Chapter One: The Last Spring
Beyond the low rise lay a place of the dead where the Bull band's winter camp should have been. Radovin wobbled to a stop, winning a short battle with the bundle of firewood on his back.
He shook off the haunting overlay of memory. This camp was not abandoned. Its people were not dead, but out gathering food. Sod and hide covered lodges basked in midday sun, inert lumpy mounds, fires gone to ash on this unseasonably warm day. A solitary trail of smoke rose from one outdoor hearth, where the two women who had not gone foraging tended soup.
Good, Ivergan wouldn't be back yet, waiting for him. He plodded on. The shaman's small hut lay a long spearthrow from the rest. Beside it, he turned and let his burden fall with a satisfying crash. He swung his arms a few times, gazing idly across the camp. Despite the sun's warmth, spring was still barely a promise. Dirty heaps of snow lay on the north sides of the lodges. The low rise beyond slept under grass weathered to a dull tan.
Wind teased him with the aroma of soup. No early taste for you, he told his stomach. He was beyond shame when it came to acquiring food, but he didn't need trouble.
Maybe being dead wouldn't be so bad. At least he wouldn't be hungry all the time. He turned, yanked out the quick-knot in the braided leather rope, and gave the sheaf a kick to loosen it. A few at a time, he added dry branches to the heap already piled high against the small lodge. It might be enough even to content Ivergan, who could find fault in anything.
He was about to coil the rope when he saw Vezanidi walking slowly toward him from west of the camp. Her growing need for that stick she used to help her along worried him. Not much he could do about that either. She was the oldest woman in the band; some said the oldest of all The People. He took his time, pretending not to notice her.
She stopped, close enough to poke him with her stick, and thumped it on the ground. He jerked around, eyes wide. "Hai! Good day, Nidi."
The old woman smiled. "A very good day to you, Rado."
"D'you need me to do anything?" A cup of tea for joint pain or a leg-rub was not real work. They could at least sit together a while and talk.
"No, I'm fine, just out stretching my three legs on this fine spring day." She waved a hand, gnarled and brown as her walking stick, toward the smoking hearth. "The soup should be ready by now. We can have a taste before all the rest crowd in."
Radovin grinned. She could get away with that. "Sure. Thanks." He put an arm around her hunched back and they set off at a slow, old-woman pace.
"Warm today, ah?" Vezanidi tilted her head, her sly glance a challenge to Radovin's silence.
The bland remark unsettled him. She was not one for idle chit-chat about the weather. "Yeah. Did you see anything good on your walk?"
"I saw a bundle of wood walking." Smile lines around her eyes deepened at his short muffled laugh. "Everything was good. It's spring. Ah, Rado, I think it's the last one I'll see."
"Vahé! Don't say that!"
Vezanidi patted the hand that lay over her shoulder. "Nah, one gets tired after a while. I've seen enough summers, and far too many winters. But what about you, you're young."
"What about me? I'm all right." Lie. Facing his sixteenth summer with dread, he felt a lot older, and too close to the Underworld.
"Phtt! You should go to another band, should have long ago. It's spring, you could leave any time."
Those age-discolored eyes peered too close. He looked away. "I'd bring 'em bad luck." The well-worn excuse shied well clear of deadly truth.
"Ayah-kayah." Vezanidi shook her head. "This band has what it asks for. One of these days there'll be a reckoning, and no one handy to dump all the blame on. It's time some people woke up. What do you owe anyone here? You go to another band, ask to be cleansed. Tell them I'll speak for you at the Summermeet. You know I would have long ago, if you'd let me, I've told you enough times. I still have a voice that some will hear. If I can't do anything else for you, at least I can do that."
Radovin clamped his teeth on his lower lip. Why did she always have to get onto that? She knew he couldn't tell her why he couldn't leave. He knew she was right, he had to, no matter what it cost him. Mostly just his life. It was too late to start anew; it had been from the moment he accepted Ivergan's offer of apprenticeship. He only hoped the good spirits would let him stay alive long enough to do what he had to. If he could.
"All right," she sighed, when he didn't answer.
"I will go. I--just don't know when yet." The problem was more where than when. How sent his thoughts running in panicky circles.
Vezanidi gave him a sharp look, but only nodded. They were nearing other ears.
The cooks had started before dawn. Wisps of steam escaped from the flat basketry lids of two rawhide-lined pits, close to the low stone wall of the hearth in front of the headman's lodge. The aroma of slowly simmered remnants of stored foods grabbed at Radovin's stomach. This year's batch of get-rid-of-it soup, the traditional last meal before the Feast of Rebirth, had the right stuff; odds and ends of dried foods, but nothing moldy, no rawhide scraps. He took a deeper sniff of it, anticipating the soup now that he was assured a portion.
Maybe.
The older of the two women, a little taller than Radovin and a great deal wider, turned a sour face toward them. Ambelda, headwoman of the band. She wore a loose shift of high-quality doeskin that exposed a long vee of saggy cleavage. Several heavy strands of beads flaunted her high status.
"Hnnn, here come the flies," she said.
"Consider it a compliment to your cooking, Belda," Vezanidi said dryly.
"Compliments draw bad luck," Ambelda retorted. She glowered at Radovin.
He bobbed his head. "Good be with you, Ambelda-mada."
Ambelda's expression mellowed to simple disdain. She bent over the soup, lifting the lids partway to sniff analytically at the steam like a hog seeking underground edibles. Satisfied, she left the hearth and sat on a rough wooden bench beside the low, open doorway of the lodge. It creaked in protest.
The younger cook turned toward them with a tired smile. "It smells good," Vezanidi said to her. "Done cooking, isn't it? Must be time to take a taste."
"I'll get you a bowl, Nidi," the woman said, her smile warming at the wheedling hint. "And one for you, Rado." She stooped to enter the lodge.
"Thank you, Katalina," he called after her.
Vezanidi proceeded to the sun-warmed mate of Ambelda's bench, on the other side of the doorway. She sat with a contented smile, eyes closed.
Two girls and a boy sat on the ground nearby, playing with sticks and scraps of leather. They wore little more than breechclouts and simple foot coverings of hide with the fur side in. The older girl had a bandage of soft deerskin on one thigh. She had smiled and waved at Radovin as he neared the hearth, then turned back to moderate a dispute between her siblings. The little ones leaped up when Katalina reappeared with a basket containing bowls and spoons. "Soup, soup, I want soup," the girl cried out, hopping around.
"Yes, little bunny, soup," Katalina said. "Sit down now and be quiet, and I'll get you some." The tots plunked down on the ground again with big grins.
"She's a bunny, I'm a hungry wolf," the boy declared.
"Hoosh, don't start that again," the older girl said. He stuck out his tongue at her, but settled into a temporary truce of anticipation while their mother ladled the soup into bowls. She handed Ambelda the first.
Radovin carried Vezanidi's to her, and sat beside her on the bench, with a cautious glance at Ambelda. Though he tried to eat slowly, his small portion vanished too soon. He rose and stepped toward the stewpit. Ambelda's nasal squawk arrested his hand in mid-reach for the ladle.
"Hai! Away from there, hearthless!" She waved a threatening spoon at him. He backed away from the redolent steam.
"Och, let him have another bite, Belda," Vezanidi said. "He earns his eats. He has a right to a decent share as one of the Dedicated, ah?"
"He eats like a fire," Ambelda snapped, "And he's not been initiated yet, nor likely to be soon."
"He ought to have been. How much more can he learn from Ivergan, anyway? Any other would count him ready, I'd think. Besides, there's plenty of soup."
"Hmpf. Maybe so, but they'll all be hungry when they get back, man, woman, and child. This bad-luck carrier can wait until the rest have had their fill. And why aren't you at work?" The woman pointed her spoon at him again with a look of contempt. "Not that you wouldn't bring it all back in your belly."
"Ivergan told me to get wood while he was away," Radovin mumbled, eyes downcast.
"Then you should get back at it, you lazy worm."
"There's enough now." He ducked his head low and hunched his shoulders up to his ears.
Ambelda hoisted herself up, bowl in hand, and took the ladle. "Good. You can clean the hearth and dump the ash baskets." She pointed the dipper toward the lodge.
"Yes'm."
"Nah, Rado," Vezanidi said. "Sit and keep me company a while yet. You'll get more done if you take a break now and then." Her last words seemed to be aimed at Ambelda, who made no further objection beyond a disgusted snort.
Radovin sat and re-examined his bowl. He picked off a few stray bits with a fingertip, sucking it clean. Vezanidi shook her head. He shrugged.
The headwoman finished her second bowl. She rose with a surly grunt to Katalina, who got up to tend the fire. While Ambelda lumbered off toward the small ravine that served as both latrine and garbage dump, Katalina shifted the hot coals with a reindeer antler rake and added wood to one side of the fire. She deftly lifted stones one at a time out of the bed of coals using two pieces of reindeer antler, knocked some of the ash off against the hearthstones, and dropped them into the soup.
Radovin's mother had died in the winter following their move to the Bull band, after the Raven band's catastrophic end. Her death firmly established his bad repute. According to Ivergan, the curse of ill-luck could be removed through strict obedience and discipline. Eventually he might join the circles of the Dedicated. It was better than being a homeless midden-rat. Or dead. At least the path of his heart was still open--so he once thought.
After five more winters of drudgery, he doubted everything. His head was stuffed with ritual and lore. How much did you need to know to enter the first Circle? As for the bad luck, all Ivergan had done was give him an amulet to shield others from his misfortunate aura. Nidi was probably right; it was only another excuse to hold him back.
One thing he didn't doubt: the gravity of the oath that bound him to the flint-hearted shaman. There was no way out of that alive. Whether or not he could muck up someone else's luck, his own was bad enough.
"Rado?"
"Ayah?"
Katalina had covered the stewpits and moved closer to the lodge. "Could you look at Melina's leg while you're here?"
"Oh, sure." He stepped over to the children and squatted, facing the girl with the bandaged leg.
"How's the leg feeling, Meli?"
She smiled at him. "It still hurts, 'specially if I bend it a lot. I try not to, like you said."
"She hollered when she got up outta bed," the little boy offered.
"You're a magpie, Niko," Melina told her brother fondly.
Niko stuck his tongue out again. Their little sister laughed. "Tell us a story, Rado," the boy demanded.
"Later, wolf-cub." If I have time. Radovin rumpled the little fellow's hair. He turned back to his patient. "It will hurt for a while yet. That's to remind you to be careful." He touched the incised ivory disc that hung from a thong around his neck, then laid his hand on her bare thigh close to the bandage. The skin felt quite warm yet, but there were no dangerous red streaks creeping out from under the covering. He nodded to the girl. "It's getting better. I'll wash it and put a fresh bandage on, ah?"
"All right." Melina pushed her empty bowl out of the way and let Radovin give her a hand up. They walked away hand-in-hand toward the shaman's hut. The girl hobbled, keeping her injured leg straight, and Radovin kept pace with her.
The two younger children went back to their play with the circle of pebbles that represented a lodge and the stick people that inhabited it. Katalina gathered the used bowls and spoons into a basket. "Would you like a little more?" she asked before depositing Vezanidi's bowl.
The old woman looked up, blinking. "No, thank you. I think I'll take a little nap. I seem to need more sleep than food these days."
"However are you going to get to the Summermeet this year? I think you'll have to ride the drags all the way."
"Oh, I'll have Rado turn me into a little bird and fly. Maybe shit on a few heads while I'm at it." Her clouded eyes turned toward Ambelda, who was heading back toward them.
Katalina laughed nervously, glancing in the same direction.
He rested his arms a moment after dumping the last squat-basket into the ravine. Streaks of gold still glowed between long shadows. The intense blue sky promised a cold night. Tomorrow, the feast. The hunt had gone well, the spirits were pleased. Everyone would have a fair share, even the bad-luck boy. His stomach pinched at the thought of enough meat to fill it.
"Radovin!"
"Ayah." He spun around to face Ivergan. The shaman stood out in sharp contrast against the sky, his scowl side-lit by the low sun. Radovin kept his gaze down, avoiding eye contact. He didn't like Ivergan's face all that much anyway; especially not since he had learned what the man was capable of.
"You're filthy. Get washed up."
"Yes, o-denu." He picked up the empty basket and walked away, passing Ivergan on the sunward side. The shaman had not seemed to notice--so far--that his apprentice had lately made a habit of not crossing his shadow.
"Not just a splash in the river."
Radovin turned again, startled, daring to question with a look.
Ivergan's eyes reflected the sun, twin fires in ominous caverns. "Take a cleansing wash, that rat's-nest on your head too. I want you really clean tomorrow."
"Yes, Ivergan-anu." He hesitated, wondering why; not that he minded an opportunity to dunk his head in warm, herb-scented water. A flash of temerity, born more out of the habit of yearning than of withered hope, loosened his tongue. "Am I--are you going to let me assist in the ritual?"
"No, you undisciplined wall-rat. But you will be of some use to me soon."
"Yes, o-denu." Of some use. Vahé! Now that it was too late.
He returned the basket and hastened to the shaman's hut. As he reached for the door-flap, the loud crrruk! of a raven came from just above. Radovin staggered back a step. The bird sat atop the lodge, staring at him. It cocked its head, one beady eye sparked by the sun's last ray. Then, with another hoarse cry, it took off toward the southwest.
Radovin watched it vanish in sunset glare. Raven was his guiding spirit. Did it mean....
This was no time to gape at signs and omens. He had to fetch a lot of water before the light was gone. Turning back to go in, he saw a big, white streak of fresh birdshit down the side of the lodge. Ehh... ayah-kayah.