"Ardath Mayhar - Hunters of the Plains" - читать интересную книгу автора (Mayhar Ardath)

"You look funny," the child said. "Angry. Are you not happy that you have killed your badger?"

Do-na-ti relaxed into a smile. This was, after all, a child. He could not understand what it meant to reach
this point in his life, the feel of the cooling blood on his hands, the anticipation of the fur hood about his
neck and ears, the knowledge that E-lo-ni would be his…

"I was thinking like a badger," he explained patiently. "We are Badger Clan. We work hard, like the
badger, gathering seeds from the grass, netting birds, digging roots from the riverbed, catching fat insects.
We are fierce, like the badger, when any other people threaten our lives. We are like the badger when
we hunt the great beasts, for we do not fear them. So we must think like badgers in our minds."

Ka-shi's forehead wrinkled with puzzlement. "Do you feel like a badger when you snarl like that?" he
asked his brother. "Are you thinking about biting when you do it?"
Do-na-ti nodded slowly, thinking about how he had been feeling. "I smell the freshly dug earth, feel it on
my paws, under my claws. I can hear things that I never heard before, feel the weather building in the
sky, understand the very worms and grubs that I dig as I make that burrow."

The boy nodded slowly, as if beginning to understand. He smiled, his eyes brightening. "I will be a
badger, too, when I am older. Let me hold the front legs so you can pull the skin evenly, without tearing
it."

Together they freed the striped hide from the thick, powerful body of the animal. No part of that would
be wasted: the flesh would go into the pot; the ligaments would be used for thread or twisted into thongs;
the bones would be used for dozens of different things, from needles to stitch together hide robes and
moccasins to pins that would hold the leather door flaps closed.

But it was the fate of the fur that fascinated the brothers. Ash-pah stretched the flexible skin, pinned it to
the earth with bone pins, and began scraping it hard with a half-moon of chert. Blood trickled from it, to
be absorbed into the dirt floor of the lodge. Fatty fragments rolled up, to be gathered carefully and added
to the ever-hungry stew pot.

So skillful was she that the hide was cleaned quickly. Then she rubbed in the ash and turned to her other
tasks while this first treatment dried the skin side of the fur enough to allow it to be used for the ritual.
After it had, she would beat it, scrape it again, and hang it, stretched on willow hoops, to dry completely
before being permanently shaped to Do-na-ti's head.

It was growing late. The heavy pot sitting beside the fire in the center of the lodge had been tended by the
small girls, whose task was to keep rolling rounded stones into the fire, pulling out with wooden tongs
those that were hot, and dropping them into the pot to keep the stew boiling.

The badger had been added, along with the scrapings of fat; the smell of strong meat, wild onion, and
wild sage filled the rounded space where the family lived. Most of the members had been sitting quietly in
the shelter of their house to avoid the storm. Now, as the single meal of the day neared readiness, those
who had remained to talk with friends in other lodges drifted in to join the rest. They were not a
demonstrative people, but most found a moment to pause beside the newest man among them.

Some merely smiled. Others touched his shoulder and nodded. The grandfather, oldest of this family,
offered a small gift, a badger carved of bone to be the fetish beginning his bag of powerful things that
would go with him all his life.