“Ripple,” Water Bow whispered to interrupt his thoughts. “They called you Ripple because of your threats as a boy.”
Ripple turned his head away, wincing. How could they know this?
Water Bow’s voice was like a snake’s hiss. “Way back then, you, an angry little boy, said you would kill us all.” A pause. “They mocked you. Said that such a mouthy brat would have no more effect on the First People than a ripple in a pond. And the name stuck.”
Ripple clamped his eyes shut, remembering Cold Bringing Woman, seeing her midnight eyes flashing in bloodred irises. Is that why she chose me?
Larkspur said something soft, and Ripple slitted his vision, glancing unsurely at what was coming out of the sack: yucca fiber ropes, a hammer, the sort of thick stone mortar used in cracking nuts, a slender brow tine cut from a bull elk’s rack, and long yucca leaves.
Water Bow gave him a sad look. “Why don’t you tell us about this vision you’ve had? Did Old Woman North really come to you?”
Ripple began to pant and tried to huddle into a ball. Was it best just to keep silent?
Larkspur spoke again, her voice half-bored. He shot her a glance, wishing for the first time that he understood the First People’s tongue. She was watching him with the same scrutiny she might give a boiling root.
“You should talk now,” Water Bow insisted.
“She will destroy you,” Ripple whispered in return. For the first time, he felt sure of it. She had told him he would be tested, even maimed. What a fool he’d been to think it would be at the hands of the Mountain Witch.
Horned Lizard and Burning Smoke laid their callused hands on him, shoving him down onto the floor. Horned Lizard wrenched his right arm behind him, and Ripple cried out. The rope sawed into his flesh as they bound his right wrist to his right ankle, and then the left to the left. The posture was awkward.
Burning Smoke reached down and wrapped a hand in Ripple’s hair. Ripple bellowed fear when they jerked him to his knees.
Water Bow said softly, “You could end all this. Just tell us what happened up on the mountain.”
Ripple tried to swallow, his heart racing. He could see the bowl made of his father’s skull, rocking like an irregular pot on the floor.
The words formed in his throat. “I will destroy you.”
“Yes,” Water Bow answered absently. “I’m sure you will.”
Matron Larkspur gave an order, crossing her arms in finality.
Ripple met her dark stare as Horned Lizard pulled his head up by the hair and slammed him violently against the wall. Ripple screamed when his legs pulled down on his shoulder joints, seeking to pop them loose from their sockets. By rocking back on his toes, he could barely support a portion of his weight. He was still staring into Larkspur’s eyes when Burning Smoke picked up the hammer and elk tine. The hammer had a rounded stream cobble for a head, the stone just big enough to cup into a man’s palm. It had been bound to the handle by means of wet rawhide sewed to shrink tight as it dried.
Burning Smoke handed the tools to Matron Larkspur. She hefted the hammer in her petite hand, testing the weight. The antler tine rolled between her thin fingers. A smile curved her sensual lips when she knelt in front of him. Gods, how could such a beautiful woman strike such terror?
She raised the tine, holding it like a chisel in her left hand. With her right, she choked up on the hammer handle. A slight frown marred her perfect forehead as she slipped the point past Ripple’s lips.
He tried to squirm, agony eating at his shoulder joints. Trussed like a backward frog, hanging by his hair, and jammed against the wall, he could barely twist his head to the side. She moved with him, the frown deepening.
The quick blow surprised him. A sharp snap traveled up his jaw—was felt more than heard. Stinging pain accompanied the sensation of the loose tooth rolling around on his tongue. Blood rushed warm across his palate, the taste salty and metallic.
Dazed, fighting a ragged scream, he felt the sting as she deftly knocked another tooth out of his jaw.
“You could talk,” Water Bow reminded from the side. “Wouldn’t it be easier than spending the rest of your life without teeth?”
Matron Larkspur continued to smile as she leaned forward. The chisel was gripped in her small brown fist for another blow.
Sixteen
“Who comes?” a voice called from the darkness beside the trail. The way led up the steep sides of the Dog’s Tooth. Bad Cast was panting, he and Wrapped Wrist having run most of the way from Soft Cloth’s house in Mid-Sun Town atop Juniper Ridge.
The darkness reminded him of the inside of a sealed kiva at midnight. Cool mountain air sighed through the conifers and rattled leaves in the scrub oak and sumac. Overhead, even the late-night stars had vanished.