People of the Fire (41 page)

 
          
 
"You've done very well," Seven Suns
admitted from the side. "I never would have believed this many of us would
ever be in one place again."

 
          
 
The gruff old voice wrecked his concentration.
The urge to rebuke the old man surged, hung for a moment, and ebbed as a cool
wind of reason scattered his anger. Seven Suns needed to be won yet. That's
right, son. Take your time. Use your senses and win him over completely. Then
you can put him in his rightful place.

 
          
 
That's what she would have said.

 
          
 
Heavy Beaver spread his hands wide, head back,
serenity on the flat features of his face. "We're the new hunters of the
buffalo lands. Like the very wolves, we prowl and take what we need. But it's
more than the mindless courage of our young men. You see that warrior there? The
tall one, painted in blue with the antelope headdress?"

 
          
 
"The one dancing closest to the
fire?"

 
          
 
"That's him. His name is Two Blue Moons.
He's the oldest son of the Cut Hair People's chief, Fat Dog. He came to me. He
offered himself to the new Dreamer. I have a great deal of faith in him. When
he leads a war party, his very presence drives our young men to seek to outdo
him. Rarely does he let them. But the important thing is the daring, the
cunning in warfare that such behavior develops."

 
          
 
"Is that all, though?" Seven Suns
leaned forward, gesturing with his hand. "Life must have more to it than
war and the ability to demoralize enemies."

 
          
 
"Must it?" Heavy Beaver lifted an
eyebrow. "Look around you.. Once we were in rags, starving, always moving
and dying, trying to find fewer and fewer buffalo."

 
          
 
"We had some good years. Rain came. The
herds began to grow, the calf crop—"

 
          
 
"And now the rains might fail
again." Heavy Beaver yawned, letting his soul sway to the beat of the drum
and the rising keen of the Singers. Where was his mother's voice? There,
hanging just at the edge of consciousness. t4 And if it does, Seven Suns, we'll
not stay bound by the old agreement to hunt only the lands drained by the
Moon
River
. Indeed, we can hunt south to the
Sand
River
, to the
Big
River
in the north. We can hunt where the game
are, and no one will stop us. No, we hunt more than buffalo. We hunt people. If
we can't find buffalo to kill for hides, we'll take them from those who
do."

 
          
 
"And if others become—"

 
          
 
"They won't. They can't." Mother
won't let them. She takes care of us y you doddering old fool! You knew her.
You should have recognized her talents then.

 
          
 
Seven Suns shook his head slowly. "You
sound very sure of yourself, Heavy Beaver.''

 
          
 
The Spirit Dreamer smiled and waved a hand.
"I am. I've Dreamed the new way . . . and it's as the spirits told me.
It's a new age, a new kind of life. We've cleaned the pollution from the
People."

 
          
 
"And what comes next?"

 
          
 
"To purify others as well. I don't intend
on letting the Cut Hair, or the Fire Buffalo, or the White Crane ever challenge
us again. Their power must be broken, enough of their women taken to ensure
marriage and economic ties with our bands." A flush of certainty, like the
rising of the morning sun, warmed him. That was the way. He could almost feel
it in the very air.

 
          
 
"And the Red Hand? How do you plan to
tame the wild men of the mountains?''

 
          
 
Heavy Beaver chuckled to himself. "Oh,
they'll fall. For the moment, the only advantage they have is that they know
the country up there. They can ambush us at will. The
keis
to plan ahead. When we have enough supplies laid in, and enough warriors
trained for it, we'll go up there and root them all out."

 
          
 
Seven Suns frowned, sucking at his lower lip.
"There are some of my elders who—"

 
          
 
"Forget them. This isn't an age for the
old men and old women to spout stories about First Man or the Hero 1 Here, in
this new world, we're making a new way. I'm the legend of the new world, Seven
Suns. My mother had this vision. She foresaw this future. She had Power running
in her veins like blood. I'm just living it for her."

 
          
 
The image he'd conjured possessed him. In his
reverie, the pot drum reflected the beat of her heart. She had become the
People. He cocked his head, listening again to the chant, seeking her words.
They hovered at the edge of his understanding. If only he could break that last
barrier and comprehend.

 
          
 
“What is it?" Seven Suns asked.

 
          
 
Heavy Beaver ignored him, lost, trying to
unravel the secret of his mother's words.

 
          
 
"The water has ceased to run in Monster
Bone Springs. As my Power weakens, so does that of the world. Even the
sagebrush is wasting. Can't you do something?" The Wolf Bundle called up
into the spinning golden haze, its plea sending shivers along the silver silken
way of the Spirals.

 
          
 
Wolf Dreamer's voice came hazily from the
Spirals. "We have reached our limits for the moment. We must wait, hope.
"

 
          
 
"And watch a world die?"

 
          
 
Hungry Bull helped Two Smokes down a steep
place, looking around the new shelter. The old
berdache
led them down a twisting trail as a gentle dusting of snow settled about them,
whitening shoulders, heads, and packs. A scattering of juniper mixed with
limber pine along the drainages while the south-facing slopes had a gray look
from bitterbrush, currants, and serviceberry. Deer tracks had stippled the
trail they walked.

 
          
 
Across from them, the opposite side of the
canyon looked cool and somber as the conical tips of fir rose dark green above
snarled black timber. At the crest, however, broad meadows appeared to stretch
up into the grayish haze of falling snowflakes and cloud.

 
          
 
"Elk winter up there," Two Smokes
said, gesturing toward the high meadows. "Good place to hunt in the deep
cold."

 
          
 
"Good camp all around," Rattling
Hooves agreed. "Doesn't look like anyone camped here for a long
time."

 
          
 
"Maybe." Two Smokes shrugged.
"Last time I stayed here was as a young man. Five Falls came here with his
cousin and we spent the winter. The camp was pretty good, but the mice and
packrats almost drove us crazy that year."

 
          
 
"But did you come this late?"
Rattling Hooves asked, twisting her body under the tumpline so she could see
him.

 
          
 
"Earlier." Two Smokes pointed up the
canyon. "But we did the hard work then. We built a sheep trap up there. I
don't think it would take much to fix it up. We've got the new net Elk Charm
and I have been working on. Once we kill some bighorns, we'll have hides and
meat for a while until the elk come down. Perhaps Hungry Bull, here, and Three
Toes and Black Crow can kill a deer or two. From those hides we can make snares
for elk."

 
          
 
"Whoa!" Black Crow cried. He'd been
listening with his head cocked, trying to pick up the
Anit'ah
words. "Did he say snare an elk?"

 
          
 
Hungry Bull chuckled. "Hunting here is
different. Come, let's find this rock shelter." He winked at Rattling
Hooves. "Maybe you can teach me how to snare elk and hunt sheep?"

 
          
 
She grinned at him before returning her
concentration to the trail. "I think you'll learn. But come on, it's
starting to get dark. Better to be off this loose slope before we can't see our
feet."

 
          
 
Tall stands of giant wild rye—brown under the
hand of winter—hid the mouth of the rock overhang. The place looked to be ten
paces in length and Hungry Bull found it extended back another three paces once
he'd pushed through the s^ of grass. In the failing light he could barely make
out the litter of a large packrat nest in the back corner where the floor met
the rock.

 
          
 
"You could be right about the
packrats."

            
"What we don't drive off,
I'll eat." Rattling Hooves sighed as she swung the pack off her back and
rubbed her arms. "Hey, great hunter of the Short Buffalo People, why don't
you make us a fire?"

 
          
 
Three Toes helped Two Smokes up the slope and
into the dark shelter. The rest straggled in one by one, sighing, shivering,
and puffing in the cold as they shed packs here and there.

 
          
 
"So this is home?" Black Crow called
as he reached up to rap knuckles on the stone. He shook his head slowly.

 
          
 
From where he dug around in his pack for fire
sticks, Hungry Bull looked up. "Worried?"

 
          
 
Black Crow led Makes Fun by the hand, his
three children staring around owlishly. "Worried?" Black Crow cocked
his head, watching as Hungry Bull's quick fingers placed the charred sharpened
end of the small stick in the friction hole of the base piece. Puffing foggy
breath, he began spinning the sticks as Black Crow added, "No, we're not
worried. Everything's just new, is all. We're . . . well, we don't feel like we
fit here. Like the world's different, you know?"

 
          
 
Hungry Bull nodded, glad for the blood he
pumped through chilled arms. "I felt that way when we left Heavy Beaver's
camp—but Sage Root had just been killed. I followed along like a soul without a
body."

 
          
 
Rustling grass marked the arrival of Elk Charm
and Little Dancer. Some private joke had them laughing with the buoyancy of
youth, despite the cold and fatigue of the long journey.

 
          
 
Makes Fun's teeth had begun to chatter from
the cold, before the spinning fire stick coaxed a faint thread of smoke from
the tinder. Despite chill-stiffened fingers, Hungry Bull grinned as he got a
red glow.

 
          
 
"Got a place for this?" he asked
Black Crow.

 
          
 
The latter immediately reached into his pack,
drawing forth a twist of dried
ricegrass
stems and
shredded bark, all partially charred. Makes Fun reached for the packrat nest,
pulling long-dried lengths of sagebrush and duff from the mass. Somewhere back
in the rock, a faint thumping could be heard as the frightened rodent stamped
with a nervous back foot.

 
          
 
"And there's worse coming," Makes
Fun promised the little creature.

           
 
Hungry Bull scooped his glowing tinder into
Black Crow's grass twist and blew cautiously. The ember gleamed, a bright red
eye. Smoke rose in a thin trail. A dance of flame gave birth and greedily
devoured the twist. One by one, they fed bits of twigs and sticks, adding
bigger pieces until they had a crackling blaze.

 
          
 
"Hey, look at that!" Three Toes
pointed at the sloping back wall of the shelter. A long section of sandstone
had broken loose, the top of it barely protruding from the floor, so long ago
had it happened. In the meantime, the flat panel created by the roof fall had
been smoke-blackened and soot-encrusted, but not so much that a person couldn't
make out the figures pecked into the rock.

 
          
 
A large spiral dominated the panel. Three Toes
stepped closer, rubbing at the side to clean the rock. "Blood and
dung," he whispered. "A monster! Look! Look how well this is done.
There's the humped back, the big teeth, and the tail thing growing out of the
snout!" He scrubbed at the wall with his hand, wiping more of the soot
away, and stopped old, peering at the figure he'd uncovered.

 
          
 
A man with a dart stood to one side, obviously
in the act of casting his deadly weapon into the monster's side.

 
          
 
"White Calf always said that people
killed the monsters like we do the buffalo." Hungry Bull reached over the
huddle of children clustered around the fire with hands out to the warmth. He
snagged a burning brand and stuffed it into the side of the packrat's nest.

 
          
 
His smile beamed up at Rattling Hooves.
"I don't like packrats, they chew things in the night. They also lead to
trouble with Spirit Power. I was doing just fine until a packrat chewed my
atlatl
once."

 
          
 
She slapped his shoulder. "That nest
ought to make enough coals for a day or two. I'll smack them when they run out
this side."

 
          
 
She positioned herself across one of the
runways with her walking stick raised. Elk Charm took the other side as tire
crackled into the nest.

 
          
 
Three Toes shook his head, attention glued to
the rock carvings as Black Crow came to stand next to him.

 
          
 
"I don't know how long those have been
there " Two Smokes settled himself on an angular chunk of roof fall.
"I first saw them when I was a boy, maybe as old as Dancing Leaf"—he
pointed to Black Crow's oldest daughter—"and they were old then."

 
          
 
Three Toes continued to rub at the soot as
Rattling Hooves cried out and whacked at a brown streak with her stick. "Got
you!"

 
          
 
On the other side of the spiral, Three Toes
uncovered pictures of two animals, obviously mountain sheep from the horns
curling on their heads. Then he found a buffalo and an elk, both transfixed
with darts. A series of grooves in the lower part of the wall he identified as
scrubbings for platform preparation in the manufacture of chipped-stone tools,
but above, hidden in the dancing shadow of the fire, he scraped the soot from
one last figure.

 
          
 
"What's that?" Hungry Bull craned
his neck to see.

 
          
 
"Wolf," Three Toes whispered,
stepping back as the lines of the animal became clear. "Look! Like it's
alive."

 
          
 
Little Dancer gasped, almost startling Hungry
Bull. He managed to glimpse his son's face, seeing the color drain from his
wind-nipped cheeks.

 
          
 
"Wolf was the Spirit Helper of the First
Man when he came from under the world," Two Smokes reminded them from
where he rubbed at his shivering arms. He nodded slowly. "We never cleaned
the rock carvings when we were here."

 
          
 
Elk Charm's deadly stick smacked another
skittering pack-rat as the fire burned into the nest. "That's two! Fresh
meat tonight!"

 
          
 
"Hey." Three Toes grinned, stepping
back to put his arm around Meadowlark and ruffle his children's heads.
"This might not be such a bad place after all!"

 
          
 
Hungry Bull chuckled as Rattling Hooves
whacked another packrat. The heat from the fires had begun to penetrate his
half-frozen clothing. "No, it might not be bad at all."

 
          
 
Then he caught sight of Little Dancer, still
pale, glazed eyes on the wolf that seemed to stare down at him from above.

 
          
 
Snaps Horn studied White Calf's shelter from a
distance, seeing no one but the old woman. He waited for two days, making sure
the others had left. Angrily, he looked up at the somber sky. White fluffy flakes
fell wet and heavy. There'd be no trail now. He should have cut for sign
earlier. He'd known the Short Buffalo People would be there.

 
          
 
The Short Buffalo boy should have come walking
down one of the trails so he could drive a dart right through him. That'd teach
him to fool with the woman Snaps Horn had chosen. Then no one would stand in
his way if he took her for a wife.

 
          
 
Where would they have gone?

 
          
 
The old ewe trotted forward, stopping for a
moment to look back over her shoulder.

 
          
 
"Slow up!" Rattling Hooves called,
her voice barely raised in the chill air.

 
          
 
Little Dancer stopped where he was, trying to
keep his footing on the steep slope.

 
          
 
Sunlight slanted from the winter sky, warming
the southern face of the canyon. Behind the rocks, shadows of snow clung in the
recesses. Bits of grass, winter-dry plants, and occasional patches of brush
eked out a fragile existence on the crumbling slope of the mountain.

 
          
 
"Can't believe people hunt like
this." Hungry Bull's words barely traveled to where Little Dancer waited,
trying to catch his breath.