People of the Lakes(247)

Otter said, “Tell Trout that we all thank him for sharing this with us. Pearl, offer him some of our nicer shells, maybe that matting, I don’t care.” He stood and walked silently out into the dusk.

“He didn’t seem pleased,” Trout noted.

“He has just realized how far we have yet to go,” Pearl said.

“He thought he was closer to the Roaring Water than he is.”

“You’re of his clan?” Trout asked. “A relative?”

“No, my clan is far to the south. Where the Father Water empties into the Salt Sea.”

“Then you have no tie?” Pearl smiled wistfully. “If you are asking if I am tied to Otter, no. We met in the Khota lands. It seemed expedient at the time to travel together.”

“Ah! The Khota.” Thin Belt shook his head. “We’ve heard of them. Not nice people, according to the stories. I thought you had an odd accent.”

She raised her eyes, aware of Trout’s appraisal. His attention and interest eased a nagging doubt deep in her soul. If a woman had to be noticed, it helped when the man was handsome, clear eyed, and endowed with a charming smile that promised other things.

“How does a woman from so far away end up here—and speaking in a Khota accent?” Trout began to stir the coals. Thin Belt had returned to the canoe and now approached, bearing two monstrous trout. Green Spider was backing his way toward the fire, making growling sounds.

“It’s a long story.”

“I’d like to hear it.”

Pearl met his stare, reading challenge as well as desire and concern. Very well, let’s see what you make of this. Trout. She began to talk as Thin Belt used a chert flake to fillet the fish and then propped them on sticks to roast and smoke over the fire.

Green Spider flopped down in the sand, rubbing his belly and claiming, “I’m so fat and heavy I’m sinking into the sand. That fish looks horrible.”

Night settled as the fire crackled and the fish cooked. Trout listened as Pearl told of her trip upriver. Otter and Black Skull seated themselves when Thin Belt removed the steaming fish from the coals. They talked quietly while eating their fill of the flaky white trout meat. When the others had finally sought their robes, she sat staring at the fire. Only Trout remained in the fire’s glow, his gaze fixed on her.

“About out of firewood,” he noted, getting to his feet.

The moon had risen and light was slanting across the dunes.

From logs to sticks, driftwood littered the sand. Gathering didn’t take long.

“Come,” Trout took her hand. “Finish your story.”

As she talked, Pearl studied him. Half a head taller than she, he walked with a confident stride, and his hand was warm around hers. He looked up at the moon, pensive, the slight frown on his face somehow inviting as she studied his profile, the way the moonglow played on his muscular chest.

She told him about escaping the Khota, about Otter pulling her from the river, the pursuit, and the storm on the lake. But she didn’t tell him everything, and was curious at her reticence.

“You could stay here,” he said as they walked along the shore. The waves rolled and washed, but not with the phosphorescence she knew on the gulf.

“Stay?” she asked. “You’ve heard the story. I have no clan to speak for me. I’d be a homeless woman with no relatives.

What would I do? Live like a … slave?”

His grip tightened. “You don’t understand. Just north of us— up there—are a bunch of savage people who will kill you as soon as look at you. This territory is the northernmost outpost of the Ilini. We don’t pay as much attention to forms and ceremonies as our cousins down in the secure Ilini valley do. We’re a young and vigorous clan. We’ve only begun to clear and plant.

We’re building here, making a new way. A woman of your skill and courage could find a place with us.”

“And my friends?”

“They’d be welcome, too. This foolishness of trying to reach the Roaring Water—it’s a place of legend. Pearl, you’d be safe here. No Khota are going to be chasing after you. And what if they did? We would protect you.”

She studied him from the corner of her eye. “Why do you make this offer to a woman you only met today?”

He stopped, taking her other hand. “Because I think you might fill the empty place in my heart. When I saw you walking up the beach, your body illuminated by the setting sun, you looked like one of the Sea Spirits, too beautiful to be real, your stride sure, your hair blowing free around you. You are a woman for a man to be proud of, to share his life and his dreams with.”

She closed her eyes when he pulled her close. For long moments, they stood, holding each other. He reached down, running his fingers along the curve of her face, and she could hear his breathing deepen.