People of the Morning Star(109)
Returning his attention to the task at hand, he took another bite from the turkey leg and tucked the spine back to free up more meat. The first fork in the trail led south past one of the charnel houses that served some group of immigrants. Seven Skull Shield took it, finding a mish-mash of tracks in the soft soil. To his right, and not surprisingly upwind, a wizened old man of forty summers sat in the doorway of a small hut with a split-cane roof. No doubt the priest who served the charnel house, he wore a simple smock. His hands cradled a gourd tea cup, and he smiled into the morning sun.
“Greetings, Elder. A fine morning.”
“In First Woman’s name, yes, it is,” the man spoke through an atrocious accent.
“Do you always enjoy the morning with your tea?”
“For the most part. As the winters go by, they’ve started to make my bones ache. I’m ready for the warmer weather.”
“Must have been exciting when the Yellow Star war chief was killed yesterday.”
“Who would have thought?” the old man shook his head. “Can’t tell about these foreigners.”
Seven Skull Shield let the irony pass. “I’ll bet the archer ran right past you with his bow.”
The old man shook his head, his gaze following a young woman who stepped out of the nearest house. “No. I was sitting right here. No one passed. Would have been good to see him, though. Would have been a bit of excitement.” He paused. “Care for a cup of tea?”
“Some other time. First Woman’s blessings upon you, Elder.”
Seven Skull Shield gnawed the last of the meat from his turkey bone as he backtracked to the lakeside trail. He hadn’t hoped to get lucky enough on the first try.
Resigned to a long day, he tossed the bone into the lake and took the next branch that led up from the lake shore.
At the third house he stopped. A toothless old grandmother proved to be his loadstone. She kept reaching up absently with a misshapen right hand, pulling at the few remaining patches of white hair left on her nearly bald scalp. Large brown age spots freckled her lined face.
“Ah, just before the excitement? Yes. A man passed. Walked right there on the trail where you’re standing, but he carried no bow. He had a sleeping mat rolled up. A really clean one. Looked new. Odd, don’t you think? No one around here makes them. Not for Trade. Too hard to get the material. Mostly around here we farm. My grandson, he hunts ducks out in the lake. Ties stones around his waist and breathes through a hollow tube as he sneaks up from below and drags them down by the feet. He can only do that when the water’s clear.”
“A man with a clean sleeping mat?”
“Oh, if he’d been sleeping down by the lake, the mat would have been stained with grass or that dark silt. Like I said, it was a new mat.”
“And what did he look like? Tall, short, young, old, what kind of tattoos?”
“Maybe twenty-five summers?” she guessed. “Tall and muscular. You’ve seen those stickball players? The kind who can run all day? Had his face painted funny, mostly brown. Very pleasant.”
“He spoke to you?”
“Oh, yes. Just like you. Asked how my day was. Then people started shouting about the commotion over east, and he said he’d go see what that was all about.”
“Odd that he’d paint his face brown. How was he dressed?”
“Just a sleeveless hemp-fiber shirt belted at the waist with a rope. His hair was in a bun pinned with a wooden skewer. Looked just about like everyone else.” She frowned slightly. “He’s a noble.”
“And how would you know that, Grandmother?”
“They have that way about them. Like they own the world. Arrogant, haughty, superior … even when they’re trying to make believe they’re just like you. I know this. I was brought here as a girl … slave to serve the Moon Chief, Jenos. He was the ruler at River Mounds back then. I was there the day the mighty war chief Badgertail brought Tharon’s demand for tribute and the return of Priestess Nightshade.” She chuckled. “I hid in a big seed pot as Tharon’s warriors looted and killed the Starborn warriors. So, yes, I know nobles.” Shading her eyes with a gnarled hand, she studied him, as if to see if he believed her.
“Could you recognize the man with the mat again, Grandmother?”
She shrugged. “Probably. It was his eyes. Excited, dangerous, and deadly. I was of less importance to him than something unpleasant he’d have to scrape off his feet. So, why then, did he want to stop and talk to me? Why did he seek to convince someone as unimportant as me that he was something other than he was?”
Before Seven Skull Shield could speak, she added, “And why are you, yet another nondescript man, so interested?”