The Shield of Time Read online

  His own woman, Tseshu, clutched at him. “Wait here,” he told her. Through the blindness of the den his hand found a weaponstone. He scrambled out of the skins, grass, and boughs in which they had rested, sharing warmth. Fear tore at him, but rage overwhelmed it. A beast, vexing his kin? On hands and knees, he shoved the windbreak aside and scuttled through the doorway. Rising to a crouch, he confronted what had come.

  The courage spilled from him like water from a cupped hand flung open.

  Cold seared his nakedness. Low in the south, the sun turned day to a blaze, hard blue sky, hard blue shadows, brilliant white over ground and alder branches. Ice gleamed duller on the stream, swept clean of snow by winds. Where the ravine ended, the stones of the beach lay rimed, and the sea itself had frozen a long ways out. Surf growled afar, as if the Bear Spirit spoke in anger.

  Before him stood two men. Leather and fur covered them. One held a spear in his right hand, a hatchet in his left. Aryuk had met him before, yes, he knew that thin glittery-eyed face, they called him Running Fox in their tongue. The other was old, wrinkled, gaunt, though not much wearied by his traveling. He gripped a bone carved with signs. Both had painted their brows and cheeks, marks that must be powerful too. Tracks showed how they had come down the slope—quietly, so quietly, until they were here and yelled their summons.

  Barakyn and Oltas had gone off to walk the trap lines. They would not return till tomorrow. Did these two watch and wait for my strong helpers to leave me? flashed through Aryuk. Barakyn’s woman Seset huddled at the entrance of their dwelling. Aryuk’s third living son, Dzuryan, hardly more than a boy, shuddered in front of the hut he shared with Oltas, where he had been tending the fire and otherwise dozing.

  “What… what do you want?” faltered Aryuk. Though dread clogged his mouth, he could not bring himself to wish these newcomers well as one should for any visitor.

  Running Fox replied, colder than the cloudlets that puffed from between his lips. He had learned Our speech better than any other Cloud man—in how many times with Daraku? “I talk to you. You talk to me.”

  That, yes, of course, Aryuk thought. Talk. What else have we left? Unless they want to mount Seset. She is young and toothsome. No, I must not let myself know wrath. Besides, they do not look at her. “Come inside,” he said reluctantly.

  “No,” spat Running Fox—half in scorn, half in wariness, Aryuk guessed. Crammed into a Tula shelter, he would have no room to wield those beautiful, deathful weapons. “We talk here.”

  “Then I must cover me,” Aryuk said. His feet and fingertips were already numb.

  Running Fox made a brusque gesture of agreement. Tseshu crept forth. She had put on shoes and a skin cloak, which she held tight as if afraid or ashamed to have strangers behold sagging breasts and slack belly. She brought the same garb for her man. Dzuryan and Seset slipped back and outfitted themselves likewise. They returned to the entrances, very quiet. Meanwhile Tseshu helped Aryuk dress.

  That comforted him mightily, as belittling as it was to do this while Running Fox flung his questions. “What walks… between you … and Sun Hair?”

  Aryuk gaped. “Sun Hair? Who?”

  “Woman. Tall. Hair like sun. Eyes like—” Running Fox pointed at the sky.

  “She Who Knows—We, we were friends.” Are we yet? She abides in your place.

  “What else? Talk!”

  “Nothing, nothing.”

  “Ho! Nothing? Why she give tribute for you?”

  Aryuk stiffened. Tseshu finished tying on the moss-stuffed bags that were his shoes. “She did? What?” Joy rushed over him. “Yes, she promised she would save us!”

  Tseshu straightened and took stance at his side. So had her way ever been.

  His moment’s happiness blew off across the ice. “What kuyok in knife?” Running Fox snarled.

  “Kuyok? Knife? I do not understand.” Was the man working a spell? Aryuk raised his free hand and made a sign against it.

  The intruders tensed. Running Fox spoke to his companion. The elder man pointed his carven bone at Aryuk and uttered a short, shrill chant.

  “No tricks,” Running Fox rasped. His hatchet waved toward the elder. “Here is Aakinninen—you say ‘Answerer.’ He kuyokolaia. Got kuyok much more strong than yours.”

  The word must mean “magic,” Aryuk knew. His heart shook his ribs. The cold slid through cloak and flesh. “I meant you no harm,” he whispered.

  Running Fox brought his spearhead near Aryuk’s throat. “My strength much more strong than yours.”

  “It is, it is.”

  “You see Wanayimo strength at Bubbling Springs.”

  Aryuk clutched his hand ax tight, as if its weight could hold him from being whirled up by a gust of forbidden fury. Should I go flat in the snow?

  “Do what I say!” Running Fox shouted.

  Aryuk glimpsed Dzuryan and Seset, how they quailed. Somehow he stood fast, and Tseshu beside him. “What must we do?” he asked in bewilderment.

  “You say what is with you and the tall ones. What they want? What they do?”

  “Nothing, we know nothing.”

  Running Fox slanted his spear downward. The stone-edged head sliced across Aryuk’s calf. A shallow cut reddened behind it. “Talk!”

  The pain was little, the menace bigger than heaven. When at last he meets the lion, a man stops being afraid. Aryuk squared his shoulders. “You can kill me,” he said low, “but then this mouth cannot speak. Instead, my ghost will.”

  Running Fox’s eyes widened. Either he knew the word for ghost or he guessed its meaning. He turned to Answerer. They conferred fast and harshly. But always Running Fox stayed mindful of where each of Us was. Aryuk’s free hand found Tseshu’s.

  Answerer’s withered face hardened. He barked something. His companion clearly agreed. Aryuk waited to learn the fate of his family.

  “You not make kuyok against us,” Running Fox said. “We take one along. She talk.”

  He stuck his spear upright in the snow, made a long stride forward, seized Tseshu by the arm. He hauled her from her man’s clasp. She wailed.

  Daraku!

  A wind roared over Aryuk. He himself screamed as he sprang.

  Running Fox chopped with his hatchet. Caught off balance, he missed Aryuk’s head but struck him on the left shoulder. Aryuk neither saw nor felt the blow. He was in against the Cloud man. His right arm swung. The hand ax crashed on Running Fox’s temple. The hunter crumpled.

  Aryuk stood above him. Pain smote. He dropped the hand ax and went to his knees, pawing at the hurt shoulder. Dzuryan boiled toward him. A weaponstone of his own, hurled, barely went by Answerer. The old one whirled about and ran off, in among the trees, up the slope. Dzuryan joined Tseshu where Aryuk was. Seset silenced the children.

  Aryuk’s soul returned as the darkness ebbed from him. Helped by both women, he regained his feet. Blood ran, a red flame amidst the snow, from his shoulder. That arm hung useless. When he tried moving it, the pain was so vast that the night rolled over him again. Tseshu drew his cloak aside to look at the wound. It wasn’t deep, the edge had hit bone, but surely that bone was broken.

  “Father, shall I catch the other man and kill him?”

  Dzuryan asked. Did his boy-voice waver, or was that how Aryuk heard it?

  “No,” said Tseshu. “He is too far ahead of you now. You are too young.”

  “But he, he will tell the Red Wolf what happened.”

  Dimly surprised, Aryuk found he could think. “That is best,” he muttered. “We must not make this thing worse … for all of Us.”

  He stared downward. Running Fox sprawled limp. The blood that had gushed from the man’s nose flowed no more, only trickled, slower and slower as the cold thickened it. The open mouth had gone dry, the open eyes had filmed over, the open bowels had emptied. A snowbank into which he had fallen hid the smashed part of his head.

  “I forgot myself,” Aryuk whispered at him. “You should not have laid hand on my woman. Not after my daug
hter. We were both unwise, you and I.”

  “Come in by the fire,” Tseshu said.

  He shambled obediently along. The women tended him as best they could, stanching the cut with moss, binding arm to side with thongs. Dzuryan built the fire up and fetched a frozen rabbit from a small cairn nearby. Tseshu laid it in the coals.

  Hot meat gave heart, and Aryuk drew more strength from the bodies pressed against his. At last he could tell them: “In the morning I must leave you.”

  “No!” moaned Tseshu. He knew that she knew what he intended. Nonetheless she protested. “Where can you go?”

  “Away,” he said. “They will come after their dead man when they hear, and after me. If they found us together, it would go very badly with you. When Barakyn and Oltas return, everybody must go different ways, seeking shelter and help among friends. The Cloud men will know that I and I alone killed him. I think, if they do not see you where he lies, they will be content with my death. Tracking me down will use up most of their anger.”

  Seset hugged herself, rocked to and fro, wept aloud. Tseshu sat moveless, excépt for taking her man’s good hand in hers.

  “Say no more now,” Aryuk ordered. “I am weary. I need a night’s rest.”

  He and Tseshu sought their hut. Lying beside her, he found he could sleep—lightly, skimming above pain, dreams flickering like bits of rainbow. I have lived longer than many, he thought once, half wakeful. It must be time for me to go find our children who died. They have been lonely.

  At dawn he ate again, let her clothe him, and went out. The ravine reached shadowy, its alders hunched into their own dreams. A few stars still glimmered overhead. Breath smoked into the chill. From the sea rumbled sounds of waves and of ice grinding ice. His wound throbbed, hot, but if he moved with care the pain seldom bit too hard.

  His woman, son, and first son’s woman gathered about him. He pointed at the corpse. “Bring this inside and close the entrance before you leave,” he told them. “The Mammoth Slayers may feel milder if gulls and foxes have not eaten of their friend. But first—” He tried to stoop. His wound forbade. “Dzuryan, you are the man now, until your brothers come home. Dig those eyeballs out. If I carry them away, his ghost should follow me and leave you alone.” The youth hung back, lips fluttering in the twilit blur of his face. “Do it!”

  When the things rested safe in his pouch, Aryuk, one-armed, drew Tseshu to him. “Had I grown old and feeble, I must go into the wilderness,” he said. “I leave a little sooner, only a little sooner.”

  From Dzuryan he took a hand ax. He wasn’t sure why. He had refused a food ration, and was in no shape to knock down an animal or even make a trap. Well, the stone was something to hold. He nodded, turned, and trudged off, toward the easiest path up the slope and out of sight.

  Surely you never wanted this for me, You Who Know Strangeness, he thought. When you learn of it, will you come help? Better if you help my children and grandchildren. I do not matter anymore. He sent the memory of her elsewhere and gave himself to his wandering.

  VII

  Throughout winter, the Tulat were as little active as possible, to conserve energy for survival. They collected what food they were able to; by daylight they did what work came to hand; but mainly they stayed in their dens, and for most of that time they slept or sat in a self-induced, daydreamy trance. It was no wonder that so many, especially infants, took fatally sick. Yet what choice had they?

  The Paleo-Indians were different, busy the year round, even during the long nights. They had the skills and the means to keep themselves well fed in all seasons. While some animals, such as the caribou, migrated, others, such as the mammoth, did not. That was the reason they settled on the steppe, though their hunters ranged into the northern highlands and the southern woods. Only the sea daunted them. Their descendants would master it. Meanwhile these, the Cloud People, had the Tulat to glean along its shores for them.

  Thus Ralph Corwin grew accustomed to movement and noise after dark. An optical pickup secretly planted in the till enabled him to watch on a screen in his dome, magnifying the view at will. If things got interesting, or if he simply felt like it, he would stroll over and mingle. The folk had long since accepted him as human—enigmatic, potentially dangerous, but fascinating and, it seemed, well-disposed. You could enjoy his company, the mystery adding salt to the pleasure. Girls smiled, and some were quite pretty. Too bad that taking advantage would mean a degree of involvement compromising his mission. The Tulat were easygoing but … grubby; nor had he time to spare for them. The Patrol didn’t want its too few agents spending more lifespan than necessary on any single job.

  How grand it would be if Wanda Tamberly, who otherwise fitted what he’d heard about outdoorsy California girls of the later twentieth century, were forthcoming. No matter, he often scolded himself.

  On this night he forgot about her. Tumult was rising in the village. He dressed warmly and left.

  The air lay still, as if wind had congealed in the cold. Passing through his nostrils, it felt liquid. A moon just past the full made his breath a phantom akin to the hills north and south. Snow glistened and crunched underfoot. He had no need of a flashlight, nor did torches flare among the houses ahead. It was an extravagance the Wanayimo could have afforded, thanks to their tributaries. A fire was being built at the cairn of the skulls. Folk milled about, talking, gesticulating, sometimes howling. When the flames were high, they would bring drums and dance.

  It would be a dance of mourning and propitiation, Corwin judged. That meant leadership, which meant certain plans and preparations. He steered wide of the crowd and made his way to the home of Red Wolf’s extended family.

  His guess proved right. The hingeless door leaned loose between the tusks and light trickled around it. He put his face to the crack. “Aho,” he called softly. “Tall Man speaks. May he enter?” Ordinarily that would have been an affront, implying that those inside were not hospitable, but rules changed when demonic forces were abroad, and Corwin also had an idea that Answerer was on hand. Unease had waxed these past few days, after the shaman sequestered himself; and now this abrupt excitement—

  After a minute, a form within blocked off the light. “Be welcome,” said Red Wolf, and drew the barrier aside. Corwin stepped through. Red Wolf accompanied him back to the middle of the room, where the banked coals had been stoked up. That small, smoking blaze gave about as much illumination as the fat that burned in four soapstone lamps. Beyond hulked darkness. Corwin could barely see a screen, hide stretched over a driftwood frame, propped across the rear end. Behind it must be such of the family as had no business here tonight and were not out among the howlers.

  Those who had met were a chosen few. Corwin recognized the hunters Broken Blade and Spearpoint, the respected elder Fireflint, standing. On the floor, arms across drawn-up knees, sat Answerer. Shadows lay doubly deep in the furrows of his visage, the sockets of sunken eyes. His back and neck were bent. Utter exhaustion, Corwin realized. He’s been away, but I don’t think it was on any spirit journey.

  “Yes, best is that Tall Man be in our council,” said Red Wolf. His tone was steely. “Did you summon him, Answerer?”

  The shaman made a noncommittal noise.

  “I saw what appears to be trouble, and came to see if I might be of use,” Corwin told them, not insincerely.

  ’Trouble indeed,” said Red Wolf. “Now Running Fox is dead, the cleverest of men.”

  “Ill is this.” Corwin had found that man valuable—quick on the uptake, talented at explaining things—though apt to ask disconcerting questions. His shrewdness and independence of mind were a distinct loss to the tribe. “How did it happen?” Some extraordinary way, obviously.

  Gazes through the gloom ransacked the outsider. “The Vole man Aryuk slew him,” Red Wolf replied. “That Aryuk for whose sake Sun Hair gave up her knife.”

  “What? No, can’t be!” They’re cowed, the Tulat, they’ve had it stabbed into them that they’re helpless.

&n
bsp; “It is so, Tall Man. Answerer has just arrived with the news. He escaped by a gnat’s wing, he, whose person should be inviolable.”

  “But—” Corwin drew his lungs full of warm, odorous, sooty air. Stay calm. Stay alert. This situation could get nasty fast, “I am surprised. I am grieved. I ask that you tell me how the woe came about.”

  Answerer looked up. Flame glinted in his eyes. Malignancy hissed: “It was because of you and your woman. Running Fox and I went to find out why those Voles are so dear to you.”

  “Friends, only friends. Sun Hair’s from earlier years. Not mine. I hardly know them.”

  “Aryuk said the same.”

  “It was true!”

  “Aryuk may have cast a spell on her,” Fireflint ventured.

  “Answerer needed to find out,” Red Wolf said. “Running Fox went with him. They spoke for a while, then suddenly Aryuk attacked. He took Running Fox off guard and killed him with a blow of a hand ax. Somebody threw another at Answerer, who fled.”

  No wonder he’s done in, Corwin thought distantly, an old man—perhaps as old as fifty—going day and night over the snow in terror for his life. The shaman had slumped again. “But what could make Aryuk do this?”

  “It is not clear,” Red Wolf replied. “A demon may have seized him, or the evil may long have nested in his heart…. You truly have no knowledge?”

  “None. What will you do now?”

  Glance met glance. The silence grew until Red Wolf reached a decision. He’s still leery of me, Corwin knew, but he wants to believe Wanda and I are honest. He wants to show his own goodwill by being candid.

  “I will not dance for Running Fox tonight,” Red Wolf said. “With certain hunters I will be bound for the sea. We must bring our friend home.”

  “Yes, you must,” Corwin understood.

  It was more than sentiment: “We need him here. His is a strong ghost, like Snowstrider’s, to aid us against evil spirits and hostile ghosts.”

  “Hostile…. Tulat?”

  “Who else? Although I will see to it that Aryuk’s body lies afar with his ghost tightly bound to it. Answerer will give me the tools and words for that.”