"For my people and others like me," Little Blue Hawk said, "people whose flesh comes from this land and rose out of this dust from the beginning, names have a real meaning. A name can change if a person grows out of one and into another."
"How can you grow out of your name?" I asked.
Little Blue Hawk grimaced and looked sideways at me without turning her head. "You become someone new," she said. "Twisted Spear, my mother's brother, grew out of that name one summer. He went out with his brothers and a few others. They made camp by the river. On the fourth night a storm blew in. The storm swelled the river in the dark and the water swallowed the camp before they could climb high enough. They all drowned. All except Twisted Spear who awoke on a far bank the next morning. He returned home alone and after the mourning was over, began to be called Spared by the River. You see? Twisted Spear drowned along with his brothers and Spared by the River was born."
Little Blue Hawk smiled and reached her hand over to me and pushed and clump of hair away from my face.
"You look too sad, Judah. Why?"
I shook my head and swallowed the lump in my throat.
"It's almost like one of Early's stories."
"I haven't heard them."
"If you stay with us long enough, I guarantee you, you will."
Little Blue Hawk nodded.
"What name were you born with?" I asked.
"The one you call me by. I was born into it, though. Not with it."
"How come?"
"The day I was born, a hawk from the East, where the trouble came from, flew into the reservation. It landed on my parents' roof the moment my mother felt the first pains of labor. Eventually it settled on the windowsill outside the birthing room. It stayed all day and night. At the dawn of the second day, I was born and with my first cry, the hawk cried, too. When the people looked, the first light of morning slanted down from the sky and shone upon the hawk and upon me. Over the course of the night, the hawk had changed colors, from gray to blue. When the sun was completely above the horizon, the bird flew away. I was left in its place but the Old Ones say it was a guardian and so I would hold it in me. Little Blue Hawk is my namesake. I go where my wings carry me and I watch over. I have not outgrown my name."
"You're watching over us."
"For the time I'm here."
She blew out a breath and gathered dust from the ground in her fingers, then let it fall. "There's an eastern wind blowing," she said, looking up. "But you give the White Man a better face."