The Broken Land (44 page)

The savory odor of wet leaves met her nostrils. She inhaled deeply and hugged herself. Another rock clacked! Taya silently walked down the deer trail to the place where Sky Messenger must have climbed up, for the rounded stones resembled steps. The rocks were cold and damp as she ascended. She couldn’t see him for a while. Then when she glimpsed him at the top, she felt almost euphoric.

He
was
the human False Face.

When she emerged three paces away from him, he turned to her. Bathed in starlight, with black hair dancing around his broad shoulders, his gaze made Taya’s heart stand still. A gust flattened his cape across his muscular chest. She carefully stepped across the slick boulders to reach him. He smelled faintly of crushed grass and forest-scented winds.

Sky Messenger said, “You should be sleeping.”

When she tried to sit down next to him, her moccasins slipped on the wet rocks and she grabbed for his arm to steady herself. The hard muscles beneath the soft buckskin felt comforting. “As you should. What are you doing up here?” She eased down beside him.

“Throwing rocks.”

“That’s what woke me. Why?”

He shrugged. “It seems to ease the Dreams.”

She gazed out across the sparkling pond to where a flock of geese paddled. The white feathers on their throats flashed as they bobbed up and down on the waves. “I missed you. The blankets grew stone-cold after you left.”

He hesitated for a while. “I was too anxious. I couldn’t lie there any longer.”

She squeezed his hand. “How strange. You’re anxious, and I feel so happy. Too happy. I’m sure I’m Dreaming.”

“Well, if you’re happy, I suggest you don’t wake. What I see coming will certainly ruin it for you.”

Taya gazed up into his starlit eyes. “Tell me what you see. Please?”

Sky Messenger’s eyes tightened. He kept staring at her, his gaze intense, searching. Probably measuring her sincerity.

Taya heaved a sigh and explained, “I believe you now. I didn’t. I didn’t believe any of it—until four days ago when you met with War Chief Hiyawento. I’m sorry. It’s taken me a few days to come to grips with the truth that you’re actually a great Dreamer and not a crazy man, but I think I have. I would like to know what you see coming. If you wish to tell me.”

He looked out across the pond. As the trees swayed in the night breeze, the black limb shadows moved across the silver water.

Finally, Sky Messenger replied, “The beginning is almost upon us. In the depths of my souls, the air is cooling off, and the colors are leaching from the forest. My heart already sees that gray and shimmering world. And that world is the start of everything.” He heaved a breath. “I feel like … like my heart is crumbling, sifting through the cracks in my soul a grain at a time, vanishing into eternal stillness.”

His tone of voice, the lilt of the words, seemed to cast a spell upon her. Softly, she asked, “How long do we have before Elder Brother Sun covers his face with the soot of the dying world?”

The muscles in his arm went hard, as though straining against what was to come. “I don’t know. The way the Dream plays out, I can’t tell if the events occur over a single day, or several years. The images jump around, rearranging themselves in a different order. I—”

“‘As though not even the Spirits know the final shape of the story,’” she repeated the words he’d said to Hiyawento.

The Power in his haunted eyes stunned her. “Yes, that’s right.”

The breeze that blew over the pond batted at Sky Messenger’s hood where it rested upon his back. Taya nodded and said, “How may I help you?”

He inclined his head uncertainly, or perhaps it was suspiciously. “I don’t wish to place you in danger.”

“I’m already in danger. I’m with you, aren’t I? You may as well let me help.”

He hurled another rock, which splashed in the darkness. “As I get closer, I suspect I’ll have a better idea of what each of us can do. But right now, I honestly don’t.”

“All right. I’ll be ready.”

He frowned at her from the corner of his eye. “I think, perhaps, you’ve grown up some.”

Taya wet her lips. Wind Mother whispered through the trees. A wall of dark clouds had formed in the north, blotting out the campfires of the dead. “Sky Messenger, since our meeting with War Chief Hiyawento, I’ve been thinking a lot about the Beginning Time story. It was Sapling, the Good-Minded Twin, who brought order after the creation. He made lakes and rivers, brought good weather, ensured the corn grew, and released the animals from the great cave where they were being held. It was his brother Tawiscaro, the Evil-Minded Twin, who tried to undo everything good that Sapling had accomplished. He sent bad weather and brought chaos and death to the world.” She took his one hand in both of hers and held it to her heart. “I think, one day, there will be stories told about you. Great stories of life and death, and good and evil. I truly believe that you are the human False Face.”

He flinched and drew his hand away from her. “I am not.”

“How do you know? You wear that gorget that matches the stories, and you—”

“My gorget is a copy; it’s not the original. Chief Atotarho wears the original—or half of it.”

Annoyed, Taya said, “The stories speak of two gorgets crafted just after the creation. One must have been made first. So the other is obviously a copy. No one knows whether the human False Face wears the original or the copy. Yours could be the sacred gorget, and the other is just a distraction.”

He hurled another rock. He appeared uncomfortable with the entire discussion of legends. “I am
not
the human False Face.”

Taya shrugged. “All right. But maybe you are the person who clears the path for the arrival of the human False Face. That’s still critically important.”

His head dipped once. “Yes, it is.”

In the distance, the geese started flapping their wings and honking, as though preparing to take flight. Their beautiful calls serenaded the night. “My Spirit Helper told me something tonight that worries me.”

Almost breathlessly, she said, “Shago-niyoh was here? What did he say?”

He watched her closely, as if trying to anticipate how she would respond to what he was about to say. “He told me that I must dive headfirst into the darkness and blood. If I do, others will follow.”

Taya’s breathing went shallow. “But … that sounds like … it sounds like you’re talking about dying. I’m mistaken, aren’t I? That’s not what you meant?”

Sky Messenger didn’t answer.

Taya slid away from him. “If you’re planning on dying, tell me now.”

“Why? So you can start looking for another husband?”

“No, so I can beat you senseless for being an idiot!”

“Taya, I’m not planning to die, but if it’s the only way—”

“It’s not the only way!” She leaped to her feet. “We’re going home to convince Grandmother that it’s possible to create an alliance with several Hills villages to destroy Atotarho. That’s the way to end the war.”

“Yes, I hope so. But Taya, I have this feeling that things have gone too far, and we can’t—”

“We’re going to form this alliance; then everything will be all right,” she insisted.

“I hope so.” Sky Messenger rose to his feet and stood uneasily before her. After several heartbeats, she felt his hand stroke the long hair that draped down her back. “Earlier, you asked if there was something you could do to help me. I’ve changed my mind. There is.”

“I will
not
help you die!”

They stood for a long time, looking at each other. He lowered his hand. “I would never ask that of anyone. But there may come a moment in the storm when I need someone politically astute to act as a negotiator on my behalf. I know you are young, but—”

“I can do it,” she said with utter confidence. “I have watched and listened to my grandmother all my life.” She drew herself up and faced him squarely. “
But …
” She pointed a stern finger at him. “Not if I know that you’re planning on sacrificing yourself for the greater good, or some other stupid notion. Do you understand?”

His gaze went over her angry face as though memorizing it. “Yes. I understand.”

They stood for a time, just gazing out at the glimmers of starlight on the pond, until Sky Messenger said, “I’m going back to camp and try to sleep. Are you coming?”

“Not yet.”

He looked around at the darkness and seemed to be wondering why she wasn’t terrified to be more than a few paces from him. She was wondering that herself.

“Very well. I’ll be waiting for you.”

She listened to his steps as he climbed down the slippery boulders. A short while later, she saw him slowly walking the trail back to the camp. He was alone. Where was Gitchi?

Taya climbed down the boulders and found the wolf standing with his ears pricked. He did not wag his tail. He merely gazed at her with shining yellow eyes, as though waiting for a command.

“Leave,” she ordered, and flung her arm to point back to camp.

Gitchi stood his ground. The old wolf’s graying head had a curious sheen in the silver light.

“I don’t want you here. Go home. Go find Sky Messenger.”

Gitchi licked his muzzle and sat on his haunches.

“Did Sky Messenger tell you to stay and protect me?”

He stared up at her, and she threw up her hands. “Gods, that means I’ll never get rid of you. All right, come on.”

Taya marched along the shore with Gitchi at her heels. When she reached the far side of the pond, she stared across the shimmering surface to where their camp nestled in the maples. She couldn’t see him, but she knew Sky Messenger was there; it tore her souls apart. “Do you really think he’s planning on dying?”

She slumped down on the sand and put her head in her hands, trying to force sense into her worry-laced brain.

Gitchi eased forward, lay down, and rested his muzzle on top of her feet. When she looked at him, his tail thumped the ground as though he knew she was hurting, and he was trying to comfort her.

He was a curious animal, totally devoted to Sky Messenger. In all the world, the only person who really seemed to exist for Gitchi was Sky Messenger. Yet … here he was. Taya reached out and stroked his warm fur. “I don’t really like you, and you know it, don’t you?”

Gitchi wagged his tail.

Elder Sister Gaha pushed the air with a soft invisible hand, and Taya tugged her cape up beneath her chin. Gitchi watched her. When she shivered, the wolf got to his feet, walked around behind her, and curled his body warmly around hers.

Tears filled Taya’s eyes. She slid a hand from beneath her cape to stroke his head. “We can’t let him die, Gitchi. Even if he’s foolish enough to think it’s the only way. You’ll protect him, won’t you?”

The wolf’s gaze suddenly shifted to the opposite side of the pond. A low growl rumbled his throat.

“What is it?”

Gitchi eased to his feet, his eyes still focused on the forest shadows across the pond. His muscles bunched as though ready to spring forward. She tried to see what he was looking at. By now Sky Messenger was wrapped in his cape and almost asleep—yet something moved near their camp. A black silhouette. It ghosted through the darkness.

Silent as the moonlight, Gitchi broke into a dead run.

T
he wolf shot around the pond like a silver arrow, its lean body gleaming in the night. Ohsinoh chuckled and took one last look at Odion. He would always be Odion to Ohsinoh, never Sky Messenger. Odion, the boy who was always afraid.

He’ll be even more afraid. Very soon.

Long before Gitchi rounded the pond and hit the trail to camp, Ohsinoh turned and trotted into the deep forest shadows.

Forty-seven

H
igh Matron Tila lay on her sleeping bench with her great-granddaughter Kahn-Tineta snuggled beneath the hides beside her. Morning sunlight streamed around the leather curtain that led outside, casting lances of pure gold across the longhouse floor. As they flashed across the little girl’s face, Tila’s heart ached.

Many people scurried to and from the house today, securing the village, hauling in pot after pot of water and armloads of wood. Each time a person walked through the blue clouds that rose from the fires, smoke swirled and snaked upward toward the smoke hole in the roof high above.

She weakly stroked Kahn-Tineta’s long black hair. “I know these are hard days, child, but things will get better.”

In a pitiful voice, the eight-summers-old girl said, “No, they won’t. Mother and Father are going to die, Great-grandmother. Just like my sisters.”

Tila frowned. From this view, she could just see Kahn-Tineta’s profile. Tears sparkled on the girl’s long eyelashes. “What makes you say that? Your father is a great war chief, one of the most respected men—”

“When Father left, he barely had the strength to lift his war club! Didn’t you see him?” Kahn-Tineta rolled to her back to look at Tila. Her small face was white and strained. There was a luminous look of stunned disbelief in her eyes. The innocence of her expression struck Tila like a blow.

“I did see him.” Tila shoved away the hair that had glued itself to the girl’s wet cheeks. Zateri and Hiyawento had both come to bid her good-bye three days before. Though she was almost beyond feeling anything except her own agony, Tila had hurt for them, but especially for Hiyawento. The man who’d stood before her had been a pale haunted shadow of what he had once been. “I think your father’s souls split apart for a time after your sisters traveled the Path of Souls. It will take time for them to weave back together again, but they will.”