What is it? Do you see it?
“I never see them clearly,” he whispered. “They are shadows dancing at the edges of the light, or flaming eyes. But I hear them and smell them. The ghost last night was a stinking mess. It reeked of garbage middens.”
Soon, you are going to have to give me new eyes. How do you expect me to see the future when I can’t even see you?
“And how shall I do that? Do you expect me to carve out some living person’s eyes and put them in your skull?”
More warriors rose from around the fire and tramped into the forest. Jumping Badger scowled after them, then returned his attention to Lamedeer.
“Whose eyes would you like? Eh? Elk Ivory’s, perhaps? She is a nosy old woman I would be glad to be rid of. She is almost as ruthless as Hollow Hill.”
He tossed to his side to look at her.
Elk Ivory’s eyes had narrowed, and sweat beaded her broad flat nose. She’d tucked her shoulder-length black hair behind her ears.
“Ha!” Jumping Badger laughed. “Are you afraid of me, old woman? You should be.”
He reached up and grasped his Power bag, where he kept bits of each of his warriors. For the most part, he had collected single strands of hair, but he also had threads of fabric soaked with her menstrual blood. He had scavenged them many winters ago, when he first thought she might prove a threat to his rising authority.
Jumping Badger caressed his Power bag. “Take care, old woman,” he said and grinned at her. “You do not wish to anger me.”
Softly, she replied, “It’s not your anger that frightens me, Jumping Badger.”
Twenty-One
Sugar maples dotted the way, their dark brown trunks blending with the lengthening evening shadows. High overhead, the branches created a sable weave against the dusk sky.
The thick white hair flowing down Sparrow’s back had turned an unearthly shade of blue. Dust Moon kept her eye on it. Sparrow had insisted they walk in single file, Blue Raven first, himself second, and Dust Moon last. While she understood his good intentions, it meant that all day she’d been forced to trudge through the deep mud churned up by their moccasins. Her legs ached, but she refused to admit her weakness in front of the Walksalong Headman. Not only that, she knew that they had to press onward, or the children would surely beat them to the ruins of Paint Rock Village.
Her moccasins suddenly slipped, and she had to flail her arms to keep from toppling. She stopped and took a breath. Mud oozed up around her feet. The warm sunlight had melted most of the snow, though white patches glistened in the dark recesses of the forest.
She’d spent most of the day watching Blue Raven. Slightly taller than Sparrow, his graying black hair framed an oval face with brown eyes. The elk hide over his shoulders swayed as he walked, revealing the knife tied to his belt. A bow and quiver hung over his shoulder.
She started walking again, her arms out for balance, placing her moccasins with care.
She’d been chewing on the things he’d told them about Rumbler and Little Wren. While she understood his need to find his niece before Jumping Badger did, the rest of his plan remained hazy. He’d said that together he and Wren would “figure out something,” but that made no sense. A girl in the Bear Nation had no life outside her clan. Yet, the Walksalong matrons had condemned the girl to death. If he took Wren home, she would surely be killed. No clan matron could afford to rescind such a judgment. It would weaken her authority. That is … unless the matrons were given a very important reason for changing their decree. Blue Raven had to offer something in return for Wren’s life. Something that would mollify the matrons, and lessen the force of Wren’s crime.
The “something” seemed clear.
He has to take Rumbler back.
If she stood in Blue Raven’s moccasins, that’s what she would do: find the children, take them home, and offer both to the matrons as an appeasement—while pleading for Wren’s life. She might suggest to the matrons that, as part of Wren’s punishment, the girl be forced to sit Vigil over the boy while he died, or she might even recommend that Wren be ordered to kill Rumbler. That was the only truly equitable resolution. Wren had saved him, and risked her clan by doing so. If she killed him, and thereby saved her clan, the matrons might spare her life.
The trail took a sudden steep drop, heading into the narrow valley below. To her right stood a tan cliff fifty hands high. As it curved around the south side of the meadow, the cliff sloped ever downward, until it vanished into thick golden grass. Snow encircled the bases of the boulders that scattered the valley. To the north, evergreen trees mixed with leafless maples. Almost hidden by the shadows at the edge of the trees, a herd of deer grazed.