s grandson, looking down into his face,
bending low to sniff his breath.

"Redbird, be very quiet. We must not wake him."

"What happened to him?" she whispered, trembling.

"This." He gestured to the open medicine bag that lay where he and Eagle
Feather had been sitting. "He must have taken some bits of mushroom
while we were looking up at the eagles."

Terror cascaded over her. "What will it do to him?"

Owl Carver emptied the gray scraps into his hand and then poured them
back into the bag. "What a foolish old man I am, leaving that bag open
right next to him."

Eagle Feather had gone on a spirit journey. And her own sensitivity to
the other world told her that he was _meant_ to. She felt for him the
fear she had felt for White Bear in that long-ago Moon of Ice.

"No," said Redbird sadly. "You were not foolish. It was Earthmaker's
way. He sent those eagles to take our eyes away from the medicine bag."

With infinite care, so as not to disturb him, Redbird carried Eagle
Feather into the lean-to, resting his head on the blanket roll that held
everything she had been able to carry.

"I will stay with you until Eagle Feather comes back," said Owl Carver.
Redbird picked up Floating Lily and held her tightly.

As the sun crossed above the lake, they sat watching the small, still
body. Redbird could barely see Eagle Feather's narrow chest rise and
fall in the shadowy lean-to. There were moments when she was sure he was
dead.

Sunset had turned the small lake to a sheet of beaten gold when Eagle
Feather sat up suddenly, his eyes wide.

"The Bad Axe!" he shrieked. It was the voice of a child struggling with
a nightmare.

"Eagle Feather!" Redbird cried.

Owl Carver put his hand on her knee. "Be quiet."

"The Bad Axe!" Eagle Feather called out again, staring at something no
one else could see. "The Great River runs red!" His eyes closed and he
fell back.

Redbird felt as if she were shivering in a blizzard. Eagle Feather's
words seemed to open a doorway of second sight in her own mind,
disclosing a horrifying vision of bodies drifting in red-tinged water.

She heard a sound behind her. Suddenly terrified, she whirled. In the
birch forest she saw a man riding toward them on a gray pony. The beat
of hooves sounded hollow among the trees.

Feeling on the edge of madness, she let out a scream. She had wanted so
much for White Bear to come to her that way, that she thought for a
moment it was he. Like White Be