Kim Robinson - Shaman

Strangely, even while walking at great speed by night, there was still time to think about other things. None of the thoughts seemed to matter very much, and yet they still flitted through his mind, like ghosts he was shedding as he conjured them up, because now they meant nothing. Nothing mattered but their walk, so really it was a question of whether his chittering thoughts helped him to deal with Badleg or not. Sometimes they did, being distractions, like squirrels on a branch overhead. Other times it felt like he had to devote every part of his attention to landing properly on his left foot and getting across its stride with the least amount of weight possible put on it, and quickly getting back onto Goodleg, so foursquare and reliable. If Goodleg were ever to give under these strains he was putting on it… that was a very sharp fear. But for now Goodleg kept on coming through for him, solid and painless. He could rely on Goodleg, push him a little. Then, deep in the rhythms of that altered walking, if his mind did drift to things not present, to other worries, to spin like a firestick, maybe that was all right, even a good thing. Part of the ability to ignore the repeated jab of Badleg’s squeaking.

As they continued Loon felt more and more tired. At moonset Thorn stopped at a lead to drink and eat some honey seedcake. After that they hiked on under the stars, pricking out everywhere in the darkening black. It got harder to see. They had to pay more attention to the snow, really look at it, and even when they did it was sometimes not possible to see how it tilted or how slippery it might be. You had to feel the land with your feet.

After a long period of walking blind like this, in the after part of the night when it fell deepest into its icy chill, Loon felt that his second wind had slipped into him when he hadn’t noticed. He was stronger now, lighter, tougher; he could go on, and it even felt like he could go on forever, or at least as long as needed. Hike on with these three companions for the rest of his life, and yet never tire. That was how it felt sometimes, when the second wind came on you and someone would say, Let’s hike all day and then talk it over.

That was a good feeling. He almost always felt the arrival of the second wind in him with immense gratitude, welcoming it with a little hop and song, and never more than now. It was so good to feel the absence of the light-headedness and weakness, feel their replacement by a deep strength.

So he swung into his pacing, poled hard with Thirdleg; he took over Elga’s spot, and then passed Click with a brief hello, and a tilt of the head that indicated his hope that Click would drop back and follow Elga, just to be sure of her. Click rooped his assent to something, anyway, and Loon caught up with Thorn.

Together they came on a river’s bend like the big loops in the Urdecha.

As they walked on the frozen stream Thorn said,—We’re almost to the big river crossing this valley. I hope the ice there isn’t already broken up. It seems like it’s almost time. Even these side streams are getting thin. It’s eighth day of the sixth month. The rivers down south are broken up by now. These must be close.

—Should we be walking on them then?

—We have to cross them! And I want to know how they are. If we could get across the big one, and then it broke up… He hiked on a little faster.

Loon let Thorn get his lead, followed. Thorn was on the hunt now, and Loon wanted to leave him to it, as well as nurse his second wind, pace it to serve the long haul. Behind him he saw that Click was just behind Elga, and they were close behind. Elga looked intent, downward, inward: some creature of the night, serious about being out there, even less inclined to talk than usual. At one brief stop she looked at Loon and it was as if she were looking right through him. She had not expected to get to try this escape, he saw; it had surprised her to get this chance, so that she reminded him of the jende when they had gotten off the ice raft. She had not expected to live. Now she would escape or die.

Soon after sunrise, in the raw yellows of morning, the stream they had been descending for the past few fists widened, and they were crossing a frozen pool or flood meadow, near their stream’s confluence with the big river. Thorn turned and trudged up to the top of a little prominence overlooking things, and while following him Loon realized how tired his legs had become; even a slight tilt uphill was close to devastating. And as soon as they crossed this river, it would all be uphill.

From the knob they could see up and down a broad sweep of the big river. Its surface was still white, yes, but a great number of giant white plates stuck up into the air, very striking to the eye. And the ice was speaking. Low long booms filled the air, like thunder from below the river, muffled as it came up through the ice. Sharp cracks punctuated these booms, also long sizzling sounds, zinging away from them. The river groaned when the zinging sounds ran through it. Oh yes: this ice was going to break up soon. All these booms and zings and cracks were announcing it, and rather emphatically at that. Even though nothing moved.

Thorn looked back to the north, pointed: a gyre of crows wheeled over something near the horizon in that direction.

—Let’s cross now, Thorn said.—No time to rest. Let’s cross and get up on a hill on the other side, then see what we can see.

So they took off across the river. They walked with sliding gentle steps. Crossing lanes of black ice, they saw bubbles trapped below the glistening surface, and below the bubbles caught glimpses of the watery depths, slight suggestions of green grass flexing in the current, perhaps the flicker of a trout. Downstream the cracks and zinging noises were louder than ever, and Loon’s breath caught in his throat; this was how break-ups announced themselves, the noise moving upstream well ahead of the break-up itself.

Thorn just put his head down and walked faster. They were still in their snowshoes, and sometimes they walked across black slicks that looked wet, they had frozen so smoothly. The older white ice was much more nobbled. They shuffled and skidded as fast as they could, arms pumping. Loon used Thirdleg to push himself along. The other three stayed as close to Thorn as seemed safe, each a few body lengths behind the one before, Loon bringing up the rear, determined to keep a good distance from Elga but not to drop back too far.

It took a long time to cross the river, it was so wide. When they reached the far bank they were all winded; they had been hurrying for their lives, and now they felt it. After a moment to catch their breath, to slow down the beating of their hearts, Thorn led them to another little headland point, just a man’s height doubled above the stream.

Up there they dropped their sacks and pulled out their leather patches, and untied their feet out of their snowshoes and sat on the patches set on the snowshoes. They were still breathing hard. Thorn made them drink from his water bag, and they all fumbled in their sacks and ate nuts, and dried meat, and seedcakes. They saw they did not have much food, although Thorn had a few bags of oil; but that would have to be a problem for later. For now they were famished, and would have to eat a lot to go on at anything like the pace they had been setting. So they ate.

Nothing they could see to the north was moving, except for a pack of otters, frolicking upstream on the far bank as if nothing special was happening that day, as if the river weren’t about to break up right under them. Thorn scowled to see that, and after a while he stood, and performed a little dance while singing the break-up song: