“They were so close—Lo and Orn—almost like twins. They would think and act as one.” Her face contorts into something between a grimace and a shattered smile. “They were dangerous together, because they each fed the worst within the other. Yet something about them drew people to them. They ignited hope. They read signs about a prosperous future that the Divine was planning for us. Many people found them impossible to resist—”
“I’m sorry. I have to ask . . .” I can feel my mother’s glare. Does she find it rude that I’ve interrupted? That I intend to question Dora? My mother may feel that way, but then, she wasn’t there. She didn’t chop through the shaft of a spear protruding from Chev’s chest. “Why didn’t anyone stop them? Couldn’t you—couldn’t someone—stop them?”
Dora tilts her face toward me, her eyes meeting mine. I see now that she is not as old as I had thought, just very weary and worn.
“They planned it well. For so long, the elders had tried to convince Lo that we should settle on the water—that we should stop following herds as her father had always done.
“Finally, she began to yield. She focused on building new kayaks. She announced she was sending the elders on a scouting expedition. She was very cunning. We went away so pleased that morning, heading west along the coast in search of a suitable bay, convinced she would soon agree with our own plans for the clan. While all along, they were preparing something different . . . something much darker . . .”
My mother leans forward, placing herself between me and Dora. She’s noticed, as I have, Dora’s voice growing thinner as she speaks, fading into a whisper. “Why don’t you let me bring you something to eat? I could bring it in here—”
“I’m not saying we were innocent,” Dora says, completely ignoring my mother, her eyes wide and unblinking. “We know the weight of our guilt. We know there will have to be consequences for what happened. Lo and Orn didn’t act alone.
“But in the end, it happened as they say—you die the way you live. They lived for vengeance. And for vengeance they died.
“Out of all of them, everyone else came back alive. Only those two—only Lo and Orn—lost their lives.”
She drops her eyes. Turning away, she picks up Pek’s hand, as if he were her own son.
As if he were Orn.
Later, I stand in the shallow water, holding the kayak steady as Dora gets in, ready to return to the western shore. The kayak bobs, thumping against my leg, as Dora moves slowly and methodically, tying the belt around her waist. Chev and Mya are there, climbing into the only canoe with room to sit.
When I wade out of the water and back onto the sand, my parents are talking about the burials. They will be tomorrow, when the sun is at its highest point in the sky.
The rowers wait until Dora is out in front of them. Then they dig hard with their oars. I watch them recede across the bay, remembering how I’d watched the Bosha cross the bay in the same way. When they are so far away that they are no longer distinct individuals, but mere dark shapes blending into one another, I think I see Mya look back, but I cannot know for sure.
THIRTY-THREE
I am alone in my family’s hut, dressing to do something I do not want to do.
My mother stands at the door. She tells me everyone else is leaving. It’s time to go. I tell her not to wait. I’ll come on my own. Soon, I promise.
“I won’t leave without you,” she calls through the door.
I step outside, barefoot, still tying my pants at the waist. “Just go,” I say. “I promise I won’t be long.”
My mother raises her hand to shield her eyes from the sun as she looks at me, and the lines at the corners of her lips deepen. She will wait. My mother has had to wait for so many things. For the bay to thaw. For the herds to return. For the first kill of the spring.
For the Divine to provide wives for her sons.
I should not test her patience now. I drop my head and step back into the hut. I have no choice. This task will not go away. I lace up my boots, pull the elk-hide tunic over my head, and join my mother outside, where the sun is reluctantly climbing out of the eastern sky.
A two-man kayak waits for us on the beach. The rest of our party is far out on the bay. The wind is in our faces, slowing us, and by the time we land on the western shore, the sun is directly overhead.
It’s time.
A girl approaches, helping my mother alight from the boat. She is familiar to me; I’ve seen her in this very spot. The day I hiked the overland trail with Lo, she met us right here on the beach.
This is Anki, the sister of Orn.
She glances over at me, and I can’t quite read the emotion on her face. Does she know that I am her brother’s killer? She can’t possibly. If she did, I doubt she would look at me at all.
“Mya was asking for you,” she says. “She was on the beach earlier, looking for you.”
I hear voices. Up ahead, on a ridge above the Bosha’s camp, a crowd is gathered around two open graves.