Priam's Lens

FIFTEEN To the Great Sea

Littlefeet was still bothered by what he knew should be the most wonderful of coincidences, the fact that, of all those who’d jumped into the river rather than face the mad ones and Hunters from the demon flower groves, one should be his Spotty, and with no Mother Paulista or anybody else to make the rules. Not anymore. Froggy was a nice bonus; he’d always liked her and had at one time lain with her, but that could be said about almost all the girls of the Family.

“You act like I’m some kinda creature or something, like those things that attacked us,” she accused him, as they sat waiting for the night’s storm.

“I just want to know how come it was you out of all the girls. How come you came to me?”

She frowned and stared into his eyes. “Why, you called me!”

“I what? Oh—you mean my yelling and all?”

“No, not that. I heard you. Callin’ me, drawin’ me to your side. It was almost like those magic stones Mother Paulista had—those—what’d she call ’em? Magnets. Like I was one and you were another and I was almost pulled to you.” She paused. “If anybody oughta be wondering ’bout who’s got witch power and who don’t it should be me. ’Course, it coulda been God, y’know.”

He let out a long, loud sigh. “I dunno. Maybe it is me. Ever since I went up to the top of those mountains it’s been weird sometimes, y’know? Like I can feel things I can’t figure out and see things like maybe the demons see things, and I get these crazy ideas and pictures. I’ve got no words for ’em. Some things are really clear; other things are all jumbled up and don’t make any sense. Look, let’s forget this whole thing—not the attack and all. I mean between us. There’s the three of us now and nobody else, at least not yet.”

Spotty wasn’t all that sure it was going to be that easy, but she also was practical enough to realize that it made little difference. In the broadest sense Littlefeet was right: their situation now was the problem, and it had to be worked out.

He moved over, gave her a hug, and kissed her, and she didn’t pull away.

Froggy had made a short exit while they started to work things out, and she now came back and sat with them. “You decided to kiss and make up, huh? ’Bout time!”

“Yeah, don’t seem nothing but crazy to wonder over good luck,” he responded. “So, either of you wanna tell me what happened over there in the camp?”

Spotty looked at Froggy, who looked back and shrugged. Clearly neither of them wanted to bring up the memory, but Spotty finally took the initiative.

They had come from the demon flower groves, she told him. Come just before dawn, when there was much mist and not much light, and they had burst upon the Family in numbers they had never before faced, screaming unintelligible noises and in a killing frenzy, with no thought as to their own safety or protection. The guards had fought well and bravely but they were simply overwhelmed; the Hunters used what looked like human leg bones as clubs, and they took the spears and knives from the fallen and used them as well.

“I heard Father Alex praying and cursing the attackers to hell,” she told him. “Then I heard him cry out in what sounded like pain, and he shouted something I could not hear but which must have been the command to sound the horn, for that’s what happened next, and it kept sounding and sounding until it kinda died in midblast. By that time they were in the women’s kraal, and it was just all mixed up and so confused with everybody yelling and screaming and going every which way. I was asleep far from the nursery. I know some of the crazy ones got there, and I picked up a pole and tried to get there too, but I could see that they’d surrounded the women there and there were more of ’em and they were closing in. I went to run and help them, but then I got hit here, on the hip, and I was in a fight for my life with a man not much older’n us, but there was nothing inside him, just screams and hatred and those eyes that didn’t have anyone in them.”

“I wasn’t that far away,” Froggy added, realizing that Spotty had reached her limit for the moment. “I saw much the same. The only thing that mattered was the kids, but you couldn’t get to ’em. I know some of the older ones ran off into the grass and I pray to God that they got away. The rest, I saw some—some… ”

It took until the first cracks of thunder sounded in the great valley before the two could, painfully, piece together the rest. They had seen sights that would haunt them for their entire lives. Babies, little babies, impaled, held up on spears still shrieking, and some of them were their babies and there was absolutely no way they could help them and absolutely nothing they could do.

Eventually, in the carnage, many of the young women had found themselves at the water’s edge, unable to do anything, facing the Hunters and the mad ones which both women described as men without souls. The only choice was between succumbing to the attackers and jumping in the water and drowning.

Many of them jumped, and some, like Spotty and Froggy, found themselves buoyant enough to keep above the water for a short period until, just as they felt themselves going under, each of them had bumped, or were bumped by, something that floated and they’d managed to hold on, remembering Littlefeet’s own example and some of the lessons of the past. Neither remembered much after that, except that Spotty insisted that she had heard and been drawn to his calling. Neither knew how they’d gotten to the other side, but that could be explained by a slow curve in the river to the east that might have taken them closer to the opposite bank.

And when they’d told their stories and the rains came, their tears were added to the downpour as they simply sat in the mud. He held tightly to each of the women with his arms and they gently rocked in the rain.

And after the storm passed, he stayed as long as they wanted, and, finally, they found a comfortable spot in the brush with good cover and lay down for the night, as close together as they could. He didn’t get a lot of sleep that night, but at least, unlike them, he didn’t dream.

Still, there was an odd sense, almost that magnetic sense that Spotty had insisted he had, that drew him in odd and mysterious directions, first to the tiny point that could barely be seen in the night sky and would soon be washed out by Achilles, the feeling that something was up there, something was on Hector, something not quite god or demon but different than he.

And, as the night wore on, he had the strangest feeling that something had fallen to earth. He still felt the presences above, sort of, but now he felt the same kind of draw down here, to the south, where the great sea was, and where he’d been taught that there was nothing but monsters and endless deep waters.

They would spend the next two days patrolling up and down the riverbank, looking for anyone alive, but if anyone else had survived, they had taken off for the brush. The sounds the two women had told about were made by a hollowed reed specially carved to sound a deep, penetrating note. It was reserved for the greatest of emergencies, and would bring the scouts in and also tell the people to grab what they could and scatter and hide because the defenses had failed.

He had never heard that sound except in practices, nor had any of the others, but they were all properly drilled. If the family could not be defended, it must scatter and preserve as many as possible and merge again when the danger was past.

It was possible that many were now hunting for one another over there, on the other side, but nobody was showing themselves by the river, nothing but some sad corpses.

We should gather them and give them burial,” Littlefeet said, feeling oddly guilty that he’d not been there and had survived mostly for that reason alone.

“No!” Spotty responded. “None of the Hunters will guess that any of us could make it across the river. Some will come, and if they see it like this, they’ll just figure, with no battle signs, that the bodies floated down or from the other side and that’ll be that. If we do anything more, then they’ll know there are some alive on this side and maybe go on a hunt. Their souls are in heaven now and ours aren’t. Leave what’s left.”

He nodded sadly. “Then let’s get away from here. This is an evil place.”

“But to where?” Froggy asked him. “There’s nowhere left to go.”

“We’re on the right side of the river,” he pointed out. “We know this area, at least beyond this new river. I say we follow the river down and stay just out of sight, but look for signs of others across the way. They’ll have gone south along the river because it’s the only way to find any others. If we find any signs, maybe we can get ’em across. If not, at least we’ll know. After that, well, we’ll see about finding Family marks and be on our own. They’ll either find us or else we’ll be starting a new Family. What else can we do?”

“South…” Froggy looked out at the river. “How far south? If this is like all the other rivers we know, it’ll get bigger and wider as it goes on. If they’re on the other side, they’re gonna stay there.”

He sighed. “Maybe. But what else can we do? C’mon. There are no nurseries now. We’re all three scouts and guards and gatherers. Let’s find something to eat and then get on.”

How could he explain about the pull? How could he explain when even he didn’t know what caused it, or what he was being drawn to? Like everything else, he knew he’d simply have to trust his instincts and hope that the pull was God’s and not any of the demons’.