Chapter Three
Duncan had never truly walked in a forest before until he had walked with Conawago. The old Nipmuc had first taught him how to listen and smell, how to see things he had never seen before, how to move without disturbing the forest floor, but only after subjecting him to long hours of cleansing rituals. The grime of the European world had to be scoured from his skin, washed from his ears and nose, Conawago had insisted. The winter before, they had spent days on a remote mountain building an elaborate sweat lodge, then alternated between the lodge and a pool of icy water as the old Indian murmured to the spirits, staying up for hours each night to watch stars and meteors. Finally Conawago had stood at the edge of a high cliff and shouted up to the sky that this Scot from acros
