People of the Morning Star (53 page)

She blinked, shaking her head, unable to …

Piasa reached out, his taloned feet catching her by the throat. Panic-stricken, terrified, she looked into black pupils surrounded by a sea of burning yellow. Her gaze was drawn down into an endless midnight. And there, in the stygian darkness, she finally saw.

The scream was trapped in her throat by Piasa’s crushing grip.

“Now do you understand?”
Piasa’s voice boomed through her.

As she writhed in his crushing grip, she nodded, her head exploding with pain.

“Then you know what you must do.” Piasa released his hold, letting her drop to the soft mud. “I know what this will cost you, Lady of Cahokia. By possessing me, he will completely own you. Either you will save yourself, and our world, or he will destroy you in ways too horrible to contemplate.”

“How do I defeat him?”

“By surrendering yourself to him.”

“I can’t.” She placed a hand to her wounded throat, glancing up at Horned Serpent, and then Snapping Turtle, knowing they didn’t believe she had either the courage or will. When she shot a frightened glance at Piasa, she could see the beast’s own growing skepticism.

Like voices inside her, she could hear their thoughts:
Weak. Pampered. Despicable. Spoiled. Pitiful.

What was it the Red Wing had said? Anger was a better weapon in the Underworld than fear?

“I am Night Shadow Star,” she gritted through her teeth. “Of the Four Winds Clan, daughter of the
Tonka’tzi.
I have unfinished business.”

“Then finish it!” Piasa’s whiskers trembled, and his ear flicked. “I will help you when and if I can. There is a way.…”

*   *   *

After the Keeper’s household finished supper, Seven Skull Shield sidled up to Smooth Pebble. The
berdache
had her hair up in a gray bun, the muscles in her arms flexing as she scraped one of the boiling pots and threw food remains into the fire as an offering to the Spirits. Dogs were licking the plates, cleaning up scraps. The fire crackled and spit sparks toward the palace great-room ceiling.

“Where did the Keeper disappear to?”

“She wants time to herself. Leave her alone.” Then Smooth Pebble relented, her lined face tensing. “I’m worried. I’ve never seen her like this. What happened up there in the Council House?”

“It takes something out of a person to realize they’ve been betrayed by friends they trusted. Though why she’d put any faith in that Deer Clan chief after what Chunkey Boy did to him?” He shrugged. “I thought she was supposed to be so smart about these things.”

“She thought Chunkey Boy had made amends before he became the Morning Star. Even if he hadn’t, when the Morning Star took his body, Chunkey Boy ceased to be. Nothing was left to hate. Since then, they’d worked to earn her trust.”

“Chunkey Boy and this brother of his seem to have left quite a wake of destruction in their passage. Does the Keeper think she has to accept responsibility for all of it?”

Smooth Pebble studied him for a moment. “You like her, don’t you?”

He gave her a sheepish grin. “In spite of all my better sense, I…” He scowled at her. “And what if I do? I’ve been around,
berdache
. It takes a special kind of woman to pry any kind of respect out of me.”

Smooth Pebble’s knowing smirk communicated a shared understanding. “She’s out back, southwest corner, leaned against the wall. Just don’t add to her distress, thief.”

“Why’d you tell me that?”

“Because, may the lost Spirits of the dead help her, and for reasons I’m barely able to understand, she’s come to respect you. You’re something different for her. Maybe even a … Well, never mind. But if you let me down? Make her feel worse? Poisoning by hemlock—like you’ve just seen—would be mercy compared to what I’ll do to you.”

“You are indeed dangerous with a stewpot.”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

He stepped out into the cool spring evening. Sparkflies were dancing in the dying light, rising from the new grass in blinking columns. Palely illuminated clouds marched up from the south, and between them he could see the early stars casting patterns across the black.

The smells of Cahokia’s great city were carried on the damp evening breeze.

He saw the red glow of her pipe on the southwest corner and walked along the mound edge to where she sat. She was staring off to the west, the smell of burning tobacco sweetening the night.

Seven Skull Shield dropped down beside her and propped his arms on his knees, hands dangling.

Cautiously he said, “I think I’d open an artery before I chose hemlock. Dying that way? It’s nothing pretty.”

She nodded, sucking on her tubular stone pipe. “If you’re picked up by a squad of warriors, and you don’t know the reason for your summons, what do you do? For all they knew, I wanted to talk about how much corn the dirt farmers were growing. It’s not always easy to slice an artery when you learn the terrible truth. And even if you could get to a blade, your captors might be able to plug the bleeding with a finger long enough to get it sewed up. After that, you’re dying on the square for days. Being slowly skinned alive. And having your dangling parts burned off while you scream your voice out.”

“I’m sorry it turned out that way, is all.”

She drew on her pipe, held the smoke, then exhaled. “I’ve always considered myself the strong one in this family. The one who can do whatever’s required to get the job done. For the first time since I was a little girl, I’m not sure I’m up to it.”

“You’re up to it.”

“Oh? You learned this down on the canoe landing, or perhaps in some cuckolded man’s bed while his wife flopped around beneath you?”

“The value placed in the knowing of something is in the knowing of it, not the where or how it was obtained.”

She chuckled hollowly.

“Keeper, you’ve never had the game changed on you like this, that’s all. You and the other Houses, you play by certain subtle rules. This scorpion, he’s attacking you head on, and throwing it right in your face to keep you off guard.”

“To achieve what? That’s what baffles me.”

He stared out at the darkness. Dogs were barking in the distance. People were singing somewhere. A woman was calling for her children to come in.

Finally he said, “The difference this time is that he’s not trying to just topple your House in order to supplant it with his own. He’s trying to destroy Cahokia and, as the Tula said, ‘pull it up by the roots.’ That’s a different kind of antagonist. He doesn’t care what he breaks in the process, because he’s not interested in fixing it later.”

“I still should have anticipated Right Hand and Corn Seed’s treachery.” She paused, took another drag on her pipe, and exhaled. “Did you believe him when he said Chunkey Boy beat his hand to a pulp?”

“That part, to my ears, was no lie. I’ve been thinking about this all evening, and if you’ll let me have a puff off that pipe of yours, I’ll tell you my thoughts.”

“Just who do you think you…?” She paused, considered, then chuckled at herself as she handed the pipe over. “No one has ever
dared
ask that of me before.”

“You need a better quality of friends.” He drew deeply of the tobacco, held it, and exhaled through his nostrils. “I’ll be taken and whipped, that’s smooth and strong, Keeper.” He quickly drew again and handed the pipe back.

“If I so much as hear a peep that anyone knows I shared my pipe with a thief?”

“Your secret is safe. My threshold for honor may be lower than catfish crap, but what little I’ve got is sacrosanct. Mostly. Depending upon the price.”

She knocked what was left of the ash and ember out into a small dish, fumbled a thick pinch of tobacco from the pouch at her side, and rapidly tamped it into the bowl. Using a twig, she coaxed the few red coals on the dish into the pipe, then drew to light it.

Almost absently she noted, “You saw War Claw when he stepped in and whispered to me just before supper?”

“I did.”

“The raid on that warehouse of War Duck’s netted us nothing.” She extended her lips, blowing out smoke. “Nothing but a big red snake painted on the back wall. Just like the one in Red Warrior’s sleeping quarters and on Lace’s wall. He’s mocking us.”

“Not unexpected, but discouraging nonetheless.”

“Not a single indication that Lace had been there. The people around, they’d just seen men coming and going. Young men who looked like warriors but dressed like slaves. In River City? Who’d notice?”

He took the pipe when she offered it. Rot take him, that was the best smoke he’d ever enjoyed. “I need to know about Chunkey Boy and Night Shadow Star. And this other brother. The banished one that no one speaks of. Are the rumors true? Did the Morning Star have him murdered out of jealousy and fear?”

Even in the darkness he knew she was giving him that “don’t go there” hard-eyed look. “My pipe is one thing. I wouldn’t discuss such family matters with a Four Winds kinsman, let alone you, thief.”

“Like I said, I do have some standards when it comes to discretion. I’ve made a stock and trade of family secrets, but those have been artfully stolen through guile and craft. Earned the hard way, if you will. But information given willingly in confidence from a friend?” He handed her pipe back. “That, like the names of my confederates—if you’ll recall—cannot be tortured out of me on the square.”

“What in the Sky Worlds and down below makes you think I’d believe you?”

He was considering his answer when she unexpectedly sighed and said, “They likened themselves to being the living incarnation of the Creation story: Chunkey Boy was Morning Star, Walking … the younger brother, played ‘Thrown Away’ the wild one, and Night Shadow Star fashioned herself as Corn Woman. Looking back, I’m sure they almost came to believe it, what with Morning Star’s souls living in their grandfather’s body.

“The brothers acted as brothers do, squabbling to the death in one heartbeat, best friends the next, and ready to stand shoulder to shoulder in defense of each other at the toss of a rock. Night Shadow Star, however, provided the special glue. She was game for anything, trying to outdo both of her brothers, and pretty much succeeding until the change came. The boys’ muscles hardened, their voices deepened, and they grew into men. Meanwhile her breasts budded and her hips widened, but she never stopped competing. She might not have been able to throw a chunkey lance farther, so she threw it straighter. The same with her archery, what she lacked in strength, she made up for with skill and accuracy.”

“People still talk about her out there,” he gestured. “Some say she was becoming
berdache.
”

“We wondered.” Blue Heron puffed on her pipe. “But that last year they spent together, there were strains. Tensions none of us understood. Some, like you heard tonight, came from the constant stream of suitors vying for Night Shadow Star’s hand. And then, like a breaking branch, everything came crashing down. The Morning Star’s human body was dead.

“Chunkey Boy’s body was the first choice. He’d been groomed for the honor all of his life. But until that moment it hadn’t been real for any of them. Chunkey Boy hardly had time to dwell on it as he was prepared, cleansed, purged, smoked, and sweated.”

“The other two had to watch the ceremony from the sidelines, realizing they were losing their brother. That nothing would be the same again. How did they take it?”

She nodded, handing him the pipe. “Walk … I mean the younger brother—”

“Why was he killed?”

“I heard he drowned.”

At his silence, she shot him a glance. “I mean it. No one knows why Morning Star exiled him. Night Shadow Star refuses to even discuss it.”

When he handed her the pipe, Blue Heron used it to gesture toward Morning Star’s palace. “He knows. It was his order. One of the first he issued when he finally recovered from the ordeal and walked again among men.”

“One rumor says it was jealousy. Another is that Morning Star finally had his fill of the boy’s unseemly behavior.”

“So I’ve heard.” The pipe bowl glowed red in the darkness. “What I know is that I woke up one morning and was informed that warriors had escorted my nephew to the canoe landing, and that he was going downriver to a new life. No sooner had that shock soaked in, than I was told that Night Shadow Star had entered the women’s house for her first menstruation.” She paused. “In one stroke, Chunkey Boy’s, my nephew’s, and Night Shadow Star’s lives were transformed.”

“Keeper, people whisper behind their hands that Chunkey Boy and your nephew were, how do I say, in trouble a lot? That but for who they were, they might have been, um…”

“Severely disciplined?” She blew smoke through her nostrils. “More than once we paid out to Earth Clan families to compensate for the boys’ indiscretions and unfortunate choices. On occasion we had to resort to other measures. What could we do? They were the
Tonka’tzi
’s sons and daughter. And young.”

“Which, of course, absolves them of any kind of punishment and places them above the sanctions mandated for lesser beings?”

“I don’t like your tone.”

“If you think my tone is unsettling, you haven’t been paying attention to the lengths someone is going to in an attempt to destroy your family. And Cahokia with it.”

“I suppose.” She rubbed her face anxiously. “Lace has always been the good one of the bunch. Why is it that she’s the one they’ve taken? Where’s the justice in that?”

“The justice? It’s everywhere. She’s Four Winds Clan, the
Tonka’tzi
’s daughter. And young. I’d say someone Chunkey Boy, Night Shadow Star, and your maybe-or-maybe-not-dead nephew really hurt now wants revenge. Some significant person? A family? An entire House? Perhaps someone denied justice and unfairly exiled, sent off to found one of your colonies? They’ve been waiting, biding their time. They’ve chosen now to strike.”

He paused, glancing sidelong at her. “Who might that be, Keeper? Where in the abuses of the past do we find explanations for the actions of today?”

“There are so many, thief. I wouldn’t know where to begin.” She bowed her head, the tobacco having gone cold in her pipe.