Child of the Dead Read Online Free

owners assumed the use of the new.
    However, that was not what the wolves had said. A whole village abandoned with the lodges intact? Not even abandoned, maybe. The smell of death was strong now. Could everyone have been killed by a war party? But the People would surely have heard of such a war in their territory, and they knew of no other tribe here, even. Not one of this description. Their allies the Head Splitters frequently camped in the area. But there had been Head Splitters at the Sun Dance. Since that nation had no Sun Dance of its own, there were usually quite a few who chose to participate in the ceremony of the People. They would have said something, would they not? If they had known … No, this was not likely a band of that nation.
    Occasionally, a band of the Trader People would be encountered. They were usually welcome, because they had good things to trade. Exotic stone knives and arrow points made of flints of strange colors … pink, white, yellow, black … In recent years, even some metal knives and points. Strange food items, too, from faraway places. But when the Traders came through, everyone knew, because they traded with all.
    There were others, sometimes. Cheyenne, the “finger-cutters” in hand-sign. Comanche, from the south, whose sign was like the motion of a snake. Surely, though, the presence of these groups would have been known. And, according to the wolves’ description, this was not a war party, but a
village
, of skin lodges. That meant women and children.
    Someone had asked if this might be a band of Shaved Heads from the east. Or Horn People, or even Kenzas from the northern range of the People. All of these groups were known to move out into the prairie sometimes for a summer buffalo hunt.
    The wolves were indignant over this question.
    “Do you think we would not know a hunting camp of Kenzas?” one snapped irritably. “These are skin lodges, like our own. This is the camp of a band much like ours!”
    Broken Lance had stopped such argument with an impatient gesture, and the three had moved toward the rise.
    Now, Singing Wolf could see the tips of the lodge poles ahead. They seemed to sprout from behind the ridge as the horsemen advanced up the slope. The smell of death was strong now. Wolf felt his neck hairs bristle. The strange thought crossed his mind that they were approaching the Other Side, with the spirit-world just beyond this ridge. But no, surely the death smell was a thing of
this
world, not of the other. But are they not all the same? Yet, surely the Other Side would not smell of death … Or
would
it? He wished that he could talk of this with his father.
    It was almost a relief to see as they topped the rise that there were burial scaffolds in the ravine. Not in close proximity to the lodges, but a few bow shots’ distance away, as it should be. Quite a number, though … A quick estimate of the number of lodges and of scaffolds showed that perhaps half the families of the band must be in mourning. A great tragedy of some sort …
    They sat on the ridge, trying to understand. The well-ordered camp of lodges lay before them, with no sign of life. A breeze barely stirred an eagle feather hanging on a warrior’s shield in front of one of the lodges. It took a moment for Wolf to realize that this should not be. If the warrior who owned the shield was alive, its presence said that he was at home. Yet there was no sign that any of these lodges was inhabited. No activity, no smoke from cooking fires, no sound. Only dead silence. Dead … If the owner of that shield were dead, it should be with him on the funeral scaffold, so that hemight use it on the Other Side. It must be one way or the other, yet it was not. Other strange thoughts flitted through Wolf’s mind. Why were there no dogs? A camp of this size would usually have a large number of dogs, yet there were none. Was this a nation who did not have dogs? Surely not. Could there
be
such a nation? The People had used