Overwinter Page 20

He leaned over and kissed her quite softly on the lips. “When this is over, I want to marry you. Don’t answer me now. I want to propose to you as a human, on one knee, with a diamond ring, the whole ritual. And then we’ll have a lifetime together. Not this eternal cycle of moon and sun. A human lifetime. Maybe we’ll have a little house, somewhere civilized. In an actual town. Maybe we’ll be blessed with children. We’ll get jobs, and have friends—human friends—and—Jesus—we can go bowling one night a week. Do people still bowl out there? It was the biggest fad when I was human, before I met Lucie. Do you like to bowl?”

  “I … do. That sounds great,” she said, which was the first honest thing she’d said.

  He nodded and started trudging forward again. They were silent after that, but sometimes when they were walking over even ground and the snow was shallow enough to make walking easy, he reached over to hold her hand.

  In less than two hours they came in sight of the inukshuk.

  It stuck up out of the ground like a signpost, alright. Like a landmark. It was about twelve feet high and in that flat country it could be seen for kilometers in any direction. It was made of piled gray stones, in the rough shape of a human form—two tall stones made its legs, with more stones laid flat atop them to create the body. Halfway up its height a pair of flat stones stuck out straight at either side like arms. The wind had brushed it almost clean of snow.

  It was massive and silent and powerful. To Chey’s eyes it was an incredible work of art—half natural and half manmade. She thought it was very beautiful.

  When they finally reached its base Powell dropped the seal carcass at its feet. It landed with a thud, having frozen solid overnight. The sun had not been able to defrost it. “Okay,” Powell said. “Let’s start searching for wood. There have to be some bushes around here buried under the snow. I want to build a fire so we can thaw this out.”

  “Then what?” Chey asked.

  “Then we wait for Tulugaq to come.”

  59.

  Dzo grew increasingly agitated as they waited around the fire. He would pace back and forth for a while, then plop himself down in front of the blaze with a dramatic sigh. Then he would get back up and start pacing again. “I can’t believe this,” he kept saying. “Tulugaq. It had to be Tulugaq.”

  “Relax, old man,” Powell told him, but Dzo just shook his head.

  “Listen,” Dzo said. “Just—just be careful. He’s smart. Really smart. Whatever he says to you, think about it real careful. Figure out what he actually means. And before you say anything to him—just know, he’ll decide what you really mean for himself. And it won’t be what you meant to mean.”

  “We’ve dealt with other mischievous spirits, you and I,” Powell said. “Do you remember the time we spoke with Coyote the Trickster?”

  “What happened then?” Chey asked.

  “This was about thirty years ago, when I was actively looking for a cure. I had already learned something of what Nanuq told us—that Amuruq, the wolf spirit, was the origin of our curse. Coyote was her little brother,” Powell explained. “I thought he might know a way to free her. So I sent Dzo to go find him. It turned out Coyote was living on a ranch in America, in Colorado, where he raised sheep.”

  “I brought him up here to meet Powell,” Dzo said. “They drank some beer and things seemed to be okay. They had a few laughs, told a bunch of old stories.”

  “Nothing useful, really, just stories about Amuruq’s youth. But it was nice to have someone else to talk to, and I thought it would be nice for Dzo to be around one of his own for a few days. So I invited Coyote to spend the night.”

  “Big mistake,” Dzo said. “In every story where somebody lets Coyote spend the night in their house, they regret it in the morning.”

  Powell shrugged. “I knew that Coyote had that reputation, yes. He is what folklore experts call a trickster figure. A hero who overcomes obstacles and defeats threats to the community through guile and intelligence, rather than strength or brutality. Odysseus was the trickster of Greek myth, for instance. The Trojan Horse is a classic trickster strategy. Every culture has such a figure. In Africa they tell stories of Anansi, the spider, who—”

  “I get it. What kind of trick did he pull on you?”

  Powell looked down at his hands as if he was embarrassed, but he was still smiling. “I figured Coyote would behave himself around another spirit. I was also more than a little drunk when I finally went to bed that night. In the morning I couldn’t find Coyote anywhere in the house, so I went to the front door. That was when I saw that he had taken every roll of toilet paper I owned and used them to make streamers that hung from the branches of the trees out front.”

  Chey waited to hear more, but Powell was done with his story. She laughed in disbelief. “That’s it? He TP’d your trees?”

  “He also stole my truck,” Dzo added. “I had to chase him down to get it back. He was joyriding around on the logging roads and totally threw it out of alignment.”

  “Most vexing,” Lucie said, rolling her eyes.

  “If that’s the worst we can expect from Tulugaq,” Chey said, “then suddenly I feel a lot less worried.”

  “Oh, no,” Dzo said, with a snort. “Tulugaq’s different. He’s a trickster, alright, just like Coyote. But he has a much nastier sense of humor. This one time, back in the old days, back when the old stories were first being written, I ran into him. I don’t even like thinking about it now.” He shivered violently. “It was winter. Maybe the first winter, I don’t know.”

  “Back when there were wooly mammoths and Neanderthals?” Chey asked.

  Dzo’s face puckered as he thought back to that time. “Maybe before that. Like I keep saying, time is funny. It was a long, long time ago, let’s say. And it was very, very cold. So he comes across me down by the water, where I’ve been diving, and his teeth are rattling and he’s turned kind of blue, and he says, ‘Hey, musquash’—this was before the Dene people gave me my name—‘Hey, musquash, I’m really cold. You look warm in that fur coat. Do you think I could borrow it?’ I said no, of course, like, three times. Finally he asked me if I was getting enough to eat. I said it was tough, because all the plants were frozen. He said if he could borrow my coat, just for a little while, he would go find some food that wasn’t frozen and bring it back. Sounded like a good deal, right? So I loaned him my fur.”

  “Did he bring back some food?” Chey asked.

  “Sure. Loads of it. Only, I couldn’t eat. See, I was just standing there in the water with no fur on. Just my bones and stuff hanging out in the cold air. So I froze like an ice cube. I couldn’t even ask him for my coat back because my tongue was frozen inside my mouth. He left me there for months like that. It was horrible!”

  “I can imagine,” Chey said.

  “Let’s be fair,” a new voice said. There was a fluttering of wings. “I gave your coat back after I stole the sun and invented summer.”

  Chey had experienced enough weirdness since she’d become a werewolf that she did not immediately jump up and run away. Instead she held very still and turned her head slowly to look around and see who had spoken.

  On the far side of the fire, a massive raven had perched on top of the dead seal. It was as big as a dog, with untidy feathers forming a ruff around its neck. It took a step forward on its reptilian feet and then bent down to pluck at one of the seal’s eyes with its wickedly sharp beak. As Chey watched in horror it dragged the eye out of its socket and swallowed it whole.

  “Am I correct in believing this is meant for me?” the bird asked, in a croaking voice.

  “Yes, Tulugaq,” Powell said. “Thank you for coming.”

  60.

  The raven hopped down to the ground and fanned its wings before the fire for a moment. “It would be improper for me to refuse your summons.” With one wingtip it pushed upward on its beak, which swung free to reveal a human face underneath. It wasn’t an Inuit face, but Chey couldn’t have said what kind of face it was. The skin was
kind of brown, but light enough that it could have belonged to a Caucasian with a tan. The eyes weren’t almond-shaped, but they weren’t exactly round like her own, either. They were brown, and the bangs that hung down beneath the beak were black, but the hair was neither curly nor truly straight. She wasn’t even sure if the face was male or female. “When a pack of shape-shifters and my dear old friend Musquash call me, it would be rude not to at least show up.” The raven shifted its wings around and suddenly it was wearing a cloak of black feathers, and human hands emerged from beneath the cloak. At some point—she could not have said when—the raven had become human sized as well. The beak had become a carved wooden mask, painted black and red, that stuck up from behind the spirit’s head like a miter.

  “Is our sacrifice acceptable?” Powell asked.

  “Yes. Though a trifle fresh for my taste,” the spirit said, prodding at the seal’s nose. “Usually I prefer my dinner well aged. The meat grows tender when it’s left out in the sun a few days. But it’s rude of me to complain. This time of year game is hard to come by, in any condition. You must think me rude to say anything.”

  Dzo opened his mouth to speak, probably to agree, but Powell reached over and grabbed his arm. Dzo settled back down. He stared at the raven spirit, though, with a brooding intensity.

  The raven ignored him and started skinning the seal with a pocket knife. When he got to the meat underneath the pelt he tore off a long strip and popped it in his mouth.

  “Tulugaq,” Powell said. “I—”

  “You shouldn’t call me that.”

  Powell blinked. “I’m sorry? Did I address you improperly?”

  “Not at all. But that is only one of my names. I have so many of them. You’re not an Inuit. Would you prefer to pick a name you can actually pronounce? Like Munin. Or how about Bran?”

  “I don’t suppose it matters what we call you,” Powell said, “but—”

  “Kakakiw? Hrafn? Kangi Tanka? Cuervo? Fiach? I was always partial to Cigfrain. That’s my name in Welsh. Or Watarigarasu, which is Japanese.”

  “He’s trying to impress you,” Dzo muttered. “Just because people tell stories about him all over the world, he thinks that makes him a big deal. Talking all fancy like some kind of big shot, you ought to just call him Mr. Fancy Pants.”

  The bird spirit looked over at Dzo as if he was vaguely amused. “That would be a new one.”

  “Raven,” Powell said. “How does Raven suit you?”

  “Nicely.” Raven shrugged and picked another strip of meat off the seal.

  “Good. Now, I wanted to ask you a favor, which is why—”

  “Vron.”

  Powell looked confused. “Ah …?”

  “That’s what they call me in Russia.”

  “I see.” Powell laid his hands in his lap and smiled wearily. “Perhaps we should let you eat before we talk.”

  Raven shook his head. “No need. I can do two things at once. I am not limited to linear time like a mortal.”

  Powell nodded. “Alright, then. I had hoped that I could ask you for a favor. In exchange for this meal.”

  Raven stopped eating. “No.”

  “Please, it’s very important.”

  The bird spirit inhaled deeply. “Yes, of course it is. Would you have called me all this way if it was something trivial? It doesn’t matter, though. Believe me, I would gladly oblige you if it were that simple. You summoned me, and I came. Payment in full.”

  “Be reasonable,” Dzo insisted. “These are my friends!”

  Raven gave them all a weak smile. “That makes very little difference, Musquash, and you know it.” He turned to look at Powell again. “I’m afraid I’m hampered by the stories that are told of me—I must live up to my reputation. In those stories, I don’t give away anything for free. If you desire something more, we must trade for it. Though I will warn you—I make hard bargains.”

  “Even for the descendants of your sister, Amuruq?”

  “The wolf?” Raven shook his head in the negative. “I never much liked her. She was well on her way to becoming a trickster spirit like me, once. She had some excellent stories—you must know the one about Fenrir, the wolf who had to be bound with magical chains so he wouldn’t swallow the moon. That was one of hers. And there was the one where she devoured an old woman and then wore her skin so she could eat her granddaughter, too.”

  “You mean Little Red Riding Hood?” Chey asked.

  Raven waved away the thought. “The red cloak was a much later addition, something to do with menstruation, I believe. In the original the girl gets eaten. Wolf’s stories always ended with somebody or something getting eaten.”

  “So you tricked her into letting an angakkuq chop her up,” Powell suggested. “And be eaten herself. Why? So she wouldn’t compete with your fame?”

  Raven stared across the fire at him. “That’s a very hurtful thing to say.”

  “Is it true, though?” Powell asked.

  “Well, that depends on how you define truth,” Raven said, with a sly smile.

  Lucie stood up suddenly and glared across the fire. “Enough! Enough of this babble! Answer his questions honestly and simply, or it will go very hard for you.”

  Raven dabbed at the corners of his mouth with the end of his sleeve.

  “Will you talk like a normal person, or will you continue with these pointless digressions? Will you do as we ask?”

  “Yes, granddaughter,” Raven said, with a twinkle in his eye. “I will …”

  “Good.” Lucie sat down.

  “ … for my price.”

  Lucie growled and started to get up again, but Powell raised his hands for peace. “I’m prepared to pay any reasonable price for the information I seek—”

  “Excellent!”

  “—however,” Powell went on, “I will be the one who decides what is reasonable.”

  “Ah.” Raven looked dejected for a moment. “I suppose that is acceptable.”

  Powell nodded. “I need to know the full story of what happened to Amuruq. And I need to know where, exactly, it happened, so that I can find that place again. What price will you demand for this information?”

  “It must be a reasonable price, you say.”

  “Yes.”

  “Hmm.” Raven looked down at the seal. He touched its head with one finger, pointing out its empty eye sockets. Then he looked back up at Powell. “Well, as you can see, I’m partial to eyeballs.”

  61.

  “What?” Chey asked. “You mean—metaphorically, or something. You can’t possibly mean you want our eyes.”

  Raven looked confused. “Why ever not?”

  “Because—that’s just horrible,” she said.

  “Better than your skin,” Dzo pointed out.

  “Okay,” Powell said. “How many?”

  Chey grabbed his arm. “Wait!” she said. “Wait—just—this isn’t cool. What the hell kind of spirit are you, Raven? You’re not like Dzo, or Nanuq. They would never ask for something like that.”

  Raven sighed dramatically. “It does seem—untoward, doesn’t it?” he asked. “But I assure you, it’s strictly necessary.” When that didn’t seem to mollify her, he added, “It’s part of who I am. I feast on the eyes of the fallen. On battlefields, in desolate forests, out here in the frozen tundra, all the stories agree. For myself, I’m not very fond of them. They’re not very nutritious, but they’re soft and easy to get to and so ravens, the actual birds, do eat them first when they find a nice piece of carrion. So I do it too. And when I eat somebody’s eyes, I can see what they’ve seen. In this case, it will allow me to know exactly what you’re looking for.”

  “Bullshit. We already told you that,” Chey said.

  Powell rubbed her hand where it lay on his arm. “Sometimes you have to follow the rules,” he told her. “How many?”

  “Two should suffice. Are there any volunteers?” Raven asked.

  “I refuse,” Lucie said. Chey was not surprised.

 
; “I guess I—” she started to say, but Powell interrupted her.

  “You can have mine,” he said. “Both of them. They’ll just grow back, anyway, the next time I change.”

  “That’s not for five days,” Chey pointed out.

  Raven shrugged. “Even so, he has a point. Would someone be kind enough to hold him down?”

  Chey couldn’t watch it happen. There was some screaming, though not much. Powell always had been a tough son of a bitch. When it was over she was surprised to see there wasn’t much blood. However Raven had done it, Powell’s eyelids had been left intact and he kept them closed so she didn’t have to see what was underneath. She tore off a strip of her shirt and tied it around Powell’s empty sockets. “I would do anything for you,” he whispered while she stroked his hair. It made her heart sink when he said that.

  “Let’s make sure it was worth it,” she told him.

  Dzo had moved around the fire to stand over Raven and started shouting at the bird spirit. “Don’t you try anything tricky,” he said. “Don’t you even think of backing out of the bargain now.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t dream of it,” Raven assured him.

  “I’m watching you now. I’m watching you like—like an eagle.”

  “I would expect nothing less,” Raven said, and laughed. It was a nasty cawing laugh, totally at odds with his previous demeanor, and Chey wondered if it had all been a trick—if they had just played right into Raven’s hands.

  “Now,” Chey insisted. “No subtlety, no tricks, no games. You got what you wanted, now tell us what we want to hear.”

  “I’ll go one better, and tell you what you need to hear,” Raven said. He drew himself up straight and looked deep into her eyes. “I’ll tell you how the first werewolves came to be, and where it happened. Exactly where it happened, so you can go there and undo what was done.”

  62.

  Raven’s voice dropped an octave as he began to tell the story. The werewolves and Dzo all craned closer to pick up every syllable, to catch every nuance. Chey expected another abstract retelling of an old myth, a tale couched in the vague language of folklore. But Raven was true to his word and gave them all the nasty details. “This isn’t a story you’re supposed to learn from,” he told them. “There’s no happy ending, and no easy moral to glean. This is about the facts, about what I saw with my own eyes, not anybody else’s.