I gaze longingly at the Path of Souls for a time, imagining what that brilliant glittering silence must be like. Like all men, sometimes I yearn for it.
“Come on!” Taya says.
I walk back.
Taya clutches my sleeve as though her life depends upon it. “Let’s go.”
I say, “We must be very quiet.”
“I will.”
This time I think she finally understands.
Ohsinoh stepped from the cold shadows of the boulder, and the night breeze blew his long black hair around his triangular face. He smoothed the locks behind his oversized ears. The Flint warriors he’d been traveling with were long gone, headed home. The only other human sounds in the forest were the soft voices of the two people on the trail ahead of him. He knew Sky Messenger. He’d been watching him, dogging his path, since they were children, though he doubted Sky Messenger had the slightest idea.
They were only thirty paces in front of Ohsinoh. He had to be cautious. His enemies said he had ears like a bat, but Sky Messenger’s hearing was even better. It had been honed by many summers on the war trail when missing a strange sound could have cost him his life.
He glanced around, wondering what had happened to his gahai. Had the deer and the lost souls scared them away?
With the stealth of a big cat, he moved from tree trunk to tree trunk, hiding long enough to listen to the forest. Finally, lights flickered to his right, out in the trees. When he turned to look at them, they sped away, heading straight for Sky Messenger.
He smiled and followed.
Thirty-two
As the two warriors dipped their paddles to steer around the bend in the river, the canoe rocked beneath Koracoo and water slapped the hull, shooting spray over her white hood and cape. She wiped the drops from her face and returned her gaze to the shoreline, searching the maples and red cedars, expecting to see a war party emerge at any instant. Despite the fact that she’d sent a runner ahead with a white arrow, she kept CorpseEye resting across her lap, just in case. She didn’t trust the Flint People to honor the request. In fact, it would not surprise her to find her runner’s body on display, lying gutted on the bank, when she arrived.
Pale pink shards of broken dusk light scattered over the river, twinkling and shifting as Wind Mother touched the branches that overhung the water. Koracoo—no, I am Jigonsaseh now—Jigonsaseh took a few moments to appreciate them before her thoughts returned to the Flint People.
After they started bickering last summer, their alliance dissolved, and the relationship between the Standing Stone and Flint peoples had gone from bad to worse. It had started with war parties clashing on the trails, then a few raids where warriors had attacked people harvesting crops and stolen their food, and finally they’d fallen upon each other like wolves. When the Ruling Council had ordered War Chief Deru and Deputy Sky Messenger to attack a Flint Village, there had been no going back.
The low harsh kak-kak-kak of a gyrfalcon sounded overhead. She looked up. Against the pastel evening sky, the bird’s sleek body resembled an arrow in flight as it plummeted toward the ground. Every other bird in the forest launched itself heavenward, flocking together for protection. The air was suddenly filled with warning chirps and batting wings. When the gyrfalcon disappeared into a copse of oaks, the flocks of smaller birds seemed to calm down. In barely ten heartbeats the sky was empty again, except for three ducks circling over the glassy river ahead.
Deputy Wampa, kneeling in the bow, lifted her nose and scented the air. She wore a slate gray cape painted with brown spirals that blended with the leafless trees and brush. The morning dew had glued her shoulder-length black hair to her cheeks, making her nose seem wider and her lips more narrow. “Matron Jigonsaseh? Do you—?”
“Yes, Deputy. I smell the smoke.” She could also hear the far-off sounds of the village: people chopping wood, dogs barking. Her fist went tight around the smooth wooden shaft of CorpseEye. He was cool in her hand, which made her nervous. CorpseEye always grew warm when there was danger or he was trying to show her something. How could there not be danger ahead?
A short while later, warriors appeared on the right bank and ran along the river trail, paralleling her canoe. They carried nocked bows, but the bows were not aimed at her. Instead, the warriors’ gazes scanned the trees, as though searching for anyone who might wish to do Koracoo and her party harm.
“What do you make of that?” Wampa said.
From the rear of the canoe, Jonsoc replied, “It looks like they’re here to protect us. I’m intrigued. Maybe my relatives won’t have to requicken my soul in another body after all.”