Rawley woke me up shortly before we reached the tribe as dawn started to brighten the sky. They had set up camp on three hills that rose a little bit higher than the rest in the vicinity and were well outside the floodwater’s reach. The two large hills were given to the herds while the last held the majority of the tribe in a makeshift camp. It teemed with activity and noise. No hands were spared in the effort of checking for damaged supplies, repairs, setting things out to dry, and retrieving any lost animals or tribe members, dead or alive. It even looked like only two thirds of the Pack were keeping a perimeter. My heart sank. The only reason they wouldn’t be there, other than that they got swept away in the flood, was because enough people were missing that Ghani didn’t think there were enough lone huntresses to find them all quickly.
I got down off of Rawley’s back, still sore but now able to keep my eyes open, and we entered the makeshift camp together. After get directions to Ghani’s whereabouts, my mentor made right for her. As tribe leader she would have the best information about the tribe’s condition and where we could be the most help. We found her directing a man on how to properly bind the cracked pole of a travois. Her normal grin had shrunk into a tight, forced smile and I noticed that she kept glancing up to scan everything that was going on around her, pausing with more intensity when she looked through the gaps between people and objects and into the hills around us. Levain had once remarked that Ghani wasn’t fit to be tribe leader because you could tell easily how well the tribe was doing based on the size of her smile. I didn’t particularly like Ghani but I thought that, despite her easiness to read, she had to be doing something right if only one person had seen fit to challenge her for her position in the last nine years. Which might have to do with many tribe members appreciating the stability her attention to detail brought.
During one of her scans, Ghani noted us and gestured for us to come closer a few minutes later when she finished micromanaging the man.
“Good! I’m glad to see the goddess didn’t turn her eye too harshly on you, Rawley! We’ll need your tracking skills sooner rather than later.”
Rawley asked, “How many lost?”
Ghani ticked off on her fingers. “Landra and Reece of the Pack. Tenne and her young one, Yalin, were also swept away. Mel’s boy with a handful of her sheep. One of the young reindeer helpers and few beasts. Old Spinner.”
“Do you know when they were lost?”
Ghani gestured vaguely upstream. “We aren’t certain for all of them. Most of the tribe was away from the river with half the Pack in between it and us to keep track of our location. Landra and Reece got caught in the flooding when it started, and we think Tenne got pulled in when she tried to save Yalin after she tripped. The storm spooked the herds badly and while most of the herders were able to keep them under control, we think for the boys they either got separated in the storm or the flooding caught them. Old Spinner wasn’t here when we did the count, but none of the Pack remember him leaving their perimeter.” Ghani snorted. “Frankly, I’m surprised the two of you weren’t swept away as well. All the other lone huntresses came back before the storm hit.”
With how bad visibility had been I wasn’t surprised the Pack hadn’t seen the old man disappear. Likely, he hadn’t been able to keep up in the storm and slipped between the huntresses as the tribe pressed on.
Rawley said, “I had thought that having eyes in the front quickly would be beneficial once we left the storm behind, but the storm was more in the goddess’s eye than expected.” Rawley gestured to take in the work being done all around them. “And how long until the rest of the tribe is ready to continue?”
Ghani had enough restraint not to sigh, but she came close to it. “For repairs and a bit of rest? About four hours. But everything else? The search alone could go all day if we don’t find all the tribe members quickly and there’s bound to be some dead unless the goddess didn’t watch to the end. You know how Grandmother is about the ceremonies. Those could easily take another four hours. I’ll be surprised if we’re able to make up any of the ground we lost today.”
“I assume you’ll want me to start searching as soon as possible then?”
Ghani’s smile brightened slightly. “You always catch on fast. The men are cooking pluckings wrapped in flat bread. Grab some before you go.” Her gaze fell on me and her smile dimmed again. “Will your troublemaker be able to go with you? She looks like one light blow would knock her off her feet.”
Rawley glanced down at me. “She’s tougher than she looks.”
Ghani shrugged. “Less likely to cause trouble out there than here in camp I suppose. Don’t let her slow you down though. The sooner we find those missing the fewer ceremonies we have to perform, and I prefer living followers to dead ones.”
Rawley nodded. “Of course, tribe leader.”
Ghani dismissed us after telling us to head upstream. We went and got our meal, eating the steaming meat, vegetables, and bread as we left the camp. Rawley stopped me a few yards away from the edge of camp after she ate the last bite of her food.
“If you can’t keep up, I’ll need you to go back to camp on your own. Tracking might be a slow process, but I don’t want you risking another injury by pushing yourself too far. Do you understand?”
There was no way I was going back to Grandmother’s tent yet, no matter how stiff my body felt. “I understand.”
Many of the huntresses had already been sent downstream to look for those who had been caught by the flooding—Rawley had apparently seen them as she carried me back to camp—so we were being sent to look for the ones who might have been separated by the storm itself. Namely, Mel and my father’s son, Jess, the other boy, and Old Spinner as well as any sheep or reindeer we could find. I kept myself out of the way at the bottom of the hill full of sheep as Rawley went to go find out if Mel had any more information about when her son went missing.
It was odd to think that I was going to go rescue him. I’d never really had contact with Father’s other family. Levain went to Mel’s tent to treat them or Father when they got sick. Not even the twins got to play with the three other children. But now that Levain had cast me out, it seemed I wasn’t as strictly beholden to the agreement for the families to ignore each other or Ghani wouldn’t have sent Rawley and I upstream. I would just have to do my best not to catch Mel’s eye if Rawley and I did manage to find Jess, in case she still reacted badly to my presence.
I actually wished we had been sent after the tribe members who had been caught by the flooding. I’d never really wanted to interact with Father’s other family, anyway. They had never factored into my life, other than placing restrictions on when we could see Father and, even if he hadn’t been married to Mel, he wouldn’t have been able to marry Levain. There was too much life in that.
Rawley collected me a short while later and we began to make our way upstream, skirting around muddy puddles and keeping an eye out for any tracks or signs of passage that hadn’t been washed away in the rain. As we went Rawley let me know that Mel wasn’t sure when her son had gotten separated, she had been too focused on controlling the sheep in her own vicinity, but one of the other herders said that they thought saw a boy holding onto a panicked sheep as it tried to flee the storm. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much of a track to follow after the storm. While we could see large trampled sections of mud and grass the tribe had made, the rain had washed many of the signs of lighter travel away. The tribe’s trail became more difficult to follow the further we got away from the makeshift camp largely because the storm had longer to work at making it disappear.
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So instead after an hour or so of following the river we left it and started to head deeper into the hills. It was slow going as we looked for anything that might count as shelter. At first glance there wasn’t a lot to hid behind or under in the grassy landscape, but some hills were positioned well to block the wind and others had valleys or outcroppings that you couldn’t see unless you looked from the right angle. We also had to check behind any bushes that came into view. My body was more than ready for me to sit down and rest after the first couple hours, but I didn’t turn back. I had made it through the storm, I was stronger than that.
At one point we saw one of the Pack huntresses in the distance with a camp dog. One of the benefits of joining the Pack was learning how to train and command the dogs to track and hunt. It could be helpful in times like this when there wasn’t much to follow other than a scent trail, though it was dubious if that had even made it through the storm. It did look like the dog was a trail. Rawley made it clear that she acknowledged using the dogs for that reason, but that she much rather use her own eyes and ears.
It turned out that the dog was on a true trail because a while later a long sharp whistle cut through the air. Rawley whistled back to let the other huntress know we were answering the call to gather before she picked up the pace and we jogged to where to the whistle had come from. We found the Pack huntress standing in a small valley between hills with three sheep munching on grass and the dog standing on point away from them. Now that we were closer I recognized her as Yolay, a tall, slim woman with long dark hair who was known for her ability to quickly train and calm the camp dogs. Levain and I had treated her for several bites from some of the more temperamental and stubborn dogs.
She spoke to Rawley while gesturing to the dog and sheep. “Bluebell has picked up another trail from here and it would be easier to follow it without sheep in tow. I noticed you have your apprentice with you. Would you trust her to bring the sheep back to camp?”
I didn’t like being treated as if I wasn’t there in the same breath she was planning on using me, but I knew better than to interrupt.
Rawley gave her a calm smile. “That’s fine by me. I was about to send her back to check on what progress has been made anyway.” Rawley let her smile stretch a little wider before continuing, “I’m glad you recognize that she can help our work rather than hinder it.”
Yolay froze for a moment as Rawley’s words recalled Fenris’s complaint when Grandmother had first brought me to the huntresses. Then the Pack huntress attempted to smooth over her reaction with a calm smile of her own. “As Grandmother said, the healer forsook her and she no longer wears her beads. She no longer carries the extra taint that might hinder us.”
“I see.” Rawley nodded to me. “Take the sheep back to camp and learn if anyone has been found. If you’re quick I should still be in this area of the hills when you come back. Whistle for me.”
I ignored Yolay in favor of the pride swelling my chest. Rawley trusted to me cross the hills on my own, both with the sheep and on the way back. Granted, it was difficult to get lost with the river and no Pickers had been spotted in the vicinity. She trusted that I would be able to find her.
Herding the sheep back to camp wasn’t as simple as all the herders made it look. Once I got them going, getting them moving wasn’t difficult, as they basically did their best to keep a short distance between us. The trouble was that they kept trying to weave away further into the hills or too close to the still flooded river and, with how sore my body still felt, my patience quickly ran thin. I took to practicing with my sling, flinging small stones I found in the grass to either side of the sheep whenever they threatened to go off course. My aim still wasn’t nearly as good as Rawley’s but my stones generally landed within three hand spans of where I wanted them to go, so I didn’t have to worry about accidentally hitting the sheep.
The sheep were branded with Mel’s mark, but instead of risking an awkward conversation with her I convinced one of the sheep hands I was too busy to deal with the sheep any longer. Luckily, he didn’t seem to recognize me without my beads and he promised to let Mel know that three of her herd were returned. I didn’t have the same luck when learning about if anyone had been found in the past few hours. Without Rawley, I couldn’t go up to Ghani to ask her and none of the other huntresses or tribe members would give me the time of day. So, I was forced to make my way to where Grandmother’s tent had been set up.
I didn’t want to see her. At all. Not after she taunted and threatened me into cutting off my healer’s beads, not after she bled me excessively for the Traveler’s Offering the day before yesterday.
Old Lilly and the other wards were outside the tent, drying supplies and clothing. She smiled and bustled over when she saw me. “I’m glad you’re well, child! We were worried when you and Rawley didn’t come back before the storm.”
Grandmother’s voice cut in before I had the chance to respond. “Send her in, sister. I need to have words with her.”
Old Lilly gestured to the tent. “Go right on in, and if you need anything after, just let me know.”
I held in a sigh and, gritting my teeth, stepped into the tent. Grandmother was sitting on a brown cushion carefully examining her personal collection of inking tools. Her bone shard was intricately carved. The carvings created what looked like swirls of smoke, dyed yellow near the sharp tip that faded into red and then black toward the other end. I stood just in front of the tent flaps, ready to duck out at a moment’s notice.
“You think there was a death then?”
Grandmother snorted. “I know it. More than two, judging by how keenly the goddess had her eye on us during that storm.” She set down the bone shard. “You missed your offering last night. I’ll have you make up for it now.”
She turned to pick up the offering bowl that sat on her other side and beckoned me closer. I listened and lifted up my skirt after pulling out my prayer needle, hating how easy it was to obey.
Grandmother’s eyes bore into me as she pushed the bowl against my thigh. “Thank the goddess for allowing you to live despite not fulfilling your obligations.”
I ran the prayer needle in a long bloody scratch across my mark and said the ritual words. “I gift this blood to the Goddess so that She does not have to take in the coming days. May it grant Her strength.” Grandmother pushed the bowl harder against my thigh and for a second I panicked—there weren’t any other ritual words that came after that—before I collected myself and met her gaze for gaze. “I thank the goddess for averting Her gaze and gifting me with the power to always see a storm through, not matter who else might buckle to it.”
Grandmother’s smile turned a bit feral as she praised me, “Clever girl.” She chuckled as I flinched back before raising the bowl in the air. “This lowly blood speaker drinks this blood in your stead. Do you accept this girl’s offering and her thanks?”
Grandmother tipped the bowl back and drank the blood inside with one swallow. The blood coating her lip stayed there long enough that I began to worry I had gone too far in my last statement, but a few moments later it flaked away and disappeared into thin air. Grandmother set the bowl down and turned back to me.
“Now then, why did you come here when you clearly didn’t want to?”
“I needed to know if anyone has been found yet.”
“The huntresses washed downstream have made their way back with the bodies of Tenne and Yalin. It seems the girl drowned and a rock bashed her mother’s head in. All that’s left are the boys and that spinning fool.”
“Thank you for that information.” I turned to leave the tent.
Grandmother’s voice stopped me from taking more than one step. “Where do you think you’re going?”
I pointed upstream. “Rawley wanted me to report who’s still missing.”
“No.” Her tone brooked no argument. She pointed to a bed roll in the corner of the tent I hadn’t paid attention to. “I’ll need you to offer blood at least three more times today and you look near dead on your feet. I can’t have you fainting on me. You’ll sleep until it’s time for the ceremonies, and I’ll send a runner to inform your mentor of the situation.”
I tried to argue anyway. “I—”
“No.”
And that was that. I laid down on the bed roll. Old Lily was called in to wrap a new bandage around my thigh before going back out to send a huntress to inform Rawley of the situation. Because even though every hand was busy and Grandmother wasn’t supposed to just be able order huntresses about, she had the power to get what she wanted—especially with death ceremonies looming and reminding everyone of her importance.