People of the Nightland (North America's Forgotten Past) (32 page)

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Authors: W. Michael Gear,Kathleen O'Neal Gear

BOOK: People of the Nightland (North America's Forgotten Past)
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“
S
kimmer … Skimmer … Skimmer …”
She jerked awake at the sound of her name being repeated over and over, and stared up into Ti-Bish’s worried eyes. He carried an oil lamp with a moss wick. Two long braids framed his boyish face and hung down over the front of his bearskin cape. In the fluttering light, the tiny black ravens painted on the cape seemed to move, to be flying.
“Is it morning?” she asked, and sat up.
“There is no morning here. Are you hungry?” He lifted the basket in his left hand, and she smelled the distinctive aroma of roasted fish.
“Starving.”
Ti-Bish started for the mouth of the cave. “Come, I want you to see something. We’ll eat there.”
Skimmer rose, swung her cape around her shoulders, and followed him out into the tunnel. The endless moaning of air flowing through the crevasses and tunnels mixed with the low groaning of the ice.
Her mouth dropped open at the size of the winding irregular passage. She’d had no idea when she followed him here in the darkness. This stunned her. The tunnel arched three body lengths over her head
and spread five wide. Sand and gravel dotted the floors and walls. Occasionally a massive boulder jutted out through the ice.
“I thought the Nightland Caves were pure ice,” she said.
“The ones near the surface are,” he replied softly, but his voice reverberated from the walls, almost as though he’d shouted. “Here, in the lowest tunnels, the Stone People live with the Ice Giants.”
The tunnel forked. Ti-Bish took the passageway to the left, the one that slanted sharply down. Skimmer was happy for the gravel in the floor; it kept her moccasins from slipping.
“It’s not much farther,” he said.
“Where are we going?”
“To my secret place.”
She kept her eyes on Ti-Bish. He had a gawky walk, like a blue heron hunting shallow water.
In another six tens of heartbeats, the tunnel seemed to fade, but as Ti-Bish carried his lamp closer, she saw the truth.
Ti-Bish stepped out onto a gravel shore and looked up. A pained howl rose from the bellies of the Ice Giants and shook the world.
“Blessed gods.” Skimmer had to brace her hand against the tunnel wall to stay on her feet. When the tremor stopped, she walked out behind him … and her breath caught.
The coal-black water rippled in the aftereffects of the quake; it spread before them like an endless ocean. An ocean of living light. Tens of fish swam near the surface, driving billows of light with their heads and, in their wakes, leaving milky veils behind. As far as her eye could see, the water had a faint glow; and the ice ceiling above, scalloped and sculpted by eons of water, gleamed.
“It’s … unbelievable,” she whispered. Her heart began to pound. “No one could ever Dream such a place.”
Ti-Bish knelt on the gravel and set his basket down. “Grandmother Earth is alive, Skimmer. The mountains have souls. The trees Sing late at night. Grains of sand can speak. It’s just that no one listens.”
Her gaze followed a sinuous trail of light created by a very large fish. She had heard elderly Traders speak of the far oceans as living seas of light, but she’d never imagined this. “Where are we, Ti-Bish?”
“Beneath the Ice Giants.”
“You mean …” Terror killed her voice. In a bare whisper she said, “You mean that massive bulk of ice sits on top of us?”
“Yes. This lake is their tears. Every time they cry, the water level
rises.” He pointed to the ledges that had been carved into the ice from the rising and falling water.
“Do they know we’re here?” she whispered.
“Oh, yes, they called me here—to this very spot—ten summers ago.” That mad gleam had entered his eyes again.
“Called you?”
“Please, sit beside me. Let’s eat and talk.” Ti-Bish laid out shell bowls. With care he unwrapped four roasted fish and divided them into the bowls. Finally, he drew out two wooden cups and handed her one.
Skimmer took it and sat down cross-legged.
Ti-Bish pulled out a water bag and filled his cup as he said, “The water here is salty, so you can’t drink it.”
“How can it be salty when it’s melted ice?”
“Because it’s part of the Thunder Sea. At high tide, salt water rushes in, and fresh water drains out at low tide. Those are ocean fish. And sometimes I see seals and walrus in here.”
Skimmer let him fill her cup from the bag and drank. It tasted good. “This must dazzle everyone you bring here.”
He gave her a hopeful look and softly said, “I have never brought anyone here before.”
For the moment the awesome vista overwhelmed her hunger. He picked one of the bowls up and handed it to her.
Skimmer set her water cup down, took the bowl, and rested it in her lap. When she took a bite, she found the fish still warm, the meat flaky and delicious.
Ti-Bish said, “I come here when I’m afraid or worried. When I’m here none of the terrible burdens of being the Guide weigh my soul down. I feel like I’ve already gone through the hole in the ice and returned to the sanctuary of the Long Dark.”
Her thoughts shifted briefly to Headswift Village, and worry began to nibble at her heart. She ate more of her fish, trying to force the thoughts away, but when she looked up, she found him studying her anxiously.
“I’m glad you’re here, Skimmer.”
The air around her shifted, as though moving in response to the wind outside, and the faintest of ripples brushed the shore. “Why, Ti-Bish?”
“I need to be with you. To pray with you.”
She gave him a hard look. “I thought you wanted me for other reasons.”
“What other reasons?”
“As a man wants a woman. The way Nightland warriors usually do with women captives.” She watched his eyes widen as she added, “If that’s the price I must pay for my people, I will lie with you.”
“You would …” He looked completely stunned. “I … I …” He swallowed hard, turning his eyes away in embarrassment. In an oddly squeaking voice he barely managed to say, “I only want to pray with you.”
“Pray?” she asked, confused.
His eyes widened. “Yes, you … you’re important. To me, and especially …” His excited voice stopped suddenly as though he’d been hushed by invisible Spirits.
“Yes, Ti-Bish?”
“You would …” He blinked his eyes, as though suddenly tortured. “I
can’t
lie with you.”
She sighed relief, ate another bite of fish, and swallowed. “We live in a terrible world, Ti-Bish. I’m sorry I—”
“Terrible?”
She blinked. “Filled with rape, sadness, and death. Suffering is the heart of everything.”
Ti-Bish pulled a long strip of crispy skin from his fish and ate it before he replied. “Fortunately there is darkness to kill that terrible light.”
She frowned. “What did you say?”
“Sadness and death … they are sharp daggers of light that blind the soul. Darkness eases the pain.” He spread his arms to the dark womb that held them. “Raven Hunter’s black wings make it go away.”
He inhaled the scents of the darkness as though they soothed him.
Skimmer finished her first fish and tossed the bones into the lake. An eerie glow expanded in its wake.
She watched it fade before she started on her second fish. “Do you actually see Raven Hunter?”
He smiled and bowed his head. “No one believes me. But, yes, of course I do.”
Fascinated, and frightened, she asked, “What does he tell you?”
“Oh, things I’m too stupid to understand. A few days ago, he told me that Wolf Dreamer has touched the Spiral and it’s twisting down into nothingness. Like a child’s top, winding down.”
Hesitantly, he reached over and caressed her hand. The warmth of
his skin, the tenderness of his touch, made her turn her palm up so they could twine fingers. He gripped her hand tightly and heaved what sounded like a sigh of relief. Then he closed his eyes as though drowning in the feel of her flesh against his.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“I …” He lifted his gaze and shyly said, “I need to talk with you.”
“Then talk.”
He gazed at her through dark eyes that glowed with a haunted light. “Do you remember when I brought you the feather?”
“I remember.”
“You laughed, but you had tears in your eyes.” He hesitantly reached out and touched her hand where it rested in the sand, caressing her fingers. “I asked you why beauty made you cry.”
She didn’t remember any of this. “What did I say?”
For an instant, his heavily lidded eyes reminded her of deep dark holes. He dropped his gaze to examine the twig of driftwood. “You said that beauty died.”
“Why did my words about the feather bother you, Ti-Bish?”
“Because”—his voice sounded pained, unsure—“it has a bearing on our lives, doesn’t it? I mean, if you believe that all beauty dies, then you’re never happy.”
The hollowness in Skimmer’s breast seemed to boom. She said nothing.
He pressed. “Why do you think there’s so much suffering?”
“You’re the holy man. You tell me.”
Ripples undulated across the surface like swirls of luminous frost.
“I asked Raven Hunter.” He gazed up at her with childlike innocence, but his eyes seemed haunted. “He told me it’s the fault of the Sunpath People.”
“Our fault? Why?”
He tenderly stroked the long black hair that fell down her back. After the consternation her offer to bed him had caused, she allowed it. “Because you believe in Wolf Dreamer.”
“Well, the next time you see Raven Hunter, tell him there is one fewer believer.”
“You … you’ve stopped believing in Wolf Dreamer?”
“He’s just a story our Ancestors created to entertain children.”
Sounds from the lake drifted to them: a fish jumping, water dripping, the deep aching groans of the Ice Giants.
Ti-Bish looked at her through eyes filled with so much sorrow that she felt wounded. “Oh, no, he exists, Skimmer. He’s just wicked.”
A curiously empty sensation invaded her. “If he exists, I agree with you.”
And there’s no sense in telling you what I think about Raven Hunter. Not after what I survived in the pen that night.
Ti-Bish reached around and pulled the basket onto his lap. As he unfolded the hide that had kept the fish warm, he said, “This is for you.”
He handed her a beautifully painted bundle.
Skimmer took it and examined the designs. The paintings looked ancient. In many places the colors had flaked off, leaving gaps in the picture, but she could still make out the two men hurling lightning bolts at each other. “Where did you get this? It’s very old.”
Ti-Bish wet his lips and stammered, “I—I found it. I’ve never opened it, though, and I don’t think you should either. Just … keep it. As a gift.”
A strange phosphorescent fog formed on the far side of the lake and moved toward them, as though being pushed by Wind Woman’s breath.
Ti-Bish said, “Father Sun has risen. He’s warming the sea outside.”
Skimmer stared at the fog. “Do people come in here in boats?”
“No. You can’t see the opening from outside because the Ice Giants have fallen into the water, blocking the way for boats. But I think once, a long time ago, people rowed their canoes in here. I’ve found skeletons on the shore.”
“Skeletons? Of people?”
“People and animals. Some of the monsters are frightening. They’re huge, and their bones are rock.”
A fluttering like bats overhead sounded, and Skimmer looked up. The ice vault shimmered, but nothing alive flew around up there.
Ti-Bish abruptly got to his feet, picked up his oil lamp, and said, “I have to take you back to your chamber now.”

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