Kel of the Mountain

Chapter One

I knew she was different.

I remember when I was little, noticing the subtle differences between my mother and our tribe. She was thin, for one, waiflike in comparison to my father who towered above her. Where my tribe's skin was ruddy, hers was fair and smooth, without the toughened patches on her nose and cheeks but instead was decorated with a spray of light-colored brown spots, varying in size and shape and beyond counting. Her movements were clumsy, in comparison, even though she lived among the people she did not melt into the underbrush as the rest of us, barely a pine needle bent out of place, but instead moved as if she were walking on sharp rocks, slowly and carefully, ready to fall. Above all, her eyes were...odd, without the deep earthy tones of the people, but the vibrant blue of summer skies.

Blue, she taught me the word, all the names of all the colors of our world, the people had no need for such things.

Even so, with all these differences, it never truly dawned on me that she didn't belong. She was simply mother, muda, she taught me all the things the people didn't. The lines that made up writing, something the outsiders did, numbers and the history of the world beyond the mountain, which to me were no better than fantasy. Boxes of light and objects that conveyed real words across vast distances, not the knocking which abbreviated danger vaguely from one direction or another.

"The world is so big Kel," she would tell me in the Other Tongue, those long nights in winter when the rest of the People would be fast asleep in our caves, and only the low light of our dying fire would illuminate her face, those eyes like pools of water. How her eyes would dance in that light! She'd use charcoal from the fire to draw marvelous things on the cave walls, things I'd learn were machines and planes and cars. Each night we'd spend like that, her telling me what it was like with the Others, drawing out an entire world on the rock surrounding our nest, only to have her wipe it clean as we lay down in our furs. It was the way of the people to leave no trace.

That is not to say that the People treated her poorly, or not as if she didn't belong. If there had been a time when this was so, she never mentioned it. My father, a giant of a man who even among the people stood a head taller than most, doted on her as far as the People were concerned. As we moved through the high forest my father would rest a hand lightly on her shoulder if we paused, a show of affection that was rare in our tribe. He would help her traverse rocky trails and carry her on his back as he jumped over crevasses in the mountain and ice. For my mother's part, she cared for him, I remember her resting her cheek against his furs as he carried her, wholly at ease. They would laugh together, her voice tinkling like bells and riding the wind, his low and rumbling, something you felt rather than heard deep in your chest, vibrating your bones.

I still remember the day that I knew she didn't belong, that she was something "other". We were in the low forest, collecting the bruise berries that stood in clumps during the hot season. I remember my stomach was full and uncomfortable, having gorged myself as only a child could, my face and hands sticky and stained. The tribe walked silently along a game trail, a route which would have been avoided had it been anything but berry season, as the trail was uncomfortably open to the sky above this close to the Others territory. I remember looking up and watching the clouds skirt across the sky, hiding behind the arms of the trees above, only to reemerge a second later with new clouds to follow. My father led the group, my mother at his heel, and it was he that heard it first, a strange buzzing sound. He held up a hand, and the People stepped off of the trail, melting into the underbrush.

Everyone, except my mother.

She stood tall and proud in the center of the trail, raising an arm and shielding her eyes from the glare of the sun, looking to the sky. Taking a risk, I peeked out and did the same. The buzzing grew louder, and just overhead a large object slowly made its way across the sky, appearing only for a few seconds above the trail before disappearing over the canopy.

Still my mother stood, pivoting her body to look in the direction of the object as the buzzing faded away. The People returned to the trail, my father nudging her elbow before continuing on. For a moment, she looked as if she might move off toward the sound. She stood frozen in the trail as my father led the People onward, and I saw him look back briefly, his heavy brow knitted with concern, before he turned back to his task.

I emerged from the underbrush, walking up to my mother and wrapping my dark, squared fingers into hers, light and willowy. She didn't look down at me, but instead squeezed my hand tightly before she spoke, her voice barely above a whisper.

"Look Kel, a plane."