This was the event that boys most eagerly anticipated and desperately feared. Unlike most, who had time to prepare, the initiation into manhood was being thrust on Mud Puppy at a moment’s notice. He lay on his back on the split-cane matting beside the great fire in the Men’s House.
Normally, he would have been excited to see the interior. Until this moment, it had been forbidden to him. Upon being led within, he had the briefest glance of the colorful masks that hung on the walls, the atlatls, darts, and smooth skulls. The latter, trophies of hard-fought battles, watched him with empty black eyes and grinning brown teeth.
All of the Speakers and lineage heads had come to the Men’s House for his initiation. His only relative, Yellow Spider, sat just to his right, a sober concern in his eyes as Mud Puppy had undergone the ritual lashing with palmetto whips. They beat him to drive the child from his body. Then his smarting skin was splashed with salt water to begin the healing.
After that, he had been ordered to lie down on the floor, his head facing the West—symbolic of the fact that one day he, too, would die. The sharp cane cut into his raw back as the Serpent began the process of tattooing his chest. He closed his eyes against the pain. His jaw ached and knotted, and his teeth hurt as he clamped them against the stinging fire that prickled his chest.
Don’t be afraid. You cannot show fear. They can kill you if they think
you are unworthy. He hadn’t wanted to do this. His heart had been thumping like a shrunken drumhead as the Serpent and Mud Stalker led him here. It had taken all of his courage to keep from breaking and running. But for the surprise of the moment, he would have.
Around him the irregular chanting of the men kept time with the clacking of rhythm sticks and thumping of a hide-covered drum. They were all here: the leaders of the clans, prominent men, and lineage leaders. They had dressed in their finery, brightly colored feathers in their hair, faces painted in red, white, blue, yellow, and black. Many had slathered alligator or bear grease on their skin, the mixture containing crushed honeysuckle, redbud, or other flowers to scent their bodies.
The last image before he’d squeezed his eyes closed was of the Serpent bending over him, blotting out the sight of the soot-grimed thatch roof. The copper needle in the old man’s hand had gleamed in the firelight. A smile had split the Serpent’s flat face as he stared affectionately down at Mud Puppy.
Again and again the copper prick was twirled into Mud Puppy’s skin, only to be followed by the old man’s blood-caked fingertips as he dipped them in charcoal and rubbed the black color into the wounds.
Mud Puppy would not receive the intricate pattern of dots his brother had been given. He had achieved no accolades in war or Trade. No one sang of his great deeds during the hunt. Instead, only a line of dots running down from the notch between his collarbones to the end of his breastbone and simple arches over each breast were being tattooed into his skin: the marks of manhood.
“You must make no noise, no sound. You must not show the least sign of fear or pain. If you do, they will beat you with clubs and chase you out of the Men’s House. You will live the rest of your life in shame. If you cry like a baby, they will be forced to kill you to cleanse the shame from inside the Men’s House.” The Serpent’s words echoed in his head. “But you do not worry me, Mud Puppy. This is nothing compared to the terrors of that night on the Bird’s Head. After Dancing with the mushroom and walking hand in hand with the spirits, this will pass like a dream.”
A whimper rose unbidden in his throat; he swallowed hard to stifle it before it could be heard. No, he must not allow them to see any trace of pain or fear. But how? The pricking needle, the rubbing fingers, the line of fire crossing his chest was growing worse. Panic curled and flexed under his ribs. Within heartbeats, he would be screaming his fear and pain.
“Talk to me!” the voice came echoing from deep in his souls.
“Masked Owl?” he asked, hardly aware that he’d spoken aloud. The faintest break in the rhythmic chanting and clacking could be heard.
“Hush!” the Serpent muttered angrily.
The voice told him: “Keep your eyes closed. Concentrate. I am here. Hovering above you, around you, my wings beating away the pain. Look with your souls. Do you see me?”
Mud Puppy tried to see Masked Owl’s familiar form, but a glowing blackness, a hovering dark shape, flew around him on midnight wings that traced rainbows through the air.
“Many Colored Crow?” Mud Puppy asked. “Is that you?”
“Hush!” the Serpent’s voice chastised again.
“Yes, I have come to watch you be made into a man. You are important to me, young friend. The future lies with you.” A pause. “Your brother is here. He says you look like a splayed worm, wiggling and jiggling .”
At that, Mud Puppy laughed and spoke from his Dream, “That’s like you, isn’t it, White Bird? You always made me laugh when you teased me.”
“He says to tell you he misses you.”
“And I miss you, Brother.”
“He asks, Do you remember the time you greased the log bridge across the gully?”
“We thought Yellow Spider was supposed to come home that way, but it was Uncle Cloud Heron who appeared on the trail. He started across, carrying a sack of poison sumac cuttings to make fish poison out of.” His uncle had slipped, and plunged headfirst into the sticky black mud. The subsequent rash had deviled him for weeks. Mud Puppy chuckled out loud, remembering his uncle’s mad roars as he and White Bird cowered in the modest concealment of a cane patch and hoped they wouldn’t be discovered.
From somewhere in the distance he heard the Serpent make a shushing sound.
“And the worst thing was, we did it to him again, not a year later,” Mud Puppy added silently, then burst into giggles.
“Quit that!” the Serpent’s voice intruded.
Mud Puppy blinked his eyes open, the last of the giggles dying on his lips. He realized that the room was silent, that the pain in his chest was returning. The Serpent had a puzzled look on his face.
“I was talking to Many Colored Crow,” Mud Puppy blurted. In panic he realized that the men lining the walls were staring at him
with uneasy brown eyes. “Did I do something wrong?” He tried not to wince at the returning pain.
“No one laughs,” the Serpent muttered. “It is supposed to be a test of courage. To be taken seriously.”
“I’m sorry.” Mud Puppy glanced around nervously. “Forgive me.”
He nodded for the Serpent to go ahead, and couldn’t help but hear the soft whispering as the chanting began again. The words didn’t carry the conviction this time, and Mud Puppy could feel the difference in the air: uncertainty, hesitation. He screwed up his face to mask the renewed pain as the Serpent twisted the needle in the seemingly endless process of making him a man.
Can’t I do anything right? When he opened his eyes again, it was to see Mud Stalker staring hard at him from one side, something dangerous and provocative behind his eyes.
“Beware,” Many Colored Crow whispered to his souls. “They will begin to fear you now.”
Fear me? The notion took him off guard. Since when had anyone feared Mud Puppy?
“You laughed during your initiation,” Many Colored Crow reminded. “They will remember that. And the fact that you talked to me.”
A sudden fear ran through him.
“From this night forward,” Many Colored Crow whispered, “you must live differently, Mud Puppy. Everything has changed. Hear my words: After tonight they will try to destroy you. Place your trust in your Spirit Helpers, in the animals, and in the plants. Look beyond the skin. See into the souls. You will not find allies in the usual places.”
“Masked Owl said—”
“Has he promised you the One? Promised you the Dance? Are you just another of his playthings like your brother, White Bird? A thing to be broken and discarded if you disappoint him?”
“What?”
“Let me show you what Masked Owl has in mind for you.”
The vision came spinning out of the darkness behind his eyes. Death swirled around like a charcoal wind. The odor of putrefaction wafted past his nostrils, while coldness touched his skin. He could sense the huge black shape of a malignant bird hovering above, feel the cold strokes of the spirit bird’s midnight wings.
Mud Puppy bolted into a sitting position, pointing up at the charred rafters. “There!”
“What?” The Serpent stumbled backward, clawed for balance, and craned his thin neck to peer up at the smoke-hazed ceiling of
the Men’s House. The clacking music died along with the chanting on everyone’s lips. Heads craned, wide eyes fixed on the ceiling.
“A big black crow!” Mud Puppy blinked, his chest pulsing with agony. He could feel blood trickling down the sides of his ribs as he searched the ceiling. “Up there,” he sputtered lamely. “Dark, and … smelling of death.”
In the deepening silence, only the crackle of logs in the fire could be heard.
“Yes, I feel him up there.” The Serpent drew a wary breath, letting it out as a hiss. “Leave here!” He pointed a finger at the dark roof. “This place is not for you. This boy is not for you! Go back! Back to the darkness of the West and your lair of corruption.”
Mud Puppy could feel the rising tension in the room. He was acutely aware of the stares going from him, to the ceiling, to the Serpent, and back to the ceiling again.
Mud Stalker broke the silence, hardly masking his impatience. “I don’t see anything.”
“You wouldn’t,” the Serpent replied softly, his eyes still fixed above.
Mud Puppy cocked his head. “Did you hear that?”
The Serpent frowned. “What?”
“Giant wings beating the air,” Mud Puppy told him. “Like the whistling a crow makes when it takes off fast.”
The Serpent nodded, as if this made perfect sense.
“What is going on here?” Mud Stalker demanded, stepping forward. “Is this the way a man is made?”
“It is tonight.” The Serpent shot him a hot glance. “Power is loose! It is shifting and curling, surrounding us—held back only by these four walls!” Silence filled the room. “Now, watch, you men. Study this boy! Your futures are borne upon his blood!”
The Serpent slipped a hand into the sack hanging from his waist thong and removed a sliver of milky gray chert. “This stone comes from the far north. There, the Earth Beings deposited their semen and it hardened, became this stone.” He straddled Mud Puppy’s legs, pushed him flat again, and squatted. In two quick motions, the old man slashed a deep cross on the middle of Mud Puppy’s breastbone over his heart. “With it, I mark you.”
Mud Puppy’s souls twisted, and his lungs jumped and pulled at the bottom on his throat. Tears silvered the edges of his vision.
The Serpent raised the bloody flake of stone for all to see, and cried, “Know all, that this man, whom I today name Salamander, is marked with two crossing lines. The cross on his chest reminds us of the four directions. It is the place where things come together,
an intersection between Power and the world. From now on, when you see this man, you will think of things coming together, crossing.”
“This isn’t right,” Clay Fat muttered from his clan seat along the south wall.
“No, it isn’t,” Deep Hunter agreed. “This boy isn’t acting right.”
The Serpent stalked forward; his hard eyes challenged the Speakers. “It is very right. More right than you could know. What has happened here tonight isn’t about you, or your scheming clans. This new man, this place where we live, is caught between warring Powers. I will tell you this thing once, knowing you will not understand or heed my warning. This man we have made tonight, Salamander, will have to fight for you all. He will have to do it alone, for most of you will betray him!”
Mud Puppy blinked against the tears and tried to understand the seemingly insane words the Serpent spoke. The slit skin oozed and pulsed in red—the flow of it down into his navel frightening and terrible. He barely registered the looks of uncertainty that passed from man to man, or comprehended how individuals were shifting warily, jaws working. The room roiled like water about to erupt into steam.
The Serpent pointed a gnarly blood-caked finger at Mud Puppy, and cried, “I give you Salamander, son of Wing Heart, of the Owl Clan! Nephew to the great Cloud Heron, brother to the late Speaker, White Bird. Greet him and praise him.”
With that, the Serpent pitched the bloody flake into the fire and strode toward the doorway. He walked as though possessed of a terrible purpose; then his thin body vanished into the night beyond the Men’s House.
Salamander. I am now called Salamander. That is my man’s name.
Through the agony in his chest, Mud Puppy was aware of one or two muttered greetings. One by one, the men seemed to shuffle to their feet, easing away as if they were tendrils of smoke. He barely noticed, his blurring vision fixed on blood that had begun to mat and dry on his chest. The throbbing pain was growing worse, and he could do nothing about it but endure.
“I don’t understand what happened here tonight,” Mud Stalker said as he bent down and met Mud Puppy’s gaze with hooded eyes. “But know that I am your friend, Salamander. Don’t forget that. In the coming days you are going to be in need of a friend.” He offered his good hand. “Come, let me help you up. Your mother and your late brother’s wives have prepared a feast for you.”
Yellow Spider appeared by his other elbow. “I don’t know what
you did, but it got everyone’s attention.” To Mud Stalker he added, “I’ll take his other arm. Let’s get him home.”
Salamander’s souls screamed in agony, but no sound passed his lips as Mud Stalker and Yellow Spider pulled him upright.
The room seemed to sway; and through the pain, an urge to throw up coiled in Salamander’s stomach. He fought it, struggling to keep his balance despite the weakness in his knees. Mud Stalker’s firm hand stabilized him.
“They will fear you now,” Many Colored Crow’s voice called through the haze of pain and blood, “ … and people always seek to destroy what they fear.”
Salamander lay on a cane mat in the midday shade behind Water Petal’s house. The incisions on his chest burned and ached under the slathering of bear grease. Before rubbing it on, the Serpent had mixed it with a concoction of gumweed and pine resin. The latter, he said, promoted healing and kept the insects away.
So many things were wheeling through his head. From where he lay, he could see the smoking remains of his house. Or, rather, his old house. It had been torched the evening before, in full ceremony, and White Bird’s bones had been incinerated along with everything that had been Mud Puppy’s. Not only had his few possessions gone up in fire, but so had an entire lifetime. Nothing remained the same.
He kept stumbling over the inevitability of that, eyes focused on the smoking rubble. It was then that Hazel Fire and Jackdaw came trotting along the edge of the embankment, turned onto the ridge, and approached. Their bodies were lithe and lean in the midday sun, muscles flexing and sliding as they trotted forward. Their hair had been pinned to one side as was the manner of their people, and they carried atlatls and darts in their right hands. As they caught sight of Salamander, both waved and turned in his direction.
Salamander managed a smile, but the pain that accompanied the subsequent wave brought a grimace to his face. His chest skin might have been pulled apart given the way it felt.
“Greetings, Salamander,” Hazel Fire called as he slowed and led Jackdaw into the cool shade. “It is our pleasure to greet you as a man.”
“I am happy to receive you.” Salamander smiled at them. “Could I get you something? There’s water inside. I think some of the root bread is left.” He gasped as he started to sit up.
Jackdaw waved him down. “Don’t move, at least, not on our account.” The Wolf Trader was frowning at the swollen scabs and pustulant tattoos. “We have come to bid you farewell.”
“You are leaving?” Salamander asked. “I hope it’s not because of White Bird. He wouldn’t want you to go just because of what happened to him.”
“It isn’t just that,” Hazel Fire said as he hunched down and leaned his back against the wall. “The water in the swamp is beginning to drop. People have been more than generous. We can’t carry all that we’ve been given in Trade as it is.”
“White Bird was our partner,” Jackdaw added.
Hazel Fire gave Salamander a serious inspection. “He was more than that. He was married to my sister in my own village. That strengthens the tie between us. It is for that reason that we are leaving you all the goods we cannot carry. Some we have given to Yellow Spider. The rest are yours to dispose of as you will.”
Salamander frowned. “This isn’t necessary.”
“You will need it,” Jackdaw replied, squatting and resting his wrists on his knees. “You should hear the talk. People are saying all kinds of things about you, about your mother, and what Mud Stalker is planning.”
“I don’t want any part of it.” Salamander looked away, a sadness in his breast.
“No, but it is being thrust upon you.” Hazel Fire rubbed his back against the rough mud wattle, scratching between his shoulder blades. “We have learned a great many things while we have been here in your town. You were kind to us, Mud Puppy.”
“Salamander,” Jackdaw reminded. “They call him Salamander now.”
“Your brother spoke to us of you.” Hazel Fire studied the smoking ruins of Wing Heart’s house. “But I don’t think he understood who or what you are.”
Salamander cocked an eyebrow as Hazel Fire pulled the little red owl from his pouch.
“This owl has brought me Dreams.” He held it before his sober brown eyes, studying it thoughtfully. “I have thought about the day you talked to the alligator. You wear Power the way other men wear a cloak.”
“I’m just me.” But he wasn’t sure he wanted to be himself any longer. Nothing led him to believe that things were going to get better. Many Colored Crow speaking to him at his initiation had frightened him. As of that moment, the Spirit World had taken on a threatening quality.
“Your people see you through slitted eyes.” Hazel Fire turned the little polished owl in the light. “Sometimes it takes a stranger to look at a man with his eyes wide open. I speak for all of us when I tell you we are honored to know you.”
“I had a Dream last night,” Salamander said cautiously. “It concerned you.”
“I would hear your Dream.” Hazel Fire gave him a clear-eyed look.
“In it I saw you reach the mouth of a great river that fed in from the east. High bluffs rise on that eastern bank. Raiders lie in wait there. They have a camp on a stone outcrop that overlooks the Father Water. From there they can see who passes on the river.”
“You saw this?” Jackdaw asked uneasily. “From the river?”
“No, I was riding on Masked Owl’s wings. Circling high above. These raiders, they wear black stripes on their faces and do not honor the Power of Trade. In the Dream, you passed the mouth of that river at night and no harm came to you. Do you know this place?”
Hazel Fire nodded. “It sounds like the mouth of the Great Eastern River that feeds the Father Water. What if we were to pass during the day?”
“The raiders will sweep down on you. In loaded canoes, you will not be able to outrun them. On the open water, flooded as that place will be, you will make easy targets.”
“Why do you tell us this thing?” Jackdaw asked, clearly uneasy.
“You are my friends.” Salamander smiled. “You are good men. Kin to me through marriage. We are bound by the gift of that carved owl. I would have you return in safety to my brother’s wife and his little daughter.”
“You know that Lark had a girl?” Hazel Fire narrowed a skeptical eye.
“She has a birthmark, like a flower petal on her hip.” He pointed to the fleshy swell of his own hip to mark the place. “If you pass that place I have told you of with great care, you may yet see that mark on my brother’s daughter.”
“I would dearly like to see that.” Hazel Fire had turned his attention to the gleaming stone owl. “We will deliver those goods to your house, Mud Puppy.”
“They call him Salamander now,” Jackdaw reminded.
“Yes, yes.” Hazel Fire shot Salamander a sidelong gaze as he raised the small carved owl in his fingers. “We live far away, my friend. I know not what I can ever do for you, but by the Power in this owl, I will do what I can to help you.”
“I ask only for your Trade. That, and that you beware at the mouth of the Great Eastern River. They will be waiting for you there. It would pain my souls if they caught you.”
“We hear your words, Salamander. And are warned.” Hazel Fire gave him a wary scrutiny. “You are headed for great things, young friend.”
He smiled sadly. “Greatness and tragedy seem to embrace like lovers.”