Her sister’s hand grabbed her arm, holding her back, but the man on the shore kept talking in the honey voice, and she was sorely tempted.
“You can both join me. There’s nothing to fear. I’m as harmless as a marmot.”
“I wouldn’t go with you if you were a marmot talking to us. Shoo. Go away.”
“I’ll turn my back and you can put on your clothes. It’s just that I heard you before, shouting insults at the bear, and there is something you should know.”
S’ee wrenched free from Shax’saani. “I want to go. Nothing ever happens to me.” Drawing near, she whispered into her older sister’s ear, “Besides, have you ever seen such a man before?”
“A man is a man is a man. Don’t go, Dolly. What will I do without you?”
“He has cast a spell—”
“I will not let you go. I will send the Tlingit men after you.”
“No need to send out the search party, for I will be back by nightfall. Aren’t you the least bit curious about the world?”
They turned to the man, who stood with his back to them, as promised. He pawed the ground with one foot as if to keep his eyes from wandering back to the women. S’ee waded over and slipped into her clothes in one swift motion, the wetness of her skin already spreading patches where her body curved. From the cover of the stream, her sister watched, dumb and helpless, as S’ee climbed ashore and went to the man’s side, touching his arm to alert him to her presence. Glancing back once, she followed him into the brush, and when the leaves ceased moving, Shax’saani muttered a prayer that she might one day see her sister again. As she dressed and gathered their baskets, she heard Curly Tail and Chewing Ribs return from the opposite direction. The dogs worried the spot where the man had stood, noses mad at the scent, whimpering softly to each other.
With the point of an elbow, the old man caught my attention through my ribs. “Do you know,” he whispered, “the single biggest regret of old age?”
I glared at him, encouraging silence.
“It’s nothing to do with making more money or taking better care of the old body, nothing like that. The old folk say their biggest regret is not having taken more risks. Can you beat that?”
“Will you let her tell her story?”
“That girl wasn’t the least bit afraid.” He smiled and shook his head. “You’ve got to admire her chutzpah.”
Every step of the way, he hummed or sang to her, keeping two paces ahead through the dense woods and walking shoulder to shoulder as they crossed open land. The sun blazed in front of them as they began their journey, hung above their heads at their midday repast, and followed their backs as they climbed into higher country, the cedars tall and so thick that S’ee no longer smelled the salt water. She had never known the air without the sea, and its sweetness among the pines frightened her, but she marched on, enchanted by the man’s songs. They made camp when the sun dipped below the timberline, and while S’ee gathered dry sticks for the fire, the man disappeared into the brush. As she warmed her hands over the new blaze, she was startled by his return. He held up a rabbit by the hind legs and grinned at his own prowess. While the dinner cooked, he told her stories, starting with the traditional tales of how the Tlingit came into the world, but stranger stories, too: “The Man Who Killed His Sleep” and “The Salmon People” and, strangest of all, “The Woman Who Married an Octopus.”
“And it was the eight arms that convinced her to live under the sea and marry the octopus. Two arms to hold her feet, two to hold her hands.”
He circled her wrists with his fingers and then let her go.
“One arm to stroke her hair.”
She felt his hands comb her hair but averted her eyes from his.
“Two arms to hold her breasts.”
With the lightest touch, he cupped her breasts and smiled when she did not flinch. The crust of the rabbit skin blistered over the crackling fire. S’ee looked at his eyes. “And where went the eighth arm?”