Reverently, Elk Charm had said the prayers, Singing the spirit to the heavens above. She asked fervently that the deer's soul might run with the wind, and Dance with the stars. Gratefully, she thanked the doe for the gift of life and what it meant to her family. Then she straightened and lifted a hoof, rolling the animal over.
Not even Hungry Bull could have made a better shot than that! She'd pulled her butchering kit from the pouch hanging at her waist and quickly slit the gleaming white belly hide open. With her quartzite chopper she split the ribs from the sternum. She'd emptied the heart of clotted blood and cut it from the tough sack that surrounded it. The windpipe came out next. The liver, kidneys, and fetus had gone into her pack as delicacies for tonight's feast. Then she'd halved the carcass, unloading part of the roots so she could carry the organs and hindquarters back. The rest she propped in the juniper branches to cool.
Only after she'd finished butchering did she drain the paunch and intestines. Tbrning the paunch inside out, she coiled the intestines and laid them inside where they'd stay moist and flies couldn't get to them. She'd return with Little Dancer before dark and retrieve the rest of her roots and the extra meat and organs.
Remembering the events of the day, she walked in a glow, and grinned, and chanted a song under her breath in an attempt to ignore the pain her load caused her. That didn't stop her from worrying about the strain on the pack. She'd sewn the straps herself, using the finest sinew, and most of the leather had been doubled. Still, what she carried had to be almost half her weight. Not even the best packs could take that for long.
Besides, she had to get back. The milk in her breasts had begun to ache in addition to her muscles and bones. Already she could feel the wetness and smell the musk of leaking milk.
"Ho-yeh!" The cry came from behind her.
She slowed and turned, lifting a hand to shade her eyes. A man trotted briskly down the trail.
"Ho-yeh!" she called back, trying to place the figure. "Catch up! This is heavy!" And she started down the rocky path again, using her digging stick to help with balance.
She heard him closing, heavy feet crunching on the friable sandstone pebbles that littered the cap rock.
"Who is it?" she called.
"I am Ramshorn, warrior of the Red Hand, and I'm betting the front side of that big pack is Elk Charm, also of the Red Hand and my cousin on top of it all."
Elk Charm bit her lip, knowing full well what he wanted. She'd hoped Blood Bear wouldn't be foolish enough to send someone down. She'd hoped it had all gone away, blown like the dust on the west wind to some other place far away.
"Ho-yeh, Ramshorn. Welcome to the camp of Hungry Bull. You've timed it well, I've got fresh deer in the pack and roots, too—albeit a little blood-soaked by luck."
He laughed. "I stopped to look. You'd scuffed up the tracks, but it looked like a neat one-shot kill. How far did you throw from?"
"Maybe twenty paces." She grinned despite his presence; pride over something like that didn't come every day. "When I opened her up, the dart had cut through the lungs."
"Well, if you do that sort of thing all the time, why don't you leave this Little Dancer of yours and come be my number-one wife? The others can step aside for a hunter like that."
"And you'd never sleep," she shot back. "All those wives you displaced to bring me in would slit your throat some night—and mine, too, no doubt. If they didn't, someone else would, cousin, because marrying you would be incest."
He laughed with her and offered, "I could carry something. Maybe those back legs? I see the hocks sticking out the top."
"Not worth it," she puffed. "We're almost there."
The trail forked. The less-traveled route to the right continued to follow along the cap rock. The other split left and dropped down through a crack in the thick sandstone. Elk Charm slowed, placing each foot just so from long practice.
"Heard you had another baby. A boy this time?"
She frowned as the pack scraped the rock on both sides of the narrow way. Please, don't let those straps fray! "No, to Hungry Bull's dismay, Little Dancer got another daughter."
"Hmm. I'll bet you heard about that."
She picked her way along the top of the slope where the colluvium fanned under the tawny sandstone. Rabbitbrush, bitterbrush, serviceberry, and sage rasped against her moccasins and skirt, scratching loudly on the pack. A warmth rose within her. "No, not Little Dancer. To him, any child is a blessing, a special gift he accepts with thanks ... the way most people should consider every sunrise and sunset. For you never know when you'll see the last one."
He grunted.
The thought of the future settled around her heart like a frosty spiderweb on a winter-blue day. Yes, she knew why he'd come. The nagging worry had begun to eat away at the glow of both a perfect kill and the fiill pack.