People of the Mist (51 page)

 
          
“I’ve
lived dangerously all of my life, Elder.” She straightened her back, arms
braced on her knees. “I’ve paid for my mistakes. Oh, have I paid. Sometimes, I
wonder how I managed to do the things I’ve done, but I tell myself,
7 am
the Weroansqua ‘s daughter!” I do what I
have to. The cost has been greater than you could know.”

 
          
“So,
you will add another mistake to a long list?” He paused, weighing his words.
“Copper Thunder isn’t any different than the Mamanatowick. If anything he’s
more ambitious than the other chieftains. He’s seen the Serpent Chiefs, and
pictures himself as one.”

 
          
She
paused thoughtfully, then asked, “What happened between the two of you?”

           
“Many years ago, I killed his father
and captured him and his mother. His father was a Trader. The man’s timing was
bad. He was visiting and trading in a village I overran for my chief.” Panther
shrugged. “If Copper Thunder’s father had stayed out of it, I might have let
him go. Instead, he felt an obligation to stand by the chief, a man called
Stalks-By-Night. Grass Mat’s father picked up a war club and joined the fight.
He killed my lieutenant, and I killed him. After the battle, I claimed Copper
Thunder and his mother for myself. They went back to my house as slaves.”

 
          
“How
did he get here?”

 
          
“Ran
away most likely. I’m sure he’s not keen on having the knowledge spread that he
was once a slave.” Panther sighed. “I might have done you a favor, that
long-gone day, by cutting off his head instead of taking him back to carry
water and firewood.”

 
          
“That’s
why he hates you?”

 
          
“I
can’t blame him. I ruined his life.”

 
          
“And
his mother?”

 
          
“She
served my needs while I was there. After I left she went to another and I don’t
know what happened to her. Dead I suppose. Originally, she was a woman from the
upper villages. The Trader arrived one day and they fell in love. She went with
him, back across the mountains to trade on the great rivers. She was used to
being well treated, and never adapted to being a slave. Grass Mat was still
young. A boy is more flexible, but those days of beatings and living like an
animal soured something inside him, made him what he is today.”

 
          
She
clapped her hands together and leaned forward to spill more water on the hot
rocks. As the steam rose, she asked, “What about all of those tattoos? Do they
have a meaning?”

           
“Those are the marks of a Serpent
Chief. Your Copper Thunder is trying to make himself into the very man he hated
so passionately as a boy. Envy, like the bite of a copperhead, can dispense the
most deadly of venoms.”

 
          
“He
says that you poisoned your enemies, that you were very good at making your
rivals disappear.”

 
          
He
took a deep breath. “You have told me that in your life you have made more than
your share of mistakes. As a young man, so did I. And like you, I have paid for
them.” He barked a harsh laugh. “Anything that Copper Thunder tells you about
me, well, if it’s not true, it ought to be.”

 
          
“So,
you were a great, influential War Chief. What did you do? Dally with the
Serpent Chief’s wife? How does a feared War Chief end up as a witch on an
island in the
Salt
Water
Bay
?” He closed his eyes, seeing himself as he
had been, tall, strong, wearing brightly dyed fabrics, his body decked in
necklaces of shining copper. From his house, high on its mound on the western
end of the plaza, he could see out over the shining
Black Warrior River
, across thatched houses among the
cornfields beyond. His ranks of slaves knelt at his feet, heads down. His hair
was festooned with feathers of blue, yellow, and orange, held in place with a
burnished copper hairpiece. There, at the foot of his high square mound, stood
a pyramid of human heads as tall as a man, all rotting in the bright sunlight.
Even now, so many years after, and so many days’ journey away, the smell cloyed
his nostrils. He could still hear the buzzing of the flies.

 
          
He
wiped at the trickling sweat on his face, looking back into the past, into that
dark room, the moonlight streaming in through the little square window. He
could hear the hooting of owls out in the forest, smell the dank water and mud
of the Black Warrior. “I had a dream. First Man, Wolfdreamer, came to me. He
said, “Who are you, Raven? What have you become?”

 
          
“I
answered him, “I am the mighty Raven, War Chief for the renowned White Smoke
Rising, Lord of the Three Rivers. Before me, all the world trembles, for I am
my lord’s sweeping right arm.”

 
          
“You
are polluted,” the Wolfdreamer told me sadly. “You were born under the sign of
the Wolf, and here you are, perverted by the Raven. Look inside, great man, and
tell me what you see.” “

 
          
Panther
wet his lips, staring into the darkness of the sweat house. “So I did, brash
and headstrong as I was. What did I, of all men, have to fear? I… I looked
inside and saw what I had become.” He shook himself, casting off the dangerous
memories. “That night, I argued with my chief. Then I went a little crazy. And
later… later that night, I walked away. Told no one I was going. I just walked
out of the great gates, across the cornfields, and into the forest. I never
looked back. Hungry” dirty, and alone, I traveled north, following the
Black Warrior River
to the crest of the mountains, and then
followed them east, from peak to peak. From them I descended to the lands of my
birth. Alone, in defeat and silence, I came home.”

 
          
She
waited patiently.

 
          
“That’s
about it.” He smiled grimly at the hot swirling steam. “I went out to my island
to find myself.”

 
          
“And
did you?”

 
          
He
worked his fingers. The stiffness, of old age had been driven from them by the
heat. “Oh, yes. It frightened me to my very bones.” She shifted uncomfortably.
“So, why are you here?”

 
          
“Because
of innocence,” he replied.

 
          
“I
don’t understand.”

 
          
He
straightened. “I wouldn’t expect you to. You can’t find yourself until you’ve
become lost. In order to see, you must become blind. To seek goodness, you must
become evil. To achieve great wealth, you must seek poverty. To be truly free,
you must first become a slave.”

 
          
“That
makes no sense.”

 
          
“It
makes all the sense in the world.” He cast a sidelong glance at her. “What
about you, Shell Comb? Have you ever looked deeply into your soul?”

 
          
He
could feel her fear when she said, “Of course.”

 
          
“You
are a liar,” he told her evenly. “But then, most of us are at heart.”

 
          
“I
know,” she said, voice low. “But, sometimes it hurts too much to tell the
truth.”

 
          
Nine
Killer hunkered down on his heels in the snow, watching the clouds scud
eastward toward the ocean. The spot he’d chosen gave him a good view of the
inlet. On its slate-colored surface, choppy waves marched relentlessly toward
the narrow beaches, where they would curl, slap the earth, and die. He rested
with his back against an elm, the rough bark scarred by the years and the
periodic fires his people used to clear weeds from their fields.

 
          
From
here he could see over to the far shore with its gray-furred winter forest, but
his attention centered on the sweat house and the girl who stood guard before
the doorway.

 
          
After
the Panther entered, Nine Killer had loitered beside Sun Conch, and heard most
of what had passed within. Only when Shell Comb had stepped out into the weak
afternoon light, her naked body glistening with sweat, did he step
self-consciously away. She’d twisted her damp hair into a thick knot and walked
out to splash in the cold water just below the lodge entrance.

 
          
For
the briefest of moments, Nine Killer had let himself admire her lithe body.
Those athletic curves would have blessed a woman half her age.

 
          
What
was it about her that captivated him so? Of all the women he’d ever known, her
body, the sultry look in her eyes, attracted him like no other. Was it the way
she moved with sensuous grace or the rapt attention with which she listened to
a man talk that made her so irresistible? She’d enchanted him more than once
when he spoke to her. He’d seemed to fall into her gaze, his heart racing as he
became the center of her attention. Then her lips would part the slightest bit,
and his senses would swim. As if she could discern his attraction, she’d smile
at him, teasing him just beyond his ability to respond.

 
          
She’d
stepped from the water, dripping and shivering, her nipples taut, and wrapped a
blanket around her shoulders. Only after she’d dressed, caught his gaze on her,
and given him one of those flashing smiles, did she turn and walk toward the
palisade. At that point, Nine Killer had retreated to the old elm to sit and
think.

 
          
With
an effort, he dragged his thoughts from Shell Comb, and settled on the
fascinating things he’d been able to hear through the thin sweat house door
hanging.

 
          
The
Panther had been a war leader for the Serpent Chiefs? He would never have
guessed. The implications startled him. Nine Killer might pride himself on
being a responsible war leader for the Weroansqua, but from the stories told by
the Traders, the Serpent Chiefs made a different kind of war—one where entire tribes
were pitted against each other, and warriors numbered in the tens of tens. All
those warriors did was practice their art. When they marched, their bodies were
bedecked with bright feathers, wicker shields, and finely made arrows. Those
warriors, he had been told, left on dedicated battle walks, each group
traveling like an appendage of the whole.

 
          
And
The Panther had been the brain for an organization like that? He chewed
thoughtfully on his lip, recalling the defeats Copper Thunder had inflicted on
the Mamanatowick, and Stone Frog, the Conoy Tayac. Was that the sort of
chieftainship Copper Thunder was building on their very borders?

 
          
What
fate would befall Nine Killer’s people if Copper Thunder consolidated his
territory? That thought rolled around in his mind. How could his warriors—a
collection of hunters and fishermen—compete with those nearly mythical warriors
of the Serpent Chiefs?

 
          
Down
by the sweat house, Sun Conch turned suddenly, and reached out with a slim
brown hand to help The Panther through the low doorway. The old man shivered in
the cold air, blinking in what was, to him, blinding light.

 
          
Nine’
Killer rose, winced at the stitches in his knees and ankles, and walked down to
the shoreline, where The Panther splashed -water on his antique flesh.

 
          
Nine
Killer gave him a skeptical inspection. Withered skin, now flushed with heat,
hung from a bony skeleton. Strings of muscle were only a memory of what had
once been strength. Here and there, an old scar still puckered whitely. Even
the testicles seemed to hang tiredly beneath the gray thatch of pubic hair. Had
this old man really been that kind of War Chief?

 
          
“I’ve
not done this in years,” The Panther said, rubbing his shivering hide with his
blanket. “I think it’s time for a cup of warm tea and a nice fire.”

 
          
Nine
Killer gestured toward the village as The Panther pulled on his old hunting
shirt, arranged his breech clout and slung his blanket around his shoulders.
Sun Conch took up her place behind them. For a moment, Nine Killer walked, lost
in thought.

 
          
Then
he caught Panther’s knowing eyes on him, as if the old man were peeling away
the layers that protected his thoughts.

 
          
“Yes,
War Chief?”

 
          
“I
couldn’t help but overhear.”

 
          
Panther’s
lips quirked. “I expected as much. It must have been the heat, it ate into my
self-control.”

 
          
“You
served a Serpent Chief? The one called White Smoke Rising? Even I have heard of
him.”

 
          
“It
was a long time ago.”

 
          
“I
heard you say that Copper Thunder was trying to be just like the Serpent
Chiefs. You said that was why he adopted their tattoos.”

 
          
“A
great many people want to be what they are not. With Copper Thunder, I think it
goes back to when he was boy.” The Panther hesitated. “You heard that I
captured him? A child is such a curious creature, strong and resilient, yet so
very fragile. Grass Mat was all of those.”

 
          
“I
don’t understand.”

 
          
The
Panther gave him a thin smile. “When I killed his father and captured young
Grass Mat and his mother for slaves, my warriors and I destroyed his whole
world. From those shambles, he had to make a new one, one that he could
understand.”

 
          
“That
doesn’t make sense, Elder,” Sun Conch said from behind. “He should have hated
the Serpent Chief who took him captive. I would have.”

 
          
“Oh,
Grass Mat did, but he admired him, too.” Panther glanced over his shoulder at
the girl. “Sun Conch, you must put yourself in the boy’s place, see the world
through his eyes. Can you imagine that?”

 
          
“I
think so, Elder.”

 
          
“Well,
some of us have problems with that.” He cast a sidelong look at Nine Killer.
“Despite what the Kwiokos claims, that he can beat the boy’s soul from a body,
and chase it away with his rattle, if a man can’t remember his life as a child,
he is either a liar, or was hit on the head harder than he recalls.”

 
          
Nine
Killer grinned at that, knowing full well that after being Blackened, no man
would consciously talk about anything that happened in childhood. The Panther
was picking at another of his people’s self-imposed rules. Aloud, he said, “Is
nothing sacred to you, Elder?”

 
          
“Many
things, War Chief. But not the rituals of men.” Panther took a deep breath.
“So, what do we have? A boy whose whole world is crushed. His father is dead,
and for that, the boy will never forgive him.”

 
          
“Why?”
Sun Conch asked. “His father couldn’t help being killed in battle.” “Does a
young boy understand that?” Panther asked. “Sun Conch, Grass Mat’s father was a
very influential Trader. He didn’t have to join the battle for Stalks-By
Night’s town. The boy worshiped his father—thought the man invincible—and no
matter how he died, Grass Mat couldn’t forgive him for not living up to
expectations. Children do that, especially if they are taken into slavery along
with their mothers—whom they also love. It has to be someone’s fault.”

 
          
“So
the boy turned all that rage against his father?” Nine Killer shook his head.

 
          
“Being
dead, and unable to defend himself to his son, he made the best target.”
Panther glanced at Sun Conch. “And, naturally, Grass Mat hated me, and my
chief, White Smoke Rising, but because we won, he couldn’t hate us too much.
After all, the one thing Copper Thunder wants today is to win.” “I heard you
telling Shell Comb about the tattoos. If he hated the Serpent Chiefs, why try
to look like them? And, if he did, why come back to
Fish
River
and the
Salt
Water
Bay
?”

 
          
“War
Chief, answer me this: What would you say if I told you I wanted to be the next
Weroance for
Flat
Pearl
Village
?”

 
          
“I’d
tell you that you were crazy. It’s impossible, and you know it.”

 
          
“Absolutely.”

 
          
“You’re
not Greenstone Clan, Elder,” Sun Conch reminded. “Exactly, and Grass Mat didn’t
belong to any of the ruling clans among the Serpent Chiefs. He was forever an
outsider.”

 
          
“So,
when he came back to his mother’s people on the
Fish
River
,” Nine Killer mused, “he had a place.”

 
          
“Now
he wants to build a chieftainship on the
Salt
Water
Bay
that will be like the ones he knew on the
Black Warrior, or the
Serpent
River
, or the Father Water.” Panther kicked at
the melting snow. “Can he do it?” Nine Killer asked.

 
          
Panther
shrugged. “I would think, War Chief, that the answer to that lies with you, the
Mamanatowick, and Tayac Stone Frog.”

 
          
Nine
Killer tightened his grip on his war club. “I heard you say that anything
Copper Thunder accused you of was probably true.”

 
          
Panther
peered intently into Nine Killer’s eyes. “I told you once that the hardest
thing to share was honesty, War Chief. I haven’t forgotten that I made that
bargain with you. I said that to Shell Comb for a definite reason: I want her
to know exactly what sort of man I was.”

 
          
“Why?”

 
          
Panther
shrugged. “In due time, War Chief, I will tell you. I’m not ready to yet, and
I’m not even sure why that is. Just a hunch—an itch that tells me it will be
the right thing at the right time. But getting back to the point: Yes, I did
murder, assassinate, poison, and otherwise eliminate my enemies. Unfortunately
for us, here today, Copper Thunder knew, or at least suspected, most of those
terrible murders.”

 
          
“But
that was part of your duty as War Chief, wasn’t it?” Nine Killer asked.

 
          
Panther
snorted irritably, rubbing his chilled arms for warmth. “Some were killed on
orders from my chief. Others I killed because I feared them, or disliked them,
or wished them punished from some slight or another.” His gaze hardened. “The
point is, War Chief, I killed them. And yes, sometimes a man can kill from
duty, and it is all right. But mostly those people died—some horribly —because
I wanted them to.”

 
          
Sun
Conch paled, a stricken look on her face.

 
          
Panther
noticed and turned. “You may relax, my friend. None of them died by witchcraft.
Those that I killed, I killed deliberately, with weapons, poison, or
suffocation. None of them were witched, or had their souls driven away by
sorcery. I give you my word.” Sun Conch whispered, “Thank you, Elder.”