Except, he never would. He had been born of the People. With the very milk from his mother's breast, he'd sucked up the manners of the Short Buffalo folk. The young never acted disrespectfully to the elders who had come before. No one would dare take such a liberty. No matter how she might goad him, twist him, and eat away at his resistance, he could never scorn her, or shout his anger. And that made the anger and frustration even worse.
“Boy, you've got to listen to the voices in your head. You got-"
"I'm going to find my father." Unable to look at her, familiar with the pained expression on Two Smokes' face, he ran for the door hanging and exploded out into the night.
"One of these days," Two Smokes said into the sudden quiet, "you will drive him too far. Chokecherry warned you before she died."
"She never understood my role."
"Maybe. But she knew this boy. I know this boy. White Calf, you can't keep pushing like this. You've alienated his father. Hungry Bull's lost himself . . . lost his way through life, and doesn't know what to do except stay away. He won't argue with you on account of the debt he owes you. He's afraid of Power. But when you badger the boy, it tears at him. It's another strand pulling apart between us. If you keep this up, you'll-—"
"Yes, yes ... I know."
"Do you?"
She looked at him, keen black eyes smoldering with a curious desperation. "I do. I just can't seem to reach Little Dancer.''
“He'll find Power himself. He can't ignore it forever."
White Calf seemed to deflate as she sighed from the depths of her soul. She nodded absently. "Yes, old friend, I suppose. But I don't have much time. And there's so much he needs to learn."
Little Dancer trotted down the trail, keen eyes picking out the undulations and rocks in the darkness. The red flush of anger began to dissipate, leaving in its place a foreboding depression, thick and gloomy as the cloud cover over the night sky.
“Why don't they leave me alone?" He swung a halfhearted fist at a fir branch, oddly relieved by the action. He continued slashing at the tall grasses that had gone brown and brittle with the first frost. Already the air carried a promising tang of coming cold. A person could feel it; the subtle bite of winter cloaked itself in the crisp mornings, or hid in the gust of the afternoon breeze. Like a ghost, it waited, ready to slip out of the memories of summer and bear down on the land in full-fledged cold. Daylight had begun to dull the belly of the fall sky as Father Sun retreated to the southern trail across the heavens.
And what would this winter bring? More stifling days around the smoldering fire as White Calf retold the old stories? More of her constant harping, the endless questions and ceaseless picking comments about Power?
These days Hungry Bull stayed out of sight except during the coldest of weather when he might suffer frostbite. What good was a frostbitten hunter? If the flesh froze too severely, his father's only pleasure in life might be denied him. And if Hungry Bull lost that one solace of the hunt, he'd be as good as dead.
Hungry Bull had changed. That sparkle of fun had gone from him, leaving him dull. He wouldn't even meet White Calf's eyes. His spirit had fled someplace the day he'd walked in shock from Heavy Beaver's camp. Then, not even a year after they'd come to White Calf's, Chokecherry had died in her robes. Without her to share the past, no one understood him anymore.
What had happened to them? Once again Little Dancer asked himself the old worn-out question. From the day he'd Dreamed the antelope, everything had changed. Existence had turned inside out and lost itself in a tangle of hurt and confusion. Power had entered his life— and it wouldn't leave.
The Dreams continued to haunt him. The old woman was right. He could deny all he wanted, but that didn't change the truth. Like this night's Dancing fire, the Dreams spun around him with the power of Crafty Spider's Starweb, ensnaring him, holding him captive. Once he'd tried beating himself with a quartzite cobble, seeking to drive the visions from his head. Outside of swelling bruises and a wretched headache, he'd received a tongue-lashing from White Calf that ended in a fight that had ensnarled Two Smokes and his father for months until White Calf finally relented.
"Let him beat himself half to death!" she'd finally agreed. "That's fine with me." Then she'd hesitated for a brief moment before adding, "I'll bet Heavy Beaver would love to hear about that!"
And he'd never tried to harm himself thereafter. At the thought, the knowing, satisfied smile of Heavy Beaver would form sickly sweet in his memory.
With no pattern or hint, the Dreams would come on him. And the old woman never seemed to miss it. So what if she really had been his grandmother? She didn't have to watch him like that. At times he felt like a mouse scurrying under a coyote's nose. The huge jaws always gaped open, ready to snatch him up. He never knew when those heavy paws might pounce and smash him flat in the grass to leave him dazed and dying before being swallowed by something he didn't understand.