Crisscross Moon - 4. Chapter 4

4.

Except she dreamed about the boy. About his death and his screaming. He kept shouting over and over, "Please!"

The first time she helped kill a man wasn't the first time she'd seen one die. There were always hunts, and people were always dying in the village. Sometimes, younger ones were hurt in the fields. Sometimes, people simply got too old.

The first man she helped kill was her father's age. He'd been part of an attack on her village, so he deserved to die and seemed to expect it. He'd been hurt in the attack so was already weak when he was brought to the women.

They cleaned and fed him. They helped him. And then they killed him. He died almost without a sound. He was always watching the women and always seemed to be looking for a way to escape. But he had to know he wouldn't get far. He'd be caught, and then the men would make his death horrible. The girl remembered how the man's eyes were always open and how he never seemed to forgive the women as he died.

The second man was younger. His warriors had attacked, but he'd been captured without being hurt. When the men brought him to the women, they were taunting him, saying what a terrible fighter he was. They ordered the women to make his death quick and not waste their time.

Still, he screamed through his entire washing. He begged and cried and blamed. Hearing this, the warriors told the women to go more slowly and to kill the man outside their meeting house, so everyone could see. They knew if any of the man's warriors were near, they'd take his screams as a warning. No one would save a man who was so weak.

As the girl woke, she wondered what kind of death the boy would die. She lay beside her husband, not far from their young sons. As near were her parents and brothers and sisters. She thought the boy might be weak and then remembered him rocking silently in pain. His eyes had been closed. Maybe he'd die without a sound.

The women respected that. They couldn't kill a warrior sooner, but they could make the pain so bad he'd go into a sleep. When a man was strong enough to keep the pain to himself, the women would ease him into death.

The girl was one of the younger wives in the village. She could help in the boy's death, but like her husband among the men, she had no authority in it. Though if she cut a little deeper, if she let his blood flow a little fast, the older women would only call her stupid.

Except in the morning, the warriors had to search again. Her husband told her it wasn't her fault. The warriors had found the cave. They'd found the tree and had even seen signs of the bears. But there had been no boy, and they thought he might already be dead.

The girl asked if her husband thought that was true. He told her the bears might have killed the boy, but there was no reason for a warrior to die in the dark to find out. The girl almost hoped the bears would get the boy before the men did. But she said nothing because she didn't know why she felt that way. Later, when the warriors came back with only pieces of the boy's clothes, the girl thought she'd gotten her wish.

Then she saw the boy again. The second time, he was crouched by a stream close to the village, and the girl was again gathering wood. At first, she thought he was the brother of one of her friends, and she moved toward him and called his name.

When the boy saw her, he instantly stood. As soon as she realized who he was, she ran, shouting to the other women. Two of them heard her and came quickly, and all the other women followed. They had their knives out, so there was no way the boy would be foolish enough to attack. For a moment, the women even talked about capturing the boy. They laughed among themselves, wondering what the men would think. Catching even the weakest warrior wasn't the work of women.

Though when they looked for the boy, he was gone. The girl had seen him run right after she'd called to him, and he seemed almost angry, maybe that she'd seen him first. But this time when the women went back to the village, the warriors couldn't chase the boy. Most of them were away on a hunt, and the few older warriors who'd been left to protect the women and children couldn't do that by searching the forest.

The girl thought the boy shouldn't be hard to find. He was probably still hurt, or he wouldn't have stayed nearby. Then she remembered how quickly he'd stood, and she realized his leg had to be healing. Though she'd seen something wrapped around his leg or attached to it, and the boy hadn't done more than run. If his leg had been strong, he might have tried to attack.

Though what good would that do? Killing her would only bring her warriors sooner. Unless the boy knew they were away on a hunt. And if he'd been smart enough to hide his own death, to make the warriors think he'd been killed by the bears, he could probably hide hers, too. The fact that he was smart only worried the girl more.

But the warriors who'd been left to protect the village had other ideas. They thought the boy might have other men with him, and the warriors ordered the women and children to hide in the cave for the night. "Our men will be back after light," they told the leader's wife.

"We never know," she later told the women though it was something they never liked to talk about. On any hunt, any of the warriors could be killed.

Once the women and children were in the cave, the leader's wife also told them the older warriors thought the boy had let the girl see him on purpose. The warriors didn't even think the boy was hurt.

The girl reminded the women that the boy had asked for her help. The leader's wife said she was only repeating what the men had said. The girl asked if everyone had forgotten about the bears and asked if they were part of a trap, too. When the other women stared at her, the girl realized she'd said too much and quickly apologized. She added that she'd mostly been scared.

The women understood that because they were almost always afraid in the forest. All of them had been threatened by bears or other animals, and no one felt safe when the warriors were away. Still, like the girl, they thought the boy was more worried about saving himself than about tricking anyone.

When the warriors came back in the morning, they again hunted through the forest. They searched the cave where the boy had been seen. Finally, they asked the girl if she was sure it was the same boy.

When the girl nodded, the warriors wondered why the boy was still there. The girl knew the men didn't care what she thought, so she said nothing further. She knew the men would spend many evenings in their meeting house, talking over the question. And they'd enjoy all their talk. That was mostly how they passed the time when they weren't hunting.

The girl's father later told her that the men didn't think the boy could hurt them, and the girl's husband agreed. The men thought the only reason the boy was staying in the forest was because he was still too weak to go back to his village. That made sense to the girl, and when she didn't see the boy again, she stopped thinking about him.

(continued)