Wolf's Brother

CHAPTER SEVEN

She did not sleep, but morning came anyway, and with it a semblance of normalcy that chafed Tillu's nerves. She and Kari rose, they ate, and Lasse came for the harkar.

They spoke very little and of Kerlew and Heckram not at all. Heckram had not returned, Kerlew hadn't wandered in. If Kari and Lasse knew of Heckram's plan, they did not betray it. The only sign was that Ristin's rajd had grown. She passed them with a solemn nod. Carp sat astride the last harke in her rajd. Tillu stared at him as he rode past, hating his unperturbed manner. She didn't blame Ristin for putting him on the last harke; from there he couldn't speak to her.

The harkar and their loads were gone, the fire burned to embers, and still they lingered. Families and rajds moved past them as the temporary camp broke up and resumed the migration. Tillu wandered aimlessly in the trodden circle that had been their camp last night. The place held her; leaving this spot and moving on would be abandoning Kerlew. Surrendering him to death.

'I thought you would come to ask for word of your son. I see you were not as worried as you seemed.' Cool words, edged words. Tillu turned her head slowly.

Joboam stood at the edge of their camp, his fists on his hips. His jerkin was open halfway down his chest, displaying hair. His arms were bare and muscle bulged on them. She found the sight repellent.

'I never thought to seek you out,' Tillu said softly, truthfully. 'I thought you would come to tell me if you had found anything.'

He shrugged. 'Well, if you're interested. I found bones spread about, still red with clinging flesh. At least a dozen wolves had nosed and pawed through them.'

Tillu's throat clenched. Kari's voice was shrill and raw in the chill air. 'And?' she demanded.

'And I suppose they must have found a calf that straggled away from the main herd.

It was probably half-starved by the time they pulled it down. There is a kindness in the savagery of wolves, making sure a lost calf does not suffer too long.'

'But Kerlew? Did you find any sign of him?' Either Kari's voice shook, or the humming in Tillu's cars made her think it did. She hated Joboam and his ghastly teasing. He smiled so kindly as he sliced her with words.

'The boy? No, I saw no sign of the boy. I called, but he neither answered nor came.'

Tillu looked at him dumbly, unable to reply. His eyes met hers, and for an instant the anger and mockery in his died away, to be replaced with pitying condescension. 'It seems hard, I know. But only the strongest are favored on the tundra. Life is for the strongest. But mercy's teeth are sharp and swift.'

'Perhaps. But not all strength is easily seen,' Tillu found herself answering. Her voice was surprisingly steady and she lifted her chin as she spoke. He stared down at her, and she saw his determination to master her grow. What had he imagined last night?

That she would come to him in tears and pain, and he would comfort and distract her?

Did he believe that with Kerlew gone, she would forget her son, and accept Joboam?

'You had better get started, if you are to keep up with the caravan today. Capiam would be very angry if he had to send me back to look for you also.' The words were formed as a suggestion, but spoken as a command. Tillu and Kari stood insolently still, staring up at him.

'And Carp told me last night that if you ignored his summons again, there would be little he could do to help you.' Bright color dotted Kari's cheeks as she suddenly flung the words at him. Tillu wondered what she was talking about.

With a snort of disdain and anger, he spun away from them. He yanked the lead harke's head around, and dragged the rajd off at a lagging trot, hastening up the moving line of folk and beasts to take the place his status required.

'What does Carp want with Joboam?' Tillu asked distractedly.

Kari looked at her for a long moment, the secrets behind her eyes looming large. Her eyes were black as she said, 'All my life, Joboam has been making me do things. Things I did not want to do. Just once, I should like to be able to make him do something he didn't want to do. When I was small and he came to drag me back to Ketla, I used to scream and scratch at him. I remember screeching, 'You can't make me do it. You can't make me.' But of course he could. And did. He has been the biggest for so long, he has come to believe that gives him the right to command. My father does not see it, but I do.

It chafes him that he is not herdlord, but he dares not dispute it yet. One day he will, in the meantime, he does not tolerate any defiance.'

Kari turned to Tillu, a sad warning in her eyes. 'Don't defy him, Tillu. Give in to him, for awhile. And then, after a time when you do not resist, he will think he has mastered you. Then he will leave you alone. Pretending to give up is the only way to win with Joboam. Giving in is easier and hurts less than fighting him. You can't win.'

'Kari,' Tillu began wonderingly, but the girl only shook her head angrily and turned away. She snatched up her gathering bag from the ground and set out after the caravan.

Tillu followed silently, a dreadful suspicion gnawing at her heart.

Tillu tried to focus her mind on the plants she passed. Her pharmacopia was complete now, or nearly so. These last few days of gathering had been mostly for Kari's education, and to provide fresh greens for their meals. Today they both moved slowly, pausing often to stoop and dig for roots. Rajd after rajd moved past the grubbing women. Both took exaggerated care in cleaning the roots and cutting them in manageable pieces. Old Natta finally passed them, limping and huffing, but too proud to let her grandson lead her rajd while she rode. Tillu had met her once before, when she had come to her for a liniment for sore joints. She slowed and then halted her two moth-eaten animals.

'Healer?' she called in her cracked old voice.

Tillu looked up from the roots in her lap. The old woman's eyes were set deep in her wrinkled face, and one had begun to film with age. She spoke slowly, pausing often.

'I'm sorry about your boy. I lost a little daughter that way, years ago. Just a wee one, just old enough to run and play with the other children. But when they came back to the fires at night, she wasn't with them. They tell you not to grieve, there will be other children for you. And there will. But I know that none will be like the boy you lost, and you will never cease missing him. So grieve away, and know I grieve with you. But don't do what you're thinking of doing. Don't go back down the trail, looking and calling. You'll only be lost as well, and if you do find him, you'll wish you hadn't.' She paused a long time, taking quick, shallow breaths, and Tillu thought she was finished.

But then Natta flashed a look to her from old eyes that suddenly brimmed with tears. 'I know. Don't go back to look.' Her old mouth folded in on itself and said no more as she turned her face away from them, looking to the far horizon.

Then she was stumping on her way. She did not lead her head harke, but leaned one hand on its shoulder. Its muzzle was rimmed with white, and the pace they set suited them both. Silence flowed in slowly after they passed. Tillu squatted on her heels, staring after them. She started at Kari's touch on her shoulder.

'She's right, you know.' Kari spoke simply. 'If he can be found alive, Heckram will find him and bring him to you. You have to trust that task to him. And if he finds him otherwise ... he will do all that can be done for him; you could do no more by being there.'

Tillu tucked the roots into her shoulder bag, and rose. She looked back the way they had come. The passage of the people and hooved beasts had leveled a swath through the tundra's face. Her eyes followed it back to the horizon. Within her sight, nothing moved. No one followed. She trudged after Kari, and for the first time in days her legs ached with the long walk. The mosses and grasses of the tundra grabbed at her feet and slowed her.

They were last into camp that night, arriving even after old Natta. Great worn gray boulders and outcroppings of stone characterized their stopping place. In the long gray twilight, the camp was visible as small red fires and children outlined against the sunset as they clambered and leaped from the stones. Tillu felt exhausted. Her head throbbed and her entire body ached with unrelieved tension. She knew she should be hungry, but the thought of food choked her. As they trudged into the camp Lasse slid down from a large boulder. They knew he had been keeping watch for them.

Without preamble he told them, 'Ristin has cooked more than enough for all, and bids you join her. And if you say you would rather be alone now, I'm supposed to tell you that she would, too. But being alone right now is not good for you, and besides, if she has to share her fire with Carp, she'd like some other company as well.'

Kari looked uncertain of the invitation, but Tillu was too tired to resist. She followed Lasse and Kari came behind her.

Ristin had set her tent between two great boulders, and it gave an air of privacy to this home in the middle of the tundra. Her fire burned cleanly, reindeer dung and twigs turning to glowing coals. A pot of bubbling stew was wedged into the glowing embers, and flat cakes baked from reindeer moss were heaped on a flat stone where the fire could warm them. Skins were spread on the soft grasses between the boulders, and roofed with a slanting of hides. Ristin sat by her fire, her eyes narrowed as she stitched away at some project. Of Carp there was no sign.

'Wash your face and hands,' she told them as they began to settle near her fire. 'You'll feel better.' And though Lasse was the first to obey her, it was clear she addressed them all. It was the first time Tillu had really looked at her since Elsa's death. Strange, how long ago that seemed now. This woman looked older than Tillu remembered. Older and stronger. There was sorrow and serenity in her features, and they somehow combined to suggest wisdom. Tillu wondered if her own mother would have looked like this, and behaved this way, calmly assuming dominion over anyone the same age as her son.

Kari came to sit beside Tillu and as Lasse moved to sit beside her, Ristin calmly observed, 'I fetched a bucket of water for your grandmother, Lasse. She said that one would be plenty, as she eats alone now. I tried to get her to join us this evening, but she wouldn't. I think she thought we would be bored with her.'

The stricken look on Lasse's face was not something he could control or hide.

Without a word he rose and hurried away.

'He's a good boy,' Ristin observed to no one in particular. 'But sometimes he needs to be reminded that there are responsibilities to being loved.'

Beside her, Kari stiffened. Tillu did not know if the words had been aimed at her, but they had certainly struck. 'But sometimes one does not choose to be loved. Then does that one have a responsibility?'

Ristin stared at the girl across the fire. Tillu could almost see the thoughts in her head being reorganized. She thought she looked surprised. 'Then one can always choose to be kind,' she suggested softly. 'It costs little enough. Come. Let's eat, and let words wait for later. I was waiting for Carp, but if he chooses to stay away, he chooses to eat after we have.'

'Where did he go?' Tillu asked as she accepted the bowl of soup and the warm cake of bread.

'I don't really know. He saw Joboam pass. Or rather, Joboam made sure we saw him, for he stood and stared at the fire and shelter quite rudely. Then, as he started to walk away Carp rose and followed him. But maybe it only seemed that way. He could have gone for a walk, or to see the herdlord, or just to relieve himself. He'll be back when it suits him.'

'You seem to know him well already,' Tillu agreed with a mirthless laugh.

'Better than I care to,' Ristin admitted, and a tension that had hung in the air melted.

Kari smiled uncertainly and accepted another round of bread from Ristin.

'Do you think he'll find him?' Tillu found herself asking the older woman, and then could scarcely believe she had spoken the words. But Ristin accepted them calmly.

'If anyone can, Heckram will. He's a good hunter and tracker. I have always believed he was better than most, because he hunted so often alone. The lone hunter cannot afford to make a mistake, or to rely on others to see what he has missed. If anyone can find the boy, he will.' Ristin leaned forward to poke at her small fire. The yellow light played over her features, and Tillu saw Heckram's cheekbones, Heckram's brows on her face. Then she leaned back and turned to face Tillu squarely. 'Don't hide what you know from yourself, Tillu. With each hour that passes, it is more likely that Heckram will find only the boy's body. I know how my son works. He will go back to where he last saw the boy, and track him from there. But this time of year, tracks do not long remain on the ground. Moss springs up in the morning dew, and one bare footprint looks much like another. He will be thorough, and I do not think that he will return until he has found something. But what he finds may not be what we hope for.' Ristin took a breath, and suddenly looked away into the darkness. 'Do you blame him?'

'I ... no. No. I can imagine how it would have been. Perhaps I would not have let the boy go, but men always are eager to help a boy prove himself. Any man would have let him go.'

'Good. I mean, I am glad that you do not blame him. He blames himself for it. And for Elsa. And I had thought, perhaps, that you blamed him for Elsa's death in some way.'

The air in Tillu's lungs turned to stone and sank down to press on her belly. She kept her voice steady as she asked, 'Why would you think that?'

Ristin looked over at her, holding her eyes but not speaking.

'Everyone knows who killed Elsa.'

Tillu and Ristin turned incredulous eyes to Kari. Her feet were flat on the ground, her knees gathered to her chest. Her shoulders were hunched against the night, and in the wide black eyes that stared into the fire, she could almost see Owl.

'What are you saying?' Ristin asked in a horrified whisper.

'Wolverine. Wolverine did it. Who else comes so softly, who else creeps so silently?

You know how they kill, Ristin. They wait until the reindeer has scooped out a hollow in the snow to bare the moss. Then, when the deer puts its head down to eat and cannot see anything but snow, the wolverine streaks forward and tears out its throat. That is what happened to Elsa. When she knelt to dip her bucket in the water, Wolverine was waiting. He was angered, as he often is, for no reason at all, and poor Elsa had no spirit beast to protect her. Wolverine sprang out and seized her spirit and ran away with it into the dark lands, to drink its blood. That is why Tillu could not make her live. Her soul was gone. If Carp had been with us, he could have drummed and chanted and followed Wolverine into the earth. He could have fought Wolverine for Elsa's soul, and when he came back, he would have brought a spirit beast to protect Elsa. But we had no najd, and so she died.'

'Who tells you these things?' Tillu demanded when the silence had grown long.

'Carp. Old men sleep little, and night is the time for owls to be wakeful. It was not your fault, Tillu. No healer could have saved her from Wolverine. Only a najd.'

'No wolverine attacked Elsa. I've seen women beaten before, and Elsa was beaten to death. By a man, not a wolverine spirit!' Tillu added emphatically. She felt sudden disgust.

'And you have never met a man with the spirit of a wolverine?' Kari asked coldly.

'Joboam.' Ristin dropped the name, and it fell like a heavy round stone into a still pool. The ripples of the implication washed over Tillu, and dizzied her. Heckram's behavior suddenly had a logical pattern.

'If this is known,' she asked weakly, 'why is nothing done about it? Do your folk have no punishment for those who kill?'

'No proof,' Ristin said heavily. 'But I am not the only one who thinks it so. There is Missa, Elsa's mother. She dares not speak, for fear Kuoljok would be driven to do something. He has not been the same since the death. Stina and Lasse suspect him, as do Heckram and I. But the herdlord is blind to Joboam's faults, and will not even ...'

Ristin's voice ran down, and she turned to Kari apologetically. 'I did not mean to criticize your father, Kari. I forgot to whom I spoke.'

'Too many forget to speak at all. To whisper the truth is better than to not speak it at all. I take no offense, Ristin. If I thought I could make my father hear, I would scream it to him myself. But his ears are closed.' Kari's voice was bitter, and brought no reply from the other two.

Tillu sat silent, too many thoughts whirling through her head to make sense of any of them. It seemed possible that Joboam had beaten Elsa to death, and no one had spoken out against him. Kari had dropped enough hints that she thought she knew what Joboam had been able to 'make her do' when she was a child. And Carp was using his strange influence over Kari to pull her ever farther from the normal paths of life. Kerlew was likely dead; or so Ristin believed. And her own ambivalence toward Heckram was not as secret as she thought; his mother at least had sensed it. The food she had eaten was a sodden lump in the pit of her stomach, and she felt drugged with exhaustion.

Into the midst of the fire-light and silence. Carp came stumping. He sighed noisily as he eased himself down onto the skins, conveying both weariness and satisfaction. 'I need food,' he announced to no one in particular. Ristin and Tillu exchanged glances.

Neither one spoke nor moved. But Kari was unmindful of them as she rose to fetch cakes and soup for the old man. He took it from her without thanks, and sipped at the stew noisily. He smacked his pale tongue against his gums and remaining teeth and sighed again. 'It's all been arranged,' he said with smug satisfaction.

Kari fell into the trap. 'What has?'

He gave her a scathing look. 'Women. Always babbling and prying. The work of a najd is not for you to ask about, girl. Bring me some water.'

'Let him get it himself,' Tillu cut in angrily. His manner rasped on her like sand against a wound.

'There speaks an ungrateful woman. What does she care about her son, or the one who will bring him safely home to her? Oh, she likes to mope and drag about, so that all will pity her for her loss, but when one does something to bring the boy back, does she thank him? No, she will not even fetch him a simple dipper of water.'

Instead of maddening her, the words only made her weary. She ignored him, didn't watch Kari as she rose to get him a drink. To Ristin she said, 'I think I will sleep now. I want to thank you for your hospitality this night. And for making me understand things I had not known before.'

'What things?' Carp instantly demanded.

'Only women's natterings. Nothing to interest a najd.' Ristin assured him blandly. In spite of her sorrows, Tillu felt a small smile twitch the corners of her mouth. She liked this Ristin. She found the bundle that held her sleeping skins, and took them to the far side of the shelter, as far from Carp as she could get without leaving Ristin's hospitality.

She unrolled the hides and rolled herself up in one. The spring nights were getting warmer. But it would still be cold for a boy out alone in the dark. She tried to push the thought from her mind and sleep.