by TM Simmons
Not bothering to dispute Gagewin's idea of Channing somehow being his doctor, Keoman answered, "I haven't talked to her since she started treating Walt." Walking to the kitchen door, he glanced into the living room. "Looks like Walt's regaining consciousness, though. And we need to decide what we're going to do."
Gagewin collapsed in one of the chairs at the kitchen table and buried his head in his hands. "There's no way we can follow her. You know that."
Radin placed a comforting hand on Gagewin's shoulder. "We have to try. What about a ceremony to see if we can discover where she went?"
Gagewin laughed harshly. "Our best Midé can't help us!" Then he looked up at Keoman. "I'm sorry. That was uncalled for. But I don't know what to do. Lark was our heart. Our joy."
"No apology needed," Keoman answered. "I'm just as disturbed as you about probably not being able to help."
"Probably?" Radin asked.
Keoman hesitated before he admitted, "Something led me to Nodinens' niece when she was dying in the snow. But I haven't felt anything since then."
"But you can try?" Gagewin asked hopefully.
"Of course," Keoman agreed. "Maybe with several of us working together, combining our abilities …."
"Maybe we would all support each other," Gagewin mused. "Make each other stronger."
"It would be best if you didn't join us," Keoman said quietly. "We leave ourselves and our concerns behind when we do a ceremony. You might not be able to do that, even for a spirit quest ceremony."
Gagewin angrily wiped a tear crawling down his cheek. "You're right. However, as Tribal Chairman, I'll decide whether or not to take part. If I don't, you'll call me as soon as you're finished."
At the kitchen doorway, Channing cleared her throat. Focused on Gagewin, she said, "Your son needs to go to the hospital for an x-ray, but he refuses. I understand why, so without that, the best thing will be to try to make sure he rests for at least a day. Watch his eyes and his actions. If he starts getting confused, you'll need to take him to the hospital immediately, despite his protests."
"There's a portable x-ray machine at your clinic," Gagewin informed her.
"I didn't know," Channing replied. "That should do, unless he gets worse. Then he might also need a CT scan."
"He'll want to stay here and try to help find his daughter," Keoman said.
"If he collapses, he'll do himself more harm," Channing warned.
"We understand," Gagewin assured her. "I'll keep him informed about what we're doing to find my granddaughter. That should help."
Channing faced Keoman. "I've been thinking about calling Grant now. Asking if he ever dealt with anything like Nenegean. But I don't have any cell reception."
"I have a satellite phone in my truck," Nodinens said as she stepped from behind Channing. "We can go out there and call, where we have some privacy to speak freely."
"Or you could bring it in here," Keoman pointed out.
"No, we will just take you three and the two of us." Without waiting for any further argument, Nodinens took Channing's hand and led her through the living room. When they got to the door, Walt sat up on the couch.
"Where are you going?"
"To my truck to make a phone call," Nodinens told him. "You can come with us. Keoman, you and his father go help him, in case he is still weak."
Keoman and Gagewin crossed the room as Walt stood, steadying the other man when he swayed. Supporting Walt, they left the house and walked down the driveway to where Nodinens had parked. She already had the engine running, exhaust smoke coming from the tailpipe.
There was plenty of room in the backseat for the other three men, and after Keoman helped Walt get in with Gagewin and Radin, he took the last vacant seat in front, beside Channing. Nodinens was behind the wheel, and the sound of the phone rang through the speakers as he pulled the truck door closed.
"Hello," a man answered. "Who is this?"
"Grant, it's me, Channing. Can you talk?"
"I'm at the apartment," Grant said. "Alone. Where are you?"
"In Minnesota," Channing explained. "There's something bad going on here, and you might be able to help."
For a few seconds, there was only silence on the other end of the connection. Then Grant asked, "Paranormal?"
"Yes. I have some others here with me, all members of the Ojibway tribe." Channing took a moment to introduce Nodinens and the men, then said, "I'm going to let Nodinens explain things, and any of the others who might have something to add can also speak up."
"I'm listening," Grant replied.
"Her name is Nenegean," Nodinens said.
"I'll be interrupting when I want something clarified," Grant broke in. "How do you spell that?"
As Nodinens answered, they heard the faint sound of computer keys. Since Grant didn't ask anything else, Nodinens continued. "She lived several hundred years in the past. I'd have to look at our history to see how long ago."
"Nearly four hundred years," Gagewin said.
"When the fur traders came into our land to trap the beaver and mink," Nodinens went on. "She was called Waweikum then, and she caught the eye of one called Armand Pascal. Waweikum's father, an important chief, refused Armand's request for Waweikum to become his wife. He eventually forbade his daughter to see Armand again. But as we all know, young love finds ways somehow. Waweikum told her sister that Armand swore he loved her and would care for her always, so she ran away with him.
"And Armand did take care of her for a few years. They had three children together during this time."
Another vehicle pulled into the driveway, halting just off the road, since there was nowhere to park any closer to the house. The lights went off as Nodinens continued her story.
"As he had done each year, one spring Armand left with the furs she had helped him prepare to sell, promising he would return within the month. He always brought back food and other supplies they needed. Waweikum waited for two months, becoming more and more worried that he had been killed. It was hard for her to leave the children to look for food, since one was only a baby. Their stores dwindled to hardly anything, and at last Waweikum went to her family to tell them what had happened.
"Her father turned his back on her. She begged and begged him for food for her and her children. When he refused to relent, she went to others in the tribe. None of them would disobey her father, and she left with no help."
Someone knocked on Keoman's window, and he pushed the button to roll it down.
"What's —"
Keoman whispered a, "Hush," and a quiet, "Just listen for now, McCoy."
"—tried every way she knew to feed her children," Nodinens was saying. "One by one, things failed her. She lost the only fishing hook when the line broke. One day a blue jay carried off her last piece of flint, and she had no way to light a fire. The animals appeared to grow wary of her, and her snares went empty."
Nodinens' voice faltered, and she waved at Keoman to continue the story.
"It was the baby who died first," he said. "Her milk had dried up as she gave most of the scant food she was able to get to the children. Each day as she grieved, she kept hoping one of the tribe would show up. The two other children, as well as herself, grew weaker and weaker. Finally, neither of the children could even walk. They lay there listless, except for their faint cries of hunger. At last, rather than watch her other two suffer, Waweikum drowned them."
Beside him, Channing gasped, but Keoman continued, "She buried them behind the cabin, tied herself to a rock and started to wade out into the nearby lake to die. But a hunting party happened by and pulled her out of the water as she screamed about what she had done. About how she hated them for not helping her. She then begged them to let her go, so she could join her children.
"The hunting party leader sneered at Waweikum and said she should not have deserted her clan and gone off with the white man. That her children's deaths were her fault. She was a killer, rather than a savior who had ended their suffering. With the las
t of her strength, she attacked them. Just before the leader thrust his spear through her body, she cursed them. Angry, the hunting party didn't bury Waweikum beside the new grave she had dug. Instead, they took her body to another part of the wilderness."
When Keoman paused for a moment, Grant said, "I'm finding some stuff about her under both names on the internet, from a section on tribal lore. A week later, yet another white man arrived in their camp, asking about her. The man said he was supposed to bring Waweikum to Quebec, where Armand had bought a house and left money for her and the children. Armand, though, had already returned to France, where the woman he was going to marry lived. This other man had visited Armand a time or two and fallen in love with Waweikum, although she remained true to Armand. Now he said he would stay with her in Quebec and raise the children. Is this the same story we're talking about here?"
"Yes," Gagewin said from the backseat. "Our storytellers have passed this lore down through our ages. More recently, with tribal permission, some of them have been writing the Ojibway history and stories down and putting them on the internet to keep for all time."
"It says," Grant went on, "Waweikum's father said she was dead. The white man didn't believe him and demanded to see her body. So they took him to where they had buried her. The white man refused to trust that it was her until the men dug up her body. As soon as they saw her, they realized she hadn't been dead when they buried her. She had tried to claw her way out of the hole."
"My god," Channing murmured, sharing a heartbreaking gaze with Nodinens.
Keoman took up the story once more. "The tribe at last felt guilty over what they had done, but they told the white man that they were only following their customs. He broke down sobbing, and before they re-buried her body, he spoke to her as though she were still alive. He told her that Armand had not totally abandoned her and their children. Explained about the house in Quebec. The tribal members said they were glad he had done this. They hoped revealing it would make Waweikum's journey into the land of the ancestor's complete, rather than her staying behind for vengeance. But over the years, the tale spread and was used in unkind ways."
"From then on, no one hunted the lands around the cabin where Waweikum and Armand lived," Nodinens said. "Or ever used that lake. Some who did venture there despite the warnings said they heard sounds of her grief echoing in the air."
"You didn't mention the curse," Grant said. "I don't see anything about that on my end,"
"The storytellers were not allowed to write the curse down," Gagewin told him. "Tribal members are not to repeat that, for they risk it coming down on them and their families."
"I know about it," the man at the window said. "Caleb McCoy here, Grant. Long time since we've talked, but I recognize your voice."
"Caleb," Grant replied. "Since you're a white man, you should be able to repeat the curse with impunity."
Caleb looked in the backseat toward Gagewin. In the rear view mirror, Keoman saw the chairman nod agreement.
"It was what she said just before the hunting party leader ran his spear through her," Caleb explained. "She screamed that some day she would make them know what it felt like to lose their children. How much it hurt. That she was giving them one last chance to let her go back to the lake and finish what she had started. She wanted to die by her own hands, the same hands that had failed the baby and killed the other two. That it was the only way for her to be in the land of their ancestors with her children. If they did not allow this, she didn't care how long it took but some day she would return and seek her vengeance."
Now that the curse was explained, Keoman again spoke. "After that, whenever a child would die from no apparent cause, what today they call crib death, they blamed Waweikum. Her name became Nenegean after some parents used her to frighten their children into obedience. Nenegean means 'one who frightens children.' It was just a story for a long while. Now we've seen her. Now, she's come back to wreak her revenge."
Silence lingered in the vehicle until one of the doors opened.
"Sorry," Radin said as he got out. "I need to make a call myself."
"Will you be at the sweat lodge?" Keoman asked.
"I … uh … I don't think my attitude is what you need for a ceremony like that," Radin said. "But I'll be back to help organize the search parties."
He walked off up the line of vehicles to one near the front of the house. No one spoke until he jockeyed his truck around and passed them headed out.
Grant's voice brought their attention back to the phone. "Are you still there, Caleb?"
"Yeah," Caleb responded. "What's your take on this?"
"My take is that you've got a really bad situation on your hands," Grant said. "I've been searching while I listen, and I don't see a damned thing anywhere about how to eradicate something like this."
"We didn't know how to get rid of the windigo, either," Caleb replied. "Until Kymbria went after it alone."
"Nenegean needs to finish her journey to the afterlife," Keoman growled. "But first we need to find her and the child she took."
"Before she kills my granddaughter," Gagewin said in a ravaged tone.
"Channing?" Grant said next.
"I'm here," she replied.
"Are you doing all right with this?"
"I'm OK," she said. "Not completely, but I'm handling things. Do you think it would help if you came up here? If not, I want you to at least send me anything you think might be helpful for protections against this evil thing."
"I'll be there tomorrow," Grant assured her.
"Not in an official capacity," Keoman cautioned.
For a moment, Grant didn't respond. Then, "Agreed. But I've still got a lot of experience that might be of help. Plus if we would need any assistance, I have favors I can call in."
"Come," Gagewin interrupted. "I have spoken and you will be welcomed. As well as given any support you need from us to assist in destroying this monster and finding my granddaughter."
Chapter 15
"Do you meditate?" Nodinens asked Channing as they drove down an isolated road a couple miles out of town.
Channing loosened her grip on the door panel arm and glanced over at the giant pickup's driver. She bit her lip, contemplating what she could say about riding with Nodinens that wouldn't hurt the elderly woman's feelings. "Sorry," she said. "I'm not used to …."
Nodinens chuckled. "I have many years of driving behind me, and more ahead, I hope. I understand your concerns, but I specifically bought this vehicle with where it needed to take me at times in mind. It is tooled for the bad roads."
The truck slid as Nodinens swept it around a slight curve, but she expertly jockeyed it back into a straight line to follow the two trucks ahead of her.
"And I was not really teasing you about your clench on my door," Nodinens went on. "We are not going into the sweat lodge with the men, which I am sure you will be glad to know when I tell you they perform their ceremonies without clothing."
Channing raised her eyebrows. "Are there times when both men and women are involved in the ceremonies?"
"Yes. But even though we will not be with them, we do need to be on guard. Keoman only allowed you to accompany me because I insisted. I also told him you might be needed if Walt overdid things."
Channing nodded her understanding. "To answer your question, yes, I do meditate. Meditation is wonderful for stress relief, as well as getting in touch with myself. And sometimes I do protection meditations and prayers. It was one of the things that drew Grant and me together. We actually met one night when he spoke before a healing circle a friend asked me to attend with her."
The trucks in front of them turned off between some trees, where Channing didn't see even a sign of a road. However, Nodinens followed through an opening where a wide path was trimmed through underbrush. It appeared someone had even plowed, in preparation for anyone needing to use that wilderness trail off the main road.
Within a quarter mile, they arrived at a clearing, and Nodinen
s halted her vehicle. The other pickups continued on until they were near a dome-shaped structure covered in snow. The drivers turned to face back the way they had come before they parked.
"We will wait here," Nodinens said softly as she turned off her engine.
Silence descended, as though a cone protected the area from sound. Channing couldn't even hear the noises the men exiting the other pickups had to be making. She tensed again, but immediately did a breathing exercise to diminish the stress. She needed to be clear-headed, both to take in what would surely be a profound experience for a white woman and ready if her medical skills were needed.
Around the clearing, tall pines and hardwoods stretched upward to an ebony sky sparkling with billions of pinpoint stars. Never that interested in astronomy, Channing only recognized the Big and Small Dippers, as well as the Milky Way Galaxy blanket swathed across the darkness. A half moon shone so brightly it illuminated the area to the point where it was easy to see everything.
"If it becomes too cold, I have some blankets in the backseat," Nodinens said. "Please ask if you need one. They are those thermal blankets that rescue people use and will protect us. From the cold, anyway."
"What else would we need protection from?" Channing asked, echoing Nodinens' soft tone of voice.
"Nenegean," Nodinens said bluntly.
Channing gasped, recalling her deep, abiding fear when the entity appeared across the clearing at her cabin. But she stoically sat watching out the windshield as the men in the other trucks gathered around the domed structure. At least they had more people with them this time, men trained in the spiritual ways needed to keep the reborn evil at bay.
Two men carried snow shovels and cleared a space on one side of the sweat lodge, then raked the snow off the roof. Channing recognized Keoman when he opened a door in the structure. By the time smoke poured out of a chimney a good fifteen minutes later, Channing was ready for one of the thermal blankets. The cold had seeped into the truck even with the doors and windows tightly closed.