by Nick Lake
Everywhere he went, the burning brand on his tail set fire to things—to bushes, to grass, to trees. The first forest fire began, destroying many acres and lives.
But after that, fire was out in the world, was loose, and people were able to use it.
I blink, trying to wash the tiredness out of my eyes. There is an idea buzzing around my consciousness, like a fly. A thought, about chaos and order, and what they mean. About stealing. I can’t quite catch it, though.
I sit there trying to empty my mind for a long time, empty it into a wide net to seize that flashing fish of a thought, its scales gleaming as it disappears into the blackness of deep water, and then I must fall asleep because when I open my eyes I’m surrounded by
The Bright, Bright Multitude of The Stars
Chapter 32
And then I’m in the Dreaming, kneeling by the fallen elk.
My hand is on his chest, feeling his slow breathing. Flecks of foam are starting to form at the edges of his mouth. Mark is standing next to me—I can feel him, the heat of him. He is a human-shaped furnace, and I wonder why I didn’t notice that, that he’s too hot to be a real person.
The other elks are crowded around, in a circle, looking down at their leader, their eyes brimming with sadness. Their heads low. Forming a kind of honor guard, a phalanx—is that right?—all around us. A barrier no wolves or snakes can get through.
Except that it’s too late now.
Come on, says Mark. We need to go. We need to continue on to the castle. To the Child.
But I will not leave the elk, not while he is alive.
No, I say. No, I’m not going anywhere.
Mark puts his hands on his hips. We must hurry, he says. The Crone—
Can wait, I say. I’m not leaving him on his own.
Mark sighs.
All right, he says. I will scout this side of the river. Make sure it’s safe. Then I will build a fire.
He turns and walks off, away upstream, looking all around. Once he is out of earshot, I am surprised to see the eye of the dying elk roll toward me—I thought he was nearly gone, and this movement startles me.
Be careful of him, says the elk in a quiet voice. As if using the last of its strength.
What? I say. Why?
He is Coyote, says the elk softly. He is the Player of Tricks. He is the First Liar.
I sit cross-legged next to him, still with my hand on his warm body. The breathing is getting even slower now, I can almost feel the life force leave him. He doesn’t seem like a liar, I say. He seems … nice.
It is easier to trick with charm than with aggression, says the elk. Just remain vigilant.
The dying elk’s great soft eyes, fringed with long lashes, flutter up to the sky. The spirits and First Man and First Woman made the stars in patterns. They laid them out on a rug, to plan them. Then Coyote said it was taking too long, and he picked up the rug and scattered the stars across the heavens, a great mess of fire in the firmament.
I look up, at the vast glittering chaos of space.
Then I look down at the elk again, and see that his eyes are beginning to shut. Something sharp drives itself into my heart. But only he can bring rain, I say. He said that.
The elk breathes out, slowly. Yes, that is true, he says. It is given to Coyote to control the rain.
The rain is disruptive, says one elk.
The rain is disorder, says another.
The rain is chaos, they all say.
But you need it, I say. For the grass. To eat.
Reluctantly, the elks nod. We do.
Coyote is not evil, says my elk. He simply plays tricks. But he is not to be trusted.
Before Coyote, says another elk, a female, there was no death. Then Coyote threw a stone in a lake, and he said to First Man and First Woman, if the stone sinks, then there will be death. And the stone sank, so there was death.
But stones always sink, I say.
Yes, says the leader. That is the nature of Coyote.
So you’re saying I shouldn’t kill the Crone? I shouldn’t rescue the Child.
No, says the elk. You must do these things. Otherwise all will be lost. I am only saying you must be careful of Coyote.
I lean against him, feeling the departing warmth of him. I don’t understand any of this, I say. I don’t even understand what this place is. The Dreaming.
It is the First World, says the elk. It is the place before time, before Coyote stole the sun and moon and—
Ah, says Mark, coming between two of the honor guard of elks, breaking into the circle. You are telling my tales?
First Angry, says the elk.
Elk, says Mark.
Look after the Maiden, says the elk. Keep her safe.
I promise it, says Mark.
Your promises are nothing, says the elk. You are Coyote.
Then, quite abruptly, it closes its eyes, takes one last deep breath, and dies. I sense it, I almost see it, like when a bright light goes off and a person’s shadow jumps back into them; there is an energy that is pulled back in, and disappears.
The body is still beneath my palm.
Mark closes his eyes. Let his spirit be reborn, he says.
Let his spirit be reborn, say the other elks.
I touch my eyes—they are wet, and my breath is hitching. I have never seen anything die before, and the elk was so beautiful.
And now, of course, I don’t know what to think. Who to trust. The elk said not to believe Mark, to be careful of him. But at the same time it said the same thing as him—that I need to kill the Crone, and rescue the Child. So why would I not trust Coyote?
I mean Mark. I mean Mark.
I can hear the crying of the Child now, faintly, even without Mark doing that magic spell—a kind of constant, low soundtrack, like the moaning of the wind. It is calling me, a dull ache inside me, I feel the urge now that the elk is dead to follow it and make it stop.
To pick up the Child, and hold it in my arms, and make the crying cease.
Ah, says Mark. You hear it.
The Child? I say. Yes.
It is calling you. There is not much time left.
I take his hand and he pulls me to my feet. The castle is still a long way away, he says. We have no time to lose.
What about them? I say, looking at the elks that are still standing in a circle around us.
What about them?
I turn to the elks. But they have been listening to our conversation.
We are coming with you, Maiden, they say. To the Crone. To the Child.
And with me? says Mark. You will suffer the presence of Coyote?
We do not know your goals, says the elk. But you are Coyote. You lived before the world. We will do as you ask.
I think to myself—as soon as he and I are alone Mark and I are having a serious talk about all this Coyote stuff. But now is not the time. I nod at the elks. Thank you, I say.
They begin to walk up the narrow, winding path leading out of the canyon. Mark and I follow.
We keep climbing, higher and higher, and I try not to look down.
Then, out of the corner of my eye, as I round a bend, I see a swift shape behind us. It’s shadow, gray, and it’s following us fast, gaining on us.
Then another.
And another.
Mark whirls around too, stops. More wolves, he says.
I see their muzzles now, their legs and tails, the sleek projectile speed of them. They are running flat out, trying to catch us. It looks like they’re going to succeed. The first one appears from behind a stone, races fluidly upward—a gray needle, stitching the yellow slope of stone. Of course! I think. Why worry about the drop when there are wolves to kill you?
Mark’s eyes skitter over the ground. The path is rocky, and the slope is mostly scree—bits of small stone and like, gravelly stuff, from when the river was much higher, I guess.
I’m going to make a landslide, he says. You get out of here. Ride.
Ride?
&n
bsp; Elks run faster than people.
I can’t leave you, I say. I can’t leave you to—
I’ll be fine. Go.
He begins to kick rocks, sending them down the slope. Nothing much happens, and the wolves are gaining. I can see their teeth now, their slobbering tongues. Mark curses, keeps kicking. He picks up a really big rock and throws it, toward a large patch of loose-looking scree.
There’s a pause.
Then a slow movement, like molasses running down the side of a bottle.
Go, says Mark.
I run up the last section of slope with the elks. When we reach the top I see the prairie stretching out before us again, under the vastness of the stars. In the distance is the dark spire of the Crone’s castle, where we’re headed.
Maiden, says the big female elk. Mount. She bends her forelegs so that I can climb onto her back. Quickly, she says.
I grab the fur where her neck and back meet, and pull myself up. Barely are my legs around her before she rises, and begins to run. The sensation is completely different to that of crossing the river—it’s fast, and shakes my bones. I hold on for dear life as the elk flings itself along the ground away from the wolves.
The other elks are running too, their hooves flickering over the dry grass of the prairie. I look back, clinging to my elk’s neck, and see the side of the canyon give way behind us, or that’s what it seems like, rocks roaring downhill like a wave away from us, dust puffing up in clouds.
Holy— I start to think, but I don’t finish the thought, because then the whole world goes out. I mean, it just goes black, everything, the stars disappearing, the river, the gnarled trees clinging to the cliff face, the huddled elks—all of it just switches off.
Click.
Like a light going off.
What the hell? I say to myself, in the darkness. The elk keeps running, but I can sense its fear, I can feel its head turning from side to side, and it slows, as it tries to work out what is happening.
Everything is gone—no sky, no prairie, no castle spire in the far distance. I freeze, because if I took a wrong step I would fall to my death.
And the crying of the Child is loud now, so loud, not just a sighing like the breeze, underneath everything, but an all-encompassing noise I can’t block out, exactly as if someone turned out the light in a baby’s room, and the baby is screaming—
Something is wrong, says Mark’s voice, loud and breathless in my ear. I look to the side where his voice came from, searching for him in the utter darkness, and—
suddenly there is a burst of light, like a bolt of lightning except that there is no lightning, just that instant the stars are blazing again and there he is, but he is Coyote, streaming along beside my elk, muscles flowing, fur shadowy in the starlight. His mouth is open, long sharp teeth visible, pink tongue lolling, panting as he runs—more like some enormous gray bird flying just over the ground, than an animal.
Something is wrong in your world, he says. Shouts, more like.
Is it Mom? I say, is it—
And at that moment the world disappears again, I mean the Dreaming disappears, everything turning off, the stars gone, and I hear my elk snort and whinny in panic, it is weaving from side to side now, terrified.
I don’t know, says Mark’s voice from the blackness.
Then hands are touching my head, stroking my hair.
Shelby? Shelby, honey, there’s been—
Chapter 33
—A power outage, says Mom.
Huh? I say.
I’m on the other side of the air, in the armchair by the fire. I look around. The fire in the fireplace is little more than embers now, gently smoldering, but giving enough reddish light to see by. There’s a blanket over me; I guess Mom must have put it there.
The lights are all off—the lamps and the overhead lights. Outside the windows is pure blackness.
I’m going to see if there’s a generator, she says. I think I saw one in the woodshed.
What time is it? I say.
Five a.m., says Mom. Early. I didn’t want to wake you, but you should probably go to bed. Get some more sleep.
Yeah, I say. My eyes are still sandy with exhaustion. Yeah, okay.
She leaves the room, opens the door to the outside. There’s a little blast of cold night air and then she’s gone.
I slowly sit up, and that’s when I see a sandwich on a little tray on the table next to me. A glass of milk. I smile. I fell asleep before dinner and Mom didn’t want me to go hungry. I take a bite of the sandwich—it’s good. Corned beef, I think, mayo, tomatoes. Where the hell she got the tomatoes I don’t know. I find myself suddenly hungry and finish the sandwich quickly. Then I drink the milk.
I should go to bed, I guess, like Mom said. But I have just been asleep—I know I would lie there in the darkness, eyes open, mind refusing to switch off. I glance at the book that got lodged between the cushion and arm of the chair, the Apache folktales. I shiver, and don’t touch it. These dreams have been getting way too weird, too real, for my liking. I can still feel the knife in my hand—the one Mom doesn’t seem able to see.
I slip it into my pocket, and out of my mind.
I get up and stretch, and nearly fall over because I’ve forgotten about the bulk of the CAM Walker on my foot. I grab on to the fireplace and steady myself.
I remember going outside the night before last, the moths flying, the moon bright in the sky above the trees. Fireflies leaving vapor trails in the air. I decide to go out again, to drink in the stillness, the peace.
Opening the door quietly, I ease myself out into the inky night. I wonder where this woodshed is that Mom mentioned—I can’t see her and of course I can’t hear her either.
It’s very dark—the moon hidden behind some clouds. I can feel living things around me—bats flitting, insects careering. For a moment I remember the sounds of the elks in the Dreaming, and I am filled with grief.
No.
I get a grip on myself.
I’m here, in the real world, and I can’t hear the insects, and it’s a real shame but just fricking deal with it, Shelby.
I look back at the cabin and it’s weird seeing no lights on in there, just the dim glow of the fire, red through the windows. It’s actually kind of creepy—a lonely cold feeling.
Should I be worried that the power went out?
Could someone have MADE the power go out?
I wonder if Mom thought about that too. I cast my mind back, to try to remember if she was looking anxious when she woke me up. In the meantime I turn away from the cabin, from its dead dark eyes.
Over there in the woods, I see something gleam. I blink. What was that? I make my way over to the tree line. I’m barefoot apart from my CAM Walker; I can feel the gravel under one foot, then the grass and moss, the bark, and it’s a little piece of the Dreaming in this world. I peer into the deeper darkness between the trees. Nothing. I make my way farther into the forest, avoiding fallen logs and stones as I get deeper into the trees.
Another flash—I turn and it’s gone. I head in its direction but I can’t hear anything. A creepy thought crosses my mind: if something weird was going on, I would have one less sense to detect it. What if there’s a sound that anyone else, anyone who could hear, would identify immediately as a hunting mountain lion?
Then I think:
No, a hunting mountain lion would be silent. Even someone who could hear would be screwed.
This thought cheers me up by a factor of approximately 6,700, except that it totally doesn’t. I take the knife from my pocket and hold it out in front of me, a feeble defense, especially because the knife probably isn’t real.
Enough of this crap, I’m going back in, I think.
I turn, and there’s a guy in front of me in a black uniform and with night-vision goggles on his face and an assault rifle in his hands.
Chapter 34
My body goes still as deep water. The guy hasn’t seen me—he makes some signal, some Call of Duty stuff,
and I see another shadow moving beside him, both of them heading toward the house. I whirl. More of them, tiny red lights glowing on their night-vision goggles like—
like the eyes of wolves, shining in the forest of the Dreaming—
and they are getting closer and closer to the cabin, moving lithe and dangerous through the trees like a wolf pack, closing in.
Armed police, I think.
For a second, I just stand there, not knowing what to do. I mean, these guys have SERIOUS guns, and they can see in the dark. I’m a teenage girl wearing a CAM Walker that seriously impedes my movement, I’m not going to be outrunning anyone anytime soon. I feel my hands shaking, my empty hand and my other hand that’s holding the kn—
Knife.
The police are after Mom, I know that, but I also know it isn’t going to look good if they find me with this big blade in my hand. Mom couldn’t see it, but I don’t know what that means yet. For all I know I’m going totally crazy and it doesn’t exist at all. Or she pretended not to see it, for some reason I still don’t understand, and it IS real.
Whatever: I throw the knife into the undergrowth; instantly, I can no longer see where it landed.
How the hell did they find us?
I could try to run away, or hobble away, anyway—I won’t be doing any running. But … Mom’s here somewhere, probably back in the cabin in bed. The police—I don’t know how they found us—are going to find her and arrest her, and do I want her to be alone for that? She killed someone, but it was self-defense and—
Without even really thinking about it, I’m moving back toward the cabin, following the SWAT team, or whatever they are. At the edge of the clearing, I stop. One of the men, the leader, I guess, holds up three fingers, then makes like a turning motion with his hand—three men peel off and head around the back of the cabin. Then he points to his eyes, and arrows his finger at the windows.
Two guys creep forward, crouching, and look inside. They shake their heads.
Leader makes another gesture, and now the two by the window stand on either side of the door. Another man steps forward—he’s got like a personal battering ram in his hands. He approaches the door.