Summer Page 18

  “Some do, but their chief, Radan, organizes hunting parties to track them down and kill them. They have some pretty good trackers.” The guy who’d been talking shrugged, “Sometimes they don’t kill them, just make them wish they were dead. Especially the women. The ones they do kill, they hold a ceremony where they eat part of them.”

  “They eat people?!” Pell asked, aghast.

  The guy nodded.

  Suddenly doubtful that this could actually be true, Pell said, “How did you learn this?”

  “My mate and I were slaves there,” he said in a bitterly sad tone.

  “Which one’s…?” Pell stopped, suddenly realizing the man might not want to talk about his mate being a sex slave.

  “Who’s my mate?” the man continued for him. At Pell’s nod, the man shook his head sadly, “They killed her. After that, I felt I had nothing to live for. I ran away by swimming across the river and then walking up along the opposite bank, but I was really lucky. Most people can’t even swim well enough to cross the river down there. But even if you can swim well, there’re big lizards called crocodiles, and sometimes huge fish called sharks at the river mouth. Both of them eat people.” He shook his head, “I was very fortunate to make it across without encountering either one.” He looked into the distance and spoke flatly, “At the time, I thought it was unlucky. I’d wanted to join her in the afterworld.”

  A tremor in her voice, Gia asked the man, “Do you think some of the people from Aganstribe might be slaves of the sea people? People the flood washed out of our cave?”

  The man nodded, “That’s how they get some of their slaves. People who get washed down the river.”

  Horrified, Pell said, “How do they get the rest?”

  “Hanging around other villages and hunting the good-looking women.” He nodded at Gia, “No offense, but they’d go to a great deal of trouble to catch her.”

  Gia turned to Pell, “We’ve got to go now! If some of our people are slaves there…” she shook her head despairingly. “We should’ve come last winter! Or at least as early in the spring as we could travel.”

  Pell turned his face downriver, a distant look in his eyes, “If we go, we’d need to be ready to go to war against them.” He turned to look at the man who’d been answering their questions, “What’s your name?”

  “Zema.”

  “Thank you. How many hunters do they have?”

  Zema said, “They had nine when I was there. There were some boys who’re probably old enough to call themselves hunters by now.”

  Pell turned to Gia, “With just us, fighting against nine or more, we might not win.” He shrugged, “We might be killed.”

  Zema said, “I’ll go with you. I’ve tried to get the villages to make war on them. To free the slaves and tell the sea people they can’t keep doing what they’ve been doing.” He shook his head disgustedly, “But the only ones who care enough to fight are those whose family members are slaves.”

  Behind him, Nolo said, “I’ll go too.”

  Pell turned to look at Yadin, “This isn’t your fight…”

  Yadin interrupted him, “I’ll go with you. I’m old enough to know better than to get into wars. But… this is the first war I’ve ever believed in.”

  Pell glanced at Manute and got a nod back. Pell said, “So, we have five against their nine…”

  Gia leaned toward him and said fiercely, “Six! I can throw spears too you know.”

  “But…” Pell said uncertainly, “wars are fought by men.”

  Gia said, “You’re always saying that men need to learn women’s work and vice versa.”

  Pell barked a laugh, “Yes I am, aren’t I? And now look, it’s come back to chew on my ear.” He shook his head as if mournfully, “I really should be more careful what I say.” He looked around at the other men and saw them staring wide-eyed at him. Well, some of them are staring at Gia, I guess…

  Yadin stood and strode back into the forest. Pell called after him, “Yadin, is something wrong?”

  Yadin lifted the axe he had in his hand, “If we’re going to do this, we need new spear shafts.”

  Woday came up, “I heard what you’re doing.” He sighed, “It’s about time someone did something about the sea people. I’m not much of a fighter, but I’ll come along and do what I can.”

  “Maybe you and your fish trap can keep us in food?”

  They spent the rest of the afternoon straightening spear shafts and reattaching the flint points they’d salvaged on the trail. Yadin’d cut enough heavy traditional spear shafts so everybody could have one and he’d cut a lot of the slender shafts for the throwing sticks. When Pell saw the huge bundle he’d brought back, he feared Yadin’d expected him to succeed in recruiting a lot of men for their war band. “We don’t have enough flint points for all of those,” Pell said.

  Yadin said, “I brought points for trade. If there aren’t enough, we’ll just have to fire harden some of them.”

  Pell made spear throwing sticks for Nolo and Zema. He didn’t try to make any stone throwing sticks for them since the stone throwers were much more difficult to carve and learn to use. Besides, they didn’t have Deltin there to carve them.

  It turned out that one of the reasons Yadin had cut so many of the slender spear shafts was so that everyone, especially the new people, could practice with the extras. After throwing a few, Nolo said, “This is really hard! Watching you guys kill that aurochs, I thought it’d be easy.”

  Yadin was teaching them since he had a real knack for instruction. He said in a reassuring tone, “You’re doing well. You just need practice.”

  “But it’s getting dark and we’re leaving in the morning.”

  Yadin grinned at him, “Practicing while you’re hiking’s easy. You throw at a target ahead of you on the trail. Then you just keep walking until you get to your spear. Pick it up and throw it again. You don’t even have to carry it back to the throwing line like you’ve been doing here.”

  ***

  After a restless night, Woday fed them with what his basket had trapped in the river overnight and they set out.

  At first everyone was somber, feeling daunted by the task they’d set themselves. But then Nolo handed off his pack to Zema, keeping his throwing stick and his two practice spears. He went to the front of their group, took a stutter step, and threw a practice spear.

  Yadin said, “No, no, you misunderstood my instructions.” As soon as Nolo turned to look at him inquiringly, Yadin continued, “I said to throw it at a target on the trail ahead, not out into the woods where you’d have to search for it.

  Nolo kept a puzzled expression for a heartbeat, then realized that Yadin was mocking his accuracy. He grinned, “I’m sorry, I’m sure I’d already be hitting what I was aiming at… if only I’d had a good teacher.”

  They all broke out in laughter.

  Their spirits lightened, they continued hiking. Everyone took turns at the front throwing practice spears. Each person was required to announce their target so they could be roundly criticized for missing it. When Yadin took his turn, there was a moment of silence as they all waited to see how the old master would do. He picked a cluster of flowers the size of someone’s head and the spear flew through what would have been the person’s right ear. “What, no cocky comments?” he said.

  Manute shook his head and spoke as if disappointed, “If that cluster of flowers was supposed to be one of the sea people’s hearts, you’d only have speared his lung. The sea people are supposed to be so fierce he’d probably have just kept fighting with a spear through his chest.”

  That got a laugh, then it was Pell’s turn. Nolo and Zema had no idea what to expect from the big young man. Despite his size, he looked younger than everyone else. Yet, the others seemed surprisingly deferential to him. Nolo’d seen him throw a spear at the aurochs, but didn’t know how close he’d come to his mark since Nolo hadn’t known which of the three spears in each flight came from Pell. He did know Pell was incredib
ly accurate when throwing stones with the stick; after all, he’d hit the lion’s open mouth and Indo’s head.

  Pell went to throw without announcing his target, but Manute called him on it.

  Pell said, “There aren’t any good targets I can call. Nothing that stands out well enough that you’d know what I was talking about.”

  Manute said, “That rotten stump, it’s yellow.”

  Pell turned to look at him unbelievingly, “That’s got to be sixty or 70 feet!”

  Manute grinned, “We can’t ask our enemies to come stand thirty or 40 feet away for you, you know.”

  Pell shrugged, turned and cast his spear. It plunged into the middle of the stump and stood quivering.

  Manute shook his head in disbelieving wonder, “I guess that’s enough practice for you.”

  Since Pell was last, Nolo started up to the front to practice some more himself. But Gia put a hand out and stopped him, “It’s not your second turn yet.”

  Gia threw three spears, announcing her targets like the men had and striking with good accuracy, at most a little more than a foot from the center of the target. As Nolo went up to the front for his turn, he thought, I’m about to be embarrassed. She throws far better than I do.”

  ***

  When Nolo thought they were about to get to the village of the lower river people, they startled a young boy coming over a little high spot in the trail. He turned and ran the other way, shouting, “Strangers, strangers!”

  They took their time, and by the time they arrived at the village proper they were met by a small group of men leaning on their spears. Nolo said, “Hello, I’m Nolo, of the…”

  But then one of greeting party threw down his spear and ran to throw his arms around Pell. Bouncing up and down, he danced around, turning Pell with him and shouting back over his shoulder at the people from his village, “It’s the Bonesetter. It’s the Bonesetter.”

  Looking embarrassed, Pell asked, “Hello Jomay, how’s your arm working?”

  Nolo stared. At River Falls they’d heard of a wise bonesetter far to the east. In fact, Woday’d gone to apprentice himself with the man, but hadn’t said anything about the bonesetter since he’d returned. Nolo’d thought Woday must not have been able to find the man, or perhaps had been disappointed by how little the man could teach him. Or, perhaps the man just wouldn’t take Woday as an apprentice. He glanced at Yadin, Yadin certainly appeared old and wise enough to be a master bonesetter, but if so, why was the young man from the lower river village dancing around Pell?

  By this point the young man was holding out his arm, bending and straightening the elbow. Nolo could see that the elbow was a little thick. It didn’t go entirely straight, or bend quite as far as Nolo thought it should. Had he gone to the bonesetter for this problem and the bonesetter hadn’t been able to do anything for him? But, if so, why was he so excited?

  Another man trotted out from the village, excitedly calling out, “Pell! Yadin, Gia, Manute, Woday!”

  They were welcomed into the village like visiting chieftains.

  As they walked in, Nolo noticed that several of the men in the village had throwing sticks in their belts! How did they know about the sticks?

  Then Gia shouted, “Hargis!” She and Manute started running into the village, grabbing a man there and hugging him too.

  Nolo learned that Hargis was originally from Aganstribe, the same tribe Gia and Manute came from. He’d been washed down the river in the big storm like Canna had been and was just as excited to see them.

  Nolo had been expecting to tell the lower river people about their guests and astound them with details about what amazing hunters they were. Instead, it seemed that the lower river people knew more about their guests than he did.

  It turned out that, whether or not Nolo thought he was old enough to have become renowned, Pell was indeed the legendary Bonesetter of the east.

  If that wasn’t impressive enough, Nolo learned that he was not only by far the best with the throwing sticks, he’d actually invented them.

  Apparently, he was also the one who’d come up with the idea of smoking meat. Nolo had tasted some of the aurochs that’d been smoked. He wasn’t sure it would last without spoiling like they claimed, but he liked the way it tasted. Sandro, the man who’d so enthusiastically welcomed the Cold Springs people into the village, gave Nolo and Zema small pieces of smoked meat. He claimed the little strips of meat were hands of days old. They were tough to chew, but still flavorful and good to eat. If they’re really a moon or so old… Nolo thought, we might not get so hungry this winter.

  Hargis and Sandro volunteered to go with them to challenge the sea people. Actually, so did Jomay, but everybody thought he was too young. Besides, his elbow wasn’t really back to normal yet. After he understood what’d happened to it, Nolo concluded the elbow functioned amazingly well, but hopefully it would still get better.

  So now we have seven hunters in our war band; Pell, Yadin, Manute, myself, Zema, Hargis, and Sandro, Nolo thought. He didn’t count Woday as he didn’t think of him as a hunter. Nor Gia, despite the fact that she’d repeatedly proved she was better with a spear thrower than he was. Normally I’d be worried about taking on the sea people in their own territory with only seven of us. Even if we did win, some of us would get hurt. Injuries that might kill some of us long after the fighting was over.

  He was surprised to realize that he was no longer as worried as perhaps he should be.

  ***

  Valri and Quen were on their way to one of the northern areas of shore to gather salt. Karteri’d been sent to gather wood, so she wasn’t with them. When Valri’d realized that the sea people women didn’t seem to be gathering the available vegetable foods she’d had great hope that they’d be able to eat better. However, now that such foods were plentiful, she’d learned she was expected to gather them as well as salt.

  She and Quen were supposed to keep an eye out for food they could gather while they walked out to the shore. Once they’d collected their salt, they were expected to collect such greens and root vegetables on the way back to the village. The sea people didn’t seem to begrudge their slaves eating some of the greens and roots while they were collecting them. In fact, from comments, it seemed that they were expected to get their food that way rather than taking much from the communal stew pot.

  To Quen, she said, “I hope we can find some carrots, turnips, beets, or even onions we can sneak back for Karteri. She probably won’t find much out in the woods looking for deadfall.”

  Quen said, “I’m more worried about her being out there by herself. Big cats and wolves are bad enough, but even if she just fell and hurt herself it’d be horrible. Nobody’d even know where to look for her.”

  Valri said, “They probably figure that if she gets hurt badly enough she can’t walk back, they don’t want her anyw…” She cut off with a sigh as Urdan stepped in front of her wearing his usual nasty smile.

  Urdan was the chief’s perpetually horny teenage son. Worse, he was mean…

  ***

  They set out the next morning on the last leg of their journey. On a couple of occasions a bit of joking banter broke out, but the seriousness of their endeavor kept quashing that spirit.

  After a long period of silence, Gia broke in by saying, “What if they don’t have any slaves that came from Aganstribe? Will we still fight them?”

  Emphatically, Zema said, “We should fight to free any slaves. Not just your friends. Nobody should have to be a slave.”

  “But should we be risking our lives for people we don’t…”

  “I’m risking my life for your friends and I’ve never even seen them,” Zema interrupted in a voice that sounded like rocks grinding together.

  “But…”

  Zema stopped abruptly and rode over whatever was about to be said, “If we’re not going down there to free every slave they have, let me know so I can go back home.”

  The rest of the group stopped as a gaggle to stand
uncomfortably facing one another. No one spoke for a few moments, then, without looking at anyone, Pell said, “I also don’t think anybody should have to live as a slave.” He looked at Zema and continued, “I’ll fight with you no matter who the slaves are.” He shrugged, “But I don’t know about the others, I think each person should decide for themself.”

  Without further discussion, they all continued onward.

  In an area where the path was wide, Pell moved back amongst their group so he could walk beside Hargis. “Did you make marks on the wall of the old Aganstribe cave when you went to look for survivors?” As Pell spoke, he held up his spread fingers and move them in a wavy fashion.

  Hargis nodded, “In case someone else came. I was trying to show them where I lived at the time.”

  Pell called Gia and she joined them as they kept walking. “Hargis says the marks on the cave wall were to tell people where he lived now.”

  Gia gave Hargis a curious look, “So what did the wavy lines stand for?”

  “The waves on the river. There were more of them to the right end to show that the river was getting wider that direction. That really sharp wave was supposed to be the falls and the circle beside the river below the falls was supposed to show you where I was living.”

  Pell grinned, “So the wavy lines weren’t supposed to represent Gia’s hair?” He nearly succeeded in dodging when she smacked his shoulder.

  Hargis frowned, “Did you really think the lines were supposed to be hair?”

  Pell shook his head and got a serious look, “No, but Gia had this idea that we should all agree on what certain symbols mean. That way we could leave messages for each other and know they’d be understood.”

  Hargis frowned again, “It seems like you’d have to know the meaning of an awful lot of symbols before you could leave useful messages.”

  “Yeah,” Gia sighed, “It seems like you’d have to have a symbol for every word. I don’t see how anyone could remember so many.”