People of the Morning Star (41 page)

“I have servants for that,” she told him sharply.

“So he is a noble?” Blue Heron mused. “But he could be from anywhere. Even Pacaha.”

“With respect, Clan Keeper,” Seven Skull Shield added, “I don’t think so.” He glanced at Fire Cat who’d stood silently at the back of the room. “Red Wing, would anyone in your family, no matter how highly ranked, have paid out two bowls of such value for a bundle of arrows?”

Fire Cat crossed his arms, shaking his head. “We survive on Trade. Being wise in the ways of it, establishing fair value, is how we maintained ties not only with the wild forest tribes, but the established Traders as well. Perhaps we don’t …
didn’t
show the same passion for it as some of the better Traders, but we weren’t held up to ridicule, either.”

“The south might be different,” Sun Wing pointed out. “That’s where those bowls came from.”

Seven Skull Shield looked distinctly uncomfortable when he said, “I’ve spent more than my share of time on the canoe landing. The southern chiefs are the subject of considerable discussion among the Traders. While some have better reputations than others when it comes to Trade, none are, as the Red Wing would say, ‘held up to ridicule.’”

Sun Wing glared daggers at Seven Skull Shield. “Correct me again, thief, and I’ll—”

“Enough,” the
Tonka’tzi
ordered, shooting her niece a warning look. “I think it’s pretty clear that we are dealing with an anomaly here. The assassin was obviously raised without an understanding of Trade. Determining where that place might have been will lead us to the assassin’s origin.”

“Um…” Seven Skull Shield had his eyes firmly fixed on the floor.

“Here.” Night Shadow Star announced with finality. She was vaguely aware of the thief’s look of relief. “In all the world, Cahokia is the ultimate recipient of Trade. It all comes here eventually.”

“But Cahokia is awash in Trade!” Sun Wing cried. “The Earth Clans, the immigrants, the Traders, the colonies, everyone is Trading.”

“Except the Four Winds Clan.”
Tonka’tzi
Wind looked thoughtful. “We expect, and receive, anything we want as gifts. Nor do we “Trade” as such with the embassies who come here. They bring the most remarkable offerings to us. We “gift” them in return, offering like for like. But it isn’t like real Trade where we compare values and haggle.”

“So,” Blue Heron mused, “it’s one of us?”

Very good!
Night Shadow Star heard Piasa murmur from the depths of her souls.

“But who?” she asked.

Someone close.

Night Shadow Star felt a tremor run though her. Involuntarily her glance went to the people in the room. “Surely,” she whispered under her breath, “it
can’t
be one of us!”

Where Tie Snakes Lurk

I am curious. And, to be honest, a bit frustrated. I cannot escape the notion that some aspect of Power is working against me. Not that I blame it. By now even Piasa is aware of the threat I pose. I doubt, however, that the cunning Spirit Beast has the slightest notion of just how dangerous I really am. Someday soon he, and all the Spirits of the Underworld, will have an awakening.

The attempt to call back my dead warrior’s souls from the lower realms will have alerted them. Granted, the ritual didn’t work as anticipated. Nevertheless, they would have felt the pull on my dead warrior’s souls. That anyone would have the temerity to attempt such a thing must have upset the Tie Snakes, Piasa, and perhaps even Old-Woman-Who-Never-Dies. Normally First Woman remains in her cave where it winds around through the roots of the World Tree. There, undisturbed, she dreams fertility into the soils, plants, and forests.

I grew up on stories about Lichen, the great priestess who actually sent her soul to First Woman’s cave, and pleaded with her to restore the rains. Compared to what I’m about to attempt, Lichen comes across as a bumbling novice.

I laugh, and the Mos’kogee man beside me gives me an uncertain appraisal.

For the moment I mingle with the crowd that has gathered at the base of Morning Star’s great earthen pyramid with its palisaded Council House, and even loftier palace. I am desperate for news, hungry for any tidbit. Everyone is talking about the attack on Night Shadow Star; they wonder who could possibly be behind it. Many speculate that it’s the Red Wings, while others remind them that a Red Wing now serves the lady. Others speak of a Powerful witch loose who might have possessed a band of hunters with madness. Still others whisper that it is incipient warfare between the Houses, and tie it to the
tonka’tzi’s
mysterious death. I am amused. None of them, however, appear to have any information that will benefit me.

People hardly look twice at me, figuring I’m just another of the endless stream of pilgrims who pass through Cahokia. They think the large roll of matting I carry contains my bedding. One of the miraculous things I’ve learned about people is that they generally dismiss what they see as what they expect.

If they thought about it, would any pilgrim wear my current expression of wary contemplation? I am obsessed by what went wrong last night. And delightfully relieved.

How did Night Shadow Star extricate herself from my attack? I’m irked that I killed so many of her worthless servants, and somehow she escaped without so much as a nicked finger.

Power saved her for me.

I hear the voices whispering agreement.

It only makes sense. The rains are called by the Tie Snakes; their Power is with water. The mighty beasts inhabit dripping caves, lurk in the depths of springs, and lounge in the silt-laden depths where the great rivers twist back on their courses. Somehow they knew I would act last night; they called the storm into which she disappeared.

But for their interference, my wolves and I would have at least had starlight, perhaps a sliver of the new moon to pick our targets. Instead, given the inky blackness beneath the storm, we had to shoot blindly.

But in doing so, I demonstrated the lengths to which I would go, the depth of the sacrifice I am willing to make. Only the exceptional are willing to murder that which they love the most.

I now know that Power has saved her for me. So great is my certainty that my dreams last night were filled with Night Shadow Star. Like the young woman at the farmstead, she was bound, naked, and I was washing her body in preparation for the ritual. As I stared into her eyes, she spread her muscular legs, opening herself to me. The moment I drove myself into her the explosion of my loins had been so vivid I jerked awake, panting.

“I understand, my love,” I whisper to myself. “When I released that arrow, it was proof that I was finally worthy to possess you.”

I look up at the great mound’s first terrace. The edge is bordered by its stout palisade, and behind it I can just see the Council House roof. Night Star Shadow, Blue Heron, and the rest are up there. What I would give to listen in on that worried meeting, to hear what measures they plan to take.

Around me, people continue to whisper about the attack on Night Shadow Star. At least I have made them wary, anxious, and uncertain. I must feed that fear, grow it. I will need their panic when my plans finally come to fruition.

It takes all of my concentration to keep my painted face from smiling. Here, in the crowd, I am just another foreigner, come to share in the glory and excitement. In the throng, I am faceless.

“Look!” a fish Trader cries, pointing. “It’s a runner from the Council House.”

I glance at the young man with his painted staff of office as he trots down the stairs from the palisade gate and work my way closer to the ring of warriors who guard the bottom of the stairs. They look fierce in their bright paint and plumage. Instead of the two ceremonial guards, today three tens surround the base of the stairs. They ensure that no unauthorized person passes their line. I can read their barely masked rage, see the anger in their eyes in the aftermath of the attack on Night Shadow Star.

I am close enough that I can hear the runner as he approaches the squadron leader and says, “The
tonka’tzi
requests the presence of
Amayxoya
Frantic Lightning, of the Yellow Star embassy. Please prepare an escort for us upon my return.”

That startles me. I have purposely avoided any direct contact with the Yellow Star embassy. Not that I fear that Frantic Lightning, or any of his people, might recognize me. I not only passed the war chief on the avenue several days back, but attended his reception atop the Morning Star’s mound with impunity. Dressed as I was he never gave me a second glance, but he, or one of his assistants, might comment on my Tula wolves should they catch sight of one. The last thing I need is anyone asking questions about the Tula—or why they might be in Cahokia.

The runner hesitates, then, looking puzzled, asks the squadron leader, “Have you ever heard of a people called Tula?”

Hot anger and the cold chill of fear both coil inside me. Did the fool just hear my thoughts? And if not, how else did they make this leap?

My gaze narrows to a slit as I watch the runner pass the line of warriors. His staff of office held high, he calls, “Make way! I am on an errand for
Tonka’tzi
Wind!”

I dare not sprint after him. But then, I know where the Yellow Star embassy is quartered. They have been given a large house, courtesy of the Morning Star. It lies a short run off to the west, just back the main avenue, on a terrace overlooking Cahokia Creek’s marshy bottoms.

I must hurry.

Thirty-five

He had earned the name Frantic Lightning Mankiller for his exploits in a battle against the Tanico Nation. Located on the Great Western River, several days’ travel downstream from Yellow Star Mounds, the Tanico had been subordinate and paid tribute to the Yellow Star’s Kadadokies tribe for nearly a generation. Then the great Kadohadacho, or “Supreme Chief” of the Yellow Star Nation had died. Two of Frantic Lightning’s cousins had made a play for the high chair. Civil war was narrowly averted at the last instant when a stickball game was played between the two brothers to settle the succession.

The Tanico
Caddi,
or high chief, meanwhile, took the opportunity to revolt. Mistakenly, he and his people had assumed that Yellow Star mounds would consume itself in the struggle. Instead the newly installed Kadohadacho had dispatched a small army to march on Tanico. In the subsequent fighting, Frantic Lightning had distinguished himself by charging back and forth between hard-pressed squadrons as they battled through swampy bottomlands along the river. No sooner had he snatched victory from defeat by his heroic actions on one front, than he raced off to another. Afterward the warriors reported that he acted like a frantic lightning bolt, striking first in one place before being called to strike at another. The name had been formalized and bestowed upon him at the ceremony that marked him as an
amayxoya
, or squadron commander and war chief. Subsequent responsibilities had cemented his reputation and led to his nomination to head the most recent embassy to Cahokia.

The fact that, on this particular day, the
tonka’tzi
’s messenger found him in the luxurious dwelling the Morning Star had offered for his use was somewhat fortuitous. Since his arrival in the city, Frantic Lightning had availed himself of Cahokia’s phenomenal entertainments. Not only did the food stands, Trader’s booths, lapidary, and ceramic workshops, coppersmiths, and exotic Traders constantly amaze, but endless games of chunkey could be had. And Frantic Lightning was a player of no mean skill.

He had just returned from a morning of chunkey in River City Mounds, having won an embossed copper falcon from an Illini opponent. Halfway through the process of sponging sweat from his neck and shoulders, his squadron second—a renowned war leader named Takes Horn FiveKiller—entered the room and touched his chin. The man was in his mid-forties, his weathered face and faded tattoos bent by a wry grin as he announced, “
Amayxoya,
a messenger has just arrived from the
tonka’tzi.
Somehow they’ve come to the conclusion that some Tula were involved in the attack on the Lady Night Shadow Star. The
tonka’tzi
has sent a request that you attend her and hopefully provide some information on the Tula.”