People of the Morning Star(40)
Soon, my love. Soon.
Meanwhile—and the reason that brought me here in the first place—something has gone wrong. That was readily apparent when I arrived at dawn toting a couple of Casqui pitchers in a sack to give the allusion I was but another Trader. I’d come to enjoy and revel in the spectacle. I couldn’t wait to see the panicked faces, hear the screams of dismay, and delight in the mass hysteria as the ignorant wretches tore their hair and clothing. Instead of news of the Morning Star’s heinous murder, only silence rolled down the long stairway to the plaza.
Glancing past Smooth Pebble, I can see and barely hear Blue Heron and Night Shadow Star as they talk. Tense, yes, and obviously plotting, but I’m not quite close enough to catch more than an occasional word.
My agents assured me that Cut String would act last night. I have assurances that the warrior was seen climbing the stairs to the high palace, and that he carried the ritual knife.
… And nothing!
The day proceeds as if Cut String never existed. The Morning Star plays chunkey, unconcerned, and my beloved Night Shadow Star wins at stickball.
This actually excites me. To have succeeded too easily would have been boring. A tingle, not unlike the sexual anticipation I have for Night Shadow Star, runs along my bones. Instead of simple victory, I must now apply all of my brilliance. Winning will boil down to who can keep whom off balance, plot and act the quickest, and seize unexpected advantages.
Either it is the incompetence of my allies, or Power has taken a hand in the game.
Which means I must now employ other weapons and strategies.
Beware, Blue Heron. I am about to raise the stakes!
I have preparations to make. It no longer seems that I can trust either the locals, or Power. I must take a more active role. I pack the last of my pitchers, take leave of Smooth Pebble, and saunter off into the crowd.
Wild Cat has been watching, now I catch his eye and nod. In an instant I have made the transition from a harmless fly to a stalking lion. Wild Cat is off to dangle a baited hook.
Me? I am off to challenge Power in a way that will shake the depths of the Underworld.
Thirteen
The damp clay sank with each step Matron Columella took. She’d come to inspect the progress of the new mound her Evening Star House lineage was raising on the river’s high western bluff. The heights overlooked both the broad expanse of the Father Water and the endless sprawl of Cahokia where it stretched across the floodplain to the east. Given the elevation to which the new mound had already risen, Columella was exposed to the breeze blowing in from the west; it tugged playfully at her bright yellow skirt, heavy as it was with its decorative shell and copper beads. They glinted in the sunlight and had been sewn to the fabric in an Evening Star pattern. She had thrown her cloak back out of respect for the warm morning sun. Her hair was fixed in a bun and secured with an ornately carved eagle-bone pin.
Columella’s brother High Dance Mankiller, high chief of the Evening Star House, gave her a sidelong glance, refusing to betray his distaste for the short caricature of man who struggled to keep pace beside her. The dwarf called Flat Stone Pipe waddled precariously over piles of soft clay where they’d been dumped by the endless line of laborers. To do so, he had to windmill his arms for balance, his short legs almost flailing.
High Dance bit off an irritated curse. He was a handsome man entering his forties, tall, muscular, immaculately dressed in a yellow-and-black apron. He was everything that the dwarf was not.
“Building a mound,” the dwarf said, “is like creating an empire.” He turned his attention to the long line of laborers as they climbed the ramp, panting. Sweat streamed down dirty chests and shoulders. The closest man gave them a wary glance, slowed, and shifted his burden basket to touch his forehead respectfully.
Columella gave him a faint nod of acknowledgment and watched the man plod wearily forward and dump his basketful of damp black clay atop the thick layer of white sand. So far the struggling line of humanity had managed to cover half of the new mound top with a knee-deep layer of silty clay.
Immediately behind them, another twenty or so men tamped the black clay, using flat-bottomed logs like giant pestles to ram the basket-loads into a compact and flat surface.
The construction of a stable mound was an art, and it was here that Flat Stone Pipe, a noted engineer, excelled. Plain dirt piled into a pyramid would last only as long as it took the Tie Snakes in the Underworld to call a heavy rain. As soon as the soil became saturated, the sides of the mound would slump down into a gooey mess. Instead, a complex layering of loam, topped with clay, topped with sand, topped with loam, topped with clay was used. Loam provided most of the fill. Clay of just the right consistency was used to create a mostly waterproof cap. Sand acted to absorb any water that infiltrated past the overlying clay caps and let moisture slowly dissipate.