People of the Sea(53)

Warmth built in Oxbalm’s bony old chest. On holy days, the world always seemed brighter, more beautiful.

“Look at all the people,” Sumac said. Her eyes gleamed as she gazed out across the plaza.

“Yes, this is the biggest Dance we’ve ever had.”

Villagers from nearby settlements had been arriving all day, forming a noisy throng in the plaza. They milled around, or sat down when they could find a dry space beneath the towering fir trees. The light of the moon shone weakly through the fog, but it illuminated the joy on people’s faces. A mixture of great hope and great fear animated the low voices.

“I pray that Sunchaser gets here before the Dance is over,” Oxbalm said. “I overheard one of the women from Robinwing Village say that she and her family had walked for four days straight to be at this Dance. They expected Sunchaser to greet them when they entered the village. Like he used to. Do you remember? When he first started the Dance? Those were great days, indeed.”

“Of course I remember,” Sumac replied. Her ears and nose glowed red in the bitter cold. Her withered lips had shrunk



over her toothless gums, and she spoke as though her cold mouth wouldn’t work quite right. “It’s those memories that have made me start wondering about Sunchaser.”

“What do you mean?” Sumac’s brow furrowed. “Sunchaser used to feel it when something was wrong. Remember? He used to show up out of nowhere to offer his help because he’d had a Dream that someone in the village needed him.”

“Yes,” Oxbalm sighed. “I do remember. Like the time Berryleaf canoed too far out to sea and got lost. Sunchaser came down from the high mountains to tell us that Berryleaf had called to him for help in a Dream.”

“Yes, he did. Sunchaser sat right out there on the beach and Dreamed the dolphins and whales in so he could ask them to go find Berryleaf and lead him home. Remember? Berryleaf returned the next afternoon. He came canoeing in amidst a school of cackling dolphins!”

“His wife and children were so happy.” Oxbalm laughed, remembering.

Sumac stared unblinking toward Mother Ocean. In the moonlit mist, the Mother’s dark face glimmered. “I wonder why Sunchaser didn’t Dream about the mammoths running into the sea. Has he lost the ability to Dream? Is that why he no longer comes to the Dances? He’s afraid to?”

Oxbalm tucked the hide more securely beneath his chin. “I don’t think it’s fear of the Dance, or of us. He knows, as we all do, that we must Dance to send prayers to Mammoth Above, asking her forgiveness for our greed, begging her to stop taking her children from the world. These latest drownings must have been guided by Mammoth Above. She’s still punishing us for over hunting her children. We must Dance to appease her wrath, before all the mammoths are gone. Sunchaser would be here if he could come. He probably has felt the “wrongness. But he’s been Healing in the mountain villages. That’s all.”

Unconsciously, his eyes strayed to the beach, where thirty four mammoth skeletons lay, keeping silent watch on the



proceedings. The whitened bones appeared and disappeared as the mist swirled.

Sumac’s fingers dug into his palm suddenly. “Look!”

Sounds of flute music eddied through the fog, the notes clear and pure, like the sweet chirps of chickadees on spring mornings.

A sharp yip.

The crowd hushed and turned.

At the edge of the forest, Humpbacked Woman stood. She stamped forward slowly, one step at a time, the trunk on her mask swaying from side to side, while she grunted in the deep, breathy way of Mammoth. A lane opened for her through the crowd. She dipped her head toward the children in the lane, looking hard at each one for a moment before continuing on. Giggles and a few horrified cries rent the air. One little girl shrieked and scrambled to hide behind her mother’s legs as Humpbacked Woman neared.

Oxbalm smiled. Humpbacked Woman wore a fragment of mammoth hide drawn over a hoop on her back and adorned with white circlets of mammoth ivory. His people believed that inside of the hump there were billowing black rain clouds and all manner of seeds—the seeds of the plants that had first grown across this land when Wolfdreamer brought the People up through the World Navel. Humpbacked Woman’s Dance sowed restlessness and the yearning for harmony in the human soul, just as rain sowed seeds. She stamped into the center of the plaza, and the clear notes of the flutes gave way to the deep, rhythmic beat of a single pot drum. Finally the music of bird-bone whistles, split-stick clappers and turtle-shell and deer-hoof rattles joined in.

Oxbalm exhaled, and his breath formed a white cloud before him. He watched it twinkle in the firelight until it melted into the body of fog. Soon the other Dancers would rise and begin Singing the mammoths back into the world. Over the next four nights, the entire village would participate, begging Above-Old-Man to guide the people, to help them