People of the Mist (8 page)

 
          
“I
don’t think I want to be a woman,” she told the silent sky.

 
          
Red
Knot was her best friend. Together they had played, worked, and dreamed. They
had laughed, flashed smiles at the boys, teased them unmercifully.

 
          
Quick
Fawn thought back to that summer night, not five moons past. Canny leader that
old Hunting Hawk was, she’d sent runners to the surrounding villages,
announcing a celebration to mark the final weeding of the fields. Of course, the
visitors had arrived early to find the people of Flat Pearl still out weeding
the corn, beans, and squash. Naturally, they had pitched in, and what would
have taken Flat Pearl five days took less than one.

 
          
Hunting
Hawk disposed of large quantities of last winter’s stores that were on the
verge of molding, emptying storage baskets and pots. What better way than to
fill the bellies of her friends and allies from the surrounding area?

 
          
From
the corner of her eye, Quick Fawn had watched Red Knot and High Fox, side by
side, weeding the rows. Corn, beans, and squash alternated in the field. Here
and there, an old stump, the wood charred, thrust up like crows’ beaks. Bent
over, High Fox and Red Knot had talked, laughed, and shared special smiles.

 
          
At
first, Quick Fawn had been included in their games, but later, after the feast,
while Flat Willow had been strutting and leaping in his hunting dance, they had
slipped away from the circle of dancers around the ceremonial fire in front of
the House of the Dead.

 
          
So
I followed. Quick Fawn rubbed her face and sighed as she stared up at the
scudding clouds. In the dark trees beyond the canoe landing, she’d lost them.
Only later did she finally discover them, bathed in moonlight on the sandy bank
of the inlet.

 
          
High
Fox had passed his Blackening and rebirth into manhood but two moons past. And
Red Knot, at fourteen, hadn’t had her first menses; nevertheless, their bodies
were locked together. Quick Fawn watched the moonlight shining silver on their
greased skin. It cast twin crescents on High Fox’s buttocks and back, and shone
silver on the backs of his legs as his hips moved rhythmically against hers.

 
          
Their
audacity had stunned Quick Fawn. What if someone found out? A man didn’t couple
with a girl. Red Knot would be beaten, and every sort of abuse heaped upon her
in punishment. And High Fox at the very least would be dishonored, at the worst
killed outright by Nine Killer and the Flat Pearl warriors.

 
          
Like
a shadow, Quick Fawn had faded into the cover of the trees, and placed a hand
to her pounding heart. She had glanced around, frightened, to reassure herself
that no one else was close.

 
          
The
next day, High Fox left with his father, Black Spike. Red Knot walked as if in
a private mist. She had a happy, moony look. “Do you know what you’re doing?”
Quick Fawn asked that afternoon. They were using heavy pestles, made from
straight branches, to pound corn kernels into flour. Each beat of the pestles
was accompanied by the hollow thump of wood. Together, they beat out a rhythm.

 
          
“Know
what I’m doing?”

 
          
“You
and High Fox!” Quick Fawn whispered. “I know about the two of you! But I’m your
friend. What if someone else finds out? You could be ruining your life!” Red
Knot laughed, her supple body flexing as she thumped the heavy pestle down on
the dancing corn in the mortar hollow. “No, my friend. Just the opposite. I’m
saving myself. Blessed bats, Quick Fawn. We’re going to be married, live the
rest of our lives together. He’s going to be a great chief someday, maybe even
Mamanatowick. And I’ll be his wife.”

 
          
Quick
Fawn frowned down into the powdered corn and hammered it with extra vehemence.
“I suppose that Hunting Hawk and Shell Comb have agreed to this?”

 
          
“Oh,
they will. I’m sure of it. Mother has always had her way with Black Spike, and
Three
Myrtle
Village
. Why would they object?”

 
          
“I
think your. sight has been blinded by High Fox’s radiance, my friend. The
Weroansqua and your mother never do things for convenience, or because someone
wishes. You are the granddaughter of a chief, the daughter of a woman who will
become chief. Remember that. You’re not like other people.”

 
          
Those
words had been prophetic. Less than a month before Red Knot became a woman, it
was announced that she had been promised to Copper Thunder.

 
          
How
well Quick Fawn recalled her friend’s eyes that day. Shock, disbelief, and
desperation all mixed together to turn that pretty face into a mask of crushed
hopes.

 
          
No,
I don’t want to become a woman. Let me stay as I am. Free, happy, and without
worries beyond my daily chores.

 
          
Everything
had come to a head early that very morning. In the darkness before dawn, Quick
Fawn had sneaked out to see her friend. Red Knot had spilled her plans: “I’m
running away with High Fox! We’re leaving at first light from Oyster Shell
Landing!”

 
          
Quick
Fawn rubbed her face, an empty feeling in her gut, as she recalled her
desperate pleas that Red Knot couldn’t run off, couldn’t betray her
responsibility and duty to the clan.

 
          
And
they’d argued, almost to the point of violence.

 
          
I
could have stopped her. Quick Fawn closed her eyes, seeing the triumph in Red
Knot’s face.

 
          
What
a fool her cousin was. The War Chief would hunt her down and bring her and High
Fox back in disgrace. Quick Fawn sighed, and pulled her knees up until she
could rest her chin on them. The forest had grown oddly quiet.

 
          
Quick
Fawn frowned at the prickle of premonition. On the point of hopping down to
resume her wood collecting, she caught a faint movement in the corner of her
eye.

 
          
She
froze when two tens of warriors filed past on the slope below her, bows strung,
arrows nocked. The faintest whisper of moccasins sounded on the damp leaves.
Dark eyes gleamed warily as they scanned the forest around them. Each face was
painted in red and black, the colors of war and death.

 
          
She
knew them by their hairstyle—the right side of the head shaved bald, a long,
braided roach falling down the back from the center scalp lock and a war fetish
pinned into the tightly wrapped bun on the right. These men belonged to the
Mamanatowick, Water Snake.

 
          
But
what were they doing here, sneaking through Flat Pearl lands?

 
          
Quick
Fawn tried to swallow down a fear-choked throat. Her heart hammered hard, fit
to burst her chest. Every nerve screamed at her to run, but panic had frozen
her to the old oak.

 
          
One
of the warriors seemed to look right at her. The world swayed as Quick Fawn’s
guts went runny.

 
          
And
at that instant, a rabbit burst from beneath her, frightened by the closeness
of the men, and streaked away, its fluffy white tail bobbing with each leap.
Distracted, the warrior watched the rabbit go, his pace unbroken.

 
          
She
remained there, gasping for breath after they’d passed, then slid off the
fallen oak. Her wobbling legs would have failed her but for locking her knees.

 
          
“I
have to warn the village!”

 
          
Quick
Fawn had earned her name because she was the fastest girl in Flat Pearl. Now
she lived up to her reputation, hair streaming out behind her as she streaked
away, arms pumping, bare feet pattering.

 
          
Nine
Killer juggled his thoughts as a magician did green walnuts. That ability had
saved more than one war party from disaster. He could take up a problem, give
it a moment’s thought, and toss it up again as he entertained yet another
thought, eventually recapturing the first in an uninterrupted flow.

 
          
Ideas
raced through his head as he trotted up the ridge trail ahead of four warriors.
Life in
Flat
Pearl
Village
reminded him of dancing on a spiderweb. One
had to move one’s feet quickly, lest they become stuck. Balance was a
precarious thing at best. Even flailing around could leave one entwined for
whatever spider lurked in the shadows.

 
          
Fortunately
for Flat Pearl, and Greenstone Clan, Hunting Hawk had always been a nimble
dancer. Her keen mind had kept the territory between Oyster Inlet and Duck
Creek autonomous. That the Independent villages often accomplished their goals
through manipulation, military prowess, and intimidation was of no concern to
anyone: the final arbiter was survival.

 
          
But
now the Independent villages lay like an un cracked nut between three stones.
To the south, the Ma manatowick, Water Snake, brooded and schemed, forever
seeking to extend his influence over the Independent villages, while in the
north, across the Fish River, the Tayac, Stone Frog, had strengthened what had
been a weak coalition of Conoy villages into a strong confederacy.

 
          
In
the west, Copper Thunder was the new element. Less than ten Comings of the
Leaves ago, he had arrived in the upriver villages to the west. His mother, a
woman of the Pipestone Clan, had married a Trader, and followed him off to the
wealthy chieftainships inland. Copper Thunder had been born there, raised on
the great rivers; and he told stories of fabulous cities, and stupendous temple
buildings atop man-made mountains that gleamed under the sun.

 
          
Such
stories stretched Nine Killer’s credulity, but so many of the Traders insisted
that such marvelous chieftainships existed that a kernel of truth must lie
within.

 
          
Copper
Thunder had returned to his mother’s people as a young man—and such a man: his
face was tattooed in a peculiar fashion, as if his eyes looked out of two
swallowtails. He carried a fearsome war club inset with a nasty copper blade.
The spider gorget he wore was said to belong to some secret society of warriors
who served the Serpent Chiefs. Others said he knew strange ways, that he spoke
to alien gods, and enchanted evil spirits to his will.

 
          
All
of these things might be true, for he had welded the squabbling upriver clans
into a cohesive alliance for the first time in the memory of men. With them at
his back, he’d managed to defeat first Stone Frog” and then Water Snake.

 
          
Both
battles had been won with inferior numbers of warriors, and had inflicted great
losses on the larger forces. And now the Great Tayac, as Copper Thunder styled
himself, sat astride the most important trade route to the interior. Along that
line flowed all the copper, chert, and rhyolite for tools, fine fabrics, dyes,
and steatite for pipes and bowls. That lonesome young man had collected an
amazing amount of prestige, authority, and power. His strength seemed to be
growing by the year. Many now said there was no way to stop him.

 
          
But
is that true? Nine Killer listened to the shouts of his men echoing through the
forest, and considered what sort of man it took to accomplish such a thing.

 
          
Copper
Thunder was more than just a long-lost kinsman of the Pipestone Clan. He had
some other quality, something that set him above other men. Whatever it was, it
differed from the proclaimed deity of men like Water Snake, who believed
himself to be part god. In all the times Nine Killer had dealt with the
Mamanatowick, he’d always known instinctively that he dealt with another
man—albeit a powerful one.

 
          
Copper
Thunder was a different matter. Nine Killer need but look into those eyes and
his soul shivered. People said that the Great Tayac carried a powerful amulet,
a tablet engraved with the image of a creature part bird, part man, and part
snake—and whispered that it made him invincible.