language that was an isolate. All other spoken languages belonged to one or another interrelated groups, such as the Romance languages. But not Haida. It stood alone, isolated. Unique.
Like Raven, who also fascinated her.
Raven’s lips quirked as he measured Janna’s eagerness. He was oddly proud that the Haida language truly intrigued her. He had always known that his native speech was different, but through Janna’s eyes he was learning just how rare his language really was. Learning like that was an unusual experience. So was Janna. With her around life grew more interesting with every instant.
„Raven?“
He laughed softly before he answered her question in Haida.
Janna listened to the brief rumble of sound that was the Haida name for the purple sea urchin. „What does it mean?“ she asked.
Beneath the gleaming midnight mustache, Raven smiled widely. „There’s no – “
„Direct translation,“ interrupted Janna, groaning. It was a phrase she had heard too many times lately. „So give me an indirect one.“
„Round, purple, spiny, edible, sea-rock dweller.“
„See?“ Janna demanded triumphantly. „No matter how unique the language, the human mind that thought it up is still wired along the same basic diagram. Descriptive. The scientific name for purple urchins tells me pretty much the same thing as the Haida name, but in more detail. Except for edible.“ She grinned. „Most scientists aren’t interested in eating the subjects of their studies.“
Raven eyed the prickly, violently purple urchin that Janna held. „I know how they feel,“ he said emphatically. „Takes your appetite away just to look at it.“
„In Japan, the roe of the urchin is a delicacy, like caviar in Russia.“
„We aren’t in Japan.“
„Where’s your sense of adventure?“
„In the bottom of the inlet along with your brains,“ Raven retorted.
„No urchin soup?“
„No urchin soup.“
„How about raw urchin?“
„How about raw sand?“
„Eagles eat urchins,“ Janna pointed out, remembering her surprise when she had seen an immature bald eagle perched on a log and eating an urchin with every evidence of enjoyment.
„My moiety is raven, not eagle.“
The teasing light vanished from Janna’s eyes, to be replaced by a curiosity that was much more intense. She wanted – she
„Haidas are divided into two groups, eagle and raven,“ he explained. „My mother was a raven. Therefore, I’m a raven.“
„The Haidas have a matriarchal society?“
„In some ways.“ He smiled crookedly. „It’s just as well, since my father was a Scots sport fisherman named Carl who left as soon as the salmon run was over. So I’m Carlson Raven.“
„Did he know your mother was pregnant?“ asked Janna. Even as the words left her mouth; she knew that her curiosity was almost rude, but she couldn’t help herself. She needed to know more about Raven with an urgency that overrode her polite upbringing.
„I doubt it,“ Raven said, shrugging. „And I doubt that it would have mattered if he had known.“ Raven hesitated, then added quietly, „He picked my mother up in a bar. She never had enough money to buy all the drinks she wanted.“
Janna’s eyes became even more silver as a sheen of tears unexpectedly gathered. She thought of how proud her father had been of his strong sons and lively daughter, and of how much love there had been between herself and her family. Then she thought of Raven growing up without that kind of love.
„What a waste,“ she whispered. „Most men would kill to have a son like you, and most women would die proud knowing that they had once carried you in their body.“
For an instant Raven closed his eyes, unable to bear the depth of emotion he saw in Janna’s. „Not really,“ he said finally, his voice almost harsh. His eyes opened black and very clear. „I’m Haida. Indian. Maybe that doesn’t matter here and now in this inlet, but it matters like hell out there,“ he said flatly, gesturing with a broad, powerful hand to the rest of the world.
Janna started to object, then stopped. What Raven said was true. She didn’t like it, but she was too realistic to deny it. She hated it, though. She hated it so intensely that her eyes became almost as dark as his. The thought of Raven being subjected to a loveless childhood and then to bigotry in adulthood made her so angry that she shook with the force of her suppressed emotion.
„I don’t feel that way about you,“ she said distinctly. „You’re a man, Carlson Raven. You’re as fine a man as I’ve ever met. That’s all that matters to me. That won’t change whether I’m here in Totem Inlet or on the far side of the moon. And I can’t bear the thought of you being raised without love, without someone to appreciate what you’ve become.“
Janna’s voice broke. She turned away quickly, replacing the spiky, fragile urchin in its nest of stone. Impatiently she wiped off her tears on the thick sweater that she wore. It was damp and smelled subtly of the sea and the man who had worn it before he had given it to her to keep her warm.
„Janna.“ Raven’s voice was deep, gentle, gritty with restraint.
He pulled her to her feet and put his work-hardened palm beneath her chin, tilting her face up to his. He started to speak, saw her tears and felt breath rush out of his lungs as though at a blow. He bent and brushed her eyelashes with his lips. The effort it took to stop after those comforting, undemanding kisses shocked him. Slowly he released her chin, caressing the line of her jaw with his fingertips as he withdrew his hand.
„I wasn’t unhappy,“ he said softly. „Among the Haida, children belong to their mother’s moiety, and boys are initiated by their mother’s brothers rather than by their fathers. My uncle raised me, as is the custom among my people.“
„And your mother?“ Janna asked unevenly, knowing that she shouldn’t ask… unable to stop herself.
„By the time I was six my mother wasn’t capable of caring for herself, much less for a son. She abandoned me and took up full-time drinking. My uncle adopted me under both tribal and Canadian law four years before she died. Eddy is a good man, a strong man, a kind man,“ Raven said deeply. „In the summer he fishes salmon and in the winter he carves argillite into images as old and unique as the Haida language. You’d like Eddy. He would love you. He has nothing but disgust for women who are too spoiled to walk the Queen Charlottes in a storm.“
Janna looked intently at Raven, measuring the emotion that lay beneath his words. She sensed that he didn’t talk casually about his parents – or lack of them – yet he had talked to her. As she looked up into his black, gleaming eyes, it was all she could do not to throw herself into Raven’s arms and plead that he notice her as a woman. But throwing herself at him would be a disaster. Whatever Eddy might like, Raven himself was drawn to tragic, fragile blondes who wore silk scarves that exactly matched their mysterious blue-green eyes.
„Do you think Eddy’s man enough to eat urchin soup?“ Janna asked lightly, hoping Raven wouldn’t notice that her smile quivered on the edge of turning upside down.
Raven smiled suddenly, transforming the dark, harsh planes of his face. „I can’t wait to find out.“
When Janna saw Raven’s smile, emotion gusted over her like wind over the surface of the sea. She turned quickly and looked out at the water. Another squall line was sweeping in. „How long do we have to wait?“ she asked.
„For the soup?“
„For the squall.“
