The Animal Wife (18 page)

Then he stood straight, and to my great surprise, he was not a man at all but a small young woman with little pink breasts, a rounded belly red from the cold, and a crotch thick with curly hair that streamed with water. And I all but knew her! She was the woman with the horses, the naked woman at the pool by Uske's Spring!

Stripping water from her arms, she slowly lifted her long, rounded thighs, one after the other, as she waded right to us. She then took her hair in both hands to squeeze water out of it, turning her head sideways as she did. Thus she faced me. Our eyes met.

She froze. I saw her eyes growing wide and her mouth opening as she drew in her breath to scream. I saw her start to turn, and before I knew what I was doing, I leaped forward, dove at her, caught her wrists in my left hand, and ducking under her arms, forced my right shoulder into her belly. Her breath left her in a great cough. Burning with strength as if from drinking blood, I stood up straight. The woman rode my shoulder like the carcass of a deer.

I heard her gasping. Tighter than I have ever held anything, I held her wrists against my left side, her legs against my belly. Then, amazed at myself and what I was doing, I turned and ran. The woman's weight and my great speed astonished me. My eyes found the trail even as I leaped over the juniper, while a thought seemed to come from nowhere into my mind that I was leaving behind both my spear and my parka. I realized I didn't want them.

At my back I heard Andriki. He didn't dare to shout, but his hoarse whisper seemed as loud as a shout. "What are you doing? What are you doing? Stop, Kori! Stop!"

I didn't answer Andriki. I was saving my breath for running and my attention for the trail. I wasn't sure myself what I was doing. I only knew that whatever it was, I was doing it very well. Downhill I hurried, half running, half staggering, holding tight to the heavy, naked woman who jounced on my shoulder, whose bare skin was heating the side of my face and throwing sunlight into my eyes, making me giddy. I tried not to grunt or let my breath seem labored—I wanted her to know my strength. It didn't occur to me to wonder why she wasn't crying.

On I ran, Andriki behind me, until it came to me that the woman was choking. I stopped, bent, and set her feet on the ground, still holding her wrists tightly. It shocked me to see that her face was red and twisted; she was crying and choking at the same time. Suddenly anxious, I let go of one of her hands and waited while she gasped.

I was also surprised by the sight of Andriki. I had often seen him angry, but I had never seen him enraged. His face too seemed twisted as he looked wildly from me to the woman to the summits of the hills now far above us, the hills from which, I suddenly realized, this woman's people would soon come running. Andriki had thought to bring my spear and parka, which he threw down. "Her people will kill us!" was all he could say. "Let her go. We'll run while we can!"

I drew a deep breath while my eyes took in this gasping woman, at last getting air, at last not so red in the face. She was a stranger, it was true. She was crying and angry—I was sorry about that. And possibly her people wouldn't want me to have her.

Yet there she stood in front of me, the pulse of her wrist like a bird in my hand, the bare flesh of her body calling mine. I saw how Andriki could run if he wanted. I saw how this woman's people could chase us if they liked. And I saw that if they did, I would surely fight them, since this woman was theirs no longer. She was mine.

I turned to Andriki. "Run," I said. "I'll follow. Leave me my spear."

"There's your spear," said Andriki, pointing his lips at the spear on the ground, then looking over his shoulder at the brushy slope down which a band of armed and angry men should soon be charging. "Will you carry her and fight too?"

"I'll do my best, Uncle. I'll die before I let her go."

Andriki gave me a long look. Then, picking up my spear and parka, he pointed his lips at the trail. "Try leading her, then," he said. "But hurry! Let's not die if we don't have to."

By now the woman's breath was coming fast but naturally. Her eyes had opened very wide, and were looking from Andriki's face to mine. I pulled her arm. "Come on," I told her. She didn't move but instead, like an animal about to leap, stared at my eyes. What did she find there? I saw that her lids were swollen and her lashes very short, that her irises were the darkest I'd ever seen. On each shining surface I could see the brushy hills behind me and the tiny outline of my head and shoulders against the sky. Her pupils were shrunken, small, pointed at me. I saw danger.

"Move," said Andriki suddenly, poking her bare back with his spear. He shouldn't have done it. If he had seen her eyes, he wouldn't have done it. She kicked at my groin with a force that would have dropped me if I hadn't quickly turned to take most of the blow on my hip, twisting her arm behind her as I did.

Snatching my spear by its middle, I jabbed the blade at this woman. She stiffened, but stood still. "Walk," I said, poking her again. As the skin of a horse will shrink from a fly, her skin shrank from the blade, but she didn't obey. "Do you hear?" I asked. Her jaw began to shudder, but she gave no other sign.

Andriki put his face close to hers. "Walk!" he shouted. Now she looked terrified, and her eyes darted from me to Andriki, as if she were trying to learn what we meant. "She hears, all right," said Andriki. "Tie her hands. Hurry!" So although she suddenly began to struggle violently, I tied her hands, wrapping my belt around her wrists and Andriki's belt around her neck to make a lead between her and me.

Again Andriki started down the hill. I gestured with my lips and chin for the woman to follow. When she seemed slow to start, I poked her again with my spear. At this, out of her mouth came a flood of speech, a tumble of sounds without meaning. Her voice was high, nervous, and her eyes almost popped. Then suddenly she gestured with her lips and chin to something behind me. Startled, I turned to see, which was all she needed to aim another mighty kick. This caught me in the groin and doubled me over. Then Andriki clubbed her head with both his fists together, a blow that sat her down in the bushes with her legs spread.

Although the terrible pain had robbed me of speech, although my eyes could hardly focus, I clenched my jaws and forced the words "Get up!" between my teeth. She stared at me but didn't move.

"She doesn't know real speech," said Andriki. "Get up!" he said, jerking upward on the belt that tied her hands. She struggled to her knees, stood, then slowly followed Andriki as I limped behind her, the lead in one hand, my spear in the other. I saw that our tussles had raised a cloud of dust as conspicuous as a campfire, so I kept watch over my shoulder, sure that at any moment her people would come.

We reached the trail. My pain was leaving. To my surprise Andriki crossed the trail, led us into the woods, and started toward the lodge through the forest. A small doubt rose in my mind as I saw how he was taking us. "The tiger, Uncle," I reminded him. "The Lily."

"You think him dangerous?" asked Andriki. "What if this woman's people have set an ambush for us? Armed men are more dangerous."

Even in the forest, where our footsteps didn't raise dust easily, I tried to look for every sign of her people, and gripped my spear, ready to fight. But I couldn't keep my mind off the woman in front of me—my dreams for her had begun. I watched her scratched rump, untouched by Scars of Ohun. Our women would scarify her, and I would get her pregnant. I watched the callused palms of her upturned hands. She would make clothing for me with those hands. I watched the wind lifting her black hair, now getting dry and tangled. I would show her the ways of our people, how to speak, how to braid her hair. I almost forgot the pain from her kick as I watched her, as the sight of her filled my eyes and plans for her filled my mind.

Then, as my eyes roamed up and down the fine powder of dust on her skin, I noticed that the insides of her thighs were clean. The air had dried her after her swim, then dust had powdered her, then something had wet her between her legs. As I watched her there, interested, a drop of blood slowly crept toward her ankle. Menstruation!

The sight shocked me. The woman seemed unaware. Quickly I looked at my shirt, where I had carried her, to see if she had stained me. Blood there too—a smear on my chest! "Uncle! She's menstruating," I said.

His sudden stop surprised the woman. Both then faced me, Andriki anxious, the woman afraid. "Your shirt," said Andriki uneasily.

"I'll take it off. Watch her while I do." I threw him the end of his belt, so he could hold her. Andriki took it, and also prodded her with his spear so she would know we hadn't forgotten her. I pulled the shirt over my head, careful not to let the stain touch my face. Then I dropped the shirt on the ground as Andriki and I looked at each other, dismayed.

But the woman looked bewildered. Was she stupid? She didn't seem to understand what was wrong. She didn't even seem to care that she was menstruating. Didn't she know? Had she put menstrual blood into the pond? She must have! Why? Were her people animals that they didn't know better than to foul water?

Worried by this new thing, I put on my parka and used my spear to poke the shirt away. It was useless to me. The woman looked at it. Lifting it on the point of my spear, I thrust it at her. Of course, with tied hands she couldn't take it. Again she stared, first at the shirt, then at me, with dangerous eyes.

"Free her hands," said Andriki.

"You do," I said, my eyes on hers. "You're behind her."

So he did. She took my shirt and put it on. It hung partway down her thighs. Reaching into the neck, I pulled out Andriki's belt, and reaching up inside the sleeves, I found her wrists, which I again tied together. Then I poked her to follow Andriki. She obeyed, glancing in every direction for people who might save her. Now and then, as if from an animal, a drop of blood would crawl down her leg and onto the path, like a snare for my foot. But then and later no sickness came to me, so I know that I sidestepped the drops.

Perhaps I should have been angry with the woman for her reckless menstruation. Perhaps I should have been afraid of her people, of the revenge they might take for her capture. Certainly I should have worried about facing my Uncle Maral, whose anger I knew would be hot and very great. Yet the nearer we came to the stream, then to the lodge, the less these things worried me. Instead my heart beat so joyfully I could almost hear it, filling me with pride, with strength. All by myself I had taken this woman whose bare feet stepped neatly in the tracks left by Andriki. As in the very best of hunting, I had seen at once what should be done and I had acted quickly and bravely. By Ohun's will, the woman wasn't even pregnant. I would change that. This woman was young. She was strong. She had many children in her. This woman would start my lodge and my family. She and those children would be mine.

B
ECAUSE SHE SWAM
I named my woman Muskrat. Later, after I could make some sense out of her speech—the jabber she had shouted while we brought her to the lodge—I learned she had another name in her own tongue, Dabe Nore. But almost from the start she answered to Muskrat. Anyway, we called her that.

So began a time of great excitement, for me and for us all, starting with Maral's rage when Andriki and I came home with a captive. As we waded across the stream, Maral happened to crawl through the coldtrap and stand up. I almost laughed aloud to see how he looked at us three times—first the quick glance that noticed us, next the puzzled, scowling gaze that found three of us instead of two, and finally the open-mouthed stare of disbelief that took in Muskrat's bare legs and tattooed forehead. His anger came. "By Ohun's name!" he shouted. "What have you here?"

The shout brought people tumbling out of the lodge, gaping at what they saw. They all began shouting.

"Andriki has a stranger!"

"Is it a child?"

"It's a woman!"

"We'll be attacked!"

"The children—where are they?"

"Find them!"

"Death is searching for us! Get your spears!"

The excitement seemed to frighten my woman. Wide-eyed, she braced her legs and wouldn't move. With my spear I prodded her between the shoulders, and with my foot I gave her a shove in the rump. In spite of herself, she stumbled forward.

"Madmen!" shouted Maral. "Turn her loose! She'll get us killed!"

Strangely calm, Andriki shrugged to show his half-brother that he was helpless to change things. I, in contrast, was blazing with pride, shivering with strength and excitement. Nothing my Uncle Maral could have said or done would have made any difference to me. Far from it! I laughed because I felt so happy. And hot, but pretending to be cool, I answered him. "She's my captive, Uncle. You needn't fear her."

"Is this your doing, Kori?" cried Maral, turning toward me. "How will you fight her people?"

"There were no other people."

"But they're somewhere! You saw their smoke! You went to scout them! Are you insane, to say there was just this one woman alone?"

"We saw no others," I said.

"Do you say there are none?"

Andriki's show of calmness was fading. Seeing that I was dodging Maral's questions, he answered instead. "Of course there must be others," he said.

To me Maral shouted, "Did you remember we have only five men here when you got us into a battle with strangers?"

But I had made up my mind that nothing would part me from this woman, so I was ready to fight Maral if need be. "I'll fight whom I must—even you, Uncle," I said loudly.

These words made him very angry. He strode toward me. So I stepped in front of my woman, ready to meet him. But Andriki stepped in front of me. "Save your fighting for the strangers," he said. "Are we women, to fear them? Let them come for us! They'll save us the trouble of searching for them. Or if they fear to visit us, I'll scout them, to learn how many they are and what weapons they carry. Perhaps we can easily fight them. Who knows? Perhaps we can capture more women!"

But Maral wasn't listening to Andriki. "So you would fight me, Kori? You, my son-in-law! My brother's child! You would fight me?"