Sky Coyote (13 page)

“ ‘That’s my bride!’ shouted Falcon. I clapped my paw over his mouth to shut him up, but it was too late, the Sea People heard us.

“There was hissing laughter behind us. We turned around and saw them. They were evil, dirty old men, with long white beards and eyebrows, and every one had a sword in his hand. Quick as a flash I said:

“ ‘Hi there, Undersea Fellows. This boy here and I are travelers, and we’d like shelter for the night. Will you grant it?’ And this really screwed them, see, because once I’d asked for hospitality, they couldn’t attack us. They looked at one another with their cold eyes, trying to think of a way around the rules. At last one of them said, Of course!’ grinning with his sharp teeth. ‘Please enter into our house, and share our food and the heat of our fire!’

“So we went inside, and they crowded in after us, careful to sit between us and the door so there was no quick way to exit. We sat down by the fire, but it was an undersea fire: it burned cold and blue and made the place darker. The only real light came from Eagle’s daughter, who looked at us hopefully but didn’t dare stop pounding snails in her mortar.

“ ‘That’s a pretty girl,’ I said to the Sea People.

“ ‘She’s all right,’ said the oldest old man. ‘It’s been a long time since we had a slave who made decent sea-snail mush! Come, we were just about to eat our evening meal of whale meat. There’s plenty for everyone. You’ll insult us if you don’t eat heartily!’ They were trying to trap us, see, by making us insult them
at their own hearth, so they’d have an excuse to kill us. But I said, ‘Sounds great! Bring on the blubber!’

“So one of them went out, and after a minute he starts to pitch dead whales in through the doorway. Obviously this was a magic house, because it expanded as the whales came in, so that everybody was able to sit comfortably with a dead whale in front of him. ‘I hope you don’t expect such decadent luxury as
cooking,’
sneered the oldest Sea Person. ‘We eat our meat raw under this roof, it’s healthier that way.’

“ Of course!’ I answered cheerfully. ‘That’s how it tastes best!’ I could see Falcon looking green, so I leaned over and whispered to him: ‘Just pretend to eat. Cut off chunks and pass them to me.’

“Well, the meal commenced. You should have seen the disgusting table manners those guys had! Grease and blood and blubber all over their faces. Each one chewed down a whole whale all by himself. I ate up all mine too—but then, I can eat anything. Falcon couldn’t manage more than a couple of mouthfuls, but he tore off big pieces and passed them to me under his thigh, and I gobbled them down so the Sea People couldn’t say we were turning up our noses at their food.

“When the meal was over, I licked my chops and grinned. ‘What a great meal!’ I told them. ‘Truly you Sea People are masters of hospitality.’ But the oldest one just grinned like a saw blade and said, ‘If you liked our meat so much, you’ll have to try our tobacco. Our feelings will be very hurt if you don’t like it!’ And they handed around a tube of the awful stuff they use down there. It was like sticking a salted fish up your nose! I took a big helping, though, when my turn came, and signaled to Falcon that he do the same. Then, just like with the meat, he passed me his share under his thigh, and I was able to partake of it without
harm, because nothing makes me sick. But I was getting tired of this, and besides the Sea People were still between us and the door, giving us no chance of grabbing Eagle’s daughter and making a break for it. So I said:

“ ‘You’ve been so kind in sharing your comforts here in your home, allow me to repay you by singing to you all!’

“ ‘All right,’ said the oldest of the Sea People, not knowing what to expect. Now, personally, I think I have a beautiful voice, but all the other Sky People have told me they’d rather be dragged over hot coals than listen to me sing. They say I sound like wild animals being skinned alive. Anyhow, I began to serenade the Sea People in my own special way.

“Poor Falcon went pale, and Eagle’s daughter covered her ears and cowered down. The Sea People made faces as though they’d just bitten into something rotten; but what could they do? I was hoping they’d leave, but they were so tough and ugly, even my singing wasn’t too much for them. I sang and sang, love songs and lullabies, fishing songs and songs of war. A couple began to rock back and forth in pain, one of them clutched at the side of his head like he had a toothache, and the oldest one’s nose started to bleed. But there they sat, blocking the way for us to escape with Eagle’s daughter.

“I sang at them for hours, thinking they would at least have to go out to relieve themselves. But nobody was moving, even after that meal! Finally I realized they were going right where they sat, like fish! Their poop didn’t have any smell, like the poop of fish or shrimp, but it gave me an idea.

“ ‘Excuse me a moment while I refresh my voice, won’t you?’ I asked, and I slipped the tube of magic stuff from my ear and poured a little into my mouth.

“ Oh, please, don’t strain your throat,’ begged the oldest of the Sea People, wiping blood and tears from his face.

“ ‘Don’t you like my singing?’ I asked in an offended voice. ‘After I’ve racked my brains for every tune I know, just to entertain you?’ Because I could feel the magic stuff working inside me, you see. And the Sea People brightened a little at that, because they thought I was going to insult them and there’d be a fight, so they could kill me at last.

“ ‘Well, I guess I can tell the truth in my own house,’ said the old one with a grin. ‘The plain truth is, your singing is terrible and hurts our ears!’

“ ‘Oh yeah?’ I retorted. Yes, the magic was working! ‘And do you want to know what I think of your taste in music?’

At that every one of the Sea People grabbed hold of his sword. ‘What?’ they said in a chorus. ‘What do you think of our taste in music?’

“ ‘THIS!’ I replied, and let loose a thunderous fart. Now you know I’m an ancient and powerful creature, and I’d had a huge meal of rotten whale and magic powder on top of that, so you can imagine what happened. The whole house rose on its foundations and settled again in the crater my fart made. Eagle’s daughter and Falcon fainted dead away. Over on the islands, people thought they were having an earthquake. When the bubble broke on the surface of the sea, birds fell out of the air like stones, and fish were killed instantly, and washed up on the beach for weeks. There were colorful sunsets for a year and a half from the poison in the air. But the Sea People got out of that house as fast as they could. They didn’t even bother with the door—they jumped out through the smoke hole!

“I grabbed up Eagle’s daughter and Falcon, one in either arm, and beat it through the door and swam up and up until I saw clear water above me and the face of the Moon, white with horror. She used to be red like the Sun, before that night when I farted. I broke the surface and found the canoe still floating there,
though it was half swamped, and Cormorant and Pelican were lying in it unconscious. I tossed in Eagle’s daughter and Falcon, jumped in myself, bailed out the water, and paddled us all back to the mainland single-handed.

“Eagle’s daughter and Falcon recovered and were married, and lived happily ever after. I’m not sure if they had children, though. At least I wasn’t invited to any naming ceremonies! And you can hang that story on the hook, because I’m finished telling it.”

“God, Sky Coyote, that was so gross!” giggled Awhay, rolling close to me. “Did it really happen like that? Was that really the truth?”

“As much of the truth as I ever tell, child of earth.” I grinned lazily at her.

“My mother used to say You’re a truth made of lies. Maybe she was right, for once in her life.” She snuggled closer. “You know what? I think Puluy’s gone to sleep …”

When it got quiet at last, I lay there between the girls and watched the stars. From time to time a little wind moved in the oak trees, but mostly there was only the old sound, the oldest sound, mortals breathing slowly by their hearth fires, with now and then the whimper of a child or dog.

Sleep tight, children. Sky Coyote is with you.

I
SLEPT, AND SAW ALL
the terrible things I’d warned the Chumash about. From the sea came the white sails, and they anchored and the white men came striding up over the land. Their armor gleamed silver and their priests carried banners with crosses. My people fought and died, or turned to flee into the mountains. But from beyond the mountains came more white men, under a striped banner, bearing long rifles. What were my people going to do? Were we all going to die?

No! Because here they came, the Enforcers, heroes to save the day. Budu pointed at the Spanish and the Americans with his ax. He pronounced his sentence on them, as he always did: If you make war on other tribes to take their land, you must die. He gave an order, and the big men in bearskins moved, as they always had, like a wave rolling in to crush the guilty and protect the innocent. The Spanish cut them with steel, but they kept coming. The Americans shot them with bullets, but they kept coming.

Oh, it was wonderful! All the terrible things I’d prophesied weren’t going to come true after all, no near extinction for the Chumash, no mission slaves, no conquerors! The Enforcers were
seeing to it that life would go on in the ancient ways forever and ever, so that good people could sleep safely by their fires under the kindly stars. The problems with history being changed had all been smoothed over, somehow.

Now all the invaders seemed to be dead, and Budu was helping his men take heads. The bodies were stacked in heaps and burned. He was laughing his high-pitched laugh; his pale-blue eyes were dancing. The Chumash were bowing down to thank him. But then from the dead I saw a figure leap up, a priest who somehow hadn’t been executed, a small man in a black robe. He slipped in under Budu’s arm. He had a long knife in his hand. I tried to yell a warning but I couldn’t, and anyway I recognized the man in the black robe. I saw myself running my knife in between Budu’s ribs. No. No.

It didn’t happen that way. I would never have done that.

Would I? If I’d been ordered to do it, would I have betrayed him?

I was shivering when I woke up, but the girls were hogging the furs. Growling softly, I nipped at Awhay until she woke up enough to relinquish some bed space to her principal divinity.

I
F THE CHUMASH HAD BEEN
impressed with me, I really made a sensational entrance at the weekly production meeting.

I had to open the rear seam of my breeches to let my tail out, and it stuck through the rear pleat of my coat. I had to abandon my wig, but my tricorne fit very tidily between my coyote ears. Yes, all eyes were on me during my report on Initial Contact and Preliminary Negotiations. I disconcerted Mr. Bugleg no end. I could tell, because he kept dropping his stylus. Then again, maybe he usually had trouble holding small objects. Anyhow I concluded my report and stepped down, and there was vast creaking in that prefab hall as fifty people shifted uncomfortably in their folding chairs.

“Questions?” inquired Mr. Lopez.

One of the administrative team put up his hand, an elderly mortal. He wasn’t a scientist or anything; he was just some investor the Company had sent along on the trip so he could think he was helping to make decisions. He stood and frowned at me.

“I’m sure everyone at Dr. Zeus would like to thank Joseph for his report, and it sounds like he’s doing a great job, but I
don’t see why he had to include in his report his adventures with the underaged native girls. I would like to go on record as protesting that.”

“So noted,” intoned Lopez, and I made my ears droop. There was a wave of subvocal giggling from the immortals in the hall. The old man glared around—you’d have thought he could hear us—and raised his voice as he continued:

“I would also like to go on record as protesting the choice of the Chumash tribe as preservation subjects.”

“So noted,” replied Lopez hurriedly, but the old guy went right on:

“I’ve been watching the preliminary field reports. These Indians aren’t like the Hopi or the Navajo. Those were clean, peaceful Indians with an advanced society and beautiful mythology. They farmed and they built houses the way we do. These Chumash are different. They’re dirty-minded, lazy, pleasure-loving Indians. They don’t have anything important to contribute to human culture. I think it’s a waste of Company funds to bother with them.”