People of the Mist (4 page)

 
          
The
clerk scanned the paper, and returned her appraisal to the artifacts laid out
on the counter. “We do a very good business in American Indian crafts here. Our
customers include Japanese, Kuwaiti, German, as well as some of the better
American buyers. Perhaps we can be of assistance.”

 
          
“Yes,
we know.” The woman gave her a satisfied smile. “You’re the best in the
business. That’s why we came here.”

 
          
The
clerk picked up a shell gorget depicting a spider. “Burial piece. Mississippian
if I’m not mistaken.”

 
          
The
young woman shrugged. “This is only a sample. If the price is right, we have a
great deal more to offer. Even two remarkably well preserved skulls.”

 
          
The
clerk nodded and smiled. “If the affidavit is in order, I think we can do
business with the Piankatank Confederacy.”

 
          
The
young woman looked up at the blond man and smiled her satisfaction. “Good.
We’ve done our homework. We are selling authentic artifacts: museum-quality
pieces, not reproductions. I think your buyers will appreciate that.”

 
          
The
clerk lifted an eyebrow, appraising the young woman, then studied the artifacts
with a practiced eye. “My people will have to inspect the items, of course, but
provided they agree with your claims, we can start at ten thousand for this
first lot. Provided, that is, that we can have an exclusive on the rest of your
collection.”

           
I tell you truly, the source of
life’s greatest delights and glories is Death. It is our soul.

 
          
Bright
and shining.

 
          
Yes,
I know, you have been taught all of your life that the soul is some mysterious,
hidden being, like a cloaked child secreted in a corner of your mind, but that
is a lie.

 
          
Death
is soul.

 
          
Anyone
who is truly alive knows this. He can feel Death staring from his eyes every
moment, watching, reminding him, making him cherish each breath.

 
          
Sunrises
are beautiful because Death knows sunsets. Spring is glorious because Death
knows winter.

 
          
Why,
then, do so few of us see the murderer within?

 
          
The
terrors of the world are not outside. They are his.

 
          
The
dark abyss that is always about to swallow us belongs to him.

 
          
He
is curious, a wanderer, walking in the emptiness, his steps silent. His cries
mute. His grief unending.

 
          
We
all glimpse him at one time or another, his shadow tiptoeing around inside us,
and are afraid.

 
          
We
know that shadows cannot exist without light.

 
          
Shadows
live on light.

 
          
I
tell you again, my friend. Death is our bright and shining soul.

 
          
And
the soul casts a shadow.

 
          
He
is always there. Dark. And terrifyingly alive. He stares through our eyes. He
moves when we move. He touches those we love. . We must be vigilant.

 
          
Red
Knot stopped where the palisade overlapped to form a protective entrance to
Flat
Pearl
Village
. Here, defenders could remain sheltered and
shoot attacking warriors restricted in the narrow space between the posts. She
stared nervously out into the morning, hesitant at stepping from the palisade’s
security. What she was doing wasn’t wrong. She told herself that over and over.

 
          
The
sky had grayed with the new dawn and mist ghosted over the calm water in the
inlet. To her right, the canoes down at the sandy landing were barely visible,
their outlines blurred by the clinging haze. Above the canoe landing, the
gardens lay fallow now, the corn and beans harvested from withered brown
plants. Here and there, grass-thatched houses stood among the fields. Gentle
streamers of blue smoke rose from the smoke holes in their roofs. Beyond the
gardens, at the foot of the tree covered ridge, the stubbly cornfields gave way
to the thick forest.

 
          
Red
Knot glanced back at
Flat
Pearl
Village
. The long houses the House of the Dead, and
the storage buildings stood silently in the gloom, their rounded shapes
reminding her of hunchbacked monsters.

 
          
Grandmother
Hunting Hawk’s brown-and-white dog watched her with pricked ears. Like her
mistress, the animal was worn by the years, her joints swollen and painful. She
hobbled a few paces and studied Red Knot with mild curiosity.

 
          
Odd,
Red Knot thought. Hunting Hawk usually kept the old bitch close to her bed on
cool mornings like this. Why was the dog out wandering? With so many people in
the village, perhaps the animal was just on edge.

 
          
Red
Knot studied the path she would have to take. Time was running out. She cocked
her ear, listening. Not a sound came from the houses behind her, or from the
predawn forest surrounding the village and its fields. Soon, however, the
winter birds would begin to sing, and the village to stir. The honored guests
would be fed before starting off. The guests—all had come to
Flat
Pearl
Village
in her honor. Red Knot clamped her jaw in
determination. Echoes of her grandmother’s endless lectures spun through her
head. Honor. Duty. Respect. They blurred into meaningless words.

 
          
I
owe something to myself. I can’t be what they want me to be, go where they want
me to go. Memories of Copper Thunder’s face haunted her. Even in relaxed
moments, he looked more like a cunning witch than a man. If the thought of him
even touching her brought a twist of revulsion to her stomach, how could she
allow him to mount her? She might be Shell Comb’s daughter, but the very
thought of taking her rightful place and stepping into that tangled web
sickened her.

 
          
Her
village, clan, and family—she was letting them all down. Red Knot closed her
eyes, imagining the gray world around her, damp, cold, and misty. Like
everything else in my life.

 
          
She
knotted her fist in the cloak that covered her shoulders, and slipped out of
the palisade. Her moccasin-clad feet walked silently and swiftly, cutting
across the frosted gardens. As she hurried, she could just see her breath in
the half-light.

 
          
The
winter-bare trees along the riverbank lay no more than two bow shots ahead.
Once she reached them, she would have taken the first step toward freedom, and
a brighter future.

 
          
I
am a woman now. The thought stuck in her mind. And, yes, she felt different—but
oddly the same. Four days past, she’d stepped out of the Women’s House, the
menstrual lodge, for the first time. She had been ritually washed and decked
out in resplendent finery. Her face still stung from the new tattoos on her
chin and cheeks.

 
          
In
response to the runners who had been sent out at the onset of her cramps,
guests had arrived from the surrounding villages. Speeches had been given, and
gifts exchanged. Her clan had prepared a marvelous feast in her honor, the
wooden dishes piled high with venison, duck, oysters, roasted corn, steaming
tuckahoe, and smoked fish.

 
          
To
everyone’s amazement, Copper Thunder, accompanied by four canoes of warriors,
had arrived on the last day of the celebration.

 
          
Red
Knot had danced before him and the rest of the honored guests. Despite the
presence of Copper Thunder, she had danced for young High Fox, her steps driven
by desperation as his eyes gleamed for her.

 
          
As
she thought of him, her heart quickened. Now, or never, she had to take this
one chance at happiness. What would happen, how it would all work out, she had
no idea; but others had done as she was doing. They had become legendary among
her passionate people. Their stories were sung in the Weroansqua’s Great House.
Perhaps, one day, songs would be sung about Red Knot and High Fox, and the love
that had driven them to abandon their clans.

 
          
She
hurried through the trees, darting between the boles. To her right, water
lapped at the sandy shore. To her left, she could see the dim haze of one of
Hunting Hawk’s cornfields. Once past that, she would head left, skirting the
cleared land, and climb the steep ridge on the old deer trail.

 
          
“I’ll
be waiting at Oyster Shell Landing. ” High Fox’s words echoed. His solemn eyes
haunted her, his handsome face radiating love. “Meet me at first light. “

 
          
No,
this wasn’t wrong. Not in the eyes of the gods. They only reacted in rage over
lying, murder, or that most horrible of crimes, incest.

 
          
She
ran, feet pattering on the damp leaf mat. Over the years all the fallen branches
had been scavenged for cooking fires, so she need only worry about roots that
might trip her.

 
          
She
almost missed the trail, but, heart beating, she sprinted up the steep winding
path, her breath beginning to labor. The white-tailed deer had originally forged
this route down to the cornfields, but they ran it no longer. Her people had
all but hunted them out on the narrow neck of land surrounding the village.
Now, only occasional deer raided the fields, and they did so at risk of an
arrow. Was it not better to have the deer in the people’s belly than their corn
in the deer’s?

 
          
She
panted up the ridge, and thanked the Spirits that they had granted this warm
spell and held off the snow that would have betrayed her tracks. Her toes drove
into the soft, mulched soil.

 
          
When
she reached the great beech tree, its smooth bark marred by the years, she
stopped to catch her breath. Six men would have to stretch fingertip to
fingertip to reach around the tree’s circumference. She stepped past the beech,
out onto the rounded ridgetop, into the shade of the other forest giants. A
robin chirped in the high canopy of bare branches, and a squirrel skittered
across the fallen leaves.

 
          
Morning
was coming. She had to hurry.

 
          
Red
Knot took a deep breath, and started forward. She had only to cross the
ridgetop, then descend the steep path on the other side to the’ Just as I
thought,” a familiar voice called from behind her. “It’s all in the blood.”

 
          
Red
Knot spun, gasping, the worst of her fears suddenly realized, as a blanket-wrapped
figure stepped from the deep morning shadows behind a walnut tree. “What are
you doing here? You’re supposed to be in your…”

 
          
The
blanketed assailant moved with uncanny speed. Red Knot glimpsed the war club,
heard it whistle as it sliced the air…. The loud crack of breaking bone echoed
across the quiet misty hills.

 
          
Shell
Comb, first daughter of Hunting Hawk, hesitated as she looked out from the
shadowed doorway of the House of the Dead. She took a moment to steady herself.

 
          
Today
she began life again. She had been cleansed, purged of the mistakes of the past
and the price they’d exacted from her soul. She could start over, live as a
Weroansqua’s daughter should. She had proven to herself that she was worthy of
the awesome responsibility of authority. Still, as she watched the clearing
beyond the doorway, she nervously smoothed her hands on her deer hide skirt.

 
          
Several
people moved in the plaza, attending to various tasks. Rosebud’s daughter,
White Otter, carried a water jug toward the gate. Old Blue Moon urinated on the
back of his house, too blind to find his way outside the palisade. Shell Comb
started when she saw the Great Tayac, Copper Thunder, slip in through the
opening in the palisade, glance furtively around, and stride arrogantly toward
Hunting Hawk’s Great House.

 
          
Shell
Comb coughed and rubbed her sore windpipe.

 
          
Where
has he been? And to what purpose? The Great Tayac had no allies here, and
wouldn’t have until properly married into the Greenstone Clan. How long had he
been gone from the village? A cold shiver raced down her back. Well, if his
absence meant trouble, she would know soon enough.

 
          
She
needed all her wits with one cycle of her life finished, and another beginning.
This time, she would be smarter, wiser. The final stitch had been sewn into a
bag too long open. Why, then, did her heart leap and her muscles tremble?

 
          
She
made sure no one looked in her direction, then stepped out to meet this new
day. With steely control, she forced herself to walk across the plaza toward
the Great House. The Guardians, upright posts carved into the likenesses of
human and animal faces, watched her pass the smoking fire pit in the plaza’s
center. The ground here was hard-packed from the dancers the night before.

 
          
Old
man Mockingbird tottered toward her, blinking in the half-light. He heard her
cough, and tilted his head to squint at her. “Best tend to that, girl,” he
warned. “Shouldn’t be out in this cold.”

 
          
“Thank
you, Elder.” And Shell Comb hurried past.

 
          
Hunting
Hawk’s Great House nestled beneath the spreading branches of three mulberry
trees: a sign of her status. The house had been constructed of two rows of
black locust interspersed with cut red cedar saplings, their butts set into the
ground. The limber tops had been bent over and lashed together to create an
inverted U. Cross braces of red maple gave the framework strength, bound
together with pliable yellow pine roots, and the whole house had been covered
with sheets of bark. The interior was six paces wide and nearly forty in
length. Woven matting divided the Great House into three separate rooms.

 
          
Shell
Comb ducked through the low doorway and made her way across the mat-covered
floor. Bedsteads, made of poles laced with a wicker of saplings and bark, lined
the walls. Mats had been laid over the wicker, and then layers of deer hide
added to form snug beds. As she passed, people rolled up their bedding and
placed the matting and hides to the side to create sitting room.

 
          
No
one so much as glanced at her. But surely they should have viewed her
differently, or at least sensed the change in her life. Today, as never before,
she had proven herself worthy to be her mother’s daughter. Any question of her
ability to take over this building, and control of clan business, was now behind
her. In the presence of the blessed ancestors, she had atoned for her lack of
judgment. Black Spike might never have been. Life had come full circle. Balance
had been restored.

 
          
The
Great House, like all those in the lineage holding, belonged to old Hunting
Hawk. Upon her death, since she had no brother to inherit, the lineage
holdings-houses, land, fishing and hunting grounds, shell beds, slaves, and
property—would pass to Shell Comb.

 
          
She
looked around at the wealth that would be hers. Large baskets were hung from
the walls, brimming with corn, dried squash, acorns, hickory nuts, chinquapins,
chestnuts, and beans. The tightly tied bundles of hemp stacked to one side
waited for women to process the silky fibers into cordage or soft fabrics.
Flat
Pearl
Village
controlled rich resources, and its people
rarely went hungry.

 
          
Copper
Thunder sat beside the central fire, watching Shell Comb with oddly luminous
eyes. She glanced at the big, round-bottomed ceramic pot that rested over the
glowing coals. It held a steaming stew of corn, oysters, squash, and diced
fish. As second in line to Hunting Hawk, her first concern was to insure the
well-being of her family’s guests.

 
          
This
morning, Shell Comb would have gladly sidestepped that duty. She wanted nothing
more than to be alone, to have the time to think and reflect. But as she looked
around, she did not see her mother. Hunting Hawk was gone, and with such an
important guest seated before her fire! Shell Comb marched forward. Facing
these people, especially this powerful’ man, would be an ordeal, but it
couldn’t be helped.

 
          
She
tried to keep her hand from trembling as she stirred the fire. Fatigue weighted
her bones. Would it betray her? How long had it been since she’d had a full
night’s sleep? From the onset of Red Knot’s first cramps, Shell Comb had
attended to the girl, sending messengers, supervising meals, coordinating the
arrival of the guests, orchestrating the dances, and struggling to behave as a
Weroansqua’ sdaughter should. Her own competence surprised her, hinting at
reserves she had never known.

 
          
Responsibility—as
befitted the future Weroansqua of Flat Pearl Village—bore a terrible price. Why
hadn’t she understood before? She glanced down at her right hand, worked the
muscles, and made a tight fist. What incredible power she would wield.

 
          
Shell
Comb remained a beautiful woman despite the thirty-two Comings of the Leaves
she had survived, and the six children she had passed from her womb. Some said
her large dark eyes could snare a man’s soul and bend it to her will. The story
had always amused her. She recognized her vanity, moderated it when necessary,
and surrendered to it when circumstances permitted. And she had surrendered
much too often. But when Ohona and Okeus had battled for the world after the
Creation, they’d insured that, hadn’t they?

 
          
Trace
your ancestry back, and there you “II find Okeus, staring at you with that
malicious smile on his face. Face it, Shell Comb, your seed sprang from his
loins. No matter how many generations removed, you are still his daughter.

 
          
She
loosened her feather mantle from around her shoulders and let it slide down
around the curve of her hips as the fire’s heat reached her. The chill was
finally leaving her bones—as the sadness and confusion eventually might.

 
          
Of
her six children the third had died at birth; five, two girls and three boys,
had lived to be named. Her oldest son, White Bone, had drowned in his sixteenth
summer when he was caught on open water by a terrible storm. His canoe had been
found beached on the
Western
Shore
, but his body had never been recovered. Her
third son, Grebe, had been killed in his fifth year by lightning: his seared
body had lain under a splintered black oak. The scar could still be seen,
spiraling down the tree’s bark.

 
          
Fever
had taken her eldest daughter barely a year after her birth. She had never been
lucky with children. But then, as Hunting Hawk could confirm—provided she ever
dared to—that trait ran all through the lineage. Do I dare to try and have
another?

 
          
At
times, she wondered if perhaps some evil had slithered inside her, impregnating
her with a dark spirit that blighted the fruit of her loins. Where else had the
insatiable craving come from? Why had she thrown caution to the winds so many
times? Why had the wrong seed taken hold so often?

 
          
She
shivered at the thought, aware of that same desire stirring as she studied
Copper Thunder.

 
          
The
Great Tayac crouched across the fire from her, arms clasped around his drawn-up
knees. No one would call him a handsome man. His nose was too large for his
face; the jaw made a person think of a snapping turtle’s. Forked eye tattoos
surrounded his eyes, and a black band followed his jawline across his mouth.
Older tattoos had faded and blended with his dye-stained skin. He wore his hair
in a roach, both sides of his scalp shaved. But when he looked at Shell Comb,
that penetrating stare sent a shiver through her. Secrets hid behind those
stygian eyes, along with fleeting glimpses of his quick intelligence. He’d kill
at the slightest pretext, and when he struck, it would be like a timber
rattler: lightning fast, ruthless, and equally cold-blooded.

 
          
We
promised Red Knot to this serpent? What have we gotten ourselves into? Her
harried soul frayed further.

 
          
Copper
Thunder wore a brown bearskin over his left shoulder, leaving his right breast
bare. A large conch gorget, suspended from a choker, hung at the hollow of his
throat. The polished white shell was etched with the effigy of a great spider.
Below it hung a necklace of copper-tube beads, a wealth of them. They gleamed
in the firelight. The colorful flaps of his breech clout hung down front and
back. A decorated deer hide sash crisscrossed his belly; the shells sewn to it
sparkled in the firelight. He’d laid a folded blanket beside him. From the
dampness on his leggings and moccasins, he’d been far out beyond the palisade.

 
          
He
turned his gaze to the flames that leapt around the burning wood. Behind him,
ten warriors sat cross-legged on mats. They’d already rolled their sleeping robes
and stored them near the long house door in preparation for leaving. They
talked in low tones, and laughed as they discussed yesterday’s feast and last
night’s Newly Made Woman Dance.

 
          
Copper
Thunder pointed to the stew. “Is it ready?” he asked in his heavy accent.

 
          
She
struggled to sound calm. “A while yet, Great Tayac. We added a jar of
smoke-dried fish. Allow it to soften. I wouldn’t have you carrying tales of
poor food away from here.”

 
          
His
smile didn’t reach his hard eyes. “You may rest assured, Shell Comb, I will
leave here completely satisfied.”

 
          
It
had been a mistake to promise Red Knot to this spider. Unlike the other great
chiefs, Copper Thunder had built his own chieftainship, carved it out of Water
Snake’s to the south, and Stone Frog’s Conoy Confederacy to the north. Both
Water Snake and Stone Frog hated and feared Copper Thunder, but as much as they
feared him, their generations-old enmity kept them from allying and crushing
the upstart between them.

 
          
As
Shell Comb considered him, their eyes locked across the fire, measuring,
probing. Those dark orbs seemed to ask, Are you worthy?

 
          
She
ground her teeth. She had endured the worst, and seen it through. If she could
do that, she could do anything. Her heart seemed to swell, becoming as stone-cold
and calculating as his. If his soul heard, he gave no sign.

 
          
After
a moment, he asked, “Are you sorry to lose your daughter?”

 
          
She
molded her face into an emotionless mask, betraying nothing. “We all have
responsibilities, Great Tayac. To our families, to our line, and clan. I have
done mine. Red Knot… well, she has her responsibility to become your wife.”

 
          
“I
didn’t ask if your daughter would do her duty. I asked if you were sad to lose
her.”

 
          
“Yes,”
Shell Comb croaked, throat tight. She took a breath, and forced herself to say,
“When a daughter is born, every mother knows that their time together is
limited. Just as a father’s time is with his son.”