by Jeanne Rose
One who would have your help.
He imagined the words rather than actually hearing them, and yet the sender was familiar, had been since his youth. “Victor?” He didn’t know why he called out, since Victor Martinez, the last of the stormbringer priests, was dead, killed by the evil that plagued the pueblo.
Our people need you, Stormdancer. You must recognize your past before you can secure the Kisi’s future.
No one but his grandmother had ever called him by the name he’d taken at manhood.
“What if I am the evil?” Or crazy? For he was talking to less than a shadow in the darkness.
You must dreamseek.
“I’ve tried.”
You turned back from the truth too soon.
Mara had indicated as much. Honest, he whispered, “But I’m afraid.”
You must face your greatest fears and make peace with them or the Kisi are doomed. Your woman cannot triumph over the evil alone. The most powerful medicine is made by a spiritual joining of the male and female. You are needed to make a future for our people possible.
Angrily, Luke cried, “There’s too much darkness in me!”
But his words hollowly rang off the walls. Waiting for an answer, he was disappointed. The voice in his head had retreated, as if he’d driven it away.
“What should I do? How should I start?” he implored the dark anyway.
The answer was his own, for Luke knew he had to begin with the visions he’d painted earlier that day. At last he was ready to face his nightmares. He had to allow himself to know the whole truth. To take a step beyond what he’d already seen.
He concentrated on fire, on the burning images that haunted his nights . . .
He was consumed with burning emotions.
Obsession for the woman who was his heart. Rage at being thwarted in his demands that she run away with him. Jealousy for the old man of a husband who had access to her bed any time, day or night.
He had a mind of his own. He would not wait until she sought him out again.
He would go to her now . . .
Startled by the unexpected memory – for the emotions were so vivid and clear in his mind, Luke realized they had to be real – he wondered how his will had turned him from his course. What did lust and love have to do with his nightmares?
Fear kept him from wanting to find out even as fear forced him to search further.
He easily found the secret entrance to the pueblo. Once known, it no longer had the power to hold her from him.
As his feet trod the rocky passageway that twisted this way and that, his heart thundered in his chest. Soon he would see her. He would steal her away and then they would be together always, just as they were meant to be.
He easily overpowered the single guard who amused himself with a solitary game of chance rather than seeing to his duty. The hidden entrance was thought to be secret and so did not require such careful scrutiny as did the frontal approach. He bound the man’s hands and feet with leather thongs, used a wider strip of hide over his mouth – should the guard waken too soon, he could not alert his clan.
Then he ran for the main dwelling structure only to hear scuffling and muffled voices and animal sounds behind him. Thinking more guards had been alerted, he threw a glance over his shoulder. To his horror, he saw other men pouring from the secret entrance. Men dressed in the clothing of the dreaded Spanish soldiers.
Some were mounted, all were armed, a few carried torches.
Torches. Fire . . .
One torched the nearest building, while the captain ran a sword through the unconscious and bound guard.
Bleeding inside with guilt, he ran, knowing he had led the enemy into the heart of the Kisi pueblo. He ran, thinking to save the woman he loved from the curse that his jealousy had brought down upon her people . . .
And when the action had played itself out, Luke sat frozen in the dark, stunned, knowing that this had been no vision but a memory. If not for him, there would have been no fire, no horrible, haunting deaths. If not for him, the Kisi would never have been nearly decimated. If not for him, his people would not now be cursed.
Surely the darkness within him was more evil than he had ever imagined.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
MARA’S EYES FLASHED OPEN to the dark, though she had no idea of what woke her. Having slept a bit, she was still exhausted, still wearing Luke’s t-shirt and cut-offs. She’d waited for his return for hours until Isabel finally had risen and had ordered her to rest. She’d gone to Luke’s room, had tried to pretend he was with her in his bed . . .
Turning on the lamp, she squinted at the clock. Nearly four a.m. If Luke had returned, he hadn’t made himself known. And though she’d slept a few hours, she was getting a headache, the symptom one of needing more rest, though she was no longer sleepy. She rose, moving carefully so as not to make the headache worse.
Barefoot, she padded out into the hall, intending to make some nice, soothing tea. But a voice called to her.
“Mara, come join me.”
She entered the living room, dark but for several lit candles, illuminating sacred figures in their niches – kachinas and Catholic saints – and casting a spooky glow over the slight figure in the overstuffed chair. “Isabel, what are you doing here alone?”
“Onida needed her sleep. So did you.”
“How are you feeling?”
“Better . . . yet worse.” Shadows flickered across her face. “Luke . . . something is wrong.”
A chill shot through Mara. “He didn’t come back, then.”
“No. I fear for him.”
As did she. Why hadn’t she stopped him from leaving the house alone? As if she could stop him from doing anything he wanted, any more than she could force him into anything he didn’t.
Rubbing at the back of her neck – this was some weird headache coming on – she assured Isabel, “Luke will be all right.” He had to be.
“Then where is he?”
Mara shrugged, her attention taken over by the buzzing at the back of her skull. She’d had a few headaches in her day, but nothing like this. Tea wouldn’t do a damned thing to ease this kind of pain.
“My head feels like someone’s pounding on it,” she told Isabel. “I think I’d better find some aspirins.”
But Isabel sucked in a loud breath and intoned, “White man’s medicine cannot fix what is wrong with you,” before Mara could leave the room.
Mara’s hands flashed to her head. Damn if she didn’t feel like someone was driving through her skull as if trying to get inside. “What do you mean?”
From a distance, she heard Isabel reply, “The evil is upon us.”
The prayer stick Mara had made was lying in one of the niches. Without thinking, she picked it up and tried to focus on the wise woman. But the room wavered. Isabel’s face went out of focus. And the pounding at her skull intensified.
The evil . . .
Flesh crawled up her spine and her blood rushed through her veins.
“What do I do?” she gasped.
“Fight it!” Isabel ordered, but as if from a vacuum. “Fight the evil with everything you have learned!”
The buzzing at the back of her skull became unbearable. Horrified, Mara sank to the floor, clutched the prayer stick to her, closed her eyes and tried clearing her mind. She took deep if shaky breaths.
She concentrated on her sacred name, Palo-Wuti . . .
. . . and in her mind became Snakewoman.
She stood on the earthen floor of a long narrow canyon, its walls so fiery the very brilliance of the red hurt her eyes. And the wind howled so fiercely around her, its whistle threatened to pierce her ears. Grasping her feathered prayer stick, straightening her posture, she pushed her discomfort away and concentrated on finding the one whose summons she had answered.
A prickling sensation at the back of her neck made her aware of a malevolent force behind her. Slowly, she turned, the deliberate action bringing her face-to-face with a red-eye
d man, who was painted and feathered as intricately as any of Isabel’s kachinas.
Hatred hit her like a hot wind and her heart thundered with a fright she tried to bury.
“Who are you?” she demanded, her voice trembling in spite of herself and echoing along the corridor. “What is it you want of me?”
“Call me Witchman.” He laughed, the reverberation virulent. “Or perhaps you prefer my Kisi name – Lucas Naha. Such a foolish woman, thinking I wanted to change my ways. Thinking I might love you.”
“Luke?”
Heart pounding with dread, she concentrated on seeing beneath the disguise, concentrated on learning his true identity, but she only succeeded in frustrating herself.
“You should have stayed away,” he told her. “I betrayed you once and I’ll betray you again, this time for good. Your death will amuse me.”
A painted arm plunged up toward the sky, the hand opening and fisting in a gesture of power.
The winds instantly whirled in a circle around her. Overhead, ominous black clouds rolled in and the sky opened. Thunder barked its frightening laughter and heat lightning zapped the earth mere inches from where her feet were planted.
Was the man she loved really trying to kill her?
Despair deeper than she’d ever known gripped her. And for a second, she let her concentration slip.
Suddenly, she found herself rushing upward, the walls of the canyon striating, stretching, lengthening. The speed was dizzying, leaving her powerless. Then she was left standing atop a mesa, toes too close to the edge for comfort. Her insides clutched as she wavered. A laugh from behind startled her into carelessness. Turning awkwardly and too fast, she saw the painted arm coming for her. An open hand smacked her in the chest like a lightening bolt, its sizzling power plunging her over the rim.
“No-o-o.”
She plummeted, weeping that her lover could truly be so evil.
But there were other people to consider, a voice deep inside reminded her. Other people to protect.
As she quieted her emotions, she understood that Witchman was trying to scare her into dying in spirit so that her flesh would follow. And then she would be of help to no one. She concentrated on saving herself. Instantly she was floating on a soft current that drew her in a different direction, giving her time to regroup, finally setting her down in the cliff dwelling that was her powerful dreaming place.
But the ghostly dwelling was filled with dark shadows, which meant Witchman had preceded her.
She searched the darkness for him, but found things that were far more subtle . . . a ghostly face suddenly bloomed in the shadows . . . a muted wail came from somewhere nearby.
Ghosts. People who had died in the massacre.
Her heart thudded as spectral bodies seemed to materialize before her eyes, limbs twisted and bloody, startled eyes open in horror.
The ghosts were restless, floating, wandering, gathering. They lurked in every corner.
Murderess! they accused, their voices hollow.
Guilt seized her, heart and soul. She wept, sobbing aloud.
But she realized she couldn’t allow this. She had forgiven herself. She had another chance to right the wrong.
But did she have the power to overcome the evil this time?
She wasn’t certain she could do it alone.
The ghosts started fading . . .
Only to be replaced by a voice that echoed from every chamber. “I will enjoy killing you,” Witchman growled, “along with the old crone you protect with all her drivel about Kisi magic.”
“You would kill your own grandmother?” The grandmother her lover had professed to cherish? The elderly woman she was sure he did love? “I don’t believe you!” One way or the other, Witchman was lying. Either he wouldn’t kill his grandmother
. . . or he wasn’t who he said he was.
Witchman’s laugh was pure evil. “When I get through with the Kisi, they won’t be the cursed ones any longer. They’ll be the ones who disappeared.”
Clutching her prayer stick, she prayed for the truth and for help . . .
Both came in the form of someone suddenly approaching, bursting through the secret entrance. Snakewoman stared at the man as he ran toward her, his long hair flying behind him, his face bloody.
She spoke his sacred name, “Stormdancer!”
Stormdancer. Her lover wasn’t Witchman, after all. She should never have doubted him. Gladly, she flew into his arms, shared emotions if not a more primal embrace.
They had no time.
The being that was Witchman howled in fury. His features pulsed and transformed. Beneath the painted mask, she suddenly recognized the Spanish captain who had thrust his sword through her Comanche lover’s heart and, sitting atop his horse, had ridden her into the dust.
“Francisco Castillo!” she shouted in fury.
“Who do you call now? This Francisco will not help you.”
Startled, she realized Witchman did not know his own identity.
“You are Castillo!” Stomdancer cried, hugging Snakewoman close to his side. “Three hundred years ago, you followed me through the secret entrance to this pueblo and massacred the people who lived here.”
Witchman stood still, his body tense with fury. “Enough of your lies.”
“Why do you want to kill again?” Snakewoman asked, clinging to Stormdancer. “Don’t you have enough blood and destruction on your conscience?”
Hissing in answer, Witchman threw a stick to the earthen floor and muttered a curse. The stick shape-shifted and slithered toward her. A sidewinder, fangs dripping.
“Spirits guide me!” Stormdancer cried, setting her aside. He swooped down, grabbed the rattler behind the base of its head and hurled it past Witchman, out of the pueblo ruins and down into the canyon.
Witchman laughed. “You should have thrown it at me. But you are a weak fool. No doubt that’s why I killed you before.”
Now he was remembering, she realized. But this man’s vision hadn’t been called forth for the sake of knowledge. He wanted to destroy them.
Chanting sacred words, she threw her prayer stick of carved wood decorated with feathers directly at Witchman. In awe herself, she stepped back as the prayer stick grew and transformed into a great blue serpent that towered over him.
The eyes of the creature glittered with rainbow colors. It wove a dance and hissed, the sound reverberating through the ancient surroundings.
“Palolokon.” Recognizing the ancient god that slithered closer, Witchman stepped back further and further until he was teetering at the edge of the cliff.
Snakewoman knew that with one command, the evil would be dead. But killing and hatred must end or the Kisi would continue to be cursed if not destroyed completely. She raised her hand and once more cried, “Palolokon!” and the prayer stick returned to her hand.
Stormdancer encircled her waist. Together they had the strength to conquer anyone or anything.
Gazing into Witchman’s insane red eyes, she said, “I forgive you for the destruction of my people . . . for the murder of my lover . . . for my own death.”
Again Witchman’s face transformed to that of the Spanish captain, and for a moment his expression altered from hate-filled to peaceful . . . and then he purposely took that final, deadly step backward.
Shaken, Snakewoman and Stormdancer gazed down into the canyon. Witchman’s sidewinder crawled over his still form, his own magic and guilt having turned against him in a final dance with death.
“MARA! MARA, COME BACK,” Luke implored until her lids flickered open.
He stroked her hair and gray light crept into the room. Was it dawn already? Her gaze searched Luke’s face, as bloody as it had been in her vision. She found one of his wrists, bruised and bloodied, as well.
“What happened to you?”
“Mahooty and Delgado thought locking me in the kiva would keep me off their backs.”
“But you escaped.”
“With some help from
Victor Martinez.”
Victor Martinez, the stormbringer priest and the first victim. “Did we really do it?” she gasped.
He nodded and took the prayer stick from her clutched fingers. After setting it on a nearby table, he scooped her up against him. “Together.”
“The evil is finished,” Isabel stated.
“Thank God,” Onida added, tears sliding down her cheeks. “And you are both safe.”
They clung to each other, and as Mara absorbed Luke’s very real, very human warmth, she knew she never wanted to be separated from him again.
“Witchman – who was he?” she murmured against his shoulder. “Mahooty?”
“Let’s face the bastard together and find out.”
Together had such a wonderful ring. Permanent. Could Luke be feeling the same bond she did?
“Um, you might want these,” Onida said, sniffling as she offered Mara her own clothes, now clean and dry.
Taking them from Luke’s mother, Mara escaped for a moment to the nearest bathroom where she hurriedly changed. Within minutes, she and Luke were on their way to confront Mahooty. Luke told her how he’d been bound and thrown inside the kiva, and how he’d gotten out using Kisi magic through Victor Martinez’s guidance.
Ironically, they found the pueblo bully accompanied by Delgado in the middle of the plaza. The two men were staring down at the mouth of the kiva, while several other curious residents looked on.
His back turned to Luke and Mara, Charlie Mahooty kicked the charred cover to the kiva opening and muttered, “What the hell happened here? How did Naha get out?”
Luke answered, “With the help of an elder,” loud enough for all to hear.
Mahooty whipped around, his eyes wide. “A blind old woman set you free?”
“No, the truth and a fireball – the first I ever created. Victor Martinez gave me a few instructions.”
Luke’s naming the dead man forced a snicker from Delgado. “You been in the sun too long, man.” But Mara could tell he was spooked as he moved away.
Luke stepped closer, growling, “What’s your excuse? What made the two of you crazy enough to throw me down there in the first place?”