The Storyteller Trilogy (5 page)

He crept back from the tunnel, pulled on his parka. She could see the burn of red on his cheeks, but he said nothing. He would return. They always did. And what could Ground Beater do? Throw her out? Kill them? He was an old man. She could tell him anything, and he would believe her. Especially now that her son, Chakliux, was gone. Why worry?

Chakliux. She wondered how he was doing in the Near River Village. She smiled. Had they figured out who he was? Probably not. The Near River People were not known for their quick minds. She was glad he was gone, but she missed him. He was so very wise. He could keep her laughing—or thinking. His riddles! Whose were better?

But he also frightened her. He knew what she was, had probably known since he was a child. But then she knew his secrets also, things he did not even know about himself. Things no one in this village knew.

Gguzaakk had claimed his heart, but she had been no match for K’os. What wife could replace a mother? Especially a wife who had so unfortunately died in childbirth.

Ah well, Chakliux was at the Near River Village now. The shaman’s daughter was said to be beautiful. He would soon forget his round, plain Gguzaakk.

Chakliux’s powers were great, but they were like the powers of the owl. You did not want to see Chakliux’s eyes turned toward you. He did not carry good luck with him. No one was safe. Not even his mother. Not even his wife.

K’os threw back her head and laughed. Let the Near River Village live with Chakliux’s luck.

THE NEAR RIVER VILLAGE

The years had weakened Tsaani’s legs. He still hunted, but everything he did, he did slowly. Now, as he walked to his daughter’s lodge, he planted each foot carefully on the packed snow paths. Mud bled through the ice in the center of the path, and the wet earth smell of it filled Tsaani’s nostrils. In that great battle between the sun and night, winter was being defeated once again.

He came to the lodge near the center of the village where his daughter lived. It was a small lodge; the caribou hide cover needed to be replaced, but since she was second wife, Tsaani had little hope that would happen.

Perhaps he would get a few caribou during this year’s hunts. His own wife did not need the hides. Her lodge was new. He would not have his daughter live in shame because she was second wife and because her husband would rather sleep than hunt.

He scratched at the doorflap, but no one came. Finally, he crawled in through the entrance tunnel—something he would not have done except in his own daughter’s lodge. The lodge was empty.

Fox Barking, Day Woman’s husband, was a man whose thoughts were always turned toward himself. He had no doubt taken both wives to see the Cousin River Dzuuggi, thinking the Dzuuggi would assume he was someone important. If a man was too lazy to hunt, what good were wives? When you let your wife live in a lodge that stinks of mildew, who could think you were important?

Tsaani’s knees and ankles ached, but he made himself walk more quickly. The shaman’s lodge was on the far side of the village. Tsaani’s caribou hide moccasins seemed to slip more than necessary, but finally he came to the lodge, to the crowd that had gathered around it.

When the people saw him, they parted to allow him inside.

The lodge was warm, too warm, with too many people, each adding to the heat with words and laughter. Tsaani stayed at the edge of the group, though several urged him toward the comfortable fur mats and willow backrests reserved for the elders, but he remained where he was, watching, listening.

His eyes fell first on the Cousin River Dzuuggi, and in that moment of seeing, he wondered why Ligige’ had asked him to come. There was nothing he could do. The young man stood with feet bare, the otter foot and webbed toes uncovered for anyone to see. But even if the man’s feet had been covered, how could he hide his high forehead, his wide cheekbones, his well-formed eyes? This was Gull Wing’s son. The young man laughed, and it was Gull Wing’s laughter. Were they blind? Were they deaf?

He looked at the faces in the lodge. There was no one from the Cousin River Village. Had the man come alone? Perhaps, like Tsaani and Ligige’, he realized that too many young hunters longed to become warriors, and so decided to risk only his own life.

Tsaani watched the man for a time, listened as he spoke to the people. Perhaps he looked like his father, but he had wisdom far beyond any Gull Wing ever possessed. It must be the wisdom, Tsaani decided, that closed everyone’s eyes to who he was.

Slowly, Tsaani studied each face, the men and women of his village, old and young, wise and foolish. They listened as the Dzuuggi spoke of the ties between the two villages, as he told stories of the battles and the hunts, the grandfathers and warriors who bound them together into one people.

Then Tsaani’s eyes found his daughter, and he saw that she knew. There was pain in her face, sorrow etched in long lines down her cheeks. She opened her mouth, and Tsaani was afraid she would speak, would say something to break the spell the Dzuuggi was weaving, but though her mouth moved, no sound escaped.

Tsaani began to work his way through the people, toward his daughter, to warn her, to explain that she could not claim this man as son, that she must make a sacrifice, as she had when this son was born, to protect their village.

More people crowded into the lodge, pressed against Tsaani, so that it seemed as though he were in a dream, each step taking him nowhere, but finally he was only three women from her, then two. He reached out to clasp her shoulder, but before he could touch her, the cry came, a long, loud keening.

As though the cry were a wall, Tsaani felt himself being pushed away. Day Woman flung herself at the young man’s feet, clasped his ankles and called out, “My son, oh my son, you have come back to me.”

“You think I want a husband who was thrown away?” said Snow-in-her-hair. “You think I want children who are cursed? My children may already be cursed, just because I looked at you. Just because I sat beside you!”

“No one in the Cousin River Village has been cursed because of me,” Chakliux said softly.

“That is because they do not know who you are!”

“Nothing has changed. I am the same person I have always been,” said Chakliux, but even as he spoke, doubt pricked his heart.

Gguzaakk had died in childbirth. Had he cursed her? He shook his head. No. He knew why she had died. It was one reason he was here. How could he bear to stay in his own village with that knowledge tearing him apart?

Then he felt the comfort of Gguzaakk’s spirit close to him, and he reminded himself that even his son had been born whole and perfect. No deformities, no marks that told of curses.

Wolf-and-Raven and his wife, Blue Flower, sat without speaking. They watched their daughter as though she were a dancer, performing. Finally, when Snow-in-her-hair was exhausted, she dropped down to cry, lying with her face in her mother’s lap.

After a moment, Wolf-and-Raven cleared his throat. Chakliux waited for the man to speak, and as he waited, he gathered words for his reply. He must convince Wolf-and-Raven that neither he nor old He Talks, the shaman of Chakliux’s village, had intended to harm Snow-in-her-hair or any person in the Near River Village. They only wanted everyone to live together in peace.

“There are those who say the Cousin River People sent you to curse us,” Wolf-and-Raven finally said. He was a man of long face and loose skin, and his lips were too large for his words, smearing them together so Chakliux had to listen carefully to understand what he said. “I do not believe this.”

Chakliux raised his eyebrows to show that he agreed with the man.

“I saw your surprise when Day Woman claimed you. I think you came to bring peace. That is something we need. I do not remember the last time of fighting between our villages, but there are those who do. If what they say is true, I do not want the same thing to happen again.

“I also knew your father, your true father. You have his face, though it seems you do not have his spirit. And Day Woman is not one to lie. Nor Ligige’.” He stopped to point with his chin at Chakliux’s feet. “She said your toes are like those of a baby she delivered long ago—Day Woman’s son. That child was taken to the Grandfather Rock. Even your Cousin River mother has said you were found on the Grandfather Rock.”

Yes, Chakliux thought. Found by his mother. He knew the story well. How could he not, being Dzuuggi?

“But we need peace,” Wolf-and-Raven said. “I have spoken to your grandfather, Tsaani. He agrees with me. Snow-in-her-hair will not be your wife. I cannot force her. I do not know the ways of your village, but here a woman is not given as wife against her will.”

“It is the same in my village,” Chakliux said quietly.

“We ask you to stay. To hunt with us and fish with us, to spend this year with us, so our people will see that you are not a curse. The young hunters need to understand that if they choose to fight, they will kill good people—men just like themselves.

“For now, you will live with your brother. Your mother’s husband does not want you in her lodge until he knows you are not cursed. Your brother, though, is a strong hunter. He and his wife say you are welcome in her lodge.”

“His name is?”

“Sok. You have seen him. His wife makes the pattern of the sun from pieced skins on his parkas and boots.”

Yes, Chakliux thought. He knew the man. He was strong-looking, not tall but big. His voice was loud and he laughed often. He seemed to be a man who sought attention, who enjoyed the envy of others. It was strange to think of him as brother.

“For my daughter’s sake,” Wolf-and-Raven said, “I wish you were animal-gift. For myself, I do not care. Animal-gift or not, we need you to stay in the village, to bind our people together in friendship. Too many will die if we become enemies.”

The man’s words washed through Chakliux like clear water. If there were men in the Near River Village who hoped for peace, then there was a chance.

“I will stay,” Chakliux said.

He lowered his head so Wolf-and-Raven could not see doubt darken his eyes. He had a brother he did not know, a mother who seemed aware of nothing beyond her own needs. Why had she claimed him now, when she had once left him to die under cold and wind and the teeth of animals? Why take away his honor as animal-gift?

But should she say nothing? He was not animal-gift. He was only a child thrown away, a curse.

Then Gguzaakk’s voice came to him, spoke in his heart, reminded him why he was in the Near River Village. He must discover how to turn people from hatred to understanding. It did not matter if he was animal-gift. It did not matter if his foot was a sign that he carried otter blood. If he could not bring peace, then many people in this village and his own would die.

THE FIRST MEN VILLAGE, TRADERS’ BAY

(PRESENT-DAY HERENDEEN BAY, THE ALASKA PENINSULA)

Aqamdax looked out over the ice-covered inlet, north toward the sea, then east toward the land of the River People. Perhaps next summer her mother would come back. It had been four years since she left with the trader, but she had promised Aqamdax she would return, and each summer Aqamdax waited and watched.

The wind cut hard from the west, forcing Aqamdax to step forward and brace herself against it. There was no one else on the beach so she called out her words, placed them on the wind, and prayed the message would find its way to her mother.

“You left me in He Sings’s ulax,” Aqamdax said, lifting her words like a song. “His throwing board is strong. His seal harpoon is cunning, and there is food enough for everyone. His wives still hate me, but I do what I can to help them.

“For two summers now my blood has followed the moon. Soon I will be wife. Come back and share my joy.”

She would have said more, but from the edges of her eyes she saw that He Sings’s second wife had come to the beach. The woman walked toward her, bent with the wind, her mouth opening and closing like a fish’s mouth. She was dragging her youngest daughter by the hand. The child was howling, but the wind pulled away the noise, so Aqamdax knew of her protests only by seeing her face.

When Fish Taker drew near, she set her hands at the center of the girl’s back and pushed the child toward Aqamdax.

“I told you this morning, you must take care of her. How will I finish my husband’s parka if this one is forever crawling into my lap?”

“She was asleep,” Aqamdax told the woman.

“She woke up.”

Fish Taker turned back toward the sod-roofed ulas, leaving the girl with Aqamdax. The child was not yet to the age of remembering, but she could talk and walk. Aqamdax knelt down beside her, turning so the girl was in the lee of Aqamdax’s body, shielded from the worst of the wind.

“Little Bird, why do you cry?”

“I want eat,” she said. She raised a mittened hand to wipe at the mucus running from her nose, then hiccoughed out a sob.

“Here, I have something.” Aqamdax pulled a strip of dried fish from the sleeve of her birdskin sax.

Aqamdax ate well in the chief hunter’s ulax, but had not forgotten the summer after her father’s death, before He Sings had agreed to feed her and her mother. Now she always carried dried meat or fish, even hid some in her sleeping place.

Little Bird reached for the fish, but Aqamdax chewed off a chunk, warmed it for a moment in her mouth, then handed it to the child.

“We should go back to the village,” Aqamdax told her. “It is too cold on the beach.”

Aqamdax hoisted her to one hip, then walked up the slope of the beach, over the path worn into the snow. She carried Little Bird to Give Spear’s lodge. Give Spear was an elder, and never worried if someone chose to sit in the leeward shelter of his ulax. Besides, he was one of the few hunters in the village who had never come to Aqamdax’s bed. Even if Give Spear’s wife saw Aqamdax sitting outside his ulax, there should be no trouble.

Aqamdax squatted on her haunches and pulled Little Bird close to her. They sat, leaning against one another, and ate. Little Bird chatted in half-formed baby words that Aqamdax could not understand, but the girl did not seem to mind if Aqamdax did not answer her.