Departures

Among the gigglers was Hozay’s older sister, Neena. That only made Madyu more furious. Some shamans eschewed marriage, believing a celibate life made their magic stronger. Of those who did take a woman or two, most chose from outside their own tribe. That was not a law, but it was fairly strong custom: knowing as he did the secret names of his tribesfolk, a shaman might be tempted to try using sorcery to win a girl’s heart.

Madyu would never have stooped to such a thing, however pleasant he found the picture of auburn-haired, softly curved Neena sharing his tent. He resolved to go courting at the trade fair a couple of moons hence. But despite that resolution (which he had made, and broken, before), he did not care to have Neena laughing at him. Even a scrawny, clumsy, nearsighted man has his pride.

As the shaman had expected, his missing garments lay close by the tent. The imps who’d absconded with them-and if Hozay wasn’t one of them, Madyu would go out and eat grass for supper-knew how far they could go in provoking him. Had leggings and shirt vanished for good, some small backsides would have had an encounter with the switch. Madyu sighed as he got dressed: this one was a clean win for the boys.

Toward evening, a commotion announced the return of the hunting band. Madyu put away the Old Time book he’d been trying to decipher ever since he’d traded another shaman a six-tool pocket knife for it. The man was a cheat; if Madyu ever learned his secret name, he’d regret the day he was born. The book’s faded cover proclaimed that it had to do with medicine, but instead of talking about how to fix a broken leg or what to do about measles or lockjaw, it went on and on about genes and enzymes and other such incomprehensibilities. Madyu was sometimes tempted to use its pages for kindling, but keeping it around and looking through it every now and then reminded him not to be too eager in a deal.

With some trepidation, he came out of the tent. If this hunt proved as bad as the last one had been, Jorj was liable to clout him into the middle of next week. But the chief hunter wore a grin as wide as a longhorn’s span. When he saw Madyu, he clouted him, all right, but it was a happy clout, not an angry-one. The shaman staggered just the same.

Jorj caught him, steadied him, and patted him on the back. “Look at the fine wizard we have here!” he shouted to anyone who would listen-and he hadn’t even been into the blackberry wine. “Look at all the ducks we brought back, thanks to his spells.”

“Ducks?” Madyu quacked, but his startled voice was drowned by a chorus of cheers from the rest of the hunters and from the women of the tribe. Madyu looked from one smiling hunter to the next. Sure enough, they were carrying two or three or even four fat ducks apiece, with some of the shining feathers now dark with blood.

“Hardly ever seen such a big flock before,” Jorj boomed. “They were tipping up in that pond-you know, the one near what’s left of the Old Time road-and they were so busy eating, they barely noticed us shooting at ‘em till they were dead. Wonderful spells, Madyu! I wish they’d work that well all the time.’’

“So do I,” Madyu said in a hollow voice. He’d magicked rabbits and squirrels, turkey and cattle and deer-he hadn’t said word one to the gods about ducks. But here they were, dozens of them. The tribe would feast for a week.

He saw Neena looking right at him and cheering as loud as anybody. When he smiled at her in a tentative way, she smiled back, not tentatively in the least. All at once, the world seemed a brighter place. Maybe he hadn’t asked the gods for ducks, but if they sent ducks his way, he’d take credit for them.

He puffed his chest out as far as it would go (standing there beside Jorj, he still looked like nothing much). “I tried something new this time,’’ he declared. “It had to do with genes and enzymes.”

“Never knew ducks wore jeans,” Jorj said. Joke as he would, though, the meaningless and therefore necessarily magical words impressed him. “Whatever those en-things are, use ‘em some more. They were something else.”

“I’m glad,” Madyu said, bemused still.

By then the women of the tribe were busily plucking the ducks, putting aside feathers for ornament and for fletching arrows, and the soft underdown for pillows, quilts, and jackets. As casually as he could, the shaman strolled over to Neena and asked her for one of the metallic green feathers from a male mallard’s head. Their fingers brushed for a moment when she gave it to him. He felt a spark, and from her friendly expression, she might have, too.

Before long, the savory odor of roast duck drove even lustful thoughts from his mind. Some of the women took out crocks of currant jelly to accompany the feast. Crisp skin crackled under Madyu’s teeth as he bit into a juicy thigh; rich hot fat filled his mouth. He ate until he could hold no more, then licked every finger clean.