Shadow of Time

by Jen Minkman

  Ben got up. “Well, I’ll be on my way to Naabi’aani then. I’m too restless to read. I want to do something useful.” He gently mussed Hannah’s hair. “See you tonight.”

  “Yeah, see you tonight,” she replied absently. All of a sudden, she felt nervous again.

  “I really don’t need to know each minute detail of what happened between you and Josh,” Emily blurted out that afternoon during lunch. “I just want to know for sure he’s not going to turn you into an emotional wreck again.”

  Hannah had spent the last fifteen minutes dodging Em’s questions about tomorrow’s ceremony. By now, her friend knew that the skinwalker curse was related to Josh, but that was all Hannah had wanted to share.

  “Trust me, that won’t happen. We talked it over. There are no secrets between us anymore.”

  “What time are you going to Naabi’aani tonight?” Emily asked as they were leaving the restaurant.

  “Around dinner time. Ben is with Josh right now. By the way, I don’t know if I’ll be there for the barbecue tomorrow night at Nick’s uncle’s. We might be running late.”

  Emily raised an eyebrow. “All righty, I won’t ask any further. I can only hope you’re making the right choice, and Josh won’t change his mind again.”

  “He won’t. I’ll see you later. Enjoy work.”

  Hannah watched Emily walk back to the pharmacy. What was she supposed to do all afternoon without letting her nerves get to her? She hadn’t heard back from Ben yet, so he must be having a lengthy discussion with Josh. Good. She preferred that to keeping her brother in the dark about things.

  Who knew? Perhaps Ben would really be able to help Sani. For all she knew, Ben might be sitting in a sweatlodge right now, decorated with beads and feathers, smoking a peace pipe. Cue mysterious flute music. She giggled, half-nervous and half-amused with her own overactive imagination.

  Passing Safeway, she suddenly spotted Yazzie leaving the store with two plastic bags. “Hey, Yaz,” she called him. “What did you buy?”

  “Hey, biligaana!” Yazzie changed course and walked up to her. “I bought some stuff to bake an apple pie for Josh’s sweet eighteen. I sure hope it’s going to work. My mom’s oven is a bit unpredictable. Half of the pies we bake in there never grow to their full potential.”

  Hannah laughed. “Why don’t you haul your groceries to our place and use the oven in the cabin?” she suggested, and Yazzie’s face lit up. Excellent. Baking a pie with Yazzie would be the perfect distraction right now. At least she wouldn’t nervously pace back and forth on the porch, waiting for the clock to strike six.

  Hannah hitched a ride on Yazzie’s motorcycle, and it didn’t take long before they were both in the kitchen. Yazzie was busying himself making pie crust and Hannah was cutting apples into cubes.

  When the pie was in the oven, Hannah dove into her bedroom to change into her new dress for the occasion. She’d never worn this long, purple dress before. In all honesty, it was a bit too posh to wear to the reservation, but she wanted to look her best. After putting on the dress and adjusting the spaghetti straps, she put up her hair and fixed it with a hairpin that had been a gift from her grandmother. It was made of gold filigree and shaped like a butterfly. Very fitting.

  “Wow.” Yazzie whistled, doing a double take when she emerged from the room. “You look like a fairytale. Josh will eat you right up, honey.”

  She grinned. “Let’s give him the pie first to distract him from me, then,” she threw back.

  At five, Yazzie left to pick up some things from Wahweap, leaving it up to Hannah to transport the apple pie. Nick and Emily both showed up at quarter to six to give Hannah, Amber and Ivy a ride.

  Hannah got into Nick’s Jeep. “Naabi’aani, please,” she said to Nick, addressing him like a cabbie. “Please don’t leave the meter running. I won’t be back anytime soon.”

  Nick snickered. “I can imagine. On your way to your legal boyfriend, huh?”

  “Oh.” Hannah turned beet-red. “Uhm, yes. There is that.” She clasped her hands primly together and stared down.

  Nick patted her hands. “Don’t worry. Your secret’s safe with me. I won’t call the cops on you if you promise to help me with my life’s work one more time. Dissertation in dire need of a critical teacher’s eye, yada, yada.”

  Hannah rolled her eyes. “What secret? I haven’t done anything wrong. FYI.”

  “Too bad.” Nick winked at her with a cheeky grin. “You should fix that. ASAP.”

  She turned even redder, suddenly giggling like a schoolgirl. What a relief to have her down-to-earth friends around on the eve of stepping into the unknown. After all Josh’s supernatural revelations, it felt good to just act silly for a while.

  “We’ll see,” she said with a sly smile, sinking back into the passenger’s seat when Nick drove away to the village.

  Copper Mine Road was dusty, dry and bumpy. Hannah was tossed back and forth in the Jeep, trying to lean her head against the headrest. She was getting more nervous by the minute. When Nick finally parked next to the Benally hoghans, she couldn’t wait to wish Josh a happy birthday and hug him tight. Quite a crowd had gathered in front of the house already.

  “Heya, sis!” Ben waved at her. He was busy laying the table next to Josh’s hoghan. Five fat candles were sitting in the middle. Ben just put down a big salad bowl, and Hannah put the homemade apple pie next to it. She shot her brother an inquisitive glance. He looked happy, so his conversation with Josh must have gone well. She was dying to find out what had been discussed.

  More guests had shown up to celebrate Josh’s birthday. Linibah was there with her husband and kids. Yazzie’s parents were grilling yucca plant on the big grill. Yazzie was busy making lemonade for everybody.

  “Shiyáázh!” Josh’s mom yelled. “Your guests are all here!”

  Colored balloons had been fixed to either side of the traditional blanket covering the hoghan’s entrance, and a golden garland had been wound around Josh’s smaller house. Because the hoghans didn’t have grid-based electricity, Josh’s dad had turned on the car stereo. The Mustang was blaring out Blackfire music.

  Hannah’s breath caught when Josh pushed the blanket aside and stepped out the door. Her gaze skimmed over his new pair of blue jeans, the traditional velvet shirt he was wearing and the big, turquoise pendant he’d worn before. He looked amazing. He graciously accepted all the food people had brought along, and casually pulled Hannah aside when everyone was done congratulating him. “Come inside with me in a minute,” he said in a soft voice.

  She nodded curtly. Josh cheerfully chatted with his guests, but managed to get away after a while. He walked back to his hoghan. Hannah followed him inside. The light of the setting sun slanted into the room through the small window in the wall facing the door. Soft light came from a few candles sitting on the desk to the left.

  “So, where’s Sani?” she wanted to know.

  “In a ceremonial hoghan outside the village, built especially for the occasion. He’ll start making a sandpainting tonight – the painting we need to pass into the veil. Tomorrow, at sunrise, we will go to him, and the ritual will start.”

  “And what have you told Ben?”

  “Almost everything. Except you being in a life-threatening situation because you want to stay with me. I didn’t think it was wise to be too frank.”

  Hannah gaped at him. “Almost everything?” she parroted.

  A smile crossed his face. “Yes. Ben wasn’t even that shocked. For years he’d had the feeling that I was too old for my age. He always felt I was somehow in close contact with my ancestors. It was a small step to embrace the truth that I am my own ancestors.”

  “Well, have you ever,” Hannah blurted out. “He wasn’t shocked?”

  “No, he took it all in his stride pretty easily.”

  “Hah. I guess he was shocked enough already by the whole skinwalker-curse-revelation. This was just another piece of the bizarro-puzzle for him. But does this mean he’s been able t
o help you for real?”

  “Not yet,” Josh replied cryptically. “But he might be. Later.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  Josh shook his head. “Tomorrow’s ceremony is only taking place to connect you and me, to bond us together, so we can protect you better. The Evil Way ceremony, which is to take place at a later stage, is our means to lift the curse. Ben can help us do that. He has strong ties with both you and me, so he’s our man.”

  “But... won’t that be dangerous for Ben?”

  “It will be dangerous for all three of us,” he responded in a monotone. “You know that.”

  Hannah fell silent. “Yeah, I know that,” she mumbled, her voice trembling.

  She quietly gazed into the smoldering fire in the middle of the hoghan, the coals still simmering with heat. Josh put his arm around her shoulders, and she leaned her head against his chest. “Sometimes I forget I’m in danger, because I feel so safe when I’m with you. So secure. I know it doesn’t make sense.”

  Josh didn’t reply, but just gave her a smile. She raised her face up to him, silently asking for a kiss. He pressed his lips to hers, caressing her face with one hand.

  A cough at the entrance both made them jump. “I knew it. I knew you guys would end up hiding somewhere together again,” Ben grumbled. He clomped inside, a teasing grin on his face.

  Josh chuckled. “Stop moaning, you killjoy.”

  “Go back to your cave in Jurassic Park, you old fart,” Ben shot back. “Aren’t you getting a little old for feeling up girls in dark rooms?”

  “Oh, I may be a quintuple centenarian, but I’m also just an eighteen-year-old guy.” Josh waggled his eyebrows at Hannah, who couldn’t help giggling.

  “You look good for your age, you know,” she teased him.

  “So do you,” he teased back.

  “What? You think I’m too old?” she pouted.

  “No, of course not!” he backpedalled.

  “It’s called ‘ripe’, Josh,” Ben added dryly.

  Josh bit his lip and stifled a laugh. “Wow. It feels good having shared my secret with you guys. I almost feel normal.”

  Ben patted his back. “You should have done it ages ago. I would have been able to understand you so much better.”

  When all the food was ready, everybody sat down for a nice dinner. Josh had put on the new CD Nick had given him on his car stereo. The upbeat music was the perfect backdrop for an evening full of friends and good food. Josh cut Yazzie’s pie, his parents kept pouring everyone drinks, and Ben was busy fishing for compliments, asking everyone what they thought of the potato salad he made. Although Josh made sure he mingled with all the guests, he kept close to Hannah all the time, giving her occasional looks so full of love it made her heart melt like butter in the desert.

  “Where is your medicine bundle?” he asked, when they were both scooping dessert onto their plates and nobody was listening in.

  “In my handbag,” Hannah answered softly, holding it up.

  “Just wear it around your neck. It works better that way. Especially now that we’re close to each other, you should wear it at all times.”

  Slowly, the sun sank below the horizon. When summer rain started to fall, Ben and Josh carried the table back inside the large hoghan. Josh’s parents were helping Linibah and her family to pack the car. They’d be driving them back to Chinle tonight. The others were huddled around the fire burning in the Benally family hoghan. When Nick, Amber and Ivy got up to leave, Hannah got nervous again. The birthday party was drawing to an end. She couldn’t stop thinking about the ritual she was going to be a part of tomorrow.

  “Will you please be careful?” Emily urged, when Hannah walked her to her own hoghan. “I completely trust Sani, but I don’t want you to get hurt.”

  “We’ll be careful,” Hannah promised. She took her overnight bag from the trunk on her way back to Josh’s hoghan, and slowly lowered it onto the floor next to his bed. She didn’t really know where Josh expected her to sleep that night. She could use his parents’ hoghan too – they’d be staying the night in Chinle after driving Linibah’s family back. Perhaps Josh needed solitude on the eve of an important ritual. It wouldn’t surprise her.

  “I’m going, Han.” Ben entered the house, stepped toward her and hugged her in a tight embrace. “Be safe, okay?” he whispered in her ear. “I want you back alive. So I can help you and Josh with the final reckoning.”

  Hannah smiled weakly and nodded. “Josh will help me. He’s got a huge bear to back him up.”

  “In the Big Blue House?” Ben smiled, but his eyes looked solemn. When he left the hoghan, she heard him talk to Josh outside for a while after that.

  Hannah sat by the fire and looked around. She noticed four handprints in white ash on the ceiling in each of the cardinal directions, like the ones Sani had done in his hoghan. She couldn’t remember seeing them before, so it was probably an extra precaution. Josh had most likely also made a circle of corn pollen around the house to ward off evil spirits.

  Hannah heard the Chevy drive off, spitting exhaust fumes, and her stomach made a revolution when Josh stepped inside. He stood next to her, caressing her hair. “You nervous about tomorrow?”

  “Yeah, a lot, actually.” Hannah got up and sank down into the armchair, staring up at Josh. “I know that what we’re about to do isn’t even the most dangerous part of the whole operation, but still. I just wonder what will happen. All those past lives of yours... am I going to see them all flash by?”

  “I don’t think so. You’ll see the memories directly related to my life with you.”

  Hannah sighed. “I want to help you so badly. It’s not fair those skinwalkers cursed you. You had a task to protect your people so you could bring peace, right?”

  “Well, I shouldn’t have murdered anyone, then,” he answered, his tone grim. He kneeled down next to her. “Times were different, but nevertheless, I shouldn’t have done it.”

  Hannah was quiet. Staring into the fire, Josh got the all-too familiar distant look in his eyes. “I was under a tremendous amount of pressure. You can’t imagine how bad the situation was. How everything changed during my lifetimes. How all the lands populated by Diné were flooded with gold-seekers from Mexico. How they sent out their soldiers to round up our people as slaves to work in the mines. How my little brother suffered terrible pains, dying of smallpox brought to our continent by the Spaniards.” His eyes glazed over, and he impatiently wiped at his tears with the back of his hand. “All those families ripped apart. All those people forced into baptism only to be killed afterwards. They used a select group of converted native Christians as slaves to build their churches in Santa Fe. The oppressors wouldn’t leave – nothing would stop them. Something had to be done. My clan members all looked to me, expecting me to do something. Po’pay appeared right on time.”

  “Who was Po’pay?” Hannah asked quietly. She almost didn’t dare interrupt his sad story.

  “He was the leader of the revolt. A Pueblo headman. I helped him prepare for the attack. I couldn’t just stand by, watching the Spanish military and priests deliberately destroying our culture.” Josh got up and rubbed his face, as if to erase the bad memories. “I participated. I killed people too. Innocent people. Women, children. The Spaniards were resilient. They never would have left if we hadn’t been so tough on them.”

  Hannah sprang to her feet and hugged him. “You couldn’t help it,” she whispered.

  “Yes, I could. I could help it. I shouldn’t have lost sight of my task. I was swept away on a tide of hate and revenge, and it was wrong.” Josh closed his eyes, and a gentle smile spread across his face. “In the life following that one, I roamed the land as a storyteller. So the Diné wouldn’t forget their traditions. A peaceful existence. The white people had come back, but they usually left me alone. They didn’t see any harm in some woman performing as a traditional singer, visiting villages.”

  Hannah shot him a surprised look.

  “Yes, I was a w
oman in that lifetime. I think my soul chose it like that, after all the bloodbaths and violence in the life prior to it.”

  “And after that?”

  “After that, I was born again as a man, in Tseyi... Canyon de Chelly. That’s where I met you.” He caressed her cheek. “That life saw me carry out my mission to a very great extent. I saved my people and brought peaceful relations with the white man.”

  “You said you were Barboncito?”

  Josh nodded. Hannah suddenly thought back to all the notes she’d made in the library that one afternoon. She’d seen that name a lot. “But then... you were there during the Long Walk. You were the leader setting the Diné people free from the Fort Sumner reservation. The man who single-handedly put Navajo Nation on the map.” She stared at him in utter amazement. This was too bizarre. She was sitting right next to a living legend – who was supposed to have died over a century ago.

  “I paid the price for it,” Josh said. “I had lost you. I had lost my two adoptive children. We had lost our pride.”

  “I’m sorry you had to suffer so much.” She hugged him tighter. “But at least we’ll take the first step in destroying the curse tomorrow. Some pain will disappear.”

  Josh smiled at her and walked toward the table on the other side of the fire to get two incense cones from a wooden box sitting there.

  “Juniper berry,” he explained. “It will protect us.”

  He lit them both and sat them down on the floor on either side of the fire, where they kneeled down together.

  “This is the same incense Sani burned when I visited him.” Hannah inhaled the scent, getting up when Josh got to his feet and took her hand to pull her toward the mattress.

  She eased herself down next to him, biting her lip when his eyes found hers. In the silence between them, he slowly bent over and brushed his lips against hers. He gave her a simple kiss, cupping her face in his hands. “You’re amazing. I still can’t believe you’re actually doing this.”

  Hannah smiled. “I’ll stick around until you do believe it.”