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Article Excerpt
"WHEN YOU NEED FIRE," said Shadow-Below, "it won't bed warm April morning. Not like today is. You'll be stuck in the middle of some emptiness, lost and scared, and the weather's going to be miserable. If there isn't rain, there will be snow. And your hands are going to feel like claws. And if there's dry tinder within a hundred miles, you'll feel blessed." Then, after a grim little laugh, he told his new class, "When you look at me, you're seeing years of practice and practical experience. And now I'm going to show you the very best way to create a spark."
With a flourish, he unfastened his shirt pocket and pulled out a fully charged laser-lighter.
Some students laughed, while others, probably expecting some treasured piece of flint, looked mildly disappointed. But these were not stupid people, and with a single nod to modern realities, the teacher had won himself a little more respect.
Shadow-Below was kneeling--a handsome fellow with an athletic body and thick black hair tied into a short ponytail. "Making your spark is just one conundrum," he pointed out. "You can have ten lasers in your pocket, but without a self-sustaining blaze, your first night in the wild is going to kill you."
That brought thoughtful silence.
A tall, big-shouldered kid was standing in back, conspicuously ignoring the lesson. What mattered to him was a certain girl with pretty features and cascading hair. He turned to her now, winking in a smug, hopeful way.
The girl ignored the flirting, her green eyes focused entirely on their teacher. "But should fire be my first worry?" she asked.
Sitting in the front row was the boy's father--a big fellow named Porter; a billionaire who had made his fortune building robots. "I know I'd want a good campfire," Porter said.
The billionaire's wife was a pretty woman with red hair and a fondness for tight clothes. She poked Porter in the ribs, in warning. When he turned, he noticed that it was the green-eyed girl who was talking.
He instantly closed his mouth.
Everyone was staring at the youngster, waiting.
She pretended not to notice. "If we could first build a shelter," she offered, "then we'd have someplace safe for our fire."
The adults were people of consequence, with money and responsibilities in the civilized world. But when that particular fifteen-year-old girl spoke about shelter, they wanted to believe her. It showed in their faces, in their postures. Shadow-Below had never seen such a show. Plainly, her opinions could not be ignored.
"But fire would be what?" asked Porter. "Next on the list, right?"
"If you can build one," said Shadow-Below with an agreeable shrug.
"But when it comes to life-and-death matters, I'm a pragmatist. If you don't have tinder or dry wood, or if you lack the necessary skills...well, you're going to need a good shelter. And if there's more than one of you, you'll be sharing body heat, too."
Every student took a moment, picturing the person with whom they would like to cuddle.
Porter's wife stared at Shadow-Below.
Shadow-Below held out the guts of last year's milkweed. For a few minutes, he spoke about the merits of matches and flint and magnifying glasses. Then he listed the tinder that might work in even the wettest weather: paper birch bark and oak leaves, and even the lint from a warm navel. The red-haired wife constantly stared at him. Every class had one student who showed feelings for him. Most were women, and if there was a husband, he was usually somewhere far away. But this admirer was braver than most, sitting close beside her millionaire and giving Shadow-Below an eager, longing grin.
Ginger was her name, wasn't it?
He continued lecturing about fire, and soon only Ginger and the green-eyed girl were paying close attention. The other students didn't quite believe there would come a day when ancient skills like making fire and building huts would matter. These were modern souls who had paid a tidy sum for a weeklong distraction. They could afford to let their bored minds drift. And Shadow-Below could only imagine what these strangers might be thinking about.
Pausing, he looked across the grassy yard. Half a dozen vehicles were parked beside an abandoned one-room schoolhouse. The oldest car--a simple green Mercedes--came with a bodyguard who sat on the hood, watching the class and the bright sky and sometimes staring across an open landscape that was quickly returning to prairie.
"Can't you make fire with a bow?" Ginger wondered aloud. "I've seen demonstrations. A person threads some stick through the string and moves his bow back and forth, igniting tinder inside a piece of grooved wood." She winked at him, nothing playful in her expression. "Can you do that kind of magic...?"
"No," Shadow-Below replied. "I can't do that."
The confession brought everyone's eyes back to him.
"And I should warn you," Shadow-Below continued, "I don't like the word 'magic.' It always comes before spells and spirits, and that sort of fuzziness. And those things don't exist in this world."
The declaration came with its own heat.
"Besides," he continued, "those friction techniques are exceptionally hard work. They usually do nothing but waste energy. When you don't have any choice except to rub two sticks together, believe me, you're damned lucky to have fire at the end of the day...."
He let his voice trail away.
Then the green-eyed girl spoke up.
"Is that really true?" she asked with a soft, thoroughly disappointed voice. "You don't believe in spells and spirits?"
ON A GIVEN DAY, Shadow-Below was never sure what he believed in. He lived in a trailer perched high above the Loup River. Every day, an automated postal clerk delivered mail to somebody named Conrad Shadow-Below. But despite the Visa bills and offers for exotic cruises, and the insurance solicitations and trade publications from survival schools ... despite a relentless paper trail proving that Conrad was real, he wasn't. He was a fiction and a fraud, and worse, he was a fraud built upon another person who had never really existed either.
For most of his life, Shadow-Below lived outside this century--and beyond the last century too. He grew up among an isolated band of Lakota half-bloods, in a Sand Hills pasture they called the World. Why they lived in that place and what they hoped to accomplish there ... well, those were mysteries. And Shadow-Below had little patience for mysteries. But it took a lot of hard thought and pain before he'd found the courage to walk away from his old life. Alone, he entered this world with the single goal of becoming normal--a legal citizen of a great civilization. He embraced the name "Conrad" and found work where he could, saving up his subsistence wages until he had enough capital to start a little business where he might make a comfortable living. Teaching wilderness crafts to a succession of wealthy souls: What else could he do in this world and do half as well?
On a cold, soggy day in February--a day when fires would be difficult to build but very welcome--Shadow-Below walked to his mailbox and pulled out a thin collection of envelopes. Bills, mostly. And to the girl down the road, he asked, "What are you doing, miss?"
The girl was standing beside a plum thicket.
He looked at her face, sighed, and tucked his mail into his jacket. The rain was cold but windless. He was free to just walk away. If he treated her like an apparition, maybe she would vanish. But that was hoping for too much, which was why he took the trouble of saying, "You don't want to be here, miss."
Robert Reed introduced us to the Lakota Indian boy Raven and his world in "Raven Dream" in our Dec. 2001 issue. Subsequent stories in this series include "Buffalo Wolf" (March 2003), "The Condor's Green-Eyed Child" (Aug. 2004), and "Less Than Nothing" (Jan. 2006). This new tale takes a hard look at the future and the ways of the haves and the have-nots.
"You're right, I don't," she said. She was holding one of his brochures --smart-paper filled with pretty images of the wild prairie and promises of a unique experience. Not for the first time, she asked, "Why won't you let me take a class? That's what I want to know."
"As I told you, miss. I'm not the teacher you want."
"But I need to learn," she said. "I got myself into trouble last year--"
"You've explained that already."
"You're perfect for me."
"I gave you three names, and I told you who's the best of the lot. And that's what you deserve. Nothing but the best."
He was trying to drive her off with compliments.
But she responded by stepping closer, halving the distance between them. "Those other teachers don't live here," she said. "You do, and this is the country I have to understand." Her bright eyes were staring at him. Farther down the road was the green sedan and a man dressed in black--a dark Hispanic fellow, judging by his appearance. His stance was protective, alert and serious. He was watching his young charge pursuing what to him must have seemed like an insane adventure.
"Miss--" Shadow-Below began.
"Mara," she corrected him.
"I keep giving you my answer, Mara. No, I won't take you." He shook his head, adding, "I'm the teacher here, and I'm the one who decides who sits in my classroom."
"I'll pay ten times your usual tuition," she promised. That was twice her last offer.
"Isn't that enough?" she asked.
Shadow-Below didn't answer. Instead, he shook his head, explaining, "I do agree with you. You need to know how to survive in the wild. But that's why you should hire the best and get individual lessons. Fly in that woman from Fairbanks. She's going to help you a lot more than I ever could."
"But I've done research," Mara said. "And you're the expert I want."
"I'm booked up for this year," he countered. "You'd have to join one of my regular classes."
"Fine."
"No. Not fine." Frowning, he said, "A lot of my students think they have money. But I'm sorry to tell you, in terms of wealth, you're in a completely different category."
"My father is," she blurted. "Not me."
"If you say so."
She was a pretty girl--no, she was beautiful--and she stepped even closer to him, using a pleading smile and her looks. Probably unconsciously using them, because she didn't seem the type to flirt for favors. "I don't want that woman from Fairbanks, and I don't want the man from New Jersey either. I want you."
"Why?"
She glanced back at her bodyguard.
"Give me a fresh reason," he said. "A better reason."
"I remember you," she replied. "From before, when you worked security at the City.... I would see you walking by the river. You'd make your rounds, and from a distance, I could tell that you were seeing everything. Hearing everything. More than the rest of us, you looked as if you actually belonged there."
Shadow-Below hesitated, and then asked, "How old are you?"
"Fourteen," she said. "In a month, I'm fifteen."
"Do you really want to know why, Mara? Why I won't take you?"
Her shoulders slumped. "Tell me."
"It's your father," he said.
She dipped her eyes, chewing on a lip.
"He scares me, Mara. I don't want to be responsible for his only daughter, particularly while she's a minor."
She had no quick response.
"Besides," he added, "I don't think Daddy would be happy to learn that his little girl is outside the house of a one-time security guard, waiting for him to come get his mail."
Her gaze lifted. "Do you even know my father?"
Very carefully, Shadow-Below said nothing.
"How much would you need to let me take your next class? Because if you do, I can make it so you don't have to work again in your life."
The rain kept on falling, and Shadow-Below had a jacket full of bills, and he could see that this young woman wasn't going to stop chasing what she wanted. So finally, with a despairing sigh, he said, "Yes," and then added, "But you'll pay just the usual tuition. I'll make an eleventh slot for you--"
"My friend has to come along," she interrupted, gesturing at the bodyguard. "Dad's going to insist on that. But I'll pay for him too."
"Does your friend want to take my class?"
"I can ask him, if you want."
"If you want."
"Not particularly, no," she replied.
"We have three nights and four...
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