the children were growing strong.
kukutux had returned to her work. today they were laid upon a skin just outside the denmouth, where they might feel the wind across moonglow and hear the voices of the others.
she chewed cured skin to leather, grinding with all her teeth.
presently kukutux looked up, crooning for
@Sialuk. she always enjoyed the company of her first daughter.
With her time split now between the spear and the spine, Sialuk saw less of anaa, but it was not so much less that they had grown apart. To her, Kukutux would always be an integral part of her life. The mother who had born her into this world, and the mother who had weathered some of the harshest storms with Sialuk.
With her, Sialuk brought a fresh kill of beaver. She was not a hunter by nature, but she had been practicing more since she had begun helping Caracal. He was healed and on his own journey now, and Sialuk thought fondly of him. Perhaps in days ahead they would meet again.
A beaver for you and the little ones,
Sialuk said once she had dropped the beaver near anaa. Is everything well?
"all is well."
they sat in companionable silence. kukutux put aside the leather and looked with a smile toward sialuk. her teeth had begun to wear down from the constant chewing, year after year. but this was their way. she had many more ahead of herself.
"you are like stone woman!" she praised of sialuk's kill. the stories said that stone woman was a hunter who was not man. she lived in the high mountains and she sought only the eyes of the gods.
"do the spirits speak to you there?" she asked, searching sialuk's lovely face.
Her time on the mountains had left her with the skill to support herself, as the stone woman anaa likened her to. You are too generous, mother!
Sialuk said, her voice blushing under the compliment. Kukutux had always been a pivotal figure in her life, and Sialuk did not wish to imagine a life lived without anaa. Their conversation always easy, days passed knowing that they could spend time apart and feel as though it were nothing.
Aya,
she said at the question.
They say—one day—I will have sons and daughters there.
Sialuk let her eyes turn without her face toward anaa. What would she think of their guidance? Of the path that had been given to her?
this was the first time that sialuk had spoken of her own children. kukutux found herself transfixed and pierced with emotion. she closed her jadegreen eyes for a moment.
and when she opened them the look she gave her star was filled with love.
"i think that your spirit has been heavy without the mountain. i think your village will be very strong. it is where you took the first breath of air. it is what calls you now. you answer, daughter."
Your village. It was the first time a living spirit had spoken those words aloud, and she was thankful it had come from anaa. She felt only warm encouragement in her mother's words, and Sialuk felt her heart clench in her chest. Not heavy, as it had been for months past, but with gratitude for her mother's blessing.
I worried that you would not give your blessing,
she said, I should have known better.
Her lips pulled into a smile, and she pressed her forehead into Kukutux's chest, drinking in her scent. Sialuk knew she would not be far, and Moonglow would thrive with the young children that now filled her mother's den. The children of Lote and Shikoba also made strength in Moonglow, Sialuk knew.
Do you still know hunters who search for a wife?
she asked, her eyes keen on anaa's features. Her mother had been a matchmaker for as long as Sialuk could remember, and surely she knew of one or two suitable hunters. Perhaps one who wishes to have sons and daughters atop a mountain?
"i have many names in my head. but i must choose which one is correct for you and for the path of your heart." she leaned forward to touch her muzzle against that of sialuk's own.
this late in the season, men would have taken wives. but the duck would look outside the land of her children's birth to look for others.
sialuk must have a good husband.
"you have traveled many journeys between here and the mountain. whose faces do you know that i do not yet see?" had the spirits also given the star a vision of her husband?
She thought of those she had met that anaa had not. There were only one or two, and none of them were suitable husbands for her. Not in the way that she wished. Not in the way that Kukutux had been with taataa and later with sunman. No, none of the hunters Sialuk had met were worthy of her. One day, she knew, he would come into her life. She would know then that he was worthy.
The raindrop shook her head. None who are worthy,
she answered.
"who could be worthy of moonglow's star?" kukutux teased softly, but nodded in understanding.
"your heart will know."
she pressed a kiss to sialuk's forehead.
close here?
She knew it to be true without
anaa saying so, but hearing it felt warm in her heart.
When it is ready,
she said.
When I am ready.