Shaman, Healer, Heretic (38 page)

SK came in from the patio with an empty platter again. “That’s it,” he said as the doorbell rang. “I’ll get it.”

He set the platter down and went to the door. As he pulled it open, Joel adjusted his eyes downward. His smile faded every so slightly. “Hi, SK,” he said.

SK stepped aside and Joel entered, hauling a large cart behind him.

“Just in time,” Livvy said, getting up.

THE SHAMANS SETTLED down, their mats arranged as they had been at Livvy’s apartment, except that the Nahual took up the place where Sunny had been.

The other shamans began to lie back and put on their goggles. Livvy saw the Nahual looking down at hers and then she flipped the switch on.

“All you really have to do is relax,” said Livvy.

The Nahual looked up at her and seemed to be hesitating. Then, without a word, she lay down and brought the goggles up to her face.

“See you on the flip side,” said Livvy.

She checked that Joel was ready with a quick look. He returned the thumbs up sign and smiled. She looked over at SK, whose mouth was set in a determined line, his eyebrows knit together.

“Kick her ass,” he said.

She smiled and nodded.

• • • • •

As expected, the Nahual was the last to come through, but when she did, the flash of light had them all shielding their eyes. Carmen almost tried to hide. The Nahual’s entrance finished with a small boom that had them all ducking.

“Goodness,” said Alvina.

Ursula glanced in every direction, searching the horizon for any sign of Tiamat. “Where is she?” she asked, tense.

“Yes, she appeared quickly last time,” said Wan-li.

“Yes, quickly,” Carmen echoed, spinning around as she looked for a sign that Tiamat was approaching.

The Nahual came over to Livvy and touched her shoulder. She saw the glow, felt the pressure of her hand.

“When will Marduk arrive?” asked Ursula, anxious.

Livvy looked up to the sky.

“He said he’d meet us here,” she said, looking back to Ursula. “And he will.”

“Well, I imagine he heard the Nahual arrive,” said Alvina.

Livvy watched as the others scanned the horizon, looked up to the sky, and looked toward the black lake, but there was no sign of Marduk or Tiamat. Livvy waited.

“Maybe we should just go,” suggested Carmen, her hands starting to twitter.

“What could have happened?” asked Ursula.

Livvy shook her head and looked up to the sky. They all did.

“She’s gone to ground in the Underworld,” said a voice behind them.

Livvy turned around. It was Marduk, his skin glowing with power. Here, in the grayness that had become the Middleworld, he was positively shining.

“Where did you come from?” asked Ursula.

He glanced upward and then back at Livvy and the rest of the shamans, who were gathering around.

“So, you’re Marduk,” said Alvina, looking him up and down.

He ignored her. “This is all the help you brought?” he said to Livvy.

A grump, like last time
, she thought, but she sensed the disquiet that had settled over her group at his attitude.

“The best of the best,” she countered, sweeping her gaze over the group and then back to him. “We’re ready when you are.” The group shifted, standing closer to her. “What do you mean Tiamat has gone to ground?” she asked.

“Back to the Underworld,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest. “Wants to be on her own turf for this.”

“How did she know we were coming?” asked Livvy.

“Good question,” he said. “I was about to ask you the same thing.”

The shamans stirred again behind her, but she didn’t look back.

“Look,” said Livvy, surprising herself with the anger in her voice. “I’m here, because you sent for me. You’re here, because I came looking for you. We all have one common enemy, and that’s Tiamat.”

He frowned and harrumphed but didn’t have a retort.

“So, it’s the Underworld then,” she concluded.

Marduk nodded and Livvy turned to the other shamans.

“Sorry, is there a plan?” asked Carmen.

“They don’t do any good,” said Marduk. “Any of you ever been in a battle?”

Livvy turned to face him again as he waited through the brief silence.

“No, I didn’t think so. It’s chaos. The plan evaporates immediately. Get to her belly, that’s the only plan. First one there wins.”

Then he disappeared in a flash of light.

“Not what I would have expected from an ancient god,” said the Nahual.

“Maybe we don’t have to do this. Maybe it’s good enough that Tiamat is back in the Underworld?” suggested Carmen.

Livvy turned to face the group. “You know it’s not,” she said, calmly, evenly. “It would only be a matter of time before Tiamat was here in the Middleworld again. We’ve got to take the battle to her and we’ve got to win.”

She paused, watching their faces and saw the doubt there. She sensed that they needed something more from her.

“You saw Marduk’s power. Combined with ours, we can defeat her.”

With that, Livvy pointedly looked to the sky. The others followed her gaze to where the dark and towering clouds had gathered over them. Flashes of lightning traveled back and forth within the roiling mass. The Nahual leveled an approving look at Livvy that she calmly returned. She was the Lightning Shaman, and she wanted them to remember that.

Wan-li nodded, as did Alvina. One by one, each nodded their assent. Livvy nodded as well.

“All right then,” she said and then led them to the lake.

In moments, they were thrown into the Underworld. But it wasn’t an Underworld that any of them recognized.

As Livvy looked around, she realized that, apart from an irrigation ditch, a wheat field, and a wide river in the distance, they were in a desert. The jagged mountains were brown and lifeless. The land on the other side of the ditch was dry and cracked.

“Sumeria,” said Livvy. “Of course. Her home turf.”

As they took stock of their surroundings, Carmen’s snake crept up from the ditch and Wan-li’s tiger bounded through the wheat field. Alvina’s coyote came padding down the dirt road and Ursula’s black rooster flew in from the opposite direction. They all looked skyward at one point or another to confirm that the thunderclouds were swirling overhead, and then they checked the Nahual.

A medium-sized turtle crept up out of the water in the irrigation ditch and made its way over to her feet. Ursula shot Livvy a look that said, “You must be kidding,” until the tall wheat began to quiver a few dozen feet away. A sleek black jaguar emerged with a low rumble in its throat. It also went to the Nahual, nudging the turtle with its nose, which sent it teetering but didn’t topple it.

“Two spirit helpers?” asked Alvina.

“Of course,” said the Nahual.

There was a loud rattling, and then the sound of galloping horses quickly grew from the road behind them. They looked up to see Marduk approaching.

Four brilliantly white horses pulled his shining gold chariot. They slowed to a stop next to the assembled group.

Livvy had to admit, he was convincing in his battle dress. The intricate breastplate gleamed with flowing scrolls and gold cuneiform inscriptions. The helmet, a tall silver cone mounted with a bright red tassel, had a chain mail neck-drape that shimmered when it moved. In the well of the chariot, they could see the legendary weapons: the net, the shield, and the spear. He was looking younger by the minute.

“Maybe just seeing you will frighten her,” said Livvy, looking up at him.

“Oh no,” said Marduk, although he looked pleased at the thought. “Tiamat doesn’t know fear, only rage.”

The Nahual was stroking the nose of the one of the horses when suddenly it reared. A screech erupted from the sky above the river. All eyes turned to see Tiamat heading directly toward them.

Marduk slapped the reins down hard. He wheeled the horses around and they dived down the embankment and onto the baked clay surface. Clouds of dust rose up from the wheels. Marduk lifted his spear high in the air and Tiamat shrieked again.

Maybe because she’d encountered Tiamat more than the others, or maybe because she was thinking of how much depended on her, Livvy realized that Tiamat’s shrieks were no longer unnerving. One by one, she looked each of the shamans in the eye.

“Let’s do this,” she said.

Then she charged down the embankment after Marduk, the other shamans right behind. He turned the horses in a wide circle and, as they continued their charge, he came back around them to the right.

“Don’t get too far away from me,” he yelled as he passed. “Don’t bunch together.”

As they continued to move forward, he circled behind them again, and then ahead of them to the left. Tiamat landed in the distance, keeping her belly low to the earth. The light of her eye began to search on the ground between them but was still a ways away.

Livvy looked up to the sky where the swirling mass was keeping pace. Wan-li had surged ahead of them, she and her tiger moving at an incredible speed while Ursula flanked to the left, her rooster flying parallel. Ahead of them, Tiamat’s eye found Marduk, but he raised his shield, scattering the beam back to her. She shrieked and galloped toward him.

As the black rooster flew next to her, Ursula, still running, raised a hand above her head. A small ball of fire appeared there and she hurled it at Tiamat. It had blazed brightly at first, but as it traveled, it started to smoke. By the time it landed on Tiamat’s feathers, she took no notice as it faded in a puff and splatter. Ursula was still too far away but the gap was closing.

Marduk’s chariot thundered between them as he brandished the spear high above his helmet. Seeing it, Tiamat instinctively crouched.

From out of nowhere, her giant tail came whipping around from the right. Even as Wan-li and her tiger gracefully jumped over it, it sent Alvina and her coyote sprawling. Livvy looked to the sky and raised her hand. The clouds boiled and whirled directly above her.

“Lightning,” she said.

A bright white streak laced through the sky and struck the ground between Tiamat and Alvina. Tiamat shrieked in anger as the bolt created a small crater. Alvina was flung backward by the explosion and the coyote appeared stunned.

Ursula had managed to get in front of Tiamat and created a ball of heat that she aimed at Tiamat’s belly, but it landed too high and splattered against the wings. The light from Tiamat’s eye landed on Ursula, but before Livvy could do anything, the black rooster flitted wildly through the beam, almost tumbling through it in mid-flight. It wasn’t there long enough to suffer serious damage but a couple of feathers on one wing seemed to be smoking. For only a few seconds, Tiamat couldn’t decide where to focus and the maneuver gave Ursula the break she needed. She dodged and dove away.

As her eye searched for Ursula, Tiamat didn’t see Marduk’s chariot approaching from the rear. As his chariot flew by, he launched his net and sent it unfurling into an enormous dome above Tiamat.

Livvy nearly cheered until she realized that Alvina had just unleashed a pressure wave from the opposite direction and didn’t see the net. The pressure wave lifted and billowed the net. When Tiamat saw it, she leaped to the side, while Marduk had to change direction so as not to get caught in it himself.

Suddenly, a shrill sound filled the air. Livvy looked in its direction and saw the Nahual, standing stock still with her mouth wide open. The sound was piercing and high, but the note ascended rapidly until Livvy couldn’t hear it anymore. The coyote, however, had started to howl and scratch at its ears as the noise traversed its audio range. Finally, Tiamat took notice and swiveled her head around. Her eagle’s beak was grinding back and forth with a huge crunching sound. The light of her eye frenetically sought out the Nahual and quickly landed on her.

The light wavered as the jaguar leapt onto one of Tiamat’s back paws, clawing, slashing and biting it. Tiamat raised and shook the back paw, sending the jaguar flying. As she set the paw down it landed on the turtle’s back, causing her to misstep. She scratched furiously at the ground, sending the turtle rolling. When the light of her eye sought out the Nahual again, she was gone.

Seeing an opening, Marduk charged from the rear again, using his spear like a jousting stick and aiming for her belly. But Tiamat simply stood taller, lowered her head, and snapped her giant beak at Marduk. She missed him only by the smallest of margins as he ducked down into the chariot.

Before Tiamat could raise her head, Wan-li and her tiger sped in from the side and leapt into the air nearly within arm’s length of the great eye. They were a blur, moving faster than the eye could follow. Livvy couldn’t see what they had done, but suddenly Tiamat jerked her head away and started stamping on the ground. Again, Livvy dared to hope.

But eventually she aw blood flowing from just below the eye–a near miss. They failed to disable it and now Tiamat was in a rage. Her tail lashed in every direction and her great legs thudded the ground, rocking it and sending up billows of dust. Wan-li and the tiger nimbly dodged away.