Chapter 22: A Knife-Tip Promise

“…and so I thought, well, maybe she just doesn’t know how to express her interest in me. I mean, all that arm-slapping and telling me to go away had to mean something, right?” Bachi turned as best he could, wedged into the center of the canoe as he was, in order to catch Tarek’s gaze. He gnawed at a bit of sweetstick he’d found for them the day before, and he’d gotten a little of the fibrous stuff in his wispy mustache. Tarek nodded at him and leaned in the opposite direction to keep the canoe from overturning. “So I went to the elders to ask permission to marry her, but all they did was laugh. I think when you get old it’s hard to remember the rush of romance, don’t you?”

“I bow to your wisdom,” Tarek murmured, pulling hard on his oar. The water here was clear, and the drowned grasses waved at him from belly-deep waters. The rains still fell incessantly, but the Land had risen as they moved farther north and west over the last handful of days. He hoped they’d be back on foot by the time they reached the Iktaka village.

“Sounds to me like maybe she just didn’t like you,” Tavi said from the front of the canoe.

The Singer chuckled tolerantly as he smoothed his sparse mustaches with a knuckle, pausing to pick out the errant bit of sweetstick and pop it in his mouth. “You’ll have to grow into this game for a few more years before you try to guess at a woman’s wants, little man.”

Tarek didn’t even have to glance at his brother to know he was rolling his eyes, and he kept his smile to himself. Bachi had proven himself eminently useful as a forager, but it was his happy chatter that Tarek valued most. He had sped the hours along nicely during the boring, gray days confined to their canoe. He was earnest, always spoke with conviction, and rarely knew anything of what he was talking about.

“So…” Bachi said casually, “why didn’t you hang up a little leaf pouch of food this morning?”

Tarek sighed. He’d tried to keep the little packets he left behind for Pahtl hidden from the others, but between tree nooks and canoeing, privacy was nearly nonexistent. He’d caught Tavi shaking his head over the practice, but so far Bachi hadn’t mentioned it.

“Is it a Catori custom?” he asked. “Food for the ancestors or something?”

“He has a pet,” Tavi said.

“He’s not a pet,” Tarek replied. “He’s my friend.”

“He’s an otter.”

“Oh, of course,” Bachi said, nodding knowingly. “An otter friend. That you feed.” He paused. “Were there no other boys your age in your village?”

“He needed the otter so he could talk to someone on his own level,” Tavi said, smirking.

Tarek used his oar to flip water at him.

“Aahhhh ahum,” Bachi responded, eyebrows high and head nodding. “Of course. An otter to talk to. I see.”

Tarek and Tavi shared a grin and let the silence grow uncomfortable.

“So, then, um…” Bachi stuttered, unable to contain himself. “What, er, how… is this some kind of Catori joke that I’m missing? You two keep smiling, and I’m pretty sure otters don’t talk.”

“There’s some things I haven’t told you about myself,” Tarek admitted. “I don’t have the Song, you know that, but I do have a different kind of magic. It lets me talk to animals if I touch them. Well, not talk exactly, but get a sense for their intent and emotions.”

“Right,” Bachi said slowly. He spent a long moment in deep thought and leaned forward to Tavi, speaking seriously for once. “If there’s something wrong in your brother’s head, why did you ever let him leave your village? Don’t your elders take care of the moon-touched?”

“He’s not crazy,” Tavi said with a laugh. “Or not in this, at least. He really can communicate with animals. I’ve seen it more than once.”

Bachi blinked and then blinked again, his face very still. “Huh.” He looked from one brother to the other, making the canoe rock. “And this isn’t a joke? Really?”

“Really,” Tarek assured him.

“So you could just walk up and pat a panther on the back and let it know, ‘hey, don’t eat me!’ and it would say, ‘lovely, then,’ and trot off to chew someone else?”

“I don’t think I’d try it on a panther,” Tarek said. “Just because I can talk to it doesn’t mean it will agree with me, and then I’m holding the scruff of an angry predator. I can’t control it just because I’m touching it.”

Tavi gave a pointed cough, and Tarek acknowledged it with a hand gesture that pled for patience. Enough time for the unvarnished truth a little later.

“So why didn’t you leave any food for, uh, your otter friend today?” Bachi asked.

“We ate the last of the journey meal last night,” Tarek said. “I’m hoping I can catch some fish on towards dusk, but I didn’t think he’d want any of the berries or nuts you’ve been finding for us.”

“I hate to say it, but you’ve probably just been leaving food for squirrels and monkeys to find. We’re a long way from Catori lands.”

Tarek shrugged. “Maybe so.”

Tavi shook his head but remained silent.

“Well, you Catori fellows are more than I bargained for!” Bachi said heartily, slapping Tavi on the back, setting the canoe rocking once again. “What can you do, Tavi? Fly?”

“No,” Tavi said, eyeing him with annoyance, “but hit me in the back again and you’ll magically find yourself swimming.”

Bachi chuckled. “Wouldn’t be the first time! Once I accidentally interrupted our loremaster in the middle of a moonchant. Do you do those? Blessing the soil on the full moon? No? She has to be standing over moving water, you see, and so she…”

Tarek lost the thread of Bachi’s story as he turned in his seat, looking back to the southeast. Something had changed. He could feel it. What is it? He saw a flicker of movement in the corner of his eye like sunlight dancing on the water. But there’s no sun.

The water to the left of the canoe exploded into motion and a large, furry form latched onto the side of the canoe with clawed hands.

“You didn’t leave me meat today!” Pahtl exclaimed, his teeth bared.

“What!” Bachi shrieked, rearing back from the enormous otter. There was no stopping it. The canoe flipped over, and suddenly Tarek was thrashing his way back to the surface.

“Pahtl!” he cried. “You came back!”

“I had to. You didn’t leave my meat-leaf!” The otter sounded mortally offended.

Bachi was floundering away from them, half running and half swimming. “What is that thing?” he screamed.

“He swims worse than you do,” Pahtl observed.

“It’s the otter, you ninny,” Tavi called out as he struggled to flip the canoe back over. “We just told you!”

 

“Otters don’t get that big!” Bachi protested, trying vainly to haul himself up the side of a chicle tree that was barely more than a sapling.

“I’m sorry I didn’t leave the food,” Tarek said to Pahtl, tears suddenly prickling at his eyes. “We ran out of meat.”

“Oh.” Pahtl thought about that. He was big enough to dig his rear paws into the soil below and still rear his head well out of the water, which came past Tarek’s navel nearly up to his ribs. “It was not good meat anyway.”

“It was all I had for a while. I wanted to make sure you weren’t going hungry.”

“Stupid slick-skin. I am the best hunter of food.”

“Stop talking to it!” Bachi demanded. “That’s weird!” He had given up on climbing the tree and was now hiding behind its trunk despite the fact that he stuck out on both sides.

“It’s all right, Bachi,” Tarek said. “He won’t hurt you. We told you – he’s a friend.”

“Friend!” the frightened boy shrilled. “That thing’s nearly as big as a caiman.”

Tavi shrugged as he slung their wet bags back into the now-upright canoe. “I guess we grow them bigger down on Catori land.”

“What are they saying?” Pahtl asked Tarek.

“The new one has never seen one of the water people so big as you before. He is frightened.”

Pahtl chuckled and launched through the water toward the tree where Bachi was hiding. He reared up on his hind legs and dug his claws into the bark. “Fear me, slick-skin! I am the greatest of all the water people!”

“Make it go away!” Bachi whined. “Please!”

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Tarek laughed. “Pahtl, don’t scare him, please. Bachi, his name is Pahtl. I promise he won’t hurt you.”

The Wobanu boy regarded the otter suspiciously. “You’re certain?”

“Give him a fish and he’ll be your friend for life,” Tarek assured him.

“I thought you had to touch the animals to do your magic. And you said it wasn’t exactly talking, so why are you talking to him?”

“He’s… different. It’s complicated.”

“Not complicated,” Pahtl grumbled, swimming back to Tarek. “You are complicated. Stupid. Wrong. You don’t leave food for me.”

“I did! Every single day until today, remember?”

“Not good food.”

“Pahtl, I’m sorry. For everything. I shouldn’t have forced you to take us across the river. I shouldn’t have lied. It was wrong. I was a bad friend, but I’ll be better. I promise.”

He could feel the doubt radiating from the furry creature. “Promises are what you gave before.”

Impulsively, Tarek drew the stone knife from his belt and nicked his finger with it. “I give my blood on it instead, then.” He let a bead of bright red form on his fingertip and dashed it into the water. “I swear it by the Ones… no, on my life and by my own blood. I will never make you act against your will again. Never.”

Pahtl put his front paws on Tarek’s middle, looking closely at his hand in amazement. “You hurt yourself,” he whispered.

“Only a little. It will stop bleeding in a moment.”

The huge otter sniffed at his hand and licked at the bloody fingertip. A shiver passed down him from head to tail, there and then gone. “Slick-skin blood. Tastes funny. Bleagh.”

Bachi, who had finally sloshed out from behind the chicle tree, now backed up against it again. “It can talk?!”

Pahtl’s head whipped toward Bachi. “Why do I understand him? Is he a water-people talker too?”

“Uh, Tarek?” Tavi said, still holding the canoe. “What did you do?”

Tarek looked from his brother to Bachi and back again. “You can understand him?”

Tavi nodded, eyes wide.

Pahtl cackled, darting through the water in a circle. “I speak slick-skin! I am the best water people!” His tail thrashed powerfully and he sped off between the trees, too excited to stay still.

“He tasted my blood,” Tarek said, marveling. “A little bit of him in me and me in him. Xochil was right – I know nothing about all this.”

“What kind of magic is this?” Bachi demanded. “You never said anything about animals talking back!”

“Good magic!” Pahtl cried, zooming back between them, twisting tight circles in the water around each human in turn. “The best!” Then he was off again.

“It’s blood magic,” Tavi admitted to Bachi quietly.

“That’s…!” Bachi sputtered. “Well, I suppose that’s obvious.”

“I should have told you before,” Tarek sighed, slithering back into the canoe as Tavi held it. “I didn’t want to scare you.”

“Mmm, yes,” the Singer said, pulling thoughtfully at his mustache. “And… why should that scare me, exactly? Other than the talking animals?”

Tavi goggled at him. “Haven’t you heard any of the old stories about the blood magic?”

“Yes, of course! I mean, no. Not exactly. Ah, none of them, to be precise.” Bachi looked faintly embarrassed.

“I will tell them!” Pahtl crowed, leaping out of the water like a dolphin.

“He has no idea,” Tarek said, exasperated. “Did your tribe truly not tell any of the ancient stories?”

“Oh, of course, plenty of them! All about the famous Singers of legend like Atl and Neris and Byue.”

“Byue wasn’t a Singer,” Tavi objected, holding the canoe steady on one end as Tarek held fast to the little chicle tree and helped pull Bachi back into the boat.

“She most certainly was!” Bachi said. “It’s a terribly sad story.”

“Does your tribe have a loremaster?” Tarek asked, still holding the tree. Tavi slipped into the canoe much more easily than Bachi had.

“I am a loremaster!” Patl growled, snapping at the end of Tarek’s oar in his teeth, wrestling with it. Tarek snatched it back with a chuckle and fished a long twig out of the water. He sent it spinning into the drowned jungle and the beast gave chase.

Bachi shook his head in disbelief at the talking otter. “Loremaster. Yes, we have one. It passes down from mother to daughter, and they keep the House of Scrolls.”

“No scrolls for us,” Tavi informed him. “It’s all memorized.”

“That’s probably why your stories are wrong,” Bachi said sagely.

“Our stories?” Tavi shot back, outraged.

Tarek pushed off from the tree, and both he and Tavi took up their paddles. “Never mind who’s wrong,” he said. “In our tribe, we have old stories about people who can taste the blood of others and take control of them. It’s a dark thing, very evil… and I have it.”

“Oh,” Bachi said in a small voice. “Is that why you’re after the chiefs’ blood? Are you going to do bad things with it?”

“No,” Tarek replied forcefully. “I’m gathering blood from all the tribes so a wise old man can lift the magic from me. I don’t want it.”

Pahtl was following in their wake, his fit of playfulness past. “If you lose your magic, will I lose mine?”

“I don’t know,” Tarek admitted. “I didn’t know this would happen to you.”

“I like talking to slick-skins,” Pahtl mused. “You are stupid, and it makes me feel smart.”

“He’s kind of rude,” Bachi whispered.

“I can hear you,” Pahtl informed him. “I am not rude; I am right. You should listen.”

“I won’t use my magic to hurt you,” Tarek promised Bachi. “But I’ll understand if you want to leave us and go a different way.”

“It’s all so strange,” Bachi said, shaking his head in bafflement. “I never knew any magic like this existed.”

“Well, that egg’s cracked now,” Tavi said. “Might as well cook it.”

“That’s an odd way of putting it, but I suppose you’re right,” Bachi said. “I think the Song wanted me to find you two. I’ll stay. But please let me know the next time you plan on doing something weird or impossible so I can be better prepared.”

“He who has cast off the names of men has spoken,” Tarek said with a grin. “Let’s get as far as we can before dark. Stay with us, Pahtl. I’ll catch you a fish tonight.”

“And I will catch two for you first! And then we will play!”

The odd little group pushed north and west, and Tarek’s heart felt lighter than it had in a long time.

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