Spirit Hunter Read Free Page A

after all. Will he be at the lakeshore again? He spends a lot of time by the water now.
It’s the gateway to the World Below,
I think, and the relief drains away, replaced by cold dread. There will come a day when Tulan is not here, when he will never come back. There will come a day when I am the only shaman.
    I must get away before Mama asks me to help her make the yogurt. If I’m asked to watch someone’s squalling baby or fetch water, the day will shrink before me in a muddle of chatter and tea-drinking and skinning hares for the pot. I will have to go without being seen – the skill I love dearest. Why – because it has nothing to do with my fate as shaman, or because it is so much fun? I don’t know, but here I go, anyhow.
    I run headlong through the camp, right past my cousin Shemi as he walks lazily to his mother’s tent, trailing his feet, and he does not see me. I run past Otem and his small sister walking hand-in-hand to the lakeshore to fill buckets of water. Not one of them sees me. I am a shadow, a breath of wind. I am free. The chat and hum of camp fades as I reach the lakeshore trees. It is cooler here. I can go anywhere; I can do anything.
    “Asena!”
    I freeze.
Curses.
It is Mama, coming out of Aunt Zaka’s tent. I sigh. Mama is the only one who can ever spot me once I’ve chosen not to be seen.
    I go to her, shrugging. “What?”
    Mama rests one long-fingered hand against the side of my face. Her touch is cool, but her spirit-horse is skittery, dancing around her shoulders like a freshly kindled flame, glowing with silver light. Much as she might try to hide it, Mama is always touched by fear when Baba goes away trading. “Where are you going in such a rush, my cub?” she says, speaking in Anglish. “What about the yogurt? Am I to make it alone again?”
    Looking back at camp, I watch as Yan and Tela emerge from his mother’s tent, hand-in-hand, each carrying an empty pail. They have been milking together. It is enough to make you spew. Sometimes it is so hard to swallow my jealousy. It’s not that I want Yan – Tela is welcome to him.
I just wish—
Oh, it is useless to think of it.
    “Well?” Mama says.
    I reply in the tongue of the Tribes. I don’t like speaking Anglish: I am set out as different already. I cannot love; I cannot hunt. I am shaman. I do not like being reminded of my foreign blood. “Tulan has woken. I must find him.”
    Mama sighs. I hate it when my mother looks at me like this, as if she sees another in my place. “Sometimes you put me in mind of my brother, with all this sneaking around, not being spotted by anyone save me,” she says. “And I don’t like it—”
    “Your brother, the greatest thief in Constantinople?” I cut in. “Don’t fear, Mama. I’m not sneaking to steal, only because I can’t move without being given another task, and I must speak to Tulan—”
    This time Mama cuts me off. “I know it,” she says, glancing at Yan and Tela, who have stopped and set down their buckets near the great fire. Tela is standing on the tips of her toes, shiny black plaits hanging down her back, whispering into Yan’s ear. Yan smiles. I glimpse a flash of sadness in Mama’s eyes. “You carry more burdens than most girls your age. Asena, I know the rules are hard to bear, but never forget that being shaman is a gift as well. And one thing I have learned is that nothing good comes from dishonesty.” She smiles. “Perhaps you should try asking for help every now and then. Shemi and little Aza can make the yogurt with me this morning. Now, go to Tulan in peace.”
    Mama is forever reminding me how much I love her.
    Here he is, Shaman Tulan, sitting beneath a mulberry tree just a few paces from the lake’s edge. He stares into the fire, wrinkled, dry old hands hanging loose in his lap. A pile of bones sits on the dusty earth before him, next to a bowl full of charred twigs and ash – I catch the smell of burnt juniper and the warmth of thyme.
    Tulan