In the end, Busby shook his head in defeat. "I had hoped that you would never learn of this, but there is no helping it now."
Busby leaned back in his chair, running his age-worn fingers though his thin-gray hair.
Laura waited, feeling as if she was in some kind of bizarre limbo. Her eyes rested on Kenny, and she knew that he had always known what her grandfather was about to tell her.
"Rosa was your older sister. Your mother and father didn't die in an accident...." Busby paused, searching for the strength to force the dreaded words from his lips.
"You see ... I loved your grandmother very deeply, but as I have told you before, she was half Spanish and had a very strict Catholic upbringing. This alone was a bad enough conflict."
Laura waited while Busby drew in a deep breath.
"I think your grandmother had a lot to do with why your mother married a Belagana. It pleased your grandmother when her daughter married a Christian. Your grandmother’s ways and mine were constantly in conflict." He closed his eyes, summoning the painful images.
"Years after our marriage, your grandmother discovered that I was a practitioner of something which the white man might call ... witchcraft. I believe it may have driven her mad." He waited for Laura’s reaction--it was not long in coming.
Laura paled and was unable to keep her bottom lip from trembling. "A Skinwalker! My grandfather is a Skinwalker!" She took an involuntary step back. All the time she had spent in the white man’s world hadn't etched away enough of her beliefs to calm her turmoil.
Laura’s eyes sought Kenny. "If you know about this, then you must be one too," she observed.
He turned away without a word in his own defense.
"No!" Laura refused to believe what they were saying. "How could you have kept this from me all these years?"
"As you must know, the information could be dangerous if it were known. I wanted to protect you from this. I didn't want you to turn on me as your grandmother did," Busby tried to explain.
Laura closed her eyes, attempting to gain control of the turbulent emotions that stormed through her. "What happened to them?"
"The year that it happened, Isabelle began having strange dreams. She said a jaguar haunted her dreams. She was convinced it was a saint in disguise. At first I didn't take it seriously, not until she began talking of how the saint was telling her that her family was evil. It was then that I began to worry for her sanity. I thought that my ways must have finally broken her."
Busby’s eyes were filled with painful memories. "When your parents brought you girls to visit that summer I watched her closely. Whenever she looked at you children, it was with hate. I told my daughter and her husband of Isabelle’s behavior and dreams. Your father thought the best thing to do ... would be to admit her to the hospital for a psychiatric evaluation. I could not do this to my Isabelle."
Busby’s hands shook, as violent emotions threatened to escape his firm grip. "I now wish I’d listened."
Laura watched him, unable to comprehend the terrible nightmare her grandfather was reliving.
"It was a Friday night, two days before your parents were to return to Colorado. You were not much more than a baby, maybe three years old. I could deny you nothing, even then."
"I had to go to Glass Mountain to get some milk for the next morning, and you begged to come with me. When I picked you up to take you out to the truck, Isabelle tried to stop me. She said it was not good to have you out in the night air,"
Busby shivered as if a chill had just settled over him. "I was glad when your mother stepped in to say it was okay if you went. I had a very bad feeling all of the sudden ... but I left anyway. That was the last time I saw them alive. When we returned...." Busby had to stop-- struggled to keep control of his overwhelming grief.
"What I saw when I walked back into my home was something that will never leave me. I ran you back out to the truck as soon as I understood. Your parents were on the couch, both shot in the head. Rosa had also been shot. Her body I found in the kitchen. That was a different trailer than this one. I wouldn't live in it after that."
Laura felt lightheaded, like she was entering a dream. The scene that her grandfather described unfolded before her eyes. Busby was one of the gentlest people she knew. Laura was sure that the horror of his discovery must have devastated him.
Losing his battle for control, Busby let the tears stream down his face. "I found Isabelle in the bedroom. She had turned the gun on herself."
A thought struck Laura. "Something like this would be legend around here, why have I never heard of it?"
"The investigating officers agreed to keep quiet for the family’s sake."
Kenny finished the story for her grandfather. "The official story was that they died in a car accident. Those that did know the truth agreed that it would be best if you never knew what happened that night."
"In her mind, she believed that evil power had been passed to her daughter and grandchildren. She thought it would be used for some bad purpose. I think she thought that if she killed you all ... she would stop the eventual consequence of evil, but the part of her that was still sane could not live with what she had done. If we hadn't left that night, I’m sure we would have both been dead, too," Busby finished in a voice so low that Laura had to strain to hear it.
Laura went to the fridge and took out a bottle of tomato juice, something that she had developed an intense craving for the past few weeks. Her hands trembled so badly that when she poured the juice into a glass, some of it spilled onto the floor. Laura looked down to the splattered red liquid and wondered if it was symbolic. She drained the glass and poured some more.
"I'm sorry, but I didn't tell you any of this because I had hoped that there would never be a need for it to darken your life." Riddled with guilt, Busby could not even find it in him to look at his granddaughter.
"I know, Grandpa, and I might never have known, except for one thing...."
Laura stopped and at the sink she splashed cold water on her face. "Since going to Wyoming, I have been having visits from my grandmother’s ghost and twice from a little girl, whom I just discovered today, is my sister."
Busby’s features twisted with fear.
"I wonder if they were trying to warn you of the Sungmanitu?" Kenny voiced his thoughts.
"I thought the same thing ... at first, but now I think it’s a lot more complicated than that. This jaguar that she dreamed of--I think it has to have something to do with what happened in Wyoming. I saw Rosa again today, at the cemetery, and she said that they were after my child and she warned me--she said that I should leave here."
"Who ... what child?" Busby was confused.
"I have the impression that she isn’t speaking of Justin’s people," Laura explained.
"But what child?" Busby asked again.
"The child that I am going to have," Laura told them in a steady, determined voice.
Both men appeared as if they could have been knocked over with a feather.
"And it is his?" Kenny’s voice was so low--he could not hide his hurt.
Laura nodded.
"When will you have the child?" Busby asked.
"Probably sometime in February."
The heavy silence that prevailed spoke of their fears, and doubts. What were the ghostly visions telling her and what would this child be like?
Chapter Seventeen
Surrounded by thick, inky darkness, her body radiated shades of red. She was on fire--burning for his touch in the most intimate of places.
The scent of pine was prevalent as she lay back in her bed of grass. Sensations of the gliding wet tongue on her inner thigh scorched her to blazing passion. Her eyes strained to cut through the darkness, seeking the source of her pleasure, but there was only burning eyes.
The slick heat traveled to the root of her womanhood and she was flooded by wave after wave of ecstatic release, dying to embers only to flame into an inferno.
Shivering and suddenly cold, L
aura woke to find her nightgown damp and sticking to her sweat-slick body. Traces of tears still clung to her lashes. She knew that it had been Justin who had come to her in her dreams.
Laura was gripped with the feeling of being closed in, smothered. Leaving the sofa, she found her robe and slippers.
Outside, the night air was cool and she was finally able to breathe. The perfume of the desert lent her some comfort. Looking to the night sky, she admired the millions of tiny stars inlaid in black velvet.
Laura walked through the darkness with no conscious thought of where she was going. She followed a path that she had traveled at least a thousand times before. It led to a Kiva left there many yeas ago, perhaps by some Anasazi people.
The junipers thinned as she neared the Kiva. Stopping to gaze at the moon which seemed so close, it was almost like she could reach out and touch it. Falling to her knees, she cried, "Justin! How could you have left me?" Her voice carried through desert hills.
"Why did you have to let it happen like this?" Laura’s cries were answered by the howl of a lone wolf. She imagined it wandering and lone out there in the darkness. Laura’s tears were like drops of blood, escaping from her wounded heart.
Something scratched at the edge of her grief, a sound--pulling her back to the desert night.
There was movement, just beyond her vision. She heard voices, hundreds of them; voices that spoke so softly, as to be almost inaudible. Gradually they became clear and more distinguishable, but still no more than ghostly whispers.
"You belong to us."
"The child is ours."
Laura jumped to her feet and ran, mindless of the sting of cactus against her legs. The voices followed her, taunting, demanding her child.
Once safely behind the aluminum door, she took a deep breath. Doubting her own sanity, Laura peered into the darkness from the kitchen window. Nothing stirred in the shadows beyond the confines of the trailer. She knew there would be no more sleep for her on this night.
* * * *
The sun had already made its majestic appearance in the eastern sky when her grandfather stumbled from the bedroom.
Laura smiled at him, "Well ... old man, it looks like you are getting slower with age. The sun beat you to rising."
"It’s been like that for a while now. You would know that if you got up early a little more often. These old bones just don’t like to move anymore," he added.
Laura’s voice grew serious as she related to him what had happened at the Kiva. "I think what I need to do is find the Sungmanitu. I believe that is the only way my child will be safe."
Busby said nothing as he contemplated Laura’s problem. "Even if there are other Shape-shifters, like your young man said, what would they want with you and your child?" Busby shook his head, the answer eluding him.
"But you are right." He looked at her. "I cannot keep you safe from this enemy. Maybe the Wolf People can. In any case, the baby is one of them and maybe it belongs to them."
"The baby is mine--mine and Justin’s." Laura frowned.
"I’m going to Glass Mountain to see if I can contact someone in Wyoming who can get a message to the Sungmanitu."
"And I’ll pack," he told her.
Laura shot him a disapproving glance, but knew it would be no use in trying to talk him out of going. He was determined not to let any harm come to the only granddaughter he had left.
* * * *
Hanging up the phone, Laura peered around the room as if she was not quite sure of where she was.
"What was that all about?" Kenny asked from behind the counter.
"I just got through talking with Mrs. Lambert at the Nugget Saloon. She acted as if she had never heard of me."
"Maybe she forgot?" Kenny shrugged.
Laura shook her head. "She said she never heard of Duccini or the Sungmanitu."
Kenny smiled, "She must be playing with you." He stated the obvious.
"Maybe," Laura grudgingly agreed as she was digging in her purse for Detective Gates’ phone number.
It seemed an eternity before she was finally connected to Gates.
"Hi ... this is Laura Ellison. I was working with the Duccini Corporation up there about a month ago."
There was a long pause before he said anything. "I’m sorry, Miss Ellison, but I never heard of Duccini."
"They were clear-cutting in Beaver Creek, but had to cease operation when there were several murders...." her voice trailed off.
"Murders!" he was astounded. "A month ago there was an epidemic of rabies in the animals in that area, and several people were killed. Could that be the situation you are referring to?" he asked.
Laura was stunned into a silence. This could not be possible!
"Maybe so," She decided to let it go. "What I'd like to know is if I can get a message to a member of the Sungmanitu Tribal Council in Beaver Creek."
"The Sungmanitu ... in Beaver Creek?" Detective Gates seemed to be at a loss for words.
"Miss, is this some kind of a joke! Beaver Creek is a ghost town, and the only Indians we have around here are the Shoshone and Arapaho."
Laura’s vision fogged and she swayed. "I’m sorry ... I must have the wrong town," she stuttered.
She looked to Kenny in dazed confusion. "It did really happen, didn’t it?"
"You know it did." Kenny looked as spooked as she felt.
Laura dialed Jessup’s number in Louisiana. She prayed he would be there. A few moments later, she hung up. If it were not for the child growing within her, Laura would have believed herself as mad as her grandmother had been. For an instant, she wondered if indeed insanity could be passed on genetically.
"Well?" Kenny prodded.
"He wasn’t there, but his sister said that as far as she knew Jessup had never been to Wyoming in his life." Laura was dazed.
"You know that cannot be true. This has to be some sort of cover up." He was angry.
"I wonder just who’s doing the covering?" Laura bit at her lip.
* * * *
The desert winds swung the trailer’s door to and fro; banging it against the exterior aluminum, cracking the stillness of the quiet afternoon. Dust flew up into the air, playing a game of tag with the breezes.
Something was wrong!
Laura knew this the same as she knew her own name. A sense of foreboding twisted around her throat--tightening until she felt her life’s breath would be cut off completely. Somewhere in the recess of conscious thought, she wondered if her grandfather had experienced the same feeling on that night so many years ago.
Aware that she was in the thralls of some sort of panic attack, Laura fought it off. With forced, deliberate movements, she entered the trailer.
A prevailing emptiness greeted her when she walked through the door. Laura’s heart jumped into her throat.
Something had happened to her grandfather! The knowledge was like acid, eating her from the inside out.
A hasty search of the trailer revealed nothing but what she had already known, her grandfather was gone. A half-packed suitcase rested on his bed and on the stove a pot of coffee had simmered dry.
Could he have gone for a walk and forgotten about the stove? Was he losing his memory?
Questions rampaged through her mind, anything to keep from thinking of her grandfather being in danger.
Twice a day, he went to a place close by to pray. Laura moved fast through the brush to this location. There was no sign of him, or that he had even been there recently. On the hilltop, Laura scanned the rocky landscape looking for anything that would give her a clue, a trail to follow.
The horizons were empty of all but the desert creatures. Where else could he have gone? The Kiva, Laura thought. Maybe he went to investigate the Kiva?
Laura approached the pit house cautiously--some extra sense warning her of an unseen danger. She wanted to call out her grandfather’s name, but her tongue felt thick and she found herself unable to utter a word.
Laura never heard their approach, but
she felt them, felt the air stir behind her, felt the blood lust in their souls. She dared not even breathe as she turned slowly. Three of them stood behind her, their arms folded, their eyes burning with hate.
Chapter Eighteen
The blackness threatened to envelop him once again, but he continued to claw his way to the surface. He struggled to open his eyes, but his eye lids were so heavy. The diminutive light that was able to creep inside sent shards of pain into his head.
It was too much effort. Much easier to surrender to the sweet numbness of nothingness, but he was not to be so fortunate as to slip into oblivion. Her cries, her pain still crawled into his head to torture him.
She was trapped in a building of stone and there were cats, so many cats--their fierce claws leaving trails of crimson on her ivory skin.
"Justin! Wake up! You have a visitor." It was his Aunt Ida’s anxious voice that pulled him from the shadows of his nightmare.
He fought to come alive, but found he just could not bring himself back to the land of the living, not completely.
Justin half registered his aunt’s fretful whispers. "He has tried to wake up a few times, but can’t quite get past this semi-comatose state. I’m afraid he lost too much blood. The doctors say he may not even be the same if he does come out of it," she explained to some unseen presence.
A gentle hand rested on his forehead and he was jolted by an invasion of light, flooding first his brain and then seeping into the veins that would carry his lifeblood through the rest of his body.
His eyes flew open, but his vision rippled as if he were looking through water. As the seconds ticked by the room took on dimension. He could feel the softness of his bed and the warmth of the blanket that covered him.
"Keeper of Coyopa’," he whispered.
"That is so." The spirit’s voice soothed Justin’s aching temples.
"I must be in the land of spirits," Justin concluded.
"No, you are very much alive, and I must say, slacking in your responsibilities."
Justin would have smiled if he’d had the strength.
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