People of the Owl(4)

In his mind’s eye, Jaguar Hide could see himself: Gray hair had been pulled into a tight bun on the back of his head and pinned with a stingray spine. His old jaguar hide, once so bright yellow, now lay hairless over his shoulder, the smeared skin tattered in places, shiny from wear in others. The turning of seasons had treated the hide no better than they had him.

A fabric loincloth sported the design of a spotted cat on the front and rear flaps where they hung from the waist thong. His brown skin, weathered from sun, cold, and storm, was puckered here and there with scars. It had lost its supple elasticity and turned flaky, grainy with age and loose on his wiry muscles. He still had his bones, big and blocky, a frame that had once given him a rare strength among men. The muscles, however, had faded with the turning of seasons until now he was but a gnarly shadow of himself.

He knotted his bony fist; if he were young again, he would show them. He would pay them back for this.

“Elder?” the young man on the mat croaked. Dried blood mottled his sweat-shiny skin. He raised a trembling hand. Jaguar Hide took it in his own, feeling how cold it was, how weak. He forced himself to ignore the rising stench that came from the wound and curled around his head.

“Save your breath, Bowfin. You need to regain your strength, then we will go back and teach that filth a thing or two about invading our territory.”

The young man swallowed hard, his eyes shining in the firelight. Jaguar Hide watched as the pupils expanded ever wider, knowing that gray darkness was flooding the warrior’s vision. Holding his dying nephew’s cold hand, Jaguar Hide could sense the life going out of him. He felt Bowfin’s heart slow, weaken, skip, and stop. With the shallow breathing at the end, the vile odor was no longer pumped from his punctured gut. Jaguar Hide’s skin prickled as the young man’s Life Soul slipped out through his open mouth and rose. He could imagine it as it drifted to the door, caressed Yellow Dye where she sat at the opening in the thatch, and slipped out into the darkness above the hut.

“He’s dead.” Jaguar Hide placed young Bowfin’s hand on his still chest. Yellow Dye bit off a sob as she fled through the low doorway into the night, where her son’s Life Soul now hovered like a bat.

“Uncle?” Anhinga knelt next to him, staring curiously at Bowfin’s vacant eyes. The boy lay naked, his body bathed in firelight. The wound in his belly gaped open under the rib cage. “Can’t the Serpent save him? Call his souls back to the body? He has already tried to suck out the evil the Sun People shot into him, but …” She pointed at the clotted blood on the boy’s side.

Jaguar Hide had watched as the Serpent, the old medicine Dreamer, had punctured the boy’s skin with a sharp chert flake. Then the white-haired elder had bent down, using a clay tube to suck at the blood in an effort to draw the evil from the body. No amount of piercing and sucking or smoking with medicine herbs had stilled the fever or the ever-stronger stench rising from the wound.

“Sometimes, Niece, nothing can be done.”

They had come here from the big settlement—a circular complex of clan houses and seven mounds called the Panther’s Bones—to the western margins of their territory in response to reports that the Sun People were raiding again. They constantly tried to sneak into Swamp Panther territory and quarry the valuable deposits of sandstone in the western ridges. Jaguar Hide’s arrival at Raccoon Camp had coincided with young Bowfin being wounded by the skulking raiders.

“I don’t agree, Uncle.” She was glaring at him, eyes hard.

“I meant about Bowfin.” He leaned back on his haunches and studied her. Firelight shot gold through her long black hair and accented the hollows of her cheeks. She had a straight nose and perfect mouth. The past fifteen winters had shaped the little girl he had once known into a most attractive woman. She was fully budded now, with high breasts, a slim waist, and rounded hips leading into long sleek legs. He understood the fire in her eyes, felt it himself as he looked at the dead warrior.

“It is our land. He was my brother!” Anhinga whispered passionately, her fist clenched. “Why do they come here?”

“For the stone,” he answered simply. “Stealing it is far more exciting … and a great deal cheaper than dealing with us.”

Bowfin made a gurgling sound. As the dead man’s gut hissed, clots of black blood, white pus, and intestinal juice leaked out. Anhinga clamped her nose with her fingers. Jaguar Hide could see the crystal shine of tears as they crept past her eyelids. The shaking of her shoulders betrayed her an instant before the first sobs broke her lips.