Saluting with a finger, Mud Stalker said, “Good evening, Elder, and to you, too, Moccasin Leaf. I shall be looking forward to sharing that loaf with you after Mud Puppy’s initiation.” With that he turned and strode off down the ridge, his course set for the Bird’s Head.
“You and he planned this? Did you do this to humiliate me?” Moccasin Leaf was shaking, her face working.
Wing Heart’s tumbling expressions were her only reaction. She should have been angered, should have lashed out at Mud Stalker for intruding on Owl Clan business. But she had done nothing! They had to have planned this whole performance. The silent grief, the vacant looks, they were all an act, a way of laying Moccasin Leaf and Half Thorn low.
“You are a foul woman, Wing Heart. I came here to help you. For the good of the clan.”
“Witch, witch, you’re a witch!” Wing Heart began in a singsong voice, her head nodding in time. “Take a war club, break her head. Leave her body for the Dead. Witch, witch, you’re a witch, throw her body in a ditch.”
Cold fear traced its way down Moccasin Leaf’s back as she stiffened her resolve. “I hope you know what you’re doing. Because tonight you have made an enemy whom you will never vanquish.” She stalked off, stiff-legged, in barely suppressed rage.
Wing Heart watched her go, then flinched as if touched with the whisper of wings in the still air above her. But when the old woman looked up, only the translucent skies of evening extended to infinity.
Nineteen
This was the event that boys most eagerly anticipated and desperately feared. Unlike most, who had time to prepare, the initiation into manhood was being thrust on Mud Puppy at a moment’s notice. He lay on his back on the split-cane matting beside the great fire in the Men’s House.
Normally, he would have been excited to see the interior. Until this moment, it had been forbidden to him. Upon being led within, he had the briefest glance of the colorful masks that hung on the walls, the atlatls, darts, and smooth skulls. The latter, trophies of hard-fought battles, watched him with empty black eyes and grinning brown teeth.
All of the Speakers and lineage heads had come to the Men’s House for his initiation. His only relative, Yellow Spider, sat just to his right, a sober concern in his eyes as Mud Puppy had undergone the ritual lashing with palmetto whips. They beat him to drive the child from his body. Then his smarting skin was splashed with salt water to begin the healing.
After that, he had been ordered to lie down on the floor, his head facing the West—symbolic of the fact that one day he, too, would die. The sharp cane cut into his raw back as the Serpent began the process of tattooing his chest. He closed his eyes against the pain. His jaw ached and knotted, and his teeth hurt as he clamped them against the stinging fire that prickled his chest.
Don’t be afraid. You cannot show fear. They can kill you if they think you are unworthy. He hadn’t wanted to do this. His heart had been thumping like a shrunken drumhead as the Serpent and Mud Stalker led him here. It had taken all of his courage to keep from breaking and running. But for the surprise of the moment, he would have.
Around him the irregular chanting of the men kept time with the clacking of rhythm sticks and thumping of a hide-covered drum. They were all here: the leaders of the clans, prominent men, and lineage leaders. They had dressed in their finery, brightly colored feathers in their hair, faces painted in red, white, blue, yellow, and black. Many had slathered alligator or bear grease on their skin, the mixture containing crushed honeysuckle, redbud, or other flowers to scent their bodies.
The last image before he’d squeezed his eyes closed was of the Serpent bending over him, blotting out the sight of the sootgrimed thatch roof. The copper needle in the old man’s hand had gleamed in the firelight. A smile had split the Serpent’s flat face as he stared affectionately down at Mud Puppy.
Again and again the copper prick was twirled into Mud Puppy’s skin, only to be followed by the old man’s blood-caked fingertips as he dipped them in charcoal and rubbed the black color into the wounds.
Mud Puppy would not receive the intricate pattern of dots his brother had been given. He had achieved no accolades in war or Trade. No one sang of his great deeds during the hunt. Instead, only a line of dots running down from the notch between his collarbones to the end of his breastbone and simple arches over each breast were being tattooed into his skin: the marks of manhood.
“You must make no noise, no sound. You must not show the least sign of fear or pain. If you do, they will beat you with clubs and chase you out of the Men’s House. You will live the rest of your life in shame. If you cry like a baby, they will be forced to kill you to cleanse the shame from inside the Men’s House.” The Serpent’s words echoed in his head. “But you do not worry me, Mud Puppy. This is nothing compared to the terrors of that night on the Bird’s Head. After Dancing with the mushroom and walking hand in hand with the spirits, this will pass like a dream.”