The Unfinished Song: Taboo (27 page)

Gwenika and Gremo exchanged a look. Gwenkia patted her. “I’m sure we’re in good hands. Just aim
away
from the hut.”

The bear-masked warriors kept coming at Kavio and Rthan.

“Grab on!” shouted Rthan when half a dozen men encircled them. Kavio linked elbows with him and Rthan spun around while Kavio ran his feet over all their faces in a circle. Kavio rolled off Rthan’s back and they both punched two men to the ground at the same time, on opposite sides of the ring of fallen bodies. They shared a grin of grim amusement.

Then Rthan shouted, “Watch out!” and tackled Kavio just as another spear sped toward the space where Kavio had stood.

“You saved my life,” Kavio said.

“Now we’re even.”

“The fight isn’t over yet.” Kavio grinned. “I might still get you back in my debt.”

“Fa!” Rthan braced as the Yellow Bear warriors regrouped for a second attack. “I’m more likely to save your scrawny neck again.”

The surviving bear-masked attackers approached from one side. Vultho, ever the coward, led them…from behind. On the other, another group of Yellow Bear warriors gathered, the men they had brought with them on the peace journey, who in theory, at least, answered to Kavio. He had no idea how many of them had been working with Vultho all along. If the odds were a dozen against a dozen, they had a chance, but if all two dozen Yellow Bears warriors were arrayed against just the two of them… those were odds even two formidable Zavaedies could not defeat.

“Are you with me or him?” Kavio asked his men directly. “Will you defend Vultho’s treachery, or the
true
honor of Yellow Bear?”

“Kavio, you fool, they are
all
with
me.
” snarled Vultho. “Did you really think any Yellow Bear warrior of honor would follow this doomed ‘peace mission’?  I lost a clan brother in the Assault on the Tor of the Stone Hedge. Did you think I would redeem his deathdebt for a basket of shells? For
anything
less than blood? As for you, Rthan, I will make you wail like a baby again, as I did before my vengeance was interpreted at the Victory Banquet. It’s a pity I won’t have the open credit of killing you both to add glory to my Shining Name, but it must be secret for now.”

“You will lie,” Kavio guessed out loud. “Blame Blue Waters for breaking the truce, killing the peace party.”

“For now. One day, all will know that I, Vultho, slew the hero of Blue Waters and the son of the White Lady,” boasted Vultho. “After Hertio has died, which won’t be long because he is fat and old, and he has few clans pledged to him any more, the elders will call
me
to become War Chief. Then all will know the glory of my deeds in war.”

“Will they also know you were on the New Moon Raid?” Rthan aimed his spear at Vultho, but too many of the bear-masked warriors stood between them for Rthan to find a clear shot.

“I slew many men that night,” laughed Vultho. “And many more sluts and brats, including Nargano’s own daughter!”

Rthan roared and plunged toward Vultho.

The dozen bear-masked warriors raised their spears.

The Yellow Bear warriors on the other side raised their spears too.

“For Kavio and the true honor of Yellow Bear!” they shouted in unison and rushed to fight the men in bear masks. Rthan reached the row first, and barreled right through them.

“We can still take them!” insisted Vultho, even as he scampered back out of Rthan’s reach, careful to keep other warriors between himself and Rthan.

Then Brena reappeared, standing on the roof of one of the huts, with a notched bow in her hand. Twenty or more Jumping Rock women climbed up beside her, all with bows and arrows. Even white-haired Aunty Baldy was there, though she could hardly draw back a bow.

“Gremo and Svego are with the children, safely hidden,” Brena called down. “We will fight by your side!”

A hail of arrows arced toward the bear-masked men, who scrambled out of the range of their fire.

Vultho found himself without cover. Rthan bore down on him.

“They’re too strong!” Vultho shouted at his henchmen.

“You just now figured that out, fishbait?” Rthan shouted back, closing the distance fast. “You’re going to die, you murdering bastard!”

“Retreat!” Vultho shouted. He and his men turned tail and ran, taking their wounded and dead with them.

Rthan would have chased them, probably all the way back to the Tors of Yellow Bear, but Kavio grabbed his shoulder.

“Rthan! If you kill Hertio’s kinsman, this peace journey will fall apart!”

“It’s already fallen apart!” Rthan wrenched himself free.

“No! Look! Vultho acted on his own authority, with just a few kinsmen for support. The rest of the men have remained loyal to me, which means this treachery did
not
come from Hertio. If we can seal a treaty, we can tell Hertio that Vultho has betrayed him, and ask for Vultho’s life to be forfeit. But you know that Hertio will never let you have Vultho’s life if you take it for your own revenge.”

“I don’t give a damn for Hertio! I have deathdebts to pay!”

“And so did Vultho,” Kavio said coldly. “From your attack on the Initiates. If this is to work, we have to give ground somewhere.”

Rthan drew heavy breaths, still maddened beyond listening.

“Please, Rthan,” Kavio added quietly. “Help me make this work.”

Rthan glanced up at Brena, who still held her bow. She was exchanging hugs of triumph with the Blue Waters womenfolk.

He nodded once.

The injured entered the healing hut in a steady stream. Dindi kept guard outside, with her bow ready, but no enemy approached. Instead, a group of miserable women and children, veiled in dirty rags, crept toward the hut, a few steps at a time, as if afraid she would shoot them. She lowered her bow, but it did not help. They still cringed when she called to them.

“Come closer,” she urged. “Do you require healing?”

The woman leading the group pulled away the rag that hid her face, revealing a slimy mass of oozing pustules.

“We do,” she rasped. “We are diseased. But we do not want to be. Can your healer help the likes of us?”

“I don’t know. Come with me.”

Dindi opened the leather flap and invited the Shunned to follow her into the hut.

“More? The elder said that was the last…” Gwenika trailed off when she saw who had entered the hut. “Oh.”

Gremo grunted in surprise.

“It’s forbidden to help them,” Dindi said in a low voice. “But they are suffering so greatly.”

Gwenika pressed her lips to a thin line.

“Please,” whispered the Shunned woman. “Please do not turn your mercy from us.”

Gwenika pleaded with Gremo. “We can’t stop now. These people need us.
Maybe more than the others.

Gremo said simply, “I am with you.”

“You know it is taboo,” Dindi cautioned. “Zavaedi Brena, Zavaedi Rthan, even Kavio, would not allow this. If Svego were to find out and tell Nargano, it might ruin any chance of the peace bargain being sealed. If you two heal them, no one besides we three must know.”

“You will not betray us?” Gremo asked.

“Gwenika is my friend,” Dindi said. “Besides.” She helped the Shunned woman remove her filthy cloak. “I think you are doing the right thing, no matter what the stupid taboo decrees.”

“Don’t let anyone know the Shunned are here, Dindi,” Gwenika said. “Knock three times on the wall if anyone comes close.”

Dindi returned to her position outside the hut. She could hear Gremo beating a drum and Gwenika playing a flute as they danced. It took all her self-control not to peek inside to see what
tama
they were using to help the Shunned.

Healing dances could eat a lot of time, and whatever they were doing, this dance was no exception. The music still wafted from inside when Dindi caught sight of Svego trotting toward the hut. Dindi knocked on the wall. The drum and flute paused.

Gwenika hissed through the door without opening it. “We need more time!”

Svego waved.

“The battle is over. There are a few warriors who need healing. Where are Gremo and Gwenika?”

The drum and flute started up again.
When he gets close enough,
Svego will hear it and wonder who could be inside
.

Dindi jogged forward to meet Svego. “What good news. Uh. It is good news? Did we win the battle? Is everyone still alive?”

“There was no one killed on our side.”

Svego tried to walk around her, but Dindi stepped in front of him again.

“Kavio is well?”

“Yes.” He stepped to the other side.

So did she. “And Brena too? And Rthan?”

“Yes and yes.” He stepped to the other side.

So did she.

“Great!”

“I appreciate your joy,” he said, putting his hands on her waist and lifting her bodily out of his way. The slender Olani was a lot stronger than he looked. “Now, stay out of my way and let me speak to Gremo.”

He swept past her, striding toward the hut.

“No,” said Dindi. She tried to go after him, reached to grab his back and instead tripped on her own foot. She went down. The corncob doll suddenly found itself in her hand.

After he kissed her, Vio released her and said nothing about it, as if the episode were concluded in his eyes. She touched her lips, marveling. No man had ever kissed her before. The experience left her shaking strangely.

Vio called for his warriors to bring the other three prisoners to join them in the tent. His “little brother Vumo
,”
as he called him, also showed up.

Vio rearranged
the sleeping furs around the edges
of the tent
, with the
magic Looking B
owl in the center.

“Sit,” he told the prisoners.

Danumoro hurried to Vessia’s side asking her without words if she had been hurt the night before. She shook her head.

Obran held tightly onto Finna, who clutched her stomach as she lowered herself to the fur rug.

Shula stood rooted in place, staring at the looking bowl.

“You see, Corn Maiden?” Vio pointed at Shula. “
She
knows what it really is.” In a more serious vein, he turned to Vumo. “Gidio and Nangi?”

“Gidio is inspecting the far side of the tribehold for a possible assault, and Nangi is attending the trial of that warrior from Banded Pot clan who tried to eat his horse.”

“That won’t take her long,” Vio said. “Let’s get this over with.”

“I’ll sit next to Vessia,” said Vumo.

“You’ll sit here and shut up.”

Making a face, Vumo sat. Besides Vio himself, that left Shula the last one standing.

“Waterfall Dancer, the time has come for me to request your favors,” Vio said to her.

A mix of dread and anger crawled over her face. “You hypocrite. You condemn me and all people like me to death for practicing
Many-Banded
magic, but then you want me to perform tricks for you, like one of your tamed horses?”

“It’s taken me years to assemble individuals who could be trusted, who had the right combination of Chromas,” said Vio. “And to find a water seer who could weave the dance together. It has to be you, it must be now.”