“Come,” Pine Drop said, tightening her grip on Salamander’s hand. “You are cold, Husband. You have been up caring for the Serpent for a night and a day without sleep. You have done your duty.”
“He’s here. See him flying? Right here around us.” Salamander raised his other hand, his finger pointing up into the rain. “Go in peace, my old friend.”
Pine Drop jerked him hard enough to pull him off-balance. It took all of her strength to keep him from falling into the mud. People were watching, curiosity in their somber black eyes.
“What’s wrong with you?” Pine Drop demanded as she tried to lead him away with some semblance of dignity.
“He was the only one who …” He caught himself, pinching his mouth closed.
“Who could understand?” she asked. “Is that what you were trying to say?”
He clamped his jaws, his huge glazed eyes looking back at the flames. Thunder! What was he seeing? Surely nothing of this world.
“Nothing of this world,” he whispered.
She tugged insistently on his arm, desperate to get him away as fast as his ill-balanced tottering feet would carry him. By force of will she overpowered his reluctance to leave.
“Salamander, I would talk to you.” She kept glancing around, trying to hide her fear, telling herself it was nothing. He was tired. That was all. Grief left him dazed, his souls crying for his lost teacher and friend.
Snakes help them if anyone heard his disjointed rambling!
“You have done enough! Come home. Anhinga and Night Rain have fixed something special.”
“There is no hurry. The buffalo tongue hasn’t baked all the way through yet.” He might have been talking to a shadow. “I just have to make sure that he knows …”
“He knows, Husband. You and Bobcat made sure.” She nearly jerked him off his feet again, aware of the stare that Clay Fat and Three Moss gave them. The latter had already leaned to whisper into Cane Frog’s ear. When the old woman died, would Three Moss continue leaning over to whisper, even if only the empty air heard?
“It is her way,” Salamander said simply.
The roar inside the Serpent’s house was dying as Pine Drop pulled him down the ridge, their feet slopping in the silt. As they passed, rain dribbled from house roofs to patter into ring-shaped puddles around the walls. Wet dogs lay in the scant shelter of the overhang before the house doors, looking cold, miserable, and starved.
“He told me so many things,” Salamander said half to himself. “He opened my eyes to the One.”
“The One?” He seemed to be half out of his head. Snakes, his souls weren’t coming loose like his mother’s, were they?
“The One,” he whispered in assent. “The Dance. The place where Dreams cross.” He smiled sadly. “What I would give! Oh, Pine Drop, I don’t want to die. If I could only rise and fly away from all this. Just spread my wings … and fly!”
“I think your souls are loose enough already.” She tightened her grip on his hand. She had to tug to keep him moving as they passed the head of the second ridge. His house huddled in the rain before them, faint threads of smoke lost in the downpour. She had kindled a fire there, just in case the rain stiffened. As it had.
She led him to the door and set it aside, ducked into the dark interior with him, and reset the cane door behind them. In the gloom she stepped over to the woodpile. Placing several lengths on the glowing coals, she made the awkward descent around her pregnant belly to blow the embers to life. As the flames licked the logs with yellow light, she looked up. His eyes were large and hollow, his expression vacant. Water dripped off him to spatter on the ashstained floor in little round star bursts.
She grunted as she stood up. He seemed oblivious, so she took the rain hat off his head. “You are soaked clear through, Salamander.”
“His souls were loose,” he said in that oddly detached voice. “He didn’t know who we were. One minute he was fighting evil spirits, the next he was grinning, curing people long dead. He was talking to the Dream Souls of the Dead. I never really understood. They’re here, right in the air around us.”
She took the wet cloak from his shoulders, shocked by its sodden weight, and laid it next to the fire to dry. She plucked the knot loose on his breechcloth and pulled the wet fabric from between his legs. Setting it aside, she positioned him over the fire, where the warm heat and smoke rose along his shivering naked body. Trickles of water ran down his skin, reflecting like silver veins in the firelight. Droplets beaded silver in his pubic hair.
“Stand there while I find you dry things.” She waddled around to his bed and retrieved his buffalo hide. Wrapping it across his shoulders, she made sure the edges were well clear of the flames and backed onto the bench. Stripping off her own cloak, she realized she was as wet as he.