A Hero's Tale by Catherine M. Wilson Page A

said all there was to say about it, they told tales of other hunts, and the men who had stayed home that day told stories of their own. The hunters spoke of going to the hunt as Merin's warriors spoke of going to war, with excitement and anticipation, and enough bravado to conceal their knowledge that they would soon be in harm's way. To them each hunt was a contest, which might be won or lost, in which the prize was life itself.
    They told more than one tale that night of hunters killed or maimed by wounded boars. They told them for my benefit, so that I would understand, while the wildness still sounded through my blood and bones, what I had accomplished, what I had overcome. Their stories taught me how the world felt to them, and how they understood it and their own place in it.
    They told tales of times of plenty, when the gods had all but laid the game at their feet, and they told tales of hungry times, when they had fought with their wolf brethren for what little game there was. They told tales of great hunters and legendary hunts, remembered from a distant time. Beneath the surface of their stories ran a thread of meaning that eluded me until I noticed that they never spoke the words for killing or for death. Instead of saying that an animal had died, they said, "he gave himself" or "he gave up," as if his death were a surrender, or an offering. And if a hunter lost his life, they spoke of his death in the same terms. In their eyes, the hunter and the hunted shared a common fate, the hunt itself a ritual in which one or the other would become the sacrifice.
    When at last I lay in Maara's arms that night, I was more than ready to retreat into my woman self. My glimpse into the world of men had frightened me a little. Though I felt no less the privilege of having been included in the day's adventure, their nighttime tales created in my mind a vision of the hunters of the forest people standing on the edge of an abyss into which someday each of them would fall. I too had once stood on the edge of an abyss, before I fell into the Mother's arms, but it seemed that these men would fall into a cold and lonely place. If they knew or thought they knew what fate awaited them, they never said so.
    I slept until midmorning, and I might have slept the day away if Maara hadn't brought me breakfast.
    "We should check our snares today," she said.
    I smiled. Checking our snares was our excuse to spend time together, just the two of us. We did set a few snares, so that we could make a contribution to the village of meat and furs, but oftener than not, we had more than half the day to spend in our hollow tree. There we could speak our own language without being rude and talk of private things. In the village of the forest people, we did as they did and made love at night, hidden by the dark, and they pretended not to hear us, as we pretended not to hear them. In the hollow tree we could make love in the open, in the light.
    That day I was glad to find all our snares empty. We arrived at the hollow tree before midday. Maara had brought a thick elk robe for us to lie on. She lit a fire, and while we waited for it to drive off the chill, we huddled close to it and to each other.
    "What do they do in Merin's house when an apprentice becomes a warrior?" asked Maara.
    I was surprised to discover that I didn't know. There was no public ceremony. One day an apprentice would appear in the great hall with a sword hanging from her belt, carrying a shield that bore her own device.
    "I think her warrior presents her with a shield," I said.
    "So it's a private thing between warrior and apprentice?"
    "I suppose so."
    "I believe your shield hangs now in Merin's hall," said Maara. "Unless Vintel took it down."
    "You mean the wolf shield?"
    She nodded. "Wolf shield, wolf skin. If Tamara he is a hunter of the forest people, then Tamras she must be no less than a warrior in Merin's house." Maara turned to me and gazed into my eyes. "I have no other token to