'The sleeve of your tunic is soaking wet,' she said with a calmness she didn't feel. 'Take it off and hang it by the fire. You'll want it dry to go home in.'
She became aware again of the pestle in her hand and used it with a vigor the dry herbs didn't require. She heard him ease out of his shirt. She mashed the herbs with some lichen in the bottom of a small pot, added water, and put the poultice to heat. She turned to find him naked from the waist up, wringing water out of the sleeve of his woolen undershirt. There was a tracing of hair on his chest, starting just below his throat, widening slightly on his breast, and stretching in a line past his navel.
'The men of my grandfathers' blood,' he said, a husky embarrassment in his voice,
'are hairy, like this. On the face and chest.' She had been caught staring.
She lifted her eyes, tried to meet his gaze nonchalantly. it is so with my people, also,'
she admitted.
'The women also?' he asked incredulously.
She laughed aloud, caught the look in his eyes, and wanted to stop, but couldn't. He was blushing, embarrassed by his ignorance. She caught her breath, found a solemn expression, but lost it again. Perhaps it didn't matter. He was starting a smile now, rueful and shy, but a smile.
'That was stupid, wasn't it?' he admitted, chuckling.
'Not really.' She got her face under control. 'You have probably always been with your own people. How are you to know the ways of other folk?'
'I haven't always been among the herdfolk,' he defended. 'When I was very small, I once made a trading journey with my father. It was when he was wealthy, before the plague. I saw the village of the traders, like, like ...' He groped for words. 'Like two great square huts, made into many little huts.'
'Rooms,' she suggested.
He paused, shrugged his shoulders, and gave a tentative nod. 'Two of them, with many families living there, each family with a 'room.' And the wide path between the two great huts. The men had beards that billowed over their chests. And the women had hair like different shades of wood. Some of the children were my cousins, but we could not talk well together. Still, we played.'
'Was it far from here?' Tillu found herself asking.
Heckram frowned to himself, 'It didn't seem so at the time. But I was small, riding in my father's pulkor, so the distance meant little to me. Still, it couldn't be that far. Some years the traders come from that village to trade. Not as often as they used to, but then, we used to have more to trade. Now it is more common for the herdfolk to go to their village. The year my father took me, it was an unusual thing. All the folk in the village were surprised to see us and marveled over our harke and pulkor. Do I have to put this back on my face?'
He had caught her dreaming, her thoughts riding on his tale. She looked at the handful of moss he held out.
'Wet it again and put it back. It will soften that gash.'
He made a sound between a sigh and a growl and sat down again. She heard him slosh the moss in the pot. She bent to study her own pot of lichen and herbs. She poked at it with the pestle, decided it had softened enough, and removed it from the heat. The white lichen was very useful as a binder. It could be used to thicken a stew, or to make a poultice, or even to be cooked into a sort of bread. She touched a finger to it, flinched, and set it aside to cool a bit. She felt both reluctance and anticipation as she walked over to Heckram.
He took the moss away from his face as she knelt before him. A few strands of the white moss clung to the edges of the slash. She picked them off carefully with her fingernails, then touched the injury. The soaking had taken down most of the swelling.
It was red and warm about the edges, with a yellowish crust down the middle. The herbal soak had softened the scab so it would slough away easily. 'This doesn't look near as bad as it did.' She picked cautiously at the edge of it and felt him wince. 'We'll try the poultice now.'
'What do you say to him, afterward?'
'Who after what?' she asked absently, poking at the mass in the pot. It was a little too runny.
'Joboam. After he's been rough on Kerlew.'
'Very little. It does no good. He denied it the first time I accused him, and the next time he said he had been wrestling playfully with the boy and the boy misunderstood.
I've told him to keep his hands off my son. Then he said something about Capiam making him responsible for us, so he must make the boy understand your rules before we go with you. Then I said if it involved beating the rules into Kerlew, I'd as soon not go. After that, he left Kerlew alone. Until today.'
'Have you ever spoken to Capiam about it?' Heckram asked.
Tillu shook her head silently. She brought the poultice pot over beside him, took up a handful of white moss, and mixed it into it. The result was a warm fibrous mass that would cling together when she smoothed it onto his face.
'Do you want me to speak to Capiam about it?' Heckram offered softly.
'Would he listen to you?'
Heckram hesitated fractionally. 'The herdlord is supposed to listen to all of his folk.
But Capiam has not been herdlord long. Nor did he have the benefit of a father's long experience. Relf, who was herdlord when I was a boy, died about five years after the plague, leaving no children. Capiam's father had been one of his most trusted men, and he assumed the leadership. Some were not happy about it. Several spoke up in favor of Eike, who was Joboam's father and another of Relf's men. But Eike's father was not of the herdfolk, but was a trader, like my grandfather. A friend of his, in fact. So many said the herdfolk needed a leader with the blood of herdfolk strong in him. So, Capiam's father was chosen, despite his great age. He died three years ago, and Capiam became herdlord.'
'Was Eike bitter?' Tillu asked thoughtfully.
'No. Eike was a good man, big in both size and heart. He supported Capiam's father right up until his own death. But I know what you are thinking. Yes, Joboam resented it. We were only boys at the time, but I remember it still. When no grown folk were around, he often said that the leadership should go to a man strong enough to lead.
Then, if any disagreed, he would wrestle them and hold them down until they were shamed. And say that good men take pride in a strong leader. Meaning Eike; he was large, like Joboam.'
'And you,' Tillu added.
Heckram bobbed a nod of agreement. 'Same blood. But we were seen differently.
Joboam was strong, and his family had plenty, even in the worst times. No matter how angry the other children got with him, it was easy to forgive him, because in his tent there were cheeses and suet puddings for his friends.'
'And what about you?' she pressed curiously, even though she sensed he remembered pain.
He smiled ruefully, 'I was a bit of the fool. Then, and some still think now. Clumsy, always too big for my clothes. And Joboam disliked me.' Heckram gave a deprecating laugh. 'He could wrestle me down, but I was never smart enough to admit he had won.
I'd always keep struggling until he had to let me up or until one of the adults came to end it. So I was never welcome in his tent with the other children. Most of the other children avoided me, for Joboam was unfriendly to any who befriended me.' He shook his head suddenly. it wasn't a good time. I was glad to grow up, glad when the wrestling and struggling stopped.'
'So glad that you nearly started it up again today,' Tillu observed wryly. 'But I think I understand now. Enough to know that your speaking to Capiam would not make any difference. I will have to think, and decide. It may be that the only way to spare Kerlew from him will be for us to go our own way. Lie back on the pallet while I put this on, or it will drip off your chin. It's not as thick as it could be. Close your eye, too.'
He eased back on her pallet, feeling the soft prickle of the furs beneath his bare back.
Her smell was on the furs, rising to make him aware of her closeness. She knelt beside the pallet, scooped some of the poultice up on her fingertips, and then leaned over him to pat it softly onto his face. She was very close, her face intent. The poultice was runny.
Some of it trickled down by his ear, tickling unbearably. She scooped it back with a finger. Her hands were
