Black Knife’s unsmiling face gave away nothing at all as he studied the group of prisoners. He sat on a log, his rifle across his knees, and nodded at one of his warriors, who began to shout angrily in their direction. Doc wondered if the nantan was too high in rank even to speak directly to captive enemies.
Nat began to argue back, speaking for them all in Apache, since they couldn’t speak for themselves anyway. Only Dolarhyde didn’t seem to care whether anybody there understood him or not.
Doc knew Dolarhyde hated Apaches even more than he seemed to hate everyone in Absolution; but he didn’t know the reason. He’d heard that Dolarhyde had fought them in the army, back before the Civil War. Maybe that had been enough. It suddenly struck Doc as peculiar that the only man Dolarhyde seemed to trust completely was Nat Colorado.
As the warrior finished with what Doc guessed were accusations, Nat began to translate them, while the warrior consulted with the chief. “He says this is all that’s left of these bands, Western Apache, Chiricahua, and Mescalero—”
Doc was surprised. Those were different tribes, and even though they shared a common ancestry, it just proved how desperate they were that they’d willingly live together with strangers, even of their own kind. The people in this camp had banded together here for support, for survival. Not that there looked to be that many of them, even so . . .
. . . which only meant that they were under way too much stress: angrier . . . meaner.
“Sonsabitches—” Dolarhyde muttered looking toward the place where Emmett was being held.
“—they all came here, they lost people too—” Nat went on, ignoring his boss now, as Dolarhyde ignored everyone else.
“—who gives a shit—don’t even listen to ‘em, there’s no reason, we’re all dead—” Dolarhyde’s eyes were locked on Black Knife, filled with the hatred that overflowed into his voice.
“—he says the pindah-lickoyee—the ‘white-eyes enemy’—brought bad medicine to his people the last fifty years—diseases, plagues—” Nat didn’t mention “extermination by the Army,” but maybe he was being tactful. “And now we brought the Wind Walkers—that we burned their people.”
In symbolic retaliation, a group of warriors brought forward Ella’s body, and threw it into the fire at the center of camp.
“Noooo—!” Emmett screamed, as her body began to burn.
“—what—?” Doc said, in disbelief. “He thinks we did that? They’re takin’ our own people too! Just tell ‘em!”
“Forget it,” Dolarhyde snarled. “Ain’t no reasoning with ‘em.”
Nat only stood staring, powerless, as Ella’s body was thrown into the fire, and even Black Knife made no protest.
Doc remembered that the Apaches felt fear and revulsion about handling the bodies of the dead—afraid of “ghost sickness,” of being haunted by an undeparted soul. Even when they had to bury their own family members—especially then—sometimes they needed the help of a medicine man to recover from it; and they’d probably been doing too much of that, for a long time.
For them to do this with Ella’s body meant anger and vengeance had driven them beyond their own beliefs, the way the demon attack had affected some people from Absolution.
Nat began to repeat Doc’s words, translating his plea for understanding without so much at a glance at Dolarhyde.
But it was a losing debate. They were all suddenly grabbed and yanked upward by their hair, even Jake. Doc saw his eyelids flicker open, as the rough handling jarred him back to half-consciousness . . . to enough awareness that he suddenly realized Ella’s body was lying in the fire, burning. “Stop—” Jake gasped, reaching out, but no one else was listening.
Black Knife stared at them, and Doc could see he was passing judgment on their fates.
“Kill us now,” Dolarhyde shouted, his eyes blazing with hatred. “Get it done with!”
Doc wondered suddenly if Dolarhyde was trying to get them all killed . . . quickly. He realized what kind of things Dolarhyde must have seen firsthand all those years in the army—the thousand different ways the Apaches had of killing somebody slowly. How many soldiers and settlers had Dolarhyde seen who’d been made examples of . . . and what would that do to a man’s mind?
Had he ever realized that most of the atrocities had been committed in retribution for lost loved ones—or that the torture only got worse as his troops, and settlers, killed more Apaches . . . ?
It struck Doc suddenly that maybe Dolarhyde, out of everyone here, was the most frightened of all.
A warrior hit Dolarhyde on the back of the head with his war club—not hard enough to kill him, but enough to stop his furious disrespect. Frowning, Black Knife nodded, and Nat’s shoulders sagged, as he muttered, “Death.”
Oh Jesus, Doc thought, oh God, this was it— A knife was pressed against his throat, as blades went against all their throats. He should be glad it was going to be a quick death, he knew that—but right now he just didn’t feel very grateful. Why couldn’t they understand? If they could all band together. . . . Maria. . . .
He heard Emmett crying mindlessly, “Nonono—!”, saw him fighting with all his strength to break free from the hands that held him back.
Doc felt the knife’s edge bite into his skin, took his last glimpse at the others, before—
The funeral pyre in the center of the meeting space suddenly erupted in a blaze of light like exploding fireworks. The flames leaped upward with an enormous roar, turning from orange to green to white—
The pressure against Doc’s throat disappeared as the Apaches, even the warriors, backed away, staring at the flames.
And Ella emerged from the pyre, shrouded in a caul of fire and light. She walked toward the captives, toward Jake, and as the fire fell away from her she still radiated light, a blinding, angelic glow. . . .
An angel—? Doc thought.
No, it was really Ella . . . but Ella wasn’t human. Doc’s mind reeled, as the Apaches all around them began to kneel down, dropping their weapons, recognizing the spirit world for what it was, something that permeated all of reality—not separate, as his own people had always taught him to believe.
With every step away from the fire her glow faded, her skin returning to its flesh tone, her hair falling straight and dark down her back. When she finally stopped, standing directly before Jake, she appeared to be the Ella they’d all known, again. But alive.
AS AN ENTIRE village of strangers, and the handful of people who knew Ella—who thought they’d known her—went on staring at her in awe, Jake got to his knees on his own, raising his head; finally fully aware, and feeling saner than he ever remembered feeling, here in the middle of the impossible . . . as if the return of Ella’s life had gifted him with the return of his own will to live. He didn’t question it—beyond questioning anything, long since—but the empty place inside him, the place where a human heart should have been, felt suddenly, unexpectedly full.
Ella stood unmoving, with an expression on her face that he’d never seen before, and couldn’t understand. Jake struggled to his feet, never letting his eyes leave hers. He picked up a blanket from the ground and moved toward her, wrapped it gently around her, before he stepped back again.
“I’m sorry, “she said softly, as she looked at his expression; her eyes filled with gratitude and apology. “I couldn’t tell you.”
Jake swallowed, clearing his throat. “Are you one of them?” he asked hoarsely, his ragged voice barely more than a whisper. It was the only thought that would form in his mind: the one he least wanted to hear the answer to.
“No.” Ella shook her head. “I’m from a different place—” She broke off, as she tried to find a way to explain it to him. “I took this form . . . so I could walk among you.”
“You should have told me,” Jake said, almost accusingly. You made me believe. . . . You let me think you were dead.
She glanced down. “I didn’t know if I could heal this body. If I would wake up.”
He
stared at her, totally lost again, as words that made no sense at all to him echoed inside his brain.
Black Knife himself spoke then, gesturing toward a wikiup behind him.
“He invites you to sit in council—with him and the most respected of his people,” Nat translated, his face and the words filled with a sense that they’d all just been profoundly honored. His voice was remarkably calm, for a man who’d had a knife at his own throat just minutes before—and then witnessed a miracle.
INSIDE THE WIKIUP, behind a makeshift screen of hides, Ella dressed in a borrowed man’s shirt and pants, rolling up sleeves and cuffs, pulling on Em-mett’s extra pair of boots, all of which Jake had been allowed to fetch from the pile of their belongings.
The other men from the group had been permitted to join her and Jake in the meeting. They sat now around a small fire at the wikiup’s center, along with Black Knife and a handful of men from the Apache camp. The townsfolk still looked as dazed as he’d been—except maybe Nat, who looked like it all made perfect sense to him.
And Ella, naturally, Jake thought, as she stepped out from behind the screen fully dressed, and with inhuman calm took the place that waited for her in the circle. Inhuman. Jake’s mind repeated the word, but his eyes refused to believe it.
Black Knife and his warriors looked toward Ella with reverence and awe, a look they withheld when they glanced at the men who had come here with her.
When Ella had settled herself, Black Knife began to speak.
“He wants to know where are you from?” Nat translated.
Ella looked toward Black Knife, her face respectful, but with something in her eyes that Jake had grown too familiar with. She answered him in fluent Apache, gesturing at the stars above. Even in another language, Jake could hear the sadness in her voice as she spoke.
“. . . the hell’s she saying?” Dolarhyde muttered to Nat.
“That she comes from a place above the stars, another world,” he answered, as if even that seemed perfectly reasonable.
Jake remembered her saying to him, “They took my people too.” Her people . . . Had she meant a whole world’s people—?
Everyone around the circle was silent for a moment, taking it in, in whatever terms they could accept.
“Another world? What?” Dolarhyde said, mockery filling the words. Jake frowned in irritation.
“—And that if we work together, we can get our people back.”
“‘Work’ with them?” Dolarhyde repeated, his voice getting louder and more angry.
Black Knife glared at Dolarhyde, at the interruption. He spoke again, eyes on Dolarhyde, with anger filling his voice.
Nat looked toward his boss, his expression finally proving to Jake that he had nerve-endings after all. “The people here believe Ella was sent by White-Painted Woman. . . .”
“‘White’—?” Dolarhyde began.
“White-Painted Woman,” Nat repeated. “No one knows what she looks like—she went back beyond the sky with Yusn the Life-giver, long ago. But she was the mother of all people, Apache and white. They called Ella “Sonseeahray”—it means “Morning Star.” They think she was sent here as a messenger, because what’s happening now is different from anything that’s ever happened to their people before. It’s like . . . like the Virgin Mary or something, sending an angel. . . .”
Nat’s face tightened with frustration, as Dolar-hyde’s eyes remained obstinately blank. Nat took a deep breath. “You—you shouldn’t talk—”
“—Why the hell shouldn’t I talk?” Dolarhyde demanded. “I got questions too—”
“—it’s an insult,” Nat said, his voice straining as he tried to make Dolarhyde understand. “A guest of the chief’s must be invited to speak—”
“—oh, am I a guest now?” Dolarhyde snapped. “Or am I a prisoner? What the hell am I?”
Black Knife pointed at Dolarhyde, and the untranslated shouting match between them rose to a fever pitch.
“Hey! Enough!” Doc said, suddenly and loudly. “You’re both big men, all right? Great warriors! Can we just listen to the woman tell her story? Or—whatever she is.” His voice subsided as he glanced at Ella, his face reddening slightly. Black Knife, and even Dolarhyde, fell silent, looking away.
“What do they want?” Jake asked Ella, beginning to understand at last that the demons he’d been fighting weren’t demons from Hell, any more than Ella was an angel. They were from someplace else entirely . . . other planets—like this one, only not—a concept so alien it made Hell seem familiar: The demons were alien beings . . . like Ella, but not like her. Not like anything he could even relate to . . .
“They want gold,” she said. “It’s as rare to them as it is to you.”
Dolarhyde made a sound like choked-off laughter. “Well, that’s just—ridiculous,” he said, not even making an effort to hide his scorn. “What’re they gonna do, buy something?”
It occurred to Jake that buying something was probably just what he’d had in mind when he’d robbed the stage carrying Dolarhyde’s gold. Why had the Mexicans come here in the first place; why had people from the States? Mostly they’d come to strike it rich. On gold. He glanced at the demon weapon, still closed around his wrist like a manacle.
He figured the only reason the newcomers had been able to kill off the people they found living here already was to call them “savages” not “people.” He wondered what the aliens called humans. Wondering that didn’t do anything to lift his spirits.
“Is Maria alive?” Doc asked Ella. “The others?”
Everyone there shared the same look, as Nat translated the question for Black Knife and the Apaches.
Ella looked down. “If they are, they won’t be for long.”
This time all their expressions froze, as a terrible chill seemed to fill the space around them. Even Dolarhyde had nothing to say to that.
“They’re learning your weaknesses.” Ella went on at last. “It’s what they did to my people. First one ship came, then more. We fought back . . . but they were stronger. Only a few of us survived.” The pain that always lay just below her surface rose into her eyes at the memory, before the urgency of the present drove it back. “I came here to stop them from doing it again. But we have to move quickly . . . before they leave and bring back others.”
Black Knife then spoke to Ella; she glanced at Jake and the rest. “He says his men will follow me.”
“Wait a minute, slow down—” Dolarhyde said, looking at Black Knife again. “What the hell you mean, you’re gonna ‘follow her’? Where you gonna go? What’re you gonna do?”
Ella nodded toward Jake. “He’s the only one who knows where they are.” She turned to meet Jake’s eyes. “You’ve been there.”
Jake shook his head, as faces around the circle turned toward him. He struggled with the void where his memories had been, remembering why it existed . . . why he wasn’t even sure he wanted to remember the truth, anymore.
“I couldn’t even remember my name.” He pointed at his head. “If it’s in here? I can’t get it out.” But his frustration only grew as he realized just how much the aliens had really taken from him . . . even his chance to find them and pay them back.
Black Knife and his men murmured among themselves, before Black Knife looked at Jake, and spoke directly to him.
“They say they have medicine that will heal your memories,” Nat translated. “There is a di-yin . . . a medicine man . . . here who is skilled in making it.”
Jake glanced at him, suddenly feeling uneasy as he looked back at Black Knife. He wondered for a moment if they were really serious. Their faces said they were.
Apache medicine . . . that didn’t exactly mean the same kind of thing Doc did. He’d heard stories . . . though he had no idea where, or when. All he could see right now was that it was the only choice left to him; and that he’d come so far beyond anything he’d thought he knew that turning back wasn’t an option anymore.
Shoot, Jake, or give up the gun . .
. He looked toward Ella again, and nodded.
14
Black Knife was a good host, once they were—at least for now—“guests” instead of prisoners. They were given food to eat, and enough water to wash it down with, as they waited for the di-yin to prepare whatever it was they expected Jake to swallow. Only Dolarhyde grumbled about what they were fed, but he ate it anyway.
Jake would have been happy to eat and drink Dolarhyde’s share too, and anybody else’s, by then. He forced himself to eat slowly, savoring every bite: Hunger made anything taste better. He was glad they’d fed him at all—the only stories he recalled about native medicine seemed to involve a lot of puking, therapeutic or otherwise. If they’d let him eat, maybe this one wouldn’t be so bad.
By the time they’d finished, Jake felt some of his strength coming back to him, along with his sense of purpose: his vow to find Alice, if she was still alive—and to take his revenge, whether she was or not.
At last a handful of warriors led them across the camp to a wikiup set a little apart from the others. One of the Apache men led him and Ella toward the wikiup’s entrance, while the rest held up their hands, keeping the others away, forcing them to wait outside. They traded concerned looks as Jake hesitated at the entrance and glanced back, before he entered what he finally understood was a kind of sacred space.
Inside, a small group of men and women sat in a circle. They included Black Knife and a solemn, graying man that Ella whispered was the di-yin who had prepared the medicine for Jake.
The Apaches sitting in the circle were chanting; it made Jake think of people singing in a church, though he didn’t know why. Ella joined the circle, and signaled for him to sit beside her. He sat down cross-legged, feeling muscles in his legs pull painfully . . . feeling as odd as he would have felt sitting in a church on Sunday.
It had never occurred to him that Apaches had a real religion, or took it seriously. But then, he wasn’t given to thinking about Apaches any more than he had to, or religion either.
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