A Journey of the Heart by Catherine M. Wilson Page A

watching me, as if she expected me to ask a question. Although her words had filled me with questions, I couldn't find a way to ask any of them.
    "My husband died," said Namet gently. "He didn't die that summer. He died of a fever five years later, and I still grieve for him, as I grieve for Eramet."
    I didn't know whether that made me feel better or not. I was glad for Namet's sake that nothing terrible had happened to him at the hands of the northerners or of the painted people. I had feared that one of the memories Namet had been unable to forget was the memory of watching him die a cruel death.
    While a part of my mind was still thinking about the task she had set for me, I listened to the rest of Namet's story. I learned that there was much more to the war than anyone had told me. It had begun long before anyone was aware, and by the time it overtook our people, there was no stopping it.
    Our people and the northern tribes had been enemies for as long as anyone could remember, but we were enemies who were respectful of each other. The painted people respected nothing. They would drive a tribe from its land, then plunder everything of value they could carry. The most terrifying thing about them was that they laid waste to everything they left behind. They slaughtered every animal they couldn't take. They burned homes and fields and stores of grain. When the northerners raided us, they had the sense to leave us enough to go on with, so that when they returned there would be more to plunder. The painted people left a wasteland behind them.
    "My husband had spent the winter with one of the northern tribes," said Namet. "He was a gifted healer. He nursed the hurts and fevers of the people who had captured him. Because he was useful to them, both as a healer and a hostage, they let him live. When he learned of the painted people, he saw a way to save his own life and many other lives as well. He thought that if our people could make common cause with the northern tribes, together we could drive the painted people from our lands once and forever.
    "My husband had learned a great deal about the northerners, and he hoped that an alliance with them might also put an end to the raids and skirmishes that every year brought grief to both sides. After he had lived with them a while, when he had begun to understand their language, he spoke to their elders of the possibility of an alliance.
    "All summer their councils met and debated, but they could come to no decision. They feared the idea of an alliance was a trick, that my husband had proposed it as a ruse so that they would allow him to go home. They didn't want to lose a hostage who might someday prove valuable and be left with nothing to show for their misplaced trust. Then my husband heard that a woman of his people was held captive by a neighboring tribe."
    Namet smiled, remembering one happy day from that unhappy time. "One morning he walked into the village where I was. I thought he was a ghost. I was sure of it when he spoke to the village elders in their own tongue. They talked for a long time. Then my husband came to me and took my hand. When I felt his warm hand in mine, I knew he was no ghost, but even if he had been, I would have followed him.
    "We had only a little time together before he persuaded the northerners to send me home, to speak with our elders while they kept him as a hostage against treachery. With one of us to send and one to keep, they were willing. At first I refused to go. I told him I hadn't traveled all that way to find him only to leave him again, but he persuaded me that both our lives and many more might depend on this alliance. So I came home.
    "I arrived here just as the first snow of winter began to fall. With my husband's life at stake, I used all my powers of persuasion to convince Abicel and the elders to join with the northerners against the painted people. I told them the dreadful things I'd seen, to make them fear the painted people more