Which makes me wonder …
Let’s say the albino is Maicoh and my father hired him to find the pot. By the time he arrived, I already had the pot. The albino should have gracefully bowed out and returned to his witch hunting, or whatever else he did with his time.
But he didn’t.
That is a puzzle I need to figure out. Perhaps he imagines he will get the reward anyway? After all, he confirmed that the pot inside the Spirit bag is Nightshade’s soul pot. So he probably does deserve some small token for identifying it. I have no objection to that. But that’s all he deserves. On the other hand, I’ve heard the rumors that only Maicoh can open the pot.
As I watch the albino, however, I doubt he cares about a reward at all. No, it’s becoming apparent to me that he is here to guard the old shaman on our journey to Flowing Waters Town.
And that’s curious.
Perhaps tomorrow I’ll order my warriors to kill the old man just to see what the albino does. If he’s only here about the reward he ought to turn his back and allow it to happen. The old man is of no consequence. But if he leaps to defend Tocho, I’ll know for sure …
A ragged shriek rings out.
I scramble to my feet with my chest heaving. “What’s wrong?”
Wasp Moth screams, “Look at it! Look at it!”
Iron Dog and Weevil rush into camp with their war clubs clutched in tight fists, prepared to brain the threat, whatever it is.
Iron Dog shouts, “What the matter? Why did you shriek like that?”
Wasp Moth crabs across the ground on all fours, gets to his feet, and charges out into the darkness, where he stands quaking like a leaf in a gale. “Didn’t you see it? I woke when it crawled up on my chest, right over my heart!”
“What are you talking about?” Iron Dog yells.
“Oh no…” Weevil moans and extends a shaking arm to point. “The bag. Look at it! It’s lying right there where Wasp Moth was sleeping! It must have slithered across the ground—”
“You morons!” I shout at the top of my voice, blinking wide-eyed at the bag. Moments ago, it was right beside me. How did it … “Somebody picked it up and carried it over there.”
I whirl around to look at Maicoh and Tocho. The men sit side-by-side with their arms around their knees, watching events play out like the directors of a sacred Dance.
“Which one of you did it?”
The albino shakes his head. “I did not.”
“Then the old man did it!”
Tocho mildly suggests, “Perhaps the Spirit bundle has abandoned you as its new Keeper, and bestowed the privilege upon Wasp Moth.”
A howl rises from the darkness, and I glimpse my war chief pounding away across the desert.
Throwing up both hands, I scream, “Dear gods! I’m surrounded by dimwits. Can’t you see you’re being played for fools? This is all trickery!”
Weevil’s eyes, fixed on the bag, look like moonlit platters. “It’s alive. I just saw it move! Didn’t you see it?”
Tocho says, “I saw it.”
Iron Dog falls into a warrior’s crouch and creeps across the dirt on the balls of his feet, his club up, ready to bash the pot inside to dust. After several endless heartbeats, Iron Dog says, “It is not moving. Every time a cloud passes in front of the moon, the light on the bag flutters. That’s all it is.”
“Are you sure?” Weevil asks.
“Yes, I’m sure. Come over here and look at it.”
Weevil has his knees locked together, but he manages to mince across the camp and grab onto Iron Dog’s muscular forearm to support himself while he bends low to examine the old bag.
“See?” Iron Dog shakes his club at it. “Nothing. The Blessed daughter is right. We’re being played for fools.”
Tocho whispers, “It has arms.”
Weevil and Iron Dog almost knock each other over as they stumble backward with sharp cries, raising their war clubs high over their heads in preparation to kill it.
“Oh,” Tocho says in a small, apologetic voice. “Maybe it was just a cloud shadow.”
Twenty-two
Tsilu
“Tsilu? I’m sorry to wake you. Crane wants to be on the trail soon.”
At the touch of a light hand on my shoulder, I ask, “Is it so late?”
“No, it’s still early, we just need to be on our way,” Kwinsi says.
In the chill of the autumn morning, the smell of frying bread is almost painful. I sit up and comb my hair out of my eyes. Kwinsi leans over me, smiling. The vista behind him is glorious. As cloud shadows flow up and down over the buttes and hills, yellow flares of sunlight strobe the canyon, turning the landscape into a red, yellow, and deep gray mosaic.
“Breakfast is almost ready.”
“Forgive me for sleeping so long. I should have been up hands of time ago to help with breakfast.”
Rising to my feet, I dust off my cape and follow Kwinsi to the fire where Crane sits cross-legged with a cup of tea in his hands. The soft breeze flutters the black hood around his face.
“Pleasant morning to you,” Crane greets me.
“Thank you, elder, and to you, also.” I kneel to Crane’s right. “Forgive me for sleeping so long.”
“It made me happy to see you sleeping. We have long days ahead of us.”
The sweet earthy fragrance tells me the fry bread is made from ground ricegrass seeds. The dough cooks on a ceramic plate at the edge of the fire. Crane must have added ash from burned saltbush to the dough, because the bread has risen slightly. The edges have just started to brown.
“Where did we get the ingredients for bread?”
A thin smile touches Crane’s lips. “I carry small bags of flour in my pack, so that all I have to do is add water to make the dough. Unfortunately, this is my last bag.”
Kwinsi crouches across the fire. “Crane also made dried yucca blossom tea. Want some?”
“Yes, Kwinsi, thank you.”
He reaches for one of the cups resting beside the fire, dips it into the gray pot, then hands it to me. “It’s hot. Be careful.”
The sweet flavor of yucca blossoms coats my mouth as I take a sip. “That’s good. Thank you, elder.”
Crane nods his head. All his gestures are so remote and distant, I wonder if he long ago decided that expressing emotion, any emotion, reveals too much. His sunken eyes appear dark within the frame of his black hood.
“I dreamed of home all night,” I say. “We were sitting around the plaza fire eating antelope steaks with people we love.”
“I dreamed of home, too,” Kwinsi says in a faint tormented voice. “But we must remember that our families wouldn’t want us to dwell upon the past. We—”
“Just be glad you two are alive,” Crane says. “If Leather Hand’s warriors had not destroyed your village, you would be dead along with all your loved ones.” He uses a stick to flip over the fry bread.
“How can you say that?” I ask in shock. “We were fine before—”
“Do you remember the doll the dead priestess carried to Chief Seff? The personal gift from the Blessed Sun?” Crane gives me one of his cold looks.
“Yes. It scared me.”
“They’re extremely fragile. Sooner or later, Seff or someone else would have accidentally knocked it over. When it broke open, corn or beans, or other seeds, would have spilled out, along with strips of dirty rags. Evil Spirits live in the rags. Whoever touches them is infested, and the evil moves through the village like lightning. Within a matter of days, everyone is sick. Death generally follows quickly, unless it’s the coughing sickness, and that can take many summers to kill.”
“But why would the Blessed Sun wish to kill our families? We are nothing to him. OwlClaw Village has never been a threat to anyone.”
Crane uses his spoon to shove the fry bread to a hotter spot on the platter. “It’s easy to believe in his innocence,” he says after a moment. “I did, myself, if for no other reason than he seems too powerful to stoop to such petty ente
rtainments. But this is about survival.”
“What do you mean?”
Crane fills our bowls with bread. As he hands out the bowls, first to me, then to Kwinsi, he says, “The great witch knows his kingdom is about to collapse. By wiping out regional villages, he’s creating space and freeing up resources, so that the remaining First People will have enough room to run when the time comes.”
Around a mouthful of delicious fry bread, I say, “Will the First People survive?”
Crane’s narrow face and silver temples faintly flicker orange in the flames. “They are not as adaptable as your people, Granddaughter. I suspect they will dance on the threshold of death for many summers before they cross over.”
Kwinsi, who has been uncharacteristically silent through the entire dreadful discussion, whispers, “Will they learn to fly?”
“Who?”
“The survivors? Will they learn to fly?”
Crane gives him a confused look. “That’s a strange question. Why would you ask that?”
“When the breath-heart soul leaves the body at death, it transforms into a cloud and learns to fly. Souls that are afraid to fly remain on the earth as homeless ghosts, forever wandering and alone. I am hoping they learn to fly.”
Crane stares at Kwinsi for a few moments, then blinks his suddenly tear-filled eyes and looks away. “They will learn to fly. I’m sure of it.”
Despite the recent rain, a huge cloud of dust whirls and careens across the sandy desert in the distance.
Crane says softly, “We should be going. If we leave now, we will reach WhiteBark Village by nightfall. There’s a man who lives in a cave a short distance away I need to see.”
“Who?”
“An old enemy. He knows more about the Blessed Sun than anyone else alive.”
“What do we need to know, elder?” I ask.
Crane reaches for his pack, slips it over his left shoulder. Oddly, he turns toward Kwinsi, as though Kwinsi asked the question, not me. “We need to know how to kill his soul.”
Kwinsi says, “His soul? I don’t understand.”
“Don’t you?” When Crane bows his head and smiles, his hood falls over his face. “That’s good. You’ll live longer.”
Twenty-three
Blue Dove
Late afternoon sunlight streams across the narrow valley, warming the pines and junipers until the air is saturated with their tangy fragrance. That’s the only thing pleasant about this dismal stretch of trail. The rich red sandstone has retreated into distant buttes and mesas, replaced by crumbling gray-blue shale uplifts and angled cliffs of gray limestone. It’s as though all the blood in the world has leached out, leaving Mother Earth’s dry bones exposed to the autumn winds. Scraggly bunch grasses form tan tufts amid the broken layers of rock. All in all, depressing country.
I trudge up the trail behind the tall muscular form of Wasp Moth. Tocho’s feet shuffle two paces behind me, then the light catlike tread of the albino, followed by the heavy steps of Iron Dog and Weevil.
When the breeze shifts, I catch a foul scent coming from the east, as though there’s a rotting carcass just up ahead.
We veered away from the river to take this deserted cutoff, which means we’re short on water. I run my tongue over my chapped lips. I finished off my canteen at noon, then drank most of Wasp Moth’s water, but I’m still thirsty. Sighing, I study the massive chunks of limestone that border this valley. This time of day, the blocky terraces cast a thousand shadows. I keep expecting to see enemy warriors step out at any instant—or even Straight Path warriors, for surely the war party that attacked OwlClaw Village must have taken this same trail home.
“Wasp Moth?” I call. “Who led the attack on OwlClaw Village?”
“Deputy Dull Nose, Blessed daughter. Why?” he answers as he climbs the trail at the base of the cliffs.
“Would he and his war party have taken this same cutoff to get home? We haven’t crossed their tracks.”
“Your father ordered Dull Nose to stop at HillCrest Village to collect the tribute they owe. They harvested their fields one moon ago, but they’ve sent nothing to Flowing Waters Town. I imagine Dull Nose took the main road.”
The scent of rot briefly fills the wind again.
I hitch up my skirt and walk wide around a patch of jumping cactus. At the slightest brush, the cactus thorns leap out and cover a person like stinging fuzz. “I’m dying of thirst. How far to WhiteBark Village?”
“Almost there.”
“Is that what that foul odor is? The village?”
Without missing a step, Wasp Moth says, “Blessed daughter, your father dispatched Priest Pod to this village.”
“Yes. To ask if he could build a kiva. So?”
Wasp Moth turns to give me a curious look. “Coming upon a village that reeks like this is a familiar thing for your White Moccasins. I suspect Pod carried a witched doll with him.”
“Oh, I see. Well, in that case, the evil Spirits have probably killed them by now, and we can take as much water as we want.”
When the trail curves, I glimpse the faces of the men who walk behind me. The warriors appear unconcerned about my conversation with Wasp Moth, but Tocho has tears in his eyes, and the albino … he wears an expression of such hatred I avert my gaze.
Not that I care. This kind of witchery is Father’s specialty. This is how he bends villages to his will. Send a plague to wipe out every last person in one village, and the neighboring village becomes instantly accommodating. It’s effective, but crude and time-consuming. Depending upon the kind of plague, it can take moons to have the desired effect. If I were in charge, I’d simply send in my army. Who needs witchery when warriors with war clubs can do the same job in a single night?
When we reach the outskirts of the village, I have to drape my sleeve over my nose to filter the stench.
Wasp Moth stops and everyone gathers around him to squint at the twenty or so pithouses strung along the base of the limestone cliff. Coughs and moans ride the wind. At the far southern edge of the village, a big pile of what looks like stacked bodies is covered with squawking and flapping ravens. As the birds feast, they rip the clothing, leaving shreds hanging down like a bizarre fringe at the edges of the pile.
“Are those—”
“The villagers must be too sick to wash the bodies and properly Sing their loved ones to the Land of the Dead. Apparently, they only have enough strength to drag the corpses away from the houses.”
“It’s their own fault,” I say. “If they’d cooperated with Pod this plague would not have been necessary.”
It startles me when four people stumble across the plaza. Dressed in filthy rags and barely able to stand, they resemble walking skeletons. “They’re not coming out to greet us, are they?”
“They don’t even know we’re here,” Wasp Moth replies.
Iron Dog strides forward to stand beside Wasp Moth. “I recommend that we do not enter this village. Evil Spirits are still flying about. We don’t wish to give them a chance at us.”
“But we need water,” I say. “There’s a spring here. We should send Weevil in with our canteens. He can fill them and run right back. That way no one else has to chance the evil Spirits.”
Weevil gives Wasp Moth a panicked glance.
Wasp Moth shakes his head. “What if he carries several evil Spirits back on his shoulders? When they’ve sucked him dry, they’ll sink their teeth into us.”
I press my sleeve more tightly over my nose. “You’re probably right.”
Tocho shuffles forward with the albino close beside him.
“Perhaps we can have Weevil fill the canteens and toss them out to us?” Tocho helpfully suggests. “That way we’ll have water, and we can just leave him behind without worrying—”
“What?” Weevil cries.
“Just for a half-moon or so,” Tocho clarifies. “If you’re still alive, you can catch up with us.”
“I’m not going in there!”
Wasp
Moth says, “Blessed daughter, we cannot risk sending Weevil in. The evil could coat his hands and latch onto the canteens when he fills them. As soon as he tosses them out, and we pick them up, we’ll be fly-blown.”
Iron Dog nods. “Maggot food in a matter of days.”
I glance back and forth between the men. The black wings tattooed across their cheeks wiggle like insects frying on hot rocks.
“Oh, all right, if you think that’s best.”
“Besides, there’s another spring just up ahead. It’s called ‘the place-where-the-water-comes-down.’” Wasp Moth gestures to the trail. “We should camp there tonight, fill our canteens, and get a good night’s rest.”
“Very well.”
Wasp Moth angles away from WhiteBark Village, taking the trail that cuts through the thick sagebrush in the bottom of the valley.
I slow down to allow Iron Dog and Tocho to pass me, because I want to walk beside the albino.
When he falls into pace at my side, I say, “You were surprised.”
“By what?”
His blue hood keeps his skin in constant shadow, but his beautiful translucent face has flushed pink.
“You didn’t know about the dolls.”
He is silent for a time, then he says, “Of course I did. But I finally realized that the gifts are only bestowed upon chiefs who refuse to build kivas.”
“Strange, isn’t it? Other nations haven’t made that connection yet.” Which I’ve always found particularly stupid.
Down here away from the cliffs, the afternoon breeze keeps the straw-colored grass in motion. He has to grasp his hood to keep it from being blown back. His long white fingers have an eerie shine in the sunlight.
“They will figure it out eventually.”
“Why would that concern me?”
He stops and regards me in perfect stillness.
Patient. That’s what that expression is. The patient, plucked-blossom moment of a man whose life is draining away, and he knows it’s too late to stop it. All he can do is die.
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