People of the Fire by W. Michael Gear

Bundle ..."
                   "Yes?"
                   "I got . . . sick."
                   "You don't look so good now." She
handed him another bowl. "Stop pouting like that."
                   Hearing the listless tone in her voice, he
looked up. The look she gave him frightened.
                   She ran her fingers through her long hair,
eyes drifting to where Heavy Beaver climbed the slopes. "After you drink
your soup, you'd better go and sleep some. It helps, slows the hunger."
                   He nodded, lifting the horn and drinking,
feeling the tightness in his belly.
                   A man living without his people didn't live
well—a problem Blood Bear considered as he stared down at the remains of his
moccasins. Idly he fingered the hole where the ball of his foot had worn though
the sole. The buffalo-hide jacket hanging from his shoulders looked tattered,
mangy where the hair had begun to slip. Poor tanning on his part: he didn't
understand how hair could be set in the curing process.
                   A man alone could only pack what he and his
dog could carry. Over the last couple of years a kill meant feast. A credible
hunter in the beginning, he'd honed those skills until he passed through the
sage as quietly as an owl's shadow. Despite that, a lone man couldn't organize
a trap, couldn't drive, or utilize the benefits of numbers of hunters in a
surround. Rather, he had to creep cautiously forward, employing every benefit
of terrain, wind, and cover to his greatest benefit. The years taught him the
cunning use of ambush and stealth.
                   In spite of it all, his ribs stood out. The
muscles of his frame remained perpetually gaunt. The growl in his belly might
be assuaged by a gorging feast after a kill, but within days the carcass would
be down to stripped bone. Starvation followed him, hovering like a phantom over
his shoulder. He crushed bones for the marrow and boiled the grease from the
fragments. This he skimmed from the top of the water before he drank it,
spitting out the sharp chips.
                  From where he sat on the ridge top, staring
out over the vast basin of the Mud River , he could look back at the Buffalo Mountains and remember the warm, friendly lodges of
his people. In his heart, an emptiness beat in tune with each breath.
                   He'd led the party of warriors after Clear
Water. Throughout the fruitless chase, the reserve in their eyes haunted him.
At night, they'd whisper among themselves, demoralized by the theft of the Wolf
Bundle. Each man's expression reflected the thoughts within: The Wolf Bundle
has left the Red Hand. This man who leads us chased it away. This man, this
Blood Bear, killed the Spirit Man. He broke the Power of the People.
                   Of course they had failed to find Clear Water
and Two Smokes. Their hearts had lost the fire. One by one, his party melted
away into the night to return to the camps, telling of failure, of defeat. When
Clear Water left, she'd taken the soul of the Red Hand with her.
                   "I'll find it," he promised.
"One day, I will find the Wolf Bundle. And when I do, I'll return. Hear
that, my people? I will return to the Red Hand . . . and bring back the soul
Clear Water and Two Smokes took from us."
                   Until then, he would not go back. The thought
of their eyes chilled him; the way they'd look at him couldn't be endured.
                   Raising his gaze to the endless blue vault of
the sky, Blood Bear shook his head, standing, lifting his clenched fist
overhead. Hiraing to face the blinding sun, he swore,
"By my blood and soul, I ask you to honor my request. Give me the Wolf
Bundle! Give me a sign ... a way to find it! Do this, Wise One Above, and I
shall humble myself before you. Hear me. Hear my plea. I would give my life for
the Wolf