People of the Mist by W. Michael Gear Page A

him settle
down, and we’ll send him a message clearing his son.”
                 Hunting
Hawk shot an inquisitive look at her daughter. “Will we? If you ask me, young
High Fox is the most likely culprit here.”
                 Shell
Comb lifted her chin. “Is he? When the forest is crawling with White Stake
warriors? Come, Mother, let’s be realistic. Who has the most to gain here?
Water Snake, that’s who. Look at what he’s done! With one murder he’s stopped a
marriage and alliance between us and the’ Pipestone Clan. He’s strained a
friendship that goes back generations between us and Three Myrtle-our clan
brothers! If this isn’t a master stroke, what is?”
                 “And
you think we should go to war with White Stake over it?” “Yes!” Shell Comb
stepped up to Copper Thunder, searching his eyes. “And what of you, Great
Tayac? This is a slap to your face, as well as ours. Corn Hunter has killed
your wife! Done it with impunity! Are you willing to just stand there and take
it, or will you join us in bringing this beast to his knees?”
                 Copper
Thunder seemed nonplussed. “For the moment, I will bide my time, wait and see.
If it appears that this petty Weroance did indeed kill my Red Knot, then I
shall act. But in my own good time, and in a way he, and his Mamanatowick, will
regret in this life and the next.”
                 Hunting
Hawk fingered her chin. The Three Myrtle villagers who were leaving shoved
their canoes out into the water and piled in. In shocked silence they set their
paddles and stroked away, the Vs of their wakes spreading behind them.
                 Something
is not right here. She felt as if she were looking at a broken pot, and half
the pieces were missing.
                 “Nine
Killer,” she called, “do you think the White Stake warriors did this to us?”
“No, Weroansqua!” But just as soon as he said it, he cast a wary glance at
Shell Comb, looking for all the world as if he’d like nothing more than to
retract that statement. Lamely, he added, “At least, it doesn’t seem likely.
Winged Blackbird’s war party could have caught her, killed her, and left no
trace. Skilled as they are. But it doesn’t feel right.”
                 Hunting
Hawk motioned the two uneasy warriors holding Red Knot’s body. “Take my
granddaughter to the House of the Dead. Tell… tell Green Serpent to smoke her,
but to do nothing more until I tell him to.”
                 “Yes,
Weroansqua,” Flying Weir said reverently, and he and Squirrel trotted off with
their swaying burden.
                 “Mother!”
Shell Comb wheeled, fire in her eyes. “Are we going to—”
                 “Enough!”
She made a chopping with her hand. “We will do nothing until I have considered
all sides to this thing! Unlike you, girl, I must think before I act! A policy
I expect you to begin to emulate. That, or Okeus help us, you’ll be a slave
washing Water Snake’s pots within a week of my death!”
                 Turning
from her horrified people, she waddled painfully for her Great House. She had
to sit, to think, to try and see the correct path through this madness.
Otherwise, it would destroy them all.
     

Five
     
                 High
above the winter forest, two black dots wheeled through the lavender rays of
dusk. Sun Conch tucked her bright feather cape around her drawn-up knees, and
tipped her chin to watch them. They must be eagles down from the north. They
spiraled, their lazy flights the only movement in the gleaming bowl of the sky.
                 As
Night Woman gathered the world in her arms, the cold deepened. Sun Conch
shivered. The woodpile sat to her right, on the north side of the fire, and
just beyond it stood the doorway to her mother’s house. As she reached for more
wood, her eyes strayed to the entry. The