Read Ivory Carver 02 - My Sister the Moon Online
Authors: Sue Harrison
Tags: #Fiction, #Historical, #Native American & Aboriginal, #Sagas, #Prehistoric Peoples, #Fairy Tales; Folk Tales; Legends & Mythology
Ivory Carver 02 - My Sister the Moon (40 page)
Kiin looked into Samiq’s eyes, saw the emptiness of his defeat. She pulled off the shell bead necklace he had given her the night of her woman’s ceremony. Slowly she placed it over Samiq’s head. “Someday you will fight him,” she said. “You will fight him, and then you will give this necklace back to me.”
She turned to the Raven. “If I am to go with you, I must go now,” she said, and she spoke in the First Men’s language, then repeated the words in the Walrus tongue.
“Where are our sons?” the Raven asked.
“Shuku is here,” Kiin answered, and raised her suk so he could see the child. “But I gave Takha to the wind spirits as the Grandmother and the Aunt said I must.” Kiin took Shuku from his carrying sling. “This is your son,” she said to the Raven, “but he is no longer Shuku. He is Amgigh.”
Kiin saw the Raven’s anger, the clouding of the Raven’s eyes, but she did not look away, did not flinch, even when he raised his hand as though to strike her.
“Hit me,” Kiin said to the Raven. “Show these people that a shaman has only the power of anger against his wife, the power of his hands, the power of his knife.” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “A man does not need a strong spirit when he has a large knife, a knife stolen from someone else.”
The Raven threw the obsidian knife to the ground. Kiin picked it up, walked back to Samiq, placed it in his left hand. Her eyes met Samiq’s eyes. “Always,” she said, “I am your wife.”
The Raven gestured toward Ice Hunter, toward the other Walrus men who had come with him. One picked up Kiin’s carvings, another brought the Raven’s ik to the water.
“We will not return to this beach,” the Raven said.
But Kiin bent down and picked up a handful of pebbles from the sand. She waited as her mother brought Shuku’s cradle and a bundle of Kiin’s belongings from the ulaq.
Once more Kiin looked at Samiq, tried to press the image of his face into her mind, then she turned and followed the Raven to his ik.
THE BASIC STORY LINE OF MY SISTER THE MOON is borrowed from an Aleut sea otter legend—an incest story. Other legends used in the book include the moon myths of the Pueblo and the Osage; the Aleut raven's marriage story; the Inuit oral histories of a mother hiding the son of an enemy; blue ice men legends; Ojibway twin sons stories; tiger legends from the Orient (which have counterparts in Aleut whale-hunting traditions); Aleut Shuganan and "Outside Men" stories; and the raven-trickster legends, which have parallels throughout most Native American cultures and are so ancient that their roots can be found in the monkey-trickster stories of the Orient.
At the time of My Sister the Moon, basketry in the far north was in its infancy; therefore, I hypothesize that the coil and sew technique was used to make baskets, and the simple over-and-under weave used for most matting. These techniques were gradually joined by or replaced by (depending on the culture) the more complex twining weave, which is used today by those few artisans who still make the exquisite Aleut ryegrass baskets and mats.
In an effort to imitate the oral traditions of Native American storytellers, I have begun My Sister the Moon with a story already told (Chapter 36 of Mother Earth Father Sky). In the storytellers' tradition, this narrative of Kiin's birth is related in a slightly different way and with a slightly different emphasis so it can serve as a foundation for My Sister the Moon.
In many Native American cultures, names are seen as having special powers. Throughout a lifetime, a warrior or
Sue Harrison
hunter may possess several names: a "real" name, given by an honored relative or a person respected in regard to spiritual powers; a nickname, which is used instead of a "real" name to protect the holder of the real name against an onslaught of curses or spells by those intending harm; a "pet" name used by family members and close friends; names chosen by the nameholder himself to commemorate an occasion in his life; and a spirit name, often kept secret, which was earned in spiritual quest or fasting. In My Sister the Moon, as in Mother Earth Father Sky, characters whose thoughts are open to the reader are given names which are presented in a Native American language. These names represent the character's spiritual nature or destiny. Very occasionally a character will also be given a spirit name, as in the case of Kiin (Tugidaq).
At the time of My Sister the Moon, stone-knappers on the Eastern Aleutian islands were producing only unifacial blades, although in other parts of North America knappers had developed the beautiful and technically superior bifacial Piano points.
Sue Harrison grew up in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and graduated summa cum laude from Lake Superior State University with a bachelor of arts degree in English languages and literature. At age twenty-seven, inspired by the cold Upper Michigan forest that surrounded her home, and the outdoor survival skills she had learned from her father and her husband, Harrison began researching the people who understood best how to live in a harsh environment: the North American native peoples. She studied six Native American languages and completed extensive research on culture, geography, archaeology, and anthropology during the nine years she spent writing her first novel,
Mother Earth Father Sky
, the extraordinary story of a woman’s struggle for survival in the last Ice Age. A national and international bestseller, and selected by the American Library Association as one of the Best Books for Young Adults in 1991,
Mother Earth Father Sky
is the first novel in Harrison’s critically acclaimed Ivory Carver trilogy, which includes
My Sister the Moon
and
Brother Wind
. She is also the author of
Song of the River
,
Cry of the Wind
, and
Call Down the Stars
, which comprise the Storyteller trilogy, also set in prehistoric North America. Her novels have been translated into thirteen languages and published in more than twenty countries. Harrison lives with her family in Michigan’s Eastern Upper Peninsula.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook onscreen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1992 by Sue Harrison
Cover design by Mumtaz Mustafa
978-1-4804-1182-1
This edition published in 2013 by Open Road Integrated Media
345 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10014
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