She knelt and checked the bandage on his arm. He opened his eyes to watch her, but tolerated her touch. The bandage was damp, but the blood had not soaked through it.
Better to leave it alone than to open the wound trying to change it. Food and warmth and rest were what he needed now. She scowled at the stiffened hare that would have to feed four instead of two. Nothing to be done about it except to do it. She took the pot outside to pack it with snow, leaving Kerlew to stare curiously at the injured stranger.
The big man made a strange profile in the dark as he returned. She held the tent flap open for him. He unslung a huge bundle of birch twigs from his shoulder and pushed them in before him. Tillu followed, setting the pot of snow by the fire to melt, then watching him curiously. As he began to spread the birch twigs in a layer over the earth floor, she wondered if this were some healing ritual of his people. She had been taught the uses of the birch tree: Oil from its bark soothed skin disorders, and syrup from the tender roots pleasantly eased a cough. One could steep its tiny cones for tea to ease a mother's body after a difficult childbirth, or toast the same cones over coals, that the fumes might clear a stuffy head. She watched carefully to see how he would use such a quantity of twigs on a bleeding wound. But then he boldly took another hide from her bed and spread it over the twigs. Careful as a mother, he helped the injured boy move on to this softer resting place. Then he straightened and looked around her small tent curiously. She could not tell what he was thinking.
Abruptly he placed a hand on his own chest and announced, 'Heckram.' A gesture toward the youth. 'Lasse.'
'Tillu,' she replied and, pointing to her son, added, 'Kerlew.'
'Tillu,' he muttered and, turning, left the tent again.
'What happened to him?' Kerlew demanded, pointing at Lasse as she knelt to open up the hare.
'Some fool shot him instead of a reindeer,' she told him tersely.
'The big man?' he asked with interest.
'No. Someone else, someone who ran away instead of staying to help as he should have. So I had to help them instead.'
'Why?'
'Because they needed help. Isn't that a good enough reason?'
'I guess,' he subsided. He watched her with interest. 'Is that all you killed today?'
'Yes. And we're going to have to share it.'
'Sharing makes less,' he observed without rancor, returning to staring at Lasse. The youth opened his eyes and at first looked confused. Then he smiled weakly at Kerlew and made a vague effort to sit up. 'Better lie still,' Kerlew advised him. 'Or you'll be bleeding all over. Bleed too much and you die.'
'Kerlew!' Tillu chided him, for the youth had understood enough of his words to look stricken. 'Be quiet, as I told you. The less you speak, the less chance of making a fool of yourself. Besides, you say things I don't want said. So, be quiet.'
Kerlew went into a sulk, poking angrily at the fire and nearly upsetting the pot of warming water. Tillu turned back to Lasse. She spoke slowly and carefully. 'Don't try to move right now. I'm fixing something to eat. Your friend will be back soon. Your arm.
Does it hurt much? Much pain?'
'Yes, pain. Sick.' He made a vague gesture with his good hand at his head and stomach. Tillu understood. The shock of the wound, the long cold hike, and the unrelenting pain of the jagged gash made him feel weak and ill. She wasn't surprised.
She moved to her healer's pouch and began to sort through it. 'Heckram?' he asked anxiously as he watched her.
'Yes. He'll be back very soon.'
As if in answer to her words, the flap was pushed open once more. Heckram and more birch twigs came in. He spoke reassuringly to Lasse, and the youth visibly relaxed. He spoke to Tillu over his shoulder as he spread the second bundle of twigs over the floor and blithely covered them with hides from her bed. The gist of his words seemed to be that this was warmer and better than the bare earth floor. Tillu nodded curtly and went on with her work. Anything that occupied him without bothering her was fine.
She poured a small measure of the snow water into a cup. From her healing supplies she took several small packets made of gut and an assortment of bone vials. Inside each were herbs or ground roots or bark. She opened several, frowning at those that had not kept as fresh as she might have wished. She chose carefully from among them, taking a pinch of willow bark and crumbling it finely into the water, adding a thumbnail-size piece of sorrel root and letting it steep. She added a small portion of dried anemone flower. It was a potent sedative, one that would cause collapse in a patient if too much were taken. In the boy's weakened condition, she would use too little rather than too much. After a few moments of steeping, she dipped her little finger into the mixture and touched it to her tongue. Heckram unnerved her by squatting down on his heels by her fire and watching her with friendly interest. He nodded in turn to Kerlew, who sulkily turned aside from him. The big man did not seem offended, but rose and moved casually around the tent, pausing to rearrange some of the hides on the birch twigs. He spoke softly to Lasse as he crouched by the boy and then returned, sighing softly as he seated himself on a layer of birch twigs and hides near the fire. Tillu rose as he sat, to take the cup of amber liquid to Lasse.
'For pain,' she said, searching his face for understanding. He looked to Heckram, who nodded to him slowly. The boy drank. Tillu took back the empty cup, ignoring the wry face Lasse made at the unfamiliar taste. She knew his pain would ebb now. And he would probably just have time to eat before sleep descended. The willow bark should keep fever away as well. She nodded in satisfaction and crouched again by her fire to carefully rinse the dregs from the cup with more of the snow water. Heckram watched her intently, apparently curious about the herbs and roots she so carefully repacked.
She paused a moment, thinking. Then, hoping her face didn't show how reluctantly she parted with her precious store, she mixed more of the herbs and root in the now dry cup. With mortar and pestle of calf's bone she ground them to a powder and rolled the mixture carefully in a tiny square of skin. 'For tomorrow,' she told Heckram as she offered it. 'Only if pain.'
He studied her face, then asked, 'Pain again, new day?'
She nodded, hoping he understood. She busied herself once more with the hare, hoping he would return to his friend. But he continued to crouch amiably at her side, looking from her to Kerlew with friendly curiosity. Cocking his head, he asked something in a casual tone.
Tillu shrugged at him.
'He asked if we live alone,' Kerlew interpreted helpfully.
She glared at him as Heckram nodded, clearly understanding the boy's rewording of his question. 'Don't you remember that I asked you to be quiet?' she hissed at him, speaking as rapidly as she could. To Heckram she made a vague gesture that could have signified anything and said, 'Soon. Very soon.'
The man looked slightly puzzled, but nodded and smiled in return. Then he transferred his attention from her to the obviously rebuked boy. 'Come,' he said, speaking slowly and plainly. 'You help me.' His gesture could not have been misunderstood even if Kerlew hadn't known his words. He glanced at Tillu for permission. She nodded, her lips tightly pressed. Kerlew rose to move around the fire and squat at Heckram's side.
The man rose, to open his loosely belted tunic and take out a packet from inside it.
Then he pulled off his heavy tunic of reindeer hide, revealing a woven shirt beneath.
'What fur is this?' Kerlew asked in amazement, instantly reaching to touch the fabric.
The man smiled at his curiosity and suffered the boy to pluck at the sleeve of his shirt.
After a moment he motioned at the package and took a knife from the sheath at his hip.
Tillu watched from the corner of her eye. The sheath itself was woven, from sinew or something. The knife was flint, ground, not flaked, to a fine edge. Beside it, her bone knife looked like a child's crude toy. As the man unwrapped the package, a smell at once familiar and foreign filled the tent. Kerlew wrinkled his nose at it, but Tillu could not keep herself from turning to stare. Cheese.
A half round of yellow cheese filled the man's hand, marked with a woven pattern on its rind. He set it down atop its wrappings and began to cut it into portions with his knife. Lasse called something to him and Heckram rose to remove a similar package from the youth's pouch. This one contained a piece of river fish with its smoky smell.
