Broken Rock Bay (Clan of the Ice Mountains Book 3) Page 16

  “I bring no evil.” Keanu stood in the opening.

  “Come in,” Attu said.

  “Will Suanu be all right?” Keanu moved to Suanu’s side, brushing a delicate hand over Suanu’s hot brow. “She still has the fever spirits?”

  “Yes,” Rika said as the two women studied Suanu, “but not as strongly as before. The potions are working.”

  “And Brovik?” Keanu was watching the poolik now. He was nestled in his sleeping skins, chewing on his fist as he slept. “He seems fine.”

  “Yes. Quite the little fighter.” Rika smiled at the boy before turning back to Keanu. “But what about you?”

  “I’m all right, thanks to you both,” Keanu said, smiling at them. “That was one experience I hope to never repeat.”

  Attu could see Rika’s healer eyes taking in Keanu from head to foot. The Seer looked all right to Attu: a few bruises, raw hands from the rope, as well as a few welts. Rika had bandaged Keanu’s rope-burned arm after putting a healing salve on the wounds. The hides were still in place, and no weeping was evident.

  Rika motioned for Keanu to sit in the guest’s spot. She nodded her thanks and lowered herself slowly to the skins, grimacing slightly. She was obviously bruised from being battered in the current and against the rocks.

  Keanu adjusted the furs around her before studying the two of them. She looked tired, but more than that, she looked anxious. “You need–” she began.

  “I need–” As their voices mingled, Attu and Keanu laughed. Attu deferred to Keanu. “You start.”

  “You need to stop allowing yourself to Remember flying with the falcon,” Keanu said. “I have felt you starting to go to that place Between at least two other times while we were traveling down the river to your camp.” She leaned forward, searching his face. “The way your mind enters the animals’ is dangerous, Attu. You have to believe me!”

  “I believe you, Keanu. And I have been trying.” Attu looked to Rika.

  “He has, Keanu. But still, the Remembering has caught him up. I had to call him back from his sleep, and just last evening he went there as he sat in front of the campfire. I’m afraid for him.” Rika poked at the small fire in the shelter, bringing up a few snapping flames, and with them, more light.

  “I understand.” Keanu breathed deeply, letting her shoulders relax as she exhaled. “I’ve been so worried. About you. About Suanu, and whether or not we would make it here before you left. Then Tingiyok, Suka, and Rusik came, and I knew you’d wait. But the longer it took us, the more afraid for you I became.”

  “Can you help me?” Attu searched Keanu’s eyes in the firelight.

  “I am praying to the spirits that I can, Attu. You never experienced anything like this, either in the Here and Now or in a dream, before that first dream when I sent the falcon to you?”

  “No.”

  “You were supposed to follow the falcon in the dream, not mind-blend with it. That has never happened before.” Keanu studied Attu. “And I’ve communicated with others in this way often. Did you do something–”

  “I didn’t do anything,” Attu interrupted her. “In the dream, my mind went within the falcon’s mind as if it were naturally supposed to, but by the time we reached you, I realized I was losing myself in the bird. Almost as if I was the falcon and no longer human.”

  “And since then, every time Attu even thinks about a bird, or flying, he fights these incredible urges to blend minds and fly with one,” Rika added.

  Keanu paled. “Nothing like this has ever happened before. It’s impossible.”

  “Well, impossible or not, it’s happening to me.” Attu felt his anxiety rising. “It only started after the dream you sent me. That’s what we’re trying to tell you. I thought it was something left over, like a Remembering. Isn’t that what it is? Won’t it fade with time?” Attu heard the fear in his voice, but he’d been counting on his father’s promise that Keanu would know what to do about it once she got to their camp. And now this.

  “This is not a Remembering you’re experiencing, Attu. Your mind is rushing to enter the minds of birds, and it’s so different from the way my mind enters...” She paused, thinking. “I don’t enter the minds of animals without a strong conscious effort. I move in; I take control of the animal’s mind. But I also keep myself separate in the animal, my mind safe. I control my Gift. From what I’ve felt happening with you, you do seem to start losing who you are as soon as you join with the animal, like you described. I could feel your mind straining to become one with the gull that day even before you’d entered its consciousness. That’s why I mind shouted for you to stop.”

  Keanu searched both Attu’s and Rika’s faces, her eyes dark with concern. “You must have always had the Gift I have, but somehow it was awakened in the dream. I’m sorry Attu.” Keanu looked distraught. “You have the Gift of entering animal’s minds, but no control over the Gift. I learned control while growing up, and I don’t even know how I did that. There was no one else to teach me. I just did it.”

  Keanu’s eyes filled with tears. “However it happened, you now have the Gift I have. I don’t know why, and I have no idea how to teach you to control it.”

  Attu thought about how difficult it had been to resist when his mind pulled him toward flight with a bird. It was only a matter of time before he lost his battle to resist. He knew it.

  What am I going to do?

  Rika looked at Attu, her eyes searching his.

  Attu looked away, unable to bear seeing her fear as well.

  The fire popped and Rika stirred it, raising up flames and accompanying warmth into the shelter, which had grown suddenly cold to Attu.

  “Keanu, has Yural spoken with you?” Rika asked, finally breaking the silence.

  “About Veshria?”

  “Yes.”

  “I gathered the root and gave it to her, at our healer’s suggestion, before we Seers left for the grasslands. Of course, she wasn’t with child at the time.”

  “I know you were just being helpful,” Rika said. “I wanted you to know that. Only Veshria seems to be angry that you did. I think she’s trying to blame you for her own mistake.”

  “She may be using that as an excuse, but I knew when I decided to come that it would open old wounds between us.” Keanu looked away, her eyes unfocused as she gazed at the fire.

  “She told me you entered her mind when you were young,” Attu said.

  “That doesn’t surprise me,” Keanu said. “She made sure all the Seers never forgot my mistake, even thought I was still a child at the time. And as much as I’ve tried to make up for that violation of her thoughts all those seasons ago, she’s never forgiven me for it. I told you I had to train myself. It wasn’t easy, but that never seemed to matter to Veshria or the others who didn’t trust me.”

  “She also said something about Rusik–” Rika began.

  “That’s just plain foolishness!” Keanu said, half rising in her anger. “I never wanted her man, and I would never try to control another person to make them love me. Veshria might want to do something like that if she had the Gift. But that’s because she doesn’t really understand what it’s like to live with this ability.”

  “So there is nothing to her stories?” Attu asked, studying Keanu’s face in the firelight and thinking about how hard her life must have been.

  Will mine be like that now that I seem to also have Keanu’s Gift?

  “Nothing.” Keanu looked at Attu. He could see she was warring between disappointment in him for questioning her and a rising empathy for his situation. But when he tried to return her gaze with compassion, Keanu looked away.

  “I’m sorry, but as Clan leader, I had to ask,” Attu said, his voice turning brusque. “I needed to know the truth about Veshria and what she’s been saying. And I needed to understand the bad feelings between you.” Attu sat back as Keanu slumped where she sat. A long silence surrounded them again.

  Finally, Keanu sighed and spoke again, changing the subject. “I j
ust came from talking with Meavu. I knew I’d communicated with her when she was in the river, but I hadn’t known if the rest of you would believe her. I sensed her, as well, urging us on as we grew closer. I don’t understand yet exactly what Gift or Gifts she has, but I can tell you she is powerful.”

  “I thought so,” Rika said. “Attu, what do you think?”

  “About what?” Attu looked at the two of them, confused. His thoughts had been in a dark place, a place where he’d lost his struggle to control his mind. He’d joined minds with a bird and mentally flown away forever, leaving Rika behind to care for their child alone.

  “About Meavu having powerful Gifts.”

  “Meavu?” Attu pulled himself back to the Here and Now. “I know she has some sort of Gift, and it is growing stronger, but you think she is already powerful?” Attu wondered what he’d just missed of the conversation and about his own reluctance to think of his sister that way.

  Perhaps it’s simply because I want to keep her safe, my little Kip, and so many bad things have happened to her already. I’m worried her Gifts might be as dangerous for her as mine seem to be for me...

  “More than you can ever imagine, Attu.” Keanu was watching him, and Attu realized she must have heard his thoughts. He didn’t mind. Attu knew she’d been listening in for both his and Meavu’s benefit. Keanu nodded her head as if acknowledging she’d heard him thinking of Meavu and, before that, of himself.

  “When I sense the power within Meavu, it’s like bright sun sparkling over new snow, like her name spirit, Meavuria,” Keanu said as she pulled her mind back from Attu’s. “Meavu is brightness. She is light. And the light shines on things, reveals the shape and creates the shadow. I believe Meavu may have the Gift of foreknowledge.”

  “Without the dreaming?” Attu asked. “Because she knows things and she doesn’t dream them to know them. She just knows them.” Attu pulled himself out of his own concerns for the moment.

  Rika said, “I know Meavu senses things, like she knew who was coming down the river, and that the rope had broken between your boat and Tingiyok’s.”

  “She yelled just before your boat went into the swirling eddy,” Attu said, remembering. “Everyone else except Soantek thought you might reach safety, but Meavu knew you and Suanu were about to fall from the boat.”

  Could it be?

  Only more time will tell us if this is true for Meavu. If so, you will have a powerful resource in your sister, to know what lies ahead for your Clan. It will also be a great burden for her to carry. Keanu mind spoke to both of them as if her final thoughts on the subject were too important to speak aloud. Then she added, Give me time, Attu. Let me consider how best to teach you to carry the burden of this Gift you have suddenly become aware of, without it costing you everything. I promise. I will try.

  “Why did you come to us with Suanu and her poolik?” Yural asked the next sun as Keanu sat with most of Attu’s Clan around a fresh fire, eating fish stew. She emptied her bowl, and Yural refilled it. Keanu murmured her thanks. She took several more mouthfuls before answering Yural’s question.

  “I must let Suanu tell you her own reasons for coming, once she’s feeling better,” Keanu said. “I had to come with her. It was either that, or she was coming alone. She was determined to leave once Kinak...” her words trailed off. She looked to Suka.

  “They know,” Suka said. “Attu and Farnook dreamed. I didn’t get a chance to tell you.”

  “Oh,” Keanu said. She set her half-full bowl aside as her face grew sad at the memory of Kinak’s death. “He died a mighty hunter,” she added.

  “Exactly as you described,” Suka said as he glanced at Attu and Farnook before looking into the fire, his eyes growing unfocused, his face stony. He said nothing else, and Farnook sat down beside him, slipping her hand in his as he continued to stare into the fire.

  Yural broke the tension as she moved from the fire to sit among them. “I believe that influenced our decision to send the men up for you, Keanu. Attu and Farnook were so certain about what had happened that when Meavu sensed you coming and bringing others with you, we were ready to accept her words and work to help you get here.”

  “Some of us didn’t want to wait.” Rusik had joined the group, his arm around Veshria as they stood at the edge of the fire.

  Ubantu motioned for them to sit, but Veshria said they had to attend to the children. As they walked away, Rusik spoke to Veshria in a fierce whisper, “I told you, woman, it wasn’t her fault.”

  “I don’t care what you think,” Veshria shot back at him, then realizing her voice had been louder than she’d intended, Veshria glanced over her shoulder and saw Attu looking at her. She turned away, her face reddening as she pulled at Rusik’s arm.

  “Not all appears to be well in that shelter, even with Rusik’s return,” Yural said, shaking her head. “So why did you go, Keanu?”

  Keanu had been studying her hands. She kept her head down as she answered Yural. “I can tell you that even before Kinak’s death, I, too, I had many reasons to leave my...” she paused before continuing, “to leave the grasslands and the tuskie hunting.” Keanu wrapped her arms around herself but looked up at them all now, her face falsely bright.

  Was her life with the Seers really that bad? Attu wondered.

  “I grew up near the Great Ocean with the rest of the Seers,” Keanu continued, “and I watched it as it thawed and stayed unfrozen. It’s a beautiful place to be, here, with the ocean breezes. No flying biters, no sweltering hot days followed by great pouring rains that leave the air like water you must try to breathe. I’ve never sweat so much in my life!” She threw her hands up in disgust.

  Attu and the others laughed.

  Ubantu glanced at Attu, and they shared a look as they remembered dragging the great hunks of meat on a sledge across the never-ending grass during their first and only tuskie hunt, the sweat dripping off them, slapping at the small biters. They had both thanked their spirits that the larger biters, the ones the Seers called ‘flies,’ were more interested in the tuskie meat than them.

  “It was disgusting,” Rika said. Her voice was soft, but several of the other women heard her and nodded in agreement.

  “I was glad to come,” Keanu continued her story. “Some of our hunters helped me build the boat of tied-together logs. We cut two long poles to steer the craft, and Suanu and I were making good progress down the river with Brovik when Suanu became ill.” Keanu cringed, remembering. “I struggled to steer the boat on my own. It was very hard, and we almost flipped twice. Brovik fussed a lot, and Suanu could barely keep herself balanced in the middle of the boat, especially when the river grew twisting. Then your hunters came.”

  “No hunters would come with you?” Ubantu asked.

  “No.” Keanu looked away. Her face reddened.

  “What happened when our hunters reached you?” Attu asked.

  Keanu had tensed, but let out a breath as the subject turned to safer ground. “They took turns tying their skin boats to mine, drifting ahead or behind and steering us as we needed it. I think they would have abandoned the log boat if they could, but their skin boats are built for just one. We would’ve made it without any more trouble if the rope hadn’t sliced on a sharp rock just up river from the last bend. And... well, you saw the rest. Thank you all again for your help.”

  The others murmured, and most smiled back at her, ducking their heads in the way of the Nuvik, to say that what they’d done was nothing special, just looking after their own.

  “But there is one thing I don’t understand,” Keanu said as she looked around at the women, studying each one. “How did all of you become with child at the same time? I’ve never seen anything like this bunch of women, ripening like the bushes of berries back home, all at once. Rika, did you use a potion on them?”

  Rika laughed with the others, looking down at her own burgeoning stomach.

  “Yural, were your prayers for a child late in your bearing years so powerful they were
answered for everyone?” Keanu was watching them all now, letting her amazement over their current situation show in her wide eyes along with her playful curiosity.

  “No,” his mother said, grinning. “This is all Attuanin’s doing... with,” she added, “some essential help from our hunters.”

  Everyone laughed.

  Attu studied his mother’s face. Rika had been checking on Yural every day, and so far his mother hadn’t experienced any more cramping. He smiled at her, and she looked back at him knowingly.

  “I’m fine,” she mouthed the words to him.

  Suka cleared his throat, bringing everyone’s attention to him. “Well,” Suka began, “since you asked, Keanu, it is an interesting story...”

  Attu grinned at Rika, and everyone leaned back against the furs, knowing their master storyteller was about to regale Keanu with a tale that would entertain them all.

  “Farnook, I need to speak with you for a moment.” Attu drew Farnook away from the other women working at cleaning fish and started walking away from the camp, down the beach and into the fresh wind. He walked slower than usual, careful to shorten his stride. “Where’s Suka?” he asked.

  “He took his skin boat out to check for leaks after he repaired it this morning. Why?”

  “I need to talk with you about the best way to get the Nukeena women out of the Raven settlement. And,” Attu added, “any of the other women who might want to come. I know Suka won’t like the idea of you going back there, but–”

  “I need to go with them,” Farnook interrupted him. “I know the Ravens better than anyone. And I can translate.”

  Attu agreed. “So. Any ideas?”

  “I’ve been thinking about getting Caanti out of there ever since we found out she IS Cray’s woman.” Farnook grinned up at him. “And you might think it’s a crazy scheme, but,” she leaned in, lowering her voice even though the two were far from earshot of anyone else, “I have a plan.”

  “What about Suka? You know he’s going to be upset when you tell him you’re going back to the Ravens’ with the Nukeena.”

  “Don’t worry about Suka. I’ll handle him.”