
A smile touched Wrass’ lips. “That must be hard … for a coward like you.”
The warrior brutally punched Wrass in the belly, and he scrambled forward to hold his head over the gunwale and vomit into the river. Nothing came up, but he couldn’t stop gagging.
“Just wait, boy. If you think it’s bad now, when I tell Gann—”
“Akio!” Kotin called. “You lazy fool, what are you doing? Get back to your paddle.”
The fat warrior glanced at Kotin, then leaned over Wrass and growled, “I know you were the one who poisoned the stew, boy. I saw you by the pot. I’ve just been waiting to tell Gannajero.” He tramped away and picked up his paddle again.
The wrenching convulsions continued until the edges of his vision started to go gray and fluttery … and Wrass … he … he was …
Vaguely, he felt his body sink into the canoe, and knew his head rested on soft packs.
L
ater that night, just before Koracoo was supposed to wake Sindak to take over her sentry position, Gonda filled his lungs with the damp smoky air and walked in her direction.
As frost settled over the clearing, the fallen plums resembled a field of small white river rocks. He tiptoed around the fire, which had burned down to a glistening bed of coals, trying not to wake anyone. Koracoo watched his approach with worried eyes. Every twig on the bare branches behind her was tipped in silver.
Gonda stopped a pace away and gripped his war club in both hands, holding it in front of him like the locking plank of a door that should never be opened.
“What is it, Gonda?”
His hands hardened to fists. “Please, just listen. Don’t say anything.”
She spread her feet, preparing herself.
When he began, his voice was low and deep. “You’d sent Coter and Hagnon out to scout that morning. They came back at dusk. Coter was wounded. Hagnon dragged him through the front gate and told me that the attacking warriors had let him through. They thought it was all a big joke … because it didn’t matter what they told me.” Her eyes narrowed, and he looked away. He couldn’t bear
to see the cold, impenetrable wall go up. He plunged on. “Hagnon told me he suspected there were at least one thousand warriors—”
She shifted to reposition her feet.
“—spread out through the forest, aligned for waves of attacks. I kept going to our elders, begging them to let me create some kind of diversion that would allow a few of our old people and children to escape, but they refused. They told me to keep fighting.”
He expelled a breath. He dared not look at her now—not until he’d finished. “Two hands of time later the palisade was on fire in fifty places, riddled with holes; enemy warriors were crawling in, swarming all over like rats in a corn bin. I ran through the longhouses, gathered all the children and elders who were still able to run, and led them outside with one hundred warriors at my back. We—we fought hard, Koracoo.” His voice was shaking. “Gods, it was terrible. But … some … a few … escaped.”
She didn’t say a word.
Gonda girded himself, and lifted his eyes to look at her quiet, tormented face.
“Gonda,” she whispered with difficulty. “I should never have split our forces and gone out that morning.” A sob spasmed her chest. She forced it down. “If I’d kept all six hundred of our warriors in the village, not even one thousand could have breached our walls. We could have saved … so many.”
She turned away, and her shoulders shook as though there was an earthquake inside her.
For a moment, he just stood there. Afraid. Then he said, “Blessed gods. Forgive me, Koracoo. If I hadn’t been drowning in my own guilt, I would have seen that you …”
He stepped forward and pulled her against him. How long had it been since she’d let him hold her? For a few blessed moments, he enjoyed the sensation of her body against his. “Don’t look back,” he said. “If we start looking back, it’s all we’ll be able to do.”
Slowly, Koracoo’s arms went around his back, and she clutched him so hard her arms shuddered.
“You lied to me, didn’t you?” he asked.
“About what?”
“You told me your greatest fear was the same as mine, that you’d fail to protect your family … but that’s not true, is it?”
She hesitated. “No.”
“No,” he softly repeated. “Of course not. You are war chief. Your greatest duty is to keep your village safe.”
He could see it all so clearly now. The fear that tied her soul to her body was that she would fail to protect her People. In her heart, she must be swimming toward a shore she couldn’t even see.
Gonda kissed her hair, and it was as if a gentle, cool hand were stealing over his wounded souls. He could feel the quiet hush of the autumn evening in the mountains and smell the pleasant fragrance of burning plum branches. The peaceful faces of the children reflected the fluttering firelight. They would never be able to go home. They no longer had a home to go to.
He hugged Koracoo tighter. He didn’t want to think of that now. All he wanted was a place where they could lick their wounds, a quiet place to heal, and try to imagine a future.
Against his shoulder, Koracoo said, “Tomorrow, we’ll find the rest of the children.”
He took a deep breath.
“Yes,” he answered. “We will.”
S
tand up, Odion. It’s time.
Sky Messenger lowered the trembling hands that covered his face and fought to blot out the images. He was jerking and twitching, still hurting, just as his child’s body had the night of Manidos’ assault. He filled his lungs with air and let it out slowly, then lifted his blurry gaze to look up at Sonon. The creature’s quartz-crystal eyes shimmered in the black frame of his hood. “Now? Already?”
Yes.
Sky Messenger picked up his walking stick and used it to brace himself as he staggered to his feet. To the east, he saw the trail he’d walked to get here. It was long and twisting. It slithered through the vast forests like a dark serpent, scaled impossible cliffs, and fought its way across wide, rushing rivers. Had it been so difficult?
Yes, perhaps it had. He remembered how, at the age of eleven summers, the mysteries had been physically painful. He’d been sick with dread, wondering what had happened to Agres’ baby sister, and trying to decipher the mystery of the two gorgets. The most powerful mystery of all, of course, had been the identity of the strange bone-carrying creature that pursued him. If any of them had known at the time that one of those little boys was destined to don a cape of white
clouds and ride the winds of destruction across the face of the land, or that the strange creature would …
Let’s walk together, Odion.
He bowed his head and nodded. “I’m ready. Take me.”
Sonon turned westward. Elder Brother Sun’s shining face had torched the evening horizon. The Cloud People blazed as though burning, and a swath of crimson blanketed the sky just above the bridge. Birdsong filled the fragrant air.
For a few blessed moments, Sky Messenger watched the flocks of wrens and finches fluttering over the bridge. Some of the birds perched upon the planks with their feathers fluffed out. The white-tailed doe stood a short distance away, grazing serenely. And the young wolf sat on his haunches in front of the bridge, his tail wagging, guarding the path, as he had always done.
…
Gitchi—y
es, his name is Gitchi, which meant “great.” The wolf had earned that name a thousand times over.
Sky Messenger propped his walking stick and started toward the bridge.
He’d taken less than ten steps when he realized that Sonon was not following him, and looked back. The Spirit stood tall in the middle of the trail, his black cape gently blowing around him.
“Are you coming?”
The Spirit did not answer. His quartz-crystal eyes had gone dark. Only a smoky gray haze filled his hood.
A strange chill prickled Sky Messenger’s wrinkled skin. He shivered. “What’s wrong?”
Something was wrong; he could feel it.
Sky Messenger walked back. Just before he reached Sonon, he saw something on the ground, and stopped.
The bones of a human hand thrust up through the soil, the fingers extended as though they’d clawed their way up through the earth just to reach out to him.
“What’s this?”
The Spirit remained quiet.
Sky Messenger scanned the leaf-strewn soil. Other bones lay exposed, scattered along an irregular line—a line beyond which Sonon did not seem able to pass.
Sky Messenger looked up into Sonon’s dark hood. The shining eyes were no longer blazing quartz, but filled with tears.
“Did you want me to find this, old friend? Is that why I’m here?” Sonon’s hood buffeted in the wind as he walked back up the twisting trail into towering sycamores.
Sky Messenger watched him until he vanished … . Then he gazed back at the bridge. Gitchi stood up and whimpered, calling to him. All the birds that had been perched on the planks took wing and circled, waiting.
“I’m such an old fool. Why did it take me so long to understand?”
He held onto his walking stick as he lowered himself to his knees and spread his cape like a blanket before him.
One by one, he picked up the bones and placed them on his cape, then moved on down the line and picked up more. They were old, fragile. Some crumbled in his hands. He soon found his cape covered with bone slivers. When he’d collected every fragment he could find, he folded the hem of his cape to create a basket for the bones, and grunted to his feet.
“I’ll make sure you reach the Land of the Dead,” he whispered. “Your work here is done, old friend.”
Sky Messenger swung around to face the bridge. The planks had picked up the fading rays of sunlight and gleamed as though sheathed with liquid amber. He steeled himself, and started forward.
Gitchi barked and leaped. His ears were pricked, and his tail ferociously sliced the air.
“Yes, boy, I’m finally coming.”

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