11. Worries about dreamwalkers
The people who had to walk back from the clearing arrived soon. Ekirä carried a few animals she had shot, they'd be very good for a meal.
The first thing Lolet wanted to know was if Rakan had behaved, and she was pleased to hear that he had been a very good guide for the teachers.
"He can be good," she whispered, "he just doesn't want people to know. I don't know why he does that, but as long as he does the right thing, I won't get on his tail about it. I'll go find him and treat him to something nice."
These last words were not whispered very softly, so the people around, who caught them, snickered and cracked a few jokes.
Lolet glared at them, hissed in fake anger and then walked off, her head held high and her kxetse happily swinging left and right.
"Did your flying go well?" Amaya asked. She was visibly relieved, hearing that all had been fine. And she immediately wanted to check the animals as they told her about the slight uncomfort that the teachers had sensed from the ikrans.
"You first rest, Amaya," Amhul said, a resolute sound in her voice. "They are well, they will wait. You travelled fast twice."
"I'm fine, ma tsmuke, really. Come, we have ikrans to visit." Amaya ducked away from Amhul's hands as the teacher singer wanted to prevent her from leaving.
"You will have to do better than that!" Amaya laughed as she darted towards the core of the tree from where she went up to the high branches.
Amhul's ikran had lost one of the herbal patches, so Amaya replaced that. For the rest, she decided, they were doing well and just needed some rest and time to heal.
While they were caring for the animals, there suddenly was commotion in the air around the crown of Kelutral. Puvomun saw several ikrans fly round and find a spot to touch down. Only then he recognised a few of the ikran aymaktoyu who had flown out to the clans near the river.
As they came walking, they looked very surprised to see the teachers and two strange ikrans there, but they were too much in a hurry to ask about that. One of them did call out a warning that the teachers should be careful so high up.
Puvomun grinned and did not respond. Instead, they followed the flyers down to hear what news they brought.
Ateyo, one of the men who had returned, was annoyed that Jake was not there. "We have news from the Olo'payfya, the Clan of the Stream. We need to tell someone."
Someone pointed him to Mo'at, but Puvomun addressed Ateyo. "Jake put me in charge of things when he is gone. You will have to talk to me, I think."
"You?" Disbelief was all over Ateyo's face. "But you're a singer."
"And a teacher," Amhul corrected the hunter. "If you do not believe it, go to Mo'at and don't be surprised when she sends you back."
She emitted an authority that made Ateyo frown for a moment. "Very well. The eyktan of Olo'faypya told us that some of their hunters had found a dead 'angtsìk. They found the dead hammerhead after hearing a loud noise."
A dead 'angtsìk? Puvomun wondered who would be able to kill such an enormous animal, and also why someone would want to do that. Despite their size and fearsome exterior, hammerheads were mostly harmless creatures, grazing the grasslands.
"There were prints of many feet near the dead animal," Ateyo continued. "Covered feet of Dreamwalkers."
"Thank you, ma Ateyo, this is serious news indeed. Is there more you can tell?"
"Kehe. That is all they found. We told them to watch out, and let us know if they find more tracks of the aysawtute who did this."
"Sìltsan. Good. Irayo, ma Ateyo."
Puvomun went to Mo'at and discussed with her what he had just heard.
"I am not sure if I should try to go to Jake and tell him this," he admitted.
"From what Amaya says, this would not be good, ma karyu. Your ikran is not well yet, and you are not experienced in flying. You must wait for them to return, but you can think of options."
Think of options. It sounded simple, but... what options? Puvomun thanked her and walked away, wishing his friend Nusumea was there.
As he pondered his options on the options, he passed a few children who were drawing silly patterns in the sand. The teacher stopped and watched them play. It relaxed him, and gave him some time to disregard the jumble that had gathered in his head.
The children paid him no attention, they kept playing, making straight lines and wiggly ones, circles and-
"Rolun," Puvomun said to himself. Eureka. He had an idea, thanks to watching the children. Now he needed an experienced ikran maktoyu to help him. This proved to be Ateyo.
"What can I tell you more, karyu?"
The teacher asked him to sit down as he started drawing in the sand and placed a pebble somewhere. "This is where we are. If this is the aysawtute camp..." -he placed another pebble- "... can you then show me where the Olo'payfya lives?"
Ateyo stared at the makeshift map for a while. Then he made a meandering line away from the home pebble. "This is the river. There is a clan here, and one here..." The hunter picked up a twig and stuck it in the ground next to the line he had made. "This is where the Olo'faypya are."
The two men reached the same conclusion. "The Dreamwalkers did not go very far during the time they are missing."
After the long awaited return of Jake and Neytiri, late in the afternoon, Puvomun and Ateyo were finally able to convey the news. Puvomun let Ateyo tell what he had seen and heard, then the teacher showed the map with the pebbles and the twig.
"Yeah, strange. They could move a lot faster, so they have something in mind," Jake agreed. "We found that the door to the hidden link-chamber is locked. That was not hard to open, the aysawtute said. Norm and some others were in there, and they found a note on one of the link-ups. Quite disturbing."
The olo'eyktan sighed.
"The note said that the six are on an expedition and we should not try to follow them. Nobody should, as they know what they are doing."
That caused discussion. Not many Sky people knew what they were doing here.
"But that is not the worst part. The note also said that they rigged two of the links. They have a bomb inside. Nobody is to open the links or stop the connection from outside, or they will blow up half the base and all people on it. Now we're not sure what kind of bomb they have, but as the mercenaries left, they did not take all their crap with them, so we have to assume they got something very nasty in there. They may even have a set of bombs linked up that go off together."
"But why would they do this?" someone asked.
"We don't know," Jake said. "We just have to be careful for now. The door is guarded, but there are some... complications."
He explained that the note had contained information about how the avatar drivers would come out of the link-ups two at the time, to eat and sleep, and also change the position of the bombs.
"Nobody is to be in the room, there just has to be food and some beds."
"What we don't understand is that they say they mean no harm. They just want to go on their expedition," Neytiri said, "and they feel that this is the good way to assure their safety."
"It makes no sense," Jake thought out loud. "If they want to go out on the surface, they could have just asked us. We could have taken them, helped them."
"And made sure they were safe, so they do not have to kill an 'angtsik," Nusumea Tirea said. He looked very upset over that.
"I'll get on the radio and tell them what you found out with your map. Maybe they can figure out why these idiots went there." Jake left the small assembly. After a few steps he turned. "Hey teachers. Good going on your ikrans!" Then he walked off.
The villagers talked a lot about the strange news that evening. Everyone agreed that it was good that the Dreamwalkers had not harrassed the Olo'payfya, although the senseless killing of the hammerhead was disapproved of by all.
The aysawtute on the base had reported back to Jake that there was nothing special around the area where the runaways had been, which made everything even more unclear.
Later that evening more people returned, from visiting the other clans. None of those had seen or heard anything extraordinary, but at least now as many Na'vi as possible were warned that they could run into six Dreamwalkers.
Na'vi - English.
'Angtsìk - hammerhead
Atokirina - seeds of the Sacred Tree
Ayewan - young ones
Ayfo lu tstunwi - They are kind
Ayfo makto nìwin - They ride too fast
Ayikran - plural of ikran
Aynivi - plural of nivi
Ayoeyä atxkxe - our land
Aysa'nok - mothers
Aysaronyu - plural of taronyu (also 'saronyu')
Aysawtute/sawtute - Sky people, the humans
Aysko / sko - bows
Ayuniltìranyu - plural of uniltìranyu, dreamwalkers
'Eveng - a child
Eveng - children
'Ewantu - young one
'Ewll - plant
'Eylan - friend
Eylan - plural of 'eylan
Eywa - the Goddess, nature, Gaia
Eywa ayoehu - Eywa be with us
Eywa ngahu - Eywa be with you
Fa'li/ayfa'li - plural of pa'li - horses
Fngap - metal
Fngapä ta'leng - metal skin, AMP suits
Hetuwong - plural of ketuwong - aliens
Heyn - to sit
Hì'i - small
Ikran - mountain banshee
Ikran makto - ikran rider
Irayo - thank you
'Ite - daughter
Kaltxì - hello
Karyu - teacher
Kava - alcoholic drink
Ke nìltsan - not well
Kefyak? - right?
Kehe - no
Kelutral - Hometree, where the Na'vi clan lives
Kelku lefngap - house of metal
Ketuwong - alien
Kìyevame - May we see each other again
Kxam - middle
Kxawm - maybe, perhaps
Kxetse - tail
Lu - is, to be
Ma yawne - (my) love
Makto zong - travel safely
Mawey - calm down
Mesawtute - two Sky people
Meveng - two children
Mllte - to agree
Nantang - six-legged direwolf
Nga - you
Nga yawne lu oer - You are my beloved
Nìltsan - well
Nìprrte - you're welcome
Ngeyä - your (ngeyä sa'nok - your mother)
Nivi - hammock
Numeyu - Student
Oe 'efu pa'li - I feel the horse
Oe irayo si Eywaru - My thanks to Eywa
Oe ke lu - I am not
Oel omum - I know
Oeyä koaka 'eylan - my old friend
Olo'eyktan - clan leader
Pa'li - six-legged direhorse
Palulukan - giant six-legged feline predator
Po lu - he is
Pxasìk - very bad curse-word
Rewon lefpom - good morning (lit. morning good)
Riti - stingbat
Rolyu - singer
Rolun - Na'vi equivalent of "Eureka", I got it!
'Rrta - Earth
Sa'nok - mother
Saronyu - hunters
Sempul - father
Set - now
Sì - and (used in listing things)
Sìltsan - good
Skxawng - moron, idiot
Sran, srane - yes
Srung - help (n)
Srung si - to help
Swizaw - arrow
Tam - Good, okay
Taronyu - hunter
Tawtute - Sky person, one human
Tokx - body
Tsa'u lu sìltsan - that is good
Tsaheylu - a mental bond, made by tendrils in a Na'vi braid to other living organisms on Pandora
Tsahik - spiritual leader, shaman
Tsamsiyu - warrior
Tsko - bow
Tsmuk - sibling
Tsmukan - brother
Tsmuke - sister
Tswin - queue, braid
Tokx - body
Txon lefpom - good night (lit. night good)
Ulte - and (used to combine sentences)
Uniltìrantokx - Avatar (dreamwalker) body
Uniltìranyu - Dreamwalker, a human in an Avatar body
Utral Aymokriyä - the Tree of Voices
Vitra - soul
Vitrautral - the Tree of Souls
Yerik - six-legged kind of deer