The Kin (5 page)

There was no point in fighting, no hope in running. He had done wrong. Even among Kin it would be wrong. Snake didn't dig or hunt in Weaver's Good Places, not without giving gifts, not without many words of asking. Men had been killed for this, and women taken.

He kneeled and spread his hands, palms forward, and bowed his head and then looked up at them. Their faces were unfriendly. The man with strange eyes stepped forward, raising his stick for a blow. Suth did not know if he would strike. It might be only a threat, a warning, but he flinched, and tried to cover his head with an arm.

Noli, from behind him, spoke. “Moonhawk sent us.”

The man hesitated. “Moonhawk?”

He said the name strangely.

“Moonhawk sent me a dream,” said Noli.

Another man strode to her, snatched her up by the arm, and shook her.

“Where are your others?” he said. “Where are your grown men? How many?”

He too spoke strangely.

“Five men left only,” Noli gasped. “Strangers came. They killed our fathers. We fled.”

“These five—they are here?” snarled the man.

“No,” said Noli. “I think they are dead. Bal led us to an empty place—no food, no water. Moonhawk came in my dream and said I must come back to the little ones. These. Bal left them behind. Suth came too.”

The man who had been about to strike Suth now grabbed him by his hair and hauled him to his feet. He seized his wrist and twisted his arm up behind his back, almost to the breaking point, but Suth didn't struggle or cry out.

The men spoke together. Then two of them stayed to finish digging out the juiceroot, while the other two led the children away. The one who was holding Suth kept a grip on his wrist and pushed him on ahead. He felt numb and stupid and helpless, the way he felt on the journey through Dry Hills. His mouth was sour with the taste of failure.

Oldtale

THE CHILDREN OF AMMU

Ammu grew very fat
.

She said to An, “I must have meat. Go and hunt.”

While An was hunting, Ammu gave birth
.

Six and six and six children she had at that first birth
.

First she bore three soft eggs. When they opened, Ammu found a boy and a girl in each
.

Next she bore three hard eggs. When they opened, Ammu found a boy and a girl in each
.

Last she bore six that came from the womb not in eggs, but as the animals that have hair are born. They came from her two and two and two, a boy and a girl together
.

Ammu looked at her six and six and six children, and wept
.

“How do I feed all these?” she said. “I have only two breasts, and the breasts of An are small, and have no milk.”

Now, Black Antelope was far away, grazing on the plains, when Ammu gave birth. But Monkey watched and listened, for he was always curious about people, and all they did. When he heard what Ammu said, he ran to the others of the First Ones and said, “Ammu gave birth to six and six and six children. She cannot feed them all. She has only two breasts
.”

The First Ones spoke among themselves. They said, “Let us take two each of Ammu's children and care for them, or they die.”

“But what when Black Antelope returns?” said Little Bat. “Then there are none left for him to care for.”

“He is the strongest,” said Snake. “He gives his strength to those he cares for. Then they rule all the rest. That is not good.”

So they agreed
.

They put Ammu into a sleep, and then they drew lots over who should choose first which children they should care for. Monkey was clever with his fingers, and he saw to it that he should choose last
.

Snake and Crocodile and the Ant Mother chose children who had hatched from soft eggs, and took them from Ammu while she slept
.

Weaver and Parrot and Moonhawk chose children who had hatched from hard eggs, and took them from Ammu while she slept
.

Little Bat and Fat Pig took children who had been born as the animals that have hair are born, and took them from Ammu while she slept
.

Thus only two children were left
.

Then Monkey said, “We cannot leave Ammu with no children. Then she weeps worse than before. Two
are due to me. Let Ammu raise these. Each of you must give me a gift. This makes up for my loss.”

They agreed to that, and it was done
.

When An returned from his hunting, Ammu showed him the two fine children who were born to them, and they rejoiced
.

Ammu said, “While I slept, a strong dream came to me. In my dream I gave birth to ten children, and eight more. I could not feed so many from my breasts. I wept for this. But great animals heard my weeping and came. They took all but these two from me.”

An said, “It is only a dream,” and they laughed together
.

When Black Antelope returned and learned what the others had done, he too laughed
.

“Monkey has tricked you,” he said. “Soon you find this. It is trouble to care for the children of people.”

CHAPTER FIVE

Suth was careful not to struggle or resist, and after a while the man who held him relaxed his grip a little. He still couldn't see what was happening to the others. He heard one faint whimper from Otan, but small ones learned very early to stay silent in times of danger.

Their narrow path wound through the bushes. Suth's captor moved warily, like a hunter in strange country, pausing often and peering for dangers.

No one spoke. The bare hills were silent. Insects clicked and whirred in the scrub. And all the time birds whistled and squawked in the huge green mass of forest on their right, strange calls that Suth had never heard before.

And then, close by, high up among the branches, something set up a steady whooping cry. He had heard the same call earlier in the distance, but had hardly noticed it because he had been concentrating on things immediately around him. Now, so near, the wild, eerie call made the hair on the back of his neck prickle. Instinctively he froze, but the man who held him twisted his arm and shoved him on, as if he knew the cry meant no danger.

A few small paths branched off, away from the forest, but they kept to the one they were on until it led out towards the bare hillside. Even before they were clear of the scrub Suth's nostrils told him that they were coming to some kind of camp—an old one too, much used, because the smells were so strong, wood smoke and charred meat and a whole tangle of people odours. It was strange. Sometimes the Kin had stayed a moon and a moon in the same spot, but they would never have let their smells build up in such a way.

They came out onto a steep, rocky slope with a line of low cliffs some way up it. People were moving around below the cliffs. One of them called. They all stopped what they were doing and gathered together. As soon as the newcomers were in earshot several voices rose, shouting questions. This was not how the Kin would have met hunters returning with captured strangers. They would have stood silent behind their leader while he made the formal greetings and asked the questions.

The man who held Suth didn't answer, but pushed him grimly on, past the ashes of a large fire, almost as far as the cliff. Here Suth saw a dark opening in the rock face, beside which an old woman was sitting in the sun. She looked as if she was asleep.

The man forced Suth to his knees. The other Moonhawks were herded around him. They waited in silence, the girls with bowed heads, but Ko staring angrily about as if he was ready to fight all these people. Otan clung silently to Noli.

The babble of questions continued until the old woman seemed to wake, and raised her head. Her hair was sparse and white, her skin yellow and blotched and wrinkled. Both her eyes were filmed over with a grey mess.

Suth had never seen anyone so old. Among the Kin she would long ago have been taken into the desert and left to die, because she could no longer keep up.

“Tell,” she croaked.

“Dith speaks,” said the man with strange eyes, and Suth realized he was telling her his name because she was blind.

“I went with Mohr and Kan and Gal to dig juiceroot,” the man went on. “It was mine. I found it. When the shoots were small and green I marked it with my mark. We drank at the lake. Then we went. These six children were there. They dug my juiceroot. I went to strike the boy. To punish, not kill. The girl spoke of Moonhawk. I changed my thought. Mohr asked,
Do you have others? Do you have grown men?
The girl said,
They are dead
. We spoke among ourselves. Our thought was,
We take these children to Mosu
.”

The old woman considered the matter, nodding and wheezing. Suth's heart thudded. He was horribly afraid of this old woman, even more than he was of the men.

“Let the girl speak of Moonhawk,” she croaked.

Noli passed Otan to Tinu and came forward. In front of the old woman she kneeled and pattered her hands on the ground, as she would have done to appease Bal when he was angry. Still kneeling she explained what had happened since the fight with the strangers. The old woman bowed her head and seemed to have fallen asleep again, but when Noli had finished speaking she raised a withered arm and beckoned to her.

Noli crawled forward. The old woman felt her all over, and then pushed her away.

“The boy,” she croaked.

Suth rose and went to her. She felt him all over with cold, dry, quivering hands, checking nose, eyes and ears, counting fingers and toes. Then she did the same to Tinu and found her twisted mouth.

“What is this?” she croaked.

Tinu was too scared to speak, but Noli explained that she had been born like that.

“Were others among you so?” asked the woman.

“Only Tinu was so, in all the Kins,” said Noli.

The woman shoved Tinu away and went on to the small ones. The people watched, muttering.

Suth studied them. There were ten and a few more. Some were old, and needed a stick to hobble on. Two of the men had eyes of different colours, like Dith's. A young woman had a withered leg. A girl, who was standing beside a pregnant woman, moved her hand and Suth saw that there were flaps of skin between the fingers, like those on the feet of the birds at Stinkwater.

Otan bawled as the old woman felt him over, but quieted when Noli took him back. The people started to move around, as if the examination of these strangers was done. Dith and Mohr left to finish digging out the juiceroot. The sense of danger ebbed away, but Suth stayed tense. He found the behaviour of these people very strange. He didn't know where he was with them.

The pregnant woman came up to admire Otan.

“That is a big voice,” she said as if this were a special compliment. “It is the voice of a lucky hunter.”

“He is hungry and thirsty,” said Noli. “Where is water?”

“You have not drunk?” said the woman, sounding surprised.

“We drank yesterday, in the morning,” said Noli.

The woman nodded and went and spoke briefly with the old woman, then called the girl with the strange hands and sent her running down the slope after Dith and Mohr. She reached them just before they disappeared into the scrub. There was an argument, but after a bit they started back up the slope. When they reached the camp they were clearly angry, but Dith said, “Come. Be quick,” and led the way down again. Suth took Otan, to give Noli a rest. The girl with the strange hands came too.

“Where do we go?” Suth asked her.

“To the lake,” she said, obviously surprised by his not knowing. “Where else is water? What is your name?”

“I am Suth. These are Noli and Tinu. The small ones are Ko and Mana. The one I carry is Otan, who is Noli's brother. We have no fathers, no mothers. Our Kin was Moonhawk, but it is gone.”

“I am Sula,” she said. “Paro is my mother. She gives birth today, before sundown. My father is Mohr, that one, and the other is Dith. Mosu made them take you to the lake. They are angry about that.”

“Why do grown men come?” said Suth. “Do we steal a lake?”

Again she stared at him, astonished that he didn't know.

“All go together to the lake,” she said. “The men guard us.”

They were on a well-worn trail that went leftward down the slope. As they entered the bushes Mohr dropped back to the rear of the line, and both men raised their digging sticks to a ready position and walked more warily. The trail was wide, and creatures other than people had left their prints in its dust. This was something that Suth had seen before, near water holes in places rich in game, but never so many, nor on a trail that so reeked of people.

This trail led directly into the trees, out of the blazing sunlight and into a dark green tunnel where the air was dense with strange odours, sappy new growth, unknown pollens and fungi, decaying litter. The men walked carefully, peering left and right into the shadows between the huge still trunks. It was a world unlike anything Suth had ever known.

He started violently as a flock of green and yellow birds flew chuckling across the path, and then froze, with the hair on his neck prickling erect, as the same weird whooping that he'd heard before rose from somewhere almost overhead.

All five Moonhawks stopped in their tracks. Mana put her hand in Suth's and huddled to his side. Sula, walking close behind, almost bumped into them.

“What makes this noise?” he whispered.

She looked at him a moment as if she didn't want to answer. Then she muttered, “He is called Big Voice. His true name is not spoken.”

Suth understood what she meant. The people in two of the Kins, Snake and Crocodile, never spoke about their First Ones by name. Instead they called them “The Silent One” and “She Who Waits.” Was the creature Sula called Big Voice the First One of these people?

Suth smelled the water before he saw it, though it didn't have the usual clean, hard smell he knew. Instead, it smelled like the water they had found seeping out of the cliff two mornings ago. They came to it very suddenly. At one moment they were surrounded by the brooding trees, and the next moment there it was, a long, narrow lake twisting away further than he could see towards the distant ridges. It was utterly still, and except in the small clearing where they stood, the trees came right down to the water.