People of the Mist (57 page)

 
          
Quick
Fawn wiped her hand under her nose. “I said I wanted her to be happy, but that
there were things we all had to do. That for her, as part of the Weroansqua’s
family, she had even greater responsibilities than the rest of us.”

 
          
“That
is true,” Nine Killer replied. “Everything comes with a price, cousin.
Especially authority.”

 
          
“I
could tell you about responsibility in the Weroansqua’s family,” she said. “But
I won’t rob you of your precious illusions.” She laughed’ then mocking me. She
said, “You’re so pitiful! Go ahead. Be a slave to them for the rest of your
life.” That’s when White Otter showed up. She didn’t even say anything. She
must have heard the tone in Red Knot’s voice. White Otter just turned around
and walked off.”

 
          
“And
then Red Knot left?”

 
          
Quick
Fawn swallowed hard. “Red Knot said, “There goes another fool. Marry her to
that monster—or marry him yourself, but promise me one thing.” I said I would.”

 
          
“And
what was that?”

 
          
“She
said, “Don’t tell anyone I’ve gone. They’ll find out soon enough.” ” Quick Fawn
wrapped her string around her fist, pulling the fiber tight enough to stretch
her smooth skin. “I just nodded and turned around to leave. I went halfway back
to the long house and stopped. I couldn’t just let her go. I had to go back and
tell her that I’d go to the Weroansqua if I had to. Anything to stop her.”

 
          
Nine
Killer heard the reservation in her voice. “Then, why didn’t you tell someone
she was going? As a clans woman, you could have come to me.”

 
          
“I
would have awakened Mother and told her first. She could have taken it to you,
or the Weroansqua.” She looked up, expression anguished. “Red Knot would hate
me for the rest of my life. But I couldn’t let her leave,” let her disgrace our
clan that way. We’d all have to pay. It wasn’t right to do that to the
Greenstone clan, to her mother, and the Weroansqua.” Quick Fawn took a breath.
“But then I didn’t have to. I thought the man and woman would tell on her
instead.”

 
          
“Man
and woman? What man and woman? Did you see someone else out there?”

 
          
Quick
Fawn nodded. “I cut across behind the House of the Dead this time, thinking I’d
catch Red Knot on the way to get her things.” Quick Fawn twisted the loop of
string into a knot. “They didn’t hear me coming. They had been in the shadows
behind the House of the Dead, just around the curve of the wall from where we’d
been standing. I could see them silhouetted against the firelight reflecting oh
the palisade. They were standing up, arguing in whispers.”

 
          
“Could
you tell who they were?”

 
          
Quick
Fawn shook her head. “They were like shadow figures against the light, and I
was too far away. You know how long the House of the Dead is? I had just come
around the corner.”

 
          
“But
you know it was a man and woman?”

 
          
Quick
Fawn gave him a knowing smile. “They were naked when they first stood up. They
were grabbing for clothes, you know, like people do when they’ve been
surprised, but not caught.”

 
          
“Did
they say anything?”

 
          
“Nothing
I could understand. I know they were arguing. I could tell from the hissing
sound of the whispers. And then the man grabbed the woman’s arm, as if trying
to restrain her. She jerked it away and said something really terrible to him.
He flinched, and just stood there. I’ve seen prisoners stand that way when your
war parties bring them in. He looked defeated.”

 
          
Nine
Killer narrowed his eyes and pulled at his ear. -“Do you think they were close
enough to hear you and Red Knot?”

 
          
Quick
Fawn nodded and gave him a guilty look. “That’s why I didn’t tell Mother. The
woman pulled on her clothing. She kicked at the blankets on the ground. Kicked
the way she would if she were angry. Then she gave the man one last look. She
had that resolute kind of stance, one foot forward, fists clenched. I guess
you’d say defiant. Then she turned and walked purposely away. I thought she was
going to the Weroansqua’s to tell on Red Knot. If she did, I didn’t have to
break my promise. Red Knot wouldn’t have hated me for the rest of my life for
betraying her.”

 
          
“And
the man?”

 
          
“He
just stood there, his head hanging.” Quick Fawn took a deep breath. “I sneaked
back the way I’d come. I didn’t want anyone to see me. It was almost dawn.”

 
          
Quick
Fawn lowered her head again, staring aimlessly at her hands.

 
          
A
man and a woman, loving each other behind the House of the Dead? But who?
“Quick Fawn, what about their hair? Was the man’s head reached like the Great
Tayac’s, or his warriors’?” “No, Elder. His hair was like our men wear. It
wasn’t one of the Great Tayac’s warriors.”

 
          
Nine
Killer cocked his head. “What if… Quick Fawn, do you think it could have been
Flat Willow?”

 
          
“Flat
Willow
?” She gave him a puzzled look.

 
          
“Could
it have been him?”

 
          
She
considered the idea, then lifted her hands. “I can’t say, Elder. It was dark.
All I saw was a naked man’s shadow. I didn’t see him get dressed, so I couldn’t
say if he had any distinctive clothing.”

 
          
Nine
Killer watched the steam rising from the cooking pots. Flat
Willow
was supposed to be on guard that night, and
White Otter thought she saw him leave with Copper Thunder. Could Flat Willow
have just done his job at the gate? Identified the Great Tayac, escorted him
out beyond the palisade, perhaps to relieve himself, and then left his post to
meet the woman?

 
          
“Elder,”
Quick Fawn whispered. “It’s my fault. If I had told, she’d be alive today.”

 
          
“Cousin,”
Nine Killer said gently, “when we are faced with a decision, we do what we
think we must. It is only after we have acted that we learn if it was the right
choice or not. Maybe if you’d told your mother, Red Knot would be alive today,
and married to Copper Thunder. Maybe Flat Willow would have told the Weroansqua
about High Fox coupling with her, and I’d have had to kill him. Who knows? We
do what we think we must, but all decisions are gambles.”

 
          
She
said nothing, her mouth in a pouting frown.

 
          
Nine
Killer indicated the steaming pots. “You’ve helped me, but I’ think you’d
better see to the food or your mother’s going to skin you.”

 
          
Quick
Fawn turned her attention to the cooking pots, stirring the stew with a stick
so that it wouldn’t burn. She checked the steaming tuckahoe, and prodded it to
see if it was done.

 
          
The
man and woman coupling there in the darkness had surely overheard Quick Fawn
and Red Knot, but had that led to the girl’s murder? The village had been full
of visitors who had come to celebrate Red Knot’s ascension to womanhood.
Sometimes a man and woman came together in such circumstances, coupled, and
parted ways.

 
          
Quick
Fawn kept giving him nervous glances as she added water to one of the cooking
pots, then steered another closer to the coals.

 
          
“Why
did they stay?”

 
          
“Elder?”

 
          
Nine
Killer cocked a quizzical eyebrow. “If a couple were disturbed while they were
locked together, you’d think they’d just move to a more secluded spot.”

 
          
“Or
call out and ask us to leave,” she said. “That’s considered polite.”

 
          
Yellow
Net picked that moment to duck through the doorway, her suspicious gaze on Nine
Killer. She stopped short, standing there as if he had intruded too long into
her domain.

 
          
“I
should be going. Thank you for your help, Quick Fawn.”

 
          
She
hesitated, fumbling with one of the pots. “Elder, am I in trouble?”

 
          
“Only
with yourself, Quick Fawn.” He stood. “You are the one who must decide if what
you did was right or wrong. What do you think?”

 
          
She
pursed her lips and nodded. “I know.”

 
          
Nine
Killer smiled down at her. “If you think of anything else, please, come and
tell me. It might be very important.”

 
          
With
that he walked to the doorway, and nodded at Yellow Net. She replied with a
blank stare, and he stepped out into the snow.

 
          
Sitting
across from Nine Killer, Panther puffed contentedly on his pipe, his belly
full, and the stripped bones of a large rockfish filling his wooden plate.

 
          
The
fire in Rosebud’s long house was particularly warm on this frozen winter night.
Outside, the sky had cleared and the cold had intensified. In the rear of the
long house White Otter laughed with her siblings as they played a gambling game
with reeds, alternately betting nutshells, and casting the reeds upon the
ground. A total of eighty one short reeds were tucked into a bundle and tossed
on the hard-packed dirt so that they bounced and scattered. The object was to
grab as quickly as possible and pluck up either seven or eleven reeds. The
player who won added to his cache of nutshells.

 
          
Rosebud
bent over one of the sleeping benches and fished a hoe from beneath it. She
then collected a deer’s scapula, some sinew, and a shark’s tooth, and walked
over and settled herself across from Nine Killer and Panther. She laid out her
materials and, with the shark’s tooth, began sawing off the old clamshell that
had been bound to the bottom of her hoe handle. “Solstice is coming,” she said
reflectively. “It’s time to start fixing up the tools. In three moons, I’ll
have wished I’d done this now.” She pointed to the blunt clamshell, its rounded
edge battered and chipped. “This one won’t cut air anymore, let alone soil.”
Sun Conch entered, a blanket around her shoulders.

 
          
“Cold
out there,” she said, puffing as she stepped across the floor and settled next
to Panther, holding her hands out to the fire. At sight of the hoe, she said,
“Preparing fields is at least three moons away.”

 
          
“Well,
Rosebud isn’t one to let things slide to the last moment.” Panther watched
Rosebud saw at the gritty sinew binding that held her hoe together. He took a
puff on his pipe and flipped the fish skeleton to the prowling dogs that waited
patiently behind him. Then he placed the wooden plate where they could lick it
clean of the last grease.

 
          
Nine
Killer cast him an appraising look. “This life seems to fit you, Elder. Your
belly isn’t the gaunt cave it was when you first came here.”

 
          
Panther
smiled and took his pipe from his mouth. “I must admit, War Chief, I’ve come to
like your household. I’d hate to make a habit of it. It might become hard to
leave.”

 
          
Rosebud
gave him an amused glance as she worked. “Surely we’re not as entertaining as
sitting around alone on that island of yours. Don’t you miss your crows and
seagulls?”

 
          
Panther
sighed, all too aware of the warm glow in his soul. Fellowship was like a drug,
it left a man wanting more. “As contented as I am to stay here and eat your
food, I’ll be going when we bring this to a conclusion.”

 
          
“If
Copper Thunder doesn’t kill you first,” Sun Conch remarked. “Honestly, Elder,
you wear my nerves thin sometimes.”