Chickadee (3 page)

Quickly, with numb hands but with an expert's knowledge that he had practiced since he was a child, Animikiins gathered dry birch shavings, moss, and bits of twigs. He had no feeling in his hands now, but he told them what to do, how to hold the striker, the steel, how to cup the spark and steadily breathe an ember to life in a tiny nest of kindling. In no time, Animikiins had a fire going in the spot where his father had appeared to him. He dried out his mitts, which had been strung inside his jacket. He winced as the blood entered his fingers and his toes. They'd throb and ache for days after this. But he was alive.

“Miigwech, indeydey,” he said. “Miigwech for your love. Thank you for giving me this good life.”

Twice more the twins shot and missed the bine, and yet it still waited in the tree. The bird's patience was beginning to spook the boys.

“Do you think it is a spirit bird?” asked Chickadee.

“Maybe it just wants us to eat,” said Makoons. With a gasp he released his arrow, and the bird fell from the tree.

“Wait,” said Chickadee. “Your arrow didn't hit the bine! I saw your arrow hit the tree! This is definitely a ghost bird and I don't want to go near it.”

“Ah, the great warriors,” laughed a girl behind them.

“Zozie!”

She had two more rocks in her hand. It was Zozie who had brought the bird down into the snow.

“Did you check the snares?”

The twins shook their heads, and she smiled down at them. Zozie was tall and pretty. They were bashful and a little bit in love with her. She was the daughter of their mother's powerful, enigmatic, bold, and sometimes bloodthirsty cousin, Two Strike. Zozie loved her mother, but as Two Strike readily admitted, her heart really wasn't in mothering. Two Strike loved to hunt and was far off to the north on a trapline. Zozie was happy to stay with Omakayas, who loved her and called her daughter.

“Waabooz,” she cried now, catching sight of a trapped rabbit. They knelt near a snare and removed the frozen rabbit. There was another rabbit caught in a snare set farther on. That one had already been half eaten by a weasel.

“Tracks,” said Chickadee. “We just missed the weasel. I would have shot it.”

“No, I would have shot it,” said Makoons.

“Just like you shot the partridge?” asked Zozie.

The twins scuffled their feet in the snow, looked down, and didn't answer.

After he felt the chill leave his heart, and after he got used to the fact that he would live, Animikiins remembered that his family was very hungry. His empty-handed return would disappoint them. Oh, they would cry when he told them about seeing his father. Omakayas would hold his hands to her face. The boys would cling to him. Zozie would hang her head and sigh. But they would all be even hungrier than they had been when he'd left. As a hunter, that made him very angry. Animikiins jumped to his feet.

Where had that moose gone, the moose that drove him into the lake and nearly cost him his life? It had surged up the shore just past the spot where Animikiins's father had appeared. It had not looked back, but melted away into a heavy stand of spruce. Animikiins followed. All of a sudden he stopped. A splash of dark blood lit the snow, then another and another. A bit farther on he saw the dark mound of the moose. Animikiins looked into the sky and smiled. He thanked his father just as the first flakes, and more flakes, and then a thin cloth and then at last a heavy blanket of snow began to fall.

And fall. And fall.

Z
ozie breathed the deeply cold air and smelled snow coming.

“Giigawedaa,” she said. “Let's go home.” The boys trudged behind her, each carrying a rabbit. She had the partridge. Omakayas would be very, very glad to see them. On the way back, Zozie sang a little traveling song and the boys sang too. Each beat of the song was a footstep, and even when the snow began to fall they marched along cheerfully. They were sure that their father would make it home before them, and that if he'd had no luck he would be filled with praise for their skills.

By the time they reached the camp, the snow was swirling through the air. The wind was blowing hard and groaning in the trees. They could hardly see their birchbark house, their wigwassi-wigamig, but they heard the dog barking. A crack of warm light showed through the blanket slung over the entry, and Omakayas parted the door and came outside.

“Is Deydey back yet?”

“Gaawiin mashi,” said Omakayas.

“Look at what we brought! What great hunters we are!” The twins gave their rabbits excitedly to Omakayas, forgetting that she was the one who had set the snares.

“Howah! And this plump bine, too! Did my little men hunt this bird?” Omakayas smiled at her twins, who looked up at Zozie.

“We tried!” said Chickadee.

“Zozie knocked it down with a rock,” said Makoons.

Omakayas laughed and brushed the snow from Zozie's hair.

“Her mama was always a deadly aim with a rock, too!”

Omakayas was remembering the sting of Two Strike's pebbles when her cousin was angry, but that was long ago.

Zozie smiled, but looked around anxiously and said, “My uncle is not back.”

“He can take good care of himself,” said Omakayas.

But everyone noticed that, when Omakayas made the stew that night and dished it out, she put a little makak out for the spirits and a full bowl on the mat with the other food. That bowl was for Animikiins. No one touched it, but they all watched the bowl as the steam rose from the delicious meat and then, slowly, cooled.

The snow came down so suddenly that Animikiins knew that he was trapped. He was far from the camp. He didn't dare walk so far in a disorienting blizzard, even to bring meat to his family. No, he had to camp where he was. And he'd better seek shelter fast. Luckily, he was in heavy spruce, and spruce branches could be made into a lean-to. He broke off an armload of boughs, took a hatchet to some larger branches, and quickly built himself a lean-to. He set it against a great rock, only a few feet from the place where the moose had died. With the snow falling thickly, there was no possibility of building a fire. Animikiins heaped snow into a circle, high as he could. The snow was good insulation. He would sleep on a bed of boughs with thicker boughs to cover himself. At last, just before he nestled into a shelter as wind tight as he could make it, Animikiins drew his knife and sliced out the moose's tongue and liver. He brought both into the shelter, heaped snow against the opening, and ate a bloody, raw, satisfying meal before he dozed off to sleep.

One day. Two days. Three days of snow. The first night, the little family ate half the pot of stew. The second night, they ate the rest of the kettle and scraped the bottom with a knife. The third night, with great misgivings, they divided and ate the bowl of stew that had been sitting by the fire for Animikiins. Then they fell asleep. It wasn't much, and their insides gnawed.

Halfway through the night, Omakayas woke, restless. Outside the snow drove down and the wind still growled and shook the branches of the trees. The snow was heaping higher and higher around the entrance of the wigwam. The dog, who had chewed up and devoured the already gnawed bones of the rabbits, was curled at the door with his tail over his head. It was still snowing, but Omakayas thought she heard something, someone. She shivered as a trickle of fear went up her back.

Sometimes when the trees cracked and the snow came down hard, the spirit of winter, Biboonang, was out walking. It was a harsh spirit, and Omakayas didn't want to challenge it. She crept from her blankets and built up the fire. They would have to find some food tomorrow.

The day dawned bright, the snow was finished. Although the air was hard and cold the twins were elated to walk out on top of the drifts. There was no knowing where Animikiins had gone to, but Omakayas decided to set out after him anyway. She put on her snowshoes, took the dog with her, and told the twins and Zozie to set new snares and to gather balsam and melt snow for hot tea when she got home. She pulled a toboggan behind her and had a keen hatchet in her belt, which was lucky, for she hadn't been walking half an hour when Animikiins hailed her.

“Ahneen,” she yelled with happiness.

They hurled themselves together and held close. They had known each other since they were children, and they treasured each other very deeply. They swore that they had known they would be married ever since Omakayas had given food to the hungry boy who would become her husband.

Animikiins had glared at her, starving, on that day so long ago, but her gift of food had eventually melted his glare, and his heart, too.

Now Omakayas rejoiced. They had real food. A moose would last them the rest of the winter. Piece by piece, the family hauled back the moose using the toboggan. Everyone also carried chunks of frozen meat with carrying straps. By the time they cached the meat near their camp, hoisting some into a tree, burying some in snow, they were warm and excited.

Omakayas brought in the tenderest pieces of meat and began to make a feast. The rest of the family had been hunting in the next bay. Now they gathered.

Mikwam, Ice, was Omakayas's father. She called him Deydey. Yellow Kettle was her mother. But nobody called her grandmother yet because Nokomis, Grandmother, was still alive and strong. Old as she was, Nokomis kept up with Mikwam and joked that when she smelled the meat roasting she'd come running and leave him behind on the trail.

There was Omakayas's beautiful sister, Angeline, and her husband, Fishtail. Angeline had survived a terrible illness, smallpox. She had no children, and this made her sad except when Zozie came to live with her. Zozie called three different women Nimama, and nobody thought that strange.