People of the Moon(10)

Three



The sprawling cluster of buildings called Tall Piñon Town existed as a gift from the prevailing southwesterly winds. They carried streamers of white cloud from the distant oceans across the arid basins to shower life-giving summer rains on the high stone-scabbed mesa. In the beginning the gift of the rains had been thick forests of piñon, juniper, and ponderosa pine. Over the years the trees had sent their roots deep into the soil, changing it from stony to a sandy loam. The first farmers had denuded portions of the mesa top, ringing trees to kill them and then burning to clear fields. In that ash-rich soil, their crops had prospered. Steep-walled gorges—chiseled down through the underlying rock—gave the farmers an additional advantage. Fields could be planted along the canyon walls and in the narrow alluvial bottoms where check dams and ditches captured runoff.

As the population increased over the generations, Tall Pinon had grown from a collection of pit houses at the canyon heads into a thriving Trade and ceremonial center. Blocky multistory buildings perched on the low ridges leading down to the south.

Two generations ago emissaries of the First People had arrived, and during the following years had built the Tall Piñon Great House in the northwestern corner of the dusty rectangular plaza.

The location was perfect for the First People and their far-flung empire. High on the mesa top they had an unobstructed view of the entire northern border: Distant towns like Juniper Edge and Lanceleaf Village were visible. So too was the Far View Town observatory atop Green Mesa, Thunderbird Mountain, and the spine of World Tree Mountain to the south.

The local Deep Canyon People made up one of the largest populations in the region. The yield of their bountiful harvests was stored in numerous granaries and storerooms located in the lower floors of the imposing buildings.

In the beginning, the First People’s influence had been minimal, but over the generations their grip had been tightened through judicious marriages, military alliances, and the subtle indoctrination of the local peoples into the intricacies of the Flute Player’s religion. But a conqueror’s hold, even if so softly applied in the beginning, is never secure. Not as long as the conquered can remember better days.

Carefully cradled within the arms of Tall Piñon’s U-shaped settlement, the squat cylinder of the First People’s great kiva hulked like a giant drum. Dug into the sloping ground on the west, the eastern side was cushioned by a thick berm of soil. While heat waves shimmered off the dusty surface, a ring of people waited anxiously, eyes on the white-plastered walls.

Inside, down in the cool depths of the subterranean structure, two men sat. One dressed in red, the other in a pristine white robe. The great kiva’s interior was illuminated by a square shaft of blue light that slanted down through the smoke hole. It cast midmorning sun on one of the plastered masonry columns that supported the heavy soot-stained log roof. Reflected sunlight shone on freshly painted images of the gods where they had been rendered on the kiva walls. Bright colors had been used to create their Dancing bodies. From the perspective with which they had been drawn, the gods might have been staring curiously at the two men who sat silently on the northern bench, separated by the stairs that led up to the Priest’s room at ground level. Both men studied the images with pensive eyes.

Deputy War Chief Leather Hand was seated to the right of the polished-pole stairway. During times of ceremony masked Priests entered from the ready room above, their bodies festooned with the colorful regalia of their office: feathered plumes; painted wooden headdresses, fans, and false wings; bustles of brightly dyed cloth; and shields decorated with symbols of the First People’s gods and monsters.

For the moment, Leather Hand wasn’t thinking of Priests. Of all the men in that northern reach of the First People’s empire, he might well have been the loneliest. He braced his scarred hands on his knees, a serious look in his dark brown eyes. His crisp red war shirt hung loosely from muscular shoulders. The first faint traces of silver streaked his thick black warrior’s mane, now pulled back in a severe bun and pinned with a single standing eagle feather. His heavy jaw was set, a weary tension around the lines of his wide nose.

He turned to the white-clad Priest. This man, Seven Stars, Deputy Sunwatcher for Tall Piñon Town, wore a Priest’s flawless white robe belted at the waist with a deep purple sash dyed by larkspur petals. Long sleek hair, freshly washed with yucca soap, hung down his back in silken waves. His features could only be described as beautiful, more feminine than masculine. Soft doeskin boots shod his small feet. He absently rubbed his chin as he considered the paintings.