'You sent Joboam after her?' Tillu asked in outrage and dismay. 'Where's Capiam?'
'Well, of course I sent him after her. What else was I to do? Capiam would have done the same thing, had he been up to it. We've always sent Joboam after Kari when she ran away and hid from us. He was always the best at finding her. Rolke was no use at all.
And he certainly couldn't be asked to do anything now, sick as he is.' Ketla looked flustered and a little angry. The healer wasn't listening at all. 'As for Capiam, he's still abed. Feverish, like Rolke, and not feeling well.'
Snorting her exasperation, Tillu stepped over to the pallet Capiam and Ketla shared.
The man was lost beneath blankets and hides. She tried to pull his blanket down, but he gripped it tightly. His eyes were shiny, his lips papery as bark, but he spoke in weary command. 'I am not as ill as Ketla thinks I am. I am just tired, and a bit feverish. Leave me alone.'
Tillu pulled stubbornly at the hides, but Capiam was just as stubborn in retaining them. 'Leave me alone,' he repeated obstinately. She sighed and sat back on her heels.
'All right. I'll leave you alone. But I will leave some tea that I want you to drink, whenever you are even a little thirsty.' She glanced about. Ketla was directing the women who were setting out Kari's joining clothes and discussing the food to be prepared. Tillu leaned closer to Capiam. 'Have you any idea where Kari is? Where did Joboam say he would look for her?' Capiam only flapped a hand at her irritably.
'Can't you leave me alone? Joboam will find her, and Ketla will handle the joining ceremony. It isn't until this afternoon. By then, I will have rested, and I will be there.
Until then, Joboam will find her. Joboam will ... he can see to things. Ask Joboam.'
Capiam's eyes sagged shut with weary finality. His hand fell limply atop the blankets.
Tillu rose abruptly.
'Ketla,' she said clearly, slicing through the women's conversations. Recklessness settled on her, a premonition of hovering disaster that could be averted only by direct action. She pushed through the circle of women and knelt to put her face on a level with Ketla's. She took the stout herdwoman's hands in hers, noting the fever that still simmered in them.
'Put off the joining,' she said in a voice so deadly soft that it filled the tent. 'Your husband is ill, you yourself are not well,' and, over the beginning of Ketla's objections,
'and your son is dying. Dying. Now is not the time for a joining.'
'No! Oh, no, not dying, Tillu.' Fear and refusal whitened Ketla's face. 'You'll see, Healer, he's a strong boy. And the najd has said he'll get better. He's sleeping now, resting, and when he awakes he'll feel better. He'll be up to the feeding grounds, watching the reindeer and the young girls before the end of summer, you'll see.' Ketla's voice rose higher and higher as her frantic words tumbled out. Tillu shook her head.
'No. Dying, Ketla, despite the best I can do.'
'But the najd ...'
'The najd has ways of making words say nothing at all. What did he say, exactly?
Wasn't it, 'In the shadow of the Cataclysm, Ketla and Rolke would be freed of pain.'
Don't you see? He will be right, whether Rolke gets better or dies. That is always how he speaks. With promises that offer nothing, predictions that take no chances. No, Ketla.
Listen to me, even though I tell you hard things. Put off this joining. Don't make me leave Rolke to run and find Kari. For she must be found before Joboam finds her. She must be told she doesn't have to join with Pirtsi. You know she doesn't want to. That's why she has run away. And you've sent Joboam after her, the very one who has made her hate and fear the idea of being any man's mate. And you know that, too!'
Certainty grew in Tillu as she watched Ketla's eyes widen in horror. She felt a flicker of hope. Ketla would put off the joining, would hear Kari out. But Ketla's face set more deeply into stubborn denial. The gathered women, shocked to silence by Tillu's words, began to mutter among themselves. Sudden glints of anger kindled in Ketla's deep eyes.
'Get out!' she shrieked abruptly. 'Healer, you call yourself? And kneel before me and wish death on my son, and carry wild tales about my daughter! Speaking lies about the najd who chants for my son, and has taken your own son into his tent! Get out! Take your evil tongue and useless medicines with you! Get out of my tent! The najd.
Someone fetch the najd for me! I want him to come now, to drum and chant for Rolke and Capiam.'
'Ketla!' came Capiam's weary rebuke from across the tent, but Tillu had already risen.
She was not surprised at Ketla's behavior. It was how she dealt with things she did not wish to face; she denied them. Tillu stiffened her back and forced herself to speak calmly.
'I will go. There is little I can do here that you cannot do yourself. Rub Rolke with water often, and pour tea into his mouth; even if he does not swallow, it will wet his tongue. And give the same tea to Capiam. It may keep his fever down. The sickness is rising in him, as it did in Rolke.'
'Get out! Get out! Get!' Ketla was shrieking now, shaking with fury. The healer's calmness only incensed her more.
'I will. I'm going to find Kari. I'm going to tell her she does not have to join with Pirtsi, that she can go to Stina and the older women. They will tell her that she is free to join or not join. And they will see that no one forces her. Some of the herdwomen seem to have forgotten their old traditions.' Tillu's eyes raked the women standing speechless around Ketla. They shifted uneasily, their sudden silence more unsettling than their previous whispering had been.
'Is it true Kari does not wish to join with Pirtsi?' asked one softly.
'Get out!' Ketla shrieked, and Tillu did not bother to reply. She swung her pouch of herbs to her shoulder and left, slapping the door-flap aside. A panting Pirtsi stood before her.
'Well?' Tillu demanded recklessly. 'Are you going to say you didn't know Kari didn't want you?'
'I ... no ... What?' He took a breath, gathered his wits. 'Healer! You are needed at the reindeer pens.'
Tillu gave a wordless cry of frustration, stamping her foot. Some fool with a broken shoulder or leg, no doubt. 'It will have to wait!' she declared fiercely. 'Have him lie still and put a cold wet cloth on it until I can come! Do what you did for a broken bone before I came along.'
'But it's the najd!' Pirtsi exclaimed, horrified.
'All the better!' Tillu snarled.
'But he's dying ...' Pirtsi's voice trailed off. Tillu looked at him hard, seeing the shock in the boy's face, the trembling of his hands. 'Like Elsa,' he added on a breath.
'What do you mean?' Tillu demanded. She stepped closer to the youth, steadying him with her hands on his shoulders. She locked gazes with him, willing the truth out of him.
'He's crumpled,' he said abruptly. 'Broken like dry sticks.' He shuddered violently and turned from her. She let him go. 'Tell Capiam,' she instructed him and began to run.
She did not see the tents she passed, didn't hear the folk who cried out to ask what was wrong. Her savage expression was enough to bring men and women running after her, all eager to witness whatever disaster she raced to.
The sorting pens were on a hillside above the camp. Years ago, the pens had been built of boulders and stones. Brush and bushes had grown up around them. The men standing at the open mouth of the pen shouted when they saw her. She pushed past them, ignoring their words. Abruptly she slowed to a walk.
Carp lay like a crumpled doll. A herdsman from one of the other herdfolk stood over him. At the far end of the pen, herders shouted and trotted, keeping the restive vajor and their calves back from the shaman. Tillu drew near reluctantly. He had to be dead.