People of the Moon(37)

The land surrounding Tall Piñon Town was an uplifted plateau cut by deep canyons that ran off to the southwest. The effect was as if a giant bear had grooved an overturned bowl with mighty claws. The flat ridgetops were treed in juniper and piñon, cleared here and there by means of slash-and-burn for agriculture. Thick loamy soil made for productive crops when the rains came. Below the rimrock, seeps dotted the canyon walls, most of them having been exploited for small cornfields. The narrow canyon bottoms themselves were stippled with fields, diversion dams, and rough ditches to capture any summer runoff.

For generations prior to the coming of the First People, the locals had prospered here. Many still lived in the same style of pit house that their ancestors had first cut out of the ground hundreds of sun cycles before. They had cleared plots, grown their corn, beans, and squash, lived and died with the regularity of the seasons. So, too, had they warred among themselves, clan fighting clan, tribe fighting tribe, until the Blessed Sun’s red-shirted warriors had enforced the peace.

Now all they had built was in jeopardy. Stories circulated along the trails: tales of the dead Snake Head’s witchcraft; of Jay Bird’s raid; and of the new Prophet, Poor Singer. Even from here, high atop Tall Piñon Town, everyone had seen the Rainbow Serpent rise into the southwestern sky, its plume of smoke obscuring the sacred mountain.

It was whispered that the First People’s Power was broken.

How do I combat that?

Leather Hand let the retinue straggling behind him catch their breath as they entered the shade of a clump of piñon trees. Twenty of his warriors followed in two ranks. Sweat streaked their faces and darkened their red shirts. Round wicker shields hung from their backs, while cane arrows bristled from quivers that rode high on their shoulders. Each carried an unstrung wooden bow, a pack, canteen, and his personal effects.

Behind them came teams of locals bearing the four Priests atop their litters. Seven Stars and his companions had remained immaculately white while their bearers appeared dust-streaked, lines of sweat having traced weblike patterns down their lean brown legs. White crusted under their armpits where salt sweat had dried on their brown tunics.

As he took their measure, he could see uncertainty in the eyes of Priest, warrior, and commoner alike. Each, for his own reason, was upset. It was as if they could feel the threat, like a winter smoke lying heavily upon the air. They could scent its odor, each wondering what it portended for their separate futures.

Yes, news had traveled fast.

The authority and prestige of the Blessed Sun has been violated.

Sucking in a lungful of the hot dry air, Leather Hand considered his situation. The whole country was talking about it: Several men had slipped into a storeroom in the Tall Piñon Great House, filled packs with food, then killed the Priest called Right Acorn, looted his room, and made off into the night. The Deep Canyon farmsteads Leather Hand’s party had passed on the trail were abuzz with the news.

They have defied my authority.

That single thought had confounded him from the moment he’d first heard of the raid. How insolent could they get? To walk right into his great house, steal the Blessed Sun’s corn out from under his nose? Murder his Priest?

Leather Hand glanced back. Seven Stars had been brooding since the word had come that his young acolyte had been found dead in the High Priest’s room. Seven Stars’ fine features gleamed in the dappled light, perspiration adding to the effect. His long black hair, freshly washed, hung in silky waves around his white-robed shoulders.

What does it mean to the people when they hear that a Priest has been killed? Leather Hand motioned his men forward and started off at a trot. Tall Piñon lay in the distance. He could see it through the mirage, a cluster of multistory buildings shimmering like a wish.

The way led past several farmsteads: rickety pit houses rising like earthen pimples beside fields of intermixed corn and beans—all drought-parched and tan under a hazy sky. Those few people who watched them pass looked gaunt and worn. They had a shabby air about them, as though their bodies were as played out as their dust-choked fields. He noted the filthy faces of the wide-eyed children, framed with unwashed locks of black hair. The adults, however, watched him with sloe-eyed looks that revealed nothing of their thoughts. In the name of the gods, he hated those weary masks of expressionless anonymity they managed to adopt at will.

Do they exalt in the fact that thieves could make us look like fools? Or do they chafe at the knowledge that someone made off so easily with their hard-earned tribute?

He had listened when the locals passed him in the plaza and tried to decipher the hushed sibilance of their strange language. It irritated him that he had no clue of the meaning behind their words. They might have been speculating philosophically on the miraculous nature of air, or making rude comments about his mother’s lack of morality.