Read Online The Storyteller Trilogy by Sue Harrison - Free Book Online

came inside, but Tsaani did not offer him his padded seat at the back of the lodge; he did not even stir the hearth coals. Tsaani turned toward his bed and sat down in the furs. “How is my daughter?” he asked.
    “She is good.”
    “Sok was here, then another man came, now you. Why are you here?”
    “To speak to you about your daughter’s son.”
    “Sok or Chakliux?”
    “Her true son, Sok.”
    “According to my sister, Chakliux is as much Day Woman’s son as Sok.”
    Fox Barking squatted on his haunches and pushed back the hood of his parka. The parka was beautifully made, narrowing to a long point front and back, with black-tipped weasel tails hanging from the shoulders and wolverine fur sewn around the hood. Fox Barking did not deserve such a parka, Tsaani thought. Most of all, he did not deserve Day Woman. People said that Fox Barking had been brave to marry her, but Tsaani did not agree. Fox Barking was a lazy man and a poor hunter. He took Day Woman not because of his courage, but because she worked hard and was good to look at.
    Fox Barking was a thin man with hands too large for his arms. It seemed to Tsaani that they had grown that way to clasp and hold all the things Fox Barking wanted but did not need. He held those hands out now, palms up, and asked, “Sok was here?”
    “Yes.”
    “Why did he come?”
    Tsaani turned his head against Fox Barking’s rudeness. Even a child knew better than to inquire about a man’s conversations.
    When Tsaani did not answer, Fox Barking said, “Do you know about the dogs?”
    “I know,” Tsaani said.
    “Do you know about the daughter of Wolf-and-Raven?”
    “I know she will make some man a fine wife,” Tsaani answered.
    “Sok wants her,” Fox Barking said, “but her father will not allow her to be second wife.”
    “Do you think Sok will throw away Red Leaf?”
    “No,” said Fox Barking. “A man might throw away his wife, but two sons and a good lodge? No.”
    “Sok does not need another wife,” Tsaani said. “He wants too much. He will break his back carrying all the things he wants. When I die, he will own my dogs. I have already given him many of my hunting songs. If he uses those songs wisely, he will be a powerful man. Perhaps then he will be worthy of two wives.”
    Fox Barking rubbed his hands together and leaned down to hold them near the hearth coals.
    “It is dark. You should be in your wife’s lodge,” Tsaani said, but Fox Barking made no move to leave. “I am an old man,” said Tsaani. “Stay if you like, but I must sleep.”
    He rolled himself in his bedding furs and turned his back on Fox Barking.
    The trader’s lodge was merely a summer tent. The caribouskin covering was secured by a circle of rocks, then banked for warmth with spruce boughs and snow. A small fire burned fitfully at the center. Its warmth was swallowed up before it reached the lodge walls, but Daes was not cold. She pressed herself against Cen’s body. She knew his lovemaking would be quick, but it was better than what she endured from the old man, who was slow and sometimes wept when he could not become hard enough to enter her. It did not matter, she told him, and that was true. He was a good man. He had offered her a home when she had nothing but the curse of a child in her womb.
    No, it did not matter, not with her old husband, nor with this trader. She had died more than four years ago, when her First Men husband had drowned. Daes raised her head from the furs of the trader’s bed to be sure her son, Ghaden, was still lying in the nest of mats on the other side of the hearth fire. He was awake, his eyes open, but he was quiet, bundled warmly in woven hare fur robes. Daes thought she could hear him hum some quiet River People song. He was a good child, but she did not love him as much as she loved her daughter, Aqamdax. How could she? Ghaden was Cen’s son.
    Cen pulled her down beside him. “The boy is fine,” he told her, then looked over at the child