“I hope your cape has not blown loose.”
“I do, too.”
Wren picked at a loose thread that stuck out from her blanket.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
She nodded. “I feel sick. Deep inside. Like my bones are drying up.”
“I’m sorry, Wren. Your grandmother … I don’t think she meant to strike you, she just didn’t know what else to do.”
Bravely, Wren said, “It’s all right, Uncle. I’m more worried about the bloody boy than Grandmother’s slap. I mean, you don’t think that Face would come into the longhouse to find me, do you?”
Blue Raven pondered the question. “The False Faces of the Forest don’t like harming children, Wren. I don’t think so.”
She sat up in her bedding, and long black hair tumbled around her shoulders. “Uncle? You don’t think the Face will go after Rumbler, do you? Since he couldn’t get me? Rumbler is out there alone, and tied up.”
“I think Rumbler has more to fear from the cold and wolves than Spirits, Wren.”
She seemed to hear the bitter undercurrent in his words. She eased back down. “It isn’t your fault, Uncle. You didn’t wish to steal the boy. Everyone knows that.”
Blue Raven’s belly soured. “I should have done more, Wren. I wish I had.”
“Could you have? Without getting killed?”
“I think so. It is easier to ignore a calm man, than one shouting and shaking his fists. I should have shouted.”
Her brow furrowed. “But you are Headman, Uncle. Headmen do not shout. They explain. People expect War Leaders to yell and shake their fists, but if a Headman does it, they hate him.”
Wind shook the walls, and penetrated around the edges of the door curtain. The coals in the firepit flared, throwing a crimson veil over Wren’s swollen face. The slap had left an ugly welt.
Blue Raven reached out to touch it gently. “Even if a Headman’s actions make him the most hated man in the village, he must do whatever is necessary to assure the safety of his people. Three of our clan are dead, Wren, and I fear it is all because I was not willing to be hated. I did not have the courage.”
She studied him from beneath her long lashes. “Did you examine Skullcap and Mossybill?”
“Yes.” He nodded. “I could find no evidence of violence. No blood. No wounds. But their families are convinced Rumbler killed them.”
“Why?”
“Because it is the only answer they have.”
Wren reached beneath the edge of her hides to pull Trickster’s knotted rawhide toy from its nightly resting place. “Uncle, do you think Rumbler has family in another village? We might be able to find them. If you freed Rumbler and took him to his family …”
Blue Raven rolled to his side. Clearly, she had decided Rumbler was not to blame for the deaths and had been … thinking about how to resolve this unpleasant situation. “Our clan would declare me an outcast, Wren. I would be hunted down and killed for my crime. Just as you would if you did such a thing.”
Wren clutched the rawhide toy more tightly. “Could we get someone else to do it for us? Pay them, maybe, twelve or thirteen beaver pelts, or a bag of seashells?”
Blue Raven whispered, “The result would be the same, Wren. Treachery never remains a secret. No, I think there is only one way to end this madness.”
“What is that, Uncle?”
“Something I have been considering for many winters: an alliance with the Turtle Nation.”
“An alliance?” she said in surprise.
“Yes. Just imagine what life would be like if all of our villages, and all of their villages, agreed to keep the peace. If we said, ‘We won’t raid you, if you don’t raid us. In fact, if you are ever in trouble we will help defend your villages, if you will also help to defend ours in our times of need.’” Blue Raven sighed. “Such a thing is just a dream now, but it is worth praying for. Both of our nations would be better off. Trade would prosper.”
“Then why haven’t we done it already, Uncle?”
“There is too much hostility, too much distrust. But someday—”
The words dried up in his throat when Rumbler shrieked, “Mother!”
Tears filled Wren’s eyes.
Blue Raven reached out and squeezed her hand. “Try to sleep, Wren. There’s nothing we can do tonight.”
She curled into a ball, and pulled her hides over her head again.
“Wren?”
Sniffles.
“I’m sorry any of this has happened. But I give you my pledge that if he is innocent, I will do my best to save him.”
Eight
Evening purpled the rolling hills, turning the fresh snow a deep amethyst. Silver Sparrow stood before his newly built lodge on the hillside overlooking the ten conical lodges of Earth Thunderer Village. Dust Moon had ordered the village be set up in a crescent moon around the southern end of Goose Down Lake. His clan did not construct clumsy big longhouses like those of the Bear Nation. They built small lodges that could be easily torn down and moved to a new location. Rounded in shape, with bark-covered walls, they stood the height of a man, and spread two to three body lengths in diameter. Delicate tendrils of smoke curled from the roofs.