He glanced down at the dog. “Which means, if you really are a demon dog, I won’t put up with any wickedness on your part.”
The dog watched him, ears up, head slightly cocked.
“So, how did you get to that village back there?” He watched the trees break to expose another farmstead. It consisted of three bark-sided, round-roofed houses in a cultivated clearing on the high bank. This settlement, too, seemed to huddle beneath a haze of blue smoke, its people inside to avoid the cold and wet.
“You don’t look like a wild dog. And if you’d been from any of the surrounding villages, someone would have noticed you. You don’t see many dogs around with your colors. Most are some combination of brown and white. Black is rare.”
He tossed another piece of jerky to the dog.
“Which brings us back to a name.” He ran a series of them past his souls. He-Who-Escapes-Underwater? No. It would get shortened to Under. Besides who ever named a dog Underwater? People would think he was a fish. Escaper? Maybe. Rotted Lucky? Now there was a fitting name. But for the dog’s rotted luck, he’d have been sucked under and drowned. No, he’d known too many Traders’ dogs called Lucky. And looking at the soggy and cold cur, he sure hadn’t been living up to any kind of luck recently.
“Swimmer.” It just seemed to pop out of his head. “Yes, you were sure a swimmer. Even if you were almost at the end of your string, you got away from those two superstitious farmers. Now, me, I’d bet when you jumped in the river, one of those little whirlpools that form around the bank sucked you under. Just like that last moment before I fished you out.”
Swimmer was listening closely, ears pricked.
“Who knows, maybe you even pulled that raft of driftwood loose from the bank somewhere while trying to get out.” He emphasized it with the paddle. Swimmer flinched. “As long as you didn’t get too cold, that raft would have put you ashore sooner or later. I’ve known Traders who capsized their canoes who just hung onto the gunwales until the current dropped them close to shore.”
He gestured toward the towering trees crowding the riverbank. The river here was little more than a long bow shot across. “The channel is relatively narrow. It doesn’t seem like it, but wait until you get downriver. At times all you can see is water. Now, down there in the south, getting cast loose in the current becomes a bit more dicey. Why, I wouldn’t doubt but that this old Father Water might sweep you right out into the gulf.”
He grinned down. “Am I talking too much?”
Swimmer didn’t answer, his brown eyes pools of worry.
“I suppose I am.” Trader sighed. “I haven’t had anyone to talk to for a long time. Well, but for the Trade. The point I’m making is that there’s no one to talk to while I’m on the river. There’s myself, of course, but somehow I always win the arguments. Oh, I know. I could have done something about it. Fact is, I had a dog once for almost three moons.” He shook his head. “There was just something about Rascal. I’d swear he had stone for a brain. Some dogs just don’t learn. Have you noticed that?”
Apparently Swimmer hadn’t, because his expression didn’t change.
“Village dogs got him and tore him up down at Winter Town on the lower river. I warned old Rascal, told him not to leave the canoe.” Trader made a throwing-away motion with one hand. “Never could break him of the habit of chewing on the packs, either.”
Trader glanced up at the graying skies. “Well, night is coming. What do you say that we put in? We’ll make us a camp with a fire and cook up something. I’ve got corn cakes dry in a pack somewhere. Then we’ll see if you’re still around in the morning.”
Swimmer’s tail slapped the wet hull twice.
“And if you try to witch me, or do any demon things, you’ll get the sharp edge of my club.”
Swimmer dropped his nose onto his paws.
“Demon dog,” Trader muttered. “Just my luck.”
Eight
Smoke Shield closed his eyes as Thin Branch applied the last dabs of brilliant red color. Smoke Shield enjoyed the soothing sensations of Thin Branch’s fingers carefully smoothing the paint over his forehead. He took a deep breath, letting the tension seep from his tight muscles, and tried to ignore the ramifications of the coming Council.
“Feel better?” Thin Branch asked in his accented tongue. He was Koasati by birth. As a child he had been captured in a retaliatory raid down on the Albaamaha River. Smoke Shield had passed but eight winters when Uncle Flying Hawk presented Thin Branch to him as a gift. They had been together since.