Ocean's Breath Plateau kavrak ∷

kukutux went out to moontide, to visit the death ulaq of her daughter.

she had greeted @Rodyn and @Heph, now she went to the sea.

her child was not the only reason she had come. kukutux found good fat offered to the spirit of the sea-girl and knew who it was who had done this.

she waded out into the frigid water once her prayers had been finished, hip-deep.

kukutux searched for the blue-black lichen which brings dreams and scraped them from stones into a piece of buckskin.

she came back to the shore; the sunshine woman shook wet from her fur and called for the seal hunter.

the man was reluctant to pull himself from his wives, but he knew a woman of such power could not be ignored. it was k'os who had raised him, shaman of the seal hunters, searched for and sought after by those of farflung villages, even other tribes.
her power had been undeniable.
chakliux came to the moon woman, finding her salted and silent on the bank. "i am here," he said in her sunshine words.

when kukutux lifted her eyes, he was there.

he had grown older but no less handsome, and in the cut of his scars she saw what her long-ago betrothed might have become: a proud man of a proud people.

"your face shines," she said in his seal hunter words.

she waited for surprise to show in chakliux; she lifted her chin.

"once long ago i learned the secret ways of your seal hunter women. i was to be married into your tribe. i offer a trade."

one of her age knew many things, but still, he had not expected her to know his language, the greetings he had long gone without saying.
chakliux stiffened, the scars upon face and body growing stark; he let out his breath and nodded, for it was good to speak the seal hunter words. it was all he had taught to raiyuk. it was all he would teach to matteo. it was all he spoke with tullik, who had her own dialect of mountains. it was what he whispered to marina.
his berrybright eyes were watchful. "say why you have come."

dripping brine-droplets, kukutux moved farther along the beach, toward chakliux, and fixed him with a stare only an old woman could give to a young hunter.

"my daughter ariadne is gone from moonsong. i know you have known her face."

her voice was hard.

"find her. find where she has gone. tell me. i will give your daughters the seal hunter wisdom, which they must have. you know this."

yes; this had been told to him; chakliux still felt a deep frown cross his face. he gazed at the skin-bag which bulged with things collected; he did not look into her face.
he thought.
why should he seek out a woman who had left her people? was this not the failing of her mother?
the seal hunter grunted. "i am her companion, and i am a companion to her husband."
kukutux offered what was missing from these lands, what he could not teach his daughters. women must instruct them.
chakliux had not refused. he only waited.

"her husband carries a curse. sedna does not know him."

how could she, if he had changed his name, if spirit-names did not bind him?

"he is tartok. seal hunters know the hard-flesh hunters."

kukutux had never stopped using the words of his people; now she spied the strip of skin draped over his hackles. "it is wolf you carry."

she threw down a pawful of lichen from her bag, eyes hard. "i know where you went. to my offer of wisdom i add a curse for the one you seek."

now chakliux was uncomfortable; it showed in how he hunched his shoulders against the wind and stared at the things she had thrown down into the sand.
moon woman was angry. kilgitsuk had been his friend but — ariadne had chosen him over chakliux.
this was not what moved him at last. it was her offer of a curse, which sliced at his breath and filled him with fear.
the green eyes were unyielding.
there was a long silence. if she could curse a man far from here then she could curse a lodge.
chakliux's jaw tensed.
"she will not want to come home."

a breath, exhaled;

"i do not ask that you bring her home. find where she has made her sleeping-place. come back and tell me. i will decide what is to be done."

the shying girl of so long ago no longer existed in kukutux. she bent the seal hunter as if he were ivory soaked in oil; she waited for him to bow or to break.

it was ominous to chakliux, who was again caught between rightness and the barter.
the sunshine people were not violent; they did not make raids upon their neighbors or cousins, setting themselves instead to creating kinship ties in all villages.
but there was no loyalty here, not to her. not to ariadne.
what she offered was too great.
the seal hunter pushed his tongue against a fang in contemplation. "say you will give my son his manhood scars. and my wife marina, if she wishes to wear them."
there was much power in this, much to give raiyuk a force that would carry him to all of his hunting. chakliux would not let this go.

"i will make the scars for your son and your wife. i will teach your wives what i know. i will teach your daughters, until your people here have no need of me."

her face thrust forward, a mother's fury blackening her features.

"say you will go, seal hunter."

"i will go. but not yet. my wives may be pregnant. my son is healing and must become a man before spring. but i will go, moon woman. and i will tell you."
a barter made. one accepted.
he grabbed up the lichen and dragged it toward himself.
a cruel, cold curiosity grabbed at chakliux.
"who was the boy you once married?" he knew she would not answer. the sunshine people spoke no name of the dead, and she would be a seal hunter woman if she had become his wife.

a long exhale threatened to remove her strength, but she looked steadily at the man with his scars.

ariadne would be found, and she did not need to speak another word of it or seek the foolish young woman herself.

but her heart sank at the man's next question; it was not so much a trade as it was a test of her power, her willingness to speak of two peoples.

kukutux stood, straight-backed; she gathered the carry-skin and looked toward the death ulaq.

for a moment the wind traced her spine; she appeared almost girlish as tresses of white held the breezes.

"seal stalker."

and then she was gone, stepping lightly past chakliux to seek rodyn and her grandsons, a choking, earthy heaviness in her mouth.

seal stalker.
the son of an uncle's second wife, one who had lived three villages away. they knew his name only in song, only in lineage.
shock and dread raced through chakliux, who had no words as he watched the old woman go.
how had she known? had she known?
seal stalker. if she had married into his people, her daughters would be as cousins to him. did the blood know? did the blood remember?
he thought of ariadne, he thought of her beautiful face and the wash of her scent.
why did kilgitsuk deserve what he himself had earned? did her sunshine blood know what had been broken between her people and the seal hunters? was that what he had sought in moon woman's daughters?
the lichen was clenched, carried.
he would remain with his thoughts the remainder of the day.