People of the Wolf(101)

Black one goes . . . aye, he's dead.

He who loves is lost and gone.

Render of the fair heart's song.

Woman weep, for not you know.

Lose forever—or live in snow!''

"That's it," he whispered, rocking her gently back and forth in his arms. "Follow the Dream through." "You, boy," she whispered.

"You. Born of Father Sun. Laid in the light next to night. Choose, my people. Dance the Father you don't know. South, ever south we go . . . Find an end to the blowing snow.''

She blinked spastically.

' 'Death in the high plains.

Others come.

Our old path they follow from.

Shelters they dig in the ground.

Made like holes in the round.

Farther . . . farther south they go.

Shelters.

Rock piled high. Raise the infants to the god in the sky.

Earth, hey Earth, from it spread.

Raise the underworld of the dead.

' 'Flight of the bird, so big, so loud. Calls the lightning from the cloud. "

"What's she talking about?" Broken Branch asked. Wolf Dreamer shook his head. "I don't—"

' 'Monster creatures on bellies crawl. Bite a man's foot. Watch him fall. Legless, armless, hair of scale. Shakes a rattle on his tail. Teeth of poison, hollow flail, Makes blood black and frail. "

Wolf Dreamer closed his eyes, her hand bound in his.

"East, aye, east. Then south the trail.

Born of ice . . . the mother's womb. Oh, black brother, there lies your doom. Taken by sea, their father came, Born of Sun, of Sun the same. One must live and one must die. See the souls rise to the sky.

"The sky? Aye, always the sky.

Blazing hot, and white the land,

Scorched by burning brand.

Dream the big beasts to the stars, away.

Their corpses bleach on dusty clay.

Change the land the People tread.

Find a new way ... or we'll all be dead.

Learn the grass, the root, the berry.

Time is short, life not merry.

Pound and grind, grind and pound,

While the hot wind blows around.''

"How do we know," Broken Branch muttered hoarsely, "what she means?"

"Who . . . who called?" Heron's head twisted. "A voice out of time . . . Under it all, lies old pain. "

"It's me, you old hag," Broken Branch said in a strained voice.

' 'Hush!'' Wolf Dreamer ordered in terror. Broken Branch's hand flew to her quivering mouth. Wolf Dreamer pulled Heron close, whispering in her ear, "Hold the Dream. Don't let go of it!"

"Broken Branch," Heron muttered, shaking her head violently. "Death to the west! Bear Hunter? Bear Hunter! Come back to ... to . . ."

She stiffened, gasping, mouth open, eyes wide. "Back to . . . the Dream. Gone . . . with Bear Hunter. Gone . . . "

She stiffened, tongue protruding, images of horror reflected in her eyes. "Can't. . . love ..."

The old woman went limp in his arms.

Stunned, he waited, rubbing his thumb across the back of her hand. "Heron? Dream. Follow it through!"

Her eyes emptied in the flickers of the fire. No expression changed her slack face.

"No . . ." he whispered in agony, shaking her gently. "No, don't leave me."

Broken Branch wailed, "She's gone! No, I didn't know what I was doing!"

"It wasn't you, Grandmother," he comforted. "It was Bear Hunter that killed her."

Broken Branch swallowed. "No, can't be. Dead. The man's been dead for years . . . years."

"She loved him." He fought the growing pit of cold expanding in his stomach. "She told me once. Can't Dream . . . and love."

The pain caught him unawares, wrapping around him, stinging his eyes, burning his heart. He barely heard himself start sobbing in anguish.





Chapter 41



Back bowed to the blowing snow, she walked. Her heart thudded hollowly against her rib cage.

She turned, looking back at the blowing gray-white swirls of snow. The high point where she'd laid Talon's lifeless body was wrapped in haze. Wind Woman, in a mirroring of her soul, picked that moment to whip the ground blizzard into a frenzy, blasting her with stinging snow and gravel.

Dancing Fox flinched from the gale, turning her steps again to the trail left by Singing Wolf and One Who Cries, seeing their marks, rocks piled atop one another. Step by miserable step, she walked, Wind Woman's harsh breath flapping her pack about on her back, sawing the tump line viciously into her forehead.

A deep emptiness loomed in her soul; another piece of her life lay frozen behind her, obscured by the endless spirals of snow. Spirals, like the rest of her life. An endless line going nowhere, a way of marking the turns of a circle. Always she returned to the place she'd begun, her soul naked and alone.

Jaw muscles clamped, a crying knot of hunger in her stomach, she walked, step after step, placing her feet just so on the rocks, using a three-point stance to cross sections where the snow made footing treacherous.