People of the Lightning(54)

He held it closed near his throat, and did feel warmer. “Thank you.” Boldly, he slipped his hand under the blanket and twined his fingers with Musselwhite’s. She did not pull away, and happiness gladdened his heart. He squeezed her fingers.

Moonsnail used her walking stick to beat her way through the crowd into the shelter and slumped down at Pondwader’s side. “Well, thank Brother Earth, the geese are done. I told Polished Shells they would be. As soon as the two of you are served, everyone else can eat. And they’re ready, let me tell you. I had to post guards while you were out in the ocean. I feared there wouldn’t be a scrap left by the time you returned.”

Kelp shouldered in, carrying two bowls heaped with food, and Seedpod followed on her heels with two more. Kelp grinned at Pondwader as she set them before him. Steaming goose, roast catfish, and killifish were piled high in one, and the other brimmed with turtle and mussel soup. “How are you feeling?” she asked.

“Better now,” he said.

Kelp grinned.

Seedpod set his bowls down next to Kelp’s. A wealth of fruits and nuts filled them. Then he knelt beside his daughter and gently kissed Musselwhite on the cheek. “You are very beautiful, my daughter.”

Musselwhite touched his white hair gently and smiled, and Pondwader could see for the first time that day the hollow, anguished look in her dark eyes. “Thank you for the lovely tunic, Father. You are the best weaver in the clan. It was the tunic that made me beautiful.”

People clustered around the shelter, filling bowls with food, laughing, applauding, shoving each other, while out in the plaza a dance circle had already formed. Warriors with hunks of goose in their fists hopped from foot to foot, grabbing bites between shrieks and whoops.

Moonsnail leaned forward and urged, “Eat, Pondwader.”

He reached for a piece of goose. “Trying to keep up my strength, Grandmother?”

“I am, indeed,” she answered and slapped his knee. “I want you to stuff yourself. You’re going to need it.”

By dusk, Pondwader had eaten so much he felt as fat as an autumn bear, and very weary. He kept swallowing yawns, while trying to pay attention to the festivities. Kelp and the rest of his family stood near the ocean, talking with Seedpod. The fine tunics in the crowd showed food stains now, hair had been unbraided and set free to the wind, and here and there, Dancers had begun to stumble from exertion. Children raced between adult legs, faces gleaming with goose and catfish fat. Everyone seemed to be enjoying himself. The food bowls were down to scraps and heaps of fish bones. Already a few women had started cleaning up the mess, stacking bowls atop each other, carrying them out to the sea to wash. Musselwhite had Danced several dances with Heartwood’s warriors, but now lay on her side beside Pondwader, her long muscular legs extended, her head propped on her hand. She looked exhausted, too.

“Musselwhite,” Pondwader murmured and leaned toward her. “I’m very tired. Could we … I mean, are you ready to—I don’t wish to interrupt your celebrating but—”

“Yes, Pondwader. I’m ready to go.”

She rose to her feet and helped him to stand, then slipped her arm around his waist and supported him as they walked into the trees. No one even seemed to notice that they had gone. She took the deer trail that led to their marriage shelter.

Starlight fell around them in streaks and bars of pale silver. The smells of the forest, of pine and soaked autumn leaves carried on the night. Raindrops pattered on the branches, creating a soft hissing sound. Pondwader glanced sideways at her, around the edge of his blue hood. In the faint gleam of starlight that penetrated the clouds, he saw the sadness in her eyes. His chest constricted and a painful desire, a deep yearning, swelled inside him, the need to ease her hurts, as if he half-knew what their life together could be, and longed for that wholeness now … but could not have it. Would not, in all probability, for many summers.

“Did your mother speak with you about the marriage bed?” she asked quietly.

“No,” he laughed. “Grandmother did. I think she had to beat Mother away with her walking stick, but it worked. Thank the Shining Ones. I’m not sure I could have borne it.”

“You don’t like your mother?”

In a melancholy voice, he said, “She—she seems to need to hurt people. As much as she can. Especially me and Kelp.”

Musselwhite looked up at his anguished tone. “Are you all right?”

“Yes. Why? Didn’t I sound like it?”

Musselwhite tightened her arm around his waist and hugged him. “One can be worn down, that’s all. Constant cruelty leaves raw wounds on its victims’ souls. Wounds that never really heal, Pondwader.”