People of the Black Sun(48)
Kwahseti nodded, then Waswanosh. When Zateri turned to Hiyawento, she found him staring directly at her with slitted eyes. “My husband?”
His teeth ground for several moments, while he met each person’s eyes. “That will be for the rest of you to decide. I won’t be there.”
Thona half-shouted, “What? You would leave at a moment like—”
“I would,” Hiyawento interrupted in a commanding voice. He and Thona glared at each other. “I must be at Sky Messenger’s side when the end comes. I will be at his side.”
Thona leaned toward him threateningly, his hand on his belted war club. “Without you here to lead your warriors, it may come faster than you anticipate.” He turned to Kwahseti. “Matron, with your permission, I will return to my duties before I cause a disturbance.”
“You may go, Thona. Thank you for your counsel.”
Thona bowed to the matrons, glared at Hiyawento again, then stalked away with his cape jerking around him.
Kwahseti vented a sigh. “Please excuse him. He’s desperate.”
“As we all are,” Hiyawento countered.
Gwinodje stared at her hands, twisting them in her lap. Waswanosh stood silently behind her.
Quietly, Zateri said, “If there are no more issues to be presented, I will dismiss this council.”
Fifteen
Snow fell from the night sky like weightless white feathers, drifting down around Sonon, frosting the hood and shoulders of his black cape, and softly alighting on the bowed head of the woman kneeling in the trail five paces in front of him. Leafless maples swayed gently behind her, their branches already shining with a thin white crust.
The woman was exhausted, gasping hoarse lungfuls of air. She’d unbraided her long hair, and it draped in perfect glistening waves around her beautiful face. Tiny arcs of snow crested her high cheekbones and iced the lashes that fringed her large black eyes. She’d been running all day without a break, desperately trying to reach Sky Messenger.
Unbeknownst to her, Sonon had been at her side the entire time. Sooner or later, he knew she would see him.
She collapsed in the middle of the path and curled into a fetal position. She made no sound, but when she succumbed to shivering, the dark curve of trail seemed to tighten around her, holding her tall body in a lover’s grasp.
Sonon tilted his head.
There were always souls whose burden of suffering seemed so great that it became an obscenity, a thing that could not be borne by any sane person. At the age of twelve summers, her village had been burned, her parents killed, and she and her two sisters had been sold into slavery. All three of them had been brutalized. Then her sisters were sold to bad men and hauled away. Within hours they’d both been murdered—leaving her alone. Or rather, in the company of a small group of children from many nations. Among them, Wrass, who was now called Hiyawento, Tutelo, Zateri, and the man she knew as Dekanawida.
She had lost so much.
He hurt for her.
For a time, he watched the snow fall. The forest had gone silent. He could hear each flake that settled upon the branches and rocks.
The woman on the trail shoved up on one elbow. Snow-covered jet waves cascaded around her slender, muscular body. Her shoulders heaved. Was she weeping? He couldn’t see her face. She’d rolled onto her hands and knees, and fought to shove to her feet, but her legs shook too violently.
Flakes whirled and spun around the woman, tousling her hair over her eyes. The woman angrily brushed it aside, sat up, and propped her elbows atop her knees as she massaged her temples. Forlorn, she murmured, “Dear gods, I can’t believe I’m lost. I know this country.”
Slowly, so as not to startle her, Sonon moved out of the trees and onto the path directly ahead of her. His black cape must be almost invisible in the darkness and falling snow.
But Baji was a warrior. She saw him.
Fast as lightning she lunged to her feet and pulled the war club from her belt, ready to swing it with deadly accuracy. Her legs wobbled so badly, they barely held her. “Show yourself now, you worthless worm!”
He opened his arms, revealing that he carried no weapons, and called, “I mean you no harm.”
Her eyes widened, and the war club in her fists trembled. Barely above a whisper, she called, “Shago-niyoh? Dear gods, please tell me Dekanawida is all right?”
It didn’t surprise him that her first question was not for herself, but for the only man she’d ever loved. “He is well enough.”
Her shoulders sagged. The white chert nodule lashed to the club’s head dipped toward the snow, blended with it. She spread her feet to brace her weak knees. “There are warriors after him, trying to kill him. Do you know that?”