He’s more bear than man. His beard is dotted with icicles, his shaggy brown hair melts into a thick fur coat that reaches down to his shins to meet two large boots. Gloves with cut-off fingertips and a hat are made of coarse, waterproofed wool. Silently, he gazes down at me as if I’m an apparition from another world.
I’m about to point out that he’s the one who looks absurd — a cross between man and beast — when he lifts the muzzle of his rifle and points it at me. It’s an old weapon, but accurate enough to kill from such a short distance.
‘I am Mickaela Capra, Sequencer’s apprentice in her third year.’ I almost gag on my own words. ‘I lost my SatPad. I’m injured and need to contact my people.’ I cock my head at him, trying to look friendly. I forget how that’s supposed to work with men. ‘Could you help me, please?’
He scowls and doesn’t lower his weapon. If he squeezed the trigger now, the bullet would hit me in the solar plexus.
‘Where’s your Sequencer?’
‘He was killed by the BSA,’ I answer.
The muzzle drops a fraction and that’s when I know he’s close to where I need him. I push a bit more. ‘Did the Sequencers already pick up the samples of dog lungs?’
He blinks. ‘Might be in a week or two. I don’t know your face. How come you know about the tuberculosis monitoring campaign?’
‘I was with your clan two winters ago. Katvar made me this.’ I slip my cold hand under my scarf and tug at the small ivory dog.
The disapproval in his expression comes as a surprise. His eyebrows bunch up as he slings his rifle over his shoulder and offers me a hand. ‘Can you stand?’
———
A settlement appears on the horizon — small, shadowy blobs amid the white. ‘Why are you so far east this winter?’ I ask, although I know perfectly well.
‘Ran into problems with the neighbours.’
‘Problems that made you move your winter camp several hundred kilometres?’
The bear man, Sal, doesn’t reply. He introduced himself a couple of minutes ago, after two long and silent hours of racing through the snowy countryside. But I’m only guessing how long we’ve been travelling; the sun is covered by clouds and time crawls slower when one wants to be done with freezing, with being hungry, thirsty, exhausted, and in pain.
I’m folded up next to a moose carcass. While it was still warm, I had my arms wrapped around its furry neck, my fingers dipping into the wound and then into my mouth, again and again. I have no idea how he killed the moose, because the hole in its neck was not inflicted by a bullet. Whatever caused it, it looks as if Sal has enlarged it with a knife. There’s another hole in the animal’s chest, a little smaller. I’ll ask him about it later.
Now, the carcass is stiff, its blood tastes off, and I can’t quite move my limbs from underneath the heavy body. At least, I got a little liquid and a few calories into me. Life is improving.
The wind carries cries of welcome to my ears. My heart skips a beat. All will be good, I tell myself. And yet, somewhere in the back of my skull is a scraping sensation. Danger! it whispers over and over again, making my muscles tense and my head ache. I try to calm my breathing.
The sled slows as we enter the village. My eyes are sharp, scanning for potential attackers. My right hand wants to touch the pistol strapped to my leg, but I won’t let it. One doesn’t beg for help wielding a loaded gun. I ball my empty hands to fists. All will be good, I repeat in my mind.
Sal shouts, ‘Stop!’ The dogs come to a halt and plop into the snow, long tongues lolling past rows of sharp teeth. Yurts stand in a semi-circle, there’s a log house at the centre with adobe plaster on its outside and a snow-covered roof. The circular opening at the top expels wisps of smoke. Scents of scorched herbs waft through the cold air.
A group of kids, six of various sizes, all covered in thick furs, approach at a run. Sal shoos them away, but they just grin at him, and stare at me and the moose, all of them rooted to the spot, poking elbows into each other’s sides.
He helps me off the sled, because I’m frozen stiff, and then he half-carries, half-walks me to one of the yurts. ‘Oy!’ he calls as we reach the entrance.
A woman opens the flap door, scans me from head to toe while he tells her where he found me, who I said I am, and that my foot is injured.
‘Ankle,’ I mutter. She’s faintly familiar to me, but I’m too exhausted to remember her name.
‘You are welcome in our home, Micka,’ she says. There’s something passing between Sal and her, unspoken words that seem like a warning.
I say my thanks and follow her inside, my stick carrying most of my weight now that Sal is gone. The room is quite large. Rugs in red and brown hues cover the floor. Some are worn down to the threads, and underneath is what seems to be a thick layer of hay and brush. At the centre of the room stands a stove that spills an enticing warmth. The walls are made of a cream-coloured, many-layered fabric. On one side of the yurt, arranged in a semi-circle around the stove, are four pallets — frames of wood, filled with thick beddings of fine birch twigs and covered with furs in all shades of black, brown, grey, and white.
‘My children will prepare a bed for you. Put your things right here. Make sure there’s no bullet in the chamber of any of your guns. The smaller kids will investigate, even if I tell them not to.’ Then, her gaze slips over my shoulder. Someone enters. Someone who seems to cause her irritation.
I turn around and find a man in furs, caked with snow from boots to shoulders. He’s not tall, maybe only a hand taller than I. Broad-shouldered and silent, he takes quick strides towards me, carrying a peculiar aura of strength and willpower ahead of him, pushing it forward and almost slapping it at my face. My right hand finds my gun easily. Safety flicked off. Index finger on the trigger guard. If I didn’t need these people so badly, he would now be hitting the ground, bleeding from two chest wounds and a hole in his head.
He reaches out and softly touches my cheek. I flinch, fighting to control my reflexes. And suddenly, I remember. ‘Katvar!’
His hand drops to his side. He looks at the woman and signs with his hands and lips, probably asking her what the hell I’m doing here.
‘I fell from the sky,’ I hear myself blurt out.
He cocks his head at me.
‘I hurt my ankle,’ I add and wonder what the fuck is wrong with my mouth, or my brain, or whatever is responsible for the garbage coming out of me.
A nod, then he turns away and stomps outside. I can hear him click his tongue, hear the dogs respond with yaps and playful growls.
I sink onto my butt, unable to stand any longer. Shit, I shouldn’t have said anything about falling from the sky.
‘I’m Seema.’ The woman gazes down at me, her hands on her hips. ‘You might remember me. I’m mother to four daughters and one son, wife of Chief Birket, of Raven and of Oakes, and I’m a maker of fine bows.’
I’m about to reach out, when I recall that the Dog People don’t make a habit of shaking hands. They give an introductory speech instead. And I do remember Seema: she gave a youngster quite a tongue-lashing the last time I was here. It had surprised me, because she seemed like someone who would never raise her voice.
‘I’m Micka. I’m a sniper. No kids, no husband, but I can hit a target from two kilometres distance.’
That’s not quite true. Two kilometres is just outside the range of my rifle, and I need a lot of target practice to get my sharp shooting skills back to where they used to be. And the kids and husband thing is… I’d better not think of it.
‘I’ll see what we can do for your leg, but first you need to eat and wash.’ She points at my mouth. I hastily lick and rub the blood off my lips. No need to sniff at my hands or clothes. I know I reek. She covers the distance to the yurt’s entrance, sticks her head outside and shouts instructions. Then she turns back to me. ‘There’ll be warm water and a tub soon. Take off your coat. It’s warm enough in here.’
I open the zipper a few centimetres to show her there is nothing underneath. ‘I don’t have a shirt.’
During the first two days of my escape, I used my two shirts and single sweater to catch all the blood. Once they were soaked, I buried them in the snow, knowing the wild dogs or other predators would find the odour of fresh blood enticing and would, hopefully, be led to my clothes instead of myself. Then, on the morning of the third day, I drenched my first pair of pants, during the afternoon, my second pair. Since then, I’ve been wet and freezing.
Seema narrows her eyes and her gaze travels from my matted hair to my grimy face and throat, and down along my coat that ends just over my knees. Various hues of brown peek out from underneath it.
The hairs on my neck bristle as she sucks in a breath. ‘You are bleeding!’ She approaches with two quick strides and gently lifts the hem of my coat to reveal my bloody pants and my soft belly.
‘When was your child born, Micka?’
‘A week ago,’ I croak, watching her hand slowly pull my coat back down.
‘It died?’
I look away. I’m glad I don’t need to answer her question, because, just then, Katvar marches in, again without announcing himself.
‘What’s wrong with you? Whistle before you enter, man!’ Seema growls at him. ‘And since you’re here already, go and fetch Barktak and be quick about it!’
He frowns and gives her a short nod, then holds out his hand to me. Two rolls of bandages for my ankle. I take them, wondering where the Dog People got the fine cotton gauze from.
‘Thanks,’ I say, but he’s already turned to leave. Katvar is just as I remember him: abrupt and short on gestures, expression forbidding, constantly unfriendly unless you bid him a forever farewell.
I can’t remember Barktak’s face, only her coarse voice and effectiveness (if not to say unfriendliness). She’d amputated my frostbitten toes two years ago, and back then, I’d caught myself wondering if she’d enjoyed cutting them off. I was a silly girl.
Seema helps me to one of the beds. I’m surprised how soft and springy it is. She retreats to the stove and scoops something from a pot into a bowl. She offers it to me, together with a wooden spoon and a mug with herbal tea. Judging from the smell, I’m pretty sure that what I’m about to eat must be the most wonderful meat stew in the world.
‘Eat slow; it’s hot,’ she cautions just as a squawk issues from one of the pallets. She crosses the room, bends down, and coos at a wiggling bundle. My heart stops.
‘My son,’ she says with a smile that’s proud and maybe a bit apologetic. ‘He is strong and healthy. Just like his three fathers.’
My daughter’s father was strong and healthy, too. It didn’t make a difference.
Seema sits, pulls at the strings of her blouse, and puts the baby to her breast. Gurgling and smacking noises tell of a happy child. ‘You will tell us your story when you’ve rested.’
I doubt that.
I shovel stew into my mouth and burn my tongue but don’t care much about it. I want to eat all of what’s in the large pot. But when my stomach cramps from the unusual amount of rich food, I place the bowl on the ground, finish my tea, and check on my injured ankle.
Unwrapping the strips of my parachute is painful and I wonder if it was stupid to use this peculiar fabric, to have it clinging to me like a telltale sign of how I got here. I scan the room and see only things that have been made by nimble hands and primitive tools. Machine-woven, super-light and durable synthetics will raise suspicion.
I press my eyes shut, think quickly, and decide for the simplest explanation, which isn’t an explanation at all: It’s a Sequencer’s thing and a secret. Period.
My cold fingers brush over my ankle; it looks sickening, much like a misshapen blue and purple balloon.
‘Jarvis,’ Seema whispers. ‘You are a good eater. I’m proud.’
I look up at her and can’t take my gaze off the scene: One tiny hand holds on to a nipple, covering the dark areola. There’s milk leaking through his fingers, a trail of rich white curling down his wrist and disappearing into his sleeve. Seema’s face is that of deep serenity and peace — a woman who seems happy and proud to be a wife and a mother. What an unusual sight.
My throat closes. My breasts never had time to produce milk.
I swallow and study my bowl to find the tiniest puddle of stew left in it — a drop, really. I scoop up the bowl and lick it clean.
With a faint plop, Seema unlatches her son, props him up for a burp, and then offers the other nipple. Within a heartbeat, lips find the target as a chubby hand strays to the emptied breast.
Too tired to sit upright, I lower my head on the furs and watch until my eyelids grow heavy. Seema begins to hum a lullaby. Peace is an illusion, my mind scoffs as I drift off to sleep.
A tap to my forehead wakes me. Two thick socks with one toe sticking out of a frayed hole. Pants made of short fur — horse, maybe? I blink and rub my tired eyes.
‘I am Barktak, mother of five, grandmother of fourteen, wife of Haruo, widow of Nehemiah. I’m the healer of this tribe.’
Her arms are folded over her chest. She looks down her hawk nose at me. Deep wrinkles carve the corners of her mouth, her eyes are the deepest blue. Her lashes are as dusty and grey as a moth in the moonlight.
Yeah, that’s her. I remember.
I clear my throat and sit up. ‘I am Mickaela Capra. Sniper. No kids, no husband.’
Barktak acknowledges me with a sharp nod. ‘Your water is ready. I will help you bathe and examine your injuries.’ She steps aside and offers her elbow.
When I push myself up, ignoring the offered aid of the old woman, she hisses at me. ‘I’m the healer. You want to mend, you listen to me. Now take my arm.’
I stand and the yurt begins to sway a little. She and I are at eye level now. ‘I’m a warrior. You want to live? Then don’t offend me.’
Her face splits open in a toothy grin and her throat produces a harsh laugh. ‘There’s more life in you than last time. You remind me of Nehemiah. Just as stubborn and proud. And stupid. Go ahead, walk to the tub by yourself and keep hurting your ankle. Might get inflamed and I’ll have to cut it off.’
I take a step and find that the pain is even worse.
Barktak looks over at Seema who’s washing her son in a bowl. His butt cheeks are all dimply and he’s punching the warm water with both fists, then he sticks them into his mouth to suck at them.
‘Why did you call me? There’s no work for me here,’ says the old woman.
Seema rolls her eyes. ‘Micka, undress and get in the tub, now. Barktak, help her. If you two don’t cooperate, I’ll wash you both outside in the snow.’
Being naked means being unarmed. That’s never good. But I need to heal and grow strong again. I clench my jaw, shed my clothes, and grab Barktak’s elbow, making myself a bit heavier than I really am just to prove a point. The woman doesn’t waver. Her steadiness doesn’t fit her bony frame. Her face looks as if she’s in her seventies, but she has the strength of a forty year-old.
I can feel the gaze of both women raking over my skin. The scars and bruises, the swollen ankle, the blood between my thighs, under my fingernails and in my matted hair. More blood runs down my legs as I walk the five slow steps to the tub; it looks like a barrel cut in half. I step into the warm water and fold myself in. A whimper slips from my mouth. What luxury! I never… If heaven did exist, would it feature a bathtub?
Gnarled, brown hands pour water over my neck and shoulders, rub unexpectedly soft over my skin. Over the DIE on my back. The countless parallel scars on my arms, chest, and legs. My knuckles — still cracked. My ankle — swollen. My belly — soft and unbearably empty.
A sob wants to squeeze through my throat; it hurts. I growl at it and shake my head. Fuck off, asshole.
Barktak takes my foot into her hands and runs her fingertips over the purple skin. ‘The swelling will go down soon. I’ll give you a salve — this, regular applications of snow, and absolute rest for four weeks will heal the fracture.’
Four weeks. That is three weeks longer than I’d planned.
She shifts and presses both hands into my stomach. ‘How long?’
‘Six days.’
‘Was the afterbirth born whole?’
‘I don’t know.’
She frowns. ‘Did the milk come in?’
‘No.’
‘What happened to your child?’
‘She’s dead.’ My cold stare tells her to shut up and leave me alone. She ignores it.
‘Was she born dead?’
I’m about to wrap my hands around her throat and squeeze until her ugly old eyes pop out of her skull.
‘Listen, child, I don’t want to dig into things you clearly don’t want to share. But I don’t want you to die under my hands. I need to know if your child was born healthy, if there were any complications during her birth, and if pieces of the afterbirth or the water bag are still inside you.’
The hardness leaves her expression. All I see is the face of a woman who has seen much in her life.
But I don’t care.
‘I don’t know what can be classified as complications during birth. She was born. She was healthy. She was… She died.’
She was beautiful. Such small fingers, her beautiful pink mouth, her warm, soft body.
Barktak nods. ‘Come. I’ll dry you off. Seema will give you new clothes and I’ll tend to your ankle and examine your lower abdomen.’
She rubs me down and I shuffle to my pallet like a ghost. I didn’t plan on revealing any of these things. I should leave tonight, I think as I lay down and shut out Barktak’s probing hands. Anything below my waistline does not belong.
The cream-coloured fabric above me changes into the sky and back into a ceiling of a simple yurt. Back and forth. There are a few wrinkles. Soft ones, not like the gashes in Barktak’s face.
Yes, I will disappear tonight. In the back of my mind, a thought begins to niggle. Some part of reality is pulling me back. Didn’t I plan to do something here? What was it that needed doing? Why the urgency?
The pressing and tugging at my belly, thighs, and between my legs ceases. Cold bites my ankle.
Slowly, I return to myself. I feel the softness of furs, the tickling of animal hair against my neck.
I look down along my body. Furs cover me. Barktak has left. Not important. I close my eyes.
Before I drift off, Seema says, ‘Many women here have lost a child. We know how you feel. You can talk to us.’
No. You don’t know a thing.
———
Another tap to my head. Does everybody wake everybody here by whacking them on the skull?
A youngster of maybe eight or nine years gives me a serious stare. She waves a knife at my face, triggering my reflexes, raising all the hairs on my skin, and bringing me dangerously close to leaping at her and twisting her neck.
‘Heard you are a Sequencer,’ she squeaks. ‘I’m a huntress. In four years I’ll be a woman and then you can take me on as your apprentice. I’ll be the best huntress in the world when I’m fourteen.’
‘Are you planning to stab me before I can recruit you?’
She blushes and quickly hides the knife behind her back.
‘How long have I been sleeping?’ I ask.
She shrugs. ‘You arrived at noon, now it’s evening. If you are hungry, you’ll have to wait. Everyone is in the log house. Masha died last night.’ Her gaze drops to her boots and she wipes her nose with the back of her hand, knife still clutched in it. Then, her face lights up. ‘I’ll have new brothers and sisters. And you! Oh!’ She whirls around, sheathes her knife, and dashes outside just to return a moment later, arms full of brush. She tosses the load onto the floor and gets six more armfuls. ‘I’m making a big bed.’
‘Could you get me a bowl with snow, please?’
‘Sure,’ she says and leaves, as quick as a flea, and returns with a pot full of snow.
‘What’s your name?’ I ask.
‘Uma.’
‘Hi Uma, I’m Micka.’ Without thinking, I hold out my hand.
She looks at it, puzzled. ‘So you people really squeeze fingers when you meet?’
I drop my arm. ‘Sometimes. Other times we wave our hands or just nod at each other. When we like someone a lot, we hug.’
‘When we don’t like someone, we don’t say anything.’ She grins wickedly. ‘We look them in the eyes and make sure we don’t turn our backs to them.’
‘Makes sense. And when you like them?’
‘We head-butt them.’ She giggles and slaps her thigh. ‘No, we do this.’ And she takes a step forward, bends down to me and softly touches her forehead to mine.
That reminds me of how Katvar said goodbye to me two years ago. ‘When someone touches your lips with his fingers to say goodbye, what does that mean?’
‘Uh. Serious stuff. That’s what husbands and wives do. Do you need help with that?’ She points at my ankle.
‘No, thanks,’ I say as I unwrap the bandages.
‘Okay.’ She shrugs, turns to her humongous pile of shrubs, and begins to layer them neatly on the other side of the stove. The outlines grow to a square of about two by two metres.
‘I’m used to sleeping on a small rug,’ I say, worried my hosts might believe I needed a huge bed or other wasteful things.
‘Good,’ Uma replies without looking up from her work. ‘That’s for four people. You’ll probably be used as a pillow.’ Her smile shows through light-brown bangs. There’s a tiny gap between her upper two front teeth.
‘Who else will sleep there?’ I ask.
‘Masha’s kids. Chief’s one of their dads, so they’ll live here now.’
‘How did she die?’
The girl stops, about to answer, but then continues laying twigs on the slowly growing mattress. After some consideration, she whispers, ‘Sometimes I think I don’t want to have babies. I don’t want to leave them alone when my time comes.’
My skin prickles. I watch the girl while the snow melts on my ankle, cooling the pain down to a rheumy throb. As I dab off the water, she begins carrying in the furs to cover the twig mattress. ‘That looks very comfy,’ I say.
‘It’s a good bed.’
‘Why do the women here have many husbands?’ I must have been half blind last time I was here, because I didn’t notice how their families were organised. I was probably too focussed on Runner and on finding out what he did for a living.
‘Because that’s normal,’ Uma answers and squints at me. Her brain is rattling behind her eyes. ‘Is it not normal where you come from?’
I blink and look up at the ceiling. Swirling patterns of clouds, stars, moon and sun have been sewn there with blue thread. I’m about to say that, where I come from, it’s normal for a man to have several wives aged nine to twenty-five. Sometimes, but not often, the girls are even younger. But they are never older, because they’ve already been used up by abuse, rape, malnutrition, and excruciatingly hard work. Or they’ve been shot or beaten to death, sometimes burned. But they usually die when giving birth to their fifth or sixth child.
‘One man can have many wives,’ I say at last. ‘I’ve never seen a woman with more husbands than one.’
‘That’s not smart,’ Uma pipes up. ‘What if the man dies? Who will hunt and provide for all his kids and wives?’
‘Hm. Good question,’ I mutter although I already know the answer: no one. If your husband dies, your kids will either be assimilated into military training, or, if too young to carry a rifle, they’ll be killed with a blow to the head and a knife to the throat. Widows are made available to all men in the camp. Some women would call it prostitution. But I’ve read somewhere that a prostitute gets paid for her services.
Blood is seeping onto the thick bandages between my thighs. It’s as if my uterus is weeping hot tears for a loss it cannot explain. Maybe it’s compensating for something my eyes are unable to do.
———
The yurt is dimly lit by an oil lamp. Shapes of sleeping people form bumps on the floor. The large bed is occupied by Uma and Masha’s three kids. Tears were spilled in abundance; the smallest of them — a three year-old boy whose name I didn’t hear properly — fell asleep at Seema’s breast and is now curled up in Uma’s armpit.
No one has interrogated me and I don’t understand why. How can these people survive if they keep inviting strangers into their homes, not asking them the most important questions? Where did you come from? Where are you heading? What side are you on? Who did you kill? Who do you plan to kill?
I lie on a pallet that used to be Uma’s and I’m glad I don’t need to share it with three orphans. I don’t like being touched. Hate it.
My mind’s eye shows me the usual: war, death, carnage. The yurt collapses, an avalanche of Erik’s troop rolls over men, women, children, staining the snow deep black in the faint light of the waning moon. My hand doesn’t stray from my loaded pistol.
———
I have not seen Katvar in three days. Birket’s home is now closed to everyone who is not family, because the new mother needs rest. That’s me. I’m considered a new mother although the necessary other half is missing.
Seema explained to me that a woman doesn’t stop being a mother when her children leave — be it to marry a man or woman in another clan, or to go to their ancestors.
I nodded at her then. I can accept that notion of souls going places, I guess, but it’s not my belief. I’m pretty sure that when you are dead, you’re dead and that’s it. No paradise at the end of a long, dark tunnel.
The Dog People feed and pamper me. Uma tells me it’s what’s done with all new mothers. They have to heal and regain their strength. I get the impression that women here are considered valuable and that weighs like a rock on my chest.
At headquarters, the girls and women were considered dirty (I should say “even dirtier”) for twenty days after giving birth if the child lived, and ten days if the child died. That alone was a motivation for many men to get rid of newborns. But even then, only a females’ lower half was the dirty part. The mouth was considered unsoiled.
‘You look like you want to kill someone,’ Uma says and moves her fingers in the air.
I think of my own child and how short her life was. My mind strays there unbidden and frequently. I wish I could cut that part out.
‘I said, “You look like you want to kill someone.” Are you still here? Micka?’
My head snaps up. I try to relax my jaws. She nods at the piece of wood in my lap. I look down at it; my right hand is trembling. I uncurl my fingers and a bead of blood crawls along the ridges and furrows of my palm. The sharp little rock I’m holding is black with my sweat. I take a deep breath and rub my palms on my pants. ‘I need to take a walk.’
Uma opens her mouth for a reply, probably to comment on my ankle and that Barktak forbade me to put weight on it, then she shuts it and looks down at my work. ‘Okay,’ she says, her hand making a wiggly sign in front of her chest.
She’s teaching me sign language. Someone has told her about the ivory dog Katvar made for me and since then she’s convinced I should be able to speak my friend’s language. ‘We are not friends,’ I told her.
‘Then do it out of respect,’ she retorted.
I couldn’t disagree with that. So I’m learning sign language now. It’s a waste of time, because I’ll be leaving here soon. And it’s a bit like tying knots in my brain.
‘This is never going to be a longbow,’ I mutter at the crooked piece of oak I’m holding.
‘Looks like firewood to me.’ She giggles. ‘If Seema sees it, she’ll insist you babysit Jarvis instead.’
My face falls. When, two days ago, Seema held out her tiny boy to me and told me to be useful, I was close to losing it. ‘Anything,’ I whispered. ‘I can do anything for you, but not that.’
So now she wants me to make a longbow for her. Or whatever this thing is going to be. With a sharp rock, no less, instead of a knife. Seema showed me how the layers of wood are shaved off the hard core. She’s teaching me stuff from the Stone Age. Sometimes, when I run obsidian over oak, I touch the two pendants around my neck: the dog made of tooth and the silvery exabyte drive made to bring down the sky. Low-tech and high-tech. They belong as little together as I belong here.
Jarvis kicks off his fox fur blanket and grasps the edges of his basket. Tiny pink fingers slip between woven willow twigs. Uma bends down to him and dips her forehead against his. His mouth begins to search for his mother. ‘Uhm-uhm,’ he says.
Uma looks up at me. ‘Was that a smile?’ She signs the words she speaks, and suddenly pokes my nose. I give her a dangerously cold stare that blanches her cheeks.
She stands, walks to the door, and sticks her head out to call for Seema. I scoot back to put a little distance between me and the basket.
‘Need help?’ Uma asks as she sits back down.
I wave her away and pick up my crutch. I’m getting better at walking. Crossing the room in five seconds is my new goal for today. It takes me six seconds to reach the flap door. I’ll try again in an hour.
‘You bring war.’
My neck prickles and heat rushes over my skin. ‘What?’
‘You bring war,’ Uma whispers. ‘Everyone can see it.’
‘I don’t know what you are talking about.’ I even manage a smile before I turn my back on her and grab the door.
‘When men return home from battle, some have the same look you have. War rides on their shoulders.’
The door flap escapes my grip.
‘They bring suffering to their families,’ Uma continues. ‘You should leave soon.’
Slowly, I turn my head and gaze over my shoulder. ‘You are wise. Don’t worry, I’m eager to leave.’
I step out into the deep snow. The sunlight blinds my eyes and I stagger as far away from Seema’s yurt as I can without hurting my ankle and delaying my departure. I walk past a group of women skinning and cutting up deer carcasses, past the laughing, jesting, and the telling of stories about dog, wolf, and bear — as if these people understood the languages of beasts. No mentioning of battles won or lost, no talk about strategies, weapons, enemy positions and movements. Don’t they know what’s coming? How can they be so ignorant?
Behind a group of trees I hide, crouch down and bury my face in my hands. War rides on my shoulders. What an apt description.
A gentle wind pushes clumps of snow off the trees. They land with small thuds in the snow cover, punching holes into it. The sun throws sparks over the white landscape. Crows are cawing above me; they can be found all around the village, scavenging for bits of food. They seem to find enough to get through the winter.
I think of Rajah, of the first day we spoke. She had taken one look at my clenched fists, my cold and determined face, and she knew. She knew I wanted nothing more than to die and take as many men with me as possible. I was on the way to Erik’s hut, to grab his semiautomatic rifle and squeeze a spray of bullets into his chest, run back out into the camp and fire until the weapon stopped sputtering. The moment I walked past Rajah, she straightened up from her washing and said, ‘I made tea. Sit with me for a moment.’
Tea. How could anyone think of drinking tea in that hellhole? And yet, I sat and let my bangs slide over my brooding face.
‘I am Rajah. You are Micka, I heard.’
I nodded.
She held up her hand and spread her fingers. ‘Look.’
I didn’t look up at her, but down at the ground. There was a dark hand, shaped like a starfish, rippled by short grass and small rocks. The sun painted Rajah’s outlines onto the earth and I felt ready to press my face right there into the dirt and cry.
‘Shadows. Darkness,’ she said. ‘We think them…unnecessary. Painful. We want them gone. But see! Do you see, Micka?’
I shrugged and squinted at her.
She smiled and twisted her neck, looking up at the sun. ‘You see the sun, no?’
‘Who wouldn’t.’
She wiggled her fingers, held them up high, then pointed at the larches that silently bent in the wind, and at the dark at their feet. ‘Life casts shadows.’
And just like that, she cast herself in a new light. I wondered, and still do, how this wise, gentle, and intelligent woman could have survived the camp for so long.
I gaze at my palms, the calluses and cracks there, and whisper her name.
When I walk back to Seema’s, one of the women lifts her head and waves at me. I approach the group seated around three dead deer. The women’s hands are bloody, as are their knives. Small children squat next to them, eating bits of raw meat. The bigger kids hang thin slices of meat on a wooden rack to freeze and perhaps slowly dry in the wind and the sun.
‘Eat,’ she says and points at liver and heart — the prime parts, if one doesn’t prefer the head.
I pull my knife and everyone starts laughing.
‘You need an eating knife. Small and sharp. Not a sword.’ She holds out her own and I take it. Her expression is open and friendly and I’m surprised by my own reaction — I relax.
‘Thank you. I am Micka, sniper. No husband, no kids.’
‘I am Tari, mother of one son, wife of Oakes and Aidan.’ She says, and the other women introduce themselves, too.
I sit and eat the offered meat, help with cutting off slices for drying, and cleaning off bones for boiling. I find myself grinning at silly stories about neighbouring clans, jokes about Birket and the chief before him, and I realise I’ve never heard Katvar’s story.
‘Uma is teaching me sign language, but I don’t understand it properly yet. Can you introduce Katvar? I mean…I don’t know whose husband he is and how many children he has. But I know he’s good with dogs and…’ I trail off when everyone stares at me.
‘Katvar is no one’s husband and no one’s father and never will be,’ says an older woman who introduces herself as Krista, mother and grandmother of…I don’t know how many.
‘Why?’ I ask.
‘He has bad blood.’
‘What?’
‘It’s his story to tell,’ Tari says and offers me another piece of liver.
I reach out and take it. ‘May I ask another question?’
Tari nods and smiles. ‘You may ask as many questions as you like. We choose to answer or keep silent.’
‘Are your men ever jealous?’
A peal of laughter erupts. Even the children are amused.
‘How could they not be? But it’s the task of a good wife to pay attention and not favour one man over the other,’ Tari answers.
‘Seema has been at Birket’s home for too long,’ mutters one woman.
‘I took good care of Oakes while she was away,’ Tari replies and grins again. The fine lines around her eyes willingly conform to her laughing. They must be used to it.
Puzzled, I cock my head. ‘You enjoy it? Your husbands’…sexual attention?’
Her eyes darken when she gives me a measuring stare. ‘You do not.’ A statement, not a question.
‘I must go back,’ I say and stand. ‘Forgive my questions. I’m not used to… Forget what I said.’
I limp back to Seema’s or Birket’s or whoever’s yurt. Unfortunately, I run into Oakes, a short man with broad shoulders and a friendly face.
‘Hey Micka, Uma told me you need this.’ He holds out a piece of split oak. It’s as long as I am tall.
‘Yeah. I screwed up the first one. Sorry about that.’
‘Don’t worry. You can always use the wood shavings to start a fire.’ He laughs and offers his arm for support.
I allow myself to accept his help. ‘Why are people so happy here?’ slips from my mouth.
‘Why should they not be?’
‘I don’t know,’ I say and bite my tongue. My body might be growing stronger, but everything else seems to be softening up dangerously.