Shaman Part 7

She did not think Wolf Paw a coward. His courage was well known. Facing a being like this, the bravest man in the world would run.

_It doesn't seem to see me. Maybe it is best to stand still._

She trembled from head to foot, unable to decide what to do. She felt dizzy, as if she might collapse into the snow. The bright light that seemed to come from the bear dazzled her.

But would a spirit bear attack people in the night and kill them? Devils and cannibal giants would, but she had never heard of a spirit doing any such thing.

She was learning to be a medicine woman, and a medicine woman must deal unafraid with the beings of the other world. Talk the bad spirits out of a sick person's body and call upon the good spirits to aid in healing.

She took a deep breath. Whether this be a good spirit or a devil, she would stand here holding herself proudly. Wolf Paw, if he looked back, would see the maiden he had threatened standing in the place he had run from.

The white bear took a step toward her.

In spite of her fear, she made herself look at the spirit as it came on.

It walked so slowly. Perhaps, after all, she could run away from it.

Under the pointed snout she saw eyes that seemed to glow out of a shadowed face.

It was a man she was facing.

She saw that its path was taking it past her. It--he--did not seem to see her at all. But he was close enough now for her to see the face under the bear's skull. The large, round eyes, the long, thin features ending in a pointed chin, the bony beak of a nose, the down-curving, tender mouth. His face was covered with a mask of frost.

Gray Cloud.

How could she have forgotten that when he walked out of the camp yesterday he had worn a black bear's skin draped over his arms and shoulders? Snow and frost had turned the fur white. The night and her terror had tricked her into thinking she saw a white bear spirit. Wolf Paw, the seasoned warrior, had been tricked and terrified, too.

Gray Cloud was alive!

A scream tried to force its way out of her chest, but her windpipe was so tight that all she managed was a gasp.

Joy blazed up in her like a summer campfire.

But no--he could not be alive and look like that. What she was seeing must be the ghost of Gray Cloud, or his dead body walking. The cold and snow had killed him there in the sacred cave, and this shuffling, frozen husk was all that was left of him.

"Gray Cloud," she whispered, unable to speak aloud, "talk to me."

If he walked right past her without seeing her, he must be still on his spirit journey. She had always heard that the bodies of men on a spirit journey remained motionless, sitting or lying down. But she was certain that Gray Cloud was not fully awake.

She stood staring at him, her mouth open, as he shambled on past her.

She slowly turned to follow him, and now she was facing into the moonlight and seeing the shadows of the snow-covered wickiups. He was walking in that frighteningly slow, measured way toward the village.

Wolf Paw was nowhere to be seen.

The feeling came to her again of other eyes upon her. Besides Wolf Paw, besides the strange creature Gray Cloud had become, someone else seemed to be out here in the snow-covered field with her. She shuddered.

She looked around to see if she could guess where the secret watcher might be hiding. Someone might be crouching behind one of the long snowdrifts that rippled across the prairie like waves on a lake. Or in the trees by the river.

She must not let herself be caught out here. She picked up the blanket roll and water skin that Wolf Paw had thrown into the snow and padded on her snowshoes after the lumbering white figure. She must hurry and try to get to a place where her presence would be unnoticed, or if noticed, not questioned.

Her legs ached. She did not have the strength to run. Gray Cloud had left a trail of two shallow furrows in the snow where he had pushed his legs through and the snow had fallen in behind him. On her snowshoes she pressed on behind him.

Even though the snowshoes helped her, her legs ached. She wanted to throw down her burdens of blanket roll and water skin, but they were too valuable for her to let them be lost out here. Merciless pain shot up from her s.h.i.+ns through her knees to her hips. Still, the miseries felt by her body could not touch the joy of her spirit. Gray Cloud lived.

A wall of fur coated with white snow loomed up before her. As Gray Cloud lumbered along, she quickly stepped to the side and hurried around him.

She turned for a closer look at him. His steaming breath obscured his face. He stopped. He swayed, and the bear's skull fell back from his lolling head. She screamed, a sound that rang distantly in her ears.

Gray Cloud dropped to his knees, then fell forward on his face, sending up a great puff of powdery snow that glittered in the moonlit air.

The silence after his fall was as stunning as thunder. Redbird felt tears stream from her eyes--and freeze at once on her cheeks. That he should have lived through two nights of blizzard and cold, that he should come down alive from the sacred cave, only to die within sight of the village under her very eyes, was more than she could stand.

"Oh, no!" she whispered. "He must not die."

She fell to her knees beside him.

He lay face down, half buried. She put her hands under his shoulder and pushed to raise his head. He was heavy, but her fear and her love for him made her strong enough to move him. She lifted his upper body and turned him on his side, and she saw the beloved features, frost-white.

Hope made her heart beat faster as little clouds of warm air puffed from his nostrils. But his breathing was ragged and shallow. She had to get him in out of the cold. Gasping with the effort, she rolled him over on his back.

She would have to try to drag him to the village.

Sobbing with near-exhaustion, she sat by his head, shoved her hands under his shoulders and tried to stand, pulling him up with her.

All at once there was no weight on her arms. Someone else was there, lifting Gray Cloud.

She looked up, thankful, yet afraid she might see Wolf Paw returned to do them harm.

No, it was Iron Knife.

Seeing the broad face of her half brother, a cry of relief burst from her throat.

"Oh, Iron Knife! It is so good you are here."

He smiled grimly, grunting as he hauled Gray Cloud to his feet. Gray Cloud's eyes were shut, his mouth hanging open.

"Lucky for Wolf Paw that Gray Cloud came when he did," Iron Knife said.

"I was getting an arrow ready for Wolf Paw." He jerked his head at the bow slung over his shoulder.

"Even the son of Black Hawk?" She vividly remembered Wolf Paw's threats, but the thought of Iron Knife murdering him horrified her.

"Do you think I'd let him drown my sister?" Iron Knife put an arm around Gray Cloud's shoulders, bent down and picked him up under the knees, bearskin cloak and all. Blowing a cloud of steam out of his mouth, he straightened, cradling Gray Cloud in his arms. Though Gray Cloud was nearly as tall as Iron Knife, he was much lighter.

It was Iron Knife, she realized, whose eyes she had felt on her after Wolf Paw ran away.

They started off for the camp. She heard the voices of men and women raised, calling to one another. Wolf Paw must have given the alarm.

"How did you know I was out here?" she asked. "You were sleeping when I left the wickiup."

"Father woke me," Iron Knife said, striding stolidly along, his calf-high outer moccasins of buffalo hide breaking through the snow. "He knew what you were going to do. He told me to go after you, to see you came to no harm."