The majority of the planning for Night Shadow Star’s marriage was carried out in the Council House ramada. For the most part Tonka’tzi Wind had orchestrated the arrangements. With her usual brilliance for detail and efficiency she delegated the procurement of venison, breads, fowl, fish, stews, and drink to various Earth Clan chiefs. Meanwhile cousins were tasked with putting together a stickball tournament, chunkey, and celebratory Dancers.
Blue Heron chafed as she sat under the ramada, listening as a long line of Earth Clans chiefs and matrons arrived with their final reports and offers of assistance.
Then there was the final curious request.
“The Itza insists on a ritual combat,” Blue Heron muttered. “Why can’t they be happy with chunkey and stickball like everyone else?”
Tonka’tzi Wind lifted a hand, forestalling Matron Red Temple before she turned her attention to Blue Heron. “They’re Itza. Maybe that’s explanation enough.”
“And what does this ‘ritual combat’ consist of?” Blue Heron asked as she massaged her hip where it had been bruised in her fall.
“His warriors will fight an equal number of our best warriors.” Wind stated the obvious. “It’s something about the way Itza see balance. He wants sacrifices to be made before the wedding. As I understand, the warriors’ blood, suffering, and death bring luck and good fortune to the marriage.”
“And just where do you expect to find warriors willing to gamble their lives on the odd chance of making a happy marriage?”
Wind threw her head back, laughing. “Are you joking? As soon as word went out, we had a flood of volunteers. From every Men’s House in Cahokia. What’s a little risk compared to the opportunity to kill an Itza warrior? It’s the chance of a lifetime to gain prestige and status. All over the city War Medicine is being conjured. Warriors are fasting and sweating, purging, praying, hoping they will be chosen by their squadron firsts. Names are being submitted from every clan, every lineage. Five Fists will choose the finalists to stand against the Itza warriors.”
Blue Heron narrowed her eyes, glancing around at the crowd surrounding Wind’s raised dais. She waved off a fly. “I don’t like it.”
“Who are we to decry any peculiar traditions held by the Itza? Willing men are going to fight each other for bragging rights. The Itza gets his good luck sacrifice; the winners get to preen for the rest of their lives.” Wind pointed a finger. “What’s different than men betting their lives on a chunkey game? It’s up to Power.”
“Horn Lance is behind it; that’s what’s wrong.”
“Sister.” Wind used her “argument’s over” tone. “The finest of our warriors—men blooded in combat—are going to fight these Itza. What do we care if the foreigners are slaughtered on their chief’s wedding day?”
“I tell you, it’s going to end badly. And I’ll remind you that I said so.” Yawning, Blue Heron winced. Any movement of her face—from scowl to smile—hurt. And as the day wore on, her bruises bothered her more. It would take days for the effects of the blow to fade.
The knowledge that the Natchez were living in the Four Winds Men’s House, just over there, diagonally across the plaza, and she couldn’t do a thing about it, irritated her to no end.
Nor did this “ritual combat” the Itza demanded sit well with her.
“Bide your time, woman,” she muttered under her breath as Tonka’tzi Wind graciously thanked Matron Red Temple of the Fish Clan for coming up with firewood for the cook fires. Revenge would come.
Wind finished, saying, “And give my best to High Chief Two Throws. Tell him my prayer is that Power grants him a speedy recovery.”
“He will be honored, Tonka’tzi.” Red Temple bowed low, touching her forehead. “For myself, I will do everything within my ability to make Lady Night Shadow Star’s wedding the most festive of days.”
Blue Heron pulled at her sagging chin as she nodded and watched the matron depart. The first humming of mosquitoes could be heard as sunset turned the northwest into a purplish gloom.
“What else?” Blue Heron asked, yawning again.
“You could look at least a little enthusiastic,” Wind muttered as she shifted on her litter atop its dais.
“I didn’t sleep well last night. Maybe you’ll recall the details?” Blue Heron glanced over at Five Fists where the old warrior crouched beside a council ramada support pole. He’d been watching one of the recorders who sat with a deerskin spread before him. The man had painstakingly strung different beads on his string to record what each of the clans was donating for the success of the occasion.
“You should keep strange men out of your bedroom,” Wind growled in mock severity as she propped her chin on a fist. “Pus and blood, Sister, have we thought of everything? A moon wouldn’t have been long enough to perfectly plan such a marriage.”
“It will do,” Blue Heron declared. “We’ll have enough food, and as for the Itza all that matters is that we awe him with the spectacle. We’ve got stickball games running from dawn to dusk, chunkey, and half the city is going to be crowding around for as far as the eye can see. No one’s ever married an Itza in Cahokia before—let alone a Four Winds noble as exalted as Lady Night Shadow Star. The Traders and hucksters will be as thick as these blood-sucking mosquitoes.” She waved at the growing column over her head.
“Not that Night Shadow Star is bouncing with joy.” Blue Heron glanced sidelong at Five Fists. Anything she said was going to be passed to the Morning Star the moment the old warrior returned to the high palace.
“She hasn’t complained,” Wind noted. “Maybe she’s ready for a man again?”
“You just hold onto that thought, dear sister. I’ll remind you that you said it come equinox, and we’ll see how right you are.”
Wind, aware of Five Fists, and whom he served, barely narrowed an eye in response.
“Me?” Blue Heron winced as she stood. “I’m going home, standing two guards at my door, and getting some sleep. Tomorrow is going to be a busy day.”
“According to my sources, Night Shadow Star hasn’t been attending to the rituals. I don’t care if she doesn’t propitiate Power. That’s her business, and maybe Piasa’s. But I do care about public perception. She’s Morning Star House, a noble woman. People look up to her as a role model for good behavior.”
“I’ll see what I can do.” She eased her way across the beaten courtyard, slapped an incautiously desperate mosquito dead, and walked to the Council Terrace Gate. Below her, the dusk-filled plaza was busier than usual, people already flocking in for the wedding. She took her time, descending step by step in deference to her bruises.
Blood and snot, as bad as the blow to her face had been, her body bouncing off the bed frame and floor had really hurt her.
On the avenue, Smooth Pebble had Blue Heron’s litter ready. Blue Heron’s porters lifted her as soon as she was seated, and the guard ran ahead calling, “Make way for the Keeper!” as he parted the crowd.
“Is everything ready?” Smooth Pebble asked from beside the litter as dirt farmers, Traders, and craftsmen gave way to the warriors in Blue Heron’s guard. Several teams of men carrying heavy logs slowed, stepping to the side and touching their foreheads as they let her pass.
“As ready as it will ever be. Some of the Earth Clans aren’t getting much sleep tonight, raiding their storage, getting water and firewood delivered to the plaza by morning. I doubt half the food will be cooked by the time we’re supposed to feast.”
“And Night Shadow Star?” Smooth Pebble lowered her voice. “Did you let Wind know what happened with the Red Wing? I tell you, Night Shadow Star was upset when she left. I saw Clay String while you were up at council. He said she confronted the Natchez, got Fire Cat’s clothes back, and ordered everyone out of her palace before she went in to see him.”
“Huh! Maybe she took the young man by the hand, dragged him back into her quarters, and used him for everything a healthy young man is good for.” She tried a crooked smile. “I sure as fire would have.”
“That snoop Winter Leaf said that Night Shadow Star and the Red Wing just sat side by side on the floor.”
“What’s wrong with young people these days?”
“Maybe she’s saving herself for marriage?”
Blue Heron shook her head. “The Night Shadow Star I once knew never saved herself for anything. As a girl she was wilder than a weasel. When she married Makes Three, she threw herself into the marriage and worked to learn a matron’s skills. She did it with all the passion in her souls. When Makes Three was killed, she took grieving to new heights. What she is good at is deluding herself over the simplest of things.” She paused. “Any word from the thief?”
“Not a squeak, though one of your spies showed up about a hand of time ago.” Smooth Pebble looked up at her in the growing gloom. “He reported that Horn Lance spent most of yesterday morning in Green Chunkey’s palace. The Horned Serpent House nobles were asked to leave, including our source.” She hesitated. “Green Chunkey hasn’t had much love for us since you hung his cousin Red Mask in a square last year.”
Blue Heron considered that. “Whatever they discussed, it wasn’t the good health and well-being of the Morning Star House.”
“Probably not. For as soon as Horn Lance concluded his business with Green Chunkey, he was borne posthaste to Evening Star Town.”
“Ah, where he began to insinuate himself with Columella!” Blue Heron clapped her hands in understanding. “My ex-husband didn’t waste any time picking scabs off old wounds, did he? Good thing we’ve currently got friendly relations with Serpent Woman Town, or he’d have had to run his porters into the ground to get up north in the attempt to ingratiate himself with High Chief Wolverine.”
They were approaching her palace, where a warrior, a war club on his shoulder, dissuaded anyone who might be inclined to climb her stairs.
Blue Heron let the porters carry her up her ramped staircase. She touched her forehead as she passed the eagle guardian posts and sighed as she was set down on her veranda.
It took her three tries to get up. Then she minced her way inside with one hand to her bruised ribs. To her relief Notched Cane was back; a cheery fire crackled and sent its yellow light through the room. Food steamed in pots beside the fire. Notched Cane rose from one, touching a finger to his chin.
“How did it go?” she asked without formality.
“As you ordered, Keeper, I found the Trader the thief suggested. He was actually delighted to assist.”
“Good.” She gestured at her door. “I’ll eat in my room. If anyone shows up looking for me, speak with Smooth Pebble before you decide to disturb me.”
“Of course.” The man bent down to the steaming pots beside the fire. In the corner Dancing Sky and her two daughters were sewing beads onto one of Blue Heron’s skirts.
Blue Heron sighed as she pushed the door hanging aside and plodded into her room.
She started as Seven Skull Shield’s weary voice announced, “Before you rip all your clothes off, or jump out of your skin, it’s only me.”
“Phlegm and vomit! How do you do that?”
In the gloom she could see where he had seated himself on her biggest storage box. He seemed to be leaned forward, looking a little worse for wear, and maybe in pain.
“How do you keep getting in here? Five Fists detailed new guards with the admonition that he’d have their scalps if they failed to keep out intruders.”
“What happened to your face?” he asked, apparently having better night vision than she did.
“That Natchez, Swirling Cloud, woke me up last night pawing through that box you’re sitting on. When I started to get indignant about somebody uninvited in my quarters, he took offense.”
She peered more closely at him. “What happened to you? Some young husband catch you in his wife’s bed?”
“This?” He pointed at his bruised face. “Your ex-husband’s got the word out to every unsavory scoundrel in the city. He and the Natchez want me. Alive. And they’re offering a fortune in exotic Trade to get me. They came close. Caught up with me in a Bear Clan charnel house.”
“That was you? Heard it was quite a mess. The lineage that owns that charnel house hung the two who survived in squares. Bear Clan know you were involved?”
“Probably,” Seven Skull Shield told her morosely. “If Slick Rock was one of the ones who survived, he’d have screamed out that it was my fault.”
That the thief spoke so dispiritedly shook her. Even in the worst of times she was used to a ribald humor lurking just under the surface. “I can deal with Bear Clan for you. You’ll have to make your own peace with the ghosts of the dead.”
“Keeper, I don’t worry about ghosts.” He seemed to shift, favoring his back. “And Bear Clan’s the least of my problems. I needed to see you, and then I’m going to have get as thin as fog for a while.”
“I don’t understand.”
She caught movement at the corner of her vision an instant before something wet touched her foot. Yipping, she leaped back, only to recognize a dog as it retreated to the safety of Seven Skull Shield’s feet.
“Where’d the dog come from?”
“A skinny guy on the avenue. That’s another story. I came to tell you that your husband and I—”
“Ex-husband.”
“Ex-husband,” he agreed. “He’s gone too far. I can’t let him put a price on my head. And I can’t run. He was at Wooden Doll’s last night. Because of me. If he’s hurt her, threatened her? I can’t have that. You understand, don’t you?”
Wooden Doll. The fancy woman who Traded her bodily skills down at River Mounds City. Her name had cropped up last spring when Blue Heron had been hunting Seven Skull Shield. The inflection in his voice indicated that she was more to Seven Skull Shield than just a mere night’s entertainment.
“I do understand.” She shied away from the dog, her eyes having adjusted to the dark. Was the beast as homely as it looked, or was it just too dark to make it out clearly? Seating herself on the bed, she asked, “Have you eaten?”
“A bowl of stew this afternoon. I could stand another.”
“Notched Cane!” she raised her voice. “Two helpings. Bring one for the thief.”
“That’s who you’ve been talking to? How’d he get in there?”
“That does seem to be the eternal question, doesn’t it?” she mused dryly.
“Keeper?” Seven Skull Shield asked, “What’s the Tortoise Bundle, and why is it so important?”
For a moment, she just stared in disbelief. “Talk about the last thing I’d expect to come out of your mouth. Where did you hear about the Tortoise Bundle?”
“From a woman who calls herself its guardian.”
As if she’d swallowed a chunk of ice, a cold chill ran through her stomach.