Ivory Carver 02 - My Sister the Moon by Sue Harrison Page A

her feet brought her to the climbing log. 
    No, she thought, I do not need to go outside. I do not need to see Samiq one more time. But then her feet were on the climbing log and then she was at the top of the ulaq, as though her body moved without the consent of her spirit. She looked toward the beach. The three ikyan were gone, Samiq's, Amgigh's and Kayugh's. Big Teeth's, too,  was gone, but Kiin knew he would travel with them only that day. 
    Kiin turned to go back into the ulaq, but then thought of Samiq's sleeping place. It should be cleaned out with new heather laid over the floor, the skins shaken and aired. Perhaps it would be best if she did this now. But first she would have to go up into the hills to find heather. Yes, she decided, and returned to the ulaq only to pick up her woman's knife and slip into her suk. 
    She left the ulaq, then climbed quickly through a shallow ravine that was sheltered from the wind, and from there to the top of the cliffs that stood at the back of the beach. The iky an would go south and west around Tugix's island and to the close island where men hunt sea otters, then across the stretch of water that separates that island from the Whale Hunters' island. Kiin shaded her eyes and looked out toward the sea. Finally she saw them, not as far away as she had thought. Samiq's ikyak was first then Kayugh's and Big Teeth's, last, Amgigh's. Kiin watched Samiq's sure, quick strokes, the straightness of his back as he sat in the ikyak. Amgigh looked like a boy beside him, his paddling more tentative. 
    Yes, Kiin thought, Kayugh made the right choice. Samiq is the one who should go to the Whale Hunters. He should be the one to hunt the whale. He is the man. 
    Qakan had watched the four men leave the beach. Amgigh laughed and made jokes, but Samiq was serious, saying little. Samiq had stooped, picked up a few pebbles from the beach— a promise that he would return to this village. Then he had scanned the ulakidaq. Qakan knew he was looking for Kiin. Why he wanted her, Qakan had never been able to understand, but he knew that Samiq did want her, had always wanted her. Even as a boy, Samiq would suddenly begin to boast and laugh whenever Kiin was near. And during this past year, each time Samiq came to their ulaq, he watched her, his eyes stopping on Kiin's small pink-tipped breasts, on her lengthening legs. 

    Ah, Qakan understood that part of Samiq's wanting. Did he not feel the same when he saw women from other tribes? On rare occasions Whale Hunters brought their wives with them on trading visits. Then one of those wives might come for a night into their ulaq, to his father's bed, and Qakan listened to the groaning and laughter, and he hated his father for keeping the woman to himself. 
    Once, Qakan crept from his own sleeping place to the edge of his father's sleeping curtains. There, as he watched his father undress the woman, Qakan's own man part grew long and hard. And Qakan had wondered if Kiin had learned her greed from Gray Bird. Surely other men shared their women with their sons. 
    So Qakan understood Samiq's desire, and though Qakan thought Kiin was too thin and too quiet, for some reason Samiq wanted her as wife. But in this one thing, Samiq would not have his way. Qakan smiled. Samiq, the boy who always threw farther and better than the other boys, who could outrun them, who was stronger, a better hunter, who even, for no reason anyone could understand, caught more fish on his carved clamshell hooks, Samiq could not have, would never have Kiin. 
    But then, neither would Qakan. 
    All his careful plans. All the years that Qakan had lain in his sleeping place at night and thought of quick retorts, replies that would show his intelligence, his wit. All the nights he had planned while others slept. 
    It had taken months for anyone to notice, to comment on his jokes, on the strength that came out through his words. 
    Then the day came, two moons before Kayugh and Amgigh brought