“This could be difficult,” Black Skull stated. “Can she come with me? Return to my country after I fulfill my obligation to my friends?” Lightning and thunder! The girl couldn’t even talk in a human tongue!
Shinbone nodded to himself, chattering to the girl. She stepped over to Black Skull and hugged him. Slightly bewildered, he could do little but pat her on the back.
Shinbone began laughing. “You are a man of honor, Black Skull. I congratulate Tall Fisher on choosing so well for her youngest daughter. But I must tell you, you look as if a sentence of death has been passed on you.”
“The news that I’m to marry has … let’s say, come upon me by surprise.” He shrugged. “And I would have to admit that had I known, beautiful as she is, I would have turned her down last night.”
“You are a worthy man, Black Skull.” Shinbone spoke to his daughter, who tightened her hug, looked up into Black Skull’s face and spoke earnestly.
“What’s she saying?”
“That you’ve given her the most wonderful of gifts. She hopes that your seed will grow within her and that now she will be eligible for marriage.” Shinbone made a gesture with his hand, as if to include all the earth. “Among our people, a girl is not a woman until she is heavy with child. A man does not marry unless he knows that a woman can bear him a family.
My daughter has been waiting, and twice before she has tried without result, but those were young boys, friends of hers. This time she wanted a man.”
Black Skull rubbed his jaw with one hand while he patted the girl with the other. “Shinbone, a man’s seed doesn’t always take with one night.”
The chief made an airy gesture. “I don’t know of such things.
Tall Fisher does. She tells me a woman counts the days between her bleedings. My daughter has a good chance … and I think she wants to marry Big Net, of my cousin’s clan. They’ve been eyeing each other for years.”
Black Skull nodded, lifting the girl’s chin. “I wish this Big Net luck, health, and wisdom. And perhaps we have both given each other a gift.” She smiled as Shinbone translated.
Green Spider appeared on the trail, spinning around and around, his arms flailing the air like the wings of a gawky eaglet just learning to fly. A silly grin split his thin face.
“Greetings, fool! You’ve been off cavorting with wolves again?”
“Never!” Green Spider cried. “I slept! Slept with the single minded intent of a log in the forest.” He wobbled to a halt, eyes wide as he pointed at the girl in Black Skull’s embracing arm. “Trouble there, Killer of Men! Beware.”
Black Skull ignored him. “Have you seen Otter and Pearl?” Shinbone said, “In the village. They were being most generous with their Trade goods.” The chief squinted. “Like my daughter, they seemed to glow this morning.. Have they been lovers for long?”
Black Skull looked over to where Wave Dancer waited.
Catcher was perched on the packs, paws pattering on the hull at Green Spider’s appearance. “Yes, Great Chief, they have.
It’s just taken them a while to discover it.”
Green Spider hopped around like a rabbit, his nose twitching.
He stopped, staring at the girl as if having trouble seeing her, and then squinted and backed away from Black Skull as if the vision were too much. “You, Killer of Men, have made the most curious of discoveries this morning. Beware, Black Skull, you’re losing touch with what you were. The earth shakes, the land trembles. Whence came the wrath of the Black Skull?”
“I didn’t feel any wrath, fool. I felt … honored. And perhaps that is not such a bad thing.” The warrior ran gentle fingers through the girl’s hair, musing on the fool’s words.
Otter and Pearl emerged from the forest, a once bulging but now empty pack over one of the Trader’s shoulders and Pearl safely tucked under the other arm.
A following crowd of well-wishers helped launch Wave Dancer, and Black Skull took his place behind the fox-headed bow, while Catcher barked. Several canoes followed them as far as the lake they’d been told about.
A crow came spiraling out of the cloud-mottled sky and chattered noisily as it circled around them.
Otter groaned uneasily, and Black Skull saw him glance suspiciously at the Contrary.
At that, Green Spider stood, spread his arms wide and shouted up, “He’s not wrong … and neither are you!”
More squawks.
“I don’t know!”
Was it Black Skull’s imagination, or was Green Spider’s voice pleading?
“Green Spider,” Otter called evenly, “is there something you want to tell us?”