People of the Raven(10)

What did a blind boy see? The thought sent a chill through White Stone. “And what did he do with them?”

“He put them into stones, War Chief.”





Evening Star shoved a dripping spruce bough out of the way and continued, half running, half stumbling, down the foggy mountain trail. The tortured terrain here consisted of long ridges thick with timber, steep slopes, and rushing white streams that carved deep ravines. In places, sandstone, shale, and limestone lay canted; in others, lava flows and volcanic mud had flattened the land. Covering it all, the riotous tangle of ferns, vines, brambles, lodgepole pine, fir, and spruce made travel perilous as she picked her way westward toward the sea.

She hadn’t slept in three days. Tired, cold, and wet, she plodded on. The small pack holding her matron’s dress and few remaining belongings swayed on her back. Her bruised and cut feet felt as heavy as the stones that abused them. Tangles filled her long red hair, and her finely sculpted face was blotched with mud and scratches. When she stared into pools, haggard blue eyes reflected the nightmares that filled every waking moment. The real horror didn’t start until she fell into fitful sleep.

She stopped, bracing a hand against the smooth bark of an alder. Overhead, squirrels chattered. The winter forest seemed to wait, anticipating her next move.

As did she.

She laughed bitterly, and massaged her aching breasts. Her moon was coming. Thankfully Ecan and Kenada hadn’t planted a child inside her.

She stared around at the somber forest. A larch, red-brown in winter drab, mocked her.

The Raven People would almost certainly refuse her sanctuary. Worse, Ecan’s warriors were on her trail. But there was one hope, one woman who might make the difference.

A stick cracked.

She spun around to look.

There’s no one there. Just keep running.

The heady confidence she’d felt after her escape had drained away like water through a cracked shell cup.

Run. Run.

As though to spur her onward, Ecan’s eyes watched from her memory. No lines marked his lean, pointed face. He might have been North Wind, but his hair was straight and obsidian black, like that of the Raven People.

His low laugh echoed in her heart—so vivid he might actually have been standing in the spinning mist, behind her. A chill ate into her like a badger into a carcass.

She forced herself to run harder.

As she entered a forested section of the trail, the odor of smoke came to her. Giant spruces rose around her like black spears. The barest of breezes stirred the massive branches. She stopped and braced her trembling legs.

They will probably kill me the moment I step into their village, but what other choice do I have? If I can’t find sanctuary, Ecan will kill me.

Wind Woman gusted up the slope, and with her came the sound of voices. The Raven People’s language had a breathy, lilting quality.

Evening Star clenched her fists to bolster her courage. The idea of going to Dzoo, the strange Raven People Healer, had come to her two moons ago, just after Ecan took her captive. He’d claimed her as his slave while the fires of her burning village raged around them. He had stripped her, forced her to the ground, and taken her there, amidst the wreckage of her dreams. Then she was prodded, kicked, and dragged back to Fire village, shoved into a small lodge, and left to relive the memories.

One guard had watched her during the day, another at night. They followed her everywhere. She couldn’t even walk into the forest to relieve herself without a leering audience. When she wasn’t “entertaining” Kenada, she spent her days hauling firewood, weaving sea-grass capes, and carrying Ecan’s, Cimmis’s and Kenada’s waste out to the midden in the forest.

For a while, she had believed Ecan when he claimed he was part god. Then one day she had been carrying out his waste. She’d looked down into the wooden bowl before splashing it onto the other trash below the palisade; his feces had looked no different from those of a slave. He was a man. Nothing more.

It had taken another moon to lull her guards into believing she’d accepted her fate. One night, after he’d finished with her, Kenada had dozed off. In that moment of vulnerability, she’d eased the obsidian knife from his belt and begun hacking at his throat. Naked, covered with his blood, she had dressed. Casting around for her few belongings, she had rolled her beautiful dress and stuffed a few supplies into her small pack before slipping out into the night.

Now, trembling, she eased around a bend in the trail and stared at the village she could see through gaps in the trees. Breakfast fires winked and sent blue smoke toward the morning sky. Dark shapes passed in front of them: moving humans who might, within a hand of time, be smiling over her dead body.