The Native Star

by M. K. Hobson

  “I don’t know,” she said. She had only the mysterious words her mother had spoken to the timber-camp workers …

  She wrinkled her brow, looked at Stanton.

  “Have you ever heard of something called the Cynic Mirror?”

  “The Cynic Mirror?”

  “They were the last words my mother ever spoke. She said, ‘We must get to the Cynic Mirror.’”

  “I’ve never heard of an item by that name,” Stanton said. “But there are many arcane objects for which no records are kept.”

  “Oh,” Emily said, her brows knit.

  “If you’d like, once our business in San Francisco is completed, I could take you around to the public Hall of Records. Perhaps you might be able to find out more about the name Lyakhov, or this ‘Cynic Mirror’ you’re looking for.”

  Emily looked at him, unexpected hope rising in her chest.

  “You think I might be able to find something?”

  “The city maintains excellent records,” he said. “I’ve been meaning to stop there anyway. They recently installed a clever new information storage system that uses tiny interdimensional windows to store records safely off-site. Very useful for a city that manages to go up in flames every ten years or so. At least it would be worth a look.”

  “Yes.” Emily sat up straight. “That sounds like a wonderful idea. Thank you, Mr. Stanton.”

  “Least I can do,” he said as he wrapped himself in his blanket. Then he blew out the spirit lamp, and darkness enfolded them—a darkness heavy with the sounds of chanting and rain.

  The next morning the clouds had parted and brilliant sunshine illuminated a perfect blue sky. The horses were brought, saddled and frisky. Despite Emily’s suspicions of the day before, the animals were in good working order; the man in the black felt hat had even repaired Stanton’s slashed reins with clever knots.

  Before riding out, they went to pay parting respects to Komé. And indeed, when they came to the longhouse, Komé was standing before it to watch them go. But this was a Komé terribly changed. Gone was the cheerful, vibrant, animated Maien; this old, old woman swayed unsteadily, even though she was clutching her feather-tipped staff with one hand and leaning on Lawa with the other. Her skin was a haggard yellow-pale, the tattoos dark and drastic. There were harsh purple smudges beneath her eyes.

  “She must have overexerted herself last night,” Stanton said, his voice low. Emily wondered if the tormented spirit of the raccoon had been worth it.

  Stanton lifted a salutational hand as they rode past, and it was clear that he expected that formal gesture to serve as a farewell. He looked somewhat surprised, therefore, when Komé called out to him, a guttural croak, and began hobbling toward them with a jerk and a stagger, as if her feet could not find the ground. Stanton pulled his horse up quickly, as if he was afraid the large animal might trample the small, suddenly fragile-seeming old woman.

  The Maien came to Emily’s side, looked up at her for a long time. Emily stared down at her. Her eyes, once glittering as topaz, now seemed dull and distant. Dull and distant and empty.

  Strange images played through Emily’s mind. Hollow bowls, husks, blown eggshells …

  Emily shook her head as the Maien took her right hand, the hand with the stone in it. The old woman held Emily’s hand tight and, pressing her forehead against the stone, closed her eyes.

  “Tenkiju, ososolyeh,” she rasped.

  Then, opening her eyes, the Maien pressed something small and hard into Emily’s hand. She closed Emily’s fingers around it. Then she looked around herself, her gaze encompassing the trees, the rising smoke, the growing brightness of morning. She breathed a deep breath in through her nose, seeming to relish it as if it were her last. She smiled. Looking up at Stanton, she reached over and swatted him on the knee fondly. Stanton reached down and clasped the Maien’s hand.

  “Josum, Komé,” he said.

  “Josum?” The Maien’s face crumpled in a strange smile, and she released a soft laugh, weak and kittenish. “Mi, jose!” Then she turned and staggered back to her hut, casting no shadow, her feet making no sound.

  Lawa, Emily noticed, did not follow her. Instead, the girl stared after them, her eyes hard and unshifting.

  “What did you say to her that was so all-fired amusing?” Emily asked, once they were well away from the camp.

  “I just said good-bye,” he said. “Josum means good-bye, and she said, ‘Oh, yes! Go!’ I can’t say I get the joke either.”

  “She gave me an acorn.” Emily held up the small hard nut that Komé had pressed into her hand. “She called it tenkiju … is that the word for acorn?”

  “No,” Stanton said. “Acorn is muyu.”

  “Then what does tenkiju mean?”

  “Well, that’s an interesting question. You see, the Miwok have no word in their language for ‘thank you.’ I suppose it’s because they believe that thanking someone implies that there is a need for thanks, which implies—”

  “Oh, skip it!” Emily sighed, exasperated. “You know, you may get tired of explaining things to me, but not half so tired as I get listening.”

  “Tenkiju. Sound it out. It’s a phonetic approximation of the English words ‘thank you.’”

  “What was she thanking me for?”

  “I don’t think she was thanking you. I think she was thanking the stone. She said tenkiju ososolyeh. She was thanking the evening star.”

  Emily looked at him.

  “The evening star?”

  “Ososolyeh translates as evening star. She called the stone that before, in fact, when she first saw it.”

  “In the journal you showed me, it said that the Indians who found the specimen that’s in the British Museum also thought it was a piece of the evening star!”

  “Exactly so,” Stanton said.

  “Acorns and evening stars,” Emily said contemplatively, holding up the nut. Then, with a dismissive gesture, she threw the acorn over her shoulder. Stanton gave a cry and pulled Remus up short. Jumping down from the horse, he felt around in the leaf mold until he found the acorn. He wiped mud from it and tucked it back into Emily’s hand.

  “Never throw away something a holy woman gives you.”

  Emily looked at him.

  “I’m supposed to carry a nut around, just because some old Indian Witch handed it to me?”

  “Humor me, Miss Edwards.”

  Emily sighed. Pulling the silk pouch out from under her collar, she tucked the nut inside, then returned the pouch to its habitual hiding place.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  San Francisco

  It was a hard day’s ride to Oakland, where they would board the ferry for San Francisco, but the bright spring sunshine warmed their backs and heartened the horses. They cantered along one of the broad wagon-roads that connected the Sacramento Valley with the prosperous markets along the Pacific Coast. All along the way, farmers were plowing the fields with their heavy teams. The sound of birdsong and the vivid smell of loamy black earth was everywhere, and Emily felt the return of her normal good spirits.

  It wasn’t just the beautiful weather that cheered her. She had gained a memory of her mother. She didn’t know why, or how … but it was a memory, and it was new, and it was precious. She kept going back to it, dark and murky as it was, trying to tease out additional details. She couldn’t remember her mother’s face, but she could remember the shape of her nose in the shadows, the smooth parting of her hair. It was a memory, the first she’d ever had. It buoyed her and made her feel bright as new-shined brass.

  The sight of Oakland sprawling on the horizon gave Emily’s spirits an additional boost. Oakland was by no means lovely, but it meant they were almost to San Francisco.

  As they came into the town proper, the main road narrowed to a crowded swath of hard-packed dirt flanked by thriving industry: livestock pens and machinery works and woodlots. Romulus and Remus shied at rumbling drayage carts and the shouts of the heavy men who drove them. The road ended at the
waterfront, where dozens of wooden ware houses crowded onto San Francisco Bay, cantilevered over the water on spindly stilts.

  It was late in the day, but they found they could still make the last ferry. As Stanton purchased tickets, Emily stood on the wharf, holding the horses and looking out over the bay. It was the largest expanse of water she’d ever seen. Flat and gray, it reflected the shifting color of the sky. There were clouds moving swiftly in from the ocean, fat white clouds that promised rain farther inland. Through the clouds, shafts of sunlight cut down and made places on the water shine with a silver dollar’s brilliance.

  “Come along, ferry’s this way.” Stanton came up behind her, tickets in hand. He took the reins and clucked to the horses to follow; their hooves were a hollow drumbeat on the wooden pier.

  The ferry’s interior was lush, with heavily varnished woodwork and shiny brass fittings. They passed the area at the back of the boat where the Chinese rode; Emily glimpsed blue coats and braided queues. In the boat’s main passenger area there were only white faces—farmers holding battered hats in their rough, dirt-stained hands; miners chewing tobacco, arms crossed; flashily dressed men and women in fabulous colors, laughing too loudly.

  Stanton led her right through the parlor room into another room, one filled with tables.

  “Hungry?” he asked. She shook her head. “It is suppertime; you’ve eaten hardly anything since we left Auburn. You have to keep your strength up, you know.”

  She shook her head again. She’d never thought of it before, but the very idea of food was absurd. How ridiculous eating was. For some reason, it seemed she remembered another way, an older and more satisfying way, pulling sustenance from a hot hidden core within herself, through veins that pulsed with fire …

  She toyed idly with these strange thoughts as she watched Stanton place an order with a passing waiter. Again, he paid from the black silk purse.

  “How does that work?” Emily asked, cradling her chin in her palm, glad for the distraction. “It’s always got money in it, but I never see you put any in.”

  “It’s a Warlock’s Purse.” Stanton showed it to her but didn’t let her touch it. It was indeed empty.

  “It’s a service offered by some of the larger banks in the East.” Stanton tucked it back into his pocket. “It’s directly connected to my account in New York. I am able to withdraw the money I need, yet there is never any loose gold in it to tempt pickpockets. If a thief were to get ahold of it, he would not be able to access any of my funds.”

  The waiter delivered Stanton’s order—two large roast beef sandwiches, a piece of thickly frosted chocolate cake, a cup of hot coffee, and a glass of cold milk. Stanton pushed the milk to Emily.

  “Here,” he said. “Milk is very restorative.”

  “I didn’t know I needed restoring,” Emily said, taking the glass.

  Stanton reached for the cake; as he did so, his sleeve brushed the fork off the plate and it clattered to the floor. Out of habit, Emily muttered, “A man will come to visit.”

  “What?”

  “If a fork do fall, a man will call.”

  Stanton smiled to himself as he reached down to retrieve the fork.

  “Well, that’s what it means!” she said hotly.

  “Yes, I’m familiar with the superstition.” Stanton wiped the fork with his napkin. “Rhyming house-magic is just so quaint, that’s all.”

  “What do you have against rhymes, anyway?” Emily leaned forward. She very much did not like being called quaint.

  “Not a thing,” Stanton said, sinking his fork into the cake.

  “I’m sure you prefer Latin, so you can sound educated and sophisticated.”

  “There happen to be several very good reasons for casting spells in Latin,” Stanton said.

  “Why? I suppose it’s some fabulously powerful language?”

  “Ask a man on the street what a spell is supposed to sound like, and he will either make up a rhyme or babble some imaginary version of Latin at you.” He raised a finger. “But ask that man which spell he believes to be more powerful, and he will choose the spell in Latin. The stereotype has become ingrained in the Western consciousness over many hundreds of years. Thanks largely to the Roman Catholic Church, ironically enough …”

  “Who cares what some man on the street thinks? It’s the spell part that’s important.”

  “Ah, that’s where you’re wrong. The magic isn’t in the words.” Stanton paused for a bite of cake, letting this provocative statement hang while he licked frosting from the silver. “The magic is in the effect the words have upon the listener—or, indeed, upon the speaker himself. At its root, magic relies on human cooperation and expectation, both conscious and unconscious. It has its basis in what humans believe. That is the fundamental precept of credomancy.”

  “Credomancy?”

  “The magic of faith, the tradition of magic I have chosen to specialize in. Credomancy draws its power from the human perception of reality. For example, you know that it takes a silver bullet to stop a werewolf, right?”

  “That’s what they say,” Emily said. “I’ve never tested it.”

  “Well, if you ever come up against a werewolf, I hope you have a silver bullet handy.”

  “So a silver bullet will kill a werewolf not because it’s magic, but because everyone believes that it’s magic?”

  “Precisely.”

  Emily leaned her elbows on the table, looking sideways out the open window. The ferry had gotten under way, and they were gliding across the bay. The keen smell of brine and churning water was surprisingly pleasant.

  “But which came first?” Emily said. “The belief or the power? I mean, wasn’t there a time before people knew about werewolves and silver bullets? What would have killed a werewolf then?”

  “An excellent question,” he said. “No one really knows. The prevailing wisdom is that belief and power evolve together.”

  Emily pondered this for a moment.

  “What if everyone stopped believing?”

  “Then credomancers like myself would have no more power,” Stanton said. “Indeed, it is one of the weaknesses of the credomantic practitioner. People can stop believing, or forget their beliefs. That is why we credomancers have to continually popularize the beliefs upon which our power is based.”

  “Popularize? How?”

  “Well, you’ve seen those subscription novels, haven’t you? The ones printed on horrible pulp paper, with titles like Secrets of a Warlock or The Mystical Jetez?”

  Emily nodded, thinking of Mrs. Lyman and her fondness for such thrilling accounts of derring-do.

  “Mystic Truth Publishers in New York puts those out. Mystic Truth is owned by the Credomantic Foundation, which was started by a man named Benedictus Zeno over a hundred and fifty years ago.” Stanton paused for a sip of coffee. “The books are designed to have the broadest possible appeal. The more people read those books, the more they believe. The more they believe, the more power we credomancers have.”

  Emily snapped her fingers. “Then that’s why everyone was buying Baugh’s!”

  “Baugh’s? You mean those patent charms sold by mail? The ones with the garish boxes?”

  “Everyone in Lost Pine believed they were more modern, more up-to-date, more effective. And if people believed they were more effective …”

  “… then they were,” Stanton finished for her.

  Emily sat back in her seat, crossed her arms over her chest.

  “Well, thanks for nothing,” she said. “That kind of magic, all flash and gold leaf and tissue paper … it’s putting Pap and me out of business.”

  “For heaven’s sake, don’t dismiss your training that quickly,” Stanton said. “There are three grand magical traditions—animancy, sangrimancy, and credomancy. Spirit magic, blood magic, and faith magic. There are hundreds of kinds of magical practice, each of which blend elements from these traditions in various proportions. You’ve been mostly trained in animancy.”

>   “Animancy.” Emily experimented with the word.

  “It’s the practice of working with the life essences that animate living things. In herbalism, for example, you take the unique life essences of individual plants and use them to perform works. I’m sure you did similar magic with animal bones and wood and such.”

  “So that means I’m an animancer, and I never even knew it.” Emily shook her head. “My word, such fine airs I could have given myself!”

  “Which shows why you should have paid more attention to me in Lost Pine, instead of always chasing me off.” The words were spoken with an insufferable tone of conclusion.

  “It’s all right,” she purred. “Lost Pine suffered no lack of fine airs regardless.”

  Stanton swapped the empty cake plate with the full sandwich plate, directing his attention to a stray morsel of roast beef.

  “Komé is an animancer, too.” He speared the meat with his fork. “But not all animancers are Indian holy women or backwoods Witches. It might interest you to know that in the Slavic regions, Russia especially, animancy is an old and refined art, and animantic practitioners are extremely powerful.”

  Emily narrowed her eyes. The name Lyakhov popped into her head. A Russian name.

  “Fascinating,” she said.

  It was nearly ten when they arrived in San Francisco, but Emily was so excited she didn’t feel tired at all. After retrieving the horses, they rode out from the wharves and into the largest aggregation of buildings Emily had ever seen. Structures towered above her—behemoths of brick and stone and wood, rising story upon story into the dark night sky. Gas streetlights cast a warm tawny glow over everything. Even at that late hour, the streets were alive with activity: hansom cabs and brewery carts, groups of men walking fast and talking loud. Romulus’ and Remus’ hooves clattered smartly against the street’s smoothly rounded cobblestones.

  They rode to a hotel on Kearny Street. It was an extremely splendid hotel and made the other hotels they’d stayed in seem unforgivably shabby. Where other hotels had flashy red-lettered placards pushing their names, this hotel had only a small, refined sign of etched brass: Excelsior.