Dream of a Vast Blue Cavern

Interlude 4: Maia

Khell, nine Summers before

 Maia stood outside her egla, still as the Doaltooth Mountains above, while the two women on either side finished fixing her long black hair into tight braids and knelt, facing the rest of the camp, palms up, hands outstretched.

 “We present to you the new Healer of the Liathua Khell,” they said in unison. One was fourteen, still a maiden. The other was a Grandmother, soon to Journey over Ice. Which meant Maia stood between them as a woman grown, mother to the whole tribe. She bowed her head as the ritual directed.

 “I live to serve,” she said. “I am Mother Healer to the Liathua Khell.” The women on either side took bone daggers from their parkas and ran the sharp edges down her bare arms, leaving a trickle of blood behind. “My blood is your blood. In birth, in battle, in death, I will Heal you.” She let the blood drip onto the ice beneath her feet. “When the Liathua bleed, I bleed.” She ran her thumbs, coated with a clotting seaweed, over the thin wounds. They sealed up as if by magic. “When I Heal, the Liathua are Healed.” She raised up her arms, high over her head, so the whole camp could see.

 A whoop went up from the assembled Khell, and a bonfire blazed into being at the center of the winter camp. Deep sounds from horns of boareal tusks rumbled from the tops of egla. The period of mourning had ended with Maia's presentation to the tribe, and the celebration had begun. A boareal had been slaughtered; one less beast to get them to the summer camp, but it would be a delightful feast after the lean winter.

 Antahua, the healer who had served the Liathua for thirty summers, had not withstood that winter; though she was still younger than many of the Grandmothers, she had taken the Journey over Ice just after Three Days of Night. The winter had been too bleak for the Liathua to emerge from the egla for the presentation ceremony until now, nearly two months later. So the tribe had undergone an exceptionally long period of mourning.

 Though Maia had participated in all of the expected rituals, she did not harbor any grief for the old healer. Even after the woman had taken her on as her apprentice, she had been cruel, criticizing Maia’s efforts and beating her when she complained or faltered. Maia had not learned as much as she expected to in the past eight winters; she had learned more as a child from her mother. Antahua’s methods were often clumsy and inefficient. Far from grief, Maia felt relieved to be out of the woman’s shadow.

 Eight winters spent with the Liathua. It was the same number of winters she had lived with her birth-tribe. Fitting, that she would be made a woman on this day. Of course, she was not entirely a woman yet.

 As if he knew her thoughts, Hakua was at her elbow. “Now that you are Healer, we can mate!”

 Maia turned to look him over. At fifteen winters, Hakua was a strong warrior. His muscles were obscured by his thick furs, but Maia could see his strength in the set of his jaw, the thickness of his hands. He would make any woman in the camp an admirable mate. She turned away, closing her eyes briefly. Her braids swung as she moved. She thought about her mother's braids, the little shell beads she had woven into them.

 The bones did not always reveal what Maia wanted to see. She never should have asked such a frivolous question, anyway. Always use the bones only for the good of the tribe, Mother had said. But Maia had been fourteen and shy around the young warriors and desperate to know what her future held. Her answer had been her punishment. And now, looking into his eager face, how could she tell Hakua that he was not for her, nor she for him?

 “The Healer mates with the Chief,” Maia said in a teasing voice. “Your father is Chief, not you.”

 He looked startled, then angry. “Fine,” he said, and walked away. Maia watched him go with regret. She had only hoped to delay the inevitable, to spare him with humor from the danger she had seen in the bones. She walked on, joining the crowd at the bonfire, accepting a choice cut of roast boareal. She did not chatter with the young girls as she had done just a few nights past. Instead she stood apart. She was still part of the tribe, but now she was more than just another young girl.

 Hakua's father approached, and Maia felt an intuitive misgiving. Chief Lubar was a large man. Hakua had inherited some of his mother's gracile build, but there was nothing gracile about Lubar. Maia made a signal of respect, and he made the signal back, chief to healer. He stood close, towering over her.

 “Come to my egla,” Lubar said. There was nothing of asking in his voice. “Hakua has informed me of your decision.”

 “My decision?” Maia’s mouth went dry.

 “There is no reason to delay. It is a good choice. I feared you would be aloof and prudish like Antahua. I am glad to see that you understand the sense in Healer and Chief joining.”

 Maia cringed away, putting more distance between herself and Lubar, eyes darting toward the people by the fire. Would they help her? After eight years, though she was their healer, she was still an outsider. And Lubar was chief.

 “Whatever Hakua told you was false,” Maia said. “A mistaken jest. I—Antahua said there is a curse on this joining among the Liathua. That is why she refused you.” It was a lie, but Maia felt no compunction. She would say anything to avoid him.

 Lubar sneered. “She refused me because her cave was dry and desolate as Pebble Beach,” he said with a coarse laugh. “You are different. Young, dripping, tender, like a piece of meat.” With each word, he stepped closer, and when he said “meat,” he took the half-eaten roast from her hands. With his face inches from hers, he took a bite and chewed. Juice dribbled down his chin.

 Maia shuddered. She stepped backward. “We must not mate,” she said. “I have seen it in the bones. If we join, the tribe will perish.”

 Another lie, but it made him pause. He did not try to follow her. He took another bite and chewed thoughtfully. He had seen the power of the bones, she knew. She had him. She seized her power and made another thrust. “And if you take me by force, I will kill myself. None but myself and my daughters, when I have them, will be able to read the bones. Even if the Liathua survive, they will not have a healer to protect them.”

 Lubar appeared to consider that, and then he grinned. “I shall have to wait until you have a daughter, then.” He stepped close again, reached inside her snowkit-fur parka. She tensed. “It will be worth the wait. The best meat is cooked very slowly over the fire.”

 He pinched her nipple, sending an involuntary shiver up her spine, before he removed his hand. He tossed the hunk of meat aside on the snow and moved past her, chuckling, to the fire. Standing alone in a daze, Maia heard him greet the other warriors. Tears began to glisten on her cheeks. When she could trust her legs not to shake so much she couldn't walk, she pulled herself in the direction of her egla.

 Glancing back toward the fire to be sure that Lubar did not follow, she saw Hakua standing on the outer edge of the ring, watching her go, something between regret and satisfaction in his eyes.

 When she reached her egla, Maia placed two doal femur bones across the small entrance of the egla, the signal that the healer did not wish to be disturbed. She let the coals grow dim, huddling under Antahua’s thick furs. Cold tears leaked from her eyes and she shook and sobbed as silently as she could. She heard a rustle and tensed—would the bones across her door be enough to stop Lubar? Would her threats be enough?

 She was Healer, but she no longer had the protection of maidenhood. Cruel as Antahua had been, the woman had sheltered her from this. The Chief could take what he wanted, and none in the tribe would stop him. Maia did not sleep that night, but lay shivering until daylight brought the sounds of camp being stricken. Then she rose, straightened her Healer’s braids, and went to face the day.