QUILLER
Roaring wind shudders the mammoth-hide lodge over our heads, but RabbitEar and I barely notice where we sit together before the fire. I’ve tied the door flap back so we can watch the storm. It’s been raining hard since dusk.
Lifting my wooden cup, I take a sip of tundra wildflower tea. The sweet tangy flavor soothes me. Jawbone still sleeps in the rear beneath a mound of bison hides with his sisters. Their four blond heads are like yellow ducks arranged in a row.
“This is a bad time to send a boy on a spirit hunt,” I say. “We should tell him he can’t go.”
“He’ll throw a fit if we do. He told me he’s going no matter what. Besides, it’s summer. The quest wall will be dry by noon.”
“What if the rain turns to snow tonight? By noon, every handhold and toehold will be filled with water. He’ll fall long before he reaches the first children’s camp.”
RabbitEar sloshes the tea around his cup. He hasn’t taken a drink in a long while, but he keeps staring down into the pale liquid as though trying hard to see the future there. “He’s more surefooted than you think he is. Don’t try to stop him. He has his heart set on becoming a man.”
“Fine, but why not wait a few days until we’re certain there isn’t another storm on the horizon? Surely a few more days won’t matter?”
“It does to him.” My husband reaches out to touch my arm. His red beard glimmers in the firelight. “Not only that, Elder Stone Bowl says if he doesn’t go now, his next spell may kill him. And you know as well as I do that they’re getting worse. He needs to find a spirit helper to heal him.”
My gaze drifts to our children. Jawbone’s spear rests right over his head in case he needs to grab it and rush outside to help his father fight off lions or wolves in the night. He is, truly, the bravest boy I have ever seen. I have witnessed him leap in front of his sisters with his spear to shield them from a short-faced bear that abruptly appeared in the brush while we were gathering berries. He would lay down his life to save them in a heartbeat.
RabbitEar pulls his hand away and sighs. “His last attack really scared me, Quiller. I’ve never seen him jerk about like a clubbed rabbit.”
“Nor have I. But his spells don’t scare me nearly as much as the stories he’s started to tell about the other boy who torments him.”
“Other boy?”
I suddenly realize I’ve just revealed my son’s most closely held secret, but I can’t stop now. Very softly, I say, “Don’t you ever ask him about this. Do you understand? He told me this in confidence.”
“Yes.” RabbitEar waves it away.
Glancing at the hides where Jawbone sleeps, I feel like a rotten carcass, but I say, “He told me the other boy lives in a cave in the back of head. The cave is covered with a buffalo hide, but sometimes the boy sneaks out.”
RabbitEar’s eyes narrow. “A child’s imagination.”
“Are you sure?” I faintly hiss the words. I don’t want any of our children to overhear this conversation, least of all Jawbone.
RabbitEar lowers his voice to match mine. “Do you think the other boy is an evil spirit that brings on his spells?”
I make a helpless gesture with one hand. “Maybe. Who knows? He’s told me almost nothing.”
“He wouldn’t. He doesn’t want you to think he’s fainthearted.” RabbitEar bows his head to stare into his cup again. “Which is even more of a reason to send him on a spirit quest. Perhaps if he can face the other boy, speak to him, or maybe kill him, Jawbone’s spells will vanish and he will become the man he should be.”
“Kill the other boy? Why would he . . .”
We both flinch when the Ice Giants roar and the sea cave quakes around us. Our icy world is never quiet, never still. Even now, I can hear entire cliffs of ice cracking loose and splashing into the sea in the distance.
I watch Little Fawn’s yellow hair drag across the hide as she rolls to her back. Is she awake?
Leaning close to RabbitEar, I whisper, “It’s foolish to force our son to go on this quest now! Even if he can get a grip on the handholds and toeholds, the shadowed ledges could be covered with ice. Why can’t this quest wait just a little longer?”
RabbitEar clutches his cup in both hands and gives me a resolute look. “If he starts early each morning, he’ll make it to the next camp by midday. He’ll be all right.”
I don’t respond. An eerie sense of disaster haunts me, as though something dark and hooded lives in the crevices of the quest wall and it’s waiting to cast my son to his doom.
Taking a long drink of tea, I lower the cup and rest it upon my drawn-up knee. “If we start at dawn tomorrow, we won’t even get there until noon. By then—”
“Do you think I’ll let Jawbone start climbing if the wall isn’t safe?”
“No. Of course not.”
I study my husband. I’ve been so consumed with dread that I’ve barely spoken with RabbitEar. For days I’ve locked myself in an internal prison where all I do is hear the sound of Jawbone’s laughter, feel his arms around my neck, see the love in his eyes. I’ve been so preoccupied that I’ve ignored the fact that RabbitEar has been locked in a similar prison, and perhaps experiencing it with even greater agony than my own. Jawbone’s spells must make him feel just as powerless and alone as I feel.
I reach out and rest my hand on his bearded cheek. “Forgive me. I know you’d never endanger our son. I just—”
“Quiller, he wants to do this. It’s important to him. Let him go.”
“My greatest fear is that Jawbone will have one of his spells when he’s clinging to the wall. If he does . . .”
As RabbitEar stares at me, anger slowly fills his eyes. “You’re not the only one who’s considered that possibility. I’ve imagined it happening over and over. Seen him go over backward . . .” He turns to blink at Jawbone.
The hides move, and I fear our son is listening to us.
Setting my cup down, I wrap my arms around RabbitEar. “Enough. I don’t want to fight with you.”
“I don’t want to fight, either. Will you gather the things Jawbone will need for the climb, so we can walk him there at dawn?”
“Yes,” I say and immediately regret it.