We crossed an open area, full of more plants. Hua stopped in front of a tent. It was large, and there were poles around it: standards. One was a metal tree, full of gold and silver birds. Bells hung from the lower branches, moving in the wind and chiming.

“I know that,” Nia said. “I made it.” She looked at her hands. “I have been traveling too long. I need to have tools again.”

The other standards were animals made of bronze or brass: a bowhorn, a killer of the plain, a biped.

“My name-mother made the others,” Hua said. “They are very old.”

Nia’s teacher. I remembered now. “Did you know her?” I asked the girl.

Hua looked shocked. “No! Never! How can you ask a question like that? What do you mean by it?”

“This person comes from a long way off,” said Nia. “When I first met her, she didn’t know the language we are speaking. I sometimes think she doesn’t know it yet. Don’t worry too much about the things she says.”

Hua made the gesture of acquiescence. But she looked worried.

A woman came out of the tent. She was tall and thin, dressed in a full-length orange robe. Her fur was dark brown, flecked with gray, though I didn’t get the impression that she was old. She wore at least a dozen necklaces made of gold and silver and amber. Bracelets covered her arms from wrist to elbow. Like the necklaces, they were a mixture: gold, silver, copper, ivory. There were even a couple made of carved wood. She had a gold stud in the side of her low, flat, furry nose.

She looked us over, then spoke to Nia. “Can you never behave in an acceptable fashion? What are you doing back here? And where did you find a person like this one?”

“This is my foster mother,” Hua said.

“Her name is Angai,” Nia said. She gestured toward me. “This person is named Li-sa. I met her in the east, in the village of the Copper People of the Forest. I’ve been living there.”

“This is no Copper Person,” said Angai.

Nia made the gesture of agreement. “I don’t know where she’s from. A long distance away, she told me. But I met her in the village of the Copper People in the house of their shamaness Nahusai.”

People murmured in back of me. A baby started to cry.

“There are more hairless people below the village in two boats. They want permission to come up.”

Angai frowned. “What have you told them about us, Nia? Have you been lying? We always make visitors welcome! There is no reason for them to wait below.” She paused. “Unless they are sick. Is that what has happened to their hair?”

“Four of them are men.”

“Sit down,” Angai said. “Here, under the tent flap. There is no reason why we should be uncomfortable while we talk.”

We obeyed, even Hua. Angai glared at her. “I am not certain this is a matter for children.”

“The whole village is here. Everyone is listening.”

Angai made the gesture that meant “very well.” “But keep quiet. Pay attention! Learn what makes a shamaness!”

Hua made the gesture of assent.

“Now.” Angai looked at Nia. “Tell me what this is about.”

“These people are different. It isn’t simply the lack of hair. Look at her eyes.” She pointed at me. “They are brown and white like the ground in early spring, when the snow has begun to melt. Who has ever seen eyes like these? Look at her hands. She has two extra fingers, and they are not deformed. All her people have two extra fingers. Friend of my childhood, draw in a breath! Does she smell like any person you have ever met before?”

Angai sniffed. “No.”

Nia hunched forward. “She is not a person the way you are a person, Angai.”

I opened my mouth to object, then closed it. Nia was far from stupid. She must have a reason for what she was doing.

“They have tools that are different from our tools. Their language sounds like an animal spitting and chittering.

“But—” Nia paused. “They do have tools, and they do have a language. They aren’t animals. Nor are they spirits. I don’t believe they are demons. They are utterly strange and unfamiliar people.”

Angai made the gesture that meant “that may be.”

“Among these people the men are not solitary. They live with the women.”

“Aiya!” cried a woman. Others called, “Hu!”

Angai made the gesture that demanded silence. “Go on.”

“That’s why they are waiting. They know we have different customs. They do not want to anger the Iron People. They do not want to show disrespect or be dishonest.”

“But they want to come into the village,” Angai said.

Nia glanced at me.

“Yes,” I said. “They—we—have a difficulty. An argument we cannot settle. We want your advice, the advice of your people.”

“It’s hardly surprising that they argue,” a woman said. “Men and women together! What a perversion!”

Another woman added, “Except at the time of mating.”

“Bowhorns mate in the autumn,” Angai said. “And there are animals that bear two or three litters in a summer. Are you like that? Is this your time for mating?”

I hesitated.

Nia said, “I have watched these people carefully and listened to them. It’s my belief that they’re always ready to mate.”

There was more hu-ing from the audience. Angai made the gesture for silence. We all waited. She frowned. “You are certain these are people, Nia?”

“You are the shamaness. Is this one a spirit? A demon? Or a ghost?”

Angai touched my arm. “She is solid. It is daylight. She cannot be a ghost.”

“What about a demon?” asked one of the villagers. “They are solid. They can go out in the light of the sun.”

Angai stared at me. “I have seen demons in my dreams. Their eyes burn like fire. Their hands and feet have long curving claws. Otherwise they look like people. I have never heard of a demon without hair.” She paused. “You are certain they are not spirits, Nia?”

“Spirits have many disguises,” Nia said. “Even a clever woman can fail to discover them. But I have traveled with these people for three cycles of the big moon. They have never changed their shape. They have never changed their size. They eat. They sleep. They produce dung and urine. Their dung and urine is ordinary, though it does not smell exactly like ours. Even when they are angry, even when they seem to be in danger, they do nothing spiritlike.”

Angai made a gesture I did not know. “They are not animals. They are not spirits. They are not ghosts or demons. Therefore they must be people. They have asked us for help. It is my opinion that we ought to help them. They have asked to come into our village, it is my opinion that we ought to give them permission.”

A woman spoke loudly, but not in the language of gifts.

Angai lifted a hand. “They are not like us. We cannot judge them the way we judge ourselves.”

Several women spoke in the tribal language. I turned to look at the crowd.

The sun was low by now. Rays of light—almost horizontal—shone between the tents. They lit the open area, the vegetation and the people: solid matrons, bent old crones, lithe girls, a lot of children. The adults shouted and gestured. Their jewelry flashed.

I knew most of the gestures. “Yes.” “No.” “You are wrong or crazy.” “We are in agreement.” “Agreement is utterly impossible.”

I looked back at Angai. She watched and listened, expressionless.

“What is going on?” I asked Nia.

“Some of them agree with Angai. Others do not. They will all shout until they get tired.”

I looked back at the crowd. The argument went on. Children—the older ones—wandered off, obviously bored. The younger children began to cry. Their mothers picked them up and hugged them and rocked them.

The other women continued the argument, but everything was less violent now. The voices had grown softer. The gestures were less broad.

Light faded out of the square. Only the peaks of the tents were lit and the tips of the metal standards. Gold, silver, and bronze gleamed in front of the sky, which was cloudless and deep blue-green.