Shadow Valley (38 page)

The Ibandi buried their own dead in the valley floor, that their flesh might run into the earth and their spirits flow to Great Sky, where, Sky Woman said, Father Mountain would give them new bones.

Fire Ant had died in Giraffe Kill. He and his brother, dead in Shadow Valley. Dead securing their new home for their tribe’s children and children’s children. The Vokka sprinkled his grave with flower petals.

Stillshadow was burned upon her sitting stone, that her spirit might rise to Father Mountain more swiftly. Then her bones were buried. Father Mountain and Great Mother would give the holy one new bones, strong bones, that she might dance with them, and Cloud Stalker, until the end of days.

The Vokka had lost two of their own and one wolf. Both two-and four-legged were buried amid somber songs and the graves heaped with fragrant flower clusters. The Ibandi stood respectfully behind them, humming along to the songs and swaying in rhythm to their dance. Only the dream dancers understood the words, but the emotions needed no translation.

After the sad singing ended, the Vokka whooped and began to dance. For folk such as these strange pale ones, sadness was not meant to last. Death begat new life. The night was only the hiding place of a new and better day.

They urged and cajoled the Ibandi into dancing with them, until the
journey up to the campground was a moving celebration. Fire Ant and Uncle Snake remained behind with Frog. “They bled for us,” Snake said. “To save us, they lost two of their own.”

“These are not friends,” Ant said. “They are family now, or I do not understand the word.” He examined his uncle’s wounded left arm, torn by a Mk*tk spear. Muscle had been severed but not tendons. He doubted Snake would hunt again, but that was not a bad thing: it was time for Uncle Snake to teach the young ones, make spears and join the elder’s council.

“Uncle,” Frog said, “you are a hero, or I do not understand that word either.”

Snake’s eyes filled and spilled as Gazelle Tears pressed herself against his back, wrapping her arms around his waist. He leaned back, resting his neck against the top of her head. “You have always been the smartest of us, Frog. What a son I have.” He grasped Ant’s shoulder. “What
sons
I have.”

Snake and Gazelle Tears left Ant and Frog together. Frog finally seemed to realize that his brother was staring at him, and had been for some time.

“What?” he asked.

“I just realized that I never knew you, Frog.”

Frog said nothing.

Ant heard the wind whistling high through the branches and smelled the smoke from the distant bonfires. So much death, in the service of life. He found the strength to smile. “I would like to spend the rest of my life undoing that mistake.”

“Long life to us both,” Frog replied.

They danced that day, and into the night. Shared meat and honey and song and touch, one with another. The Ibandi children came close to the wolves, who let them feel their fur and, rather than biting, gave them licks and playful nudges.

And the next morning, two wolves stayed in the Ibandi camp, and from that time on, Ibandi and Vokka moved back and forth between the camps as if they were family.

As Fire Ant had said. As in time, they became.

At dusk on the second day following their great victory, T’Cori and Quiet Water stood before a roaring fire and addressed the tribe.

“We have been blessed to live. The Mk*tk who chased us are dead. The one who lives carries our message:
Our women are not prey. We are not prey.”

Quiet Water stalked the circle, a cold and terrible smile twisting her lips. “I shattered his egg,” she said. “His body is mine.”

They spoke of many things that night, weaving a picture of the future they could have here in the valley, if only they kept heart. Fire Ant’s men pledged to remain. No one spoke of abandoning their new home, only questioning where in the vast valley they might best build their first boma.

The singing and dancing and speaking continued until the children were asleep on their parents’ laps and it was time to put them to bed.

T’Cori’s sisters kissed her. “I dreamed of knowing Great Sky Woman,” Morning Thunder said. “I never hoped to stand with my sister.”

“We have many days to stand and dance and dream together,” T’Cori said to Thunder and Flower. The three women hugged, then her sisters returned to their families.

As the others drifted away, Kiya brought T’Cori the infant that the dream dancer had borne in her body and given away for safekeeping.

“We gave her a name,” Kiya signed and said, “we call her Naya. Friend.”

“A good name,” T’Cori said and touched the child. No tears. No sign of sorrow. A gift is a gift.
You are not just a mother. You are chief dream dancer. Dream dancers give their children away. Their bodies, and the fruits of their bodies, belong only to Great Mother.

But she knew in her heart she was lying.

Kiya’s face crinkled in a smile. She spoke and gestured. “I wonder …”

“Yes?”

“It might be good for a child to have two mothers. To have two people. We named her, so she is ours. I think you would like to raise your daughter. I think that this would be a good thing.”

And so saying, handed the squirming bundle to T’Cori.

The dancer could not keep the tears from her eyes. “Now I owe you,” she said.

“In time,” Kiya said, “I am sure you will find a way to pay”

That night, for the first time in almost three days, T’Cori slept.

Her dreams were not her own. She felt like a spider in the middle of a web that reached from horizon to horizon and beyond.

All the dream dancers who lived, or had ever lived, were part of that web, like jeweled dew in the moonlight.

These were not
her
dreams. They were Stillshadow’s. They were the dreams of every chief dancer. Vaguely, she could sense that there were other women, from other tribes, clustered just out of her sight. The world was larger than she had ever thought, and smaller.

She dreamed that she saw the future of her people, and it was one of peace and prosperity. And knew in her bones that this was no dream but a glimpse of the world they had earned by faith and courage.

There
… there.
She raced along the web until she found a familiar face, voice … until she found a place where the
jowk
took human form as someone she knew well, Wind Willow.

Her sister dream dancer Willow was sleeping, dreaming in her hut on Great Earth. Waiting.

Sister Willow
, T’Cori said.
All is well. Tell the people. Tell them to come to Shadow Valley. If their hunting is poor, if they wish new sights, and to meet new friends …

Tell them the Circle has grown.

• • •

When Frog awoke the next morning, he felt a deep and fulfilling contentment. His brother was his brother again. His family was whole and safe, T’Cori at his side with Medicine Mouse and Naya nursing at her breasts. It was difficult even to imagine hunger or thirst in a place such as this.

And he knew that his fear, and constant obsessive training, had birthed something that had never existed before. A meld of hunt and dance, male and female, life and death. Men and women who were not just hunters or dancers … capable of waging war without losing their hearts.

Warriors.

That was what he had created.

It was a new thing. A good thing. He sighed, a deep, thorough sigh.

The happiest sigh of his life.

“Good morning, my love,” he said.

“Good morning, my life,” she replied, and kissed him.

“I have been thinking of Great Sky and Great Earth,” he said finally. “We need to—”

“It is done,” she said.

“What do you mean? The people need to know—”

“They know,” she said. “Everything is safe.”

“We need to teach them—”

She smiled. “It is done.”

He gazed into her wide, placid eyes, and … the voices of fear within him faded. Died. It was the strangest thing. It was a new thing.

“Yes,” Frog said. “Then … it is good?”

“Yes. Everything is good. Everything is perfect.”

Frog did not understand. “You lost your mother,” he said.

“I never had a mother,” T’Cori replied.

He stared at her, uncertain. “Stillshadow,” he said. “She was your mother. Your teacher.”

T’Cori shook her head. “Stillshadow was not my mother. She was not my teacher.”

“Then … what was she?”

Within their shadowed hut, her eyes were focused on something far away, beyond the valley walls. Beyond Great Sky and Great Earth. Beyond Frog and Mouse and Naya and the things of this world. “She was me.”

Was it his imagination, or did her eyes seem a bit darker than they had just a moon ago?

If Ant and Snake could find healing, what of Frog? What wound was there for him to close? Only one, the one torn in his soul by the emptiness
atop Great Sky. He now knew the meaning of that emptiness. And that if his curse was to be the only one to see it, it was his responsibility to fill it or walk his life in a shadow deep enough to devour thought and hope and happiness.

Only one thing could fill a void so deep and terrifying.

He took his woman into his arms and, feeling her heartbeat against his own, knew he had made the right choice.

“What is it, Frog?” she said. “Something just changed in you. I see it in your
num.”

He laughed, aflame with a joy bright enough to banish any darkness. “I do not know if I believe in
num. Or jowk
or gods,” he said at last. “But I believe in you.”