Bride of Thunder

by Jeanne Williams

  There was seldom a drought in east Texas, but freezes and blights struck often. Mercy could imagine that to a farmer farther west, it would be comforting to believe that his wheat or corn was guarded by beneficent spirits hovering just above him

  “Do the yuntzilob bring rain, too?”

  “No, it is the rain gods, the chaacs, that bring rain. There are several kinds of them. The four most important stand at the four directions of the earth, the eastern one being the strongest. Some chaacs bring the soft, steady rains, others cause lightning, there are ‘flooding-sky’ chaacs, and even sweeper chaacs, which clean up the heavens after the rains.”

  They were passing a field cleared from the forest where a man was planting, digging holes with a pointed stick, and dropping in several grains, which he covered with all the brooding care of a mother putting her child to bed.

  “When he picked that land, he set up that cross and brought gourds of gruel, which he offered to the yuntzilob, which were then supposed to send away the snakes and dispose of the trees being cut down. When it was time to burn, he offered more gruel and prayed to Jesucristo for the spiraling wind that helps the flame burn as it should. This wind is the soul of shiners who must pay for their wrongdoings by blowing fire through cornfields.” He stared at her in wonder. “And men in your land do none of this?”

  “No. They pray if there’s drought or disease, but they don’t make offerings ahead of time—unless you count what some give to their churches.”

  Dionisio frowned so at this that Mercy tried to explain that in the United States corn was only one of many crops, that there were grains such as wheat, rye, and oats, plus potatoes, many vegetables, and fruits; cattle, pigs, poultry, eggs, and dairy products were also depended on. Dionisio shook his head at such outlandish habits.

  “Corn is our main food. It makes our bodies now as surely as the gods made our ancestors from maize after other substances failed.”

  He told her then how the Tzotzil Mayas cut a child’s umbilical cord over an ear of corn. This bloody grain was then planted in a special little field where it was carefully tended, since its growth foretold the child’s. All the family ate this blood crop in a special meal.

  “The Tzotzils have another belief you would like,” he said with that warm, protective smile that made her feel touched by sun-gentled wind. “They think unweaned babies who die are wrapped in a soft mantle and placed in a great tree with many breasts, which the children rest upon and suckle. A good heaven for babies, yes?”

  “Oh, yes!”

  A screech came from the edge of the field. “He’s the guardian of the cornfield.” Dionisio pointed out a small hawk in a tree. “He scares blackbirds away from the corn. He belongs to the yuntzilob and should never be hurt, nor should the white-winged or white-breasted doves, or red-billed pigeons, or the x-kol bird, which sings for the corn and keeps it contented, and another that stretches the corn plants, or the bird that whistles to call up the rain.”

  It was beginning to seem to Mercy that growing corn was the true Mayan religion, one that went back to the beginnings. If people anywhere got most of their food from one source, that source would almost be a god. “We call corn the jade of divine grace, and sometimes the Grace of God,” said Dionisio, reading her thoughts. “And we believe it’s a sin to waste it and that drought can be caused if people trade it for liquor.”

  “Who’s planting your corn while you’re away? And who acts as batab?”

  “When I bound myself for rifles, my lieutenant assumed my duties, and, of course, he has helpers and the council of elders. My wife and child died two years ago, so there is only my mouth to feed, and my brother will plant enough for that.”

  He paused when he mentioned his wife.

  “I’m sorry you lost your family,” Mercy said.

  “My wife was like a flower. Like a flower, she withered, quickly, with fever, a few days after the child was born.”

  There was nothing to say to that, but Mercy knew now why he treasured the baby heaven of soft mantles and the warm-breasted tree. It was a time of flowering, and as they skirted a village and started back, he picked for her some of the large rose-red cups of the frangipani, then urged her to smell their almost dizzying fragrance. “It’s good for wounds,” he said, “and it’s always been known as the flower of passion, of desire.”

  She felt his gaze burning her and could not look at him. She loved Zane! Why could Dionisio make her feel like a bloom longing to open, like a field parched for rain?

  It was weak, shameful, not to be allowed.

  But natural. His care and protection and wanting you to know about his people have planted something in you, something that’s growing. Now will you say that he’s your brother? she scorned. You know better. When he touches you, flame spreads. You want him. This is a thing of bodies.

  But she knew it was more than that.

  During the following days, her tension increased, though she couldn’t see any change in Dionisio. He was like the sun, from which sometimes she hid or other times sought, here and constant.

  Was it possible to love two men? She tried to summon Zane, remember their loving, his eyes and mouth. But that seemed a world ago, two worlds, really: Eric’s estate and Chan Santa Cruz. She loved Zane. But he was far away, like a memory of summer, while Dionisio had saved her life and was shielding her now.

  In the white world she would never have known him like this. Here he was her interpreter, the revealer of his kingdom. He was more to her than a man—he was the revealer of secrets, some terrible, some beautiful, of his world.

  The rains had not yet come, though the corn was planted, and one day they encountered a tortoise sunning near a rocky cave. It had tears in its eyes, and Dionisio said it wept for men who needed rain and that its tears would help bring it.

  “The tortoise belongs to the chaacs,” the young batab said. “So do other creatures that live with them in cenotes and caves: frogs, bats, and toads. They shouldn’t be killed.”

  Perhaps the tortoise’s tears moved the chaacs, for the rains began that day, violent at first, then steady and persistent. Morning was bright, but afternoon brought furious storms. Water began to collect in rock hollows and wherever it couldn’t sink into the ground. Dionisio was at rosary when one of the slave women, scarcely more than a girl, ran up to the hut and tinkled the bells above the door.

  “My baby, he’s drowned!” she cried in Spanish. “He wandered off while I was making tortillas and I found him in a ditch! Can you help him?”

  Mercy put the little boy across her lap and let water drain from his mouth, pressing on his sides. His face was bluish. Too late? Was it too late? He gave no sign of life.

  A method that had worked once for Elkanah shot through her desperate thoughts. He thought it was how the prophet Elijah brought the widow’s son back to life.

  “I’ll try!” she told the frantic woman. “Pray!”

  Placing the boy on his back, she crouched over him and opened her mouth on his, sucking out as powerfully as she could, then breathing in. Out-in, out-in, she sent the air.

  Out-in, out-in … Their bodies were glued together with ditch water and sweat. Was that a faint motion? Was there anything? No. The child was still.

  Dead. Of course he was dead. Dead when he was brought to her. But she couldn’t get up and face the mother, so she kept breathing in and out, trying to start the child’s lungs, trying to begin that rhythm, so wonderful, that people took for granted until it stopped.

  There was nothing but the small prone body, nothing but this willing it to breathe. As if from a distant place, Mercy heard the mother praying, and she heard Elkanah’s words: You must not stop. Keep breathing. Breathe for the child.

  And then the body moved, the boy choked, then struggled. Mercy took her mouth from his as he spewed water and the contents of his stomach. Mercy held his head as the mother knelt, gathering him to her.

  “What is happening?” called Dionisio from the door.


  The woman lifted her child, who clutched her tightly and began to cry. But he was breathing. “My son was dead!” said the mother. It was to Mercy like an echo of Elkanah’s voice telling the Old Testament story. “My son was dead, but he is alive again!”

  She had sunk to her knees, trying to kiss Mercy’s hands, but Mercy had made her sit down and gave both mother and son gourd cups of the honey-sweetened herb brew she and Dionisio enjoyed each evening when he returned from services.

  “The child wasn’t dead,” she explained slowly, asking Dionisio to make sure the woman understood, because she certainly didn’t want it spread around that she could revive corpses. “I gave him air till he could breathe himself—a practice my father taught me.”

  “It was a long time,” the mother protested. “My Juanito didn’t move. He was dead!”

  “No. The spark of life was in him. Luckily, I could fan it back into a glow.”

  Rocking the boy, the mother pressed her lips stubbornly together.

  “Listen,” said Dionisio sternly, “it would be poor thanks to this lady to make her sound like a witch or miracle worker. What if the tatich was jealous? What if she were asked to do something beyond her powers? Would you see her die for witchcraft under machetes in the plaza?”

  “Madonna save us, no!” whispered the woman, her eyes widening. “I … I hadn’t thought, Lord! But others saw. Others said I was wasting my time, that he was dead.”

  “Then tell them he wasn’t,” Dionisio ordered curtly. “Say the lady knows, from her own country, a way of sometimes restoring one who has almost drowned.”

  “Yes, Lord,” promised the woman. Her dark eyes came to Mercy, thanking her more deeply than words. “I’ll tell them that. I’ll even say he stirred while I was carrying him.”

  Putting down the gourds, with thanks, she went to the door, shifting the boy to her hip. He had stopped fretting now and regarded Mercy with black Indian eyes, though his skin was fair. He was a very handsome child who would grow up free; at least his mother had that for comfort. “Go with God, señora. I will pray for you each day of my life.”

  She left. Mercy poured tea for Dionisio, but he was plainly troubled. “Was the boy dead?” he finally asked.

  Mercy stared. “I thought so. But he couldn’t have been. Once my father did the same kind of breathing for over an hour and revived a man. Another time it didn’t work.”

  “The story will spread.” Dionisio frowned. “You’ll be expected to do the impossible, blamed when you can’t, and if I ask to leave my service two weeks early, everyone will be sure I am bewitched.”

  Their eyes met, locked.

  “Perhaps I am,” he said.

  “What?”

  “Enchanted. It is my castigo.”

  “Punishment?”

  “To desire what I cannot have—because I tried to have it in a small way for a small time. I thought that would cure me, purge the madness.”

  She watched him in distress and a sort of fear. As long as the force between them wasn’t in words, as long as it wasn’t admitted, it didn’t have to be confronted. He seemed driven now to voice it, keeping a distance from her, though his gaze held her.

  “Do you understand, Ixchel? I could have taken you to that hacienda and returned here for my service. It would have been much extra travel and time, but what could that matter when I might still have been working in Señor Kensington’s fields? I could have delivered you to your people and have come again to my own.”

  “Dionisio …”

  “I told myself it would be good for one of the dzuls to live with us, learn our ways, and have that vision to show others. Later, when we walked and you laughed or your eyes grew as large as a child’s at something I said or showed you, I thought … forget what I thought!”

  “Surely you’re too worried about this. The slaves may gossip, but outside of their compound probably no one will hear of it.”

  He gave a short, harsh laugh. “We are a people of miracles. Our existence, this city, is a miracle. The story will sprout wings and fly straight to the tatich.”

  Crossing the room, he didn’t touch her but stood so near that she was aware of the heat of his body. “We must wait and hope that my standing as an independent ally will allow us to go at the appointed time. But if the leaders wish to keep you as a healer or kill you as a witch, I’ll get you away or die.”

  “Perhaps you could go to La Quinta and get them to offer ransom. Even if my fiancé isn’t there, his mayordomo would do that—I think.”

  “And what might happen to you while I was gone, even if the tatich accepted ransom?” Dionisio stood tensely, balanced as if receiving a load that took all his brain and strength to manage. “No, I won’t leave without you, and if you stay, I’ll always be with you in this place, for I shall die here.”

  She couldn’t reproach him for bringing her to the city, any more than she could regret saving Juanito. “You’ll always be with me wherever I am,” she told him. “When I see cornfields, birds of the yuntzilob, the tortoise weeping, smell frangipani, or feel the sun, I will remember you.”

  It was strange and formal, a kind of swearing. “It’s not that you’re graceful,” he said, “or that you’re lovely in all your parts or had compassion for me. You are for my spirit. And you are to me Ixchel, of healing, Ixchel, of the moon, Ixchel, of loving.”

  She put her hands in his. He drew in his breath. Then they went out of the hut, past sentries, out of the city, and into the woods, where they found a bed of wild thyme. The moon shone on them and the plants were damp from earlier rain, but she felt consumed in sun.

  She felt no guilt, no unfaithfulness to Zane, and after some puzzled searching of her feelings, she didn’t try to. This bond with Dionisio was deep-rooted in something other than themselves, elemental affinities joining together in spite of the otherness that, must divide them. They were together for this time, in this place, with possible death before them and, absolutely, separation. Zane was her love, her life, her home country. Dionisio was another world.

  Two days after she had revived the child, Juanito, Dionisio was on sentry duty and she was washing clothes when she sensed someone watching. Glancing around, she stiffened. Beyond the cenote stood a squat, broad-shouldered man with graying hair whom Dionisio had pointed out as the tata nohoch zul, Great Father Spy. She went on with her rubbing and rinsing, hoping he’d go away, but he just stood there.

  At last, when further delay would have been obvious, she wrung out the garments, put them in a hemp carrier, and was nearing the plaza when the man stepped in front of her.

  “I thought you’d make those clothes into rags,” he said in excellent Spanish. His skin was light and she thought he was mestizo, as many of the Cruzob leaders were, including the present tatich. Pitiless eyes bored into her. “It is odd that one with your gifts should be such a zealous washerwoman.”

  “It is my work, señor.”

  He frowned. “But you do not work much. It’s no secret that the batab of Macanehe is the prisoner of his prisoner.”

  “Señor,” she said desperately, “I don’t understand.”

  “You are a dzul, but not Spanish.” He frowned. “Are you from over the great water, like that fool Maximilian and his woman, who passed through Yucatán, dancing in Mérida and Campeche, giving medals and smiles and promises? The booted ones of Mérida followed her like puppies, eager to fight for a foreign empire when they wouldn’t defend their own frontier!” He spat on the stony ground. “Well, they have their reward—trapped in Mérida! General Traconis sustained siege in Tihosuco for fifty days, and he may hold out longer in the fortress of San Benito, but there’ll be no relief. Maximilian has surrendered. His empire has fallen. And I pray that Juárez, who is also Indian, will not spare his life.”

  “It’s over?”

  “Yes. But I ask the questions. Woman, are you one of Maximilian’s foreigners?”

  Mercy thought of Carlota, hoped the young empress’ insanity would let her esca
pe to happier days. “I’m not European,” she said to the chief spy. “I’m from the United States, from Texas.”

  “Ah! Texas! You rebelled against Mexico!”

  “Before I was born.”

  “Yes! Santa Ana made many Yucatecans, many Indians, go fight in those wars with Texas and the United States. And I recall that boats from the Texas Navy were paid to protect Yucatán from Mexico.” He chuckled. “It’s good, very good, to watch dzuls fight! Would that they might devour one another and vomit the filth into hell!”

  Mercy’s arm ached from holding the wet clothes. She switched the hemp carrier to her other hand. “May I go, señor?”

  An unpleasant smile played on his thin lips. “I’ll accompany you, slave, while you put your laundry out to dry. Then you’ll accompany me. You are greatly honored. The tatich wishes to speak with you.”

  Mercy’s heart turned to heavy, freezing ice. They had picked a time when Dionisio was out of the way. Even if he knew, how could he oppose them? He would die for her, she was certain, but what good was that?

  Be calm, she told herself, calm. Don’t show your fear. It may be only curiosity. You’re not an enemy; you’ve done nothing wrong.

  “I am honored,” she told the spy. “It’ll be interesting to speak with the tatich.” She gambled, thinking it best to show any strength she had before the Cruzob hierarchy committed themselves to any action they couldn’t retreat from without losing face. “Perhaps if General of the Plaza Crescendo Poot is in the city, he would like to send a message to my fiancé.”

  Startled, the spy stared fixedly at her. “What has the general to do with him?”

  “I’m to marry Zane Falconer, of La Quinta Dirección,” Mercy said. “Long ago his father saved the general’s life.”

  “I’ve heard of that. Most interesting! The general isn’t here, but when he returns I will ask him if he wishes to speak with you.”

  “Thank you.” Mercy started for the hut, aware that she’d thrown the spy off balance and hoping that the information would possibly help her without causing trouble.