The Wind in His Heart

by Charles de Lint

  Her eyes closed as she murmured something inaudible under her breath.

  A tight band of flame sprang from the staff’s tip, engulfing the stranger in a fire that didn’t burn anything but her. The air filled with the stench of burning flesh and feathers. For a long moment, the stranger was outlined in the flames, then she seemed to collapse in on herself.

  With the bright flare still raising spots in front of her eyes, Ruby couldn’t see precisely what had happened, and despite the smell, she wasn’t sure that the woman had actually been consumed by the fire. It seemed more as if she’d simply vanished.

  She heard the sound of wings and looked back at Abuela to see a raven appear behind the witch.

  Abuela heard it too. She turned, but she was too slow. Bird became woman, and the stranger plucked the staff from Abuela’s hands as though the old witch had no more strength than that of a child. The stranger snapped the staff in two as easily as if it were a twig. She cast the pieces aside, then one hand caught Abuela by the throat and lifted her so high that her feet dangled well above the floor.

  “The only reason you’re not dead yet,” the stranger said, looking up at her captive, “is that I meant what I said about violence. It solves nothing.”

  Abuela tried to fight the other woman’s grip. She gagged, her feet kicking the stranger, but she might as well have been trying to hurt a stone wall. The stranger held her a moment longer before finally setting her back hard on the floor.

  Abuela staggered, catching her balance by grabbing the table. She held her throat and gasped for air while the stranger regarded her without expression. The dark-haired woman waited until Abuela could breathe again before she spoke.

  “There are no more bargains to be made tonight,” she told Abuela. “You will renounce your hold on Ruby and the girl. And you will never touch another ma’inawo again.”

  “Or…or what?” Abuela croaked.

  “Or I’ll send my sister to visit you. She makes me seem like kindness incarnate.”

  “And if the dogs come after me?”

  The stranger shrugged. “You’ll have to charm them into leaving you unharmed.”

  She draped an arm over Ruby’s shoulder. “Are you ready to go now?” she asked.

  Ruby glanced at Abuela, still stroking her throat, then back to the woman. “She won’t harm Sadie?”

  “I don’t think so.” The stranger regarded Abuela. “What do you say, witch? Is the life of ‘some foolish white girl’ worth your own and that of everyone else in the barrio that you claim to protect?”

  Abuela shook her head.

  “You see?” the stranger said, her smile returned. “A peaceful outcome.”

  She started for the door again, arm still over Ruby’s shoulder. Halfway there, Ruby felt a shift underfoot as they stepped into the otherworld. She inhaled a deep breath of clean air and shook herself as though she were in her dog shape.

  “How can I thank you?” she said.

  The stranger smiled. “Save your thanks for Steve—and Sadie. It was their decision that my debt to Steve be repaid with your rescue.”

  “Sadie had a hand in this?” Ruby said.

  The woman’s smile widened. “Sometimes when you think the best of someone, you bring out that best.”

  Then she shifted and a raven rose into the air. Ruby watched it fly away into the darkness until even her ma’inawo sight could no longer see it. After a moment, she shifted as well. She rolled in the dust of the otherworld until she wore it like a coat. Shaking herself again—a much more satisfying action in this shape—she trotted off into the otherworld night.

  79

  Steve

  I’ve never been to a sweat before. I’ve just never felt that I should attend a Kikimi spiritual ceremony, but Morago told me it will be disrespectful to Aggie if I don’t show up. This is her comeback party, he said, after having been so close to death.

  So the day of the sweat Calico and I come down off the ridge trail to find a small village has sprung up around the fire pit. I’ve never thought of it as a large space, not even a couple of weeks ago when all those ma’inawo came down out of the mountains for the confrontation with Consuela Mara. But right now, there seems to be more room around the fire pit than I remember. It’s probably got something to do with being so close to the otherworld here, or maybe we’re even in the otherworld. I don’t ask.

  A large tent erected on the outer edge of the circle acts as a change-room. A sweat lodge covered with heavy blankets has been built about twenty feet from the fire pit, where flames are already crackling, heating stones that men are carrying into the lodge using pitchforks. Still others carry pails of water inside.

  Nearby, women are cooking on a large portable grill set up under an awning, and young men and women walk the periphery of the circle waving smudge sticks. The air is rich with the smell of wood smoke, sage, cedar and fry bread.

  People and dogs are everywhere. And crows. They’re perched on the red rocks, saguaro arms, and branches of the mesquite and palo verde trees. Some of the people, I recognize from the rez. Reuben and his nephew Jack and some of the other dog boys. Morago, of course. As shaman, he goes to almost every gathering on the rez, from powwows to some little potluck up in the mountains. Thomas and his family. Petey Jojoba. There are lots of familiar faces. I assume the unfamiliar ones are ma’inawo in their human forms, although I suppose that could be said of many of the people gathered here today.

  I spot Aggie sitting in a plastic lawn chair near the fire, with Leah perched on a rock beside her. Leah and I are the only white faces in the whole crowd, but I don’t feel unwelcome or out of place the way I’ve always expected to at something like this. Leah glances in our direction, pushes away from the stone and comes up the slope to meet us, a big smile warming her face.

  “Aggie said she doubted that you guys would come,” she says when we draw near. “I’m glad she was wrong.”

  “Ohla,” Calico says as she gives Leah a quick hug. “This feels like a party.”

  “And Calico’s always in the mood for a party,” I add.

  Calico laughs and we walk hand in hand as we follow Leah back over to Aggie. The old woman smiles at our approach.

  “Ohla, Steve, Calico.” Her gaze fixes on me. “So have you finally figured out your place in the world?” she asks me.

  “I don’t know about that. But I am getting more comfortable with all of this.” I release Calico’s hand and gesture vaguely at the gathering. I’m not sure if I mean the sweat, or magic, or what, exactly.

  That puts me on the receiving end of another of Aggie’s smiles, as though she gets what I mean, even if I don’t.

  Aggie reaches up for my hands. “Don’t be afraid of community,” she says as I take both of her leathery hands in mine. “Solitude can strengthen the spirit, but community strengthens the heart. We all need our tribes, even if we have to make our own, but I hope you finally understand that you are always welcome in ours.”

  “I do,” I tell her. “Thank you.” The warmth in her eyes is genuine.

  Somebody else comes up to pay their respects, so I let Aggie go, and Calico and I head off into the crowd, greeting the people we know, which, between the two of us, is pretty much everybody.

  We find Morago at a portable table with some old aunties, his hands and jeans coated with flour as he shapes fry bread with them.

  “Ohla, Speaks Justice, Calico,” he says.

  “I still prefer Beans for Brains,” Calico says, which makes the aunties chuckle.

  I lay a palm on my heart and give her a hurt look, but she only elbows me in the ribs. The aunties chuckle harder.

  “Are you going to participate in the sweat?” Morago asks me.

  I shake my head. “Baby steps,” I tell him. “I’m here, right? You got me this far.”

  “It’s never been about me,” he says.

  “I know.”

  One of the aunties says something in rapid-fire Kikimi.

  “Gotta go,”
Morago says. “Aunt Judy tells me that fry bread doesn’t make itself.”

  Calico and I fade back into the crowd before Aunt Judy can decide that we should be helping them too.

  We wander through the crowd some more, talking with people we know, introducing each other to those we don’t.

  “You see?” Calico says later when we’re sitting up on a rock overlooking the fire pit. “It’s not so bad.”

  “I never thought it would be bad. It’s just…” I search for the words. “I don’t want to pretend I’m one of the tribe. Taking part in a sacred ceremony feels inappropriate.”

  “Even when you’re invited?”

  “Even then.”

  Calico smiles. “So don’t think of it as the tribe. Think of it as a community, like Aggie said. It’s how we cousins get along with you five-fingered beings.”

  I nod. “Like neighbours.”

  She leans against me. “Or more than neighbours.” Then she pokes me with a finger. “But don’t you go trying that with any of those pretty Kikimi girls. I see how they look at you.”

  I have to laugh. “Right. What they see is an old man, worn down by the desert.”

  “Not so worn down,” Calico says. “I think there’s still some life left in—”

  She breaks off as first one dog, another, then all of them get up from where they’ve been lazing around in the dirt. They gather, facing us, on the slope below the rock where we’re sitting.

  “What the hell?” I say.

  Calico glances over her shoulder. “It’s got nothing to do with us.”

  I turn as well to see a dusty red dog higher up on the slope behind us. She makes her way down to us, slowing long enough to brush her head against the side of my leg before she goes bounding the rest of the way down. When she reaches the crowd of dogs there’s a sudden mad frenzy of barking, sniffing and happy running around.

  “Looks like Si’tala actually came through for you,” Calico says.

  Down below, I hear Leah calling Ruby’s name and the red dog bounds over to where she’s sitting with Aggie. Leah drops to her knees and enfolds the dog in her arms, burying her face in Ruby’s dusty fur. Ruby lets Leah fuss with her for a few moments before she turns her attention to Aggie. She lays her chin on the old woman’s knees and looks up into her face. Even from where we are, it’s easy to see the mutual affection shining in their eyes. It’s an image that I take a snapshot of in my mind so that I can pull it out whenever I think there isn’t enough love left in the world.

  Aggie ruffles the red dog’s fur then gives her a little push. That’s all it takes for Ruby to go racing off with the other dogs, a stream of crows following in their wake like a string of jet beads.

  “What would you have done if Sadie hadn’t made the right choice?” Calico asks.

  I turn to her. “Honestly? I don’t know. I was counting a hundred percent on it not coming to that.”

  Calico smiles. “You’re such a big softie. It’s one of the things I like about you.”

  “One of the things?” I tease.

  She puts a languid finger under my chin and looks into my eyes. “Well, besides a few other first-rate skills you have—and then there’s your music.”

  That catches me off guard. “I didn’t know you’d ever even heard the old band.”

  “I don’t mean that music. I mean the music you play now. You should let Leah hear some of it.” She puts her hand on top of mine. “Comes to that, you should let more than the walls of the canyon hear it.”

  “Performing,” I say, “That’s not me anymore.”

  Her lips form a little pout. I can’t tell if she’s still playacting or serious, but she presses her case. “Is it still performing when you’re playing for your friends?” she asks, “or your community? Don’t you think Morago would love to hear what you do with those Kikimi powwow songs?”

  I cringe inside. “I just play around with those on my own because I like them,” I tell her. “I’d never perform them in public—it would feel disrespectful. There’s no way that Morago would appreciate that.”

  Like speaking his name is a cue, we see Morago approaching the changing tent. It’s almost time for the sweat to start. Morago has removed the T-shirt he was wearing earlier and there’s not a trace of flour on his jeans. He stands beside the flaps of the tent’s opening wearing a buckskin jacket, beaded and fringed. Looking at him in that jacket, it could be forty years ago, backstage at a Diesel Rats concert. No wonder the groupies adored him as much as they did the band.

  A drumbeat starts up and the participants move toward the lodge. Most wear shorts and T-shirts; a few of the women are in loose dresses.

  “Are you going in?” Calico asks.

  I shake my head. “Baby steps, remember?”

  “Except you’re not a baby. You’re only acting like one.”

  “I don’t see you joining them,” I start, but I don’t get to finish.

  Like everybody else, I turn to look at Aggie’s house, where three SUVs have pulled into the yard. When Sammy Swift Grass steps out of the first one, a murmur ripples through the crowd. Beside me, Calico growls under her breath.

  I slip my fingers lightly around her wrist. “Will you let me try to handle this?” I ask, keeping my voice calm and low.

  She gives me a slow nod, her gaze never leaving Sammy. The drumming stops. The doors of the other SUVs all open and now Sammy’s got a dozen of his boys standing behind him. They move in a wedge toward the fire pit, Sammy out front.

  Morago starts walking to meet him, but I call out for him to stop. This is on me. I’m the one who insisted we give Sammy another chance, so I’m the one that has to deal with him. I just can’t believe Sammy would bring it here. Even with all his men, he’s seriously outnumbered.

  Morago studies me for a moment, then nods.

  People are giving way to let Sammy and his boys pass. He gets grim looks as they approach, but Sammy doesn’t pay them any attention. He doesn’t pay attention to Reuben either, or the sudden influx of dogs behind them, or the young men and women who are standing with Reuben in the crowd. His dog boys.

  I realize that Sammy’s heading straight for Aggie, so I jog down the hill and cut him off before he can reach her. He finally stops, but only because I’m standing in his way.

  He looks like anybody on the rez, except everything leans to the one percent, if one of those CEO types were dressing down. A crisp, tailored white shirt rounds his belly and tucks into a pair of dark blue jeans with a sharp crease. His tooled-leather boots gleam and a matching belt is fronted by a large buckle of a rearing horse. It looks like it’s made of gold. Hell, knowing Sammy, it could be gold. He isn’t carrying any weapons, but that doesn’t mean his crew is unarmed. Most of them are wearing loose, cotton hunting shirts with the casino logo on the pockets, which could easily hide weapons.

  The tension in the air makes me wish Jerry Five Hawks were here. A badge and a gun can keep a lid on a lot of situations. But he pissed off his boss too much with how he handled that sorry business with Sadie and her sleazeball old man. Reuben told me Jerry’s been assigned to a desk for the past couple of weeks and won’t be out on patrol anytime soon. That’s harsh, but apparently he’s devoting all his attention to substantiating every charge they’ve got against Higgins to make sure the jerk gets his comeuppance when his court date rolls around. I just hope I don’t get called in to testify. To his credit, he’s also refuted Sadie’s claim that I’m anything more than the famous Jackson Cole’s cousin, so I don’t have to worry about Higgins trying to cash in where Sadie failed.

  “I gave you a chance,” I tell Sammy. “I stuck out my damn neck for you. Why do you have to go and prove me wrong?”

  “How am I proving you wrong?” he asks.

  I nod toward his crew. “Showing up here with your bully boys in tow.”

  Sammy shakes his head. “I don’t know why you’ve got that chip on your shoulder, but I’m not here to knock it off. I’ve come to pay my respects t
o Aunt Abigail and to take part in the sweat.” He looks over my shoulder to where I know Morago’s standing, then adds, “If that’s all right.”

  When he looks back at me I hold his gaze, trying to read behind the bland expression he’s giving me back.

  “You’re on the level?” I ask.

  He nods.

  “And the entourage?”

  He shrugs. “I wasn’t sure what kind of a welcome I might get, if any.” He doesn’t look over his shoulder when he calls back to his crew, “It’s all good here. You can wait over by the cars, unless you want to join us.”

  And just like that, they head back toward the cars, all except for Dave Running Dog and another guy that I don’t know.

  “Hey, Steve,” Dave says reaching out to shake my hand.

  “Welcome home,” I tell him, accepting his handshake. Then I step aside.

  Sammy walks up to Aggie and goes down on one knee to bring his head level with hers, those fancy jeans of his getting a coating of dust where he’s kneeling. “Ohla, Aunt Abigail,” he says. “I brought you a little something.” He takes a package of rolling tobacco out of his back pocket and offers it to her.

  Aggie smiles as she accepts it. “Ohla, Sammy. It’s good to see you. You don’t have to make your boys wait by their cars. They can sit out here with us while you’re inside.”

  Sammy sends Dave back to get them.

  “Thank you, Auntie,” he says to Aggie.

  He stands up and looks in my direction. “I was listening to you,” he says. “You made a convincing argument.” Then he walks over to where Morago and the other guy wait by the teepee.

  When Dave returns, all four of them enter the changing tent, strip down to their shorts and follow the others inside the sweat lodge. Morago’s the last to enter. He closes the flaps behind him. A few moments later, a chorus of voices rises up in song inside the sweat lodge.

  “What the fuck,” Reuben says, stepping up beside me. “Did hell freeze over?”