People of the Mist(109)
“Well, odd how?” Panther demanded.
“That’s just it.” Hunting Hawk gestured helplessly. “I can’t remember. Something about that last night at the dance. He was … He was … Oh, bat dung! It will come to me. These things always do. It just didn’t seem important at the time.” “Did it have to do with Red Knot? Or maybe High Fox?”
“No, of that I’m certain. But I can tell you that I saw
High Fox and Red Knot together that last night. They were talking off to the side. It was just before her last dance. At the time, I thought little of it, since, after all, she had a right to say farewell to her friends.”
“What other friends did she have? Flat Willow?”
Hunting Hawk hesitated. She realized that he read the tracks of her thoughts as if they’d been made in fresh mud. “You know something, don’t you?”
The Panther shrugged, expression veiled. “I may, and I may not. Weroansqua, I’m not going to contribute to your problems by revealing my every suspicion to you. Were I to do so, you’d be looking askance at everyone in the village.”
“I would, would I?”
“Indeed, including yourself.” His sudden smile sent a shiver down her back. “Where were you that morning, Weroansqua?”
“Me?” She stiffened, mind racing back to that morning, to the things she’d done before she entered the House of the Dead. “I was around. In my house, checking on things. Taking care of my guests. You know as well as I that there is a lot to do with a village full of…”
His face had turned oddly blank, eyes intent as if to probe past her sudden defense.
“I was!” she declared heatedly, unsettled for the first time. She felt her control beginning to slip. “Look, you don’t come in here and question me! I am Weroansqua!”
She put a hand to her heart, aware that it hammered against her thin breastbone. Her blood raced, and in that instant, her balance deserted her. Only Panther’s quick hand stabilized her. As quickly, the dizziness passed.
“I—I’m all right.” She shook off his hand, and glared at him. “Okeus curse you!”
“But you see, don’t you,” he replied calmly, “that you, too, could have killed her.”
“That’s ridiculous!”
“Is it? The Weroansqua has made an agreement to marry Red Knot to Copper Thunder—but, when she reconsiders, she finds herself in water over her head. How does she stop this alliance without angering the Great Tayac? She can see no way out, but, with the stakes so high, and driven by desperation, she orders her granddaughter killed the morning she is supposed to leave with Copper Thunder. In the process, High Fox is sacrificed, but how great a price is that? Black Spike can fume for a moon or so, until the arrival of canoe load after canoe load of tribute, along with an apology.”
He fingered his chin, glancing up speculatively. “I’d word it something like this: “Most honored Weroance, I wish to beg your forgiveness. The grief of my granddaughter’s death drove me to rash actions. The counsel I received from the Great Tayac, and from others close to me, led me to believe your son had murdered my granddaughter. Please, take these gifts and forgive an old woman a foolish mistake!”
Hunting Hawk swallowed hard. By dint of her leather tough will, she kept control of herself. Okeus eat his soul! How does he know me so well?
He watched her without change of expression, as though he already knew what she’d say. “All right,” Hunting Hawk growled, goaded by self disgust. “If I’d had her killed, I would have said something like that.”
“Weroansqua, assuming she hadn’t been killed, but had run off with the boy, what would you have done?”
“Sent Nine Killer and every whole-blooded man here to drag her back!”
“And Red Knot knew this? Knew you would react that way?”
“Of course! She’s my granddaughter! She knew I’d be angry enough to uproot trees to get her back. The women in my family face up to their responsibilities. We do our duty.”
“Apparently, Red Knot didn’t agree with you. After all, she was running off to meet young High Fox.”
“Or to tell him she wasn’t going with him.” Hunting Hawk uttered a low growl. “I can’t believe my granddaughter would be fool enough to think that she could escape the net of warriors I’d send after her.”
The Panther cast a curious look at Sun Conch, and said mildly, “Well, one never knows about the gullibility of young love.” Sun Conch lowered her eyes, but her face flushed hotly. Turning back, Panther said, “And when they’d been returned to you, what then?”