For this I will protect your family. For this, because you are a spirit, you should know that you can transform yourself into a creature for eternity.
The wolf turned and walked away, and I shouted to him: “Wolf, how do I change my form?”
He turned his head and looked back at me: Believe you have wings, and you fly. Believe you are an animal, and you roar. Believe you are dead in the mud, and you sleep with the worms in the mud. No matter what you decide, provide counsel to your people as they are removed.
Then I followed the trail leading to the campsite on the westward trail. I never tired. I walked and walked. Along the way, I stopped and knelt down to wash my hair in a stream. My reflection was too dark to see, even in moonlight. The water rippled. I cupped my hands with water and drank as I had done in my life. Despite the winter, the water running down my chest and back didn’t feel cold.
In the ground I saw horse tracks. I saw footsteps, handprints, all leading toward the mountains, and I knew the soldiers were looking for those hiding in the caves there. I leaned down and smoothed the dirt, erasing the tracks with my hands. I kept smoothing it, and strangely, my back was not in pain as it had once been during my lifetime. Time was unknown to me, and I kept crawling and smoothing dirt for what must’ve been hours without pain or fatigue. After a while I stood and saw that the sun was on the horizon.
Ahead, I saw the long trail of wagons and horses and our people walking. I saw all the guards, the ones who slept with their ugly mouths open and their white bellies uncovered, their jugs empty, their bodies drunk and freckled and light-haired and stinking with sweat and evil. The migration had begun.
I saw, too, the manifestations of others like me: the roaring bear in the woods; the soulful, howling coyote; the eagle circling in the endless sky; and I knew I was not alone. A satisfaction came over me when I saw these things, and for a moment I felt my anger lift away in the silence of the night. I was calmed by the sounds and visions of the night as I moved forward. I thought of what I taught you, beloved: harmony and peace. Anger is like flooding water, slowly building to destruction.
I looked to the yonder sky, as Dragging Canoe had taught me when I was a child, and I saw visions of the Trail. This was revealed to me, my son: I saw that disease, not exertion, was the enemy to many. Dysentery and vomiting, head colds. There were very few white doctors on the march. The medicine men attended to children and babies who had intestinal cramps. I saw unclean campsites, bowls wiped with rags, sickness spreading rapidly. I saw people sick with tuberculosis and pneumonia. They grew weaker with each hour they walked until they had to ride in the wagons. The hot sun tortured them, especially those not in the wagons. I saw the soldiers make men dig a trench for the garbage so that rats and coyotes and other animals wouldn’t congregate near them overnight. Traveling on, they continued the brutal walk, moccasins were worn out and some people went barefoot. I saw mothers struggling to feed their babies when their breasts went dry.
After seeing these visions, in sadness and anger, I flew west along the trail with my people.
AND NOW, BELOVED SON, you emerge like a harsh wind in circular gusts, no longer a messenger but a spirit. You emerge with arms spread, rising into the sky, swooping like an eagle. Listen! This is the end:
As I made my way toward the stockades where our people were being held, I saw the soldiers loading the wagons. They were the ones who had killed us. The ones who had executed you, taken you from me. I was overcome with anger. I moved quietly as I approached them, but I knew they could hear me, knew my sound was threatening, or at least fearful, because one of the guards responded to me.
Listen to that, he said to another.
I don’t see anything.
But did you hear it?
The second guard never responded. He walked away from the wagon and left the first guard alone. I moved in closer. The guard took a drink from a jug and wiped his face with a rag. For a moment he glanced around to see whether anyone was watching him. Though I wanted to attack him, I knew it was not the right time; still, I moved in his direction out of the darkness until he turned and saw me.
I told him: “Adahnawa asgwali! There is a war going on!”
He seemed confused, then took a step to the side and gripped his rag.
“Your plan is to hurt us,” I said, moving forward.
The soldier shook his head, unsure of what was happening. I felt compelled to attack and tear into his body with my hands and kill him instantly. I felt a burst of rage at the sight of him looking back at me.
Beloved: I did nothing.
The soldier looked at me through narrow eyes, and I whispered, “Look around you, soldier!”
He stepped back and spoke the name of his god. When I moved in closer, he turned and ran.
The night filled with the smell of meat cooking, and I thought of the many times I had snared and skinned rabbits for stew, though I did not hunger, even with the strong smell. I remembered chopping wood near this place in the middle of winter. Thinking of my family only angered me more. I stomped the ground. I moved from one wagon to the next, looking for the man who had run from me. There were men’s voices, and next I heard a crowd of people, my people, walking up ahead. I saw wagons and soldiers with their guns. I saw women and men, the old and young, all walking. They kept their heads high, this was evident. The night was so dark I don’t know how they could see anything in front of them, but the moon glowed in the sky. I looked up to it, knowing my people were looking to it as well. The moon shone like a white flower. The moon, an offering of hope from the Great Spirit, because what else was there to see in such massive darkness?
The nights were freezing. They came to a stream that needed to be passed. The soldiers made one of the men enter to see how deep it was, and as he crossed, he yelled out from the cold as the water reached his chest. He rushed to the other side and fell, hugging himself. Men and women began entering the freezing water, carrying their children over their heads.
The breeze was cool as the night went on, and I followed in anger and sadness. Wagons were pulled by oxen or mules or horses. I walked with the people. I walked beside them until the children began to cry from fatigue. I walked beside them until an elder man fell. Then another fell, followed by many others. Many people were falling behind, trying to help others, but the soldiers yelled at them to keep walking. People were crawling, crying out. You do not want to hear the voices of the ones who were crying out. Their voices linger.
Soon the sun rose, and they were still walking. Aniyosgi ana’i. And I walked along with them, following the children, helping them as I could. It was as if each hour grew cooler than the last, and soon I was no longer aware of how long they had been walking. I looked to the hills and saw, in the morning daylight, that there were over six hundred wagons.
I heard the laughter of soldiers. Laughter! They were careless toward our people. How badly they treated them. I watched it day after day. I heard their laughter over the cries of pain and wondered how their souls could be so corrupt and without empathy. Where was their sense of humanity?
I thought of the triumphs and struggles our people had experienced in my lifetime, and in my ancestors’ lifetimes, all the pain we had endured throughout cold winters. My mind filled with angry thoughts once more, but I could not be consumed by this torment any longer. My rage would not affect them. I knew my people would continue to treat one another with dignity and kindness. These soldiers’ evil actions would haunt them for the rest of their lives.
Beloved child: My people would survive and prosper, and I would be there alongside them, through the temperamental winter, to help them walk when they felt they couldn’t.
Edgar
SEPTEMBER 6
I TORTURED MYSELF OVER thoughts of the game Savage, wondering whether I would be captured or shot and killed. I wondered how many others had died in this place. Jackson and Lyle wanted me dead, I was convinced. I started to panic, then. I wore myself out imagining I was dodging bull
ets, running down alleyways, crouched between buildings. Bombs, explosions, pistols fired. I pictured myself near Devil’s Bridge, being exposed to radiation and covered in mud while men in gas masks questioned me about whatever they wanted to know.
For a while I felt the urge to vomit and sat over a wastebasket with a finger down my throat, gagging myself. But I wasn’t able to vomit, only dry heave, which made my eyes water. I tried to relax in my bed. I told myself to stay calm, stay civil. It had rained all night, a steady rain for a while. Outside the window I could see branches of the oak tree waving in the wind. The thunder woke me up a few times with flashes of lightning, and I was coughing, which made me worry about my health, so I didn’t sleep well. I thought about that projection of Ray-Ray. I looked out the window and saw puddles around the tree and in the road. I saw trees with low-hanging branches in the distance, white clapboard houses beyond a rickety fence. Everything appeared dreary, as usual, the world gray-blue in a darkening land. It rained hard for a while and then tapered off.
Time started to feel heavy. Lying there, I started to think about my mother and all the weight of her responsibilities, having to care for my dad. My thoughts turned to images. A memory of when I was six or seven years old, and she pretended to cry when I said I was going to run away but didn’t make it farther than the fence out back. I don’t remember why I made the threat or where I said I was going, only that I was running away from home, from her. I stood there for what felt like a long time, listening to her sniffles, her fake cries. I felt terrible about it. All these years later I still felt bad about it, threatening to run away, even though I knew she was only pretending to cry. I stayed in the backyard and played with our dog Jack, rolling around in the grass with him. We played tug-of-war with a twig until it snapped. I let him chase me around the yard, and eventually I forgot about running away. My mother must’ve watched the whole thing from the back door, because when I came near the back porch, she was pretending to cry again. “I don’t want you to run away,” she said, putting her face in her hands.
Jackson stepped into the room and said my days were numbered. I sat up in bed, and he walked out. I got up and followed him into the kitchen.
“What does that mean?” I said. “My days are numbered.”
His back was to me. He was stirring his coffee cup with a spoon. “I’ve been trying to create these augmented realities,” he said. “This whole place is an alternate reality. Just look how many pillheads live here. People coughing, sick from decayed lungs, craving an alternate state of mind. We all overdo it.”
“What are you talking about?”
He turned to me and took a sip of his coffee. “We’ve been using you to develop our gaming here. Now your days are numbered. It’s an expression.”
“I know the expression.”
“We’ve got images of you all around town, Chief. People filmed you last night at the warehouse. It’s a live shooting game.”
“Fuck you.”
His eyes widened, but he didn’t say anything. It felt good to lash out at him. I could feel myself wanting to go on and on. I couldn’t take him any longer.
“Another thing,” I said. “I saw Ray-Ray’s image last night in the projector downstairs. What the fuck are you doing?”
He waited for some time, thinking. “You saw whose image?”
“Cut the bullshit.”
“Oh,” he said. He looked at me and blinked slowly. “The machine projects images I feed it. I feed it images I get online all the time. I use Facebook photos or whatever, and I included photos of you and Ray-Ray and your sister.”
“You’re pathetic, Jackson. You deserve to be alone. I’m getting out of here.”
“I wouldn’t try to leave if I were you, Chief. You’re the star of another game I’ve been working on. It’s called Savage.”
“Yeah, I saw the manual, scumbag. Another dumb failure.”
“That’s what you think,” he said. “We’re beta-testing it now. People use real guns to shoot Indians. That’s why people act so weird around you. That’s why I took video of you.”
“What a cruel piece of shit you are. I can’t believe I felt sorry for you.”
“Maybe you should just leave,” he said. “When people in town see you, they might assume you’re a hologram and shoot. But you could take your chances, right? I think I’ll just kick you out.”
“Fuck off. I’d rather die out there than stay here with you.”
He set down his coffee mug and stared directly at me. It was a look that took time, an attempt at intimidation, but it wasn’t working. Jackson was deceptively strong, but not very tough. For as long as I knew him, he had never been tough but had always pretended to be. In school he was always getting into fights and never winning. I started to walk away, but he pushed me. I turned and struck him in the chest with the palm of my hand, and he grabbed my arm. We started to grapple right there in the kitchen. We wrestled like teenagers. Neither of us threw a punch, but we were telling each other off, wrestling. Finally I hit him on the side of his head, and he crouched down, crying out. I could see he was in pain. He held his head with one hand and started swinging blind with the other, but I moved back and went into my room and shut the door.
He didn’t come after me or try to open the door. I tried to catch my breath. My mouth went dry, making it hard to swallow. A moment later I heard him leave, so I opened the door and went to the living room window. I saw him drive away. Then I went back to my room and packed my bag. How quickly everything had changed. I decided I hated Jackson Andrews, hated the Darkening Land and everything about it. I headed straight for the bathroom and opened his cabinets, looking for anything else, I didn’t know what, anything he had hidden. There were bottles of pills, laxatives, mouthwash. There were Q-tips and creams, gels.
I left the bathroom, kicked open the door to his bedroom, and went through his dresser drawers, his closet, looked under his bed. I searched the whole house, going through everything I could find. Then I went downstairs and climbed the ladder to his projector. I ripped the lid off and threw it to the ground. Coughing, I kicked it against the wall, then stomped on it, but none of this made me feel any better.
TWENTY MINUTES LATER I TOOK my bag and left the rotting house for good, thinking Jackson might as well stay there forever, trapped in the darkness and unwilling to change. I walked away still angry, fueled by an intense desire to confront anyone who glanced at me or mentioned my being Native. I quickened my step as I walked away. I wanted to find my way to the train station. Surely I could get a ride. I thought of the apparition of the woman with the basket I had seen in the middle of the night. She had talked about a trail lined with cherry-blossom trees.
Bulbous clouds assumed strange shapes. The mist hanging above the grass was dense. I remembered a time growing up when my family took a walk around our house. We took lots of walks together, and it was a way for me to gather my thoughts, a type of meditation. On this particular walk, my dad told Sonja and me that our ancestors had hunted only for food, not sport, and that once an animal had been killed, we should ask for forgiveness and explain that we needed the animal for food. Animals were not to be exploited, my dad explained. Neither were people. This had to do with our fundamental concern for harmony, and should always be followed. As I walked in the Darkening Land, I thought about my anger and how important it was to try to keep peace within myself. I thought about Ray-Ray’s death and how I avoided talking about him with Rae and my family. How all anyone ever wanted to do was talk about him when he was alive, and that for some reason I despised him a little for getting the attention. I was no longer angry about that attention, I realized, and telling myself this made me feel better about myself. Spending time away from my family had helped me, I felt.
The road I walked seemed to open up into a new world, with a brilliant sunlight that appeared from behind a cloud. For the first time since I came there, the sky was very blue, the humidity stifling and causing me to sweat. I heard gunshots from s
omewhere, which frightened me. I followed the road as it wound around and downhill. I walked until I saw the road dead-ended ahead, past a park with a swing set, merry-go-round, and monkey bars, on which I saw children playing. Looking farther ahead, past where the road ended, I saw tall trees towering over the horizon. I walked toward the playground, past plum trees and peach trees and pink cherry trees. It was a land of enchantment. A boy on a bicycle rode past me, ringing his bicycle bell as he passed, and I watched him ride down the hill toward the playground. He climbed off his bicycle and ran to the others. There was a small pond and an old house at the end of the road beside the playground.
Once I got closer, I saw an older man working in his yard. He wore overalls and had long white hair. He was down on his knees, digging through a trash bag. When I passed him, he stood and looked at me.
“Siyo,” he said.
I gave a slight wave and kept walking.
“Wait a minute,” he said. “Come over here.”
I turned and looked at him. He waved me over. He was holding up sheets of notebook paper. “These are all my writings,” he said.
I approached him, and he handed them to me. “I think these are for you,” he said.
There were scribblings in blue and black ink. “It’s Cherokee,” I said. “I recognize the symbols, but I can’t read them.”
“I’m Tsala,” he said. His eyes held an intensity, full of years of pain and abandonment. I was struck by how intense and mysterious he appeared. “Maybe you should read my writings?”
“What for?”
“For help. There’s the road with the pink cherry blossoms down yonder.” He pointed toward the woods, and I saw swelled pink cherry blossoms in the distance. I felt overjoyed by this. In the blue-gray world, it was the brightest color I had seen.
“I need to leave this place,” I said. “Where does the road lead?”
He paused a moment, then asked if I would join him for coffee. He was too old and frail to be dangerous, so I agreed, and we walked along a little trail to the back of his house. He invited me into his kitchen. The walls were covered with wallpaper with flowery designs, and darker ovals and rectangles where pictures used to hang. I saw dishes piled in the sink, spilled coffee, vials and prescription bottles on the counter. There was a small kitchen table with two chairs. He sat in one and pointed for me to sit in the other across from him.
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