“Ah! You mean Pale Snake! Yes, a woman and girl. But her name was Yellow Snail, and … let me see.” He furrowed his meaty face, scratching at his stubborn memory. “Little Snail?
No, the woman was Yellow Snail. Little Snake? Little—”
“It doesn’t matter. Describe the woman.”
“Filthy. She looked like she’d be handsome enough, though.
I told Pale Snake to dip her in the creek to clean her off. She and the child as well.”
“She had a pack? Not too heavy? Over her shoulder?” “Yes. With a burden basket inside. She told Pale Snake he could have it … and a copper plate, yes, that was it. A copper plate when he reached the Acorn holdings.”
“Upriver.”
“That’s right. But it wasn’t Star Shell. It was Yellow Snail.
And … I remember! The girl was Little Salamander!”
Robin remained squatted with his arms braced on his thick thighs. “You’re sure it was Acorn clan territory that she said she was headed to?”
“Positive.”
“Northward.”
“That’s right.”
“She didn’t mention the Roaring Water?”
“No, I’d have … Wait. Yes, there at the very first. I think she did. But Pale Snake told her he would take her to Acorn territory.”
“She didn’t mention taking the Mask someplace?”
“No.”
“Did she appear desperate that this Pale Snake take her?
Look nervous?”
“A bit … at first. Then when she drew him to the side, she talked with him in a real low voice. She seemed, well, confident, if you understand. Like a woman who knows very well what she’s about. I assumed, naturally enough, that she promised to warm his bed in exchange for carrying her and the girl north.”
“Yes, I suppose you would.” Robin stood effortlessly. “How long ago did they leave?”
“At midmorning ..’. yesterday.”
“Thank you, Stone Wrist. A blessing to you and your ancestors.”
And Robin loped off, not rushing like his namesake, but with the grace of a cougar stalking a wounded deer.
Star Shell paused as she followed Pale Snake and the porters he’d engaged to help them portage over the divide. She looked back down the trail toward the Red Feather clan grounds on the flat terrace next to the winding, tree-lined head of the Upper Moonshell. There a large, circular earthen enclosure had been attached to a huge square—the joining of High Head and Flat Pipe symbols. Two squat mounds rose within the clan grounds.
Beside them stood four oblong charnel houses. Bark-roofed society houses clustered around the peripheries. Smoke twined up to the cloudy morning skies in sinuous blue columns.
Irregular fields had been chopped from the forest, and faint lines of green stippled the rich earth where goosefoot, sunflowers, and squash sprouted. Men and women were already at work in them, bending down, plucking weeds and unwelcome sprigs of grass or newly sprouted trees.
The trail Star Shell now followed would cross the low saddle in the humped hills to the head of the Spirit Frog River. They had traveled as far as they could on the Upper Moonshell. Her once familiar river had now become little more than a twisting creek—narrow to the point that in some places, the brush and branches had to be chopped away to keep the channel clear enough for canoes to pass.
At Red Feather, they’d Traded the canoe to a friend of Pale Snake’s. One of the lineages who lived at Red Feather Traded in nothing but canoes, supplying the Trade. In exchange for shell beads, the young men of another lineage had agreed to carry the packs across the divide to the Wind clan territories, where Pale Snake would engage yet another canoe.
“They shuttle these canoes back and forth?” Star Shell asked as she turned and followed the Trader. Ahead of her, the young men marched at a brisk pace. The trail they followed was a deep rut beaten into the brown earth. A lot of feet had tramped this path.
“Trade is difficult between the lakes,” Pale Snake told her as he led the way. “From the Serpent Clans to Upper Lake, there’s no passage for a canoe. The same between Upper Lake and Lake of the Winds—unless, of course, you want to try to paddle over the Roaring Water. In the event that you do, I would imagine the thrill would be the cap of a lifetime—but too shortlived for most people’s tastes. The big problem, of course, is what you’d epcounter at the bottom, down in all of that crashing spray. The legends say that only the most Powerful Dreamers have ever gone over the falls and lived.”
She ignored him, trying to get back to the point. Were she to return this way, she might need this information. “Then a good Trade in canoes does exist?”