People of the River(50)

"Odd?"

"Yes. I don't know how to explain it, but I've been having Dreams." He paused. "Strange. I see huge creatures Dancing around two cradle boards. The creatures are wearing brightly colored animal masks, coyotes, wolves, ravens . . . but the beings have no arms or legs. I don't know what to think about that."

"Have you told Green Ash about the Dreams?"

"I don't want to frighten her any more than she already is."

Locust frowned. Memories tugged: something Badgertail had told her he had seen in the Forbidden Lands when he'd gone to steal Nightshade. What had it been? "What does Checkerberry think about the baby? She's seen dozens bom. Is she worried?"

Primrose settled himself into an easier position on their wom hides. "Checkerberry hasn't been 'right' since she saw Nightshade."

"What do you mean, not 'right'? Do you mean she's angry, ill, what?"

"I'm not sure. Checkerberry ran like a hunted mouse at the sight of Nightshade. I think the shock—she hid in her house and refused to come out for an entire day."

Locust had heard the old stories told time and again, when the tales of the clan were being chanted around the winter fires. Stories of how Checkerberry's family had died during that first cycle when she had cared for Nightshade. "Do you mean she's afraid that Nightshade will witch her again? To hurt the Blue Blanket Clan?"

"Yes. That very fear seems to have unhinged her mind. She sits for hands of time just staring at nothing while she mumbles about terrible things happening in the future: famine, floods, and war. I don't know what to think. Green Ash is terrified."

"I don't blame her," Locust said. "Given what's happened this past cycle, Checkerberry's predictions aren't too outlandish."

Prinu-ose toyed with a lock of Locust's hair, but she saw that anxiety had etched crow's feet at the comers of his eyes. "Locust?" he said timidly. "I heard a rumor this morning. It frightened me."

"What was it?"

Primrose sank down beside her and snugged his forehead into the crook of her neck. He hesitated, as though not wanting to tell her, afraid of her response. Locust waited, picking tawny sheddings of deer fur from the soft mass of Primrose's hair. In the moonlight that streamed through the gap in the wall, the fiir shone silver. Their hides had grown old and brittle, but new ones were scarce. Three times a cycle, traders shipped canoe loads of pelts in from the western plains, where elk and buffalo still roamed in vast herds. These days, no one but the elite could afford such luxuries.

"Promise you won't get angry?" Prinu-ose asked. "This is only your second night home, and I couldn't bear any harshness from you. Please?"

"Primrose, tell me. I'm too tired to be angry. What is it?"

"I was coming back from the squash fields with Green Ash, and two warriors were lounging around the palisades. They were talking about Badgertail."

He raised his eyes to her face, checking to see if she had adopted the characteristic defensive squint that boded ill for all concerned. Locust diligently kept her expression blank, but a hot tide of alarm warmed her chest. What had these warriors said?

"And?" she prompted.

"They whispered that Badgertail had lost his nerve. One of them said he'd seen Badgertail weeping and scoffed that maybe Cahokia needed a new war leader."

Locust fought to keep her breathing even, but rage seared her veins in a fiery wash. "Did he?"

She saw again the look on Badgertail's face when he had first gazed upon Bobcat's bloody corpse, and the tears that came to his eyes pierced her heart like an obsidian-tipped lance. She threw off her hides and rose to climb down the ladder. When her feet touched the cold dirt floor, she shivered.

Primrose hurriedly followed her down. He stood in the tarnished light streaming through the window, his muscles bulging out in hard swells. Their house spread in a rectangle around them, fifteen hands by ten. Everything occupied its rightful place, arranged with care by Primrose's loving hands. Four rows of colored baskets hung on the long south wall, each ordered according to size and shape: round on top, then square, oval, and the curiously formless on the bottom. Along the northern wall, two shelves held their cooking pots and spice storage jars. Primrose must have replenished their supplies while she was gone. The savory ghosts of dried spiderwort and lavender hyssop mixed fragrantly with fresh mint.

As Primrose folded his arms protectively across his naked breast, his sad eyes glinted with a silver-silk flash of moonlight. "Locust, please, I didn't want to upset you. I just thought you ought to know what's being—"

"Of course I ought to know what's being said behind Badgertail's back! Who were the warriors? What were their names?"