Lightning Shell--A People of Cahokia Novel, page 25
Jay Tail, seeming not to buy it, stepped close, reached out with his war club, and used the hafted stone head to lift the corner of the netting that covered Night Shadow Star’s box. He seemed puzzled at first, blinked as he took in the intricate carving, the shell-and-pearl inlays and the damning Four Winds Clan designs.
“Upriver Traders, huh?” Jay Tail beckoned his other warriors with his free hand. “Maybe you’d better start talking, and you’d best hope to high Hunga Ahuito that it makes more sense than this dung you’ve been spouting.”
Fire Cat took a deep breath, considered trying to take the five warriors, and gave it up as a bad option.
“Well, wife?” he asked Night Shadow Star. “When has anything we’ve said ever made sense?”
He tried to smile at the surrounding warriors and failed.
Thirty-nine
Having passed midnight, this was now officially the third day of the Busk, though sunrise wouldn’t come for another five hands of time.
Creeping Panther paused just before the veranda, looked back over his shoulder at Seven Sticks’ shadowy form as he eased his way along the flattened top of the mound. The dwelling was generally kept for foreign embassies to occupy. For the duration of the Busk it had been designated for Evening Star House’s sole use. Seemed the good Matron Columella had reservations about staying at the Four Winds Clan House, where Rising Flame kept her residence.
Who would have thought that Columella might not be safe in the city?
The notion brought a twist of amusement to Creeping Panther’s lips.
From the elevated step, he and Seven Sticks could hear the drums, the chanting, and the clapping of hands. Even the shuffle of thousands of moccasins on the beaten grass of the Great Plaza. Flickers of light from the bonfires cast the palaces, society houses, temples, and charnel houses in black silhouette where they fronted the plaza.
This late in the night, the orange glow had faded from the smoke and haze that cloaked the rest of the city.
The odors of Cahokia carried on the night breeze, damp, acrid, filled with the pungency of packed humanity. He caught the cloying scent of rotting corpses as the breeze shifted from the Fish Clan charnel house to the west. Somewhere to the north, across the Avenue of the Sun, a lone dog barked.
Creeping Panther slipped his war club from where it hung at his leather strap of a belt. In the faint light, he could see Seven Sticks do the same.
With a careful step, he eased onto the veranda, feeling the split-plank floor under his bare feet. Have to be most careful now. Columella’s warriors were laid out in a line, their blanket-wrapped forms barely visible in the night’s orange glow. Step by easy step, Creeping Panther lived up to his name. But then Green Chunkey hadn’t chosen him and Seven Sticks randomly.
At the plank door, the two shifted their weapons, each grabbing the portal. In unison they eased it up, shifted it, and leaned the door against the plastered wall to one side. Then, noiseless as smoke on the water, they felt their way into the great room. Here the eternal fire in its puddled-clay hearth cast enough glow that Creeping Panther could make out the wall benches where Columella’s entourage slept. These were Evening Star House nobles, Columella’s kin, and high-ranking Earth Clans chiefs and matrons under her command. Their servants and lackeys slept rolled in blankets on the white-clay floor, exposed as it was with the matting ripped out.
On feet of air, Creeping Panther led the way down the narrow path left open beside the fire. Not that he worried so much now. Room full of people like this? No one would remark on two shadows walking across the floor. Could have been any of them up to empty night water, attend to some personal chore. With this many allies, and this much protection around, no one would entertain the notion of an assassin.
At the rear, a second door had been pulled back and left half open. This, too, from long practice, Creeping Panther and Seven Sticks carefully lifted aside, working in unison like the well-functioning team they were.
And then they were inside the sleeping quarters.
Here it got a little tricky. The room was dark as pitch. The problem would be locating Columella without alerting anyone else who might be sleeping in the stygian room. Reaching out, he laid a light finger on Seven Sticks’ shoulder, their signal to stop, wait, and study.
Cocking his head, Creeping Panther listened carefully. And yes, there. He could hear the soft rasping of breath, the gentle exhalation of a sleeping human.
Wait, and another on a second bench farther back.
Sniffing, he sought to smell out the difference. Columella, being a matron who, according to their surveillance, had spent the day at the Four Winds Clan House, at the Council Terrace, and maybe even Morning Star’s palace, should have a slightly perfumed odor. A servant or guard would have been outside, waiting, sweating in the hot sun and humid air.
This one. In the nearer bed. She might even have had that faint feminine musk.
He tapped his finger on Seven Sticks’ shoulder and eased his foot forward. Felt the string with his toes, and before he could understand, heard something clatter at the far end of the room.
“I guess they’re here,” a voice said in a most reasonable tone.
“Lift the basket,” another voice declared.
Frozen in a half step, Creeping Panther gaped as a basket was lifted at the far end of the room. With that, soft yellow light from an oil lamp cast its glow across the confines of the sleeping quarters.
The woman who rose from the bed was young, in her early thirties, with a Turtle Clan tattoo on her cheeks. Wiry, muscular, she carried a light wicker shield, a stone-bitted war club in her right hand. In the dim light, her thin-lipped mouth bent into a smile.
Creeping Panther back-stepped, felt more than heard Seven Sticks turn on his heel, and winced as voices from the great room called, “They’re not going anywhere. We’ve got the exit blocked.”
On the second bed, a dwarf threw back the blanket and stood, the added elevation placing him at head height with Creeping Panther. Had to be Flat Stone Pipe, Columella’s famous consort.
A burly warrior, a squadron first’s feathers on his shoulders, full armor encasing his torso and forearms, set the basket to one side before nocking and pulling a war arrow to full draw. He said, “First one of you moves, I’ll skewer you. Second one moves, White Iris here will smack your brains out. And just because she’s a woman, don’t even think you can beat her. She trains with me.”
“Oh, Uncle,” the woman said as she narrowed a disappointed eye, “you take the fun out of everything.” Then her tone hardened. “Drop the war clubs. Then raise your hands where we can see them.”
“This is all a mistake,” Creeping Panther cried as he dropped his war club, which landed on the bare clay with a thump. “We just got lost. Apologies. In the dark we walked into the wrong building. We’ll just—”
“Indeed you did,” Matron Columella interrupted from the door. She was studying them with thoughtful eyes. “Squadron First? Think you and White Iris can manage to get them back to our side of the river before sunrise?”
“Plenty of time, Matron,” the grinning warrior said. “Have them in the squares by sunup.”
“And I’ll be happy to make them talk,” White Iris added, leaning close, a dancing excitement in her eyes as she asked Creeping Panther, “You ever been tortured by a woman with a vivid imagination?”
He swallowed hard, half wheezed, “This is a mistake.”
From the door Columella added, “White Iris is quite good at her job and does have a most ingenious imagination when it comes to naked men hanging in squares. I think it has something to do with a woman’s curiosity about the male body. But I give you my word: The pain stops and you’ll be taken down as soon as you tell us everything Green Chunkey ordered you to do here.”
When Creeping Panther shot a glance at Seven Sticks, the man was already shivering, tears leaking down his cheeks.
Forty
“Leave it be, Squadron Third Jay Tail,” Blood Talon said in Cahokian as he lowered his end of the box and stepped forward. “Yes, I know you. Served under Slim Arrow during the Shawnee campaign, as I recall. Didn’t fare too well, if memory serves.” Blood Talon glanced around at the low clouds, the stringers of drizzle. “Doesn’t look like your prospects have picked up any either, now does it?”
“You take chances, Trader.” Jay Tail stiffened. “You talk to me in that tone of voice? I’m a squadron third under Tall Dancer’s command, and you’re about to—”
“Feed you that war club if you don’t shut your empty hole of a mouth and let us pass!” Blood Talon barked. “You didn’t serve War Leader Spotted Wrist well when he took on the Shawnee, and now you’re about to make a worse mess out of a simple sentry detail.”
Jay Tail had puffed up like a freezing robin, his face darkening. He wagged his war club in Blood Talon’s face, saying, “I’ll have your hide, you worthless—”
“You address me as Squadron Leader Blood Talon! First in command under War Leader and Clan Keeper Spotted Wrist.”
Jay Tail gaped, jerked as if slapped when Blood Talon ripped the war club from the squadron third’s grip.
“I thought I knew you!” the first warrior crowed. “Yes, that’s you! The mud on your face, the way you’re dressed—”
“Is for a gods-rotted reason,” Blood Talon hissed as he advanced on the hapless Jay Tail. “Now, you do one of two things. You let us pass and be on about our mission, or you take us right to Tall Dancer. After I have to explain why War Leader and Clan Keeper Spotted Wrist’s plans are being fouled up by some pus-licking maggot of a lowly squadron third, I’m going to see you hung in a square for the locals. Let them take out any upset and frustrations they might be feeling about Cahokians. And more than that, I’ll light the first torch!”
Jay Tail looked like he was trying to swallow past a stuck plum pit.
Not finished, Blood Talon added, “Now, we’re headed down that blood-rotted trail. And not another word, you hear?” He spun. “All of you! Not a pus-dripping word! None of you saw me. I don’t exist. Neither do these Traders, and especially that spit-licking box! It’s not real. Not even a high fancy in your mud-clotted imaginations. This meeting never happened! You get that?”
“Yes, Squadron First!” Jay Tail banged out a salute, knocking a fist to his wet chest so hard that water spattered out from his soaked tunic.
Blood Talon muttered, “Good,” and handed the squadron third’s war club to the first warrior. The cowed man took it as if it were a live snake instead of wood and stone.
Blood Talon growled, “Not a fetid word,” as he picked up his end of the box and jerked a hard nod for the Red Wing to proceed.
It wasn’t until they were well out of earshot and entering the canyon that Blood Talon muttered, “No wonder he was exiled to the colonies. Idiot couldn’t find his balls with two hands on a bright and sunny day.”
Forty-one
As she was carried into the tonka’tzi’s council room, Clan Matron Rising Flame ordered, “Place my litter before the eternal fire. Then leave us.”
She was lowered carefully. Then her porters bowed and left. Tonka’tzi Wind’s floor now sported striking new cattail matting, all woven with remarkable finesse. It was said to be a product of a group of women from a settlement just outside the Moon Mounds, where the Avenue of the Sun reached its eastern terminus out in the Grand Prairie.
Rising Flame glanced around, seeing the new white-clay plaster, how the wall benches were polished. Despite the traditional hangings, the Four Winds Clan relief carving that dominated the rear of the room, and the collections of textiles, copper repoussé, and various masks, the room had a refreshed, new look.
Turning her head, Rising Flame told the four warriors standing in the rear, “You are dismissed.”
The leader, an older man in armor decorated with North Star House designs, touched his head respectfully and said, “Clan Matron, I mean no disrespect, but my orders—”
“Warrior, while I’m sure you are Keeper Spotted Wrist’s good and loyal servant, the Keeper serves at my will and pleasure. Now, you will take yourself and your warriors, and along with everyone else, you will leave the tonka’tzi and me to converse in peace. Is that understood?”
All the recorders, the messengers and runners, along with the servants, knowing the routine, promptly picked up their belongings and began filing out of the room.
The warrior, his face reflecting frustration, glanced uneasily at his comrades before saying, “Clan Matron, I’m afraid I—”
“It’s been a while since I’ve hung anyone in the squares. It’s about time that I did so again to reinforce my authority. I can’t think of a better way than letting the crowd cut apart four of Spotted Wrist’s trusted warriors. Nothing would send a clearer signal about who is in control of the Four Winds Clan, or do you disagree?” She ended by giving him a deadly smile.
“No, Clan Matron!” The warrior slammed a fist to his chest in a military salute, turned on his heel, and with a jerk of the head, led the other warriors out.
Across the fire, Great Sky Wind perched on her panther hide–covered litter, chin propped on a palm. She had her gray hair pulled up in a severe bun; an immaculately rendered Hunga Ahuito copper headpiece with a Spirit Bundle topped her head. The woman’s shoulders were covered with a rainbow-colored cloak crafted of painted bunting feathers. Her skirt, of a finely woven dogbane fabric, draped down over her knees. She studied Rising Flame through half-lidded eyes.
As an opener, Rising Flame said, “Looks like you’ve had a great deal of work done. New plaster and all. I had heard that you used the Busk as an opportunity to make some changes. Tore out part of the back wall.”
“All new buildings need some remodeling. Plaster was flaking off. Especially in the back rooms, and some thatch had been poorly installed. Had to tear out a section of wall back there and replace it. Needed to fix some problems with drainage in the southeast corner, too. Would have led to mound slumping. That why you’re here? Wanted to see the repairs?”
“No.” Rising Flame took a deep breath. “We need to talk. Seriously and honestly.”
“About putting Spotted Wrist’s enforcers in place? Or admitting that you misjudged the Hero of the North’s abilities when it came to solving the problem of Cahokia’s constantly bickering Houses?”
“My concern is Cahokia.”
Wind, chin still propped, said, “I take it that new realities are causing you to rethink all those idealistic assumptions you once made about Cahokian politics.”
“Oh, I don’t know. So far the city seems to be—”
“Stop it,” Wind snapped. “The reasons behind Morning Star’s efforts to place you in the Matron’s chair still defy my abilities to comprehend. And believe me, I can comprehend a lot. Why you? A woman with no experience given the deep currents through which you would have to swim.”
“Obviously, Morning Star thought I would be the best choice to bring new leadership to the Four Winds Clan. Change the way in which the city was governed. Someone younger, who could see past those deep currents you refer to, who wasn’t indoctrinated to do things the way they had always been done. A fresh wind blows old smoke from the room, Tonka’tzi.”
“And how’s that working out for you, Matron?”
Rising Flame chuckled softly to herself. “I made a severe miscalculation about someone whose support I depended upon.”
“I’m sure that grates. However, you appointed him, you can remove him.”
“Ah, you mean Spotted Wrist? That’s a different problem. But yes, I expected the Hero of the North to be a great deal more competent at his job. Your sister called him … I believe her words were, ‘A blunt instrument.’ Unfortunately, after working with him, I’m not sure how he managed all those military triumphs.”
“Marching an army cross-country and fighting pitched battles is a different kind of fish from Cahokian politics,” Wind told her. “But, as those warriors you just dismissed prove, a blunt instrument carries its own dangers.”
Rising Flame’s lips twitched. “I needed him, Tonka’tzi. Horned Serpent House, River House, and North Star House were on the verge of tearing Cahokia apart after that last stunt Morning Star pulled. The city was on the verge of civil war, and without Spotted Wrist’s massed squadrons, we’d never have cowed Green Chunkey back into submission.”
“Had to pay Spotted Wrist off with something? So you appointed him Clan Keeper?”
“Surely a man who could accomplish all that he had could … Well, as you say, it’s a different kind of fish.”
Wind’s right eye narrowed to a slit. “What do you want to get out of all this?”
Rising Flame jabbed a hard finger Wind’s way. “I want the city unified, Tonka’tzi. I know how the nations downriver think. And I’ve been to some of the colonies on the lower Tenasee. With each major expedition and colony, Cahokia is becoming something greater. But then, you receive the embassies, take the reports from the colonies. If anyone in Morning Star House knows this, it’s you.”
“And yet you would have replaced me with Green Chunkey, of all people?”
Rising Flame let a fleeting smile cross her lips. “At the time, I didn’t have much choice. You’ve been in my seat; you were Clan Matron before your brother’s murder. You know that sometimes decisions are thrust upon you. In this case that blunt instrument was insistent.” She made a face. “And it’s not like I could turn back time.”
“And if you could?”
“I’d have kept your sister, with her network of spies, as Keeper.” Rising Flame leaned forward, squinted an eye. “What I came to tell you today is that I will do everything I can to keep you as tonka’tzi. I think the city needs your wisdom and experience.”
“I see.”
“What I cannot do, however, is protect you from a squad of Spotted Wrist’s warriors if they come for you. Ultimately the man’s authority is backed by his fawning and loyal squadrons.”
