It Dreams in Me Read Online Free

that he hadn’t been able to regale her with stories of his bravery. He said, “I saw her long after the battle was over. She walked through the forest, sat down on a log, and looked out at the smoldering village. She said, ‘He’s dead. I want you to know that.’ I don’t know what she meant. She seemed to be staring down at two dead Water Hickory warriors.”
    “What did she look like?”
    He gestured uncertainly. “Tall, with long black hair. It was dark; I couldn’t see very well.”
    “What was she wearing?”
    “Nothing.”
    Wink paused, absorbing that. “Then what happened?”
    “I was thinking about killing her when a man ran out of the forest, gasped at the sight of her, and said, ‘What are you doing here?’ Then she said something like, ‘He was a fool. He defied our matron.’”
    “Did you recognize her?”
    “No. But, as I said, it was dark.”
    “What about her voice—had you heard it before?”
    Red Raven tilted his head. “Now that you mention it, there was something familiar about it, but I didn’t recognize it.”
    Hope reared like a wild animal inside Wink. Sora had been her best friend for twenty-five winters. Since the attack on Eagle Flute Village she had been desperate to know if Sora was alive or dead. She’d sent search parties out to comb the forests. She’d even hired a woman to pick through the ruins of Eagle Flute Village for any sign of Sora’s body. They’d found nothing.
    The woman Red Raven saw might have been Sora. It sounds like Sora.
    “What did the man do after she left?”

    Red Raven shrugged. “He went over to Short Tail’s body—though, at the time, I didn’t know it was Short Tail’s body—flipped him over, and said, ‘You fool, now who will tell our clan matron that I received her message?’”
    “What message?”
    “I don’t know! I didn’t deliver it.”
    The sound of the rain and the scents of soaked wood grew stronger.
    Red Raven added, “And I won’t even swear that’s what the man said. He was muttering. That’s what I thought he said.”
    “Did you know him?”
    “No, but he must be a member of Water Hickory Clan,” he answered a little too glibly. “Don’t you agree?”
    Feather Dancer thumped his war club into his open palm.
    Red Raven glanced up at him. “Then the man ran off after the woman, and I never saw either of them again.”
    “Why did you go over to the body?”
    He shrugged. “It looked odd.”
    “In what way?”
    “Well, for one thing, the man had a sash tied around his throat and his eyes were bulging out of his head.” Enthusiastically, he added, “The most interesting part was what the murderer had done—”
    “What do you mean, ‘murderer’? Short Tail had just attacked a village. He must have been killed in the battle.”
    Red Raven’s lips quirked into a semblance of a smile, showing his rotted front teeth. “That’s what I thought at first, but when I looked closer I saw that all of his belongings, his copper jewelry, his stiletto, bow and quiver, even his clothing had been arranged around him.”
    Wink sat back on the bench and stared at the ugly little man. “You mean like a Healing Circle?”

    Red Raven’s smile widened, as though pleased that she’d come to the same conclusion he had. “Curious, isn’t it? I can’t figure out why a murderer would—”
    “One last question,” Wink interrupted. “What was the message you were carrying to Short Tail?”
    Red Raven blanched. He looked up at Feather Dancer, then across at Long Fin. “High Matron, if Sea Grass ever finds out I told you—”
    “What was it?”
    Feather Dancer edged closer to Red Raven and searched his skull, as though trying to decide where to land his first blow.
    Red Raven hesitated before lifting both hands in surrender. “I was supposed to tell him that his next target was Fan Palm Village.”
    “Another Loon Nation village!” Long Fin burst out. “But the council voted against attacking any more Loon