People of the Fire(92)

"Good camp all around," Rattling Hooves agreed. "Doesn't look like anyone camped here for a long time."

"Maybe." Two Smokes shrugged. "Last time I stayed here was as a young man. Five Falls came here with his cousin and we spent the winter. The camp was pretty good, but the mice and packrats almost drove us crazy that year."

"But did you come this late?" Rattling Hooves asked, twisting her body under the tumpline so she could see him.

"Earlier." Two Smokes pointed up the canyon. "But we did the hard work then. We built a sheep trap up there. I don't think it would take much to fix it up. We've got the new net Elk Charm and I have been working on. Once we kill some bighorns, we'll have hides and meat for a while until the elk come down. Perhaps Hungry Bull, here, and Three Toes and Black Crow can kill a deer or two. From those hides we can make snares for elk."

"Whoa!" Black Crow cried. He'd been listening with his head cocked, trying to pick up the Anit'ah words. "Did he say snare an elk?"

Hungry Bull chuckled. "Hunting here is different. Come, let's find this rock shelter." He winked at Rattling Hooves. "Maybe you can teach me how to snare elk and hunt sheep?"

She grinned at him before returning her concentration to the trail. "I think you'll learn. But come on, it's starting to get dark. Better to be off this loose slope before we can't see our feet."

Tall stands of giant wild rye—brown under the hand of winter—hid the mouth of the rock overhang. The place looked to be ten paces in length and Hungry Bull found it extended back another three paces once he'd pushed through the s^ of grass. In the failing light he could barely make out the litter of a large packrat nest in the back corner where the floor met the rock.

"You could be right about the packrats."

"What we don't drive off, I'll eat." Rattling Hooves sighed as she swung the pack off her back and rubbed her arms. "Hey, great hunter of the Short Buffalo People, why don't you make us a fire?"

Three Toes helped Two Smokes up the slope and into the dark shelter. The rest straggled in one by one, sighing, shivering, and puffing in the cold as they shed packs here and there.

"So this is home?" Black Crow called as he reached up to rap knuckles on the stone. He shook his head slowly.

From where he dug around in his pack for fire sticks, Hungry Bull looked up. "Worried?"

Black Crow led Makes Fun by the hand, his three children staring around owlishly. "Worried?" Black Crow cocked his head, watching as Hungry Bull's quick fingers placed the charred sharpened end of the small stick in the friction hole of the base piece. Puffing foggy breath, he began spinning the sticks as Black Crow added, "No, we're not worried. Everything's just new, is all. We're . . . well, we don't feel like we fit here. Like the world's different, you know?"

Hungry Bull nodded, glad for the blood he pumped through chilled arms. "I felt that way when we left Heavy Beaver's camp—but Sage Root had just been killed. I followed along like a soul without a body."

Rustling grass marked the arrival of Elk Charm and Little Dancer. Some private joke had them laughing with the buoyancy of youth, despite the cold and fatigue of the long journey.

Makes Fun's teeth had begun to chatter from the cold, before the spinning fire stick coaxed a faint thread of smoke from the tinder. Despite chill-stiffened fingers, Hungry Bull grinned as he got a red glow.

"Got a place for this?" he asked Black Crow.

The latter immediately reached into his pack, drawing forth a twist of dried ricegrass stems and shredded bark, all partially charred. Makes Fun reached for the packrat nest, pulling long-dried lengths of sagebrush and duff from the mass. Somewhere back in the rock, a faint thumping could be heard as the frightened rodent stamped with a nervous back foot.

"And there's worse coming," Makes Fun promised the little creature.

Hungry Bull scooped his glowing tinder into Black Crow's grass twist and blew cautiously. The ember gleamed, a bright red eye. Smoke rose in a thin trail. A dance of flame gave birth and greedily devoured the twist. One by one, they fed bits of twigs and sticks, adding bigger pieces until they had a crackling blaze.

"Hey, look at that!" Three Toes pointed at the sloping back wall of the shelter. A long section of sandstone had broken loose, the top of it barely protruding from the floor, so long ago had it happened. In the meantime, the flat panel created by the roof fall had been smoke-blackened and soot-encrusted, but not so much that a person couldn't make out the figures pecked into the rock.

A large spiral dominated the panel. Three Toes stepped closer, rubbing at the side to clean the rock. "Blood and dung," he whispered. "A monster! Look! Look how well this is done. There's the humped back, the big teeth, and the tail thing growing out of the snout!" He scrubbed at the wall with his hand, wiping more of the soot away, and stopped old, peering at the figure he'd uncovered.