The Year of Rice and Salt

The Bear Wolf Beaver Turtle team pressed forward again, pushing at the new player. But one of their passes came too near Fromwest, who snagged it out of the air while leaping over a fallen man. He flipped it to Doshoweh and all converged on the youngster, who looked frightened and vulnerable; but he had the presence of mind to make a long toss downfield, back to Fromwest, already running at full speed. Fromwest caught the toss and everyone took off in pursuit of him. But it seemed he had an extra turn of speed he had never yet revealed, for no one could catch up to him before he reached the eastern gate, and after a feint with body and bat he spun and fired the ball past the guardian and far into the woods, to end the match.

The crowd erupted with cheers. Hats and bags of tobacco filled the air and rained down on the field. The contestants lay flat on their backs, then rose and gathered in a great hug, overseen by the referees.

Afterwards Fromwest sat on the lakeshore with the others. 'What a relief,' he said. 'I was getting tired.' He allowed some of the women to wrap his head wound in an embroidered cloth, and thanked them, face lowered.

In the afternoon the younger ones played the game of throwing javelins through a rolling hoop. Fromwest was invited to try it, and he agreed to make one attempt. He stood very still, and threw with a gentle motion, and the javelin flew through the hoop, leaving it rolling on. Fromwest bowed and gave up his place. 'I played that game when I was a boy,' he said. 'It was part of the training to become a warrior, what we called a samurai. What the body learns it never forgets.'

Iagogeh witnessed this exhibit, and went to her husband Keeper of the Wampum. 'We should invite Fromwest to tell us more about his country,' she said to him. He nodded, frowning a little at her interference as he always did, even though they had discussed every aspect of the league's affairs, every day for forty years. That was the way Keeper was, irritable and glowering; but all because the league meant so much to him, so that Iagogeh ignored his demeanour. Usually.

The feast was readied and they set to. As the sun dropped into the forest the fires roared bright in the shadows, and the ceremonial ground between the four cardinal fires became the scene of hundreds of people filing past the food, filling their bowls with spiced hominy and corncakes, bean soup, cooked squash, and roasted meat of deer, elk, duck and quail. Things grew quiet as people ate. After the main course came popcorn and strawberry jelly sprinkled with maple sugar, usually taken more slowly, and a great favourite with the children.

During this sunset feast Fromwest wandered the grounds, a goose drumstick in hand, introducing himself to strangers and listening to their stories, or answering their questions. He sat with his team mates' families and recalled the triumphs of the day on the lacrosse field. 'That game is like my old job,' he said. 'In my country warriors fight with weapons like giant needles. I see you have needles, and some guns. These must have come from one of my old brothers, or the people who come here from over your eastern sea.'

They nodded. Foreigners from across the sea had established a forti fied village down on the coast, near the entrance of the big bay at the mouth of the East River. The needles had come from them, as well as tomahawk blades of the same substance, and guns.

'Needles are very valuable,' Iagogeh said. 'just ask Needle breaker.'

People laughed at Needle breaker, who grinned with embarrassment.

Fromwest said, 'The metal is melted out of certain rocks, red rocks that have the metal mixed in them. If you make a fire hot enough, in a big clay oven, you could make your own metal. The right kind of rocks are just south of your league's land, down in the narrow curved valleys.' He drew a rough map on the ground with a stick.

Two or three of the sachems were listening along with Iagogeh. Fromwest bowed to them. 'I mean to speak to the council of sachems about these matters.'

'Can a clay oven hold fires hot enough?' Iagogeh asked, inspecting the big leatherpunch needle she kept on one of her necklaces.

'Yes. And the black rock that burns, burns as hot as charcoal. I used to make swords myself. They're like scythes, but longer. Like blades of grass, or lacrosse bats. As long as the bats, but edged like a tomahawk or a blade of grass, and heavy, sturdy. You learn to swing them right' he swished a hand backhanded before them – 'and off with your head. No one can stop you.'

Everyone in earshot was interested in this. They could still see him whipping his bat around him, like an elm seed spinning down on the wind.

'Except a man with a gun,' the Mohawk sachem Sadagawadeh, Even Tempered, pointed out.

'True. But the important part of the guns are tubes of the same metal.'

Sadagawadeh nodded, very interested now. Fromwest bowed.