by C. E. Murphy
Her iron-gray eyebrows rose. I gestured at Sara. "The magic took her husband to your end of time. I need to try to save him. I don't know if I can, but I promised I'd try."
Aidan spoke for the first time in what seemed like hours. "Lucas? What happened to Lucas?"
Our hesitation in answering was answer enough. His breath rushed out of him and his hands turned to knots at his sides. "I can hold it open until you get back."
"What happens if he does that?" Sara's voice cracked, and she didn't look at us when she asked the question, but at the old shaman instead. "What happens if we hold this time rift open? Can we save him?"
"Does he live, in my day?"
I shook my head, lips compressed. The shaman frowned. "Then perhaps. Maybe if his soul is still his own, or if you reach him before death takes him, perhaps he could return. But it would be dangerous. We do not die out of time, Walkingstick. We die when we are meant to. I think his soul is already lost, if he is dead in my time. I think he would return to life a sorcerer, and this battle today would be for nothing."
"I have to try. I've dealt with sorcerers before. Maybe I could..." I trailed off, because really, dealing with body-snatching sorcerers in the past hadn't gone all that well for the host bodies.
"No." Sara slumped, hands useless in her lap. "No, you don't, Joanne. If the risk is having to do this all over again...he wouldn't want that. I do." Her voice broke, harsh and miserable. "I want you to go save him, I want to make all of this unhappen, I want to go home and be happy again, but if a sorcerer stole his soul and came back in his place...Lucas wouldn't want you to try. He wouldn't want to risk it. He would say it was a good life and to let it go. So I have to, too, don't I. Because what're you going to do if you go back and save him but it's not really him? Kill him again?"
That was possibly the worst prospect I'd ever been presented with, and I'd been given a lot of unpleasant choices over the past year. Sara glanced at me and actually laughed at my expression. Not a healthy laugh, but a laugh. "Yeah. That's what I thought. No," she said to the ancient shaman. "No, go home. Sing for him, too, even if he wasn't of your People. And don't ever cross my path again."
The last was to me, and I couldn't blame her for it at all. I nodded, though she wasn't looking my way. Sara got up, brushed her knees free of debris, and left the ruin of her life along with all the rest of us.
Most of the rest of us. Les cast Morrison and me a look, then followed Sara. Ada lurched to her feet and ran for Aidan, catching him in a hug that made him grunt and squeak with protest. Not much protest, though: he hugged her back, face buried in her shoulder, while my Dad sat down hard and rubbed his hands over his eyes. Gosh. I wondered where I'd gotten that habit from. After a minute, he said, "So this is your life, Joanne?" into his palms, but I was busy crawling toward Morrison and didn't want to answer. Dad didn't seem to expect an answer, either, and for a few minutes we all simply sat there, wrung out, with no thoughts for the future.
The poor military guy finally broke the silence. Not by asking what the hell had just happened, which would have been legitimate, but by saying, "I'm going to have to radio this in. They'll already be wondering why we haven't reported. You probably won't have long to get your people out of the valley."
I couldn't help asking, "What are you going to tell them? And, look, I'm sorry, but what's your name?"
"Lieutenant Dennis Gilmore." Lieutenant Gilmore rightfully looked as though he'd seen ghosts, and like he didn't want to give the only answer he could. "I'm going to tell them that we had an encounter with the epidemic's source and were able to eliminate it, but at great personal cost. We'll send out a search team for the body, and I will identify it as our target."
That reminded me. I closed my eyes, breathed, "Jesus," and opened them again. "Lieutenant, I'm really, really sorry, but you're going to have to burn Captain Montenegro and everybody else who died out here tonight. By sunrise."
He turned his wrist over, looking at a watch, then looked through broken trees at the starry night. "Four hours. We can do that, ma'am, but it'll complicate things if the tribe is still in the woods."
"Won't it complicate things if they all come back to town, too? The CDC--"
"Ma'am, the CDC is not going to let this go. But if we can obtain the source and return it to the CDC, I believe that once they've satisfied themselves that the epidemic has run its course, they'll leave Cherokee town and the Qualla Boundary without unduly disturbing its residents. The sooner you get them home so blood tests can be run, the sooner we'll be out of your hair." He sounded so professional I wanted to cry for him. His entire team was dead, and he was holding it together admirably. I wondered what he would let himself remember.
Dad stood up. "We'll get them home and we'll get the blood tests underway. Thanks for your understanding here, Lieutenant."
"I can give you half an hour." Lieutenant Gilmore went to the bodies of his fallen comrades, standing over them in silence. Dad gestured to the rest of us, and we got up to abandon the valley together.
* * *
Choppers flew overhead when the collected tribal members were barely out of the valley. Not all of the fight had gone out of them, nor would it ever, I thought; there was just too much bad blood between Natives and the government. But they'd been there when the ghosts had come to lay the pain to rest, and that went a long way toward sobering even the most hot-headed of them. Sara and Les were among them, but I stayed well out of their way, trailing near the back with Morrison. Dad, who'd taken up a position of leadership, eventually fell back to join us, and repeated the question he'd asked earlier: "Is this what your life is like, Joanne?"
"By and large, yeah. You get used to it. Kind of." I drew breath to lay down the accusations and the arguments we'd already started once, then sighed and let it go. He should have told me about my heritage a long time ago, no doubt about it. But he hadn't, and that was the hand I had to play. There were no do-overs, no matter how badly I might want them. Eventually I said, "You were pretty awesome back there, actually. Those Lower World guys, that was kinda great. You should, um. You should teach me how to do that, huh?"
"I'd like that." Dad hesitated as much as I had, then repeated himself. "I'd like that. Does that mean you're going to stay awhile?"
My hand crept into Morrison's. "Probably not. Morrison's got to get back to work soon, and I have to go find a job."
"I thought you worked for the police department."
"I quit a couple weeks ago. This--" I lifted my hand in Morrison's, gesturing a circle with both of them. I meant the motion to encompass the entire magical mess we'd just gone through, but realized that our entwined fingers were just as much a part of this as the magic was "--this was starting to get in the way of the job."
"What are you going to do?"
"I don't know. Slay demons and fix cars, probably. Isn't that what most people want to do when they grow up? Oh, God, my car. I have to go get Petite. I am not leaving her on the mountain for another night."
Dad pursed his lips and glanced at the throng of people heading down the hills. "They won't miss us. Come on, I'll take you across the mountains."
"Are you sure? Because I'm not exactly Ms. Fitness. It might be faster to--"
"Change shape and run?" Morrison asked blandly.
"...I'd been going to say, 'Go down to the highway and hike back up.' Are you volunteering to go for a run on the wild side with me, Morrison?"
"I thought you and your dad could go. Family bonding time."
The amazing thing was he said it with an utterly straight face, as if perfectly serious. My father, however, wrinkled his eyebrows at us both. "Shapechanging is a spiritual transformation, Mr. Morri--"
I twitched. "Captain."
"Mike."
Dad waited a moment to see if we were going to argue about that, then said, "Mike," cautiously. "Spiritual, not literal. People can't shapeshift."
Morrison said, "Oh, I see," while I tried so hard not to laugh that tears spill
ed down my cheeks. Dad looked increasingly offended, until I finally gasped and wiped my face, then patted his shoulder. "You sound just like me, Dad. Just like me. Okay. Tell you what, let's go for a hike. Morrison, you coming?"
He shook his head. "I'll catch up with you in town." Apparently he thought we really did need some bonding time, which was probably true. I kissed him, took the empty shotgun back just in case we met any wights that needed clobbering, and Dad and I slipped off to the west while everyone else headed downhill.
For bonding time, it was remarkably silent, punctuated mostly by my swearing as I clambered over things that Dad just seemed to melt over. I really didn't know what to say to him, nor he to me, at least not until the sun broke behind us. Once we were in the full gold and pink light of morning he stopped to study me until I became uncomfortable from it. "What?"
"I haven't seen you in years, Jo...anne. I just wanted to get a look at you in daylight, without a war going on around us. You grew up nice."
"I'm working on it, anyway." I put my hands in my jeans pockets, shoving the long coat out of the way to do so. It made me feel like a superhero again, which once more made the coat easily the best money I'd ever spent. "You're not going to turn out to be a horrible monster now, are you? Because this is usually about when that would happen."
"Not planning to, no. Will you tell me what happened?"
I let out a short breath. "Starting with what?"
"Whatever you want. It's a long walk."
"And I still don't have any food." I honestly didn't remember the last time I'd eaten, besides the shriveled apples. Four hundred years ago, in the valley we'd left behind, maybe. I really needed to start taking better care of myself. With my life, that evidently meant always having a three-course meal in my pocket, which I didn't see happening, but it was a nice idea. I fell into step beside Dad again, getting into the rhythm of motion before I started at the beginning.
It was a long walk. Talking helped distract me from climbing over hill and dale, though with Dad's lead it seemed like we covered a lot more territory than Morrison and I had alone. Still, it was well past noon and I'd gotten most of the way through hunting the wendigo when Dad drew up again, nodding down a narrow holler. "This is your place."
I blinked down it, then hiccupped as a particularly gnarly old tree resolved into familiarity. We weren't that far from our back door now, this little gulley one I'd retreated to often as a teen. I blinked again, then scowled accusingly at Dad. "This isn't anywhere near Petite."
"I know. I'll drive you back up to her, but I thought you might want to visit this place without...Mike." He said the name cautiously, like maybe I wouldn't know who he meant, since I clearly habitually called Morrison, well, Morrison.
I pushed my hand through my hair, which stood up in sweaty spikes. "You know, Dad, he's a grown man. If I said I wanted to come up here without him, he'd say, 'See you later, Walker.'"
Dad pounced like he'd been waiting for the chance. "Is there a reason you two call each other by your last names?"
Clearly I hadn't started early enough with the History Of My Life, As Related By Joanne Walker, since the last names thing was really sort of a way to get in an eternal dig. I mean, most people at the precinct called each other by their last names anyway, but somehow Morrison and I had managed to turn it into a way to avoid referring to each other by our respective, and therefore respectable, ranks. I decided not to try explaining right now and just went with "It's a work thing."
"You don't work together anymore."
"Dad, I just quit, give us some time. The point is he wouldn't have flipped out if I'd headed into the hills alo..." Okay, under the current circumstances, he might have. "I'm going down there now."
Dad crouched, flat-footed on the slanted earth, and wrapped his arms around his knees. I'd seen him sit like that for hours when I was a kid, and didn't expect him to move again until I came back up from the holler. I slipped and slid my way down grass and dirt, catching branches to keep myself from tumbling, and in a minute or two was at my teen hideaway.
The old tree hadn't changed much. There were a few new knots where branches were bursting out like miniature trees of their own, but mostly it was the same crooked old beast it had been. I half closed my eyes, letting memory guide me as I wandered around it, fingers trailing against the bark. There was a particular twist of roots I remembered, almost a braid, that had always been the best place to climb the sloping trunk from. Still only half looking, I found the roots and scrambled upward, guided by my hands and muscle memory. About halfway up there was a dish of a branch, wide enough for my teenage butt to fit into nicely. To my ego's satisfaction, I still fit. I settled down, back against the trunk, and slid my left hand around the rough bark. My fingers stopped when they found the edge of the hollow there. I'd discovered it this way, sheerly by accident, and had done the same thing then as I did now: scootched around on the branch until I was on my belly, dangling, so I could peer around the tree into the opening.
God. There were things in there I'd forgotten I'd left. Bleached by weather, but still remarkably intact, given that they'd been stored here for over a decade. I struggled out of my coat and made a sack with it, then gingerly took everything from the hollow. Almost everything: I'd banged a little wooden shelf into place above the hollow's mouth so my stuff would be more protected, and it had swollen too much to remove. I took everything else, though, and clambered back down to sit among the roots and go through my teenage bounty.
There was a journal I barely remembered keeping, though as soon as I saw its embossed red leather cover I remembered it vividly. I'd had the presence of mind to put that in a sealed plastic bag, and the seal had held all these years. I picked it up carefully and opened it, then rifled through the journal, astonished that the pages weren't a pulpy mash. My teenage self's handwriting looked fatter and loopier than I remembered.
The last entry was about Lucas. About bringing him up to the holler and my dumb bid to make him like me by having sex with him. There weren't any graphic details, but when I written it I'd pretty clearly been thrilled, amazed and proud of myself for taking such a big step toward adulthood. But a couple weeks later I'd realized I was pregnant, and I'd never come up here again. I'd stopped keeping a journal, in fact, the date written on the last page my last-ever entry. I closed the book and tucked it into my coat.
There were other things that made me laugh: a coat pin of Raphael from the original TMNT movie, now so weather-bleached it was recognizable only because I knew what it was. A pair of plastic badger earrings, likewise bleached. Sara had given me those after we'd done her spirit-animal quest, so I'd kept them even though I hadn't pierced my ears until about three months ago. A handful of photographs that fell from the journal, faces of people I hardly remembered. Nostalgia and memorabilia, that's what was in the tree.
That, and a small wooden box, maybe five inches by three, which I had never seen before. It wasn't weather-worn or swollen from humidity. I let it sit beside me a long time while I went through the other bits and bobs, aware of its presence but not yet ready to open it. Eventually I put everything else aside and looked at the box a long time, wondering if I really even wanted to open it. It could be Pandora's Box, filled with things I didn't want to let loose in the world, or more relevantly, in my mind.
Of course, the thing I'd never understood about Pandora's Box was that she'd opened it, releasing all evil into the world, but slammed it shut again before hope escaped. That never made any sense to me. I thought she should open the damned box again and let hope escape into the world, too, because it certainly didn't seem to me like it did any good locked in a box. At least if it was released like evil was, then like evil, it would have the ability to chase through the world on the wind, offering...well, hope.
With that in mind, it was inevitable that I opened the box.
There was a photograph in it, nothing else. Me, fifteen and prettier than I'd imagined myself, my short hair spiked with gel and str
onger freckles than usual standing out across my nose, leavings from the summer sun. Sara, her own thick blond hair bleached lighter than usual, too, also from the sun, and her skin richly gold from the tan she'd picked up. I'd thought she was beautiful, back then. Looking at her picture, I still did.
And between us, where he'd always been and always would be, was Lucas. Dark eyes and black hair, a bright grin stretched across his face, and who could blame him? He had his arms around two pretty girls, like he was king of the world and knew it.
I remembered the day it had been taken, just a few days after school started. Lucas had been in Cherokee for a couple of weeks already. Sara and I had met him at the diner and we were all great friends by the time school started. It would be another few weeks before it all fell apart, but right then, man, we were happy. We were the Three Musketeers, los tres amigos, the good, the bad and the ugly. Right in that moment, we were perfect. We were all vibrant, full of life and laughter. Full of love.
Full of hope.
I turned the photograph over and found one word written in pencil on the back: Sorry.
"Yeah." I turned it again, brushing my thumb over our faces. "Yeah, me too, Lucas. For everything. Rest in peace."
I opened my hand, releasing hope.
Chapter Thirty-One
Friday, March 31, 7:37 p.m.
Dad didn't ask, when I came out of the holler, and I went back to telling him about the adventures of the past fifteen months as we worked our way home again. He occasionally interjected with stories about his own past several years, and by the time we got out of the mountains I thought maybe a hatchet had been buried. It felt good, if a little weird, and I ended up saying so just as the sun started slipping over the horizon.
Dad, watching it, crooked a smile. "And all it took was a day alone. I'm sorry, Jo...anne. For the mistakes I made. I thought I could protect you by keeping you away from your heritage, and for years I watched you heading right down that path anyway. I should have known better."