The Dawn Country(69)
He let his aching head fall forward. It didn’t matter. Zateri and the Dawnland girls had gotten away. That made seven children Gannajero had lost in just a few days.
Dakion turned to Kotin. “Kotin, we should be far south by now. What if those girls walk into a nearby village and tell them they were held captive by Gannajero? The chief will organize a war party of hundreds to come looking for us. We need to put distance between us and—”
“Didn’t you hear what Waswan said? It’s her decision!” Kotin snarled, and jerked his head toward Gannajero.
Back in the trees, she stood bent over, working on something on the ground. She kept making small grunts, as though it was hard labor. Occasionally she lifted her knife high enough that the white chert blade glinted in the sunlight.
“What’s she doing?” Dakion said. “She won’t let any of us get close. Is she—?”
Ojib interrupted. “I’m more worried about that messenger who came to see her. Why won’t she tell us what he said?”
“Maybe because it’s none of our concern,” Kotin replied. “The message was for her.”
“But how did the man know where she was? He must have followed us from the big warriors’ camp. If so much as a single person there recognized her”—Dakion waved an arm extravagantly—“there could be fifty canoes searching for us this instant!”
Kotin shook his head, but it was so faint Wrass doubted the other warriors noticed. Revealing broken yellow teeth, he said, “If there were, I promise you, she’d know it.”
“You give her too much credit. She’s just an old woman. She has no powers or the children would never have been able to escape. We’d already be far south and safely away …”
His voice faded when Gannajero abruptly stood up. Everyone saw her lift the dead boy’s eyes. They had shriveled and turned opaque. She held one eyeball in each hand and was slowly turning around in a circle, murmuring. When she stopped turning, she let out a sharp gleeful laugh and stared off to the north.
“I don’t like this,” Dakion hissed. “She just does these bizarre things to scare us.”
Gannajero put the eyes back in her belt pouch. Then she bent down, draped something over her left arm, and started toward them. Whatever she carried was long enough to drag on the ground. It slurred wetly over the leaves.
Dakion shook a fist at Kotin. “We have to do something now, before she—”
“Are you the hero, Dakion?” Gannajero asked in a low menacing voice as she emerged from the trees.
“What?”
She walked into the clearing, and Wrass frowned at the thing draped over her arm. Slowly, like poison working through his veins, he realized it was a human skin. Thin and coated with blood, the arms and legs swung as she walked. Revulsion wrenched a small cry of horror from his throat. He scrambled backward, trying to get as far from her as he could.
“I’ll let you be the hero, Dakion,” she said with mock kindness. She’d started to tiptoe forward, like a hunting cat. “You should have asked.”
In less than a heartbeat, Dakion had his war club in his fist. “You’re crazy, old woman!”
“Yes, I am doomed to walk this earth alone forever. I have nothing to lose.” Her toothless mouth widened. “What about you?”
Dakion swallowed hard. “The boy is worthless. Just tell me why we can’t kill him?”
Gannajero’s smile froze on her wrinkled face. Without taking her gaze from him, she said, “She’ll come for him.”
“Who will? What are you talking about? There could be one hundred canoes on the river behind us, chasing us down, and all you can do is blather nonsense? Just let me kill the boy, so he doesn’t slow us—”
“I’ve already told you I’ll let you be the hero. Why are you still so worried about the boy?” She cocked her head in that strange birdlike manner, eyeing him first through one eye, then the other.
Dakion appeared totally confused. He took another grip on his club as though the shaft had grown slick with sweat.
The other warriors backed away. Kotin, in particular, looked terrified.
“The boy”—Gannajero gave Dakion a cruel toothless grin—“is mine. Understand?”
Dakion looked as though he might burst at the seams. He waved his war club threateningly. “What are you going to do with him? Is he a hostage? Why won’t you tell us what the messenger said? What are you hiding?”
An old hatred, something grown fine and sharp over the long summers, flickered in her black eyes. “The messenger said that my brother promises me wealth and power beyond my imaginings. Would you like to share in that?”