Wolf’s Brother

“Don’t let him jerk you around,” Joboam commanded her as he moved to her laden animals. He tugged and pushed at the bags and bundles tied to the pack frame, tightening the ties, and once moving a bag from one animal to the other. His competence could not be denied; somehow that annoyed Tillu even more. He was talking, voice and words hard as he readjusted the harnesses. “A harke has to know that you’re in charge. You can’t let it doubt it for one moment. If you’re going to insist on doing something you know nothing about, at least know that. Keep a tight grip and make it obey you.” He shot a venomous glance at Kerlew. “If you can make anything obey you.” Kerlew was trying to smile at Joboam placatingly, but fear distorted the smile until it looked like a sneer. Joboam stared at him, his eyes going blacker.

“I can manage them,” Tillu said, surprised at how calm her voice sounded.

“Can you?” He glared at her. “And that boy? Can you make him obey you, keep him from being a burden to all of us?” She could hear the checked fury in his voice. He’d been saving his anger for days. At the least excuse, he’d show it. She looked at his big hands, the thick muscles in his neck, and felt cold fear. But only the chill was in her voice when she spoke.

“Kerlew is my responsibility. I am sure that if Capiam thought he would be a problem, he would have spoken of it to me.”

“And you are my responsibility! I have told Capiam that I will see to it that you…”

“I am no one’s responsibility!” Tillu’s voice flared out of control. Passing herdfolk were staring at them curiously.

“That is not how the herdlord has ordered it,” he reminded her, an odd note of triumph in his voice. “I am to see that you lack for nothing, that you travel easily with us.” He finished tugging at a final strap. Rising, he pulled the harke forward, to put its rein back into Tillu’s hand and take his own animals. He looked down at her. “I am in charge of you and your boy. To be sure that no one harms the najd’s little apprentice. Now you will follow me. And if…”

“Heckram! And Carp!” Kerlew’s voice split Joboam’s words. The boy dashed past her, running headlong toward the line of folk and beasts. Tillu’s breath caught as she watched, expecting the animals to startle and run. But the harkar only looked up curiously at the boy pelting toward them. A few perked their ears foolishly, but there was no stampede. Heckram saw the boy coming, and pulled his animals from the cavalcade and waited. The folk behind him moved past.

Morning surrounded the man and framed him. He wore summer clothes, a tunic of thin leather stretched over his chest and shoulders, rough trousers of leather and leather boots that tied at the knee. A hat of knotted blue wool could not confine his hair; the breeze lifted bronze glints from it. She dared not believe in the wide smile that welcomed her son. The lead harke nudged Heckram for assurance, and he rested a hand on its shaggy neck, waiting. Kerlew halted inches from Heckram, to tilt back his head and grin up at him. It squeezed her heart to see her strange son so confident of a welcome. Heckram reached out a hand. She saw him tousle the boy’s wild hair, then clasp his thin shoulder in a man’s welcome. Carp’s sharp voice parted them, imperiously summoning the boy to his side.

Heckram led a string of four harkar, with Carp perched atop the first one. Up until now, Tillu had seen only the very young and the very old riding the pack animals. Carp’s legs were sound under him. She wondered why he chose to ride. He leaned down to speak to Kerlew, gesturing to the boy to walk beside the animal, and then to Heckram to move on. Heckram looked a question at her. She lifted a hand in a greeting that was an acknowledgment but not an answer to anything. Behind her Joboam made a sound without syllables, a rasping like a beast’s growl. She was shaken by the black fury in his eyes. His hatred was bottomless; she wondered which of the three was its target.

“Follow!” he snapped and jerked his string of harkar to an ungainly trot. She pulled her unwilling animals to match his pace and ran to keep up. He threaded a trail through the widely spaced trees, paralleling the path of the herdfolk. She had no breath for questions, but could only follow in grudging obedience.

She took deep breaths of the scents of early spring. The aroma rose from the humus and early tufts of sprouting grasses and moss in an almost visible mist. Small yellow leaves and shriveled berries still clung to some of the brambly wild roses, beside the swelling leaf nodes that would soon unfurl into foliage. She saw a circle of new mushrooms but could not stop to investigate them. Joboam swung his animals back toward the cavalcade, motioning to Pirtsi to make a space. She followed him, glad to slow to a walk again.

“Keep up,” was the only thing he said. She fell in behind him. His animals separated them, making talk thankfully impossible. She glanced back at Pirtsi but he seemed immersed in simply walking. She set her eyes forward and followed his example, letting the day fall into easy monotony.

Before her the haunches of Joboam’s last harke swayed, its ridiculous white tail flicking. She glanced at the animal she led, surprised at how easy it was. She held the rein, but her beast simply followed the one in front of them. The strap between them was slack. The reindeer’s head bobbed, its moist breath warming the air by Tillu’s shoulder. Its eyes were huge, dark and liquid beneath the brow ridges. They reminded Tillu of a small child’s frank stare. Boldly she put her free hand out to touch the animal’s shaggy neck. She was pleased with the contented rumble the animal made at her touch. She scratched it gently as she had seen Heckram do, and it leaned into her touch.

There was a strange giddiness to striding along on a spring day, unencumbered by any burden. She remembered her staggering flight from Benu’s folk, the weight of everything she owned heavy on her shoulders as she fled from Carp and his influence over her son. This was better. The animals carried their packs easily, and Tillu matched their pace with a swinging stride. Stranger still was that Kerlew was not at her heels. She was not calling him back from investigating things far off the trail, wasn’t scolding him for dawdling, nor answering his pestering questions. Her life had been so intertwined with her son’s since his birth that she could not become accustomed to surrendering him to Carp. At the thought of the old man, her stomach knotted and she glanced back. But Kerlew and the shaman were far down the line. And Heckram was with them. She thought of the smile he had given her boy today. As if he didn’t resent his presence. His tolerance couldn’t last forever, might well be gone by the end of this day. But let Kerlew enjoy what acceptance he could. Soon enough he would know rejection again; soon he would walk at Tillu’s heels again, asking her the same question ten times and never remembering her answer. She forced herself to believe it would be so.

She gave herself up to the forest around her. Once she heard squirrels chattering overhead, and then the hoarse cries of a raven. The forest of the morning was pine and spruce, with a scattering of birch. By midday they were crossing rivulets, swift and noisy with the melt of winter snow. The first few were narrow streams, easily jumped by the humans as the reindeer stoically waded through the icy waters. Then came a wider one, and Tillu found herself stepping from rock to slippery rock. By now it seemed natural to put a hand on the reindeer’s shoulder to steady herself, and the animal evinced no surprise at her touch. On the far bank she paused to stroke its neck once, pleased with the feel of its living warmth seeping up through the stiff hair of its coat. Behind her, Bror was swinging his young grandson up to a temporary perch on a pack animal for the crossing.

Then they were walking on again. Tillu began to feel the complaints of muscles unused to long walking at such a steady pace. The day had warmed, and her heavy tunic was a burden. She halted to drag it off and sling it across the harke’s other burdens. The cool breeze touched her bare arms. Her sleeveless tunic of thin rabbit leather felt so light she had a sensation of nakedness. She stretched her arms and rolled her shoulders in the pleasant sun. Then Joboam angrily called to her to keep up. She pulled her harke back into motion.

Gradually the forest changed. The cavalcade of reindeer and folk wound through valleys and across streams, leaving the steep hillsides behind and emerging onto soft slopes of Lapp heather, with twisting willow ossier now covered with fuzzy catkins and alders with cracked gray bark. The plant life was lusher here, the hillsides open to the blue sky and the softly pushing wind. She thought that the reindeer would lag and graze, but they moved on with a single-mindedness that made her legs ache.

Great gray rocks pushed up randomly on the hillsides through the yellowed grasses of last summer. The earliest of spring’s flowers opened blooms in their shelter and stored warmth. She saw plants she could not name, and familiar plants shorter than she remembered them. She itched to touch and smell. Had she been alone, she would have gathered willow and alder barks for tonics and medicines, and the tips of the emerging fireweed for a delectable green. She glimpsed a violet’s leaves, but could not leave her animals to investigate. She had to pass a patch of stink-lily with its nourishing starchy roots, for when she knelt to dig her fingers into the turfy soil, Joboam yelled to her to hurry. She hissed in frustration. There were drawbacks to having an animal carry one’s belongings and being part of such a great moving group. She took dried fish from her pocket and nibbled it as she walked. And walked, while the sun slipped slowly across the blue sky and toward its craggy resting place.

She heard and smelled the river long before she saw it. The reindeer picked up the pace as they scented the water. Her hips and lower back complained as she stretched her stride, and her buttocks ached as if she had been kicked. The sinking sun glinted off the wide swatch of moving water, rainbowing over its rocky rapids. Tillu saw the line ahead of her pause and drink, but then rise and follow the noisy river and its trimming of trees. Her heart sank. Surely, they must stop soon! She paused at the river to let her beasts drink and take a long draught of the icy water herself. The cold made her teeth hum. Wiping her mouth, she rose to follow Joboam and his string of harkar. They wended through trees, naked birches and willows and oak hazed with green buds, following the river. Shadows lengthened and the day began to cool as the earth gave up its harvested heat to the naked skies. And then, far down the line of animals and men, she glimpsed a sheen of silver through the screening trees.

Abruptly they emerged on the shore of the lake. With relief Tillu saw the red glow and rising smoke of fires. Hasty shelters went up, a mushroom village sprang up from the warm earth. Unladen animals grazed on the open hillside above the lake. Gray boulders, rounded and bearded with lichen, poked their shaggy heads out of the deep grass of the slope. Children raced and shrieked among them or splashed and threw stones along the water’s edge, enlivened rather than wearied by the day’s travel. Dogs barked and bounded with them. Tillu envied them their energy. She would have liked nothing better than to sink down and rest. She watched Joboam glance about the scene, and then move surely into it, his campsite already selected. A child and a dog playing tug with a leather strap scrabbled hastily from his path. Tillu hesitated, wishing she could settle in a less central area of this hive of activity. But she couldn’t risk offending some custom of theirs. She would camp where Joboam told her. She began to lead her harkar after him.

From the shadow of a boulder, Kari rose, startling Tillu and spooking even the stolid harkar. But as it jerked the rein from Tillu’s hand, Kari caught it and turned to Tillu with her narrow smile. “Come!” she said, and put up a swift hand to cover a giggle. Her eyes were bright. Without another word, she led them off up the hill.

One boulder, larger than a sod hut, jutted from the earth halfway up the hillside. To this Kari led her, and then around and above it. On the high side of the boulder, facing away from the camp by the lake, was a shelter of pegged and propped hides. A small fire already burned and a pot of water was warming. A jumble of hides was spread inside the shelter, and Kari’s harkar grazed outside it. Kari grinned at Tillu. “In the talvsit, I live in my father’s and mother’s hut. But here, in the arrotak, I have my own shelter, and invite my own guests. You will stay with me? You and Kerlew,” she added hastily when Tillu hesitated.

Tillu did not relish the idea of company this weary night. But the fire was bright, the sky already darkening, the shelter welcoming and Kari so pleased with herself that Tillu could not refuse. She nodded. With a glad cry Kari sprang to unloading the harkar. Tillu moved to assist her, her weary fingers fumbling at the unfamiliar harness. Kari’s experience showed as she capably stripped one animal, led it to grass, and hobbled it before Tillu could unload the other. Soon both beasts were grazing. Kari stepped into the shelter, sat down on the hides, and patted the place next to her invitingly. Tillu sank down beside her with a sigh. The new aches of sitting down were a relief from the old ones of walking. Tillu slowly pulled off her boots, pressed her weary feet into the cool new grass.

“I should find Kerlew,” she reminded herself reluctantly. “Heckram must be sick of him by now.”

“He will be here soon,” Kari assured her. She leaned back on the hides and rolled onto her side to watch the hillside above her as the night stole its colors.

“It is kind of you to invite me to stay with you,” Tillu observed belatedly, but Kari only shrugged.

“You are someone to talk to, and as you have shared your tent and tea with me, I would do the same for you. Besides, if you are here it will be less problems.”

The last remark puzzled her until Lasse rounded the boulder and dropped an armload of firewood. “I told you I’d find plenty,” he said, and ducked into the shelter with a pleased smile. It faded abruptly, to be replaced with an abashed grin as he found himself face to face with Tillu. She guessed instantly that he had hoped to find Kari alone. She glanced at Kari, but the girl seemed immune to Lasse’s disappointment.

“I wouldn’t call it plenty, but it’s enough,” Kari observed heartlessly. “Lasse, go and find Tillu’s son now, please. He was walking with Heckram. They should be at the lake by now. Bring them here. We may as well all eat together.” When Lasse hesitated, Tillu saw Kari tip her head back and, after a cool silence, suddenly smile at him with such melting warmth that the boy all but staggered with the impact. He nodded quickly, and left, face flushed, to obey her. As soon as he was gone, Kari’s smile faded, to be replaced with her usual pensive frown. “I want to show you something,” she said suddenly. She swiftly unlaced the leather jerkin she wore. She tugged it open and turned to Tillu, a smile of anticipation on her face.

Tillu recoiled. Kari had a long, lovely neck, and proud young breasts jutted high on her chest. But incised into the soft rise of each breast were Kari’s four-stroked symbols, as if indeed an owl with fiery talons had rested upon them. “Carp told me about the soot,” Kari said proudly. “Now the cuts may heal, but the mark will remain.” She looked up from her handiwork to Tillu’s averted eyes and sickened expression. The girl’s smile vanished. “What’s the matter with you? I thought you’d be happy to see that they didn’t get infected!”

“Carp.” Tillu said the word with loathing. “Yes, he’d be glad to tell you how to scar yourself.” And she had left Kerlew with the old man for the whole day. What had she been thinking of? If this was what Kari had learned from him, what grisly marvels was he teaching Kerlew?

“Yes, Carp. Last night he ate at my father’s hut. He spoke of the people he used to live among. At birth, the baby’s spirit guide is found, and the mark of it is sliced into the baby’s thigh, and soot rubbed in. It binds the guardian to the child. Now Owl is bound to me as I am to him.”

“Yes. All will know now.” Tillu’s voice was flat. It was done, there was no sense in rebukes, in making her miserable over what could not be undone.

“Yes!” The hard pride in Kari’s voice challenged Tillu’s regret. Tillu chose silence, letting the challenge pass in the darkening evening. After a moment, Kari laced up her jerkin again. Tillu watched her covertly, marvelled at the intensity of her features. Life roared in the girl, like a torrent of water in a narrow chasm. She was never at peace, for even when she sat still, as now, with her eyes fixed on some distant place and her lips parted over her white teeth, she seemed to be moving. One sensed her mind traveled far and swift while her forgotten body poised here. Tillu could understand how her impassivity would distance many folk. Yes, and intrigue a young man like Lasse.

“It was kind of Lasse to bring firewood all the way up here,” she ventured.

Animation snapped back to Kari’s face. “He is a kind person,” she said softly, and then, with more vehemence, “with most peculiar ideas.” She sat up straight, then crawled out of the shelter. “I am going to cook for us,” she announced, and went to the packs and began to dig through them.

Tillu rose, feeling uncomfortable watching someone work. “I wish I’d had more time to myself today. I could have gathered fresh greens for us, and replenished some of my healing supplies.”

“I suppose you look for your healing herbs in far and strange places?” Kari’s voice had a strange, sly note.

“No. Most of them grow in the meadows and woods among the ordinary plants. Today I saw stink lily, and I think violets. And of course…”

“Violets?” Kari’s voice was incredulous.

“Yes. Picked and dried, they are good against skin rash. They can be used against illnesses of the lungs, also.”

Kari looked at her in wonder. “Why do you tell me this?”

“You seemed interested.” Tillu stopped, confused.

“And you do not mind telling me?”

“Why should I?” In the dying evening, a cuckoo called and was silent.

“The old midwife Kila was our last healer. She would never say what herbs were in her mixes, or where she got them. She learned from her mother, and said it was her wealth, and not to be shared. So when she left, only the commonest healing was known. I thought all healers would be jealous of their secrets.”

“Selfish, if you ask me.” Tillu was appalled.

“Then, if I wanted to learn the herbs of healing, would you teach me?”

“Of course. When we have time, I will be happy to show you how to gather herbs and how to use them.”

“Tomorrow?” she pressed.

“Don’t we move on tomorrow? We’ll both be leading animals tomorrow. We’ll have no time to stop and gather herbs and talk.”

Kari grinned knowingly, looking girlish and less strange. “Oh, we may. One never knows.” Taking wood from the pile Lasse had brought, she built up her fire, and began preparing food. The savory smell as the meat simmered in the pot made Tillu aware of her hunger. She came out of the shelter, stretched, and suddenly felt every pang of the day’s long hike.

“Here we are!” Lasse strode into the firelight, pleased at having accomplished his task.

“You were long in coming,” Kari observed coolly.

“They had stopped on the riverbank, to fish!” Lasse’s voice was between annoyance that they had been hard to find and wonder that they would do such a thing.

“See what we caught! Carp said they’d be there, under the bank behind the roots! And they were. See, Tillu.” The char shone silver in Kerlew’s hands, fat and slippery. They flopped from his grasp onto the grass. Kari eyed them with approval.

“Gut and spit them, Lasse, and we’ll grill them over the coals,” she ordered calmly, never doubting that fish and boy were hers to command. Lasse moved meekly to her directions. Tillu and Heckram both stared after him as he took the fish to one side. When they lifted their eyes, their gazes met, sharing amusement and sympathy for the boy. Then Heckram’s eyes warmed to something else. Tillu turned from him hastily, to watch Kerlew wiping his slimy hands on the grass.

“Did you behave today?” she asked him automatically.

“Yes.” He didn’t seem to feel any need to enlarge on his answer. His deep eyes were guileless as they stared up into hers. She wanted to ask how his day had been, if he had missed her, what Carp had taught him. But she could not in front of all these people. She had been stupid not to put up her own shelter. She would have no time alone with her son tonight, or tomorrow. Deep frustration edged with loneliness overtook her. She was severed from Kerlew, blocked by the layers of people around her. And to have Heckram so near strained her resolution. Every time he caught her eyes, her skin tightened. She had not found a way to let him know that she had changed her mind. He was looking at her again, his brows lifted slightly. The fuzzy beginnings of a beard softened his jawline. She stared at it, wondering if he had known she would find it attractive. Then she asked herself why she imagined he would even think about such things. Did she fancy she was the only woman he might consider bedding? Did she imagine he slept alone each night as she did? The thoughts stung her. She turned aside, avoiding him. Kari was directing Lasse as he cleaned the fish. His eyes were bright with her attention, and neither seemed to mind Kerlew crouching nearby and sorting curiously through the entrails. Tillu dropped to one knee, to crawl into the shelter and rest until the food was ready. Perhaps it would ease her aching muscles.

But Carp was already there, lying on the skins as if he were lord of all. His mouth hung ajar and the light from the fire revealed an occasional tooth behind his slack lips. It reflected off his grayed eyes like a sunset in a scummy pond. He nodded at her, his mouth widening. His hand gestured her in. Tillu drew back, stood again. Until she had met the herdfolk, she had never known how to describe Carp’s smell. But now she knew he smelled just like a wet dog. It did not make him any dearer to her.

The evening was cooling the land; moisture was settling to the ground. The cooking food gave off a marvelous aroma, making her dizzy with hunger. She put one hand against the rough side of the boulder that backed the shelter, and then, without thinking, began to walk around the boulder, away from the firelight and the murmur of Lasse and Kari. The soft lichen on the stone was warm with the day’s heat, like a man’s rough beard against her skin. She leaned back against it, looking out over the lake and wide valley below her.

The small fires of the herdfolk blossomed like white wildflowers on the shore. Their tents were an unevenness in the dark. The people and dogs were moving shadows that passed before the fires. Beyond them, the lake was a shining blackness, and in the deepest part the moon and stars shone. Tillu felt dizzy looking at the sky at her feet. She lifted her eyes and looked beyond it, and realized for the first time how far they had come in one day. Kari had said they would travel for ten days. Where would they be then?

Far behind her were the mountains that were the winter grounds of the herdfolk. Before her was the wide lake that tomorrow the herd would skirt. And beyond it, beyond the last dwarfed trees and bushes, rolled the tundra. It was featureless in the darkness, and it was hard to tell where the lake left off and the tundra began. She had heard of the tundra, in legends of Benu’s tribe, but she had never walked upon its wide flat face. A nameless dread of such a barren place rose in her, followed by a more pragmatic fear. In such a place, where would she gather willow and alder barks, birch cones to burn for a congested head, birch roots to boil down for cough syrup, willow roots for colic medicine, and a thousand other remedies that came from the tall trees of the hills and mountain valleys? A feeling akin to panic rose in her, to be replaced by resolve. Tomorrow she must be free to gather as the herd moved along the forested edge of the lake. She must have her supplies before they left it for the barren vast lands to the north.