Koracoo knelt on the far side of the fire. “Matron Kittle accepts our offer and will prepare a chamber for her granddaughter and her betrothed. Sky Messenger will sleep in the Deer Clan longhouse tonight.”
Sky Messenger’s head dropped, and he closed his eyes. Koracoo couldn’t tell if it was in relief or dread. She extended her icy hands to the warmth of the flames.
“Marriage is a small price, my son.”
“Yes, I know.” He exhaled the words, and when Sky Messenger looked at her, pain shone in his dark eyes.
Koracoo knew about his relationship with Baji last summer when they’d briefly been allied with the Flint People, but she’d assumed their togetherness would be fleeting, a battle-walk romance over as soon as the alliance shifted … and alliances always shifted. Apparently, it had not ended, at least not to her son.
“Will you have a cup of tea, Speaker?” Bahna asked, and reached for one of the clay cups resting by the pot that nestled in the ashes at the edge of the fire.
“Yes, thank you. It’s a wintry day out there.”
Bahna dipped the cup into the pot, and the scent of raspberries wafted up with the steam. He extended it. Koracoo gratefully clutched the cup in her cold fingers. As she sipped the tea the delicious tartness of dried raspberries, lightly accented with mint leaves, coated her tongue. “This is good, Bahna.”
“On days like this, it helps to drink fruity teas. They cleanse the blood and open the heart.” Bahna leaned back on the woven floor mats and gave her a small troubled smile.
Koracoo frowned at the men. “What have you been discussing? Your expressions are dire.”
“Many things,” Bahna said with a deep sigh, “but mostly Sky Messenger’s Dream. One part is very troubling.”
Sky Messenger braced his elbows on his knees and gazed at her across the fire. The flame-light fluttered over his high cheekbones and blunt chin. It pleased her that he’d grown into a handsome man, though she feared for his future. If his Dream was true—and she believed it was—before next summer solstice he would be tested a thousand times. He might also be dead.
Sky Messenger said, “Bahna is concerned about the way my Dream ends.”
Bahna nodded and waved crooked fingers through the firelight. The joint-stiffening disease had turned them into claws. He hadn’t been able to fully open his fist for many summers. “Sky Messenger tells me there is a black hole in his afterlife soul, a place where he fears memories live, but he cannot find them. I believe that’s where the man’s voice comes from. The ghost is calling to him.”
“Why?”
“Because, Speaker, the dead always wish to be buried so that they may travel to the afterlife.”
As images from twelve summers ago appeared behind her eyes, rage filled Koracoo. She unconsciously gripped CorpseEye where he was slipped into her belt, and leaned forward. The gesture must have been threatening, for Bahna pulled away. “This man was evil, Bahna. He hurt many children. Believe me when I tell you that I want his soul to wander the earth alone for eternity. We deliberately mutilated his body and scattered the pieces so that no one would ever be able to recognize him and send his soul to the Land of the Dead. He is a condemned man, and that is what he deserves.” Her voice had gone low.
“Yes,” Bahna said with a tottering nod. “Sky Messenger told me. But you must understand, Speaker, that that is the problem.”
“You mean that’s why Sky Messenger hears his voice at the end of the Dream? The dead man wants someone to collect his bones and Sing his afterlife soul to the Land of the Dead?”
“Of course.”
“This is a soul sickness, then? How do we cure it?”
Bahna frowned at her, then placed another branch on the fire. As sparks crackled and spat, he continued, “The ghosts of those killed by our hands or in our names must be mourned and cared for. The beginning for Sky Messenger is to remember the event that caused his sickness.”
Sky Messenger did not look at Koracoo, but his jaw ground as though he’d rather die than do that. She did not know exactly what had happened to him that long-ago day. No one did. And if that little boy had felt it necessary to bury the memory deep down in the darkness between his souls, was it wise for anyone to dredge it up again?
As though reading the tracks of her souls, Bahna smiled faintly. The wrinkles around his mouth resembled sunlit rings on a dark pond. “Please try to understand, Speaker. Each of us can put ourselves in the place of another, but your son is called upon to do more. He must put himself in the place of many. In the next moons, the Spirits will demand much of him. He will not have the strength to endure unless he stares into the blackness inside him, and releases the man he has caged there.”