Hot Cannons & Warm Lovers Ch. 02

Some children could do almost anything because their mothers were often busy or didn't care as much. Ayashe could do almost anything because her mother did care so much. Ayashe knew it because her mother had told her this. Unlike many of the girls that she knew, Ayashe was often sent on errands for her mother and they most often had nothing to do with fetching a little of this herb or that plant for dinner. She was often sent to speak directly to an adult to pass on a message because Kiwidinok knew that Ayashe could be trusted to do it clearly and with respect.

It also had the added benefit of getting her daughter to be known among the other adults -- something which would pay dividends later in her life.

She didn't want to speak to Étienne yet. That could wait. The way that she saw it, if this had been the other way around, she wouldn't have wanted to hear anything from him since he'd only be saying it because he'd been told to. It hadn't happened yet, but she knew that he was at least that smart.

She saw Nehaseemo holding Jean-Luc's bow and looking a little puzzled, so she wandered over and sat down.

He looked over in a minute, "Neh?" He smiled a little, "The fire is little too high to jump over today, Ayashe?"

She nodded, looking glum, "Mother is angry."

He nodded, "I know it. I could hear some words from here."

"Are you angry with me, Nehaseemo?"

"No. I understand the same as your mother understands. I try to see it as you do, but I think that you must see it as my son does as well. I am a man with two women," he said, "If you think about it, you can see that I walk on ice sometimes. I also now have a daughter and a son and one does not see the other, while the other wishes to see the first and is ignored. He tries to take nothing from you.

I will hunt soon," he said, "It was my thought to take my children with me; one to begin to learn and the other to learn more than she knows -- and to maybe show her father some good places for it. But I think that I cannot take either one.

Étienne needs it more, so that he can begin to learn and grow into having a father. He has never had one, not as you have, though now you have only me," he smiled to her.

"But I cannot take him alone because it would make my daughter feel left outside. I cannot take you alone because it would make him feel even worse than he feels now. He has never had our ways in his life until now and he would not understand."

He stopped there and sat in silence for a moment and then he looked over to her again. "Kiwidinok tells me that you are wise for such a young one. How would you advise me?"

Ayashe was only a girl of seven, but she knew what this was. She took a moment to consider, not wanting to appear childish and then she said, "I think that I can show you places where Uncle has taken me before, and I think that my brother needs to learn just as you have said. I think that your daughter must learn when to be a sister and that does not mean as a little brat. So you should take both and they will learn to work together."

She looked over at Nehaseemo and she knew what was coming then. There would be the test of her conviction and not only her words.

"I think that my new daughter is as wise as the young girl that I had as a friend when she was only your age" he smiled, nodding.

"I will take both of my new children. You can tell your brother."

She jumped at him and squeezed him as hard as she could. There was no one around to see her affectionate display, so ...

"Eyah," he groaned, "No so tightly, Ayashe. The world grows dim when you hug my neck like that."

She laughed and then she sat down right next to him, feeling much better for having navigated the rapids successfully.

"Now," he began as he held up the unusual recurve bow, "tell me what you know of this strange thing."

Ayashe related what Jean-Luc had told her about it and why he'd said that it was shaped in that way. In Europe it was a strange thing, but it had come to Jean-Luc in a shipment once and after he'd tried it and gotten used to its heavy draw, he swore by it for those hunts where he used a bow.

Nehaseemo had grown used to using a musket like many of his people, but he'd always excelled at using the bow. He selected an arrow and stood up, aiming at a tree, but expecting at least his first shot to be lost in the lake behind it.

The draw weight came to him as unusually heavy and it surprised him. He wouldn't want to have to shoot it all day long, he decided. But when he released, the arrow stood quivering in the wood of the tree trunk and he was amazed when he went to draw it out. It took a while.

Ayashe ran off to tell Étienne, though she slowed as she got to where she'd last seen him, not wanting to appear excited or overly friendly at all. But he wasn't there. She walked on until she heard the sounds of voices.

Coming around a bend in the path, she saw two older boys with Étienne. One look at his face was enough to tell that this was about to become the beating of the day and it had already begun. One boy held Étienne and the other stood with his fists balled as he threw insults and taunts. Étienne was the youngest one there by a couple of years and it was plain that he'd already been hit a few times.

"Leave him alone. You don't have anything better to do?" She asked.

"Mind your business, Ayashe," the larger one said, "I don't care what you do; just go away before some of what we give to your lover comes to you too. Why are you asking anyway?"

"Because I'm asking," she said, "Let go of him. He did nothing to you."

Étienne was pushed down and the other boy held him down, turning his head, "I'm going to knock the snot out of his nose for him again."

"Étienne," Ayashe said, "Hit him. You won't get in trouble. You should protect yourself. Go on and --"

Ayashe was knocked down by the other boy, "I warned you. You should remember that you're a girl."

Étienne grabbed the shirt of the boy who held him and he lunged upward, lowering his head. He caught the boy just as he was looking back and he felt the hands on him go slack, so he did it again as hard as he could and then he was free.

You couldn't tell by looking at him, but Étienne's time doing all of the chores which were asked of him, like hauling water for his two mothers, and all of that time spent slowly practicing with a long three pound sword had given him a little more strength than most would have given him credit for. He didn't think about it in any way.

But now he was putting it to use as he rolled forward onto his knees. Then it wasn't Étienne on the ground this time. After the crying began, he hit the boy a few times more and the boy was doing his best to cover his face with his arms. Then Étienne was running at the larger boy.

Ayashe was just fighting her way clear, wanting to rip the boy's eyes out, along with his hair when Étienne reached her. The boy sailed over the ground after Étienne tackled him and he landed on his face. The next thing that he knew, Étienne had him rolled over and the quiet blonde kid that everybody loved to pick on was dishing it out with his fists.

Something had let go in the boy and everything was coming out now.

The other boy tried to get his hands up, but Étienne slammed both of his balled fists against the other boy's chest, winding him and the arms had no strength then, so Étienne went back to trying to turn the kid into a wet spot on the ground. Ayashe couldn't believe it.

She stepped over, "Étienne, you should stop now.

Stop, Étienne."

Étienne looked up for a moment and then he got off the boy in the dirt to stand shaking as he watched the larger boy cry. "I think my ribs a -- are brok -- brok -- en. Leave me alone!"

"I don't think so," Ayashe said, and then she kicked him. "That's for hitting me."

She looked over at the other one still on the ground and she stamped her foot. It caused him to cringe in fear.

"Get up and run!" she yelled.

And he did.

"Are you alright, Étienne?"

He nodded with a heavy sigh, "My nose is bleeding again."

"Mine too," she said as she tried to smile, "Come on, Lover," she said loud enough to that it could be heard by the two other boys as she took his hand and led him away.

--------------------------

"Here," Ayashe said as she handed Étienne a handful of grass that she'd pulled out, "Use this on your nose and lean forward a little, so you don't get blood on your shirt. It'll leave a mark and that smelly bottom will have something to crow about every time he sees it."

She did the same as they sat on a log not far from their home.

"He wears a lot of his blood on his shirt now," Étienne said, "I do not think that he'll say a word." He looked over at Ayashe as she held out more grass.

"Thanks," he said, taking it to hold against his face just as she did.

"Why did you do that?" she asked, "You let them hit you, just like all of the other times since they started in on you, and then, ... Eyah, Étienne -- it was like seeing someone else suddenly."

"I saw him hit you," the boy said.

"It made you mad because he hit a girl?"

He shook his head, "No. He hit you. I know you can fight, but it made me mad. Why did you try to stop them?"

"I never saw them picking on you before," Ayashe said, "I know they always hit you. I just never saw it happen before. Mother told me that I have to help you and speak up for you. I was looking for you, but then I saw what they were doing."

"You don't have to speak up for me," he said.

"Yes I do," Ayashe countered, "Because she was right and I was wrong. I was thinking about that when I saw it happen right over there. You're pretty strong."

"So are you," he said, "I need some more grass."

Things changed between them then as they sat talking and licking their wounds.

"You're getting another black eye and my lip is swollen," she said and he nodded, "Why did you call me your lover? Was it to bother them?"

She nodded, "And because I like you now. Come on, we'd better tell our mothers before they hear of it from somebody else."

They stood up and began to walk home.

"Is my nose still bleeding?" Étienne asked and she shook her head, "I think it's stopped now. Mine too."

She took his hand as they walked and he asked.

"I told you," she said, smiling as much as her fat lip allowed, "I like you now."

--------------------------

"I do not believe it, "Kiwidinok said, "Lise, come and look. Ayashe comes with Étienne and she is holding his hand!"

Lise stood next to Kiwidinok and looked out through the door. "Look at their clothes. Have -- have they been fighting?"

"Not with each other," Nehaseemo grinned, "I have just had to listen to a pair of indignant mothers. To hear it, Étienne and Ayashe beat their sons half to death. I sent them away and said that they had no business speaking to me. I told them to tell their husbands. I am not related to them, so I don't have to hear it."

------------------------------

"Well I am proud of him, that's all," Ayashe said as Lise washed the dirt out of her hair for her before it was her son's turn, "I'd fight anybody for him now. I never had anybody who would do as he did for me before. The first chance that I get when this lip goes down, I want to kiss him for what he did. I am not alone anymore."

"Stop talking like that," Kiwidinok chuckled, "Now you are scaring him."

"I meant on his cheek," Ayashe said, but her mother shook her head and laughed a little.

"It doesn't matter. Boys do not like to be kissed."

"Maybe he would if I promised to tell him good news," she said a little coquettishly in spite of her lip.

"What good news?" he asked, and she motioned for him to come closer. Étienne looked a little worried, as though he thought that she might hit him. But she pulled him by his shirt just a little, careful not to drip on him and she whispered into his ear in Ojibwe to see how much he'd understand.

"Our father will take us hunting with him," she whispered, "I will try to be a sister and I would like a brother now, so no fights and we help each other?"

For the moment that it lasted until his face reminded him of its current state, Étienne tried to smile a little. He just didn't know an Ojibwe word for what he wanted to say the way that he wanted to say it, so he just said, "D'accord," as his sign of agreement.

He said nothing of it, but he still didn't want to be kissed.