A shout. Tokela juddered, blinked through gluey eyes at the craft framed by driftwood railing. It furled its wings, heeling sideways. The shout had come from one of the Riverwalkers, swinging a bow line to catch a float anchor. Sun already nuzzled the lush treetops on River’s far bank. Tokela flexed his fingers, stiff and smudged, and…
A sudden and familiar waft of herb balm touched his nostrils. A shocked catch of breath followed, with the ripple of tiny copper bells. Tokela palmed the graphite and hunched his shoulders.
He’d been caught sketching. Again.
Sliding his eyes upward, he started to explain to his aunt that he’d only meant to capture the craft in memory. Just the craft, and the light about it. It would burn holes behind his eyes until he did, and he'd not meant anything by it, none had been about to see…
Neither did Inhya seem to see him. Ebon eyes sprung wide, cheeks so ashen her pearl-inked Clan Marks were only just visible, she stared at the hide between his knees. Only those numerous copper bells spoke, a trembly shiver upon the one splash of jewel-bright she wore: hearth-chieftain’s head wrap of turquoise wormweave.
Tokela’s gaze followed hers, lowering to take in the sketch. Further explanations balled in his throat and choked him.
The boat was lovely—one of his best efforts—winged like flyingKin, rigging evocative of spinner webs damp with Sun’s rising. River cradled the craft in long sweeps of shadow to support the cream and white reflections, yet…
Yet.
A face peeked out from between wings and webbing. And he’d no memory of making it.
Ša was… well, ša resembled firstPeople. Sort of. Yet the eyes were too round, too small. A long face with neck even moreso, ears set too low, nose and mouth too small, chin too pointed, skin too pale, barely touched by the graphite.
Tokela had never seen one of the outLanders close enough to guess at whether his rendition was accurate, but he’d heard stories. Ai, he’d heard too many stories.
His hearth-mother’s expression told yet another. She recognised this being. Somehow.
Swift as swimmingKin, Inhya darted forwards, reaching for the sketch.
Nigh as quick, Tokela’s hand grasped her wrist. “Who—?”
“Better to ask what.” Quick, as if Inhya regretted saying that much. “Let go of me.”
Tokela obeyed—and in the next heartbeat wished he hadn’t. Inhya snatched up the sketch and crumpled it, shoving it out of sight in the pouch hanging from her belt. Tokela looked away, muting the questions itching upon his tongue. He didn’t need them, anyway. He was fairly certain what the person… thing… was.
The one unspeakable possibility.
Sun had slipped behind a cloud, no longer fingering the boat’s sides. The sails had been lowered to reveal a skeleton of bare rails, no longer winged with shadow and gossamer. He’d drawn their memory, a’io, yet had somehow added an image of something he’d never seen.
Not only outLander, but Chepiś.
Tokela scrambled to his feet.
“It’s of no matter. But making likenesses is forbidden. You know this, Tokela.” The diminutive intended fondness, yet Inhya's eyes narrowed into knives; Tokela sketched them, mute and unwilling, in his heart. “Why are you malingering up here? Have you forgotten?”
Forgotten. He’d forgotten something? Tokela couldn’t help a slight shift, foot to foot. The wooden beads dangling from his woven hip wrap swayed and chattered, betraying the movement. Escape was impossible; Inhya blocked the stair.
It didn’t bode well. But then, of late it seldom did.
CAUGHT UP with helping in the salting dens, Madoc nevertheless heard the talking drum’s message: the first of the Riverwalker traders had been sighted. It took a while to extricate himself from the salting duties. No doubt his elder cousin already perched on the uppermost terrace, watching.
It made one surety amidst Tokela’s curious habits. And of late, curiosity had turned to serious puzzle. Madoc liked puzzles well enough, but not in regards to Tokela. Moreover, Madoc had something to share, something surely more important than staring at Riverwalker vessels with faraway eyes.
Well, at least he knew where to find Tokela thisSun.
Madoc burst into the compound, skipping the daggers of light that filtered down from the cliff heights.
“Ho, chieftain-son, would you leap Sun?” a passerby teased.
Madoc didn’t slow, chirped back: “To leave Him for others, old uncle!”
The good-natured laugh spread, and Madoc joined in. Hard to remain solemn during First Running. Better to let thisSun’s bliss fill him. Whatever reasons the adults gathered were, after all, inconsequential. The season’s first run of silvers had been spotted downRiver. It meant work, ai’o, but it also meant gathering and games and dancing and cookpots filled to brimming…
Like now. The teasing odors wafting from the cooking hearths thought to slow Madoc, but he kept going—steadfast as the best Naisgwyr’uq hunter, he congratulated himself—and raced upward as he reached the main stair.
By the fifth terrace, however, he’d stopped for a breather. Foiling many floods, the Great Mound also thwarted quick ascent. The hands Madoc propped against his hide-clad knees gave little comfort: pale streaks of salt, callused every bit as hard as Tokela’s, but podgy instead of quick-fingered, not yet nimble enough for the finer tasks of netting upkeep. Instead Madoc found solace in eyeing the considerable distance he’d already climbed. Not many his age could run so well and fast, after all.
Still, good to wait a little longer before resuming his climb. Nothing worse than heaving his way to the top terraces—not only from the dignity befitting a son of chieftains a’Naišwyrh, but because Madoc hoped to surprise Tokela.
More proof Madoc was strong for his age: it didn’t take long to catch his breath. Tossing the thatch of Sun-tipped, unruly bronze from his face, Madoc skipped upward, counting another four and two of terraces by the dens and hollows of each level. Almost there. And not as Tokela oft teased him—heavy-footed as
