Ivory Carver 02 - My Sister the Moon (31 page)

Qakan had lost weight over the winter, and the bones of his face were sharper, his eyes deeper in their sockets. 

"I have g-given you everything I have to g-give," Kiin said. "The other b-baskets and m-m-mats are for my husband's ulaq, and I have m-made no carvings since the babies were born." 

"I do not need your mats," Qakan said, spitting out the words, disdain in his eyes. "What good thing can a trader expect to get from woman's work?" 

"You d-do not need my carvings then," Kiin replied, her voice even, her eyes on her weaving. "Bring them back. Perhaps m-m-my husband needs them." 

She did not look up at Qakan, but knew he would be scowling. "You are hungry?" she asked. Sometimes, when Yellow-hair was angry for several days, Qakan came to her to get dried fish or to stay for a night. 

"No." 

Kiin sighed. "Why are you here?" 

"You should come with me to the beach," he said. "I need to talk to you." 

Kiin looked at him, narrowed her eyes. "You are leaving s-soon. To t-trade," she said. 

"Yes." 

"Will Yellow-hair g-g-go with you?" 

"No." 

"You want m-me to p-paddle your ik." 

"No," Qakan said. 

"Do n-n-not take Yellow-hair back to our people." 

"I told you she will not go with me." 

Kiin felt the corner of her mouth twitch. Everyone in the village laughed about Qakan and Yellow-hair; everyone knew about their arguments; everyone knew Yellow-hair often kicked Qakan from her bed. Twice Kiin had found the Raven with Yellow-hair in their sleeping platform. Three times Lemming Tail had found them, and though it did not matter to Kiin what the Raven did with other women, each time Lemming Tail found them, she became sullen and angry. 

It would be that way when the Raven finally took Kiin to his bed, Kiin knew. Each night Lemming Tail watched the Raven, and each time he looked at Kiin, Lemming Tail went to him, distracted him with the stroking of her hands, with teasing and giggling. And so the Raven had not yet taken Kiin. 

"Come to the beach with me . . ." Qakan pleaded, his voice the whining little boy's voice Kiin remembered from their childhood. 

She set aside her weaving and stood on tiptoe to look into her son's cradles. They both slept, Samiq's son sucking on his fist, Amgigh's son with eyes squeezed tight in sleep, mouth moving in a dream. 

Kiin slipped on her suk and deliberately walked over to the 
weapons comer and picked up a long-bladed stone knife. 

She looked up at Qakan, saw that his eyes had widened. "It is m-mine," she said. "M-m-my husband g-gave it to m-me to protect our s-sons." 

She followed Qakan out the entrance tunnel and into the gray misty rain of the day. 

"To the beach," he said. 

"N-n-no here," she answered. "You d-do n-not remember that the Grandmother and the Aunt have s-said one of the babies should d-die?" 

Qakan's eyes narrowed. "Why do you think I want to talk to you?" he said. "I have heard of their plans. Raven has spoken to all the men." 

"The Raven?" 

"You think he wants to protect the babies?" 

Kiin held up the knife. "He g-gave me this," she said. 

Qakan shifted his weight from one foot to the other, then answered, "I do not know, but something has made him change his mind. He has decided Grandmother is right. He thinks one of the babies should be killed. He has made a plan." 

"So why d-do you tell me, Qakan? What d-do you gain?" 

"You are my sister." 

Kiin laughed. 

Qakan flushed. "I am the babies' father," he finally stammered. "They are my sons." 

Kiin saw the whiteness in his face, the truth that was in his eyes. Yes, Kiin had been careful not to let him see the babies. He did not know how much they looked like their true fathers. For a moment she closed her eyes. Of course Qakan would believe he was father. Perhaps that was enough to make him want to protect the babies. Babies were not worth much. They could not hunt or fish, but these were sons, bom at the same time. Even the Raven admitted their power. 

So whether as father or as trader, Qakan would want to protect the babies. But Qakan was Qakan. Who could believe what he said? 

"I d-d-do n-not. .. believe you," Kiin said. "The Raven will protect his s-sons." 

"They are my sons," Qakan hissed, "and soon they will be dead if you do not go with me tonight." 

"You leave tonight?" 

"Yes. Come with me. Bring the babies." 

Kiin turned away from Qakan. "No, Qakan," she said. "N-no." 

"If you do not believe me, then believe this, Raven will tell one of the women to get you, to bring you to the beach. He will say that Lemming Tail is hurt. When you leave the ulaq, Grandmother will come in and kill one of the babies." 

"Samiq's child," Kiin's spirit whispered. "She will kill Samiq's child." 

But Kiin said to Qakan, "You lie," and crawled back into the ulaq. 

Qakan waited. Nervously, he watched. Raven was fishing, and as long as he stayed away ... It had taken two necklaces to coax Lemming Tail to spend the evening in another ulaq, but they were small necklaces. If this did not work, he would have to wait another day, and each day he waited gave more chance that Yellow-hair's body would be discovered. Yes, as husband he owned his wife. A man might beat his wife, but kill her? No. And who could say what Raven would do when he found out? 

Then Shale Thrower came to the beach, and Qakan knew the spirits honored his plan. Shale Thrower was a young woman, easy to fool, quick to believe what others told her. Qakan flung back the hood of his parka and mussed his hair, then darting out from between the ulas, he grabbed her arm. 

"Quickly, quickly," he gasped. "Raven says to bring Kiin. Tell Kiin Raven wants her. Lemming Tail has been hurt. They are there, behind the village. He is afraid Lemming Tail is dying. Raven needs Kiin." 

For a moment Shale Thrower stood and stared at Qakan, her mouth curling into a circle, her eyes wide. Qakan pushed her toward Raven's ulaq. "Go, now. Tell Kiin Raven needs her." 

Qakan watched the woman run to Raven's ulaq, then he walked to the beach. The ik was ready. 

Kiin clasped Shale Thrower's shoulders and shook her. "It is the Raven who wants m-me?" she asked. "The Raven?" 

"Yes!" 

For a moment Kiin stared at the girl. So, she thought, Qakan told the truth. 

"G-g-go and tell him I am coming," she said. "Go n-now." 

Shale Thrower left the ulaq, and Kiin took a long breath. She pulled the babies from their cradles and slipped them into their carrying straps. "Do not cry," she whispered. "Do not cry; do not cry," the words like a song, a lullaby. She pushed a breast close to each baby's face and waited until she felt each child begin to suck. Then she threw a few of her belongings into a basket—needles, chunks of sinew, coils of kelp twine, the long knife the Raven had given her, a short-bladed woman's knife. A walking stick, a bag of dried fish. 

Her chest ached with the knowledge that Woman of the Sky and Woman of the Sun would do such a thing to trick her. But she heard the voice of her spirit whisper, "It is to protect their people. Their village. Even the Raven wants to protect his village." 

Quickly, Kiin crawled out of the ulaq. Quickly she slipped down to the beach. Night was coming; the sun was dark beneath clouds, the sea black. Qakan had said he would not leave until morning. She knew where he kept his Lk. He said he would sleep there for the night. But then she saw the ik, out already into the bay, Qakan alone, paddling. 

Fear grew thick and hard in her chest, clogging her throat so she could not even call out. Once, twice, she waved her hands, then finally found her voice and called to her brother. 

She heard her spirit speak: "He cannot hear you." 

Once again she called, felt the wind cold on her cheeks, cold on the wetness from her tears. She squatted down. Let the Raven find her here; she had a knife. She would fight for her sons. 

Then she heard a call, coming in from the water. Faint. She looked up. Qakan had turned the ik. He was coming for her. 

"You are my wife," Samiq said. "But that does not give you reason to decide where I sleep. You are my wife, and you will do what I say." 

"I will return to my own people!" Three Fish said. 

"Go. I will not stop you." 

"Small Knife will go with me," Three Fish said. 

"It is his choice. Ask him." 

Her small eyes slid away from Samiq's face and she muttered, "He will not go unless you say so." 

Samiq shrugged. Small Knife had already become one of the First Men. Even in the few short days they had been on the island, Small Knife was learning their ways. He was often with First Snow, each teaching the other different skills, both benefiting. Even Samiq's mother had mentioned that it seemed as though Small Knife had always belonged to them, had always been a part of their village. 

"I will not make him go," Samiq said to Three Fish. 

"If I go alone, I will die." 

"It is your choice. You can try to return or you can belong to my people. The wives of the First Men do what their husbands say, and it is an honor to be a good wife." 

Three Fish narrowed her eyes but Samiq continued to speak. 

"The skills of a good wife are like the skills of a good hunter," he said. "Does the hunter say to the sea lion, 'Come 
to my beach this day or that? Come here and make my hunting easy'? Does a hunter get meat by telling the whale what to do? No. The hunter must go to the animal. And it is the same for the wife. Who brings skins for her clothing, oil for her fire?" 

"Who sews a man's ikyak cover?" Three Fish retorted. "Who makes his chigadax? Who makes his parka?" 

For a time Samiq did not answer, but instead stared at Three Fish, his anger first directed at Many Whales, the man who had forced him to take this loud and stupid woman as a wife. It would be a good thing to be rid of her, but Samiq would not ask Small Knife to take her back to the Whale Hunters. He would not sacrifice a son for a worthless wife. And so Samiq spat on the ground, near enough to Three Fish's feet so that she would know his disgust, and then he said, "Perhaps this year a different woman will make my chigadax." And he walked away. 

Samiq was asleep and the rumbling woke him. He reached for his harpoon and went to his father's sleeping place. His mother was curled beside his father, the two with arms around each other, and for a moment Samiq hesitated, but then he knelt and grasped his father's shoulder, gently shaking him awake. 

Kayugh sat up quickly, reached for his spear, but Samiq clasped his arm and said, "It is Samiq. Listen." 

His mother awoke, sat up and pulled a sealskin around her shoulders. "It cannot be Aka," she said. "We are too far away." 

"We are not far enough," Samiq said as another tremor shook the cave. 

"But we are safe here," Kayugh said. "A small shaking will not hurt us. Go back to your sleeping place." 

Samiq felt the burn of anger at the center of his chest. He was not a child to be ordered to his bed. He left his father's sleeping place and walked to the mouth of the cave. So now the rumbling had reached this small island. What if it grew worse? In the morning he would talk to his father. He must make him understand. 

But in the morning, Kayugh felt the same way. "There is no need to leave," he said. "We can wait here. There are few whales, but there are seals. Surely before winter, we will be able to return to our own beach. Then you will teach us to hunt the whale, and we will trade again with the Whale Hunters." 

"The Whale Hunters think I brought Aka's anger on them," Samiq said. "They will not trade with us. They will kill us." 

Kayugh frowned. "Perhaps Aka will kill them and there will be no worry. If not, we will find another place, one nearer the paths of the whales." 

"We must go now," Samiq said. "This island is too small. Aka could shake it into the sea. There would be no escape for any of us." 

Kayugh sat quietly for a time. "You are a man," he finally said, but did not look at Samiq, "but you are my son. We will stay." 

Samiq rose slowly to his feet and left the shelter: Yes, he was Kayugh's son. Kayugh's son and the son of that one who had been cut apart, buried without honor. Who could say what weakness was passed to Samiq through that one's blood? Perhaps there was some truth in what the Whale Hunters said. Perhaps Samiq carried evil he did not understand, could not control. If so, who was he to disagree with Kayugh? Instead Samiq should learn from him. 

Who was a better father than Kayugh? Samiq claimed Small Knife as son, and already knew what it was to take pride in Small Knife's skills. But Samiq, in learning to be father, should remember Kayugh's example. 

Early the day before, Small Knife had taken a seal in the water just off their beach. "You have brought us luck!" Gray Bird had said to Samiq, and Samiq felt a father's joy when Small Knife took the hunter's share of flippers and fat. 

Small Knife had begun work on his own ikyak. He was young, younger than Samiq had been when he had made his first kill, but many things had changed. They lived in a new place. They must accept new ways. There were fewer berry bushes here and the beach was no long stretch of sand and gravel sloping gently into the sea, but a sudden drop, giving 
few places to find clams or chitons, even at low tide. There was not as much food available for the women to gather and so boys must become hunters. 

But that morning, the falling ash had been worse, and so Samiq and the others had brought in their ikyan soon after Small Knife took his seal. 

Even this morning, as Samiq strained his eyes toward the water, he could see little but gray. And as the women worked, each wore a cap of ash. Samiq heard Crooked Nose exclaim, "In our eyes, in our hair, between our teeth!" 

Samiq smiled. Crooked Nose. Who was more ugly? Who was more beautiful? 

Samiq's eyes fell on Chagak, tending both the fire and Wren, the tiny girl running among the women, often straying too near the cooking pits. 

Samiq stood up and stretched, then caught his mother's eye and motioned toward Wren. His mother picked up the child, and Samiq grinned at the small girl's scream of protest. 

Chagak hugged Wren then brought her to Samiq. Wren held her arms out to her brother, babbling and giggling when he threw her up into the air and caught her. 

"You do not hunt?" Chagak asked. 

Samiq looked at his mother in surprise. She had seldom begun a conversation with him since he returned from the Whale Hunters. He was now fully a man, a hunter with a wife. 

"Too much ash," he replied, but he knew that Chagak understood why the men were not hunting. 

She nodded. "Yes, for us also," she said looking back at the cooking pits. 

Samiq smiled. "I heard Crooked Nose." 

Chagak laughed but said nothing. 

She stayed with him as he walked to the beach. And Samiq realized that since his mother had spoken first, there was something she wanted to say to him, but when she did not speak, Samiq began to run toward the water, bouncing Wren in his arms. Perhaps his mother only needed him to watch 
Wren. "I will keep her here while you work," he called back to his mother. 

But Chagak hurried to Samiq's side. "I will walk with you," she said. 

Samiq hoisted Wren to his shoulders, the girl holding tightly to his hair, her legs wrapped around his neck. 

"When I left, she was a baby," Samiq said. "Now look how tall she has become. Taller than her mother." 

Chagak looked up at her daughter and laughed. "Yes, but she walks before she talks and that is not good. She gets into everything and understands nothing." 

"Perhaps it is to her advantage to understand nothing," Samiq replied. 

"Like Three Fish," Chagak said suddenly. 

Samiq looked quickly at his mother. There was no laughter in her eyes now, and Samiq waited for her to continue. 

She lowered her head and asked quietly, "If I speak to you about her, will you be angry?" 

"No." 

"She laughs at Crooked Nose's jokes, but she always leaves before we begin any hard work. She smiles and takes her gathering bag, pretending there is nothing more for her to do than walk on the beach. 

"Blue Shell says she is forever bothering Waxtal, flipping her apron.. . ." 

"I did not choose her," Samiq broke in. "I did not want her." 

"You think Three Fish does not understand that? She cannot go back to her own people, yet she feels she does not belong here. Why should she work for us? Why should she do anything but please herself?" 

Chagak smiled at Samiq and laid her hand on his arm. "In many ways, it is very difficult to be a wife," she said softly. "Nearly as difficult as being a hunter." 

Near the end of the day, the trembling stopped. The waves rolled to the shore smoothly, without jerking and splashing. Kayugh was right, Samiq thought. I call myself a man, but 
in many ways I am still a boy. I let fear rule my thoughts. Kayugh said we are far enough from Aka. Kayugh is right. 

Samiq took his place near the fire at the entrance of the cave. Big Teeth was telling a story, something Samiq had heard before, but Gray Bird—now Waxtal, Amgigh had told Samiq—interrupted him. 

"They were eating mossberries," Gray Bird said. 

"Mossberries, then," Big Teeth agreed. "Both hunters were eating mossberries when the blue men came to them." 

"There were three hunters," Gray Bird said. 

"Three, then," Big Teeth agreed, then said, "Gray Bird, you should tell the story. You have told it before. Besides, I am tired." 

"Waxtal," Gray Bird said. "I am Waxtal." He nodded and said, "Yes, I will tell it." 

So Gray Bird began, but soon Big Teeth, yawning, stood and left the story circle, then Kayugh and First Snow. Samiq tried to listen, to follow the story, but Gray Bird's story wandered, the man telling first one part of a story, then interrupting to tell another part and going back to the first until the whole story was lost, and Samiq felt like a child who had spent the day following the strange and twisting path of a puffin. So Samiq left and Small Knife. Then only Gray Bird and Amgigh sat near the fire, the two with heads together, Gray Bird murmuring, Amgigh nodding. 

Samiq squared his shoulders and went to where Three Fish sat. The other women were working on parkas or baskets, but Three Fish sat doing nothing, her hands idle in her lap. 

Samiq leaned toward her and whispered, "Come with me to my sleeping place." 

Three Fish jumped up, her mouth open. She ran her fingers through her hair and straightened her apron. Like a First Men wife, she waited for him to enter the sleeping place first, and, closing the woven grass curtains, she dropped to her knees to smooth the sleeping robes. 

Samiq sat down beside her and stroked her wide, strong shoulders. When he slipped one hand beneath her apron, she giggled and spread her legs, and then Samiq lay down beside 
her, thinking for a moment of Kiin, of Kiin's spirit watching as Three Fish grasped his buttocks and pulled herself close to him. 

"Wait," Samiq whispered in the darkness. He pulled away and clasped her hands to control her. "First, I must speak to you." 

Three Fish giggled and tried to break his hold. 

"Three Fish, you are my wife. You are a good, strong woman and I wait with pride for the day you will give me a son. But I want you to be a part of my people, for then you will be my wife in all ways." Her hands were slippery with seal oil and sweat, and Samiq was afraid that she would pull away from him before he finished speaking. "Three Fish, listen," he said, hoping she could hear his whisper above her giggling. "I want you to become one of the First Men as I became one of the Whale Hunters. You must learn the ways of my people." 

Three Fish laughed loudly. "I know the ways of your people," she said. "But Many Whales said our ways were better than your ways." 

"Perhaps they are," Samiq answered. "But ways change slowly and people will not listen to your ideas if you insult them with rudeness." 

Three Fish slid her hands up over Samiq's chest. For a time she said nothing, but Samiq held her eyes with his own, would not let her look away. 

"Yes," she said, lowering her voice to a whisper. "You are right. I have not been a good wife. I mourn my people and my mourning keeps my hands idle." 

"Mourn in your heart as I mourn, for I was part of the Whale Hunters, too. But we cannot mourn with our hands. There is too much to do." 

"You are right," Three Fish whispered. "You are right." 

And clasping his wife to him, Samiq thought, Ah, Chagak, my mother, you are wise.