“Then she’s insane?” Jo asked Becca. “This Windigo Psychosis?”
“You know, I don’t think she’s psychotic.” Becca’s intelligence was so clear on her expressive face, and she was right in this. “She tracked what we were saying pretty well. Her responses were certainly odd, but she seemed lucid to me. She’s reality-based, even if her reality is very different from ours.”
The food the old woman craved was all around her, yes, but there was enough humanity left in her that she dared not eat. Sometimes I wonder at the cruelty of Your more mysterious creations, my Goddess. You sculpted the beautiful mountain Becca showed me this morning, and the lush forest on either side of this path, and the love I share with Grady. Yet You also created a spirit so malevolent it has haunted this family for generations, so deadly it has infected an old woman with the terrible selfishness I witnessed this morning.
Pat’s eyes met Elena’s in the rearview mirror, and again she wondered about her. What was this lonely ranger’s role in all this? And the new girl, Maggie, younger even than Elena. Both of them were a part of this journey. That’s helpful to know, Diosa, but I have spoken to You several times about being more specific.
As for Selly Abequa? I leave her to Your mercy, for I have none for her.
“We should have asked the great-granddaughter about Selly’s mental health history, but we were too busy trying to breathe.” Grady sighed, her shoulder loosening beneath Elena’s fingers. “Maggie seems pretty hostile. I’m not sure how rock solid any of the Abequas are. The whole clan creeped me out a bit.”
“I’m with you on that.” Becca huddled against Jo in the back seat. The powerful heater blew welcome warmth over Elena, and the windows begin to steam.
Pat flicked on a switch to defrost them, then studied Jo in her mirror, making sure she was all right. Elena remembered Pat’s frightening stance before the Abequas, almost daring them to come through her to get to Jo. She realized there was love between them. And Elena was filled with relief that this warrior woman would protect Jo from her heart, not only out of duty. She was afraid Jo might need protection, badly.
Sweet Mother, here is your Elena riding in this expensive car with all these graduate degrees. Both Grady and Jo have the title of doctor. Becca’s degree is probably very advanced too. She has had many years of college. I’m smart, but I have community college and a nursing certificate, that’s it.
Sometimes I’m too proud of the knowledge I’ve earned in my work with You, Diosa. I know this. Help me listen to these more educated minds. Don’t let me shut out any real solutions Grady and Pat and Jo and Becca might have for us. But You and I know they are not on the right track yet.
And none of them, not even Grady, has asked me for my opinion.
“What is the Windigo supposed to look like, Grady?” Becca asked.
“Well, let’s see. I found some images on the Net, but I was surprised there weren’t more of them. A few consistencies stood out.”
Elena closed her eyes and pictured their enemy as Grady’s rich voice painted it for them.
“The Windigo is huge, always portrayed as a towering creature, three stories high. It’s animalistic, more beast than human, often featuring bony antlers. But it’s almost spider-like, so thin it’s all but skeletal, with sharp, grasping talons. And all the stories mention its howling, like a fierce wind. Basically, the Windigo is death by starvation, made visible.”
“I don’t understand.” Becca lay one hand on the headrest of Grady’s seat. “Is this thing supposed to be a mutant animal, then? Something like our Bigfoot? Or is it a kind of demon? Selly Abequa said the children of her line had been possessed by the Windigo—as in demonic possession?”
“She said their hearts were frozen by the Windigo,” Pat corrected her, and she was right. Elena remembered Selly’s words very well, and Grady met her eyes.
She shared Becca’s wish to know the nature of this beast better. Ay, Madre, are the witches and malevolent spirits of my desert valley not enough to entertain You? Must You ask me to cope with the strange ghostly evils of a Native tribe whose roots are way up north? I know nothing about their ways. I’ve never been north of Hatch.
“The Chippewa have only called the Windigo a spirit. The Spirit of the Lonely Places,” Grady said, and Elena remembered Grady always listened to her.
“But you said last night that this isn’t a spirit in the way we usually refer to one,” Becca said. “As in, the surviving energy of a human being who’s passed on?”
“Right, the Windigo was never a living creature. But from the oral history, I believe it was a kind of malignant spiritual energy,” Grady said. “It was a monster generated by the mass agony of a dying village. When starvation hit isolated tribes in winter blizzards, the suffering must have been unimaginable. There was literally nothing to eat. The Windigo was created in the minds, and around the story fires, of a desperate people who faced the very real possibility of cannibalism.”
“So the Windigo was the product of a kind of mass hysteria.” Becca looked thoughtful. “But there was a rationale to this hysteria. The legend kept the tribe from breaking a strict taboo.”
“Or it gave them a rationale for breaking it.” Jo was watching the scenery pass out the window, and her tone was bland. “You can’t really be blamed for eating your cousin if you were possessed by a huge monster with grasping talons that forced you to do it.”
Elena closed her eyes again. The blood of the cannibal Swift Runner’s six murdered children cries out to me, my Goddess. I don’t entirely understand what happened to Jo this morning, or what she is now. But I hope You find a way to explain this to me soon. The sky closes over us.
A storm is coming.
*
The day certainly began oddly, but Becca would call no day that ended with a soak in a hot tub a bad day.
She had survived the deaths of her parents and an adolescent fling with alcoholism, and she had eaten Jo’s cooking. Becca knew she was made of tough stuff. She wasn’t going to let a tragic old woman and her own obstinate lifemate distract her from the pleasure of this glorious physical indulgence.
“I’m a noodle now. I’m noodlic? It happened just since dinner.” Grady’s head was resting against the padded lip of the tub, her eyes closed. The planes of her face seemed more chiseled without her glasses. “This even beats the Gila Hot Springs, Elena.”
“No argument from Elena.” Elena reclined across the tub from Becca, her dark hair a floating cloud around her face. She had been quiet since supper.
Jo had been quiet too, and she hadn’t joined them out here for this nocturnal soak. Becca craned her neck, but she couldn’t see Jo through the large front windows of the brightly lit cabin. She must still be by her console of speakers, dissecting the recording of their disturbing interview with Selly Abequa. They had hardly been able to coax her away to eat, but at least she had inhaled the excellent dinner Pat prepared for them, making up for her earlier scant meals.
Pat emerged from the house and slid the glass doors shut behind her. Becca had insisted she allow them to share the after-dinner cleanup, but Pat seemed programmed to make herself useful in Jo’s luxurious mini-mansion. She had probably been in there remodeling the kitchen while they lolled in this blissful tub.
“And here I had you pegged as an intelligent woman,” Becca called to Pat. “Anyone who turns down a soak in this thing, after the day we’ve had, has the mind of a mollusk.”
Pat was expressionless as she tossed a white cloth over her shoulder. “It is not the way of my people, Becca,” she said quietly, “to have sex with a bunch of white girls in a hot tub, unless we are well paid for it.”
Grady sputtered on the water and laughed. She slapped the side of her hand across the surface and doused Pat with a satisfying splash. Pat stepped back, grinning, and Becca was delighted. This was the first time she’d heard Pat crack a joke, and that rakish grin transformed her briefly back into a friendly, handsome rogue of a Lone Ranger.
“Thanks, but I need to check the generator out back, in case we need it after the storm hits. Then I’ll want to turn in.” Pat bobbed her head. “I’ll wish you guys a good night.”
“Sleep well, mi amiga.” Elena watched Pat saunter out of their circle of light toward the darkness of the back lot, as if she shared Becca’s wistfulness at seeing her go. There was something forlorn in Pat, some note of sadness that Becca was only beginning to sense.
“Elena, did you forget to take your cell out of your pocket before you got in?” Grady sounded hopeful.
Elena craned her neck toward the slatted shelf adjoining the tub, the cell phone resting on it. “Sorry, no such luck.”
At least Elena’s mother was leaving them in peace tonight. Becca just wished Jo was here to share the quiet, which was broken only by the sweet gurgling of hot water sluicing around their semi-submerged bodies. Their semi-clothed bodies. Becca chuckled into the bubbles at her chin. What other three lesbians in the continental U.S. would partake of a dip in a top-of-the-line hot tub in T-shirts and shorts? Any three married lesbians, she decided.
“Maybe this snowfall will be really impressive.” Grady’s attractive features were illuminated by the recessed lights in the sides of the tub. “Maybe it’ll dump so hard and fast we won’t be able to get out of this thing until roughly April.”
“Jo can cook eggs Benedict every morning, and bring them out to us on a snowshoe.” Becca looked at Elena with feigned dread, but Elena’s answering smile was tepid. Becca wondered if she was worried about the blizzard coming tonight, which did threaten to be formidable. The solid cloudbank reflected only the faint glimmering of the field of snow, lending an eerie silver sheen to the night. At least the winds seemed to have abated, which suited Becca right down to her pruney toes. She winked reassurance at Elena.
“Ay. Now, of course, I can think of nothing but my mother.” Elena sighed and rolled over in the water, then pushed herself to her feet. “I’d best call her before it gets too late there, Grady. I said I would.”
“Well, if you gotta.” Grady rose with muted splashing, and gallantly took Elena’s hand to help her over the edge of the tub. “Give Inez my best. And put on that robe, please.”
“Si, Mamácita, I would surely have forgotten my robe up here in the Arctic.” Elena’s tone was teasing as she slid her arms into one of several lush terrycloth robes they had draped next to the tub. “Would you sit down before you freeze to death? I’ll be right back.”
Grady lowered herself into the steaming water. Becca could see her clearly, her appreciative longing as she watched Elena walk up the stone steps to the cabin. Grady’s thin T-shirt clung to her neat breasts, and for a moment, Becca could see her nipples just as clearly as her face. She averted her gaze.
Jo looked at Becca with that same longing often, but only when they were alone. She would never reveal such emotion in the presence of others, even their friends.
Their lovemaking the night before had been thin and unsatisfying. They had both been shaken by that terrible recording of the wind. Becca’s preferred remedy for this angst would have been to lie quietly curled together beneath the plush comforter. Jo had opted for quick sex and then hours of brooding aloud about the Abequas.
She had serviced Becca well, of course, before the brooding. For a scientist painfully impaired by social awkwardness, Jo was quite an adept lover. She had made a thorough and skillful study of Becca’s body—the kinds of touch that aroused her, the best use of breath and lips and tongue. And lordy, had that research paid off, even last night. But orgasm had not been what Becca needed last night. She’d wanted comfort, emotional connection, not fireworks.
The scenic glories of this mountain retreat aside, she wouldn’t bet on that connection improving much this weekend. If Jo was distracted the night before, now she was focused like a laser on this macabre project.
Becca decided to look at Grady again, because avoiding looking her way so as not to see her nipples was starting to feel sixth grade. Grady’s face was half-submerged in the rushing water, only her dark-lashed eyes peering above the surface. She was watching the surrounding trees with an owlish intensity. She caught Becca’s look, snickered into the water, and sat up.
“Sorry. We just can’t let this forest go unwatched for long. Not at night. The Windigo always hid in the forest, and it always attacked at night.”
“Well, look who turned out to be as mean as a junkyard rat.” Becca frowned. “Don’t you go invoking that creature out here. Not with me floating boob-deep in a hot tub and unable to run.”
“It skulked among the trees.” Grady waggled her eyebrows. “It blew down on them through the rattling branches on the gales of the—”
Becca splashed Grady full in the face, and they both snorted laughter. In fact, Grady almost giggled, and she did not seem to be a woman who giggled, so Becca knew they were both literally laughing in the dark. If the Windigo amused them, it wouldn’t be able to eat them. Becca loved this logic.
“Elena only picked at Pat’s delectable chicken stir-fry tonight.” Becca stretched her arms along the lip of the tub. “Just when I thought I’d met a woman who shared my good instincts for fine food. You think she’s all right?”
“Not sure. There’s something off with her.” A shadow dimmed Grady’s face. “This hasn’t turned out to be the peaceful vacation I promised Elena. But it’s had its good points.” She smiled again. “She’s enjoying getting to know you guys. I am too. And that was the best chicken stir-fry ever to hit a plate.”
“Right? Thank God Pat can cook. At least we enjoyed the few pieces we were able to wrest away from Jo.” Becca tuned her tone to casual. “Elena told me this morning that she’s worried about her. She said Jo might need my help this weekend. Just a feeling she had. And this was before the whole Jo fainting in the snow thing.”
“Well.” Grady’s expression was somber, disconcertingly so. “Elena’s feelings skew toward being right, most of the time. Not always. But if she’s worried about Jo, I think we should listen to that. Let’s keep an eye on her.”
Elena had offered similar support on their morning walk. Becca allowed herself another moment of simple relief that hers were not the only eyeballs looking out for Joanne Call, for once. She felt a fleeting regret, probably not for the last time, that Grady and Elena lived so far away. She would miss them both.
Grady stretched luxuriously in the roiling water, rested her head against the padded wood, and closed her eyes. Becca stared openly at her long, languid form, blurred by bubbles, her bare, muscled arms and shoulders, her graceful, strong legs. Becca felt a distinct and pleasant subterranean stirring in her sex.
And she wasn’t looking at Jo.
*
At least she had made Becca happy last night. Jo rubbed her burning eyes and clicked back to the key section of the recording. She might be neglecting Becca right now, but last night in bed she had made very sure to meet all her needs.
Besides, she was out there lounging comfortably in a hot tub, enjoying Grady Wrenn’s company. She could hardly complain of being too put-upon.
Jo heard an unwelcome murmuring and turned, annoyed at the interruption. Elena was passing through the living room, her ever-present cell pressed to her ear. She met Jo’s gaze and smiled. Then her smile faded. She whispered into her cell and closed it.
“You’re still troubled by Selly Abequa’s voice, Jo?”
“I’m hardly troubled by it.” Jo checked the console’s settings, hoping Elena would move on. “I just can’t figure out why she suddenly becomes audible. It would be nice if your girlfriend was in here working on this with me, but she’s otherwise engaged.”
Jo sent the sounds of the interview coursing through the room again. She had tuned the filters so that abysmal, howling wind wasn’t so harrowing.
Just as in Selly Abequa’s
initial talk with Pat, that wind had sounded whenever she answered Grady’s questions. Except at the point the howling suddenly stopped, and Selly’s voice was heard quite clearly.
“—city college people. Unless you have money to pay us for this talk, you should go away. I’ve told our story enough. I’m sick and I’m old and I have no more fucking patience for—”
Jo snapped the recording off impatiently before Elena’s rude voice could be heard again, interrupting the old woman.
“Yes, I remember that moment in our talk this morning.”
Jo sighed. She had all but forgotten Elena was there. She had stepped down into the living room and was coming closer, looking at Jo in an odd way. And Becca thought she had to remind Jo all the time about staring at people.
“Are you hungry, Jo?”
Jo was certain the mild growling in her gut had not been all that loud, so she didn’t understand why Elena asked. She had witnessed Jo consume more than her fair share of their evening meal, so she had to know she couldn’t possibly be hungry. Perhaps Elena was just being snide about being shorted on the chicken. Jo opted not to answer her, but she simply wouldn’t go away.
“Do you remember what happened this morning, Jo, just before we hear the old woman’s voice at last?”
“Yes, I remember the interview, Elena. I was there.” Jo was irritated at whatever spiritual implications Elena was groping toward, whatever superstitious interpretation she wanted to affix to the sudden emergence of Abequa’s voice. “Look, it might be best if we left this study to the empirical analysis of data. That means measurements we can track and observe, look at. It’s not that I don’t value your background in folk myths, or whatever, but as I’ve said, Grady can offer any cultural—”
“Listen to me.” Elena was suddenly standing very close. She reached up and took Jo’s chin in her fingers, and her grip was not gentle. In Jo’s brief acquaintance with Elena, her eyes had always been friendly and mild. They were neither now. “You have no idea who you’re speaking to, Dr. Mujer. Little Elenita is on to you. I would remember that, before you toss out my background in folk myths like it was trash. I might be your best hope, Joanne. I’ve been places you will never see, and maybe you should be grateful for this.”
Windigo Thrall Page 7