Time of the Eagle (10 page)

Again, people talked behind their hands.

I said, “I remind you, Mudiwar, that this prophecy is known also to the Navorans. My people have, as chief treasure, a letter from the Navoran Empress to my father. It has words about the Eagle's Time, and how it will mean a new life for the Navorans, too, and an end to the evil in their Empire. Three nations believe in the Eagle's Time—my people, and the Navorans, and the Hena.”

“Avala speaks true,” said Ramakoda. “I hold this prophecy to be a true foretelling of what might be, if we all will bend our bows to it.”

“If we were meant to be a part of it,” called out an old man, “wouldn't Gunateeta have told us?”

“Old Gunateeta couldn't foretell water boiling over a fire,” said one of the youths, and there was laughter.

Mudiwar banged his stick, and we waited for him to speak. At last he said, speaking directly to me, “As I see it, Shinali woman,
this prophecy is all about your people getting back their miserable bit of dirt. You think I care about that?”

I was dumb, trying to think of a reply.

“It's about more than that, my father,” said Ramakoda. “The Time of the Eagle would mean the end of Navoran supremacy.”

“Since when were the Navorans supreme over us?” shouted an old man. “We live free. Let the Shinali fight their own battles. They got into their mess with the Navorans—let them get themselves out of it!”

There were shouts of agreement. Then Ramakoda spoke. “You say that the Navorans aren't supreme?” he said, looking across to the old man who had last called out. “You say we live free?”

“We've always been free, my son,” said Mudiwar, and the elders nodded their heads.

Ramakoda stood up. “Have you all forgotten, so soon?” he cried. “Have you forgotten our kinsfolk taken in slavery? Our women and children still captives in the stone city? The ones who died fighting to save them? Have you forgotten how, not many winters past, we fled time and time again before the soldiers who hunted for us? Have you forgotten already this summer's battle, and the two and forty of our kin who were captured? And you want to be satisfied with this, and call it freedom? Where's their freedom—the ones who are slaves? Where is the freedom of your wives, your husbands, your brothers, your sisters, your children? Where is the freedom of my two sons? Where's the freedom of those who walk already in the shadow lands? The ones who sit among us now, with pieces sliced off their bodies, some of them blind or lamed? Is this our freedom?”

The tribe broke into an uproar, some agreeing with him, others shaking their heads. Mudiwar banged his gong, but it was a long time before they were quiet.

“My son Ramakoda asks if we have forgotten,” Mudiwar said. “I have forgotten nothing. Always there have been wars. The Hena we've fought, times past, and the Shinali. Now we fight the Navorans. Time to come, there will be new enemies. We heard this night, from Avala's own lips, that once the Shinali were a great nation, and it's the fault of the Navorans that they are a small tribe now, with nothing. But I say it's the Shinali people's own fault. I say they are diminished because of their own stupidity and weakness. They were the only ones who signed a treaty with Navora, the only ones to trade off some of their precious land, the only ones to live in the very shadow of the stone city. That is why they lost their soul strength—they gave it away. Well, we will give away nothing. We will fight for what we have, if we are attacked. We will defend ourselves. We will guard the freedom that we have. But we will not be wiped out because we are foolish.”

“My father, the Shinali are not foolish,” said Ishtok. “They are a people who have been much wronged against.”

“The Shinali
are
fools!” shouted Mudiwar. “They made a treaty with traitors! They got nothing but trouble for it. Now they have a crazy dream, and they want us to believe in it. Well, I will not. I will not invite the full wrath of the entire Navoran army down on our heads, and risk wiping out our nation, just so the Shinali can sit in their own dirt. I will not be a fool and lead my people to calamity, just because a prophet coughs up a crazy dream. I will not get caught up in the madness of the Shinali, lest we all
end up like them—a wasted tribe of outcasts, with nothing but regret and foolish dreams.

“I will not talk of this matter again. I have wasted enough breath on it. This is my final word.” He struggled to his feet and banged his stick, the sign that the meeting was over. People began to talk, to stand up to go. I sat where I was, numb. In disbelief I saw the Time of the Eagle fade like smoke, blown away by an old man's word.

Then Ramakoda called out, “There is one more word yet to be spoken, my father! It is a word of gratitude to Avala, for what she has done for us. You can ignore the freedom her people's prophecy offers us, you can ignore the call to rise up like a warrior in the fight against Navora, but you cannot ignore the good she has done in our camp in these past days. There is a word of blessing, of thankfulness, that needs to be spoken, before I take her back to her own people. This day I will take her, at sundown. I ask, my father, that you speak of our gratitude. That much, at least, you owe her, as chieftain of those she has healed.”

Gradually, people sat down again. Only Mudiwar and Ramakoda remained standing, both of them angry. Suddenly foreboding came over me, and I saw again the jagged clouds of my dream, plunging down to suffocate and entrap. In deepening dread I listened to Mudiwar.

“The Shinali woman has healed our loved ones well,” Mudiwar said. “For many days our priestess has withdrawn to her own tent, leaving the Shinali woman's
munakshi
strong and unhindered. I see it as a sign: that although Gunateeta remains our priestess, the Shinali woman is our healer now. She will live here among us as our slave and take over the care of all our sick. That
is my word, and I have spoken it.”

The clouds swarmed about me, heavy, unbearable. Ramakoda took my arm, pulled me to my feet. I clung to him, heard him say, his voice raised and distraught, “My father, when the Shinali woman helped me, on the way to these my own lands, I swore to her that I would take her home to her own place and her own people. I swore it out of the thankfulness of my heart. I swore it in a holy vow. I cannot go back on it.”

“Write your vow in the dust, my son,” said Mudiwar.

Through the violent shades I saw Ramakoda go to the ground at the edge of the feasting-mat. People moved back to give him room. I saw him kneel down, and with his forefinger he drew a circle in the dust. Through the circle he made two lines, crossing. “This is the circle of my life,” he said. “The long line signifies the force between the god of heaven and the god of earth, and the line across it signifies my vow.”

Mudiwar went over and moved his stick over the lines Ramakoda had drawn, until no sign of them remained. Then the
shoorai
wind came, wild and fitful, and swept the dust smooth.

“As your father and your chieftain, I wipe out your vow,” Mudiwar said. “The Shinali woman remains with us.”

Ramakoda stayed on his knees, though he raised himself and cried out, “We can't force her to stay, my father! Many times she could have escaped, on our way here. But she stayed with me, freely, out of goodness. She remains free, with the right to return to her own people. I promised her that. I swore it. I made my vow by the goddess of the earth and the god of the sky. It stands, sure as the earth, sure as the sky. It was my vow.”

“You made it, and I have unmade it,” said the chieftain. “I
swear the unmaking, by the same gods who made me chieftain, and by my blood, which is older than yours, and by my word, which is more powerful than yours. The unmaking is done. And the Shinali woman is now ours. Say no more. Go.”

Ramakoda stood, staggered a little, staring down at the dust. He looked shocked, devastated, his authority unmade, like his vow.

Trembling, my words rising, tumbling, I went over to Mudiwar and said, “I am not staying. I'm going back to my own people, with or without your blessing. You don't understand. By doing this, you are—”

While the words were still in my mouth, he lifted his hand and smacked it hard across my face. I fell sideways and collapsed. I lay there, stunned, the taste of blood and unfinished words bitter in my mouth.

“Never lift your voice to me again!” the chieftain shouted. “Not to me, not to anyone, not even a child or an animal. From this time forth, you are a slave.”

Then he walked away, limping badly again. Quickly, people got to their feet and went away. Those who yesterday had smiled at me in gratitude now turned from me as if I were an outcast. Ramakoda walked off toward the place where the horses grazed. I scrambled up and went after him, calling him, demanding that we speak; but he got on his horse and left me standing there, shouting my anger and fear to emptiness. Desolate, I stood gazing back at the feasting-mats. The slaves had begun to clear away the remains of the food. Women were gathering their children together, taking them down to the river to wash after the meal. They laughed and played and splashed one another as they washed, their day unchanged. All about me people went about
their work again, and everything was as before. Shocked, wandering, I went past the place where the chieftain's fateful words had been given. Two fateful pronouncements: the spurning of our Shinali prophecy, and the forbiddance of my return home. I glanced at my feet, at the earth where the mark of Ramakoda's vow had been made and then wiped out. And all was changed, for me.
All.

Slowly my gladness in these past days was all undone; and more slowly still, but with devastating sureness, my love for the Igaal people, my hope in the great prophecy of our unity, my belief in my own part in it, trickled away like blood into the dust. And then there was nothing left, nothing but uncertainty and disbelief, and the bitter rage of betrayal.

I
went back to Mudiwar's tent and sat on the floor. I was shaking, and my heart felt like a stone. After a while I got up and took off the Igaal dress I had been given, and put on my old Shinali dress with its faded paintings and frayed wool, and my own worn-out shoes. I searched through the beautiful carved chests until I found a bag for traveling, and a small pouch of flints. From another chest I took a waterskin and a straight-bladed knife. I did not consider the taking of these things theft, but only payment for the healings I had done. Beside one of the lamps was a large wooden bowl containing flat bread the Igaal had baked on hot stones, and I wrapped all the bread in a cloth and put that, too, into the bag. Finally I rolled up the sheepskin tunic my father had painted, ready to put into the bag for traveling. For a while I stood there, touching the wobbly canoes with my fingertips, thinking of all he had done for my people, to save them, to prepare the way for them to become a great nation again. Was his sacrifice also for nothing?

Angry and grieving, I sat down again and waited for Ramakoda to return.

Evening fell, and I missed the meal. Slaves came into the tent to light the lamps, then went out again. I was alone but for little Kimiwe, who slept. The boys were racing horses, for I could hear galloping, and people calling out, and much laughter. Near dark Ramakoda came in. He sat on a wooden chest in the lamplight, his hands over his face.

“I don't know what to say, Shinali woman,” he said hoarsely.

“You could say you are going to help me escape,” I said. “I'm ready to go.”

He dropped his hands and looked at the bag, at my Shinali clothes.

“I can understand your anger,” he said. “I—”

“You have no knowing of it!” I cried. “You could never have knowing of what I feel, unless I had called my people as you lay helpless in the desert, and we had taken you back to our camp and made a slave of you. But even then you couldn't know, because you have done nothing,
nothing
for my people, while I have poured out for the Igaal all my healing strength, all the best that was in me. I gave them our prophecy, our hope for the future of us all. I gave your people life—I gave
you
life, and your daughter—and I'm rewarded with slavery.”

He must have been deeply offended that I raised my voice to him, but he showed no anger. He said, very quietly, “It is no longer in my hands, Avala. My father has spoken.”

“You may bow to his will—everyone in this camp may bow to his will—but I won't. I'm returning home, Ramakoda, whether you take me there or not. The way is not difficult. And I can
walk quickly, and make the journey in little more than a day.” I added, to hurt him, “It won't take long, without a wounded hunter to support.”

He was silent for a long time. Then he said, “If you try to escape they will bring you back. You cannot get far; you'll be followed by men on horseback, and by the dogs, and when they bring you back you'll be punished. They'll whip you.”

“Then I'll refuse to heal your sick, and even your father will see no point in my staying here.”

“I think even someone with your stubbornness will soon tire of doing nothing all day. But if you accept our ways, you will find that life with us is not so bad. You will always be under my protection and will continue to live here in this tent as my kinswoman.”

“You swore that I would return to my own place, Ramakoda. You swore it. You're the chieftain's eldest son. You'll be chieftain when he goes. Yet your words, your vows, mean nothing. I won't stay in a place where vows mean nothing. We Shinali have a word we use when making a vow, or saying words strong in our heart. That word is
sharleema.
What is sworn with
sharleema
is sworn for all of time. What is asked for with
sharleema
must be given, for it is asked for with the whole heart. Gratitude spoken with
sharleema
means gratitude for all time to come. Our Shinali words hold power. And I swear this: I will return to my own people, for you Igaal have been treacherous and unthankful, and I don't trust any of you. I will go home. I swear that, with
sharleema.
I'll go home tonight, or die trying.”

“You won't die,” he said. “But you'll be brought back.”

“No one will know I'm gone, unless you tell them.”

“I won't tell anyone, Avala,” he said. Sighing heavily, and moving slowly as if he was unspeakably weary, he got up and went toward the tent door.

“I wish you farewell,” I said, and he stopped and turned around. “I hope the All-father stays with you, Ramakoda. And with Kimiwe. I have held you both in my heart, as friends.”

“Whatever happens, Shinali woman,” he said, “hold it in your heart, too, that to me you are a sister, loved as my own, and always shall be. And when the time comes and I am made chieftain of these people, we will seek out your nation, and join with you in your battle against Navora. That I swear, and when I am chieftain my swearing will not be wiped out.”

Then he left the tent. I rolled out my bedding and crawled in, hiding my packed bag under the blanket with me. When the moon was high the others came into the tent. No one saw that I was ready to escape, for I had the blanket pulled high about my neck to hide my Shinali dress. Ishtok came over to me and crouched a few moments by my bed, as if he wished to speak; but I kept my eyes closed, pretending sleep. Him, too, I blamed. They all were traitors.

It was a long time before the talking stopped, and people rolled out their beds and crawled in, and there were snores and the deep sighs of people asleep. Without a sound I got up, picked up the bag, and crept out.

It was a new moon, fine and sharp as a crescent Igaal blade, and for that I was glad, for the night was dark. The tents rose about me, black against the stars, and the rushing river sounded loud. Soundless on the dust, I crept among the tents and out toward the grasslands. Before me in the western skies hung the
great line of five stars, which we call the Nakula, the Pathway of the Sun, and beneath them stretched the brief plain and the distant forested hills.

I was almost past the last tents when shadows rose from the ground before me, and an awful growling and barking started up. The dogs! The cursed dogs! I whispered to them, spoke soothingly, for they knew me well; but the devils barked and growled, and several bared their teeth. I thought of running but was too afraid, not trusting them, for most of them had wolf blood. Then people came rushing from the tents to see what the noise was about, and there were angry shouts, and much Igaal swearing. I was taken back to Ramakoda's tent and roughly thrown in. He stayed on his bed, and I thought at first he did not hear the commotion. But he said, as I lay down on my own blankets, “You will have to plan better than that, Avala.”

For the rest of that night I lay awake, too angry and afraid and frustrated to sleep. Stupidly, I thought the botched escape would be ignored, since I did not even leave the camp; but the next morning Mudiwar spoke in a low voice to Ramakoda. I was getting the tangles out of Kimiwe's hair, and though I tried hard to listen, I could not hear their words. After, the chieftain went out and I heard the gong summoning the people together. Ramakoda would not tell me what it was about, but he sighed often, and after a while he told Kimiwe to stay in the tent and called me out with him.

All the people were gathered by the river. The chieftain was standing before them, and indicated for me to go and sit directly in front of him. Then they all fell silent, and he said, in heavy tones: “Last night you attempted to escape, Shinali slave.”

I replied, “Last night, chieftain, I attempted to keep a sacred vow that was made to me.”

Behind me people talked, and some called out in anger. The old man shouted for peace. “You have no voice in this gathering!” he said to me. “The only voice is mine. And these are my words: you will be punished for your disobedience. Twenty lashes. I will carry out the punishment.”

Terror rose in me and I tried to stand, to flee, but I was held by angry hands.

“Bind her,” said the chieftain, and a man came forward with a flax rope.

Then a voice called from the back of the crowd. “I claim the right of
somanshu
.”

It was Ramakoda's voice, and it was followed by talking again, and loud cries. I turned to see Ramakoda striding forward, and people trying to stop him. Someone called out to Ramakoda, “There's no need, Ramakoda! She's only a Shinali!”

But he came forward, and without looking at me said to his father, “I claim the right of
somanshu.
I have that right, since the Shinali woman lives in my tent as my guest.”

“She's not your guest,” said the old man, and he shook with rage. “She is your slave.”

“You have wiped out a vow I made with my lips, my father,” said Ramakoda, “but you cannot wipe out what is in my heart. I owe Avala my life, and the life of my youngest child. Avala is not slave to me, but guest and kinswoman. And so I claim the right of
somanshu.
Unless, of course, you wish me to draw a sign of
somanshu
in the dust, so you can wipe out that sacred law, also.”

The silence was so deep and wide, I could hear the river flowing, and the whirring of a bird's wings as it flew over us. Then the old man said, his voice quavering with rage or grief, I could not tell which, “Then I accept your right. But I've already said that I'm the one who will carry out the punishment. Will you ask for someone else to do it?”

Ramakoda said, “Not many hours ago, my father, you said your word is more powerful than mine. And so it is. The punishment is yours to carry out, the right to be punished is mine.”

And so it was that I was spared, and the Igaal chieftain was forced to whip his own son. Ramakoda made no sound while it was done, but the old man wept. And three things came of it, that whipping: though they did not speak of it, there was a deep rift after, between the chieftain and his eldest son; there was a rift, too, between me and the Igaal people, for they blamed me for the chieftain's punishment upon his son; and the third thing that happened, that anguished me, was that I realized I could not risk another failed attempt at escape, lest more stripes be cut into Ramakoda's back. Next time, I could not fail.

Days went by, and the new moon came and went, and a terrible despair took hold on me. Everything I had believed in had gone. I was left empty, hollow like a reed flute. I no longer knew what I wanted. Escape seemed impossible, for I was never alone; by day the children shadowed me, and by night the dogs were my guards. The yearning for my home, for my mother and my own people, was like an ache in the core of me; but I did not think that I could face them again, now that I had done my work as
Daughter of the Oneness, and failed, and that the Igaal chieftain had spat on our great prophecy. My whole life, the reason for my being, was wiped out, and all Zalidas's fine words over me seemed like a mockery.

Even my slavery seemed a joke now, since none of the Igaal came to me. The healing tent was empty, the medicines unused, yet Mudiwar commanded that I stay there every day, dawn till dusk, since that was my place. I was glad no one came to me for healing, for I did not truly care anymore about the Igaal people, and the tent flap of my heart was closed to them.

I did not speak to anyone, even Ishtok. At night he still placed his sleeping things near mine, as a sign that he remained my friend, but I refused to talk to him. One night while I wept he reached his hand across the dark and stroked my hair. I longed to take his hand and press it to my cheek, to feel the warmth and comfort of him, but in my bitterness and grief I pulled away and kept quiet and pretended to sleep. Cruel to him I was, and to myself, in my great misery.

Then one day a hunter was carried into my healing-tent. There had been a bad accident in the mountains, and he had got an arrow through his belly. His companions had pulled the arrow out, but the barb had torn his innards and dragged some of them outside his skin. He was screaming when they brought him, and straightaway I tried to ease his pain, placing my hands on the back of his neck to block the pathways of his pain. Chimaki was with me, already lighting the fire to heat up the knives and needles and tendons. But the man kept on weeping and moaning, and the white light from my hands would not flow, and
all my powers seemed scattered and undone. I could not help him. Chimaki came and sat on the other side of him, her face anxious and bewildered.

At last I withdrew my hand from the man's neck. “I can't stop his pain,” I said, distraught. “We'll have to work quickly. Call Ramakoda and some of the men, to hold him.”

It was a cruel healing, and the hunter moaned and howled until he fainted, and I could hardly see what I was doing, for sweat and tears. After, he got poison fever. That night I lay beside him while he groaned, my mind fixed upon the healing force that should have poured through all of him. But the force went nowhere, and I grew exhausted while his pain and fever increased.