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meal,” K’os told her as she chose branches from the woodpile.
    “You are a woman who thinks further than her belly,” Gull Beak said, and K’os smiled. Perhaps she liked Gull Beak.
    “Since I was a child, all things have been given to me,” K’os said. “Now, life is not easy. What good is a woman who is slave? The first hard winter, she is given to the wind so her food can be eaten by someone else. But I have been trained as a healer, and I have noticed that there is no healer in this village.”
    “Blue Flower,” Gull Beak said. She gave a bowl to K’os, then filled her own and gestured toward the boiling bag. “Do not take too much. My husband will want some later.”
    K’os had been watching Gull Beak, knew how seldom Fox Barking came to the woman’s lodge, but if he had given her moose meat the day before, perhaps he would expect to share some of her stew. She filled her bowl only half full, though she was hungry and her body craved fat.
    “Blue Flower is not a healer,” K’os said.
    Gull Beak flicked her fingers into the wind. “Surely you did not come here just to tell me that.”
    “I want to be the healer in this village.”
    Gull Beak laughed. “You think they will trust you, a slave from the Cousin River People? You think they will take your medicines? You could kill as easily as heal.”
    “That is why I have come to you.”
    Gull Beak tilted her head, arched an eyebrow.
    “What if I taught you the medicines, and you gave them to the people?”
    “Why would you do that?”
    “With the trade goods you got in exchange, you would buy me from Black Mouth. I would work with you as healer until the people began to trust me. Then perhaps there would be some hunter who wanted me as wife, once he sees I do not carry bad luck.”
    “How do I know I can trust your medicines? What if you do this only to get revenge?”
    “I will take every medicine myself before we give it to anyone.”
    Gull Beak raised her bowl of meat and ate until the bowl was empty.
    When she finished, she smacked her lips in appreciation, then said, “I have food. I have a husband. I am honored in this village for the parkas I make. I do not want to be a healer.”
    “I have seen your parkas,” K’os said. “They are beautiful. It is sad that you do not have a slave. Then you would not have to work so hard to keep traplines and catch salmon. You would have more time to sew.”
    K’os ate the last of her meat, stood and politely thanked Gull Beak for the food. “I am going now,” she said in the traditional River farewell. “Two Fist will be wondering where I am.” And as she left, K’os said, “It is good at least that your husband is not a lazy man. It is good that Fox Barking always brings you much meat.”
    She walked away with a smile on her face.
    THE COUSIN RIVER VILLAGE
    After Day Woman died, Sok went to Red Leaf’s birth lodge. She had killed before. What would stop her from killing again? How better to get revenge than to kill Sok’s mother?
    He called to her, and when there was no answer, he pulled aside the doorflap, saw Cries-loud alone inside, the boy curled into a tight ball. Sok sighed his relief when, at his touch, his son sprang to his feet.
    “She is gone, and she took our sister,” Cries-loud said before Sok could speak. “She left during the night. I brought her food and the baby. I don’t care what you do to me. I could not let you kill my mother.”
    Sok closed his eyes. Red Leaf. The woman had caused him more sorrow than anyone should have to bear. She had killed his grandfather, now had stolen his daughter, had probably killed his mother as well. Who else would do such a thing?
    Had Red Leaf taken no thought of the curse she had put on the boy, his oldest living son? Sleeping in this lodge, a place drenched in birth blood, could draw away his hunting powers for his whole life. And Sok was here, too, cursing himself, just as his son had been cursed.
    “Come with me. We should not be