I didn’t go through camp to meet Rawley at the outcropping every day. Instead, I took the shorter route past the latrine and the edges of the eastern grazing pastures before I had to skirt around the lake. I know Grandmother noticed me do it, but she didn’t comment on the fact that I still would have taken that route if it had been the longer one. There was no chance of seeing Levain or the twins or Father and his family if I didn’t go through camp. Father wasn’t to blame for being unable to take me in, but I didn’t doubt that he still went to see Levain. And pretending like someone didn’t exist was easier when you didn’t see them, even with a lifetime of practice.
Rawley dedicated our mornings to her mind games and lessons in patience and awareness. Afternoons were spent in games of physical ability such as chase and climbing the bluffs. I didn’t get to so much as touch a sling or spear until a month in, though she did have me spend a whole afternoon in various stretching poses. She commended me for my patience that day, but the praise was soured by the fact that I had remained outwardly calm only because Levain’s favorite mantra would surge to the front of my mind every time the boredom nearly pushed me into complaining or stopping.
“Ambition is nothing without discipline.”
It was a plague and a guideline I couldn’t break, and I hated Levain for it even as the truth of her words convinced me to follow them. I stayed disciplined through the endless repetition of practicing the basic movements of using my new sling, building the foundations of my skill with the short huntress’s spear. I stayed disciplined through each morning I was made to feel like an idiot until I answered more of Rawley’s lessons correctly than wrong and she called me clever. She noticed me flinch and bristle, and then she made a point of calling me it, always with a softness that grated on my ears. That I would not thank her for. I stayed disciplined through my lessons in tracking and listening and the behaviors of animals, both predators and prey. Rawley taught me what she could of plants, but there was little she covered that I hadn’t already learned years ago in my first healing lessons.
With the beginning of my third month of lessons it came time for my tribe’s seasonal run to the Root Mountains in the east where we would shelter during the cold season. It would take us most of the month to reach the mountains and head into Grislander’s Maw. Levain drilled the legend of the mountains into my head on one of the rare truly warm days of the year and all I wanted to do was slip outside her store to play in the lake. That wasn’t allowed. Instead, I learned about Grislander, a dog made of stone and fire with paws large enough to crush our camp and the lake twenty times over. He had risen out of the earth in the early days of the Era of Night, when Heliquat had subjugated her sister, the goddess Azabel, and there was no escape from Her darkness and Her forests blanketed the land. Levain said that Grislander was born out of the people’s wishes of wrath and terror to grant them a reprieve from the endless night and the goddess’s all seeing eyes, but it was all for naught. He got no more than five sweeping steps, crushing the camps of those who wished him into being, as well as the goddess’s trees, before Heliquat was fed up with his wanton destruction. She didn’t even need to appear before him. The goddess simply willed for Her trees to grow. And grow they did. The trees grew hundreds of feet into the air, their roots sprawling out and wrapping tight around the dog’s feet before growing up his legs. As they grew new trees sprung up from the roots to create a living cage. Grislander struggled. He poured out great gouts of molten rock from his mouth and crushed swathes of trees with his paws, but new trees would grow in their place and with each one the rate of their growth would increase until he couldn’t keep up. The battle ended when the pine trees covering Grislander looked like dark green fur and their roots forced him to the ground and onto his side. Submissive to the goddess for eternity, unable to move. His fire has long since gone dormant and the legend goes that he is slowly being crushed back into the earth, so that now only his head and some of his neck remain, his mouth open wide in his final roar of defiance.
Heliquat didn’t forget about those that had defied Her, those had wished the monstrosity into being and been crushed by it. There is no escape from the goddess in death. She did appear for them. Stepped out of one of Her newly grown trees, pressed Her thumbs into both eyes, Her lips to theirs, and sucked away their soul, one by one. Then She breathed a bit of the night into them, turning death pale skin gray with second life. The newly made shamble men rose and waited for Her direction, still as statues, eyes and mouths black voids. When She finished She turned back to them and smiled. They were to be Her most obedient servants, Her truest children, for as long as the night lasted. Then She swept out a hand and all the people on her land felt a sliver of cold settle into their core and they knew. Knew without a shred of uncertainty what had happened to those that had defied the goddess, and that the same would happen to their dead if the bodies weren’t destroyed within the number of days equal to the number of steps Grislander had taken. Heliquat was not one for second chances.
Now the mountains made from Grislander’s teeth and head were rounded and broken with age, but the forest’s hold was still strong. Every inch of the mountains was covered with layer upon layer of roots, so much so that I’ve never seen the color of the soil there, except in the valley between his jaws. The mountains protected us from the worst of the cold season’s winds and snow and the forest was plentiful enough to sustain us and the other tribes that sheltered there, but only a few stayed in the mountains year round. I’ve never thought of the mountains or valley as home, even though we spent more time there throughout the year during the longer cold season. Most of the tribe felt the same. It didn’t cater well to our tribe’s specialty of fishing, and we were always in too close quarters with other tribes to claim a section truly as our own.
By the start of the seasonal run I had built up my strength so much under Rawley’s direction that I had surpassed my capabilities from when I had been confined to studying in the store all day. I could keep up the brisk walk the run would require for hours. But, despite that, I wasn’t allowed a full sized pack to carry. Old Lily tried to mollify me by saying that huntresses never carried as much because they had to stay light on their feet in case there was trouble, which was true, but I knew my pack was still lighter than it should have been. Grandmother shut me up with a glare and snapped comment that the size of my ego was more than enough to make up the difference. Then she sent me out to fill up the waterskins. On my way back from the lake, I had the misfortune to see Father helping Levain pack up her tent and supplies. It seemed that his wife and their children would be getting help from her brothers again this year. Social lines always broke down during the run and Levain and Father were always quick to take advantage of it. I think Mel, Father’s wife, and Levain had reached some accord about it shortly after I was born. He would join our family during the two seasonal runs and the rest of the time he spent with his wife and their family and we had to pretend like the other didn’t exist. The rest of camp ignored what was happening both because Father and Levain stayed discrete outside of tent walls and because Mel and Levain had built up some influence in the tribe. Mel as the top sheep herder, and thus the main supply for material for warm clothes, and Levain, because no one could deny her skill. They might not respect her because of her healing, but it was also a fact that she had treated nearly everyone in the tribe at one point or another and she had lost fewer patients than any other healer in the region. Mother had honed that fact into more influence than any healer should rightly have—which meant she was allowed a few concessions others would never even be able to dream of, such as her lover accompanying her during the seasonal runs and her favored children getting to play with the others in the tribe. She was always controlled enough that she got what she wanted in the end.
I slipped back to Grandmother with the filled waterskins before they saw me. She was busy directing two men who were loading up the tent onto a travois, a contraption made of two sticks tied together in a ‘v’ shape and netting lashed between them, already filled with two others. Old Lily and the other children were helping to tie down the last of the pine flour sacks onto a second travois. Our tribe didn’t have many camp dogs so the men had to carry the majority of the more bulky items on travois fitted with straps and pads for their shoulders. Some of the reindeer and sheep were also fitted with the contraptions, but most of the herds weren’t trained to pull them. Grandmother set me to sweeping the area to make sure there wasn’t anything lying lost and forgotten in the trampled grass and dirt as soon as I set down the waterskins. I didn’t find anything by the time everyone was lifting their packs onto their back and Rawley caught me paying more attention to the herders organizing the sheep and reindeer than the ground.
She was dressed in full hunter’s gear. She didn’t need the cold season’s reindeer fur cloak, but she did have a thick woolen tunic and pants woven of varying shades of brown and green. The tunic was held shut by four teeth clasps and her wide belt of cured hide that also served to protect her stomach. She attached various pouches, her waterskin, and her knife and sling to the ropes that held the belt in place by being wrapped around each other and the belt once, before being tied into a complex knot. Her shoes were simple with laces that crossed multiple times around her calves and tied in place with the same complex knot as her belt. Her pack was compact with a blanket secured to the bottom, and her hair was pulled into a short braid. Rawley gave my idiotic child’s dress and pack a quick once over before nodding. I wouldn’t be allowed a full huntress’s garb, or any other adult clothing, until my first blooding.
She gestured toward the mountains. “You’ll be with me. We’ll be scouting ahead of the tribe with the other lone huntresses.” She noticed my question on my face before I could ask it. “The Pack is better suited at coordinating defense of the rest of the tribe. That means we’ll also be in charge of bringing in the supplemental game. You’ll get your first kill this run.”
I ignored the thrill of fear her words elicited and focused on the anticipation. “I’m ready.”
She hummed a short note, not really agreeing or disagreeing. “You will be.”
I settled my pack onto my back as a sharp whistle cut through the air and was taken up in a wave through the other members of the tribe. It was nearly time to go. “I’ve hit every target you’ve set for me.”
Rawley started to lead me to the head of tribe’s traveling column. “At a short range, and you miss just as often.”
“You only let me start to learn the sling a month ago.”
She shrugged. “That’s when you were ready.” She held up a hand to cut off another protest. “What are the huntress’s most important skills?”
“Patience. Listening. Preparation. Flexibility.” Rawley had drilled the answer into my mind as well as Levain had with any of her mantras.
She made a noise of approval. “Exactly. You will get your first kill this run. Paying attention, and developing those skills, will determine how soon.”
I nodded and we made our way to where the other lone huntresses had gathered in silence. Ambition and discipline. Her words were just another way of putting Levain’s favorite saying. No one would benefit, least of all myself, if I let myself go and rushed my training because of annoyance and impatience. The best results came from waiting for the most opportune moment to act for each situation, just as each healing salve and tincture had an optimal mixing time and their components were gathered at certain times of the year for increased potency. I would mostly likely prove myself a fool rather than a worthy apprentice if I tried to make my first kill before I was ready. I would have to wait. I could wait.
Rawley exchanged greetings with the other three huntresses. Only one had an apprentice. The other girl looked to be a couple of years younger than me. She was also in a child’s dress, but her dirty blonde hair was pulled into twin braids and her narrow face pinched into disgust as soon as she noticed me looking at her. She turned her back on me in a deliberate dismissal, and I could only think of both Rawley and Levain’s repeated lessons about protecting your back in a fight or politics until the comment Levain made after one lesson crept back in.
“Only give an enemy your back as a show of power, to show that they can’t do anything even when you are vulnerable, but even then only do it once. It’s better to force them to show their back than reveal yours.”
I glared at the girl. She wasn’t superior to or more powerful than me, not even close. Most likely we were in the same stage of our apprenticeship. I had learned far more than she ever had during my time stuck on that cushion in the store. She had probably still been caught up in the petty friendships and games of finder and pretend that the twins so loved. I held back a smug smile. I had learned a lot during those years and not all of the mixtures and plants I had been taught about had effects that were pleasant especially in certain combinations. I made a mental note to keep an eye out for feverluck and spiritflower.
Behind me another whistle sounded; this time it started high before diving to a lower note and it was punctuated by a shorter whistle in the same low tone. Answering whistles, high and sharp, rippled through the tribe. Rawley caught my attention and I followed her as we dashed ahead across the grazing pastures. The rustle of cloth and the sound of footsteps followed us as the Gabbler Shore Tribe began its seasonal run for the mountains.
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