Sky Messenger softly said, “If they destroy the Mountain villages it will provoke a war of annihilation. You know that, don’t you?”
“Yes, of course,” Towa whispered. “But look around you. No parent can peer into the eyes of a starving child without picking up weapons and doing whatever is necessary to keep that child alive.”
“Attacking the Mountain villages will not accomplish that. They are as bad off, or worse, than—”
“I know that, Sky Messenger. I’ve been there.”
Five longhouses encircled the broad plaza, each stretching six or seven hundred hands long, and forty wide. Chunks of the elm bark walls had been ripped out, others were charred. Firelight gleamed through the holes like the campfires of the dead.
Forty paces ahead of them, in the middle of the plaza, people packed shoulder-to-shoulder around a large bonfire, apparently listening to an ugly little man. The fellow shouted from where he stood on a massive hickory stump overlooking the assembly. He wore his hair in a traditional Flint roach, shaved on the sides with a black bristly strip in the middle. Few teeth remained in his mouth and they were yellowed and half-rotted. To the speaker’s left, the Ruling Council of the Landing People, composed of twelve elders, sat on log benches, listening. They each wore a white cape, decorated with the symbols of their clans.
“Who’s the orator?” Sky Messenger asked softly. “I can’t tell from here.”
“That’s Tagohsah,” Towa said. “I wonder what he’s doing here? His rounds usually bring him to Shookas Village in the middle of the moon. I try to arrive several days before just to avoid him.”
Hiyawento whispered, “Let’s move closer so we can hear what he’s saying.”
The crowd’s attention, riveted on Tagohsah, didn’t shift as Hiyawento, Sky Messenger, and Towa weaved through the tightly packed bodies, stepping into any gap that opened. Tagohsah must have begun talking only a short while ago, because fragments of the story had just begun filtering back through the listeners, relayed in awed whispers.
A young woman in front of Hiyawento said, “Atotarho attacked Bur Oak and Yellowtail villages with eight thousand warriors…” Then she turned back to hear the next few words being repeated, and said, “The Standing Stone army was cut down like blades of dry grass.…” She turned to listen again.
Sky Messenger and Hiyawento exchanged a look, and slipped closer, shouldering between two men. Towa followed along behind them.
A toothless old man whispered, “Atotarho’s forces killed over two thousand five hundred Standing Stone warriors … that’s when the Hills nation crumbled to dust … Coldspring Village, along with Riverbank and Canassatego villages, turned against Atotarho and fought on the side of the Standing Stone nation.”
Hiyawento murmured, “They’re talking about the battle five days ago.”
“Yes,” Towa replied, and stepped into a slim space that allowed him to move two steps closer.
Hiyawento and Sky Messenger followed. A young warrior carrying a war club propped on his shoulder said, “Then a Flint war party appeared, lined out on the hills to the east … the Flint warriors, too, fought on the side of the Standing Stone nation … the battle was so great and terrible it shook the ground … just when it looked like the Standing Stone alliance was about to be overrun, killed to the last person … the Prophet stepped out…”
Sky Messenger’s expression changed, as though the sense of wonder in the youth’s voice had made his heart thunder.
Hiyawento clung to his friend’s side, his hands invisible beneath his long cape, holding tight to his belted war club. A low hum of awed voices spread across the plaza, coming in waves, each portion of the tale repeated from one person to the next, but there was always someone who didn’t believe. Someone who longed to earn a reputation by killing legends. Well, he’d have to kill Hiyawento first.
The youth swung around again, his starved face alight. “The Prophet, the human False Face known to the Standing Stone nation as Sky Messenger, lifted his hands, ordering the armies to stop fighting … Elder Brother Sun saw him … he sent a great monstrous storm crashing down upon the battlefield, scattering Atotarho’s army like old leaves in a hurricane! Atotarho’s forces ran. They ran!”
Hiyawento slid into a new gap in the milling crowd and managed to get four steps closer. Sky Messenger and Towa were right behind him.
“Blessed gods!” a woman half-shouted, “the Prophet alone remained to face the storm! Just before the spinning darkness swallowed him, his cape transformed into billows of white clouds, and he rode the winds of destruction like one of the Cloud People. When the storm had passed over the battlefield, the Prophet appeared again, hovering over the battlefield like one of the Sky People. Not a single hair upon his head had been disturbed!”