She smiled as she spoke, well pleased with her work. But then the pleasure faded from her face and she folded her lips. “But it is a shame that you must show yourself so to our kin-clan, let alone to Kinrove at the winter gathering. Nevare, we must fatten you as quickly as possible. That is all there is to it.”
“Such is my intent also,” Soldier’s Boy replied. I was unsurprised to hear him say so, and yet my spirits sank again.
“Shall we go on to the village, then? If you quick-walk us, we can be there in just a few moments.” She frowned, squinting. “I wish to be out of the light. Even at this time of year, when the clouds are thick as good furs, the light still dizzies me.”
Soldier’s Boy was silent. Plainly he was thinking, but his thoughts were inaccessible to me, and I lacked the spirit to pry my way into them. When he spoke aloud, it sounded as if he had reached a hard decision. “I will send you on soon. But I cannot show myself to the People this way.”
“This way?” Olikea asked, puzzled.
“Thin. Poor. With my markings barely healed. This is not how I wish them to see me, not how I wish them to think of me.” Distress was suddenly evident in his voice. “If I present myself to them like this, I will never attain the standing I must have. They won’t listen to me at all.”
“And so I have warned you, over and over! But you would not listen to me!”
Olikea sounded both satisfied and angry at having her opinion so completely vindicated. But I felt they were talking at cross-purposes. Olikea was thinking of status and honors and gifts. I could not discern Soldier’s Boy’s thoughts clearly, but I suspected he was thinking of strategy. His next words chilled me, for they were words I had often heard from my father’s lips.
“If I wish to command, I must appear to be in command already when I am first seen. Even if I must delay my arrival at the village. When we get there, I must be well fed. All of us must appear prosperous. If I go to our kin-clan now, they will see me as a needy beggar and an embarrassment to them.”
“But what can we do about that?”
“Not go,” he said abruptly. “Not go until I am ready. Not go until you are ready.”
“Until I am ready? I am ready now. I am more than ready to seek my lodge and be comfortable again. My father will have food, and he will share with me. There is much to do to prepare my lodge for the winter. I must take down my sleeping skins and shake them out, and air my winter furs.” She looked at me suddenly in a very odd way. “As I am your feeder, I suppose you will live with me now.” She ran her eyes over me as if I were a large piece of furniture that might not fit in her parlor.
“Does Likari live with you?” Soldier’s Boy asked her.
“Sometimes. As much as a child lives with one person. He seems to prefer my aunt’s lodge to mine, and often he is at my father’s or with Firada. He is a child. He lives where he pleases. No one denies a child a meal and a place by the fire.”
“Of course,” I replied, but I sensed that Soldier’s Boy was as surprised as I was. And as oddly pleased. It seemed a wonderful idea to me, that a child could choose where he lived and no one would think of turning him out. That a child could expect food and a warm place to sleep from anyone in his village. Amzil’s children came to my mind; well, such had they found at Spink’s home.
“I am his feeder, too!” the boy suddenly but stoutly insisted. “I will live where the Great One does.”
“Do you think I will put up with having both of you underfoot?” she demanded. “I will have work enough to take care of him!”
“I will not be underfoot. And I will be taking care of him, too. Did not I stay and guard him while you went to get the fish? Have not I brought food often, and carried the water and the blanket all this way? It is my place and I will have it.”
“Very well,” she conceded, but not graciously. “My lodge will be small for the three of us, but I am sure that somehow we will manage.”
“If need be, I will build it bigger,” Soldier’s Boy suddenly asserted. “But I shall not go to it today. You will, Olikea. Go home, to your lodge, and find your trade goods. Then set out for the trading meet right away.”
“But—but the best of the trading is done. And the walk to my lodge will take me half the day, and then there will be two, perhaps three more days to walk to the Trading Place. Everyone will be gone. And what will you be doing?” This last she asked suspiciously, as if she expected him to somehow trick her.
