Chapter 13: Friends, Not-Friends, and Brothers

“Maybe it’s one of the Ones Beneath,” Tavi suggested.

“I don’t think it works like that,” Tarek replied. “Our dead ancestors don’t go live in huge turtles when we bury them by the tribe’s tree.”

“I know that,” Tavi rasped. “But this thing saved us. Do you have a better idea?”

Tarek shook his head. “I’m not sure the Ones Beneath would want to save me today, though.”

Tavi’s face contorted, and Tarek saw anguish, rage, and terrible grief fighting within the boy before his face went wooden and blank. “I suppose not.”

He hates me. Tarek knew he deserved it, but the thought felt like an arrowhead in the gut nevertheless.

Tavi looked back to the great turtle, avoiding Tarek’s eyes. “Maybe it’s like the Old Man of the Water in Ryki’s stories.”

“That was a river dolphin.”

“I am aware, Tarek. If you have experience with other massive river monsters, I’d be glad to hear about it.”

Tarek’s eyes sought out Pahtl’s limp form. The otter was breathing steadily but showed no signs of consciousness. He was bigger than any otter he’d ever seen, a man’s length from nose to tail-tip, but this turtle was something else entirely. Looking at the otter gave him an idea, though.

“Maybe if I touched it.”

Tavi blinked, and disgust curled his lip as he caught Tarek’s meaning. “Use the blood magic, you mean.”

Tarek cringed inside but forged ahead. “When I was little, I could put animals in my mouth and catch a bit of what they thought, what they wanted.”

Tavi’s face was stiff, and he turned away. “You’ve done this before.”

“Not for a very long time!”

Tavi gave Pahtl’s body a meaningful look.

“That was an accident,” Tarek protested. “I was chasing him away from my kill, and when I wounded him his blood fell into my mouth.”

Tavi shuddered, and it had nothing to do with the cold rain falling on their heads. “How could you do this, Tarek? Why?”

Tarek’s heart clenched, and again he saw his father groaning with a spear in his side, his mother running screaming into the fray. “I didn’t mean to, Tav. I never wanted this.”

Tavi crouched at the shell’s peak, turning his back. His black hair lay flat and sodden on the knobs of his back, and his wet loincloth clung to the backs of his thighs. “Let it bite off your hand if you want. I don’t care.”

Tarek wanted to argue, but he had no words. Heartsick, he turned back to the turtle. Its behemoth head still peered back at them in apparent interest even as the creature powered its way upstream. When it saw him looking, the great beast wagged its head back and forth, letting its mouth drop open to give a deep, croaking roar. Tarek flinched at the sound, but the turtle made no threatening moves.

“Are you here for us?” Tarek whispered. “Or are you just the one good bit of magic that has happened today?”

The Old Man of the Water cocked his head. Tarek didn’t think it could have heard him over the rain, but then, he didn’t know much about turtles’ hearing.

Tarek scooted forward in a crouch, drawing closer to the head. He hadn’t sensed anything when he touched the shell, but childhood experience had taught him that skin-to-skin contact was necessary. Unless I want to stab it and drink its blood. Somehow, he didn’t think that would be a good idea in the middle of the Ix River in flood.

“Can I touch you?” he asked, reaching one hand forward gingerly. Tavi’s words came back to him, and he eyed the serrated edges of the beast’s beak uneasily. The Old Man could take his arm off at the elbow without any effort at all if he so desired.

The turtle peered down at him, huge black eyes fathomless and strangely knowing. Sound vibrated in its throat, but it kept its mouth closed. It could be a growl or a contented hum, but Tarek had no way of knowing which. Ever so gingerly he laid his fingers on the Old Man’s broadly sloped cheek. His skin was pebbled and rough.

“Thank you for saving us,” Tarek murmured. He knew this kind of contact only allowed for the roughest of meanings to be conveyed, but he hoped the great beast would be able to feel his simple gratitude.

One great eye shifted to look him directly in the face, and another rattling croak blasted from the turtle’s beak. With the sound came a welter of thoughts, images, and understanding that tore through Tarek’s mind, leaving him stumbling and gasping.

“What… what…” was all he could gasp as he fell flat on his back atop the slippery shell. Images of underwater depths that stretched farther than his mind could grasp assaulted him – flashes of creatures, battles, clutches of leathery eggs, and even scraps of language floating in the whirlpool of his thoughts. Was that my own face I saw? Infusing it all was a sense of self and understanding that defied his grasp due to its utter other-ness. “Ancient,” he marveled, staring up at it. This was a creature that had seen more years than Tarek could imagine.

Tavi glanced over from where he perched at the shell’s apex. “So did you enslave it with your vile magic? Didn’t look like it.”

“No,” Tarek answered, shaking his head to clear it. “That’s not how it works, and I don’t know if I could even if I tried. Looks like we ought to call it Old Woman of the Water, not Old Man. She’s older than any of the Lost. Older than the beginning of the calendar. I can’t even imagine.”

And I got all that from just touching her. Tarek shuddered to think what might have happened had he tasted the creature’s blood. That level of connection with a magical creature like this might just drive him mad.

“Can you take us to the shore?” he asked the Old Woman. There was no need to touch her again; he knew now she could understand them. “Well, there’s no shore right now, but… the tree line? That one?” He pointed through the driving rain to the west. “We can’t go back where we came from.”

The mighty creature croaked another horn-like blast and turned her face forward, surging upstream.

“I’ll take that for a yes,” Tarek said to himself.

“So do magical creatures just seek you out now?” Tavi called. “Is this going to be the way things are now?”

Tarek sighed and mentally braced himself as he crabbed his way back to the peak of the shell. You said you’d be happy to have him be angry so long as he survived. Remember that. He crouched in front of Tavi, trying to look him in the face, but the boy kept his gaze stubbornly averted.

“Either she was waiting for us or else we just got very lucky,” he said. “I don’t know what’s going on any more than you do.”

Tavi took a sharp breath as if to make an angry retort, but instead he let the air hiss out bit by bit like a leaky bladder. “Do you think they killed them?”

Tarek throat constricted. He waited to reply until he was sure his voice would be calm. “I don’t know. I hope not.” He rubbed his face. “Probably.”

“How could you just leave?” Tavi demanded, his voice breaking. “Why did you grab me? We could have saved them!”

“There were too many against us, Tav,” he said gently. “Tata told me to take you and go. If we hadn’t left right then, we’d be dead.”

“You don’t know that! I’d have thought of something!”

“Tav, I’m sorry.” Tarek reached out for him.

Tavi batted his hands away. “Don’t touch me. Don’t ever touch me.”

Tarek wanted to shake the boy and make him weep so they could both cry together, but he kept his fists balled at his sides. Remember. He turned away and sat watching the river. Sometimes not talking was best.

“I wish it had been you instead,” Tavi said, barely audible over the rain.

Tarek simply nodded. He’d been thinking the same thing all day.

They sat in silence for what felt like the better part of a handspan. Tarek kept his hands tucked in his armpits to chase away the chill the rain and river had sunk into his bones, but there was no escaping the flood. Eventually the curtain of wetness to the west took on depth, shadow, and hints of green color before parting to reveal the flooded shore of the Yura side of the river. It was only a stone’s throw away when Pahtl stirred.

“Lie still,” Tarek told him when he raised his head. “You swam too hard.”

“I wanted to stop,” Pahtl said weakly. “You made me go.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, stroking the otter’s head.

“You said you would not make me do things. You promised.”

“Yes, I did.”

“Promise means you have to do what you say. You told me this.”

“Pahtl…”

“How can you say something then make it not so?”

“I… it’s called lying, but I didn’t mean to.”

Pahtl took this in silently. He raised his head again, looking around. “This is a very big snapper.”

“It’s friendly, we think.”

Pahtl looked at Tavi. “This one is pack to you. I smell it.”

“Yes, he’s my brother. Tavi is his name. He’s very nice, but he can’t understand you.”

“This is extremely weird,” Tavi whispered. “Are you really talking to it?”

Tarek nodded.

“He is nice. What is nice?” Pahtl demanded.

“Nice is good. He won’t hurt you.”

Pahtl turned back to him, black eyes glittering. “You are not nice. Why would your pack be?”

Tarek sighed. “I’m sorry I made you pull us.”

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“No water people will ever care that I crossed the great river. Will I ever see a water person again? Will you ever let me?”

“Of course! Pahtl, I would never stop you from doing that.”

The otter cocked his head. “What was the word you used? You are lying, and I understand it now.”

Tarek couldn’t help but defend himself. “It’s not a lie! I know I said I wouldn’t make you do things anymore, but...”

“This is the thing. The lie. Yes? Is it?”

“I…” Tarek bit back his protest and sighed. “Yes. I lied. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?”

“It means I’m sad. I wish I hadn’t done it.”

“Why feel sad? Why do things you don’t want? Your kind makes no sense.”

“But I had to, Pahtl! We would have died if you stopped pulling us across.”

Pahtl clambered to his feet, movements unsteady. “You didn’t care if I won,” the creature said, sounding as if he’d just realized it. “You only wanted to cross. Yes?”

Tarek scrubbed his face with his hands. “Yes.”

“Lies. Lies and lies and lies.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Why not ask me to help instead of lie?”

Tarek groped for words, and the only ones he found were both brutal and true. “I wasn’t sure you’d understand.”

Pahtl put his forepaws on Tarek’s arm and raised up on his hind legs so he towered over Tarek’s head. He seemed to be thinking.

“You are bad. Only a bad person would do this.”

The Yura forest was close now. Pahtl let go of Tarek’s arm and skittered down the Old Woman’s shell, pausing at the edge. “I don’t want to play with you anymore.” He slipped into the water.

Tarek watched him go, hoping to see him sleek through the rain-pocked water, but he was gone.

Tavi sighed. “You sit there talking and that thing grunts and hoots back. I thought it was going to bite your face off.”

Tarek stared at the empty spot in the water where Pahtl had disappeared. “I think he might have liked to.”

The Old Woman’s shell bumped up against a tree trunk, and she gave a clacking call. Tavi scooted toward the edge of their floating island, reaching for the tree to steady himself. “I don’t like your magic.”

Tarek pushed the wet hair out of his face and prepared to disembark. “I don’t think I do either.”

* * *

The water was chest-high and night was approaching. Tarek had tried to thank the Old Woman of the Water as they’d waded away from the river, but either she understood less than Tarek thought or else human thanks meant very little to her, for she drifted into deeper water without a backward glance once they were off her shell. They’d spent the rest of the day pushing inland, hoping to find rising ground beneath their feet, but it appeared that the Yura lands were just as low and flood-prone as the Catori’s. Tarek was fairly certain they were the first Catori to step on Yura soil in the decade since their tribe had last raided on this side of the river. Tenoch had spoken of the Yura as bloodthirsty bandits, but Tarek had never met one. Ones Beneath, let it remain so. We’re in no shape for more fighting.

“We have to find a tree for the night,” he said to Tavi.

“I’m not stupid,” he replied. They were the first words he’d spoken in more than a handspan.

Tarek let the angry words pass. “Look for wimba trees. Sometimes they have forks big enough to sleep in that aren’t too high up.”

He kept an eye out for movement in the water. Usually the caimans didn’t come out hunting until later in the floods, but nothing was normal this year. Plus there were always bonebite fish and constrictor snakes to worry about.

“That one,” Tavi said sometime later. The wimba he was pointing to rose from the water, its many trunks fused together in the manner unique to the great trees. This one was young – the two brothers could have nearly touched fingers reaching around its girth – and its forking branches had yet to climb into the canopy. It wasn’t easy to climb with the rain slicking its trunk, but the columns of fused trunks provided plenty of nooks and crannies to shove their numbed hands and feet into.

Tarek went first and found a suitable cradle in the wood only three body-lengths above the waterline. He had to shoo a pair of huddled dewdrop monkeys out of the space, but fortunately the bedraggled primates weren’t in the mood to fight. With nothing more than a few scared hoots they clambered out onto a limb and launched themselves into the canopy to find another nest. Tarek reached down and hauled Tavi up behind him.

The boy let go of his grip as soon as he was up into the fork of the tree and retreated to the opposite side. He didn’t have very far to go – the bower might have held one other person besides them, but only if it were a child. Tarek sighed and rested his back against a broad branch. “I’ve never been so tired in all my life.” He rubbed his hands together. “Or cold. At least we’re mostly out of the rain up here.”

Tavi was shivering. Tarek pulled the journey bag from his back and held it out to him. “Here. This will help.”

Tavi shook his head, not looking at him.

“Come on, little elder. You’re the smart one. You know eating will warm you up.”

Reluctantly, Tavi took the bag, pulling back the flap. The pemmican inside would be wet and gummy, but it would serve for a few days’ eating at least. Peering inside, the boy withdrew the leather-wrapped obsidian knife Tarek had stowed there in his rush out of their family’s hut.

“I forgot I grabbed that. We’ll want it soon enough, I’m sure.” Tarek held out his hand for it.

Tavi clutched it to his chest. “I’m keeping it.”

Tarek let his hand drop. “All right. We’re not likely to get any snakes coming this high tonight, though.”

“I’m not worried about snakes.” He glanced darkly at Tarek, not quite meeting his eyes.

Tarek felt a rush of ugly anger, but he shunted it aside. “Eat something, Tav,” he said. “You need it.”

Tavi dipped a hand into the journey bag and brought it to his lips, chewing joylessly on the mixture of jerked meat, dried berries, and tallow. Tarek unstrung the bowstaff from his back and inspected it.

“I don’t know if this will be any good now,” he sighed. “It still needed more drying and a good rubdown with fat to seal it. Taking it through the river may have ruined it. Still, it’s what we’ve got. I’ll grind down the ends somehow and wrap them. The guaro reeds will all be drowned, but maybe I can make a decent bowstring out of sapling strips. We’ll make do.”

“Where are we going?” Tavi asked, his mouth full.

“To Xochil. He told me to come find him when… well. He’ll help us.”

“I don’t like Xochil. He’s weird.”

“I’m not sure I like him much either, but we’re not spoiled for choice. If the Yura catch us, they’ll kill us for certain, and it’s not as if we can go back home. Xochil has always had strange magic. He can help us.” He gestured to the journey bag. “Let me have some of that.”

Tavi dropped the bag near him, withdrawing his hand before Tarek could reach out. Once again, Tarek said nothing about the slight even though it cut at him. He ate in silence for a hundred heartbeats or more.

“Are you going to drink my blood?” Tavi said suddenly. He was gripping the knife with whitened knuckles.

Tarek exhaled, trying to push out all the hurt and anger and sorrow. It didn’t work. “No, Tav. Not you. Not ever.”

Tavi risked a glance at him. “Are you sure? How do you know you can stop yourself? What about when you’re sleeping?”

Tarek put his hand to his heart. “I don’t have any dirt up here for an earth oath, but… I will never harm you. I swear it by the Ones Beneath, even if they hate me. You’re my brother and the only family I’ve got – it’ll be different with you, I know it. Besides, I’m never going to use that evil magic again. I didn’t really mean to in the first place.”

Tavi searched his face with undisguised longing, clearly wanting to believe him. “I can go by myself if it’s better. I don’t have a bow, but I could forage until I find a safe spot to live.”

“During the flood?”

Tavi shrugged uncomfortably. “It might be safer. You don’t know how you looked when I found you with Kanga. You didn’t even know me at first.”

Tarek cringed inside but kept his face firm. “I mean it, Tav: never again. You have to stay. Tata told me to take care of you.”

“You hated Tata.”

“No, I didn’t. Not really. He was hard with me, but I think he was just trying to keep… something like this from happening.”

Tears spilled from Tavi’s eyes. “They’re dead. I couldn’t do anything about it.”

Tarek reached for his brother, carefully, carefully. The boy shied away when Tarek’s fingers made contact, but crumbled when Tarek pulled at him. He collapsed into Tarek’s chest, sobbing. Tarek put his head down on Tavi’s hair, and his own tears mingled with the wetness.

“Mamah,” Tavi whispered. “I want mamah.”

“I do too,” Tarek said, choking on a sob. “I’m so sorry.”

Tavi clutched at him, and they cried together for a long time, keeping each other warm as the world wept around them.

Finally, Tarek took Tavi’s head in his hands, looking right into his eyes. “Don’t leave me, Tav. It’s just us. Keep the knife if you need to. I promise I’ll die before I hurt you.” His hands trembled. “Please don’t leave.”

Tavi nodded solemnly. “I won’t.”

Tarek took what felt like the first clean breath since he’d been strung up on a rope nearly a lifetime ago. “We’ll go to Xochil. The first thing I’m going to ask him is how to get rid of the blood magic.”

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