Brother Wind (60 page)

“Waxtal lies,” Big Teeth said. “He has no men with him. Some way he lived through the winter, and now he comes in the night to make us think he has great power.”

Big Teeth cupped a hand around his mouth, called out to Waxtal, “Your wife Blue Shell is dead.”

For a time Waxtal did not speak, then Samiq heard laughter, and Waxtal said, “Already the spirits avenge me. Then I will take Chagak. Woman for woman. Tell Kayugh he can keep his daughter, the small one, Wren. I do not need her.”

“You will not have my wife, nor any of my daughters!” Kayugh said. “Not Red Berry, not Wren, not Kiin, not Three Fish.”

“He is alone,” Big Teeth said. “Return to your ulas. I will stay outside and watch until morning. He cannot throw a spear far enough to hit me from the water, and I will not let him come on the beach.”

But Samiq, while waiting, had lifted prayers to the Mystery, that Creating Spirit. He felt the power of that One surround him, and suddenly he knew that Waxtal spoke the truth. He had brought others with him. Samiq felt the hard, warring spirits of hunters, the strong, flowing spirits of women, and, to his surprise, the smaller spirits of children and babies.

“He does not lie,” Samiq said to Kayugh and Big Teeth. “He has brought many with him, even women, even children.”

“Why?” Big Teeth asked.

“Who can understand Waxtal?” said Samiq.

“Who are they?” Kayugh asked. “Are they First Men? Are they Walrus?”

As if in answer to Kayugh’s question, Samiq heard another voice: “Samiq, I will fight you for the woman Kiin. Last time I took your hand; this time I will take your life.”

A rush of blood pumped into Samiq’s arms and legs. “It is Raven,” he said to his father. “Somehow he knows Kiin is here.”

“You told me you were ready to fight him,” Kayugh said.

Samiq heard the confidence in his father’s voice and so called out to Raven, “I will fight you. If I win, Kiin stays here and Waxtal leaves us.”

“It is fair,” Raven said.

Samiq heard the murmur of protest, Waxtal’s high, thin voice, but then there was silence, and in the silence Samiq again felt the spirits of those with Waxtal, remembered the sounds and tastes and smells of the Whale Hunter village.

“They are Whale Hunters,” Samiq said to Kayugh. “Waxtal has brought the Whale Hunters.”

“No, Samiq,” his father said. “Why would Whale Hunters come here? He has found Raven, brought him and some of the Walrus People.”

Over the water, Samiq heard the thin wail of a baby’s cry, then Waxtal’s voice, in anger, scolding the child’s mother. “Whale Hunters,” Samiq said again. “Somehow he has brought them here.”

He cupped his left hand around his mouth, called out, “Dying Seal, Hard Rock, Crooked Bird!”

At first there was no answer, then Crooked Bird’s voice came, “You, Samiq, did you think you could kill us with your curse? We are Whale Hunters. Our power is greater than yours. You are nothing. We have come to kill you and break the curse you left on our island.”

“You know I did not curse your island,” Samiq said. “If my powers were that great, you would be fools to try to kill me. But you have women with you. Children. They are welcome, and any hunter who comes as friend. We have food and oil and a good beach. Together we can be a strong village. Together we can hunt and teach our sons to hunt. Who can say why a mountain grows angry and destroys a village? Perhaps it is not something men can understand. But we must go on; we must hunt and eat and live.”

“You are the fool, Samiq,” Crooked Bird said.

Then Raven called out: “Samiq, I do not care what these Whale Hunters do. If they fight or do not fight. I have come for Kiin. You cannot change my mind with words.”

“I said I would fight you,” Samiq called out. “In the morning, on this beach.”

“On the beach, now,” Raven said.

“We cannot see,” Samiq answered.

“Light fires. I will wait.”

“Come when you are ready,” Samiq called and went back to his ulaq, to his wives and children, to his weapons, while Kayugh and Big Teeth gathered seal bones and oil, wood and grass, and started two fires, one on each end of the flat place where the men would fight.

“Grass Ears and his wives, Chin Hairs and his children, Shale Thrower and her husband, two Whale Hunter women,” Woman of the Sky said.

“There are many more,” said her sister, but Woman of the Sky did not answer. Each woman carried death mats doubled over her forearms, the mats heavy enough to make the women bend forward as they walked.

“The children?” Woman of the Sky asked.

“Some were killed, and all the men, half of the women.”

Woman of the Sky looked at Ice Hunter’s lodge. “My son’s wife?” she asked, her voice a whisper.

“She is alive. She is with the children. But Bird Sings’ wife is dead.”

“Who takes care of her baby?”

“Her sister. Be glad that your son and grandsons are safe.”

“They are with Raven,” Woman of the Sky answered. “They are not safe.”

“They will come back to us,” Woman of the Sun said.

Her sister straightened against the weight of the death mats. “It was because of the babies—Kiin’s sons.”

“They are both alive,” said Woman of the Sun. “I told her to give one to the wind spirits, but she would not. She said Takha was dead, but he was not. I knew. When the babies were small, we could have taken one. It would not have been difficult.”

“It is always difficult to take a life.”

“To save so many?”

“I have never convinced myself that we should be the ones to make that choice. So do not blame yourself,” Woman of the Sky said. “I also knew Takha was alive.”

“How did you know?” Woman of the Sun asked. “You do not have dreams.”

“No, I do not have dreams. But I know you. I know what I see in your eyes, and I knew that Kiin’s sons were alive.”

“The one was evil. He should have died.”

“No, sister,” said Woman of the Sky. “He was not evil. In that, your dreams are wrong. Evil uses what it can to cause pain. The evil is in Raven. If anyone should be dead, it is he. If Kiin’s babies had died, the evil would have come to us some other way. Why else these?” she asked and lifted her arms, pointed with her chin to the death mats she carried.

Kukutux sat with the other women in the ik. From the water, the village was only a darkness on the shore, but as the fires caught and the flames rose, she could see the mounds of the ulas, could see the people gathered on each ulaq roof. Kukutux hunched her shoulders, and the cramp that pulled at her back muscles eased.

I should have stayed with She Cries and Many Babies in the Walrus village, she told herself. I need to spend days on the beach; I need to sew and weave, dig clams and gather sea urchins.

But Waxtal had wanted her to see the village where he would be chief, and he did not want to go back to the Walrus village to get her once the battle was won.

Kukutux shook her head. This was no village—four, five ulas, a few drying racks, and a handful of hunters. But it was not much worse than the Whale Hunter village, she thought. And the ulas were in good repair; the people, what she could see of them, looked strong and healthy.

“There is no curse here,” she whispered.

But Samiq was here. She had heard his voice, and she remembered him—the Seal Hunter man who had come to their village, who had called so many whales. Had Hard Rock forgotten that? Had he forgotten the whales the young man brought them? The village had never been stronger. The curse had come when Hard Rock made Samiq stop hunting, when he gave him boy’s work to do instead of honoring him as a man. Perhaps the curse was as much Hard Rock’s as Samiq’s.

She kept the ik well back from the beach, she and the women with her, so the fire would not show the First Men that they waited.

Raven would fight, Hard Rock had agreed. Then if Samiq was not dead, Hard Rock would fight, then another hunter, and another, until Samiq died and the curse was lifted from the Whale Hunters.

But, Kukutux thought, what if there is no curse?

H
E CAME IN BLACK FEATHER CLOAK,
a knife in each hand, hair flowing like water over his shoulders. He was a tall man, but thin. One of Samiq’s arms was as thick as two of Raven’s, but Samiq could not keep his eyes from the man’s hands, each whole and strong, each gripping a long-bladed knife.

Two strong hands, said some voice in Samiq’s mind. Two strong hands against your weakness. Samiq shook his head to clear the doubt and untied the straightening bone from his forefinger. He placed Amgigh’s knife in his right hand and tightened his fingers on the handle.

“You, Raven of the Walrus, you have two knives,” Samiq called. He waited for some voice to translate his words, but Raven answered with no translation.

“Get another knife,” he said and laughed. “I will wait. The fight must be fair.”

Samiq heard the taunting in his words and with sinking heart understood that Raven knew about his hand. He turned to the men gathered near him on the beach, to those who stood in the orange light of the beach fires, and stretched out his left arm, asking for a knife. His father offered his knife, one also made by Amgigh, but then Small Knife came from the ulas. Lifting his knife from the scabbard that hung from his neck, Small Knife said, “Father, you are a man of two people. Let your strength come from two tribes.”

Kayugh nodded and stepped back, and Samiq accepted Small Knife’s weapon. It was a short knife. The blade, thrusting out from the space between his thumb and forefinger, was no longer than Samiq’s thumb, and the handle tucked easily into the palm of the hand. The andesite blade was crudely made, but the point was as sharp as the end of a whale harpoon.

Samiq turned to face Raven, but Small Knife caught his arm, turned him back, and said, “Wait. It will be better this way.” He moved the knife so the blade pointed down from Samiq’s fist. “To thrust,” Small Knife said and made a downward motion with his hand.

“Yes,” Samiq said. “Yes.” And he turned again to Raven.

Raven threw off his cloak, stretched himself tall, and waited. Samiq slipped out of his parka. The night wind was cold against Samiq’s skin, but he felt only the hardness of the knives in his hands. He held his right hand out, blade up, kept his left hand down at his side.

“You said the fight must be fair,” Samiq said to Raven.

“You complain about your hand?” Raven asked. “I do not force you to fight. Give me Kiin. I will leave.”

“The fight is not fair because I have strength earned in prayer, in fasting.”

“You think I do not pray?” Raven asked.

“A man who seeks that Spirit greater than himself does not need a knife to prove his power.”

“Fool!” said Raven. “No one is greater than I am!”

“You say your power is equal to the power of the spirits?” asked Samiq.

“Yes,” said Raven. “I call spirits. They do what I ask. You do not see them, but there are spirits in the fires, spirits hovering in the darkness. Listen.”

Suddenly a voice called from beyond the fires, a cry like a woman mourning.

“Already your grandmother’s spirit mourns your death,” Raven said.

A second voice came from the fire behind Samiq. “There is no hope for you, Samiq,” the voice said. “Soon you will be with me in the spirit world.”

Almost, Samiq turned, but a quietness came to him, an assurance of his own strength.

A third voice spoke, and this time Samiq watched Raven, watched carefully how the man held his head. He watched his mouth, the stiffness of his lips. It is a trick, Samiq thought. Only that—a trick.

Samiq spoke as if there had been no voices.

“Kiin is my wife,” he said. “She will stay here with me.”

“She is worth your life?”

“Yes,” Samiq said, “and she is also worth yours.”

“You have learned then to fight with knives?”

“I fight with more than knives,” Samiq said. He held up the knife in his right hand. “This blade cries for your blood,” he told Raven. “With this blade you killed my brother—a blade he himself made. Since that day, this knife in all its spirit thoughts has wanted nothing else but to taste your blood.”

“Your many words only show you are afraid of my knives,” said Raven. He stepped forward, swung his blade in an arc toward Samiq’s belly. Samiq jumped back, made a sound of disgust low in his throat.

Samiq took three quick steps, turning his body sideways to give Raven’s blade less chance to strike. When Raven advanced, Samiq slashed with his left hand, drawing blood on his first attack, a thin cut along the bone of Raven’s right forearm.

Raven leaped back, and Samiq jumped forward again, blocking Raven’s right arm with his left, arm against arm, bone against bone. Then he slashed in toward Raven’s belly with his right hand, with the long black stone of Amgigh’s obsidian blade. Again Samiq drew blood, and this time, as the wound opened across Raven’s belly, Samiq heard the hiss of breath from those standing near.

“You are slow,” Samiq said and moved in again to draw blood, this time from a cut across Raven’s cheek.

Raven did not flinch. Instead he came forward to meet Samiq’s thrust and to slash with his right hand, a long stroke that caught Samiq’s side, the blade going through skin to grate along Samiq’s ribs. But Samiq ignored the pain and tried to slash Raven’s neck. Raven spun, turning so quickly that Samiq’s knife met only air. In the turn, Raven thrust toward Samiq’s shoulder with the blade in his left hand, but Samiq let himself fall, and, in falling, tangled Raven’s feet with his own. Raven landed heavily on his belly, and his left-hand knife was thrust to the hilt into the beach sand.

Raven pulled out his knife, then both men were again on their feet, both with bodies marked by blood, both with sides heaving as they drew in long breaths of air.

“You have learned much,” Raven said and paused as though to give Samiq time for words, but Samiq said nothing. Then Raven, knees bent into a crouch, said, “There is more to power than strong arms and good knives, Seal Hunter.” He lifted his voice, called out toward the darkness, the words in the Walrus tongue.

Samiq saw the ikyan he had known were there, not only the long, clumsy ikyan of the Walrus Hunters, but the fine, sleek ikyan built by Whale Hunters.