Megan Lindholm - Wolf's Brother

'Where's Carp going to be?' Kerlew asked immediately.

To Carp, there was no question. 'Come, apprentice, and carry our things. I will ride with Heckram, and you will walk alongside.' The old man stood slowly, and Tillu saw his stiffness. She could make a salve for it; the dampness of the spring nights probably made mornings a torment for him. But ...

She wavered in ambivalence. The najd was good to the boy, kind and attentive to him. But he was stealing her son from her, putting his feet on a narrow, dangerous path. Tillu watched them walk away down the hillside, taking comfort that Heckram at least would be close to Kerlew today. But as she noticed three other boys of Kerlew's age peering from some bushes at them, her heart sank. What did the other children think of this boy who walked always beside the najd, who did not run and play with them, but talked dreamy-eyed to an old man who rode a harke like a baby?

She was startled from her dark mood by Kari's hand on her arm. 'And now you will teach me?' she asked. Her eyes were bright. She had a basket on her arm, and she offered a shoulder pouch to Tillu. Good thing one of them had remembered such necessities. Tillu touched the knife at her belt, and Kari held up hers to show she was prepared. 'First, we need to make digging sticks,' Tillu told her, and was rewarded with a joyous smile. Her heart lifted inspite of herself.

The day reminded Tillu of the days when she and her aunt had gathered herbs and roots together. But this time it was Tillu who pointed and explained, and Kari who rubbed the roots clean on the grass and stowed them in her basket. Yet Tillu did not feel like a mother or aunt, but more girlish than she had felt in her childhood. She tried to worry about Kerlew, but found herself remembering that he was safe with Heckram.

Then her mind would wander to the way the early sunlight glinted on Heckram's new beard, and his smile slowly dawned on his solemn face. A curious anticipation touched all her thoughts of him. Spring, she told herself firmly. Sap was running in the trees, and her blood was racing through her veins. A good tonic would take these imaginings away. But she gave no thought to concocting one.

Instead, they gathered the bark and roots of the birch for cough syrup and acne medicine. Strips of willow bark peeled easily from the trees leaving the slick white cambrium exposed. 'Later, we will gather the leaves,' Tillu instructed Kari. 'Bound on a bleeding wound as a poultice, they stop the flow of blood. But for now we will take the bark, to make a tea for fever, or pound to, a poultice for sores. Get a bit of root, too. I'll show you how to make a colic medicine from it.'

Kari knelt on the forest debris to dig for the root. Tillu continued to peel bark from the branches in long ragged strips. Beyond a thin fringe of trees, the wide blue surface of the lake glinted. Behind them, they could hear the reindeer and folk on the traditional path. The folk did not hurry today. No one minded if a harke paused to nip new buds from a tree, or snatch up a mouthful of moss. Tolerance and good fellowship warmed the air with the spring sun. The adults had stripped back to sleeveless jerkins of light leather and short trousers or skirts. The children were all but naked, their skins soaking up the sun's warmth. Tillu folded her long strips of bark into a bundle and stuffed them into the shoulder pouch. Already it bulged gratifyingly. They would have to hurry ahead to Lasse and change this pouch for an empty one.

Kari shook the clinging soil from the network of roots. Willow roots were tough, and she had had to use her knife to get this chunk loose. She wadded up the tangle of roots and stuffed it into her basket. She smiled up at Tillu. Dirt smudged the side of her nose and the look of distance and mystery had left her eyes. Her face was shining as she said,

'You meant it, then. I thought perhaps you only needed me to help with the gathering.

But you will really teach me the healing herbs.' She reached into the hole and dragged up another hank of willow root.

'Of course I will.' A reckless enjoyment of companionship settled on Tillu. 'If Carp is to have an apprentice, I see no reason why I shouldn't.'

Kari dropped the root she was cleaning, and reached up to seize Tillu's hands in a pinching grip. Startled, Tillu tried to pull free, but Kari did not release her. Her black eyes were wide and shining. 'This is true? You are not making a joke of me? You would take me as your apprentice?'

'If it is what you wish,' Tillu replied, confused by her intensity. The young woman let go of Tillu's hands and sank slowly back on her heels.

'Ah!' she sighed slowly with quiet satisfaction. 'We shall see what my father can say to me about marriage when I tell him this. We shall see.' Then, suddenly grabbing at Tillu's sleeve again, she added urgently, 'But not yet! We shall not tell him until we are closer to the Cataclysm. Not until after you have begun to teach me.'

Tillu did not understand Kari's fierceness. 'Yes. All right, I shall not tell anyone that you are my apprentice, until you wish to tell them. But as for teaching you, well, we have begun that already.' Stooping, Tillu took up the cleaned root and put it back into her apprentice's hands.

Kari looked down on it. When she spoke again, her voice was thoughtful. 'It is what you know, Tillu, that lets you be as free as you are. A woman with no man to bind her, no one to fill her with children and weight down her days.' She glanced up suddenly, her bird-bright eyes pinning 'Tillu's. 'Was that why you became a healer? To be rid of men?'

'No.' The question puzzled Tillu. 'I became a healer because it was what the women of my family knew and did. Just as my father tended animals and crops.' She sighed softly. 'I never, as a child, imagined I would live so often alone.'

'Then take a man.' Kari's voice was as careless as if Tillu had spoken of fashioning a new garment for herself. 'Heckram would have you, if you let him.'

'Heckram ...' Tillu hesitated. 'I know so little of him, Kari. And I wonder so many things. ...'

'He is a good hunter,' Kari told her, as if that were all of a man's worth. 'And a generous man. Even with Elsa, for whom he felt only friendship. When she asked his protection, he gave it to her, and the gifts of joining as well.'

Tillu was silent, staring at her, praying she would go on. Kari smiled slowly. 'I hear many things, when folk come to gossip with the herdlord and his wife. And Elsa, too, was not shy of speaking to me. She was as close to a friend as I have ever had ... and we shared at least one thing. We both wished to be rid of Joboam.'

Kari rose slowly and began to drift after the moving line of reindeer and folk. Her voice was soft, and Tillu hurried behind her, almost ashamed to be so anxious to hear her words.

'Some have said that Heckram only took Elsa to wife because Joboam wanted her. It is not secret that those two hate one another. So many have said in the herdlord's tent, saying it was a shame Elsa was given to one who loved her with friendship but not with passion. Some say Joboam would have cared more for her, kept her within and safe. ...'

'And what do you say?' Tillu prodded gently.

Kari turned bottomless eyes back to her, stared through her as the girl continued walking. 'I say that Elsa knew more happiness in her short months with Heckram than Joboam would have given her in a lifetime. Heckram showed no lack of concern. Elsa but went to the spring at night, to draw water, such as any herdswoman might do. It is not Heckram's shame that she was not safe there. Whatever attacked and killed her within her own talvsit is the shame of all the herdfolk!'

Her words were suddenly fierce. She rounded on Tillu, madness in her eyes, coming so close to her as she spoke that her breath was hot on Tillu's face. 'It is not right that any herdfolk should fear to walk by night. The world, both day and night, is given to all of us. Why should one exist who can say, 'Beware, Elsa, the night is death'?'