excerpt
“You mean animals come willingly to you to be killed?”
“No animal will come on purpose to our hunting grounds. Like us, they want to
live free. The coyote is very clever. If you catch a coyote in a snare, no other coyote
will come. A coyote sees death. He will stay away. We do not eat coyote.”
“Why hunt the coyote if you do not eat him?”
“Coyote is a trickster. Sometimes he will run through a flock of baby geese and
kill for the sport of killing. He does not eat his kill. Some men are like Coyote. They
care more about themselves than about Mother Earth.”
“I know.” Ari thought of Illska and Hrafen.
“Coyote does not give himself for food. He is a hunter. Coyote lives to be free.”
Ari nodded enthusiastically. “You knew about the sheep we held enclosed, and
you did not hunt them.”
“You are right, my brother. Now you understand. They were not free. They had no
spirit. We were sad for them but did not interfere.”
“And the ram Grey Wolf killed on his first hunt had regained his freedom in the
forest when he came to Grey Wolf,” said Ari, with excitement, “So he died like a warrior
in battle. Now I understand.”
With the advent of warm weather, the Native women removed the strips of chestnut
bark that lined the Native lodges and replaced them with tightly woven reed
mats attached to sets of arched poles. A fire burned constantly in the middle of
each home with smoke venting through a hole in the centre, rather like the homes
in Éirinn, though the latter were mostly covered with sod. Low beds lay on raised
platforms around the edge, piled with mats and furs. Hemp bags and boxes made of
bark hung from the rafters. Food was always available in pots of corn and bean mash,
mixed with vegetables and dried fish. The women crushed dried maize and baked it
into nokake bread, sweet and hearty. All around, families were close and loving and
several lodges housed extended families of fifteen or more members.
Rordan and Ula sat each day with Corn Mother, learning the identity and uses of
countless herbs and roots and where to find them. They learned how to make poultices
to draw infection from burns and flesh wounds and about various medicinal
powders made from roots and the bark of trees. They learned to apply herbs in paste
and steam to bring down fevers. Ula’s language also began to change; swearing less
often and speaking more softly.
Corn Mother had healing skills far beyond anything Rordan had ever learned in
the monastery. Brother Rordan had wanted to study medicine after the Novitiate,
but had been forbidden to do so by the abbot, Father Gofraidh. He’d never accepted
that decision. Composing poetry was also forbidden so he studied and wrote in secret.
Only when Gofraidh left for Iona, was Brother Rordan finally accepted as an
occasional healer and poet.
One day, Father Finten approached Rordan to remind him of his vow of chastity.
“My dear Brother, do you not think you are spending too much time with this Native
woman? I am afraid you might be imperilling your soul by so much contact.”
Rordan’s chest heaved. He breathed heavily and shook his head. “
Libros Libertad 