The Reindeer People (26 page)

She stared at him solemnly, refusing to be baited. He giggled again.

'Leave him alone,' she told him coldly.

'Wolf!' he sputtered and trailed off in helpless laughter. Joboam's eyes flickered. Kerlew leaned forward, heedless of how the man might react. 'Did Wolf really visit you in the night?' he asked delightedly. His hazel eyes sparkled.

'Kerlew!' Tillu exclaimed angrily, even as Joboam growled, 'Keep that brat away from me!'

'Outside, son,' Tillu directed calmly. 'Firewood.'

'I got it yesterday,' Kerlew complained.

'Then get more. We can always use it.'

'Not if we go with the herdfolk. Comes the herdlord now, to ask you to be healer.'

'Outside!' Tillu repeated sternly. 'Take the bowls and clean them with moss and snow. Now!'

He turned from Joboam, who clutched the sleeping skins about himself as if Kerlew were vermin that might be warded off. Laconically the boy gathered Tillu's bowl and lifted the door flap. As he lifted the flap, the gray light of morning filtered in. Distant shouting reached their ears, the words indistinct.

'Capiam,' breathed Joboam. His eyes narrowed with suspicion or fear as he stared after the boy. An instant later, he had flung back the bedskins and was struggling to rise. 'I will leave,' he told Tillu tersely as he kicked clear of the skins and groped after his boots. 'And you will not tell I have been here. Understand?'

She didn't understand why he wouldn't want Capiam to know he had been in her tent. It was pointless, anyway. 'Capiam knows you are here. Yesterday, his son come. He knows you are here.'

Joboam dropped the boot he had been pulling on. 'Rolke? Rolke was here yesterday? What did you tell him?'

'I tell him, Capiam cannot send to me one who is already here.'

'And that was all? You didn't say you were healing my arm?'

Tillu cast her mind back to the day before, tried to recall her exact words. 'No. I just say he could not send someone who was already with me.'

Joboam sat toying with his boot. Unreadable emotions flickered over his face as he sorted ideas. Tillu heard now the crunch and squeak of the snow as it gave under hoof and sledge. To her surprise, Joboam eased back on the pallet. He dragged the furs across himself and stretched out. 'Go out!' He gestured at her authoritatively. 'Go out and meet him. Say nothing of me, unless he asks. Then say I am here. Go out! Hurry!'

'This is my tent!' Tillu spoke through clenched teeth.

'Hurry!' Joboam urged her.

She went slowly, smoothing her hair back from her face. She gave him a final glance as she went out. He was staring after her, his face set in a grin born of both tension and satisfaction. She couldn't understand him and didn't want to.

Two sledges had pulled up in front of her tent. Rolke was there, as sullen-faced as ever, with his father standing behind him. Capiam's face was stern. He stood straight and solemn, his black eyes fixed on the healer. Short and stocky he was, as were most of the herdfolk, but his bearing and dress conspired to give an impression of height. His garments were both opulent and severe. His cap was of knotted black wool, his coat and leggings of black wolf. The hem of his coat had been trimmed with the black-tipped tails of weasels. The braid that decorated his cuffs was a stark pattern of black on white. His coat was cinched tightly around his waist by a thick leather belt held with a large bronze clasp. A leather thong about his neck supported another massy piece of bronzework. If he had intended to impress Tillu, he had succeeded.

She tried not to imagine how she must appear, in her tunic and leggings of worn leather. She stood straight and returned his gaze, trying to ignore her son's foolishness. Kerlew crouched behind a tree much too slender to hide him, peering around it at them, but not giving any greeting. Tillu pressed her lips together, took a breath, and advanced to meet them. She did not smile as she spoke, but kept her voice even and her face calm.

'Capiam. Rolke. I am honored that you visit me.'

Capiam said nothing. Nor did Rolke, until Capiam nudged him violently from behind. The boy's eyes glittered angrily when he spoke, but his words were courteous.

'I wish you good morning, Healer Tillu. I come bearing a message from my father, Herdlord Capiam of the Herdfolk. May I speak it to you?' She could nearly hear his teeth grate as he closed his jaws on the last word.

'Certainly,' she replied serenely, 'I am always glad to receive a message courteously delivered.'

He flinched at her words, and she knew she had hit the mark. Capiam had come to be sure that his message was politely delivered.

'The Herdlord Capiam' - Rolke glanced aside to find Kerlew grinning at him from behind the non-shelter of the tree. He caught his breath in frustration, and jerked his eyes back to Tillu - 'The Herdlord Capiam invites you to join our people on our spring migration. Long have our folk been without a trained healer. Last year both humans and reindeer suffered injuries that a healer could have eased. A child ate tainted meat and died. A herder's broken leg healed badly, so now she must limp. Herdlord Capiam is a man who cares for his folk. He would not see them crippled and scarred for lack of a trained healer to tend them. So I am sent to offer you these things, if you will come with us.' He took a deep breath and began his listing. 'Hides for a new tent, and the use of a harke to carry your belongings. Meat as you need it, and woven cloth for clothing for you and your son. The herdlord will see that you do not hunger or lack any necessity. And so I ask you: Will you go with our folk, to be our healer?'

Tillu stood silently, a decision still eluding her. But Kerlew leaped out from behind his tree, crying, 'Yes, oh, yes, Tillu, say yes! I am sick of eating rabbit, and tired of always staying in one place. Let's go with them!'

Rolke's face flared with hatred as Kerlew capered wildly in the snow before them. Distaste showed an instant in Capiam's eyes; then he regained his stoic bearing. If she went with them, their feelings for Kerlew wouldn't change. They would only deepen. Kerlew would be like an annoying scab to Rolke, a thing to be picked at and irritated endlessly. She should stay here, by herself with the boy, and teach him and protect him.

But the healer in her spoke through her jangling need to protect her son. Her belly had tightened when he had mentioned the child dead of tainted meat, the herder who now must limp. For so many people to be without a healer was not right. Her skills gave her a duty. As she had so many times before, she could always leave them if things became too uncomfortable. Her resolve of the night before melted.

'I need to think,' she said softly, her voice carrying clearly through Kerlew's babbling. 'At least for a while.'

Rolke nodded curtly and hung his head to hide a venomous glare at Kerlew. He was not pleased with his success as a messenger. For a moment the herdlord's eyes met hers, assessing her. His face was serious, as if he knew of her private doubts. He gave a slow nod of acceptance. Then his eyes darted suddenly past her, to widen in surprise. Tillu turned in consternation to see what was behind her.

'Joboam? You are here?' Capiam asked in disbelief.

'As you see.' The big man emerged from her tent, standing to stretch in the daylight. His hair was still tousled from sleeping and he had not bothered to put on his outer tunic. Tillu was baffled. Had not he just ordered her not to speak of him? And now he wandered out in plain sight of them, as if to flaunt his presence.

'But what are you doing here?' Rolke demanded, curiosity making him forget what courtesy he knew.

'I -' Joboam began and then hesitated long.

'Rolke!' his father reprimanded him, and the boy's eyes flew wide with sudden understanding. He swung his stare to Tillu, and a slow, offensive smile spread across his adolescent face. He leered at her knowingly.

'I came to speak to the healer and to add my ... persuasion that she should come with us.' Joboam's voice was oily with self-satisfaction. Capiam looked uncomfortable, Rolke avid. Tillu wondered what message she was missing. Even Kerlew stopped his hopping about and stared from one adult to the next, his mouth agape. Tillu knew their language well enough now, but what had passed among the men was a non-verbal implication that eluded and annoyed her. A moment longer Joboam stood in her door. Then he ducked back within her tent. Capiam shuffled his feet awkwardly.

'Healer, we are hopeful you will come with us. I promise you that you shall lack for nothing, though I am sure that Joboam will make sure that you have all -'

'I think I shall drive back with you, Capiam, if you will wait a moment. My harke and pulkor are behind the tent. It will take but a moment to harness up.'

Joboam buckled his heavy belt over his tunic as he spoke. He gave Capiam a bright smile of good fellowship, then stepped close to Tillu. He smiled down at her, and she looked up into his teeth. When he spoke, it was in a soft, fond voice that still carried clearly. 'Tillu. I am sorry to leave so abruptly, but there are things I must attend to, especially since you have decided to be one of us. But you know I'll be back soon. What shall I bring you?'

His syrupy voice and the masterful way he loomed over her were impossible to mistake. She couldn't understand what his game was about, but she could play it, too. She smiled up at him, all teeth and thinned lips. 'I have not decided yet,' she said clearly, 'but you may bring me a bronze knife. As healer for the herdfolk, I would need one. If you come back to see me, bring a bronze knife for me. A thin blade is best, but I can manage with a wide one.'

She saw the quick flash of anger in his eyes as she named the exorbitant fee for not betraying his game. He masked it quickly. She felt a small quiver of worry as she realized how important his deception of Capiam must be to him. 'A knife, then,' he agreed smoothly. He was not so foolish as to try and touch her in farewell. But the way his eyes wandered over her face was touch enough to inspire unease in Tillu. He turned from her abruptly, and the snow crunched under his boots as he went around her tent to where his tethered harke waited.

The silence was back, hanging between them like a curtain. Kerlew had completely lost interest in the proceedings. He had hooked his hands over a low branch of a nearby birch, and he dangled by his arms, feet on the ground still, but knees bent so that the tree swayed with his weight as he bounced. Rolke was staring at him, his upper lip drawn up in distaste. Kerlew spoke suddenly. 'Joboam had a vision of Wolf in the night. He yelled out, Wolf! and Tillu jumped from the bed to grab her stabbing spear!'

'Kerlew!' Tillu rebuked him, not so much for the gossip as for the way he told it, his amber eyes probing Capiam for a response to the story. For an instant, it might have been Carp hanging in the tree, working his magic on Benu's folk with his sly intimations and cryptic insinuations. But if the story meant anything to Capiam, he covered it well. He gave the boy the sickly smile adults often gave her son when they did not know how else to respond to his strange behavior.

'He does well to fear Wolf,' Kerlew added, ignoring Tillu's glare. 'For one of Wolf's own will pull him down one day. Joboam may fancy himself a Bear, but that is not what looks out of his eyes at me. I am to be a shaman; did you know that?'

Before anyone could respond to this latest comment, the squeak of Joboam's pulkor was heard and he drove his harke from behind the tent. He seemed oblivious of the changed mood that greeted him. He pulled his animal to a halt and, smiling, glanced from one face to the next. 'Well. Shall we be going, then?'

'When will the herdfolk be leaving?' Tillu asked suddenly.

Capiam answered her. 'Some of the folk are still in the higher country with their animals. When spring is a bit stronger and the ice has left the moss, they will come down from the hills, and we will go.'

'West?' Tillu guessed, thinking of more hills and forest.

Capiam looked surprised. 'North. From the hills out onto the wide tundra, and across it to the Cataclysm. To follow the wild herd, and to meet with the other herdfolk for the summer.' He turned a bemused smile on Joboam. 'She has much to learn of our ways,' he commented affably.

'I shall not mind teaching her,' Joboam assured him. Tillu seethed at his proprietary air, but said nothing. She'd let him keep his game intact, until she had her bronze knife. Then they would come to an agreement on her terms. The thought brought a real smile to her face as she bid them farewell. She marked how Joboam brought his pulkor abreast of Capiam's, to converse with him while Rolke trailed behind them. She sighed softly when they were out of sight. If it were only the healing she had to deal with! But if she went with them, it would be the day-to-day life among the herdfolk that would be hardest for her. And for Kerlew. She glanced about, but didn't see the boy.

'Kerlew!' she called, hoping desperately he hadn't followed the men and reindeer. There was no answer. 'Kerlew!' she called again sharply and pushed her way into the tent. He bounced up quickly, guiltily, from his pallet, furtively stuffing something inside his shirt. She knew of the shaman's pouch he had made by taking one of her herb bags and marking it with charcoal and blood. She had even see it once, when he had thought she was asleep and had come to the fire to examine his treasures. She never spoke of it; she didn't want to encourage him. She knew it held his red stone and other oddments. What other bits he added to it were no concern to her. His behavior was.