The Sorcerer Read online

  “This is hare,” Lefthand said, tasting judiciously. “How do you get it? Does your father hunt?”

  She shook her head. “I trap.”

  “You what?”

  “Trap. Look, like this.” She reached over and grasped his coat. The skin was so blood-stiff and rotten that she easily ripped off a long strip. She laughed at his anger.

  “I told you I would make you a new one. I take a piece of old skin like this and I tie it around a sapling where hares have been gnawing the bark. I leave the end like this …” She trailed the strip on the ground between them in a curious, repeating pattern. “Then I go off and think about something else.”

  “Along comes a hare looking for bark. He hops up to my sapling”—she hopped her hand up to the strip—“and maybe he puts a foot in my loop.” One finger plopped into the waiting coil. “Then he thinks he will go away.” She jerked up her finger and the strip tightened sharply about it. She jerked again, and the strip held fast.

  Lefthand sat staring, thoughts rushing in his brain so hard he could feel them. At last he said, “Bright doesn’t know how to do that.”

  “Oh yes, Bright knows. But you have to stay in one place a long time. You don’t catch the hare the first day. And you people are always moving.”

  He thought that over for a time, while Snowbird wound the strip idly through her fingers, creating intricate and changing patterns.

  “Why do you stay in one place?” he asked.

  Without hesitation she explained. “Sorcerer is old. And he was never strong.”

  Lefthand looked at her, amazed. Who else would dare admit such a thing?

  She went on: “In midwinter, when the new sun is born, the reindeer come down this valley. Then the people come, like now, and we have a big hunt. Sorcerer gets a good share of meat. I smoke it, and most times we have enough to last till spring. Then we can fish in the river. And in summer there are plants to eat, if you know which ones are good.”

  Lefthand marveled at all this. He had never imagined such a life as she described—living in one place, watching the runs of hares, eating plants like a food animal. One thing especially he did not understand.

  “Why does Sorcerer get a good share of meat?”

  “Because he gives the hunters their strength.”

  “But how does he do that, if he has never been strong?”

  Snowbird looked down. She looped the string back to the ground and let it lie. “I don’t know what they’re doing now. I don’t know what it is. And then all winter he makes magic across the river … by himself. I don’t know how.”

  A silence fell between them. He finally asked another question.

  “Then you are alone all winter?”

  She looked up at him. “I like having you here,” she said with sudden warmth. “I hope you will stay. I think you had better stay.”

  Yes, Lefthand thought, if the old sorcerer would let him, this would be the life for a cripple.

  A shadow approached out of darkness. Snowbird gasped and jumped up. Following her excited gaze, Lefthand saw three slow, bent forms coming toward them, two massive women supporting a third. The third woman stumbled passively along, letting herself be guided over the crumpled hillocks of snow and earth. Her eyes were bent on the burden she carried, clasped in her folded arms. As the trio slowly passed the smoldering campfires, women rose, girls leaped up, and they all followed. One fire after another was left to sputter to itself as the women gathered into a crowd which flowed silently through the darkness after the three bent figures.

  Snowbird said not a word to Lefthand. Gathering her cloak about her she darted away after the others. He glimpsed her silhouetted against a farther fire and then he was alone with the embers and the sleeping Jay.

  He sat, puzzled. Then he was aware of his heart beating, a small insistent thunder in his body.

  Then he recognized it as a drum sound. Over there beyond the deserted fires a drum was tapped softly, so softly the reindeer herd upriver could not catch the sound. A fawn might notice a tingling in his blood, an unease, but it would not be sound.

  A drum meant mystery. This mystery was wide and deep like a summer river. He felt it in the slow, tender rhythm.

  Lefthand laid both hands flat on the ground and pushed himself to his knees. He gritted his teeth and raised one knee. By pushing on that knee with both hands, he got himself up, standing in his new, humped posture. He pressed his hurts with both hands and set off toward the drumming with the speed of curiosity.

  The crowd had come to stand in a circle around a campfire. Here lay the third woman, the burdened one, on a soft skin nest. Her passive, wrinkled face bent down constantly, as did the eyes of the crowd, to the hare-skin bundle beside her.

  The soft, gray hare skin wrapped a lazily moving form. A very small fist thrust up suddenly out of the skin. The mother caught the little waving hand gently in her hard, rough hand and folded it back into the skin. The crowd sighed.

  The drum missed two beats and took up the rhythm again. Snowbird held it now, and tapped it with the tips of her fingers. She stood a little way back and the women gathered closer and took each other’s hands. Snowbird’s watching eyes were sad.

  The dance was slow and gentle, with none of the leaping and stamping of the hunters’ dance. It consisted of a slow shuffle sideways around the fire, the mother, and the squirming bundle. All the faces were quiet, all the eyes looked downward at the tiny bundle and inward to a communal understanding.

  Lefthand saw Bright across the fire. The light caught on her rugged face a moment, the fall of her worn cloak, and her hand grasping a young, smooth hand. In another instant she passed into shadow and the girl beside her stepped sideways into the light. She was young, not much older than Snowbird. Though her body was thickening into mature lines, her face was still smooth and blank. Red hair tangled down her shoulders like an echo of the fire.

  Snowbird tapped her drum and watched. A few girls younger than she stood about, and a few little boys. Lefthand looked in her face and saw there a longing, like his own.

  He hobbled over to her and held out his hands. Snowbird started, seeing a male figure approach. Then she remembered, “only Lefthand.” She smiled and handed him the drum.

  Lefthand hardly missed a beat. He stood almost proudly, creating the dance, watching Snowbird slip happily into the ring. Bright and Red unlinked their hands and let her in between them. She moved, a lean, lithe figure silhouetted against the fire between two dumpy shapes. The circle moved tenderly about its incredible axis and Lefthand thought of Bright’s baby with horror while he beat his little drum and watched. Some great mystery was here celebrated quietly, so quietly that the children, sleeping in warm little heaps like puppies, were not awakened. A great secret was being shared and he knew instinctively that the drum must stop, the dance break up, at the first suspicion of the hunters’ return. He wondered that they allowed his own presence. Then he remembered. He, Lefthand, was not a man.

  The cold bright stars were dimming when the drum stopped. The dancers continued their shuffling pace a moment longer, still hearing the drumbeat in their hearts. Then their ears recognized the silence. They stopped and dropped hands. A conscious, tired look came into their eyes; their faces drooped.

  A crunch of snow and mumble of voices came out of the night and the circle broke hastily. Bright and Red ran to help the mother off her ceremonial nest and into the privacy of her tippy tent. The other dancers moved away, talking in loudly careless voices.

  Lefthand set down the small pigskin drum and stepped in front of it. Two shapes were coming toward him from the direction of the river. He saw a pair of giant antlers move against the stars and then a smaller pair. He knew who the intruders were before they reached him.

  Onedeer trotted up to Lefthand, with Sorcerer shambling a few steps behind. Onedeer held out his arms. Draped over his arms lay a beautiful fur, white as the moon, thick and soft as new snow. The bushy tail dangled to Onedeer’s feet, the head lo
lled over his elbow.

  “This,” said Onedeer, holding it out to Lefthand, “is your part in the hunt. Put it on and come quickly.”

  Lefthand looked at the empty holes in the head that had once held yellow eyes of quick intelligence. He looked at the gaping mouth, still needled with teeth.

  Sorcerer hobbled up to explain. “This time the scouts say there are no wolves. We will need a pretend one to turn the herd. You will do better than a real one. You will know what we want.”

  Lefthand took the fur. With a stiff movement he jerked it over his shoulders. The head fell on top of his own head and he felt himself already magically transformed. A wolfish strength surged through his torn, aching body. He felt able to do whatever it was Sorcerer wanted. Painful it might be, but his wolf-spirit would win over the pain—at least for the time of the hunt. His eyes met Onedeer’s and he saw respect in Onedeer’s look.

  4

  With the rising of the dawn wind the old doe opened cunning eyes. Most of the night she had lain dozing with shut eyes and open ears, head raised into the air current. Her nose never slept. Faint vibrations reached her half-conscious ears. They twitched sleepily, the doe dreamed of running, but the vibrations were too faint and far away to arouse her.

  Wood smoke troubled the doe. Often it had been a premonition of violent disaster. Now the smell was so constantly in the air that her nose had almost ceased to record it. The valley air was permeated with it, there was no escaping it.

  To the old doe, and to any of the reindeer sleeping around her, there was no other southward route. South they must go, toward the new sun, and this was the trail. This path had been worn by the pads of thousands of ancestors; it was known to their blood. There could not be another way.

  Now the wind rose and shifted, blowing from the north. The pall of wood smoke was swept away down the valley, and with it all other beckoning or warning signals. But the doe still dreamed. The nightly smells had not been alarming.

  As the first gray light spread along the eastern mountaintops, the old doe gathered her feet and pushed herself up. She shook snow from her rough coat and looked back at the others.

  Behind her the resting herd snorted and grumbled. One by one the reindeer stood up, shook themselves, looked around for one more mouthful of moss before setting out. There was no moss to be had. The area had been scoured by their seeking hoofs the day before.

  They would have to move on. They disliked moving with the wind. The herd coiled and wove about itself, hesitating. Coughing and blowing, the deer circled and pushed. Antlers clicked, clouds of snow puffed up from the milling feet.

  Then the old doe started forward. Her pads pressed the snow determinedly and behind her the herd moved forward, at first by fits and starts, then faster and smoother until the snow was beaten solid under their steady passing. Uneasiness fell away as they walked. Only the foremost could smell anything but deer. The wind no longer mattered.

  The old doe kept her eyes alert, her gaze darting from side to side. Her nose was useless now. To the east she watched the river, the ice-road. To the west she inspected the cliffs. A movement startled her.

  She stopped. Between two boulders something had moved. The foremost deer drifted past her, watching too. The herd slowed almost to a standstill.

  Whiteness slithered between the rocks. Behind a near boulder a face poked up. The doe saw it clearly in the strengthening light—white face, black nose, sharp ears. It was only a wolf. The doe was used to wolves. They followed the herd and sometimes pulled down a sick straggler. She paid them little attention unless she had a young fawn at her side.

  She had not smelled this wolf on the fresh dawn wind and he was closer than a skulking wolf would usually come.

  As she stood looking at him she caught a whiff of wood smoke, a herald of danger that was quickly blown away south.

  The doe snorted and stamped a warning foot at the wolf. Then she turned away, swinging toward the river. Behind her the herd swerved from the cliff and followed.

  The wolf face lifted clear of the boulder and tipped its toothy grin to the sky. Lefthand very cautiously raised himself to watch the herd click past. Deer after deer came to the point where the doe had stopped, looked at him, and turned off toward the river. There were bucks with tremendous reaching antlers and does with smaller lighter weapons. Youngsters ran and jumped like heedless children among their sober elders. In his mind Lefthand stripped off all the gray and white hides and scraped and sewed them. He saw meat—neck and loin, haunch and shoulder—he saw antlers and bones that could be chipped into a thousand tools.

  Lefthand knew that most of the reindeer walking by him would escape. The kill was limited by the number of hunters hiding under the riverbank, and by their strength. Even so, a happy greed swelled his heart. Success was almost assured. He had turned the herd as surely as any real wolf could have done it. Hunters made use of the wolves who stalked a herd. They would wait till the deer were startled away from the wolves and closer to the hunters. Sometimes wolves would enter into a deliberate partnership with the hunters, driving the deer within spear range. They had learned that the hunters would leave a fair share of guts for their wary helpers.

  This time Lefthand was the helper and he could claim a share of guts for his work. It was a very humble part he played—Onedeer would never have accepted it—but Lefthand was eager to seize any chance at all to take part. He laughed gleefully, silently, as he watched the meat and hides drift past him toward the ambush.

  Half of the hunting party were crouching under the riverbank, waiting for the herd to march within range. The other half waited farther down the valley in the shadow of the cliff. Attacked at the river, the reindeer would bolt toward the cliff where there would be a second attack. It was unlikely that any deer would turn back. Their minds were bent on going forward. If any did, the wolf could struggle out from the rocks to change their course.

  Lefthand stifled an excited chuckle. A young buck paused to look at him, jumped nervously, and swerved away at a rapid trot. After him the remaining herd went by faster, raising clouds of snow which obscured the flashing gray bodies.

  Hunks of snow slid down the cliff behind Lefthand and he jerked his head around. A reddish shape darted down beside him. It raised a fanged head and laughed at him. It was Snowbird in the coat of a summer-furred wolf.

  He stared. For a moment he felt cheated of his role. But after all, why should she not join him? He was playing no part hallowed by tradition. Anyone could do this who was not qualified to do something better. And it was good to be able to share his glee. He grinned at Snowbird, accepting her presence, and the two mock wolves turned back to the herd.

  The reindeer were thinning out now. Only a few stragglers trotted by: old reindeer, hobbling along, white ruffs bouncing on scrawny necks, one sick deer, hanging his head and stumbling; and an orphan fawn. He came trotting prettily, head erect on slender neck, delicate legs twinkling in the first ray of sunshine. Lefthand knew him immediately and positively. This was the fawn he had sketched in the snow, the fawn of the moonlit gorge. In his fever he had run in this fawn’s body.

  A shaft of doubt pierced his joy. What if this fawn, whose soul he had shared, should be killed? Should that moonlit flight, that night of fear and hope and maturing, lead only to death? Should the fawn, with all his feelings and perceptions, go into oblivion? The fawn would live on in the people who ate his tender meat, in the children who sucked his marrow and leaped and ran with his own energy. But he would not know it. For the fawn would be dead and with his own eyes he would never see moonlight or sunlight again.

  For only a moment this realization chilled Lefthand. Then Snowbird nudged him and he came back to his own world.

  She was pointing up the valley. The wonderfully docile old doe had led the herd very near the bank. Any minute now spears would fly, but the back half of the herd was wavering, turning back too soon to the cliffs.

  Snowbird leaped out from behind the rocks. She ran, bent doub
le, flapping and bouncing, toward the nearest straying deer. Lefthand squirmed out of the rocks and followed more slowly, holding onto his sore belly. The wolf head flopped up and down over his eyes so that he could scarcely see where he went. He came up against a rock and stopped, panting. Pushing back the mask he peered out across the valley.

  The snow stretched wide and white to the ice and beyond to the brown-pitted cliffs. By the river the herd was now a broken gray line, spiky with antlers. The closer stragglers kicked up fluffs of snow. Farther along the cliff the wandering deer paused and watched the red wolf who was bounding up and down and howling in a thin, uncertain voice. They twitched their ears with wondering contempt.

  Lefthand drew a deep and hurtful breath and raised his head. He intended to repeat and reinforce Snowbird’s howls but he held his breath instead.

  Across the rock, an arm’s reach away, a face looked at him. Over the wrinkled white brow two pointed ears cocked toward Lefthand. Under a sharp black nose a long red tongue lolled, casual and easy. The wolf gulped, opened his mouth again, and blew strong breath in Lefthand’s face.

  Lefthand lay perfectly still against the rock. His heart froze and seemed to stop. He had no weapon with him. These wolves, though small, were strong, and he remembered fireside tales of their attacks on men.

  Looking into the yellow eyes, he saw that he would need no weapon. The wolf was neither hungry nor afraid, neither stalking Lefthand nor startled by him. He had come to join him for a different reason.

  The eyes spoke interest, partnership. “We are alike, you and I,” was their message. “We are two predators together.” Over the rim of rock the wolf’s tail tip waved slowly back and forth, a plume of brightness in the morning sun.

  Lefthand relaxed. Other tales came to mind now, flitting ghostlike at the back of his consciousness. More often than not, the tales attested, approaching wolves were friendly.

  The wolf’s gaze shifted. He turned a pointed profile toward the river, ears attentively cocked. A moment later Lefthand also heard the noise—a distant, frantic roar. He dared to look away from the wolf toward the river.