The Gathering Night (26 page)

‘Two more things,' he whispered, as if he'd read my thoughts. ‘Bakar's father—'

‘Kemen.'

‘—Kemen. Through Kemen the spirits sent Bakar back to us. But Kemen brought us trouble. I lost my son in the same Moon that Kemen arrived. Now we have enemies because of Kemen. I never made enemies: this family has never had enemies before.'

‘Kemen is my brother. His enemies are my enemies.'

‘Then my children are forced to have enemies among their own People, even though they've done nothing to deserve it.'

I raised my hands to such spirits as might be listening. ‘I'll look after your children' – I called him by his name – ‘
All
your children. I'll deal with anyone who calls himself their enemy. That I promise you.'

I think I set his mind at ease. He only had one more thing to say. He was very tired; he had to fight to speak each word. ‘We've never stayed so long at Salmon Camp before. Soon it'll be too late to get round Fierce Point to River Mouth Camp.'

‘There'll still be days of good weather.'

‘But the sea – you can't trust the sea in Yellow Leaf Moon.' ‘It's not yet Yellow Leaf Moon.'

He kept picking at the fur beside him. ‘Death is waiting for me here in Salmon Camp,' he said at last. ‘But that doesn't concern the rest of you. Amets, take them to River Mouth Camp while the sea still lets you through! If you get stuck here at Salmon Camp you won't get such good hunting. We mustn't let the children go hungry!'

‘We could make a winter Camp here. Only our own family – Sendoa and the others – hunt on this side of Mother Mountain in winter. Sendoa wouldn't mind if we were here too.' I didn't sound sure, because I didn't like the idea any more than he did. River Mouth Camp was the best place we had, and if we didn't claim it soon, somebody else might think we weren't coming, and take it.

Alaia's father knew what I was thinking. ‘Go to River Mouth Camp!' he urged me. ‘Go now, while you can! I don't need you – any of you. If I can't meet Death without your help, then what have I lived for all these Years? Amets, take them now!'

I knew he was right, but I also had to think about what Alaia would say. Not that I let my woman tell me what to do, but it never works to force them against their will. They make too much fuss. So, knowing what Alaia would want on the one hand, and being urged by her father on the other, I finally gave him my word that whatever happened I'd get his family – my family – safely back to River Mouth Camp before Yellow Leaf Moon.

Kemen said:

We woke one morning to mist so thick we could barely see across the Camp. The treetops reached into the sky and vanished. We smelt damp earth and dying leaves, and the first breath of coming winter. The air had no songs in it. Amets and I got ready to go fishing.

‘We'll take spears and gaffes,' Amets said. ‘It's misty enough.'

‘But as soon as the Sun rises he'll burn this mist off!'

‘Not for a while. It's too cold. And the mist is very thick.'

I remembered that Alaia had told Amets to check the fish traps. ‘We women have quite enough to do,' she'd said last night. ‘There's no need for you two to go hunting tomorrow. We've still got half that dried stag meat left. Someone's got to lay the fish to dry, and turn them, and scrape that otter hide – Osané and I will have to do that. And we need more sea-roots. I told Haizea and Itsaso they could go up and pick bilberries. And cloudberries, of course – your favourite, Amets – you know you don't want to miss those. The least you and Kemen can do is check the fish traps. Men are no use to anyone when they're not hunting!'

Why was I so happy when Osané's voice came back to her? I must have been mad! All I can say is the spirits were kind to me when they gave me a quiet woman! Now I remembered Alaia's scolding yesterday, I understood why Amets said we had to take fish spears even though it was going to be sunny. At least it made us look like men! Not that anyone was awake to see us off.

As we walked upriver a little circle of yellow appeared in the Morning Sun Sky. A thrush hidden in a willow began to sing. The pale circle in the Morning Sun Sky grew too bright to look at. The treetops across the River threw off the clinging cloud. Through the grey they took on red and brown and gold. Yellow light broke through and touched our hands and faces. We saw a smudge of blue beyond the cloud. Then all the day-birds burst into song as the Sun gulped down the last fleeing shreds of mist.

I'd been walking behind Amets with a heavy step. Now the autumn had come I often found myself thinking about the past. It was in Deer Moon – two Years ago now – that the sea took away everything I'd loved. My heart still beat to the pulse of the lost Lynx lands. The ways of my fathers still flowed in my blood. The same Moons brought different seasons to the Auk People. I could learn Auk lands as a man learns a new song from far-off cousins – even if he's never heard the words before he can still remember them – but in my heart I'd always be a stranger.

As I followed Amets I was thinking about a different River. My River was strong and steady. It didn't change its mood at the least whisper of weather from the hills above. It rose with the meltwater, as all Rivers must do, and shrank under the summer Sun, but it wasn't fickle. It didn't leap into spate, or dry to a skeleton of whitened stones, in less than a night, without a thought for the season. My River would let me fish from my boat early in the Year, as the ripples slid by on the currents that carried me down. I saw the brown surface of deep waters reflected in my heart. Gulls screamed overhead. I heard the steady note of the rapids, then I came down them in a swirl of water that played all round me in the shifting light. The trees above my head were taller than anything that grew in Auk lands, and they were still bare of leaves.
Our
salmon give themselves when we need them most.
Our
salmon come when the land is hungry. They come in greater plenty than Auk People have ever known, at the beginning of Young Moon – the Moon you Auk People call Limpet Moon. Before spring even reaches the land the Lynx People feast – feasted – every night on the rich pink flesh of the Wise Fish. When Sendoa told me that in Auk lands the salmon didn't give themselves until Seed Moon, I wondered what the Auk People could possibly have done to anger the Salmon so much that their spirits were prepared to let the People starve.

The Sun burst free of cloud, and I came back to where I was. I remembered that now I had a healthy son, a wife who spoke to me and a family I could trust. In Amets I had a new brother. I needed to speak to him, but now I could do it with a lighter heart. No one wants to listen to a man who's sorry for himself.

We'd stopped using the trap at Shellfish Narrows when the salmon stopped running. Now we set basket traps at the pool outlets upriver. Most days we caught a few grilse and brown trout, but the older salmon were too wily to be caught that way. We got more by enticing them in at night with fire-sticks, and that was more like hunting – any woman can empty a basket trap. It didn't take Amets and me very long. Our baskets were still nowhere near full when we'd emptied the last trap.

‘This is no good!' Amets brushed away the biting flies that swarmed around his head. He dumped his basket on a strip of green turf below a clinging rowan, and laid down his spear. He untied the leather ember pouch that hung from his belt. ‘We'll make a fire, Kemen, and smoke out these flies.'

Amets took oak-ember from its damp-moss wrapping, and crumbled dry fire-mushroom over the glowing wood. I collected rowan twigs and dry leaves, while Amets blew the embers into a small flame. Soon we were propped on our elbows, one on each side of a small fire. Leafy rowan twigs shrivelled on the flames and sent up clouds of smoke. The flies kept away. We split open a few trout, and stuck them on sticks to grill in the tasty smoke. Their juices ran down and crackled in the flames. They smelt good.

The trout tasted fresh and smoky all at once. The first one was so hot I had to jiggle it between my fingers as I bit off big chunks. I swallowed, and said thickly, ‘Amets.'

‘Yes.' His eyes were on the River, not on me. I found that easier.

‘If we don't stop fishing here soon, the fish won't want to give themselves next Year.'

‘We will stop. We'll go back to River Mouth Camp before Yellow Leaf Moon. It's going to be a hard winter. Every day more geese come from the Sunless Sky. The sooner we start hunting at River Mouth Camp the better. I want us to have meat when the bad weather comes.'

‘That's what I was thinking. Only what about the old man?'

Amets told me what Alaia's father had said to him. It didn't surprise me. When he'd finished I knew he hadn't told me everything.

‘That wasn't all, was it?' I asked. ‘He's worried about me, isn't he? He's worried about the enemies I made when I took Osané.'

‘He knows you weren't given any choice.'

‘All that means is that I needn't blame my self. Maybe I sleep with a lighter heart, but it doesn't change anything else.'

‘Your marriage with Osané was Zigor's doing,' Amets pointed out. ‘He brought this trouble on us. He must take the blame.'

‘He's Go-Between,' I said. ‘He sees more than we do. Or, if he doesn't, the spirits who guide him can see much further.'

‘Perhaps.' Amets reached into the basket and took out two more fish. ‘There's so few we might as well finish them.' He tossed a couple of slippery fish over to me, and laughed when I didn't catch them. I picked them up and slit them open, spilling out the guts. I ate the delicate red livers just as they were, and skewered the fishes longways to grill across the embers of our little fire. Amets laid on more rowan leaves. ‘What bad spirit sends all these flies into the world?' he grumbled.

We ate our fish and lay quiet for a while. The Sun was getting hot. Amets began to breathe long breaths, with a little snort inside each one.

‘Amets!' I said suddenly. ‘Let me explain to you!'

‘Eh?' Amets stopped snoring, rolled over and opened one eye.

‘Listen, Amets! Are you awake?'

‘I am now.'

‘When I saw what happened at Gathering Camp last Year – when I saw how Edur wouldn't speak to you, and how Hodei would have nothing to do with your family – I don't care about the rest of Osané's family – they've plenty of enemies already and no one thinks much of them – but when I saw how much I'd hurt you and your family by joining you – I thought I should go away.

‘I made up my mind to tell you this, and then leave. Osané was safe in your family. You wouldn't let her starve. I didn't think she'd mind if I went. Remember she'd never even spoken to me! Sometimes she seemed to like me – you don't need words for everything. For all I knew she'd like another man just as much, or even more. I thought she'd be better off going to Gathering Camp this Year without me. It made me sad to think about it, but – with her not even speaking to me – I didn't see how things could get any better.

‘Once we got to River Mouth Camp it was different. Our enemies – the enemies I'd brought on you – were far away. You needed me to hunt. You and I hunt well together. Everyone seemed happy. Osané began to smile more often. I watched her play with Esti, and I thought things might get better.

‘I didn't know Osané was pregnant at first – how could she have told me? Not that she would have – everything in Osané's life is secret. Sometimes I . . . Anyway, when Osané was sick on the boat coming round Red Point it suddenly struck me. Then your wife looked back at me from the bows, and I saw she was wondering if a man would have the sense to notice what must have been so very clear to her.

‘When I realised Osané was pregnant I couldn't think about going away any more. Our son . . .'

My voice trailed away. I found I couldn't tell Amets how Zigor's promise – it had sounded like a promise, or a threat – certainly as if the spirits meant that it should happen – had stayed in my mind. Zigor had told me that the names of my lost family would live again among the Auk People. When Bakar first lay between my hands I gazed into his face for a long while. Hopes and memories whirled through my mind. But all I saw in front of me was the little closed face, red and wrinkled, of a complete stranger.

Sitting there on the riverbank, I thought about how Alaia's father came and looked at my boy and recognised him at once. Everyone was happy. What could I have said? Also, I wanted to love my son.
That
, I realised, was why I couldn't admit to Amets, or indeed to anyone, that Bakar wasn't the child I'd hoped for. I can say this now because all that has changed.

Amets probably knew what I was thinking. All he said was, ‘Your son is one of us. A child without its father usually dies. Also, this family needs you at River Mouth Camp. It would be very bad for all of us if you went away.'

‘But if it's true that I bring bad spirits with me . . .'

Amets spat into the River. ‘You sound like Osané's mother! Anyway, there's no such thing as a bad spirit. If the spirits you bring are our enemies – well then, we have to make them change sides!' Amets reached over and slapped me on the back so hard I nearly fell in the fire; I caught his arm to steady myself. ‘At least your wife speaks to you!' He gave me another great buffet on the shoulder. ‘Some men would say that was good. I'm not so sure – I envied you the way you had it before! Plenty of sex every night – oh, we all heard
that
!
–
and no words battering against your ears all through the day. I wouldn't call that bad luck!'