PROLOGUE Read Online Free Page B

in the making of the child she's growing in her belly. The tribe elders agreed that if I work seven seasons of labor for them, then I can be named as the child's father and share a house in the village with her."
    She couldn't imagine what he saw in her expression, but he went on quickly, leaping from what he knew to what he thought. Each word made her more sick at heart and more humiliated.
    "You needn't think I'll shirk my duties as Walking One. I know what's due to my people. But there's no reason I can't do both. I can still walk the looms and labor here, for she's a good woman, is Wren, and I love her."
    Horribly, she began to cry, silent tears washing down her face although she wanted anything but to be seen crying.
    "Adica! Yours is the most generous of hearts, and the bravest! knew you would be happy for me despite your own sorrow!" Glancing toward Falling-down, he frowned in the way of someone thinking through a decision that's been troubling him.” Now, listen, for you know how dear to me you are in my heart, Adica. I know it's ill luck to speak of it, that it's tempting the spirits, but I wanted you to know that if the child is born a girl and she lives and is healthy, we'll call her after you. Your name will live on, not just in the songs of the tribe but in my child."
    "I am happy for your good fortune," said Adica hoarsely through her tears.
    "Adica!" Falling-down spoke her name sharply as he looked up from the fishing spear, his attention caught by her lie. She fled.
    Falling-down could see into her secret heart because of the link that bound them when they worked the weaving together, and anyway, she hadn't truly come to see him. She had hoped a wild and irresponsible hope, she'd turned the night wind into a false riddle, and now she'd spent her magic and her time on a fool's journey, a selfish detour. She was ashamed.
    She ran down through the woodland, not wanting to be seen in the village. Dorren yelled after her, but she ignored him. She came down to the shore of the fens and splashed out through the cranberry bog. Berries shone deeply red along the water, almost ripe. She got wet to the thighs but managed to get out to the track without meeting anyone except a boy trolling for fish with hook and line. Farther out on the track, two women hauling a net out of the water called to her, but she couldn't understand their words. It seemed to her that all of human intercourse was slowly receding from her, one link severed, another warm hand torn from her grasp, one by one, until she would face the great working alone except for the other six, Falling-down, Two Fingers, Shu-Sha, Spits-last, Horn, and Brightness-Hears-Me. They were a tribe unto themselves now: the ones severed from the rest of humankind. They were the sacrifice through which the human tribes would be freed from fear.
    The clouds broke up, and by the time she reached the island of the stone loom, she had only a short while to wait for sunset. Whatever Falling-down might have thought of her behavior, he was too old to walk out here on a whim. He would not follow and importune her with embarrassing questions. Would Dorren follow her? Did she want him to now that she knew he would find happiness with someone else while she remained alone? Not that she begrudged him happiness, not at all. She had hoped, in the end, for a little for herself as well. But twilight came, and she remained alone. As always, the
    working had slipped the course of days around her. By the position of the Bounteous One in the sky, she guessed that she had lost two days in the last passage, although it had seemed like only one instant to her.
    That was the price those who walked the looms paid: that days and sometimes months were ripped from them when they stepped onto the passageways that led between the looms. But perhaps it was better to lose a day or three of loneliness.
    The stone loom, seven stones set in an oblique circle, awaited her as darkness fell and the first stars