Old White nodded, thinking about the times he’d dealt with Power, how it had affected his relationships with the women it haunted.
Trader glanced out at the river, the water silvered with the dawn. “What about when we arrive at Split Sky City? Have you given that thought as well?”
“We land, act like Traders, and see what the situation is.” He smiled. “I must confess, the noise wasn’t the only reason I didn’t sleep last night.”
“Me either.” He flinched. “Well, I mean until Two Petals showed up.” He shook his head. “Setting foot in Split Sky City is going to be the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I was lost in that, all knotted up.” He glanced again at Two Petals. “You think that’s why she came to me?”
“Perhaps. Contrary ways have their own logic. She knows things we don’t.” He paused. “Thinking about turning back, were you?”
“The notion of going down to Bottle Town and spending this spring with the Pensacola has a certain appeal.” He hesitated. “Like staying as far away from the Sky Hand as possible.”
“And never having to face ourselves,” Old White agreed. “But that’s what Power is insisting on.”
“Why?” Trader asked the familiar old question.
“We’ll find out when we reach home.” His lips curled evilly. “Assuming anyone but me has the energy left to paddle a canoe against the current.”
Smoke Shield stared at the map he’d drawn on the palace great room floor. He had pulled back all the mats, then used a pointed stick to draw in the rivers. Each Chahta town was represented by a bowl, cup, or jar.
Flying Hawk perched on his cougar-hide stool, staring down thoughtfully. The firelight cast a golden glow across the floor, and dark shadows wavered behind the bowls. He looked up thoughtfully at the carving that hung on the wall across from him, of a warrior bearing a head. It had been taken from the Yuchi years before he was born and incorporated into the legends of his people. The story his people had started to tell was that in the beginning times, Morning Star had killed his own father and finally carried the head up to the stars where it now rested, a constellation.
But the Yuchi, from whom we obtained it, don’t believe a word of it. So how many other stories that people now believed had been born just that way, adopted as an explanation? Just like Smoke Shield’s imaginary Chahta raid?
What surprised him was that the Council had swallowed the whole thing. All but Blood Skull, Pale Cat, and Night Star, who had just listened, skepticism easy to read on their faces. Not that that surprised him; if he or Smoke Shield claimed the sun rose in the east, they would insist on believing it was a Chief Clan plot.
And now I am part of it. That knowledge bothered him. Why it should was no mystery: Smoke Shield had plotted it. The man had always had a facile way with the truth, and that it seemed to work for him made Flying Hawk wonder.
Power has always favored him. But perhaps that was part of the problem. All of his life, Flying Hawk, too, had leaned toward the red, the tumultuous and creative side of life. His violent rage had led him to kill his brother. Subduing that passion had taken most of his life.
When he looked at Smoke Shield—still scowling down at his map—he wondered if the man ever would, or even should, for that matter.
“The problem is the number of warriors we must use,” Smoke Shield said absently. “By my best figures, we can take nearly a thousand. With a force that size, moving rapidly, we can overwhelm their eastern villages.”
“But you have to feed them, keep them together.”
“Food is the problem,” Smoke Shield agreed. “Unless we can rope the Albaamaha into a caravan to pack food for us.”
“Too risky. They’ll melt away into the forest unless you have nearly as large a force to guard them.”
Smoke Shield nodded absently. “How did the lords of Cahokia do it?”
“They didn’t have to travel cross-country. They could use the rivers, especially when traveling south. They could load large Trade canoes to carry their provisions. In our country, war must be conducted across ridges, mountains, and valleys. East to west. Warriors can only carry so much on their backs. An army’s movement is curtailed by the food supply each man can carry. If you add an additional slave per warrior, you can extend the range, but only by another couple of days’ travel. The slaves have to eat, too.”
Smoke Shield traced the route of the rivers with his stick. “It would take too long to send canoes down the Black Warrior and then back up the Horned Serpent. The Chahta would have fair warning of our movement.” He shook his head. “No, it’s too easy to ambush canoes on the rivers. Down in the narrows, where travel upriver is slow, they’d be spread out, easy to pick off one by one.”