Squirrel
Follows "Immigrant" A Story of the Bronze Age
Bar and Tom and Mel and Lon sat on their horses overlooking Ria’s town. The crops had failed again. It was a small town, no larger than the tribe had been before the current chieftain had taken over. The crops were trade goods, not directly a food source – the townsfolk used the grain to make beer. Some of them turned it into honey cakes in their ovens.
The town’s main food sources were sheep and fishing in the river.
But the weather had been getting colder for three generations now. Only the oldest ones remembered the time when the harvests had been good every year. And they were having trouble keeping the sheep fed. The cold season had gotten to the point where the snow, which up to now had remained mostly on the mountains, had come down to the valley itself, where the flocks were grazed. The sheep didn’t move the snow to graze on the grass beneath, so the shepherds had to actually sweep the snow from the grass so the sheep could eat.
Meanwhile, there were still bands of outcast townsmen that lurked outside the perimeter of the town. Shepherds who roamed too far afield for their sheep were in danger. The elders remembered when daughters could be sent to tend the sheep. No one did that anymore. There was talk about coming to an agreement with one of the outcast bands – trading protection for brides. But where would the brides come from? The town headman and the elders showed no sign of giving up any of the wives in their longhouses.
Mel was in charge of this scouting party. He turned to Tom, whose horsemanship was only as good as Bar’s, although unlike Bar, he was already in charge of his own Hand.
“Where is the headman’s house?”
Tom pointed.
“But that’s not bigger than any of the others,” he said. “I know the longhouses are for the wives and their children, but it’s not bigger than the other single houses.”
“It’s the location that matters,” said Tom. “See how it’s closer to the center? And how close the biggest longhouse is? That’s his personal dwelling. Also, you can see the two houses of the top elders close by. The guards can cover the headman and top elders easily.”
Mel shook his head. The chieftain had the largest dwelling in the tribe. He needed room for four wives and their children, and space for feasting. The headman’s house here was smaller than Able’s dwelling, which was the smallest in the tribe.
Tom saw the look on Mel’s face. “We have underground storage at the houses, and there’s space underneath the roof too. The headman’s house has as much space as the chieftain’s. It’s just arranged differently.”
“And the houses with the ovens are on the perimeter, right?” noted Lon. “When we burn those down, you’re sure it won’t burn up the ovens, too?”
“The ovens don’t burn,” said Tom. “That’s why they’re ovens.”
“And under attack, they’ll use the ovens to use fire against us,” said Mel. “And we have the bands to deal with, too. Well, that’s one of the reasons we’re here – to scout out the positions of the bands. Let’s get going.”
Bar got out one of his horse skins and a marking stick. This one had a diagram of the town. Ria’s memory had been good. Everything was where his wife had described it. He only needed to add some dwellings and details that she’d forgotten.
“I think we found one of the bands,” said Mel. “Tom, stay here with your Hand to protect Bar. He needs to stay here and draw. Lon, bring your Hand to fight with mine.”
A Hand wasn’t always literally five warriors plus a leader, but that was the most common organization. Soon, Bar found himself circled by five warriors crouching behind a makeshift barrier with their horses lying on the ground and spear bundles next to them.
Mel and Lon took their men down the hill to engage the outcast townsmen. By the time they were done, they had three of their own dead, and three seriously injured, included one lamed. But all the townsmen, from what seemed to be two separate bands, were dead. Except for one boy, who surrendered.
“What are you doing?” said Tom, when they were all together again. “He’s going to knife you in the back as soon as you turn your back.”
“Better not turn my back on him, then,” said Lon, grinning.
Tom pounded his spear on the ground. “I’m serious. Look at your dead! And you have a new cripple in the tribe now.”
“I am, too,” said Mel. “The boy fought well and now has a chance to join the tribe. Right, Squirrel? Bind his hands and put him on a sled.”
“Lon, I’ll put him in front of me on my horse,” said Kan, snickering. It was where the raiders put a stolen maiden.
“That lonely?” said Mel, and the rest of the tribesmen guffawed and used words Tom didn’t know. Bar kept his head down.
“Still,” said Mel, “not a bad idea. Best to keep the sleds for our own wounded.”
They took the heads of their three dead in a bag with them, and buried the rest of the corpses on the top of the hill. Bar arranged them on their back, with their knees raised to the sky, and sprinkled them with some his red marking powder. Then Mel said the necessary words and they covered them up.
When the raiders came back to the settlement this time, the Old Woman set up a keening. The women of the tribe came running out. A keening meant there were dead this time. It happened sometimes, but it was not common. The raiders normally took their prey by surprise, slipped in quickly, and then left with their bounty. Wounded were more common – and this party had those as well. There were another three men wounded to the point of needing to be dragged on sleds behind the horses.
The Old Woman and Eema and some other healers came to tend to the warriors in the sleds. The others, who had been well enough to ride, were tended by their wives or sisters. Able watched the procession of the warriors into the settlement and the women rushing out to the them.
But when Mel dismounted and met the chieftain, he looked to be in very good spirits. “It can be done, my chief,” he said. “We engaged two outcast bands – each one about a Hand each. The two bands didn’t work together, but they fight to the death, like the outcasts of the other tribes. That’s why we lost Pol, Les and Sam. We brought their heads to console their kin, before we return to unite them with their buried corpses and take the town.”
“Three dead is a lot,” said the chieftain. “Listen to the women. This is a different way of fighting. Is it worth it?”
Suddenly, a new wail was added to the background of the general keening of the women. Eema had finished tending to the men as needed and went to find her husband. She found his head set up with the other two, tended by the Holy Man and Able.
Able left his work and hugged her. It wasn’t quite right for a grown man to do that, but before he had gotten a wife, when he had been considered as something less than a man, he had been accustomed to continuing to hug women as a child might.
“Eema, see?” he said. “I’m making a necklace for you, so his spirit can guard you until you get a new husband.” He was polishing teeth into pendants to hang on a leather strap. After Eema had a new husband to care for her and the children, the necklace would go to the man’s eldest sister (his mother was dead) and be passed down from there, mother to daughter.
The other two dead men had not yet married. The women that mourned them were mothers, sisters, aunts.
The young outcast townsman had been set, bound, on the ground, with just Lon to guard him. Some of the women were now gathering around him, and one threw a handful of dirt at him. “Which one did you kill?” she shrieked.
“Auntie,” said Lon, “do you think this child could beat Pol or Les or Sam?”
Instead of keeping silence, the young man put himself in further trouble. “I’m not a child! Why do you think I was in a band? Learning to fight to get my own bride!”
“Who was it?” said another woman, throwing another clod of dirt. “Or are you the one who lamed Bahk?”
Lon stood over the captive waving his spear. “Aunties! Sisters! Mothers! Step back!” This time, he was hit with a clod that had been aimed at the captive. The young man took advantage of Lon’s distraction to try to grab his spear.
It didn’t work. The spear remained firm in Lon’s grip and he pounded down hard on the captive’s hand, breaking bones. Then he roared, “Women! Get back!”
They stepped back, then, reluctantly, and stopped throwing dirt.
The Chieftain, who’d been watching this, came up and grabbed the boy by an ear and pulled him up.
“Do you want me to give you to the women?” he said.
Mel, by the Chieftain’s side, saw fear in the captive’s eyes for the first time. Death fighting warriors was one thing. A slow death, no chance to fight, at the hands of women, was quite another.
The Chieftain stood by the captive. “Don’t any of you have daughters who want to stay in the tribe? What if this young man proves himself?”
Now, a different look came into the townsman’s eyes. The incredulous look that Tom had had, those weeks before. He had thought only to earn a warrior’s death, after surrendering in his cowardice.
“But what if he killed one of our warriors?” The tone of the women, though, was now different. The chance to keep another daughter in the tribe?
“I’m not sure, chieftain,” said Lon. “He did surrender. He could have fought and died back at the town.”
“Grandmother,” said the chieftain. “Warriors kill warriors. Tom may have killed one of your grandsons, but he stands here now with the tribe.” The woman had daughters married into other tribes.
“Lon has the greater objection,” said the chieftain. “If you wanted to die like a warrior, why did you surrender? And after surrender, why did you try to take Lon’s spear? If you surrender and use trickery like a woman, why shouldn’t we give you up to them? Or make you one?”
Then Tom spoke up. “I was against bringing him here,” he said, “but now that he is here, I vouch for him. I take him as my brother.”