In the light of a half-moon, Anhinga drove her canoe onto the muddy landing below Sun Town. Her stealthy arrival frightened a raccoon that searched in and among the beached canoes for bits of fish guts or other edibles left by the fishermen. The beast hurried away in its rolling waddle, lucky to have escaped. Raccoon had a succulent and sweet meat.
The night pressed warmly against the land, a blessing after the cold and drizzly winter. The presence of the raccoon made it doubtful that anyone was close enough to witness her return. For a long moment, Anhinga remained still and listened to the sounds of the night: Insect wings whirred around her head. Frogs croaked. Somewhere in the distance a bull alligator roared.
Nothing moved along the line of canoes; many had been flipped over to keep water from collecting inside. The vessels reminded her of a school of sleeping fish.
She carefully stood, stepped out of the canoe, and dragged her slim boat onto the muddy bank. She bent and slung the loop of her daughter’s cradleboard onto her shoulder. Then she reached for the fabric-wrapped bundle that lay in the bow. She handled it with great care. As she started up the slope she made doubly sure that her daughter’s cradleboard hung as far as possible from the fabric bundle. She dare not even let them touch.
She slowed as she neared the top of the slope, hearing music coming from the Men’s House. The clacking rhythm of hardwood
sticks, rattles, and the thump of drums almost covered the sound of bare feet shuffling on cane matting. A heron-bone flute piped a delicate melody. Male voices rose and fell as they sang in accompaniment.
Light reflected in soft yellow from the building’s roof openings. The east-facing window made a glowing square in the dark wall. Figures darted back and forth inside. She could see that they wore masks. Some had deer antlers, others birdlike heads. Still others looked to be redheaded woodpecker, alligator, and dragonfly, all totems of war.
Let them Sing and Dance while they can.
War, like the dancers, wore many different masks.
A grim smile crossed her lips. Women weren’t supposed to see any part of the men’s secret rituals. She considered that as she turned her steps north toward the house she and Salamander had built. The mysteries of the Men’s House had always intrigued her. They had more fun than the women did, the latter sitting around weaving baskets, making pigments, and gossiping while they changed absorbent and passed their moons.
I should have been born a man. But no, had she been, she would never have had the opportunity that now presented itself. A Swamp Panther warrior would never have been allowed—as she had—to walk freely among the Sun People.
What is it about them that they do not consider a woman to be dangerous? Arrogance? Stupidity? Or just a lack of respect for her and her kind? Certainly their Clan Elders, also female, should have had the intelligence and resources to appreciate the threat she posed.
Then she recalled her uncle’s insistence that she bide her time, endure the passing seasons among the Sun People. How she had hated the wait. How smart her uncle had been; she now passed where she would, hardly garnering a second glance. She would have been faceless but for her reputation for breaking Saw Back’s face.
Thinking back, she didn’t regret it. Of course, she would have been faceless, even more invisible than she was now. Over the moons, however, that act had brought her a curious sort of recognition. People made way for her, sometimes giving her a curt nod. Not friendly, just respectful. She decided she liked that, liked it a lot.
One day soon, she would be returning home. She would see that same look in the eyes of her people. If she managed to do this thing, if it unfolded the way she planned, it would stun the Sun People to the roots of their souls. Indeed, her descendants would speak her name with awe for generations.
All it would take was courage, and the hope that she didn’t get caught before she could remove herself well beyond the Sun People’s wrath.
As she walked past it, the Women’s House was silent and dark, although the faint smell of cooking cattail and smoke hung on the heavy air. A lone dog stood up in the doorway, shook, and growled at her. She made a soft cooing noise and the cur trotted down the incline of the Mother Mound, its tail wagging. The animal appeared happy that she hadn’t thrown an old cooking clay at it.
“How are you tonight?” she asked softly.
If she could trust her night-veiled eyes, the dog was a young bitch. She bounced and whined as she followed along behind. Like most dogs in Sun Town, she didn’t receive kind words very often.
“Shsht! Don’t do that!” She raised the bundle high as the dog grabbed it with its teeth and tugged. “That’s poison! Not for you to be playing with!”
The bitch whined again, and backed off at the harsh tone. Tail wagging expectantly, she stared up at Anhinga in the faint light of the half-moon.
“Go on!” She waved her away. “Go back to whoever was feeding you back there. You don’t want any part of me.”
Cowed, the bitch dropped behind, trailing by a short distance.
Anhinga walked past the borrow pit to her dark house. Swallowing hard, she removed the door and ducked inside. On stealthy feet she crossed to Salamander’s bed, feeling his empty buffalo robe.
Good. He’s at Pine Drop’s.
She carefully laid her sleeping daughter on the bench, felt for the small ceramic pot she knew was by the bed leg, and walked back to the square of light that marked the doorway. There she found her fire-hardened digging stick where she had left it. With the pot in one hand, and the digging stick and her bundle in the other, she stepped out into the night. Haze softened the half-moon’s face, dimming the brighter stars. From Wing Heart’s house Anhinga could hear the burr of the woman’s snoring.
Anhinga laid the pot and fabric bundle on the ground. Pressing her breastbone against the end of the digging stick, she drove the sharp point into the soft earth and levered it up. It took her less than two fingers of time to dig a hole large enough to take the pot. Using only her fingertips, she placed the fabric bundle inside the pot and then capped it with a wooden plate that lay beside Wing Heart’s loom. Lowering the pot into the hole, she scooped earth over it. The excess dirt she scattered around here and there. Finally,
she laid a section of cane matting over the hump of earth and pressed it down to hide her handiwork.
In that instant, the image of Salamander’s face flashed between her souls. Panther’s blood, this was going to hurt him so. Only at that thought did her souls ache.
The crow caught Red Finger’s attention when it swooped down out of the overhanging forest and clutched a lock of his graying hair in its feet.
Shocked and surprised, Red Finger ducked, then yipped at the pain as the gleaming bird pulled the length of hair out by the roots.
In anger, he almost capsized his canoe as he scrambled for his atlatl and darts. He sent a long dart flying after the bird, clawing for balance as his canoe wobbled with the force of his release.
The crow dodged artfully to one side, the dart sailing between the branches of a tupelo before arcing down to cut cleanly into the water.
Red Finger rubbed the top of his head, glaring at the circling crow.
“What do you want?”
The bird answered with a raucous call and dived at him again. Red Finger flattened himself into the bottom of his rocking craft and glanced up warily.
The crow had landed on a low-hanging branch. It stared at him with a curious brown eye, opened its mouth, and flicked a sharp-tipped tongue at him.
“Insolent bird.” Red Finger carefully braced himself; easing his atlatl back as he fitted another dart into the nock. In a sinuous movement his arm went back. The cast was liquid, fast, and accurate.
To his amazement, the crow bobbed down, flattening itself on the branch as the dart hissed within a feather’s breadth of its shining back.
C a a a a w w w w w! The sound echoed through the swamp as the crow mocked him and bounced to yet another branch. There, it flapped its wings, teasing him.
Red Finger muttered under his breath and picked up his paddle. The cursed bird had to have been someone’s pet. A fledgling stolen from the nest, raised and trained by some swamp hunter.
As he closed, the bird flipped off the branch and sailed farther
into the swamp. Red Finger paddled after it, stopping on occasion to reach up and finger the raw place on his scalp.
For a hand of time he followed the pesky bird. Each time his interest waned, the crow dived at him, snatching at his hair, raising his ire to the boiling point again.
Thus it was that by the middle of the day, he found himself deep within Swamp Panther territory.
The crow circled him, fluttering just out of reach. Red Finger used his atlatl to flail at it, hoping to smack the miserable pest from the sky. It avoided his wild blows with uncanny ease.
“What do you want of me?” he declared, half in anger, half in wary suspicion. Snakes! This wasn’t a spirit bird, was it? Or, blood and pus, worse, it wasn’t some creature trained by the Swamp Panthers to lure unwitting hunters into their territory where they could be ambushed and killed?
With that thought, he lifted his paddle, prepared to leave the accursed bird to its own devices, when he saw it wing to a cypress knee. Sunlight shone on its sleek black feathers. It studied him with an intelligent brown eye.
The crow bobbed its head, pointing its beak toward the brackish water.
“What do you want of me?” Red Finger glanced around, wary of a Swamp Panther ambush. Every direction he looked, he could only see the swamp, the surface of the water marred here and there by the normal rings left by water bugs, fish, and bubbles. Insects fluttered around him, songbirds filled the spring-flush leaves with song.
Red Finger cocked his head as the crow plucked a white stone from the top of the cypress knee and dropped it into the water with a plop.
A stone? Out here? Atop a cypress knee?
He paddled forward, an eerie fear climbing his spine. No, this was no trained pet, but something else. He wasn’t a man used to Power, but he could feel it swelling around him.
As the bow of his canoe slipped past the knee, the crow gave him a loud squawk, leaped into the air, and flapped through a ragged hole in the canopy above. Rays of vibrant color, reds, blues, and greens flashed off its wings.
Red Finger scratched his cheek in confusion. Then, bending over the side of his canoe, he looked down into the water. There, several hands below the surface, he could see a small round white stone. It was resting in what looked like a sunken canoe.