People of the Earth (44 page)

 
          
 
Where in Sun 's bloody light had One Man
disappeared to? Calls sounded and brush scratched against the pursuers'
clothing. Wind Runner pulled himself into a ball as a victory-charged warrior
crashed past on the other side of a mat of serviceberry.

 
          
 
"Are you sure you saw him?" one of
the voices asked. "Maybe it was a shadow? Some other animal? A coyote or
bobcat?"

 
          
 
"It was him!"

 
          
 
"Spread out!" another voice ordered.
"If he's here, we have to go through in a line, drive him up to the head
of the canyon and trap him."

 
          
 
Wind Runner winced. Unfortunately, that would
work.

 
          
 
"Flying Hawk! You and the rest get up
here! It's no trap ... or we would have been attacked by now!" a bellowing
voice shouted.

 
          
 
Was that the problem? Only a few of the Broken
Stones had come to hunt him? Wind Runner gripped the thick layer of leaves he
lay on—and had an idea. He began to burrow into the mat. A flush of hope warmed
his heart. If he could bury himself in the leaves, he might have a chance—ever
so thin, but still a chance.

 
          
 
And I’ll find my way back to One Man's camp.
So help me, if I live through this, I'll kill him this time. I'll drive a dart
through him before he has a chance to blink! No one leaves Wind Runner out to
be a Broken Stones target. No one!

 
          
 
"Will it burn?" one of the pursuing
warriors asked.

 
          
 
Wind Runner's heart stopped. If they set fire
to his sanctuary . . . no, don't even think about it!

 
          
 
"Too much sap in the brush. I think it
would just smolder. These buds are too wet, too close to snowmelt."

           
 
Wind Runner sighed relief despite himself.

 
          
 
"Well, it's about time! Welcome to the
hunt, Flying Hawk. We thought you and the rest had decided it was too dangerous
for your—"

 
          
 
A chorus of ululations broke out from above.

 
          
 
"It's a trap!" a warrior shrieked in
panic.

 
          
 
Screams, shouts, and shrieks split the air as
brush broke under the weight of frantic human beings. Darts whistled and hissed
and clattered on rocks. Confusion and death sounded from all sides.

 
          
 
Wind Runner cautiously dug himself out of the
moldy leaves, reluctant to move, as afraid he'd be skewered by his friends atop
the
caprock
as killed by the Broken Stones.

 
          
 
From high overhead One Man's bellowing voice
called, "Run, you Broken Stone dogs! Run like jackrabbits from a wolf!
Show us your tracks, you miserable old women! Ha!"

 
          
 
Rocks cascaded, followed by a rattle of gravel
and dirt as feet slid down. Nearby a man groaned in pain.

 
          
 
"Snail Shell! Make sure that one's dead.
I'll bash this one's brains just for good measure. Hey, Wind Runner? You in
here? You still alive? Or did you shit yourself to death?"

 
          
 
Wind Runner peered over the top of the brush.
Fire Rabbit was smashing a heavy slab of sandstone down onto something. The
hollow, pulpy sound had to come from flesh being crushed.

 
          
 
"You took long enough!" Wind Runner
pushed through the brush, wincing at the agony that shot up from his ankle. Now
that he'd been saved, the hurt left him light-headed. Amazing how sheer,
gut-twisting terror could stop pain.

 
          
 
Fire Rabbit stared at the remains of his
victim. "They wouldn't all come up. They waited, just out of dart range,
as if they knew we were there." He grinned. "That made some of us
suspicious. One Man had faith in you, though. He said it would work, that they
were just being cautious. That if you had the guts and courage to stay alive,
the rest of the Broken Stones would come. You did . . . and they did. Victory!
Wind Runner, you did it!" Fire Rabbit whooped and jumped up and down, a
Song bursting from his lungs.

 
          
 
Wind Runner hobbled over and stared down at
the Broken

           
 
Stones warrior A dart stuck out of the man's
side, driven down through the pelvis. The face had been crushed, effect of the
boulder that had been dropped on his head.

 
          
 
"And One Man?"

 
          
 
"He's chasing the Broken Stones. I'll bet
we get another two or three besides these two. Four or five are wounded. One
looks like he'll die on the way. Blue Wind's dart took him low in the back and
two of the Broken Stones had to support him. I think there will be a lot of
wailing in their lodges."

 
          
 
Wind Runner hopped on one foot and braced
himself on Fire Rabbit's shoulder. "We'll have a little wailing here in
this canyon if you don't help me get my hurt ankle out of here."

 
          
 
Fire Rabbit laughed. "We saw that. You
sure made them howl. They thought you'd really hurt yourself."

 
          
 
"I did," Wind Runner growled.

 
          
 
To the east, Flying Hawk led his staggering
band, stopping his warriors periodically to launch darts and keep the pursuing
Black Point at bay. He kept to the middle of the broad floodplain of the Fat
Beaver River so they couldn't be flanked or ambushed.

 
          
 
If they survived this raid, it would be a
miracle. Flute and Two Shields had died in the first volley of darts. White
Smoke would die of the wound in his back. Claps Hands staggered along, looking
haggard, blood draining out of the hole a sharp dart had cut through his thigh.
How many more would die?

 
          
 
Flying Hawk had been careful, made leery by
Brave Man's Dream. At the same time, the scout couldn't have been allowed to
escape. Surely the Black Point wouldn't have sat up on that
caprock
while one of their fellows was hunted like a wounded jackrabbit. Surely the
place wasn't right—except it had been. And whoever waited up on that rim had
managed his warriors with a fist harder than quartzite.

 
          
 
Just like Brave Man said. Flying Hawk glanced
back at the Black Point, who followed them like wolves after a winter-starved
elk herd. A new Power has come to the Broken Stones.

 
          
 
He looked up at the sun, now dipping to the
western horizon. "Get me out of this, Thunderbird. You'll take enough of
our souls to the Camp of the Dead this day. Just get me and those who still
live out . . . and I will follow your new Soul Flier who sees the future in his
Dreams. Flying Hawk swears this on his soul."

 
          
 
White Ash woke to the smell of roasting meat
and the sweet tang of biscuit root. She lay in a rock shelter: a hollowed-out
sandstone overhang capped by
rimrock
. A Spiral had
been painted with rich red ocher on the wall at the rear of the shelter. A
magpie perched on a wooden peg that jutted from the back wall. The bird cocked
its head, cawing softly as it eyed her.

 
          
 
"Oh? She's up, you say?" Singing
Stones' gravelly voice asked.

 
          
 
She peered over the piled mound of her
bedding. Singing Stones squatted on the flat boulder that had fallen out of the
roof and tended the fire. Back hunched, sunlight catching the infinity of
wrinkles on his face, he looked so fragile that she could imagine a puff of
wind might blow him away. Where his wrist stuck out of his thick sheepskin
coat, the bones could have been willow sticks attached to a dried mockery of a
gnarled hand.

 
          
 
The bird uttered a hollow clicking.

 
          
 
"Yes, she did sleep a long time."
Singing Stones replied. The magpie emitted a guttural squawk as it dipped its
head.

 
          
 
"You talk to the bird?" White Ash
sat up. The robes had been delightfully warm and soft. The thick piles of furs
had been placed on a bed of grass. How long had it been since she'd slept so
soundly? How long since she'd done nothing but sleep? None of the Power Dreams
had crept into her slumber. Despite the meal they'd eaten the night before, her
stomach yawned emptily.

 
          
 
The hanging door hides had been pulled to the
side. Golden sunshine poured through to illuminate the shelter and the
soot-stained walls. Skin bags hung from the ceiling in the back—beyond even the
most ingenious bushy-tailed packrat's reach. Several sandstone slabs on the
dirt floor marked the location of storage cysts an arms' length from the back
wall, out of the rodent zone but still back from ground moisture that seeped in
from beyond the drip line. Three differently styled fire hearths—a rock-filled
shallow basin, a slab-lined hearth, and a deep roasting pit—had been placed in
a triangular arrangement in the center. Two sandstone slabs had been planted
upright as breeze deflectors for the fires.

 
          
 
Outside, ragged mountains broke against the
horizon. Clots of dark-green timber contrasted with buff-colored sandstone
outcrops that tumbled weathered talus into the cool blue shadows where deep
snow lingered. A breeze—rich in scents of bitterbrush, grass, and damp
earth—carried the warmth of the sun-shot rock into the shallow shelter.

 
          
 
Singing Stones smiled at her, exposing the few
brown pegs of teeth that remained in his jaws. The wrinkles on his face
rearranged into a complex pattern of contentment. "Yes, I talk to many
creatures. Even to Dreamers, eh? Powerful Dreamers . . . like you."