Runestone (60 page)

But there were no longboats here, and they lacked the tools as well as the skills, to construct them.

“I was thinking,” Svenson said. “What if there is treachery? We do not know these people on the other side.”

The sailor must have been thinking along the same lines as he had, Nils mused. Probably there would be no conflict, but the uncertainty was a matter for concern. And the time to be concerned, obviously, was now, well ahead of time. It would certainly not do to discover treachery with their fighting force divided and part of it marooned on the enemy’s side of the river. If there were to be enemies, of course. Yet safety would lie in preparation.

“It would be good to have a longboat or two,” Svenson observed.

“Sven, we cannot build longboats,” Nils retorted irritably.

“Of planks, no,” the sailor mused. “But Nils, remember the bigger boats that the Downstream Enemy sometimes used? They were shaped like a little ship. A longship.”

Nils nodded. “And made of bark, were they not?”

“Yes, I think so. Canoes, they were called. Could we not build one or two of those?”

“Maybe. Let us ask Odin.”

Odin was agreeable, and understood the premise immediately.

“Yes. War canoes … the Downstream Enemy uses them.”

“Yes,” said Nils. “They were used against us. Did they not carry eight or ten warriors?”

“Yes,” Svenson agreed. “Two abreast, no?”

“We will probably not need to fight,” observed Odin, “but it does no harm to appear ready.”

“Besides,” Nils added, “we can land a party on the other shore, and then carry larger numbers faster, back and forth.”

“And supplies and baggage, too,” Sven agreed. “Odin, can we build a canoe? Maybe two?”

Odin nodded. “I have seen it done. It should not be difficult. Two is good, I think. And it seems we are to be here for a season. The bark must be stripped at the right time.”

So the plan began to take shape. The People would plant, hunt, and construct boats. Attempts would be made to contact the inhabitants on the west side of the river, to reassure them of the peaceful intentions of the newcomers. They decided quite early that there would be no crossing of the stream without the consent of the council. They could not risk another accident like that which had nearly destroyed their initial contact with the Chalagees.

The initial flurry of boatbuilding subsided, due partly to the necessity to concentrate on planting. The other factor was the scarcity of fresh skins for building the small round boats. But now that there was no hurry, the People settled into their traditional pattern of letting tomorrow take care of itself.

There were contacts across the river from time to time. A traveling trader, headed west, stopped for a day with the People, exchanged stories and traded. He had come from the north, and was carrying several pieces of a soft red stone. Pipestone, he called it, showing a pipe that had been carved and polished. It was smooth and warm to the touch.

“Its spirit is good,” Odin noted.

The trader nodded. “And very powerful!”

“White Wolf, you should have a pipe of this stone,” Odin insisted. “It would make your gifts even more powerful!”

They haggled a long while, Nils somewhat reluctant. The
main stumbling block was that the trader held his wares in such high regard.

“Such stone comes from only the one place,” he explained. “The farther from that quarry that we go, the more value it has. No, I do not even want to trade it now. It has greater worth to the west.”

So the trade was never consummated at that visit. More valuable anyway, perhaps, was that this man had been across the river before.

“You are preparing to cross?” he asked, noticing boats in various stages of construction.

“Yes, but not now,” Odin explained. “We will grow crops, winter here, then cross next season. Can you tell us of the people over there?”

The trader looked surprised. “You have not met them yet?”

“No. Our scouts crossed, saw that there are people, but we were not ready. …”

“I see. Well, they are called Hidatsa.”

“What is the meaning?” Odin inquired. “We have been calling them Minitari, They Who Have Crossed the River.”

“I do not know,” said the trader. “But they are much like you, who are here on the east bank. How do you call yourselves?”

Odin shrugged. “The People, like everyone else. Right now, we are the People on the Bank.”

“Hidatsa,” an old man in the circle recalled. “When I was a child, there was such a town. They moved. … I had forgotten.”

“It is good!” a woman said. “Those on the other side of the river will be friends!”

“Maybe not,” said Odin. “We must be careful. They might be much like us, but more warlike.”

“Look,” offered the trader, “I will take you to them. I have been there. Take us over in one of your boats, and I will help you meet them.”

There was enthusiastic agreement. It was admittedly a thing for the council, but there was already discussion of who should be included in the party to make the first contact. It
was quickly apparent that it would require more than one of the small boats.

“Two, maybe,” Odin suggested. That would allow a greeting party of four of the People, along with the traveler, his wife, and their goods.

All subject, of course, to the action of the council. But the council agreed readily.

It was a tense moment when the two boats grounded on the west bank. They drew the vessels up on the shore to wait.

It was not long. Suddenly armed warriors rose up out of the grass and from behind bushes. Odin’s heart pounded in alarm. Had the trader betrayed them? Surely not. A trader who would do such a thing would never be trusted again by anyone. He glanced nervously at Big Tree and the two other warriors, Snake and Red Hand. They, too, looked quite anxious, but were trying to maintain their dignity.

“How are you called?” demanded one of the Hidatsa in hand signs.

The trader stepped forward, his right hand raised in greeting.

“I am Trader. Remember? Last season?”

The other nodded, but very cautiously.

“And these others?”

“They are people of the other bank. They mean no harm.”

“Let them speak for themselves.”

“It is good,” signed Odin, stepping forward. He used both hand signs and spoken words. “Our people are traveling to the west. We have stopped to plant, and would cross next season. If our brothers across the water do not object, of course.”

“Your tongue is much like ours,” the Hidatsa responded, ignoring the inquiry. “Where do you come from?”

“Far to the east. A salty shore.”

“Ah! We, too. But look! We, too, must grow corn. Will there be enough? Or enough room to plant?”

Odin was thinking quickly. If that was to be the problem, a fear of how much food, and whether there would be enough.

“I am made to think,” he began, “of one of our holy men. You may have heard of him—White Wolf?”

There was no sign of recognition, so he continued.

“This man has white hair and fur upon his face. Blue eyes, too, though he is young and very powerful.”

“It is not true.”

“Yes, yes. He comes from beyond the salty water.”

“What is this to us?”

“Nothing … But I am made to think of one of his stories. He tells of a great leader of his tribe, long ago, who fed a great number of people, many hundreds, maybe, with only a few fish and some corn cakes,”

“That is nothing,” sneered the other. “We once had a sack of meal that was bottomless. It never became empty.”

“Ah! Where is it?”

The Hidatsa looked irritated. “We no longer have it,” he admitted. “It is a story, from long-ago times.”

“It is good,” Odin observed. “But no matter. The stories are much the same, no? It is possible to feed many in one way or another.”

“That is nothing. I would hear more of your holy man who has blue eyes yet sees.”

“We can bring him,” Odin offered. “See for yourself. We will have a council, and story fires. And we will bring food.”

The other man now smiled for the first time. “It is good!”

A day was set for the meeting, and the four men of the People returned to the boats.

   “If they are to be friendly,” Nils said thoughtfully, “will we need the canoes?”

The season was not yet right for the stripping of bark, and they had done nothing except begin to look for appropriate trees.

“I am made to think,” Svenson offered, “that it might be good to have a canoe anyway. Have you wondered, Nils, where this river flows?”

Nils was startled. The obvious answer lay before them. Rivers flow to the sea. The sea had been the very life of Svenson until the past few years. Now his longing to return to it must be very powerful. Many times Nils himself had felt it, though the urge had become lesser now. But it was there, lying just below the surface. It was an instinct, an inherited urge, like that of the wild geese. No, more like that of the
salmon, swimming upstream to return to the place of their birth. Except that, for the Norseman, the return was downstream. Back to the sea.

“Yes,” agreed Nils. “We need a boat.”

T
wo boats would be needed, it was decided. Two of the long canoes, that is. Many families had already started to build the small round skin-covered boats, but they could hold no more than two or three people. Still, they were useful, because they could be constructed and used that summer. This would allow an occasional exploration and more contact with the people on the other side of the river.

They had made that contact with the Hidatsa, with the help of the traveling trader. Not quite the same, their way of speaking, but nearly so. There would be a slightly different inflection, a variant pronunciation, a few words used by one of the groups but not the other. It was apparent to all, however, that they were kinsmen, and it was good. When the planting was finished and the fields had been weeded for the second time, there were no pressing tasks to occupy their days.

Or their evenings. Often a flotilla of round boats would make its way across the river in the afternoon, to remain for an evening of storytelling. Usually the People would stay the night, rather than cross the river in darkness.

Nils was glad for this. He still had a dread, perhaps a premonition. It lurked in the half-formed fears among the cobwebbed recesses of his mind, a gnawing suspicion of the dark waters. He could convince himself that the Chalagee story of the giant leech was just that, a story. Still, he could not entirely escape the dread of some evil thing lying in wait.
How odd
, he thought.
Is this part of growing up, of realizing one’s mortality?
It was not a thing that weighed heavily on his thoughts, however, or that was with him constantly.

He participated in the storytelling, at the request of Odin. The two related groups had stories that were quite similar, of course, but the Norse legendry was completely new to the Hidatsa. They listened in rapt wonder at the tales of Sol and Mani racing across the sky, pursued by giant wolves who would devour their light.

“It is true!” exclaimed an old man of the Hidatsa. “I have seen it myself, as a—boy. Sun nearly went out, swallowed by a great darkness. This was the creature, the giant wolf told of by our guest! Is that not right, holy man?”

“So say the legends of my people,” Nils agreed. “But the wolf spit it back out, no?”

“That is true! We all sang and beat the drums and prayed. It has been so always, maybe. It always succeeds.”

There was a glint of mischief in the eyes of the old man, and Nils felt a kinship. This one might not be a storyteller, but he certainly had a sense of the dramatic.

“Tell them of Nidhug, the dragon,” whispered Svenson. “The People have not heard that story, either.”

Nils nodded. “My people tell of an end to the world,” he went on. “Fire Man has asked me to tell of this.”

His listeners were wide-eyed.

“When is this to happen? Soon?” someone asked.

“No, no. It has already happened, long ago,” Nils explained.

“Then how are we here, White Wolf?”

“Well … I … it was restored,” he mumbled. “But you are ahead of the story! Listen …”

He recounted briefly the tales of the ice-giants, and their wars with the gods and the forces of warmth and light.

“It is like Cold Maker,” he explained, “forcing Sun south in winter. My people have told of that. But there was a
tree
, a giant ash tree called Yggdrasil, whose leaves shaded all the earth and the heavens. And it was good. But at the base of the tree lived a great beast, who gnawed at the roots.”

“Yes. A beaver?”

“No, no. Not a beaver,” Nils insisted.

“But a beaver does this, Wolf.”

“Yes, but this is a monster creature, who breathes fire and smoke.”

“Ah! We have none like that!”

“That is true … but this is a story, Uncle.”

“This animal is a spirit-beast?”

“Well, yes … a spirit.”

The other man nodded, and Nils continued. He had not thought of this tale for a long time, and was feeling his way, trying to remember.