face seemed to be carved of amber. After five more heartbeats, she finally opened her eyes and rose to her feet.
“No, Gonda. I’m taking the child to Atotarho Village, but I’ll be back here by dawn tomorrow. I’ll catch up with you.”
She slogged through the deep leaves and started up the trail.
Gonda stood for several moments staring at the tracks with his heart bursting in his chest. He could see his children’s faces, hear their voices calling out to him, “ Father, where are you? You’re coming for us, aren’t you?”
The pain in his chest was suffocating.
He opened and closed his fists. When he could stand it no longer, he tore his gaze away from their trail and stumbled backward, breathing hard.
It took another ten heartbeats before he could order his legs to trot after Koracoo.
Six
O dion
A baby cries.
I lift my hands and cover my ears. The wail seems to seep through my skin and drifts on the pine-sharp winds that swirl old leaves up into the oak boughs before blowing them away through the chill golden afternoon. Why can’t I get the cries of Agres’ sister out of my heart?
Tutelo sleeps in the dead grass beside me. I keep glancing at her. Worrying. We are all shaky from the days of marching without food. We have rarely been on a trail. Usually we march through trackless forest, meadows, or over rocks, which has made the travel even more exhausting. Today our guards ordered Tutelo and me to climb through trees, then across an outcrop of eroding granite where stunted saplings grew as thickly as river reeds. It took two hands of time. I don’t know where the other children were at the time. Gannajero has assigned each of us a guard during the day. The guard can take us wherever he wishes if he arrives at dusk in the prearranged location. Often, the men carry us on their backs so they can travel faster.
I look around.
The camp is large. Many warriors have come to see Gannajero. But
these men did not bring children to sell. They came to gamble. Fifteen men sit around a small fire, playing the stone game. There are three teams, each composed of five players. The gangly warrior, Kotin, holds a round wooden bowl. Six plum pits clack inside the dish. The pits are gaming pieces, ground to an oval shape, then burned black on one side and painted white on the other. He shakes the bowl and tosses the stones across an elk hide spread over the cold ground. Whoops and cheers go up from his friends, and howls of dismay from the strangers. Kotin throws his head back and laughs as he pulls in the glittering pile of stone knives, hide scrapers, and copper jewelry. The new warriors grumble and cast evil looks at Gannajero’s team.
The wealth being won and lost stuns me, and I wonder if they are not wagering on more than tangles of necklaces and stone tools.
My eyes move to where the old woman sits alone in the middle of the clearing. Her head is back. She stares up at a flock of crows drifting on the wind currents above her. Her breath frosts as she speaks to the birds and makes strange signs in the air with a black feather. Is Gannajero performing some evil magical ritual? Or just praying for the crows to bring her team good luck?
When we made camp two hands of time ago, she pulled aside the three Flint girls and forced them to put on beautiful doeskin dresses. Then she carefully combed and braided their hair. The elaborate red-and-yellow porcupine quillwork on their dresses flashes when they move. The girls kneel together twenty paces from the game, whispering.
I am the only Yellowtail child awake. I roll to my back and study the bare oak branches. The farther east we go, the fewer leaves there are, and the colder the nights become.
I am feverish and sick to my stomach all the time. I think it’s the baby. Her cries are often so loud I cannot hear anything else. I swear her soul is inside me. I have glimpsed it, flitting behind my eyes like blue falling stars.
Her soul is flying. I feel it. It is
“No, Gonda. I’m taking the child to Atotarho Village, but I’ll be back here by dawn tomorrow. I’ll catch up with you.”
She slogged through the deep leaves and started up the trail.
Gonda stood for several moments staring at the tracks with his heart bursting in his chest. He could see his children’s faces, hear their voices calling out to him, “ Father, where are you? You’re coming for us, aren’t you?”
The pain in his chest was suffocating.
He opened and closed his fists. When he could stand it no longer, he tore his gaze away from their trail and stumbled backward, breathing hard.
It took another ten heartbeats before he could order his legs to trot after Koracoo.
Six
O dion
A baby cries.
I lift my hands and cover my ears. The wail seems to seep through my skin and drifts on the pine-sharp winds that swirl old leaves up into the oak boughs before blowing them away through the chill golden afternoon. Why can’t I get the cries of Agres’ sister out of my heart?
Tutelo sleeps in the dead grass beside me. I keep glancing at her. Worrying. We are all shaky from the days of marching without food. We have rarely been on a trail. Usually we march through trackless forest, meadows, or over rocks, which has made the travel even more exhausting. Today our guards ordered Tutelo and me to climb through trees, then across an outcrop of eroding granite where stunted saplings grew as thickly as river reeds. It took two hands of time. I don’t know where the other children were at the time. Gannajero has assigned each of us a guard during the day. The guard can take us wherever he wishes if he arrives at dusk in the prearranged location. Often, the men carry us on their backs so they can travel faster.
I look around.
The camp is large. Many warriors have come to see Gannajero. But
these men did not bring children to sell. They came to gamble. Fifteen men sit around a small fire, playing the stone game. There are three teams, each composed of five players. The gangly warrior, Kotin, holds a round wooden bowl. Six plum pits clack inside the dish. The pits are gaming pieces, ground to an oval shape, then burned black on one side and painted white on the other. He shakes the bowl and tosses the stones across an elk hide spread over the cold ground. Whoops and cheers go up from his friends, and howls of dismay from the strangers. Kotin throws his head back and laughs as he pulls in the glittering pile of stone knives, hide scrapers, and copper jewelry. The new warriors grumble and cast evil looks at Gannajero’s team.
The wealth being won and lost stuns me, and I wonder if they are not wagering on more than tangles of necklaces and stone tools.
My eyes move to where the old woman sits alone in the middle of the clearing. Her head is back. She stares up at a flock of crows drifting on the wind currents above her. Her breath frosts as she speaks to the birds and makes strange signs in the air with a black feather. Is Gannajero performing some evil magical ritual? Or just praying for the crows to bring her team good luck?
When we made camp two hands of time ago, she pulled aside the three Flint girls and forced them to put on beautiful doeskin dresses. Then she carefully combed and braided their hair. The elaborate red-and-yellow porcupine quillwork on their dresses flashes when they move. The girls kneel together twenty paces from the game, whispering.
I am the only Yellowtail child awake. I roll to my back and study the bare oak branches. The farther east we go, the fewer leaves there are, and the colder the nights become.
I am feverish and sick to my stomach all the time. I think it’s the baby. Her cries are often so loud I cannot hear anything else. I swear her soul is inside me. I have glimpsed it, flitting behind my eyes like blue falling stars.
Her soul is flying. I feel it. It is
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