Breakaway: Clan of the Ice Mountains (27 page)

Attu noticed it was beginning to turn the color of new hide.
No one will ever be allowed to hit you, again,
Attu swore to himself. Rika was looking at him again.

“That’s when you...” Attu prompted. He reached out and took her hand in his.

Rika smiled at him.

Proud, fiery Rika, one minute so bold, the next so shy.
Attu smiled his encouragement.

“That’s when I...” Rika paused again, then rushed out with the rest, “...gave my heart to you.”

Rika whirled away from Attu and flew back into the shelter.

E
lder Nuanu insisted on being helped out of the shelter onto the ice to perform the giving and taking ceremony. She sat on a pile of furs near the shelter, Rika and Attu standing before her holding hands and the full moon lighting the moving ice sheet as if it were daylight. All around them the water sparkled.
A beautiful setting for the joining,
Attu thought,
if we weren’t trapped here with impending drowning on our minds.

The ceremony was also punctuated by Moolnik’s loud snoring. Elder Nuanu had insisted Rika give Moolnik an extra dose of sleeping potion.

“The last thing we need is for him to start thrashing around right in the middle of the ritual,” Elder Nuanu said.

Attu and Rika stood as Elder Nuanu spoke the words over them both. They had to bend when she wrapped both Rika’s hands together in a strip of hide, placing Attu’s hands over Rika’s, one on each side, wrapping them together. Attu’s large hands enfolded Rika’s completely. When he looked up, Rika was smiling at him, her heart in her eyes. Attu’s heart lurched.

“This is to symbolize the protection Attu will give you, Rika, for the rest of your life,” Elder Nuanu said.

Elder Nuanu untied them, and the hide strip was given to Rika.

“You will keep this safe, Rika, until one day, upon bearing a child, you will stand again, and your hands will be wrapped around the newborn’s body, and your hands, Attu, will once again be wrapped over Rika’s and your child. You will both promise to accept the responsibility for the new life the spirits have given into your care.”

Elder Nuanu motioned for Attu to strip to the waist. He smiled as Rika suddenly looked shy again, even though she’d treated his back and seen him often without his parka and inner vest.

Since there was no fresh meat available to obtain blood, Rika smeared a wet paste of dried nuknuk from Attu’s last kill on her hand and placed it over Attu’s chest.

“You are now Rika’s hunter until the spirits call you to the Between of death,” Elder Nuanu said.

“I will bring you the game,” Attu promised.

Rika scratched the spark stones over the nuknuk lamp Kinak had given them in his pack. The wick of the lamp lit with the ease of long practice.

Rika picked up the lit lamp, careful not to spill any of the oil.

“I will bring you the light,” Rika promised, and Attu took the lamp from her.

“May each of your name spirits and the name spirits of all those who have gone before you in your clans, those who have followed the rituals and now inhabit the Between, guard and guide you both, until you join them in the Great Beyond. May you bear many sons and daughters, Rika, and may the spirits of the game animals find you a hunter worthy of the sacrifice of their bodies, Attu. May your lamp burn brightly and your shelter always be full of laughter.”

Elder Nuanu attempted to lift the largest hide they had on the ice chunk, to wrap Rika and Attu in, but it was far too heavy for her.

“I cannot toss you,” she grinned, “but this will work just as well.”

Rika and Attu laughed as Elder Nuanu made them lie, each on their sides, facing each other, arms around each other, and roll themselves up in the hide, until only the tops of their faces showed enough to breath.

“You must stay together so, the rest of the night,” Elder Nuanu ordered with a grin before she slowly made her way back to the shelter and the still snoring Moolnik.

Attu and Rika lay, wrapped in the warmth of the furs, the moon above, the sparkling water all around, and for a short while forgot about anything else but this time, and the wonder of becoming one in the giving and the taking.

––––––––

I
n the morning, Moolnik’s fever was gone, and Elder Nuanu lay dying.

“The Moolnikuan spirit in him has tricked us yet again,” Elder Nuanu said, as she glanced over toward where Moolnik slept peacefully. “It must have almost complete control of him now. If not, he would have died in the night as I predicted.”

“So he is the embodiment of a Moolnikuan? Is that possible?” Attu asked.

“Perhaps his father naming him so cursed him in some way. I do not know. But it seems to have made Moolnik amazingly strong against the trystas. Do not worry. Once I am Between, I will be stronger than any Moolnikuan spirit. I will protect you.”

“Oh, don’t say that, Elder Nuanu. You can still recover,” Rika said.

“It’s all right, child.”

Rika continued to fuss over the old woman, trying to convince her to take this potion or to let Rika put on a poultice, to draw out the evil spirits trying to take Elder Nuanu’s breath.

“I’m ready to go, to join the spirits, to see my man Tovut again, now a star I can visit, for I’ll be free in the spirit world of Between.” Elder Nuanu smiled and patted Rika’s tear-streaked face.

“Take this amulet,” Elder Nuanu said, “and when the clans try to shame you for being alone on the ice with Attu without being joined, you show this to any of the older women and you tell them this,” and Elder Nuanu whispered a few words to Rika.

Rika’s eyes widened. “Why?”

“Because only a woman who has been joined to a man is ever told these words,” Elder Nuanu said. “It’ll be proof you are telling the truth and the joining ceremony was performed by me.”

“I understand.”

“Thank you,” Attu said from where he was sitting on one of the packs.

Elder Nuanu studied Moolnik’s sleeping form again. “He should have died in the water, should have died of the fever, should have died when the revenging trystas came after him for murdering Banek.”

Elder Nuanu looked at Attu. “What are you going to do about this Moolnikuan, if he continues to recover?”

“I don’t know.”

“He needs to be pushed off this ice into the water without a rope to climb back up on.”

“I know,” Attu said. “But, I can’t seem to-”

“You will do... what... you can,” Elder Nuanu said, her voice growing weaker and punctuated with wheezing to catch her breath.

“Yes, I will,” Attu promised.

“And I... will... also...” Elder Nuanu said. Her voice was now a mere whisper. “I will be protecting you both, remember that.”

Elder Nuanu shuddered, then grew still. Attu felt her spirit leave her frail body, slipping out into the Between. The hairs on his arms stood up as an invisible power enveloped them.

Rika looked at him, wonder in her eyes. “Surely, Elder Nuanu is much stronger in death than she was in life, even as the embodiment of Shuantuan.”

A gust of warm air blew through the shelter, warm and full of the spicy smell of the pine trees along the shoreline. It was as if the air itself was full of life, and the power Attu and Rika were feeling drifted out of the shelter on the fragrant air. Elder Nuanu was gone.

“Thank you, Elder Nuanu, for your promise of protection,” Rika said. “I know your spirit will be watchful of us as we continue our journey. We are honored.”

Tears streamed down Rika’s face as she knelt to prepare Elder Nuanu’s body.

Attu stepped outside the shelter. He wiped away his own tears as he stood looking off into the distance again, out across the water. More and more ice sheets and tall chunks were floating past now, many of them closer to the shoreline, some even bumping it as they floated or became stuck against jagged rocks or other ice along the land.

A warm breeze blew across their ice sheet from the land beyond.
We don’t have much time,
Attu thought. The ice sheet they were on was now less than half the size it had been. They had another day, maybe, before enough would melt so their weight as they moved on it would make it so unstable it would flip.

Attu continued to watch the moving ice, like stepping stones across the water to the land. He knew they couldn’t just step from one ice piece to another, even if they could reach them. If anyone moved too close to the edge, the entire ice sheet dipped down on that side. It was no longer large enough to be stable near the edges. If he tried to help Rika from one to another, surely one or the other would fall into the water.

Attu cringed as he remembered Moolnik and Banek, their panic and their violence, each trying to save himself from the icy water’s depth.

Still, there had to be something Attu could do, some way to use the ice chunks floating past them...

Why couldn’t I spear ice chunks and use them to drag us closer to shore?
Attu thought. He chuckled to think of hunting ice sheets, stalking them and stabbing them like nuknuks.
Biggest prey I’ve ever gone after,
he thought.
Most dangerous, too,
he realized, for their lives hung in the balance.
But I’ve got to try.

Attu readied his spear by tying all the rope he could find to its shaft, in the manner of the hunt, so when he threw the spear, it would fly, unrolling the rope as it went, one end tied securely to the spear, the other in his hands.

Attu sensed it would be difficult and maybe even dangerous to pull their ice chunk against the flow of the water, and he feared the spear wouldn’t hold well because of its point. He could use the weight of the point to his advantage, however. He needed a large enough ice chunk, close enough for an easy throw, and a bit further down the shoreline than they were.

There were so many ice chunks in the water; it didn’t take long to spot one to try.

Attu lofted the spear in a high arc towards the ice chunk. There was a possibility it would stick and he wouldn’t be able to pull their chunk over to it. Attu knew he could lose his spear by such an attempt.

But what good is a spear to a drowning person?
He reasoned, and called upon the spirits to make his weapon fly true. It did. Attu’s spear sank straight down into the middle of the ice chunk he had been aiming for. Attu let out a whoop of satisfaction.

“What are you doing?” Rika asked as she bolted out of the shelter at the sound of his cry.

“Spearing ice chunks,” Attu said with a grin.

“What?” Rika asked. Looking toward shore at all the chunks of floating ice now between them and the land, Rika nodded. “It might work.”

Attu began to pull, taking up the slack in the rope. As it tightened, he pulled slower, feeling the line for unusual movement as he would when hunting, watching his spear point to make sure it was holding.

“Are we getting closer, or is it coming toward us?”

“I think a bit of both.” Rika looked north and south. “If those ice chunks are moving with us, we are definitely getting closer to land, because they’re now further out.”

“That makes sense. We move toward it, and it moves toward us.” Attu continued pulling. “Is Elder Nuanu’s body-”

“Yes.” Rika interrupted him, “it’s ready for burial. But it’s too soon. I don’t want to do it just-”

“I know. Just keep Moolnik asleep with the potion for now. We have to try to get as close to shore as we can, while the ice chunks are here. Who knows when they might stop floating by? See how many there-”

A sudden shuddering passed through the ice, throwing both Rika and Attu down onto its surface.

“What was that?” Attu asked, quickly jumping up. He hadn’t let go of the rope. “I didn’t do anything.”

“That ice chunk hit us,” Rika said, pointing to a small one, now breaking up to the left of them, behind the shelter. A piece of their own ice fell into the water as they watched.

Rika and Attu looked at each other. The moving ice that might save them could also kill them. They were surrounded by pieces, some moving faster, some slower.

Looking to the north, Attu saw two enormous ice sheets in the distance, coming toward them. If one of these huge masses hit theirs, they would be the ones breaking into bits. Attu had to work fast.

“Take down the shelter, ready the packs and pile everything in the center of the ice,” Attu said.

Rika nodded and turned back toward the shelter.

Attu pulled the ice piece closer and closer to theirs. When it was still several spear lengths away, he stopped pulling and noticed the two continued to move toward each other for a while, even without him pulling. Attu marveled at what it must mean, this floating, and for a moment he thought of the skin boats Elder Nuanu had spoken of.

How wonderful it would be to be able to move among the ice sheets, skimming across the water, dry, knowing I could go back to shore whenever I wanted to.
That would indeed be like magic, Attu decided.

But he needed to get his spear back. Attu sent a silent plea to the spirits before he snapped the rope, a quick motion, designed to slice the spear out of the ice by its sharp point. It worked.

Attu sent up another shout. Behind him, Rika laughed. For a moment it almost seemed like it should be, the day after their joining, all celebration. But Attu had many more ice targets to spear if they were going to have a real reason to celebrate.

A
ttu continued to spear ice and by mid-sun, both he and Rika could see they’d made over half the distance to land.

“I’ve never felt such deep sadness and such hope at the same time,” Rika said as she stood next to Attu, who was waiting for the next ice piece to come within reach.

“Me too,” Attu said. “Elder Nuanu brought me into our old world. I wanted her to see this new one with us. She would have loved that opportunity.”

They both stood in silence for a while as Attu continued to watch for the next ice chunk to spear.

“And yet...” Attu hesitated. He wasn’t sure Rika would understand him, but he wanted her to know how he felt, anyway.