CIRCLES IN THE SKY (The Mother People Series Book 2)

by JOAN DAHR LAMBERT

  Lupo interrupted her thoughts. The wolf had been frantic since her pups had disappeared, running first to the woods to look for them, then back to Zena, unwilling to leave her for very long.

  "You must go look for them, Lupo," Zena told her. "Go find your pups. I will be all right until you return."

  Lupo watched her intently, understanding the thought, if not the words. Lupo always seemed to know what was in her mind, even from a distance.

  She pointed to the woods. "Go find your pups," she said sternly. Lupo stared into her eyes again and then slowly loped toward the trees. From a distance, Zena heard her howl, the special high-pitched call she used to bring the pups to her. The howl came once more, then faded as Lupo moved further away, searching.

  She shivered, suddenly aware that she was alone, now that Lupo had gone. The others had taken the children into the hills, fearful for their safety, and Torlan had gone to look for wood for another carving, leaving Lupo to watch over her. The thought was strange, even threatening, though she did not know why. Torlan would soon be back.

  Seeking distraction from her uneasiness, she picked up one of the Goddess statues he had left beside her. Torlan had become a skilled carver and had made a collection of figures - one for each of the Mother People groups that came to them, he had told her. The carvings were very fine, and so were the figures of people he had made. There was one of Miko, with his sturdy body and round cheeks, one of her own face and Lilan's, one of Gunor and a few others.

  She shivered again. The air had suddenly become much colder. Reaching for one of the extra furs Torlan had also left beside her, she pulled the thickest one around her. Lilan had made it for her when she was so sick, and it had three layers of fur stitched together. It felt heavy, comforting.

  A storm was coming, she realized, glancing up at the sky; that was why it had become so cold. The sky was dark grey now, with tinges of lurid red, instead of brilliant blue. Clouds, brooding and heavy with portent, were gathering fast.

  Perhaps it was the impending storm that was making her so uneasy. Storms always had that effect on her. They seemed to fill the air with tension; she could feel it now, all around her, in her body and even in her mind.

  Or was something else making her feel that way? She stiffened, suddenly aware of a prickling sensation in her back, as if she was being watched. But how could that be? No one was here, except herself.

  The sensation was stronger now, too strong to ignore. Something, someone, was in the clearing with her, watching her, and the watching was not friendly. There was malice in it, even hatred, and the hatred was getting stronger...

  The feeling became still more forceful; Zena felt it like a weight on her chest, like the terrible constriction she had felt when she was so sick, as if she could not breathe.

  And then she knew. The evil; it was here, with her, all around her. It had come.

  Her fingers reached automatically for the oldest statue of the Goddess, the one her mother had given her so long ago. She felt no fear, only a strange sense of relief. She had been waiting for this moment for a long time. Now, it had come.

  "So you are Zena." The shrill voice was behind her. "Why do you not rise to greet me? I have long wanted to meet you."

  The words Borg had taught her sounded strange after so many years, but Zena understood the tone. It was gentle but it was menacing. She did not answer, only waited. She heard footsteps, felt the sensation of evil coming closer, and then Veeta stood before her. For a moment the sun escaped a cloud and lit up her hair so that it seemed to erupt in flames. Except the burning was inside Veeta, Zena knew, the terrible, destructive burning that would kill Veeta, or kill all of them. It was up to the Mother now.

  No. It was up to her.

  Another voice came - Torlan's, speaking in Veeta's words from the far edge of the clearing. He must have returned.

  "She does not rise because she cannot, Veeta. Her legs do not work. Surely, you do not wish to harm someone who cannot face you." He took a step toward Zena.

  Veeta's response was instantaneous. "Do not come closer," she warned, standing over Zena with her knife drawn, "or I will kill her now. I have long wanted to do that too,” she added in a tone so bitter Torlan winced, “for hers was the name Tron called out just before he forced himself on me, forced me like a crazed beast…”

  She broke off her angry tirade to stare at Zena’s legs, as if trying to determine if Torlan’s words were true. Zena uncovered them briefly.

  Veeta was satisfied. "I can see that he spoke the truth,” she said. She laughed, a hard, triumphant laugh. “So this is the Zena who has such special power - a poor creature who cannot even move. After all these seasons of waiting, planning, this is what I find!"

  "Nor are you a child, as I had thought," she added, almost to herself. She frowned. She had planned to take Zena in the same way she had taken the children and then force her to speak, but to escape quickly with a woman who could not move at all was difficult. Still, there was another way, one that might be better. A knife through the heart, her grandmother had told her, only through the heart. That was the way to take a witch's power, once she had been forced to reveal its source. But did this woman who could not move really have some kind of special power?

  Her eyes narrowed as she continued to stare at Zena. The look was penetrating, intelligent. Veeta was searching for something, Zena knew, and she met the gaze without concealment. An unexpected surge of strength coursed through her. To match wits with such a formidable enemy, one who sought to destroy not just her but all in her tribe, perhaps all the Mother People as well, was strangely satisfying.

  Abruptly, her mind cleared, became cold and totally confident. There was a way to stop Veeta, and she felt absolute certainty that the Mother would help her to find it.

  Veeta nodded abruptly. "You do have power, after all," she observed in a satisfied voice. "It is not in your body - that is clear - but in your mind. There is hardness in your mind, as there is in my own. And it is in the mind that power resides. To have yours as well as my own will be fine indeed.

  "I will have it, too," she added, brandishing her knife and smiling down at Zena. "You will tell me all that I wish to know of its source, so that I may take it for myself.

  "But first," she continued, and now her tone was purposeful, "first you must tell me where I can find Tron, and Borg. I have long sought vengeance on both."

  "Tron is dead," Zena told her, using her own words. She had begun to remember some of the words Borg had taught them but she did not want Veeta to know that. They would gain precious time if Torlan had to translate what she said.

  Veeta's lips compressed. "So the Great Avenger has cheated me of that one," she said wryly when Torlan translated her words. "I have heard this from many others, so I will believe you. We will speak of Borg instead."

  Torlan answered this time. "Borg is not here," he lied. "He left a long time ago."

  "You will have to do better than that," Veeta snapped. "I know he has been here." She pointed at Zena with the knife. "You will tell me," she ordered.

  Torlan moved again; instantly, Veeta knelt, and the knife came against Zena's chest. Zena stared into the eyes so close now to her own. They were almost the same color as Veeta's hair, glinting and hard with fire.

  "Do not move, I told you," Veeta repeated, gesturing toward Torlan with her knife. "Besides, there is nothing you can do. My men are behind you in the woods, watching. You did not think I would come here alone, surely? They will come at my signal and will be upon you before you can move. There is no one here to help you, either. All the people of your tribe watch the children who are left, or look for the ones I have already taken, do they not? No doubt that is where the man Borg has gone. I can easily find him there, and avenge Vetron's death."

  She laughed again. "He will find the children, too, almost unguarded. Was that not clever? And if they kill the two weaklings who guard them, it does not matter. I have no further need of them now that they have led me t
o Borg."

  Her voice became harsh. "They think they have rescued the children, but they have not. Do not fear. I will soon take them back. The children are mine now. I need them and I will have them."

  "Why did you take the children?" If he could keep her talking, Torlan thought, the others might return to help. The place where they watched the children was not far away.

  Veeta's head turned, snake-like, to make sure he had not moved, then her eyes sought Zena's again. Zena watched their amber lights fade until Veeta's gaze had become almost dreamy, as if she was far away. Abruptly the eyes hardened again, so that they were like rocks that glittered in the sun.

  "I will tell you why I took them," she said, her voice shaking with bitter rage. "I took them for revenge."

  She stopped, and her face filled with a strange radiance. "One child for each time I could not mate," she intoned in a loud, sing-song voice, "one child for each infant I could not bear. One child for each time the women taunted me because of the maimed creature that came from me, one for each time they mocked me because I could have no more, one child for each time the men sneered behind my back because I could not mate, because I was only a woman."

  Her face changed again as the bitterness returned. "But I will show them," she said savagely, spitting out the words. "I will be the one they fear now, the one they dare not taunt, the one they must obey. The land will be mine, the children will be mine, the power of the Mother People will be mine, because I will take it from this woman called Zena.

  "And you will have nothing; the Mother People will have nothing, nothing at all! I will have your power, your land, your children. I will train the boys to kill, the girls to bear more hunters to obey me. And so it will be."

  She threw back her head and laughed again. "Is that not amusing? The children I take will grow up to kill their own kind, for I will train them to kill Mother People. With pleasure they will kill them, and the girls will breed still more to kill more, and then there will be no more Mother People, only people like myself, who worship the Great Avenger. Where, then, will this Great Mother you speak of find her power?"

  She shook her head. "There will be no power, for all of it will be mine. And you, all of you, will have become that which you hate the most, people who live by violence, by the power of their knives. Is that not a fitting revenge?"

  Torlan took a step forward. The woman was mad, obsessed. He had to stop her.

  Veeta pressed the knife against Zena's throat. "Speak!" she screamed. "Speak and tell me the source of this power you have, or I will kill you now. It is almost the same, the old ones told me. A knife through the heart and all your power is mine, whether you speak or you do not!

  "And you will tell me what she says," she commanded, taking the knife from Zena's throat for an instant and pointing it at Torlan.

  The knife returned to Zena’s throat. "Zena cannot understand your words," Torlan answered quickly, terrified that the knife would press deeper. "I will tell her what you have asked." He did not think this was true; Zena had probably understood some of what Veeta had said, but he could at least gain time in this way. Time was all they had. He was too far away to reach Zena before the knife plunged.

  He turned to Zena, trying to warn her with his eyes. "She wishes you to tell her the source of your power. It is best to tell her something."

  Zena nodded. The small movement made the knife slide against her throat, and she felt the first prickling of fear. Could she really meet such a terrible challenge?

  Her mother's words, spoken long ago in her Kyrie when she had first taken Zena to meet the Goddess, came into her mind. Come, Zena, she had said, come with me to greet the Goddess. Pull Her wisdom into your mind, Her strength into Your body, Her love into Your heart. When the Goddess lives within you, no challenge will ever be too great.

  The words seemed to drop into Zena’s heart and mind, replacing the fear. Taking a deep breath, she looked down at the old statue of the Goddess, which still lay in her hand. Deliberately, without hurry, she stared into the calm face and spoke to the Goddess in her thoughts.

  Great Mother, tell me now what I should do. You have brought the evil to me, have entrusted me with the task of ridding Your world of that evil. I am in Your hands, now, Great Mother, and look to You for guidance. Closing her eyes, she waited.

  Veeta watched her critically, surprised at Zena's calmness. "Speak!" she demanded again. “Speak!”

  Zena’s eyes opened and she complied. "Tell her I will speak!" she said forcefully to Torlan. She did not think Veeta would like her message, but she would give it anyway. "Tell her I will speak of power and its uses, so that she may understand. But first she must take the knife from my throat. I cannot speak while it is there."

  Veeta pulled the knife back when Torlan asked. The woman had courage, she admitted reluctantly. To give orders with a knife pressed against her throat was not easy.

  Pulling herself into a sitting position, Zena began to speak in a strong, clear voice that reverberated through the clearing. There was anger in her now, as well as strength, anger not at Veeta but at the horrors she would perpetrate, at the evil one person could do to another, without thought, without caring. Strangely, there was compassion, too, that Veeta had never known love, that her life had been so full of darkness and pain.

  "The power comes not from me," she told Veeta, looking into the demented eyes, "but from the Goddess. Her power is all around you, if you but look. There is power in the land, the sky, the stars and sun and moon, in all that lives upon the earth, from the smallest of creatures, the worms and insects and tiny frogs, to the huge bears that roam the woods, the reindeer that give their lives for our comfort. It is in the waters, the lakes and rivers and streams, in the food we eat, even in the furs that warm us. Most especially, it is in the statue I hold, that was carved long ago from the trees that grow in the forest where once my people lived..."

  The image came instantly, an image of statues wrapped in her thick fur. Zena’s eyes widened and she stopped speaking even as her lips moved to frame more words. Torlan's face was uneasy as he watched her. Quickly, he filled in the sudden silence by translating, and Veeta listened intently.

  Another image came. Lupo, her beloved wolf, with her tail straight, her ears pricked up, listening, alert. The pups were close behind. So she had found them. Zena closed her eyes again for a long moment. Lupo she understood, but what did the other image mean? Abruptly, comprehension came. A knife through the heart, Veeta had said. Not the throat, the heart.

  The words came again, effortlessly. "Love is the source of the Mother's power, the love She has for us, the love we bear for Her and for each other, for the earth the Mother has given us. It is endless, this love, and all people can partake of the power it creates. But to use it, the heart must be pure, free of anger of hatred or the desire for revenge. When these are present, the power within us drains away and then there is only emptiness, a terrible emptiness that leads us to do violence to each other and to the Mother's earth. There is no power in such acts, only weakness."

  More words poured out, words Zena hardly knew she spoke, for they came not from her but from all the Zenas who had ever lived or would one day be borne, from the Mother Herself. She was one with them now; they were here with her, inside her, helping her to combat the evil, putting the strong words in her mouth so she could think, think what she must do with the images, so she could call to Lupo in her mind, over and over again... Lupo always knew what was in her mind...

  She knew what Lupo would do when she came, but still Zena called her. There was coldness in her now. The anger was gone, the compassion, and only the implacable coldness of resolve was left. The evil must be stopped. She would do what had to be done to stop it, and she alone would bear the blame.

  Rain was pouring down now, and she heard the rumble of thunder. "Power comes from the Mother's life-giving rain," she heard herself saying. "But most powerful of all is the thunder and lightning that is sent by the Goddess Herself."<
br />
  As if on cue, a jagged bolt of lightning flashed across the sky. A deafening clap of thunder followed, startling all of them.

  When Torlan translated Zena's last words, Veeta looked at Zena with respect. She had become weary of all these words, had not even understood them very well, but to make the thunder and lightning come was surely a sign of great power. Now, she needed to know how to use it.

  "I have listened to all you have said, but now I wish to learn how to take this power for myself," she said impatiently. "I need to know the magic, the rituals."

  "She wants rituals, magic," Torlan said, "so she can take the power for herself. What can we tell her?"

  Zena nodded. She knew now what she had to do. Turning to face Veeta, she began to speak again, in exactly the tone she had used before, as if still imparting words of great wisdom. Her eyes were on Veeta, but the words were meant for Torlan.

  "You must make her look at you," she said in a strong voice. "You will tell her that you are the one who helps with the rituals, does the gestures and mixes the potions. You must show them to her, show her how they are done, make her look at you so she does not watch me. Her eyes must be on you."

  "All this you will show her," she finished, and now her tone was one of supplication, as if she was asking the Goddess for help. "Then, all will be well with the Mother People." She raised her arms to the sky, then extended them towards Torlan in a dramatic gesture. Torlan stared at her, baffled. What did she mean?

  Veeta stared at her, too, and the coldness in her eyes shifted for a moment into bewilderment. Torlan had not yet told her what these words meant, but she knew there was neither fear nor hatred in Zena's tone, only strength, and then supplication.

  The bewilderment vanished. Zena was asking this Goddess of hers for protection, that was it. "To ask this Great Goddess of yours for help is futile," she said, emphasizing each word. "It is the Great Avenger who rules, the Great Avenger who drives me, gives me my strength.