Wings of Change

by Lyn Worthen

  The unnatural darkness faded. As my vision returned I saw Hwillak, dressed in filthy rags that had once been his white robes, scramble over a hill to the north.

  The llamas milled, as confused as I. I hadn’t fainted, but I wasn’t up to challenging the mad priest. I might get my flute back. But to play it again, I’d have to keep Hwillak from interfering, and I had no idea how to do that.

  How long did my parents expect me to wait for their arrival? We’d had no time to discuss it. I hoped one night was enough. No more flames rose in the west. Perhaps nothing remained to burn. By the time my head stopped swimming, dawn had arrived. I rose and stumbled toward the city.

  # # #

  Amaru’s song echoes back to her across the heavens. The red spot flashes and sparks. The forces tying her to the higher world loosen. But the song dies and she is held fast once again.

  The red blotch on her planet remains, throbbing like a wound. She feels the pain as if it’s her own. She sends her name out: Amaru.

  World Mother’s children may hear it and call for her. She only hopes their voices have the power of summoning.

  # # #

  Too tired to climb, I walked along ravine bottoms. Either I was moving slower than I wanted or confusion from my injury made me take a wrong turn. If I was nearer the city, I couldn’t sense it.

  I struggled up a hill and scanned the landscape. Mountains lined the eastern horizon, so Llaxta, which was near the coast, should be directly opposite. I pivoted and my heart sank. Smoke still rose in the west.

  I continued to turn and survey the landscape. To the north, a hunched figure in white rags ran away. Hwillak.

  I ignored my aching head and went after him. Soon Izhi overtook me and loped after the priest. The llamas knew what I wanted. Good thing they were so fast; I only had to keep the herd in sight.

  From a rocky hilltop, I spotted Hwillak in a narrow valley, surrounded by llamas. I had time to catch up. Hwillak didn’t seem to realize they wouldn’t hurt him. Raised by my highland-bred father, I had no fear of llamas. Izhi might chase off a wild dog, but we had trained her to respect humans. I threaded my way through the herd and patted her. Hwillak glared through wild, tangled gray hair, looking everywhere but at me.

  “You’re Hwillak,” I said. “Aren’t you?”

  A faint spark lit Hwillak’s eyes before he looked away, refusing to meet my gaze. Finally: “I was.”

  As a priest, he could tell me what the Song of Mayu meant. If anyone knew the power of the true note, he did. I held out a beseeching hand. “I need your help.”

  “No.” Hwillak batted away my outstretched hand. He might have run, but llamas surrounded us.

  I grabbed his sleeve. “You must! There’s no one else.”

  The old priest pulled away, not caring that my grasp tore his tattered robe. He backhanded me, bruising my cheek and bringing on fresh pain. Then, forgetting his fear of the llamas, he turned and ran. The herd didn’t bother him, but the uneven ground tripped him. He righted himself and plunged ahead.

  “The stars sing to me!” I yelled.

  He stopped but didn’t turn. “What do they sing?”

  “Almost… a word.” I searched my memories. I’d been so close to understanding. “It started with something like… Amm.”

  The surrounding air vibrated. A spark of the song’s comfort filled me. What might happen if I could remember and speak the word that wanted to form itself?

  “Stop!” Hwillak turned, his face ashen. “Don’t say it.”

  I stepped back. “Is it a word of power?”

  “I don’t… I can’t…”

  Knowledge of the song’s power had to still lurk somewhere in Hwillak’s damaged mind. I might not get a helpful answer, but I still wanted to reach him. “Why would the stars speak, if it’s too dangerous to hear?”

  “I don’t know!” Hwillak backed away. “You must forget.”

  “I can’t even remember it. I’ve been trying.”

  “No! Put it from your mind.” The priest clutched a bag that hung on a cord from his neck and uttered unintelligible syllables.

  The air vibrated. A shimmering filled the space, and the world blurred. All sound ceased. My earlier dizziness returned and I collapsed to the ground.

  After many gasping breaths, I once again heard the wind’s sigh, a distant bird, and the shuffling of llamas.

  I opened my mouth to ask Hwillak what he had done, but no words came.

  “Now you can’t say it.” He backed away, hands out in a comforting motion. “The Lady must be obeyed.”

  The Lady? She was wrong about everything!I tried to scream at him.

  Hwillak noticed the soundless working of my mouth. His eyes widened. “My magic is broken. I’m sorry. I only meant…”

  He ran off once again, vanishing over the next hill. I tried to call him, but could make no sound.

  # # #

  As Amaru waits for the summons, she recalls her earthly form. She had once been glorious – her long, sinuous coils had gleamed golden in the sun. Her feathered wings shaded from red to orange to gold to green to blue to purple. She will need this form when she returns.

  A shriek disrupts her reverie. She looks once more to her planet. The throbbing red spot is dull, and this alarms her even more than its first appearance. What if whoever needs her becomes too weak to complete the summoning?

  # # #

  I spent the rest of the day leading the herd towards Llaxta, hoping the riots had ended.

  Dusk loomed. I approached the city from the north, counting on the hills that surrounded the amphitheater to provide cover. I left the llamas in a grassy hollow and crept forward to peek over the crest of a hill.

  A condor circled high overhead. The adobe atop the lesser mound, which used to be the Lady’s palace, had gone cold. The mob had finished burning whatever it once contained.

  Smoke rose from the adobe sanctuary that topped the greater temple mound where priests and priestesses used to perform private rites. Its blackened, crumbling exterior revealed that the dying fire within hadn’t been part of any holy ritual.

  The amphitheater spread in a circular hollow below the greater temple mound. Wide steps dug into the surrounding hills once provided seating for public ceremonies and athletic contests. In the gray light, the amphitheater stood deserted, but for scavenging dogs who tore at lifeless human forms.

  My parents might be there.

  I crested the hill, running at the beasts to frighten them off. The dogs scattered, but not because I threatened them. As I stumbled down the steps, a dozen children – none older than I – came whooping into the amphitheater. They carried spears and staves even though only a few were old enough to have been trained in their use. They descended on the bodies strewn on the ground. Their leader, a strutting youth about my age, directed them to bring him food or any other valuables they found.

  “I’ll know if you don’t,” he warned.

  I might have retreated, but I couldn’t leave my parents to these human condors. Not that I had much of a choice. One young girl pointed at me.

  They dragged me to their leader. I didn’t resist, even as they pelted me with questions. My eyes strayed repeatedly to each body we passed.

  The leader was examining a body. The victim’s gray-streaked braid caught my eye. I wrenched myself away from my protesting captors and dropped to my knees. Mother’s smashed face was unrecognizable beneath a mask of dried blood, but I knew her dress. One of her arms reached toward another body.

  Not three paces away lay my father. I took his chilly hand in one of mine. In the other, I held my mother’s.

  The leader turned to me. “Your people?”

  I could say nothing. He took this to mean I was too overcome to speak.

  A younger boy gasped. “It’s Chaska!”

  I recognized him, even under the dirt and soot that covered him. Rimaq. His family had lived across the plaza.

  “You know her?” the leader demanded.

&n
bsp; “Her father was the flute player from the highlands. You know, the one who kept the llama herd. Her mother wove the finest cloth and made quipus,” Rimaq said.

  It was a quipu my mother had made and wore at her neck that the leader had been examining. Rimaq carefully removed the quipu and held it out. My hand reached, but I couldn’t make myself touch it. That would make my parents’ deaths real.

  Rimaq hesitated. When the leader made no further comment, Rimaq pressed the quipu into my hand and closed my fingers around it. I was too numb to resist. This arrangement of twine, stiff with my mother’s blood, kept an account of my family. Nineteen knots on the central strand signified each year of my parents’ marriage. Two knots on another strand told the number of years my brother, born and died before I knew him, had been in our family. Fifteen knots on another strand marked the years of my life.

  I couldn’t leave my parents for the condors or the dogs. I opened the sack my father had packed for me. Taking out the shoulder bone of a deer, I scraped a grave in the dirt floor of the amphitheater.

  The gang left me alone. Maybe my continuing silence confused them. Maybe the makeshift ritual I performed for my parents reminded them how civilized people behave in the face of death. I only knew I had one task to do and no idea of what to do afterward.

  # # #

  The red stain on Amaru’s planet throbs like a wound. She cannot leave it alone or look aside. The pain feels as if it’s her own, even this far away. She sends her name out again: Amaru.

  Call me, she sends. She only hopes their voice has the power to summon her.

  # # #

  Finally, I remembered the llamas. They were as likely as I to find water and food. I supposed they had no real need of me. But I needed them. They, and Mother’s quipu, were all that remained of my old life.

  Several of the children were familiar; I had seen them around the city. But none were my friends. Everyone I loved was dead. The smoky smell of the quiet, ruined city was too much to bear. I dragged leaden feet up the amphitheater steps and headed east.

  I succumbed to exhaustion at the edge of a pebble-covered plain. As I searched my sack for a blanket, footsteps shuffled behind me. I spun toward them, fearing it might be Hwillak.

  Rimaq and a few other children clustered at a slight distance. They came no closer, but they didn’t hide, either.

  I gestured – a go-away motion – but my command didn’t convince even me. I didn’t care if they obeyed. When I headed to the highlands in the morning, they’d lose interest and return to the city – the only home they’d ever known.

  Away from the haze that hung over Llaxta, the river of Mayu glowed. The nameless winged constellation loomed clearer than ever; its star eyes shone even brighter in the sky. The Song of Mayu echoed in my mind, and I yearned for my father. Again, I heard not Father’s habitually misplayed note but the right one – the one that had first drawn Hwillak to attack me.

  The mysterious syllables formed in my mind once again. I could not say them, but they were clear enough: Amaru.

  I choked on a mute, bitter laugh. Why now, when I could not speak the word of power, could I hear it so clearly?

  # # #

  The red spot on Earth fades to the pale pink of ash-covered embers – the light of a dying fire. The forces tying Amaru to her place in the heavens remain strong. She feeds them her anguish and they flare more brightly. They are burning too fast now, but she doesn’t care. If she cannot go home, they may as well burn out.

  # # #

  Even at dawn, with most stars disappeared from view, the winged constellation burned as brightly as it had in the night. It was as if someone as lonely as I reached across the heavens to seek a home.

  Only one living person might have known what this meant and what to do. But Hwillak the Wise had made my life worse. I must trust to my own wisdom now. I quieted. Thoughts churned in my mind.

  One conviction stood out: I wanted to honor the constellation, to tell the heavenly being I had seen it and received its message. Its shape was so familiar by now I could draw its picture with my eyes closed.

  I must make my tribute enormous if I wanted Amaru to see it. The nearby plain would serve to contain my work. Near its north, two shallow depressions suggested eyes. I marched to the craters and brushed away reddish pebbles, revealing the pale clay beneath. With my deer bone I removed more pebbles to better represent the constellation’s eyes.

  I paced a dozen long steps away and dug a shallow, curving trench that outlined the crown of the creature’s head. Pointed ears, like those of a fox, stuck up from the line at the top. Next I outlined a long, thin trench to show the slope down to the snout.

  A faint exclamation distracted me and I glanced toward the sound. Rimaq and his companions were watching. I scowled.

  Rimaq stepped forward, hands open, showing he meant no harm. “What are you making? Can we help?”

  I considered. The work would go faster if they helped, and they would be less likely to destroy what we made together.

  I cleared another patch of earth and scratched out what the finished picture should look like. A sinuous creature took shape. It had the body of a snake, a fox’s head, and great wings.

  I pointed to the eyes of this small model, then brought Rimaq to the full-sized eyes I had already formed. He grasped the idea and explained to the others. As I watched, children moved to the back of the ears, digging a trench to form the back of the head where it sloped toward the creature’s long neck and spine.

  The Song of Mayu filled my head. I showed my helpers where the line of the wings should start, where the serpent body should curve, and where it should coil. We grew absorbed in our work. I only realized we’d toiled through the heat of the day when every muscle in my body ached and my tunic was too soaked to dry the sweat from my face. The sun had deserted the sky, which took on the purple color of a heliotrope.

  An anguished howl split the air. Hwillak glared at our work from atop a hill. The priest gathered himself and stumbled down toward the plain.

  # # #

  The red spot on the Earth gains strength, glows and grows larger. It forms a shape Amaru knows. It is as if she gazes at the surface of a calm lake to see her own image. The display gives her strength, which she feeds to her stars. Once they burn out, she must either leave the upper world for World Mother’s domain or perish, but now she knows someone on Earth is trying to call her.

  # # #

  I ran at Hwillak. The other children looked confused, but Rimaq joined me without hesitation. Together we knocked Hwillak to the ground before he harmed our design. A few of the others helped pin the priest to the ground. My flute peeked out from the folds of Hwillak’s robe and I seized it. He had taken my voice, but at least I had my flute back.

  He struggled to snatch it from my grasp, but this only caused more children to pile on top of him.

  “Don’t play it!” he screamed.

  Defiantly, I brought the flute to my lips and started the Mayu. Hwillak thrashed and struggled under the blanket of children who restrained him. Lips white with spittle, he bellowed an incantation. I tried to cover his mouth, but his magic was instant. I froze.

  # # #

  Amaru’s stars suddenly chill, repelling the energy she has been feeding them. The red spot on the Earth flickers. Too many seconds elapse. She can no longer see this faint sign of life. Dear World Mother, let it not be too late. She shouts her own name with all the strength she possesses.

  The veil of heaven tears and she is set loose.

  # # #

  The sky lightened. Mist filled the air. Hwillak choked. His magic vanished and I could move again. I spun around, unsure where to look. Rimaq gasped and pointed east.

  A vivid rainbow arched across the hilltops. Its edges sparked with lightning. The sky beneath its arc burst open and a great creature emerged, its coils as long as a river and its multicolored, feathered wings as wide and glorious as the waves that broke on the coast.

  Hwillak bolted
upright and paled at the sight. Tears filled his eyes. Quaking, he fell to his knees and prostrated himself.

  I wanted to greet the beautiful winged serpent by name, but Hwillak had taken my voice.

  # # #

  There is air. Amaru pulls in a great draft and remembers. In this place, beings breathe and speak and eat and drink. She has missed the warmth of Earth and its creatures.

  Young ones below her point upward. Small children shelter behind larger ones, who stare, open-mouthed. Others smile. One even laughs as the beating of her wings blows damp tendrils of his hair back from his face. Amaru settles her attention on the oldest girl, really a young woman. This one has been touched by power. Some is her own, but another person’s fearful magic has taken the girl’s voice away. That, Amaru can return. She exhales over the girl, her breath a warm cloud.

  The girl gasps. “Amaru.” Tears spill down her cheeks, but her face is wide with smiles. “I’m Chaska. I’ve been trying to call you.”

  “You have succeeded, young one. Who are your friends?”

  Chaska tells her the name of a boy, Rimaq. “I’m sorry, I don’t know the other children’s names.”

  One by one, the children introduce themselves, and Amaru listens. An old man with them remains silent, quivering and prone beneath her.

  “And the old one?” Amaru prompts.

  “Hwillak.” Chaska spits the name and the other young ones give the man looks of loathing.

  “What evil has he done?” Amaru asks.

  “He took my voice,” says Chaska. “And he stole my flute, the one I used to play the Song of the Mayu. No matter how I tried to call you, he stopped me.”