Killer

Job nodded back, and began to speak: “Long ago, at the beginning of all, there lived in a hut by the seashore the girl Sedna, her father Angusta, and her great dog. They lived there a life of ease and plenty, for the Inua, that is to say the spirits, of the sea were good to them and the fishes were plentiful and fat. Now as Sedna grew in years, she grew also in beauty and soon the young men would come to her hut with gifts of ivory, bone and amber, with lucky stones and love. And they would say to her: ‘Sedna, I bring gifts which took great finding and love which will never die. Come with me now and be my wife.’ But Sedna always said to them, ‘No.’

“At first she said this because she loved her father more than she loved any of the young men, and she would not be tempted away from him even by fat love-figures carved from the teeth of bears; but later she said ‘No’ because she loved to see the longing unfulfilled in their faces and she would wait with excitement to see what wonders they would bring to her the next time they came courting. So the name of Sedna became known through Innuit for her beauty and for her cruelty, and many came to her hopeful but went away from her sad.

“Then one day, as she sat by the seashore, thinking nothing of suitors, and talking with the Inua of the stones, there came towards her a man in a kayak. Such was his paddling that he seemed to come up from the ocean and down from the sky. Such was his beauty that the sun grew dim, for his hair was the silver of dull pearls and his skin was ivory gold. His nose was large, but beautifully shaped, and his eyes were black as the winter’s night.

“He called to Sedna saying, ‘Sedna, come with me.’ And Sedna, looking on him loved him, but she said to him, ‘What will you give me as a courting gift?’ And the man with the pearl-grey hair said, ‘This will I give you if you will promise to be mine.’ He held up for her to see a necklace made of amber beads such as she had never seen before.

“ ‘Then what will you give me as a bridal gift?’ asked greedy Sedna. ‘These I will give you as a bridal gift,’ said the man with ivory skin. And he held up for her to see ten fat love-figures made from the teeth of great white bears.

“Then was Sedna tempted to go with him in his silver-sided kayak, and this he saw with his eyes as black as the long winter’s night. So he said, ‘Fairest Sedna, whose name is known through all the Lands, if you will come with me now to my kingdom over the sea, I will give you these lucky stones which will keep you from all harm.’ And he held up two grey stones which danced with magic in his hands, and such was the power of the stones that all the Inua of the stones upon Sedna’s beach fell silent.

“Then Sedna called to the beautiful stranger, ‘I will come with you.’ So he brought his kayak close to the shore, and Sedna went with him.

“Far and far he paddled to his kingdom over the sea, and all the time proud Sedna knelt behind him, counting her amber beads. And so, after many days and nights they came to a rocky shore, black and tall with cliffs.

“ ‘Where is this?’ asked Sedna.

“ ‘It is my kingdom,’ said her husband.

“ ‘It is a cold, forbidding place,’ said Sedna, putting away her fat love-figures made from the teeth of the great white bears.

“ ‘It is your home,’ said her husband.

“ ‘But where is your hut, my husband, that I might make fire and cook for you?’

“And her husband pointed to a high cliff ledge and said, ‘That is where I make my abode.’

“ ‘I see no wood to make fire,’ she said to her magic stones.

“Then her husband cried in a high strange voice, ‘I need no fires, Sedna, my wife, for I eat my fish as I catch them and my feathers keep me warm.’ And as he said these words, the beautiful prince rose out of the kayak and spread his wings in the sky, for he had become a fulmar petrel. Then was Sedna torn with sadness and fear, for the beautiful prince she loved was thus revealed to be a Kokksaut: a powerful and terrible spirit he was, who roamed the skies on the wings of a bird and almost never came to land. Then Sedna cried out in her grief. Loud and long she cried, but nobody heard or came. And her spirit husband quartered the sky, searching for distant game.

“Now Sedna’s father, who loved his daughter as surely as she loved him, was made most sad and lonely by her absence. So he said to himself, ‘I think it strange that Sedna has sent me no word since she went away. I will go and find her myself,’ and left his hut and went. Many and many the days and dangers he met, and braved, and left, until one day in the distance he saw a seashore tall with cliffs, and he heard a voice which wept.