People of the River(3)

"Did you hurt yourself?" she asked, taking his arm to scrutinize the wound. Seeing that the blood had clotted, she released her hold.

"Your legs are too long," he commented by way of ansv/er. "And I wish you'd act like a girl."

Lichen cocked her head. "What does a girl act like?"

"How should I know?" Flycatcher was always testy when he was scared.

Lichen shrugged and took him by the hand, confidently leading him toward the oaks beneath the spire. The trail split, one path leading up over the bluff top and across the overhang, the other angling down through the trees and onto the ledge where Wanderer's house sat, tucked into the hollow in the cliff face.

The rain had increased from a few pleasant drops to a blinding wall of water. They had to step carefully over the slick limestone as they made their way to the copse of oak.

It's Lichen. I've brought Flycatcher with me. Are you here?" Wanderer had built his house in the dry, scooped-out area beneath the overhang so that he had needed to cut logs for only two sides. He had covered the upright poles with a thick mat of tan clay, which kept the house invisible unless one knew where to look. A tiny doorway and one window graced the front. Lichen pushed through the branches and trotted for the dry ground, glancing briefly at the brier of chokecherry bushes that fringed the rim of the ledge. Flycatcher scampered at her heels, looking like a frightened rabbit that had just escaped a flooded burrow. Wet straggles of black hair framed his face.

"Where is he?" Flycatcher whispered. "Is he here?" "I don't think so." Lichen peered through the low doorway. Wanderer's house always smelled odd. The scent of cedar smoke, rich earth, and Spirit potions hung in the air. The room was a small, irregular rectangle, twenty hands by about fifteen. Because Wanderer had plastered the inside with white clay, it seemed to glow even in the dim light of the cloudy day. Covering the walls were power symbols: green squares and red spirals, black crescent moons, and purple starbursts. The old man's woven rabbit-fur blankets lay in a tumbled heap in the northern comer. All along the back wall, brightly colored baskets of coughgrass root, dried cactus blossoms, fish scales, snake heads, and other things that Lichen couldn't remember made bulges in the shadows—but Wanderer was gone.

Lichen sighed in disappointment and slumped down on the cattail mat that lay before the door. "Oh, Great Mouse, what am I going to do now? I need to talk to Wanderer."

Flycatcher eased down beside her, his brown eyes wide and wary. He propped his elbows on his drawn-up knees, and Lichen could see that blood still oozed from the scrape on his right arm. She decided not to say anything about it because she didn't want to embarrass him. Rycatcher got teased enough by his friends over his height and his awkwardness. They sat in silence, watching the waving curtains of rain that moved over the river in the distance. Flashes of lightning darted at the bluffs as Thunderbird took the storm west. The chill in the air bit at Lichen's face and hands.

"What's that strange smell?" Flycatcher asked finally, his nostrils flaring as he scented the air.

"Wanderer probably made another potion for his aching joints. He tries new ones all the time. Nothing seems to help, though. I think he's just getting old."

"How old is he?"

"I don't know. Maybe fifty summers."

Flycatcher nervously picked at a loose thread on his breechclout. "What's he like?"

"He's a good man. He loves everything. And he's smart. I helped him fix a robin's broken leg last spring. We tied twigs around it to keep it straight. Then Wanderer built a cage and caught worms and insects for the robin to eat."

''He fixed its leg instead of eating it? He doesn't sound very smart to me," Flycatcher grumped. "Roasted robin tastes great." He sniffed the air again, obviously unimpressed with this place and Lichen's reasons for being here. "So what was this Dream you had that you have to talk to Wanderer about? Why couldn't you just tell your mother? She's the Keeper of the Stone Wolf. She's supposed to understand Spirit things."

"She does," Lichen affirmed, but she laced and unlaced her fingers uncomfortably. Her mother didn't have Wanderer's knowledge of other places and people, or his Power. But Lichen couldn't explain that to Flycatcher, because he would think she meant something bad about her mother, and she didn't, not really. Her mother had actually studied with Wanderer for a while, so she had to know some important things about Dreaming. "But I've missed talking to Wanderer, Flycatcher. He's my friend. I haven't been here in about three moons, and I—"

Scratching sounded on the rock ledge above their heads as a flock of cawing ravens swooped out of the clouds and dove for the cliff face. Flycatcher grabbed Lichen's arm in a death grip. The birds pulled up just before the shelter and floated on the air currents, clucking to each other as they eyed the two children.