“Like reeds in the wind,” said Tanajin. “Or a tree that is starting to break.”

“Aiya!” said Nia.

“Every kind of log is dangerous. If the raft gets caught, you may not be able to get free. Never let a rope trail. Always carry a knife. Always keep an eye on the surface. If there are swirls and eddies—avoid that place!”

“There is more to this than I realized,” said Nia.

Tanajin barked. “You people in the north are so ignorant! You think the river is like the plain. You think that everything that matters is on the surface, where any fool can see it.”

Nia kept her teeth clenched together. A teacher always had the right to at least a few insults. Everyone knew that. It was true among all peoples.

Finally Tanajin said, “You aren’t skillful yet, and you don’t know enough about the river, but I think you’ll be able to manage. I’ll leave you now.”

Nia made the gesture of acknowledgment.

The next morning Tanajin piled her belongings on the new raft. Nia helped push the raft out into the river. Tanajin climbed on and made the gesture of farewell.

Nia waved in answer.

The raft floated out. Tanajin began to swing the paddle. Nia watched. The woman grew smaller and smaller. At last she was gone. The raft became a dot on the wide and shining river. Nia shaded her eyes. The raft was gone.

She moved her belongings into the empty tent, but she didn’t sleep in it. It smelled of Tanajin, and the walls were braced with pieces of wood. They were too solid. A proper house ought to shift in the wind—not much, but enough so the people inside knew what was happening on the plain.

Every evening she took a blanket out front. She lay down by the fire and looked up. She began to notice things.

One was a light that moved like a moon, but was the wrong color: a silvery white. It followed a new trail, different from any of the old moons. Night after night it crossed above her. She had no idea what it was. Had one of the Two Lost Women come back?

There was a new star, too. It appeared in the same place every evening: at the center of the sky. The other stars moved around it. It did not move at all.

There were other lights: red and white and green. For the most part they were in the south, close to the horizon. They moved rapidly in all directions.

She became uneasy. It was one thing for the hairless people to make a new kind of cloud. There were a lot of different kinds of clouds, and they were always changing. One more kind wasn’t likely to cause trouble. But a new star! A new moon! Lights that wandered like bugs! Here! There! Up! Down!

Smoke rose on the far side of the river. She went over. A man waited there. A big fellow with iron-gray fur.

“Who are you?” he asked. “Where is Tanajin?” He spoke with an accent she did not recognize.

“She left. I am taking care of the crossing.”

“Huh!” the man said.

She took him across the river, along with two bowhorns. He gave her salt in a leather bag. The leather was thin and soft. She did not know what kind of animal it came from. The man did not explain who he was or why he was traveling through the land of the Iron People. Nia decided not to ask.

More days passed. The new moon kept traveling over. The new star remained at the center of the sky. Every few days she saw another one of the long clouds.

The Basket Women returned. Their leader said the Amber People had not been a lot of help. “They are busy performing ceremonies of aversion and propitiation. Something has gone wrong. They wouldn’t tell us what, except to say the Trickster was behind it.

“This is a spirit we don’t know about, though he sounds a bit like our Bird-faced Woman. A troublemaker! A sneak and liar! Though I have to say we owe a lot to the Bird-faced Woman. She gave us fire and taught us how to weave baskets.”

Another woman said, “We shouldn’t be too grateful. She convinced the First People that there was nothing wrong with incest. And she let the small black bug of death loose in the world.”

The travel leader frowned. “The Amber People kept going on and on about this spirit. This Trickster. They told us the hairless people are not the problem. The Trickster is the problem. He is the one who is making changes in the sky.”

“Have the hairless people paid a visit there?” asked Nia. She pointed east.

The travel leader made the gesture that meant “no.” “I’m not certain they believed us when we told them about the hairless people and the boat that was able to fly. Maybe they thought we were liars, like the Trickster.”

“Aiya!” said Nia. She took them across the river, then went back.

By this time the forest along the river had finished changing color. The trees were orange and yellow. The reeds in the marshes were red. Flocks of birds went overhead like clouds.

Nia began to worry about food. She was running out. Winter was coming. She made fish traps and set them in the river. Then she went into the forest, cut wood, and made a smoking rack. That was the safest way to preserve fish and meat. The smoke would hide the food aroma. The animals in the forest would not come looking for something to eat.

She made traps to set in the forest. Then she made a bow. It was the weak kind that people in the east used. But she did not have the materials to make a bow the right way out of layers of horn, and she wasn’t a bow maker.

How could men survive alone? A woman needed an entire village full of people with different kinds of knowledge.

“Well,” she told herself. “I know it is possible. I lived on my own before—except for Enshi, and he wasn’t all that much help. I can do it again.”

She gathered food. Clouds came out of the west, gray and solid-looking. They dropped rain on her. The rain was cold and heavy. Leaves came off the trees. They lay on the ground in the forest and floated past on the river. Red. Yellow. Orange. Pink. Purple.

The flocks of birds became less frequent. The bugs were almost gone.

Day and night she tended the smoking fire. Gray smoke twisted up into the gray sky. No animals came out of the forest to find out if she had anything edible. In this she was lucky. This was the time of year when every kind of thing looked for food—though not with desperation. Desperation would come later with the snow.

One afternoon Nia was in front of the tent, cleaning a groundbird. She cut the belly open and reached in, pulling out the guts. One of her bowhorns whistled: a sign of warning. She looked up. A rider was approaching, coming up the trail along the river. Nia stood up, holding the bloody guts. They were still attached to the bird, and when she stood she lifted the bird off the ground. For a moment it dangled at the end of a rope of guts. Then the rope broke. The bird fell. The rider reined his animal.

He was big and broad through the shoulders. His fur gleamed, even though the sky was dark and gray. His tunic was yellow, covered with embroidery. He wore gold bracelets and a gold fish-pendant that hung from a necklace of amber beads. “I heard the old crossing-woman was gone. The new one looks as if she belongs to the Iron People. She doesn’t speak much and tells nothing about herself.”

“Who can have told you this, Inzara?”

“The man whose gift is salt.” Inzara dismounted. “Why don’t you finish what you are doing, then wash your hands?”

He led his animal in back of the tent. She cleaned the bird and washed her hands in the river.

Inzara returned, carrying his saddlebags.

“What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be in the Winter Land, protecting your territory?”

“My brothers will take care of it for me. It doesn’t matter this time of year, anyway.”

She spitted the bird and set it up over the cooking fire. Inzara crouched down. Aiya! He was big, even resting on his heels.

“It’s pretty obvious the world is changing. There is a new star in the sky and a new moon. A while back a young man came out of the village. I stopped him and spoke with him before I sent him on his way. He told me people had come from the far west, carrying their provisions in baskets and bringing a crazy story. Visitors came to them riding on a bird made out of metal. The visitors had no hair. The people from the west wanted advice. But my people were busy. They have been quarreling and performing ceremonies ever since they came to the Ropemaker’s island. The guardian of the tower was dead. The tower itself was damaged.”