The bodies were never seen again, but often the souls of those Alligator had taken spoke to the Serpents when they entered trances and traveled to the Underworld. That was how people learned of Alligator’s secrets.
As Mud Puppy watched, he noticed minnows flicking along the line of the alligator’s jaw. The little fish were nibbling at the scales, tails wiggling as they appeared, then vanished into the murky water. The sight amazed him. A lesson lay in that. Delicate little fish, dancing back and forth, safe in the presence of the most terrifying of beasts. How could they, of all creatures, pass with immunity?
Because they are small, unnoticed, and unimportant. He considered that as he stared into the impenetrable eye. What was he supposed to learn? How did he use a lesson like that?
“Mud Puppy?” an accented voice called, breaking his concentration.
“Shush!” Mud Puppy carefully lifted his chin high enough to answer. “Stay where you are.”
The alligator seemed not to have heard. No change of expression could be seen in that black slit of an eye. Not a ripple moved in the still water. Alligator remained oblivious, the little fish playing around his head. Was he Dreaming? Floating and Dreaming, seeing things of Power and magic and joy?
Mud Puppy himself had lain in the warm water, his body buoyed while sunshine beat down in radiant warmth. For him, too, it had been dreamlike, sharing a oneness with the swamp around him. Sound had been dulled, turned inside of him. The faint beating of his heart, his slow breathing, and the water stroking his skin, had left him in a shallow state of bliss. Was that how Alligator lived, his world muted by the pressing warmth of the water?
“Snakes! That’s the biggest alligator I’ve ever seen! What are you doing? Trying to get killed?” the accented voice cried from somewhere behind Mud Puppy.
“Stay back,” Mud Puppy replied carefully. “Come no closer. We were just talking, he and I.” Reluctantly Mud Puppy gathered himself, inching upward and back. As his silhouette began to emerge over the gunwales, Mud Puppy said, “Go away, Grandfather. I mean you no harm.”
With a flip of his tail, the big alligator eased ahead, a faint V drifting back from his nose and eyes. Water rippled along the protruding scutes in his back.
“I don’t believe it.” The accented voice sounded stunned.
Mud Puppy turned to see Hazel Fire and Two Wolves, the Traders, watching from one of their sturdy canoes. Both had darts nocked in atlatls, ready to cast. Each had a bright expression of wonder in his eyes as their canoe drifted slowly to one side. Mud Puppy looked back in time to see the big alligator drift into a duckweed-filled cove and come to rest, eternally one with the swamp.
“What are you doing out here?” he asked when he looked back. They were still perched, their darts held at the ready.
“We went fishing.” Hazel Fire lowered his atlatl and dart, swallowing hard. “We’ve been out here for hours, just going around in circles. How do you find your way in this mess?” He indicated the endless trees rising from the still water.
“My people just know.” Mud Puppy shrugged and pointed. “That way is home.”
“That alligator”—Two Wolves indicated the great reptile with his darts—“you talked to him? You speak his language?”
“He was Dreaming,” Mud Puppy said. “Seeing between the worlds.” Movement caught his eye as a broad-banded water snake slipped from a tupelo root and swam in gentle undulations to a foam-caked pile of flotsam. There it lay quietly, in wait for whatever might chance by. “He was teaching me things.” Why he said that, he wasn’t sure, but the words might have been a bee sting given the way they jolted the Wolf Traders. Both of the young men looked as if they had been stabbed by an unseen hand.
For a long moment, an uneasy silence passed, and Mud Puppy couldn’t force himself to look at them. In the end, he asked quietly. “Please don’t tell people I said that.”
“We won’t,” Hazel Fire agreed, and a crooked smile crossed his lips. “If you won’t tell anybody we’re lost out here.”
“It is done.” Mud Puppy dipped his paddle and coasted his canoe toward theirs. “To seal our deal, I have something for you.” He reached into his small belt pouch and drew out a red jasper carving he had made, the image of a small potbellied owl with a tilted head. “I just finished this. He’s a friend of mine. I call him Masked Owl.” Mud Puppy reached across and dropped the fetish into Hazel Fire’s open hand.
The Trader lifted the little owl, studying it with a practiced eye. “You are very good at carving, Mud Puppy. Look at this! Such fine detail. What is this around the owl’s eyes?”