A Fire in Winter

Image by PrettySleep at Pixabay

22 minutes

General Audience

I. Ambush

It was in the year of the great storm, when the snows fell for weeks, till even the animals cried out to Nokomis and begged her either to relent, or else speak to Gitchi Manitou. Then Manitou heard, and there was a great quiet over the land, though it remained bitter cold. Branches cracked, and fell like icicles, and no one could keep warm. But spring came early that year, and melted the Kitcisipi, which white men called the Ottawa, so that he overflowed his banks. Very great was the relief that winter was truly ended, and had not come forever upon the land. The elders and even the women whispered of a year without campaigns, for all braves were overtired from the war with winter, and those who do not fight supposed a peace might follow the terrible cold. Yet they figured without the Trickster, and without the hearts of men. 

In mid-summer, Blood Moon of the Mohawks came up the Long River that runs north to the ocean, and turned his braves up the Kitcisipi, and there made war upon the allies of our people. My father, Ahanu, was chief of the Laughing People, and would have held back his braves so the village might recover. But Chansomps, his eldest son, and brother to me, Setting Sun, would not be dissuaded from battle. 

He was proud, was Chansomps, and hungry for spoils, thinking to replenish our village by despoiling the despoilers. So it was that in the waning of the summer, Ahanu and Chansomps made war on the tribe of Blood Moon, and I, Setting Sun, was also there. And finding them encamped along the Kitcisipi, we set our canoes down quiet along the banks a mile upriver, and fell upon them in their revelries. It was a great victory, seemingly, but Blood Moon we did not find.

I think I feared trickery in my heart then, but I was only fifteen summers, and did not give voice to my thoughts. So it was the next day that we returned to our canoes, and found them all burned to ashes. Then Blood Moon fell upon us with a great force that he’d held in reserve. The worst fears of the elders and women came to pass, for near every brave of the Laughing People was slain. Chansomps himself, my fierce brother, hero of his people, took an ax blow to the leg, and a rifle burst to the chest. Not even this killed him, but, thinking him dead, Blood Moon himself took his scalp and left him in a heap. Ahanu, after slaying five men, pulled back and waited for the Blood Moon to withdraw. Then, finding my brother alive, he wrapped Chansomps in a bear’s fur, bound it, and ordered me to help him carry my brother.

“The canoes are gone,” I said, struggling under Chansomps’ weight.

“Yes,” said my father. “That is so.”

“We must make another,” I said.

“No,” said Ahanu, shaking his head. “Blood Moon’s people watch Kitcisipi for many leagues toward his source. We won’t make it back by water, for it is Blood Moon’s way to leave none of his foes alive, and he has not found me, or you among the slain.”

“Then what?” I said, already tired.

“By land,” said my father, as if it were obvious. “Through the trees, and on foot, for Chansomps lives, and I would not risk both sons for an easier trip. We must make our way through the forest above Kitcisipi, and then find Thin River, for the Laughing People have few warriors now. I am chief. Dying is too easy for me.”

II. Shadow and Fang

I looked down at Chansomps. My father had bandaged his head, and tied a white man’s beaver pelt cap over the top, where the scalp had been. Blood soaked through so thickly that the pelt was black and purple. Father had also bandaged the chest, and drawn the lead bits from it. Chansomps was strongly built, and lay there on the litter like a young tree hewn. I stooped, took up the branches near the feet, and began walking. We’d only gone a hundred steps, hiking under bare columns of white birches, when I begged Ahanu for rest. He looked at me bemusedly.

“We have many leagues to cover, son. And through these trees.”

“I know,” I said, sucking wind, “but I need to rest.”

Ahanu, chief of the Laughing People, chuckled, and smiled grim. 

“So be it,” he said, lowering Chansomps. 

I leaned against a birch, and breathed deeply, resting my arms. Seated, I felt the briskness in the air, and knew that the summer was already waning. Indeed, snow had fallen out of season, and the sky promised more. Winter was hunting us again, as if he scented blood. I stood and looked down the lines of white birches, which soon gave way to thick-growing conifers. It struck me that the straight birches were like the palisade wall around our village, while the dark pines and spruces were like a war party, surrounding our people. I shuddered.

“It’s so far,” I whispered. “How can we?”

“We must return,” said Ahanu.

“Yes, but—”

He raised a hand to silence me. For a moment he was grim, then laughed lightly, as was his way. He looked at me kindly.

“If a thing must happen, there’s no sense in doubt. No right in it. Grit your teeth boy. Smile, and keep the fire lit.”

I nodded, obedient, but doubtful. 

It was two nights later that the second trouble befell us. The night was bitter cold as we slept by the fire under a small clearing in the pinewoods. The trees about us were thick, but here one of the giants had fallen in the great freeze of last winter, so that there was a gap in the canopy. Through it I looked up at the stars as I lay on my back, freezing, because father would not risk a larger fire. In the gap, I saw the Seven Sisters, who once were Eight. I tried to count the other stars, hoping the effort would tire me enough to make me sleep, and escape the cold that way. Finally I did, or at least was on the point of it, when a noise opened my eyes, and made my blood colder than the air.

“Don’t move,” said Father. “Not yet.”

The howls were close. I tried to count them. Each wolf makes a different howl, and some braves can gauge the wolf tribe by the sound and character of their calls. I did not know if Ahanu knew this trick, but I could tell by his voice he was concerned.

“They’re moving closer,” he said. “They’ve scented your brother’s blood.”

I pretended not to be afraid. I reached up with my mind, and drew down over my face a sort of mask.

“What shall we do?” I asked, happy to find my voice calm.

“Get up, and build the fire.”

I started. “But the braves—”

Father shook his head.

“We do not know that they’re nearby. We know that wolves are near. Build the fire.”

So I did, first throwing on all the fuel we’d collected when we made camp. It was dry now, and went up quickly. The fire tripled in size, so that I felt sure no wolf would dare approach. Yet father sent me into the woods to gather more, commanding me to watch with one eye for the eyes that showed in darkness. There was not much untouched by snow, and I filled my arms with dusty white branches till I could hold no more. Then, slowly, I hauled them back toward the fire. That was when I saw the eyes.

The eyes of a wolf pack are like stars in the night. Like the stars, you do not see them appear all at once as you stare out while night comes on. The stars are not there, and then they are. I could only take small steps with my bundle, and I had not returned to the fire a second time when those evil stars were all around me. I saw them shift closer, floating in the blackness under the trees, the forms of their owners still obscured in shadow. Yet I did not run. Wolves will more quickly attack if by running a brave makes himself unworthy of the name. Finally returning to the fire, I dumped my second load on the ground, and hastily arranged it about the flames to dry it out.

“They are here,” I said.

Ahanu nodded. His warhammer was drawn, and he had one protective hand over Chansomps’ chest.

“Why are they so bold?” I asked.

Father smiled. “They smell your brother’s  blood. It is getting cold, and they are hungry.”

I looked at the darkness under the trees. Like the wolves to whom it gave cover, the darkness held itself back from the fire, biding its time.

“They will not attack,” I said. “Nuttah says they must be provoked first.”

Ahanu smiled again. “Your mother does not lie. But blood and hunger provokes them. Do you suppose they come this close just to make your acquaintance, boy?”

I said nothing. Ahanu watched the woods. He raised his warhammer, and shifted on his haunches, looking from one pair of globes to another. The dark watchers did not seem to move at all, yet, after a few long moments, their eyes were closer. It was as if they negotiated with the shadows under the trees, and the shadows agreed to creep forward with them. I looked around, and saw that the pack had us halfway surrounded. Then one wolf stepped halfway into the firelight. He leaned back his head, and howled.

The howl of a wolf is the most terrifying of all sounds in nature. Perhaps from far away, carried over a mountain by winds, it is beautiful. But close by, when the hunt is on, it freezes the blood. The wolf saves his cunning for the hunt, and by the hunt he is transformed. For a time, he becomes a relentless demon. One-by-one, each set of eyes moved in the darkness, and a chorus of howls rent the night air.

“Ahanu!” I cried, the wolf-fear setting in. “What now?”

Father pulled Chansomps closer, and swiped his hammer through the air. He also growled, snapping out at the smoky darkness.. 

“Build up the fire,” he said, calmly.

It is said that in the last moments before death, Manitou tells the tale of a man’s life, pouring it like a river before his mind’s eye. So it was in those moments that I remembered myself as a small boy in the old village. It was winter, and the house was full of people, and had a rank smell. Everyone else had done his work, and I and the other small boys had our own. We kept the fire lit, learning to add wood so that it burned as hot as it could without catching the long house, and learning to dry new wood so that it smoked little. Now I had an odd feeling that I was only in the same moment again, as if life was but a handful of moments, recurring in season, like spring and autumn rains. The child me only needed to build the fire up, and stay close to it, and all would be well. The demons in the darkness feared fire. We would be safe. As safe as in a longhouse. But I was wrong.

Evil respects no boundaries. It is as if a river were to catch fire, or a tree uproot itself. That is evil. Manitou does not countenance it, but sometimes he seems to lose the grip that holds it back.

So it was that though the wolf is afraid of fire, and is a coward anyway — for that is why he runs in packs — the leader rushed forward. Large, too large for a wolf, it galloped toward Ahanu, dodged the wing of his hammer, and clapped its jaws down upon his leg. He beat at it, trying to dislodge the demon, but it took its beating, and tore at his thigh. The beast did not even try to take hold of Chansomps’ prone body. There would be time for that later, when my brother’s protector was dead. Finally I came to my senses, and, snatching a lighted branch, I rushed at the wolf, and plunged the burning shaft into its back. It yelped, released the chief of the Laughing People, and went howling into the woods. 

Ahanu’s leg bled bright red. Even I knew that it was the worst sort of wound. He grimaced, still smiling in his way, and tried to hold the wound closed. The blood did not slow much, and I saw the alarm in his face. Blood was pooling up around his haunches. He tottered like wild wheat on the wind. Finally he snatched the brand from my hand, squeezed the flesh of his thigh together, and set the glowing wood to the wound. He made a terrible sound — a pain laugh, which men only make in war — and tossed the branch aside. The blood stopped. He collapsed into the red snow. Around him lay as much of his own blood as a man could drink in water in a week’s time. Within that same red halo Chansomps lay, himself near death from his terrible wounds. And I, Setting Sun, was left in the wilderness to tend to them both. 

III. The Rites of the Forest

There are two kinds of holy rites. The first is made by man; the second, by Manitou. A tribe makes rites so that boys become men, or girls women. Yet these are not always effective. Like any game, they can be cheated. Even when truly passed, it may sometimes be that the young man strong enough to complete his lonely journey is yet unable to stand his ground in battle. In that case, the battle itself is the true rite. War is Manitou’s tool for making men. In the days that followed Ahanu’s wounding, Manitou subjected me to a true rite.

I made a litter for my father, and strapped him to it, covered in furs. Then, for two days, I dragged them, one after another, through the forest. I was miserable, my back aching like an old man’s, my hands chafing till the skin was raw. Whenever I could go no further, I built a fire, then slept where I fell. With morning light I rose again to the same misery. I dared not look back to see what little distance I had made, for it would take the heart of me. And yet I changed. I had no purpose but this one thing: to do my duty, no matter the cost. On the third morning, I woke in a fog to find that Manitou had seen my struggle, and had sent me a blessing.

My eyes opened on two white men. They were bearded, and dressed in the fashion of the French trappers, who blend the styles of our peoples and theirs. They saw I was in distress, and took me to their nearby camp. It was a rough cabin, filled with smoke, and items for trade. I saw many furs, and bottles of dark liquid. Though I needed food and water, I begged them in signs to bring the litters. They did so, though the elder of the two seemed reluctant to help. He was a squat man, with flinty eyes. I did not trust him. 

It was only when they brought my father and brother in, and laid them side-by-side in the cabin, that I saw the true state of things. Chansomps, my brother, was dead. His body had already begun its hardening, so that there could be no mistake. My father still lived, but barely. His chest rose only at long intervals, and his skin was hardly warm. The elder trapper looked down on them both with disgust in his face. The younger, a red-headed man whose beard hardly hid his youth, inclined his head softly, as if to apologize both for the death, and for his companion. 

We made ourselves understood to each other in the choppy, and unsatisfying way of all trade. They spoke snatches of our language between them, and I had picked up a few French words from watching my father. the chief, at trade. I tried to show them where our village was by drawing on the soil, and pouring a small amount of water into a deeper trough to mark it as the Ottowa, and more into another trough to show Thin River, which slices almost southwards into it. I could see they did not understand at first, for the place I indicated, though well-enough known, was far distant by way of land. It was only when I pointed to Ahanu’s dried blood, and then at the moon, that the elder understood why we’d taken this long route.

“Blood Moon,” he grunted, to the younger. 

Still, the younger man tried to dissuade me from continuing by land. He indicated with wide hands how far it would be, even were I not dragging my family behind me. They clearly felt it wasn’t possible to do, or at least not worth the effort. The elder said something, and pointed from my brother to the fire. I was confused, then understood that he was asking why I did not burn Chansomps on a burial pyre. I traced the cross over my father’s body, and the men understood. Ahanu was one of those who’d accepted baptism, and he did not wish that he or any in the family should be consumed in flames. Anyway, it was already our tribe’s way to bury the dead in the ground, when possible, and Chansomps himself would not have chosen the pyre, unless it couldn’t be helped.

Supposing these French to be Christians like my father, I asked them to help me carry the litters at least as far as the mouth of Thin River. Both men declined, though the younger did so only reluctantly. He indicated instead that he would help me bury my brother here. Though I’d thought at first to bring Chansomps all the way to my village, I saw now that it couldn’t be done. Not without the river. Not before I collapsed from exhaustion, or Chansomps flesh turned foul. So bury him we did, out there in the cold ground, beside a great pine which grew strangely, its middle branches reaching wide like the figure on Ahanu’s cross. That seemed a sign from Manitou, so I prayed to Ahanu’s God, and to our own, that Chansomps should find his way to the Council Fire. That night I again fell into a sleep so deep that, despite my grief, I did not dream.

The next morning I checked on Ahanu. He smiled at me, though he seemed half dead. He took water and some food, but said nothing. Yet as I prepared to leave that day, I spied him staring over at me from his litter. His eyes flickered from me to the fire, and back again. Though he didn’t move his lips, I felt he was speaking. Once more I begged the younger Frenchman for help, but the elder blustered in, and told me, I think, to get going. I did not like the man, but I feared to anger him, for the men knew I fled Blood Moon, and they were sure to cross his path in trade at some near point. So off I went, dragging the litter behind me.

I’d gone about a mile when the redhead ran up, muttered some apology, and took the back of the pallet. I could see when I had left that he’d been torn with guilt, but also afraid to displease the older trapper. He said nothing in explanation — not that I could have understood it much — but carried the back energetically, even rushing me forward. Tired as I was, I went swiftly, not wishing to waste the much greater ground that we two could cover. At first I was afraid that any moment he might quit, leaving me to drag it by myself, but he stayed until I almost took his help for granted. 

We fell into a rhythm, and I found myself thinking about Chansomps. We had never much spoken, he and I. Though only four years apart, we were born under different stars. His had made him loud, fearless, and impatient for war. He was not a violent man, nor over-cruel in battle, and yet he could not suffer a bad peace, or any kind of surrender. I was brave enough, and considered strong by my peers, yet I hadn’t the same fire in my belly. I would fight hard, when asked, but worked just as hard at other endeavors; tracking, hunting, raising of palisades and longhouses and the like. I was a creature of necessity. Chansomps was single-minded. We neither loved nor hated each other. 

Now that he was dead, I knew that I didn’t know him. More painfully, my older brother had not known me. He was gone forever, like some star gone out, and I mourned him. I prayed I would remember where he laid. I thought I would. We suddenly stopped with a lurch. I turned, and the Frenchman lowered the litter. He put his hands to his back, then rested them on his hips, and stepped away. Hee waved his hand at the woods around, which were less dense now. That was as far as he would go. Indeed, it was much further than I’d expected of him. He pointed east, then at the sky. I nodded, and touched my forehead. He returned the gesture, then ran back the way he’d come. 

Just as he did, the wind blew. It was wet and biting. Thin River was near; I could smell him on the wind. I took up the pallet, and rushed forward, not realizing then just how much further I’d have to go to find the river’s mouth. It was several hours pulling from there, but there was light enough to guide my way. It is a small thing, and hard to make men see, but that there was light at this time was, for me, a blessing from Manitou. Yet his blessings sometimes come with sorrows. Later, when I stopped, and every day since, I would curse myself for my haste. For sometime amid that twilight toil, Ahanu, my good father, died.

IV. A Fire in Winter

By the mouth of Thin River, on the east bank, and just before he pours into the Kitcisipi, there is a fortress of stones. These are mighty boulders laid down here by the gods in the midst of green trees. There are no stones like them around, and no power of men could move them. One in particular is so shaped that it overhangs in the manner of a small cave. It must have been used before then for a shelter, for much wood had been piled beneath the overhang. It was dry and ready to be burned.

I knelt on my haunches with Ahanu’s head in my lap. I kept looking down into his face, hoping it might twitch, or show some sign of life. I felt his neck and wrists for the flow of blood, his heart for beating, and found no sign. My body was utterly exhausted, and I did not wish to fail my father. It was right and just that he be brought up Thin River, and placed inside the earth in his own village. But the village was on the western side of the river, and I could not imagine dragging him another step up the east bank, let alone fording the river, and continuing to drag it on the other side. By then, in any event, the body would start to go foul. If I buried him here, then he would not rest in his own village, and that seemed an unacceptable compromise to me.

I had two options then; to fashion a canoe, and risk the passage up Thin River, or to burn the body, and carry the bones back with me. I feared Blood Moon somewhat less then, for my father and brother were already dead. He had had his revenge after all, and there was nothing more to take. True, If he knew me, and found me, he would put me under the knife too, in the Mohawk fashion. It was not a pleasant thought, but at that moment, the idea seemed very remote. So I resolved to use the firewood under the great stone, and fashion a rude canoe from a thick tree, burning out the middle bark, and scraping with the warm hammer.

I built the fire as high as I dared, and moved Ahanu over to a protected place. I intended, once he was in the canoe, to pack his body with snow, and so delay its spoiling. I found a thick pine that was leaning, and used the chief’s war hammer to bring it down. I had not time for a proper canoe, but I aimed to burn out the heartwood and deadwood, and place my father in the gap. Much later, I saw that this was a boy’s plan.

I had been hours at my task, hungry, and freezing in spite of the fire, and my own furious motion, when something overcame me. I cannot say whether it was sorrow or exhaustion, but like a great crow it covered me, and took my strength. I fell upon my canoe, and, seeing that hardly any progress had been made, and that I might have exerted the same strength to be halfway up the east bank by now, I began to weep. I wept out of frustration, but especially out of that great grief that comes from failing the ones we love.

In this cold, and by myself, I simply could not fashion a canoe. Nor could I stomach the thought of burying my father out here in the wilderness. He must return to the village. And so I must fail him in another way. Though he would not have wished to be burned, I must do it for the sake of his village, so that the chief could lay — for a time — near his own people. No law required this, and yet I knew the Laughing People would feel empty without it. They would blame me, and rightly so, for leaving their chief behind. 

So, burning with guilt at ignoring his will, I set myself to building the fire even hotter. I took the pine that I’d been trying to shape, and threw it into the flames. The tongues of flame shrank back, as if from a great beast. Then, recognizing their fortune, they began to creep about its sides, tasting the unexpected meal. They grew higher and higher, until the heat was nearly unbearable. I walked back, and sat down in the snow, placing my hand on Ahanu’s face. It was only a leathery mask now. I tried to speak to him, saying the things I would have said, had I known that he was dying. That I had not spoken to him before death was then, and remains still, my greatest suffering. That was why I didn’t notice my visitors.

Out of the darkness between the trees, the same dark stars showed their light. The wolf pack had returned. It stalked toward me in a half-moon shape, sensing my weakness. I dragged my father’s pallet away from the pack, and toward the fire. Surely this was proof that I had no choice but to burn him. Even if burial was better than burning, surely burning was preferable to him to being eaten by scavenging wolves. My father, only newly passed, would make a meal for them. I resolved to die first. 

The great wolf stepped forward again, just as he had several days before. Its fur was badly burned where I had stabbed it. It looked at me, and it knew me. The beast snarled out a challenge, but I sprang up, and ran at it. I will not say I wasn’t afraid, only that my fear was different. As ice can be heated and made water, and water steam, so my fear was heated and transformed into anger, courage, and fighting skill. I did not fear the wolves, because I was beyond caring for my own life, and beyond the fear of pain. I expected pain. I welcomed it, and death. I had, in that moment, become single-minded, like Chansomps. 

Despite my courage, I was losing. The wolves had no more patience for a man with a lighted brand. They came at me from every angle, biting, and snarling, and nipping at my flailing limbs. I was bitten three times, and grazed many more. A large she-wolf threw herself on my back, and chomped into my shoulder blade. I only got free by backing into the fire until she released me, but from there on I was too injured to move quickly. Death would have come for me then, except that he did. As I whooped, and twisted, and swung my father’s hammer, death appeared under the tall pines, and stalked toward me.

The she-wolf, singed and snapping at my heels, fell dead at my feet. The wolf chief snarled, and then his head was split in two. The others, sensing the change, fled once more into the darkness. Where they had been, there stood a company of braves. At their head was Blood Moon.

He looked me up and down, then let his tomahawk slip through his fingers until the head hung near the ground. My head hung forward, and I was on my haunches. He came in close, and touched the ax head to the bottom of my chin, raising it. For the first time, I saw his face.

His head was shaved, but for a top-knot. He wore no paint, but bore a scar or a tatoo on his left cheek. It was red, and almost perfectly circular. Perhaps it was a birthmark, but it accounted for his name. The unevenness of his face, enhanced by the scar, made him look all the more dangerous. Three scalps hung from his belt. One was surely Chansomps’. I looked back into his eyes with as much bravery as I could manage. I tried to say, mind-to-mind, that I truly did not care about my own fate; only that my father be honored.

To my surprise, he glanced over at my father’s litter, just as if he’d heard me. Blood Moon took several deep breaths. I could tell that this was his manner of thinking. A brave behind him snarled, and spat something in their tongue. Without a word, or even a raised hand, Blood Moon somehow waved him off. There was a power in this man. He was a walking storm. I found myself marveling all the more at Chansomps, that he’d won the first foray against Blood Moon’s party, even if the other had tricked him. Finally he spoke.

His voice was thin but deep. He nodded at my father, and at the fire. I understood him to be confirming that Ahanu was already dead, and that I intended to reduce his body to bones and ashes. I nodded.

He looked down at the litter, then back towards the woods. Squinting, he gestured at the long track my litter had made in the ground. Even in the firelight, the pressed-down brush made it obvious which direction I had come. He glanced back at me, a trace of surprise in his bright eyes. A question too. I nodded.

There was a long pause then. Blood Moon’s braves were all tense, and ready to spring upon me. I did not look at them, but sensed their impatience to bring this hunt to an end. A few even champed and snarled like male grizzlies before wrestling, and I wondered that not one would move without his permission. Blood Moon continued to stare, holding the ax tip to the bottom of my chin. Then he sighed. 

“I…speak some of your tongue,” he said, in the accent of his people.

I nodded. “Will you slay me now?”

He frowned, and looked impatient.

“I vowed to,” he said, “before my own men.”

My heart sank then, though it was hardly a surprise. Blood Moon nodded at the tree in the fire, and raised a questioning brow.

“I meant to take him to the village. Up the Thin River. I was…going to pack him in snow, and bury him outside our village. ”

Blood Moon looked away before I’d finished speaking. I didn’t think he understood every word, but only the essence. I sensed some great battle taking place. Finally, he seemed to come to a decision. He looked at me, and the clarity in his eyes was not kindness. I awaited my fate. The Mohawks, it is well-known, torture their captives, and who was I to think I would escape?

“I vowed to slay Ahanu,” he said. “Ahanu is dead. Your champion... have you lost him too?”

It took me a moment to decipher his accent, and a moment more to realize it was a question.

“Chansomps, my brother, lies in the earth,” I said, pointing at the ground to emphasize my meaning.

Then his face became shrewd. He sighed in an almost exaggerated way, and shook his head. “I have been cheated! You are only a useless boy!”

He looked back at his men as he said it, hiding, with the complaint in his voice, the fact that he contrived to spare my life. I dared a look at his men, and saw their suspicion. Their disappointment. They’d been expecting blood, and some well-earned amusement. They’d not so easily be put off now. But Blood Moon was not finished. He glared down at me.

“Get out of my sight, child,” he said, sneering “Climb in your boat and return to your village. Your clumsiness and stupidity have deprived me of the pleasure of killing your father and brother!”

I swallowed. “Chief Blood Moon, I have no boat.”

I waved back at the track of my pallet in the brush, and he seemed to understand. He shook his head, as if he were speaking to a mute simpleton. But this was an act. Yes, I know now that he understood all my words perfectly, and only feigned ignorance of our tongue. He grabbed me by the throat then, and took me aside, sternly, as if to beat me senseless. When I was up against a tree, he bent down and whispered in my ear. My eyes opened wide as he spoke, and I must have looked struck, for he chuckled. Then he made as if to sneer at me, and called out to his men. There were thirty of them at least, and some carried birch-bark canoes over their shoulders. Reluctantly, the nearest brave walked past the fire, and down to the river bank where a little eddy there formed a calm bay. He placed the canoe down on the stony sand beside the eddy, scowled, and then tramped back up. In the firelight, as he passed, I could see in his face the murder he’d wished to do to me.

Then the same man, chafing at the insult, reached down and took up my father’s pallet. None too gently, he dragged Ahanu down towards the bank with one strong arm, snatching up a single paddle with the other as he passed me. When he returned, he began to say something, but Blood Moon silenced him and sent him into the ranks. Then Blood Moon wheeled back around on me, struck me hard across the face, and spoke in a harsh voice.

“I am Blood Moon, slayer of men. Your chief and brother were not my equals, but they were worthy to die under my knife. Now you must return, grow, and become strong. When you are a warrior, then you must die slowly by my hand. Now go!”

Still stunned by his secret words to me, I backed past the fire, and down to the shore. I did not let my eyes fall on his braves. Nor did I dare to thank him.

Ahanu I cut loose from the pallet, and placed snuggly in the fore part of the canoe. Then I packed his body with snow, to slow its spoilage. His hammer I kept for myself. I pushed off into Thin River, crouching to paddle on legs already fatigued beyond measure. As I drove upriver, I distracted myself from the pain in my bent thighs by musing over Blood Moon’s words to me. Not of his counsel to go west into Dagger Creek lest I fall into the trap he’d set for my father on Thin River. No, I am speaking of his counsel to my soul, as he bent down to whisper in my ear.

“All men must fight,” he’d said. “A man becomes flotsam on the river. Worthless to all. His enemy keeps him sharp. This life is cold and brisk. Summer is brief. A man must keep the fire lit. Go back to your village now, boy, and keep a fire in winter. By it, someday, I will hunt you down, and one of us will be the worthier.”

On this I mused, as I paddled on my haunches, and prepared myself to become chief. Not every man is so lucky to have known his worst enemy from the beginning, and to have had a lifetime to prepare for him. And prepare I did. Even now, as you see, I am sharper and deadlier than most old chiefs, and any of my son’s could raise the war hammer in my place. But thirty summers have come and gone, and Blood Moon never came to our village, or the one after. Nor did I ever seek him out. Perhaps he died by the violence in which he lived. Perhaps he lives still, and crouches even now outside our high palisade, waiting for you braves to go soft.

I wait for him still. Now, by the fire that ever burns in our village. Later, by that greater fire where old chiefs sit, sharp as blades, yet ever at peace.

© 2021 Joseph Breslin All Rights Reserved