by J. M. LeDuc
The pain in her hand woke her a few hours later and she was up before dawn. She quickly threw on her jeans and newly washed t-shirt, which now resembled more of a crop top. Leaving a short note, she snuck out before anyone woke.
* * *
Pamoon stood at the entrance of the woods, not feeling any of the apprehension she felt when she stood there the day before with Powaw. “I don’t know what these woods have to tell us,” she said to Atahk, “but I know they’re calling us.”
Feeling none of the heaviness in the woods, she sensed yesterday, she was pretty sure they were demon-free. Pamoon wandered the woods for most of the day, not knowing what she was looking for, but hoping somehow to find it. By late afternoon, she ended up back at the campsite and sat on the same log she and Ayas sat on just the day before. She closed her eyes and hoped for inspiration, or maybe she just hoped that when she opened them, he’d be sitting across from her.
Holding her head in her hands, she asked Kise for help. Eyes still closed, she felt a warm breeze brush against her face. The scent of Birch warmed her heart.
Ayas. Her eyes shot open, searching all around, but not finding what she hoped for. “I’m sorry for what I said yesterday,” she mouthed, looking up at the trees. “Will you forgive me?”
A warmer breeze caressed her skin and wrapped her in an embrace. Pamoon closed her eyes, wrapped her arms across her chest, and inhaled deep. “I wish I could see you.”
The breeze brushed her lips, leaving as quickly as it came.
“Soon, I hope,” she whispered, opening her eyes.
As she sat dreaming of Ayas, Atahk pecked her on the cheek and fluttered mid-air in front of her. She watched Atahk fly off in the direction they just came from and then back again. The raven did it repeatedly until Pamoon stood up and began to follow. “All right, girl; you win. Show me what you found.”
With her last word, Atahk gained speed until Pamoon could hardly keep up.
“Wait,” Pamoon grunted as she ran after her.
Atahk was hard to follow as she soared high above the trees one minute and low along the forest floor the next. Pamoon needed to keep one eye on the terrain to dodge low hanging branches and hop over roots and fallen trees, while keeping the other on the mischievous bird.
Atahk seemed to tire of the game and came to rest on a fallen log a few feet in front of her.
“It’s about time you stopped,” Pamoon huffed. “This better not just be some stupid game you’re playing.”
Atahk cawed in response.
Pamoon commanded the raven to get back on top of her staff, but Atahk continued to caw and fuss.
With one hand on her hip for emphasis, she pointed the staff at her stubborn friend. “Astam,” she commanded.
Atahk didn’t obey, but hopped away from the end of the staff and flew to the nearest tree. Perched on a piece of rough bark a few feet above the base of the trunk, the bird cawed louder and flapped her wings with an intense ferocity.
Pamoon lowered her staff and eyed Atahk. “What are you trying to tell me?”
Atahk bowed her head, looking down and crowed again.
Pamoon’s eyes followed Atahk’s body language and spotted a hole at the base of the tree. Her pulse sped up as soon as she saw the hole, partially hidden by moss and dead pine needles. Her heart jumped as she recognized it for what it was. It was the same hole she’d seen etched on the cave wall, the opening into the netherworld. It wasn’t large, but it was big enough for a bird or skull to fly into and out of.
Pamoon retreated to the campsite where she gave Atahk a series of commands. The raven bobbed her head repeatedly before pecking her on the forehead and flying off.
Pamoon had her own plans to take care of. Sprinting, she ran through the woods until she reached the old airstrip that ran between the woods and Swamp Ridge. She didn’t stop until she was in the middle of town.
56
Final Plans
March 19, 1:00 p.m.
* * *
After spending time at the Swamp Ridge Farmers’ Market, Pamoon arrived back at White Eagle’s and found her uncle, Nuna, Tihk, and Powaw at the kitchen table waiting for her. She could see in their eyes that something bad had happened.
“What is it?”
“Hassun is missing,” Powaw answered.
“What! How?”
“After you left this morning, I went back to Machk’s to help him with Hassun. I found Machk unconscious.”
“And Hassun?”
Powaw said. “When Machk regained consciousness, he told me that after we left him, he heard Hassun screaming from the room where he was tied. When he opened the door, Hassun hit him over the head with a lamp.” Powaw looked at Tihk and then at Pamoon. “This next part is where I’m hoping you can help. Machk swore that just before he passed out, Hassun turned into black smoke and blew out the window.”
She glanced at Tihk, who gave her a quick nod. Turning toward Powaw, Pamoon took a deep breath and straightened her posture. “Machk wasn’t seeing things, Hassun had been bitten by Kanontsistonties or one of his . . . I don’t even know what to call them anymore, his followers, I guess. Anyway, after he was bitten Hassun became part evil spirit. All of the beasts we encountered in the woods, when defeated or hurt, transformed into black smoke—or mist—then disappeared.”
Pamoon watched as Tihk stood from the table and paced the kitchen. “Uncle,” he said, “are you sure that’s what Machk saw?”
“I am. We can call him if you’d like to hear it from him directly.”
Tihk shook his head and continued to pace.
“Why, what’s wrong?” Nuna asked. “As strange as this all is, don’t his actions mimic the others?”
Pamoon jumped out of her seat, eyes opened wide. “Oh my God,” she squealed. “No. No, they don’t” She looked at Tihk, who silently agreed.
“The two of you need to sit and tell us what has you both so worried,” Powaw said. “Then, together, we can work on a solution.”
Using one hand on the back of his chair, Tihk flipped it, and straddled the seat. “Everyone who has been bitten by Kanontsistonties has transformed into a mythological beast—”
“Except for Hassun,” Pamoon said, finishing his thought.
“That’s right,” Tihk said. “He remained in human form . . . but why?”
No one answered.
“There are two possible scenarios I can think of,” Tihk said, answering his own question. “The first is that his bite was weaker than the others, so his transformation wasn’t complete, but,” he hesitated and looked around the table before continuing, “I don’t think that’s what happened.”
“Why? It seems feasible,” Nuna commented.
“Because,” Pamoon interjected, “Hassun was able to leave the woods after he was bitten. No one else has.”
“That means the demon, Kanontsistonties, is growing stronger,” Tihk said. “His followers are evolving. We need to find Hassun before he infects others.”
White Eagle was on the phone before Tihk finished speaking. They waited in silence for him to finish. “The tribal council is calling a meeting with our neighboring Seminole brothers. Together, we will surround the woods with a twenty-four-hour watch. He won’t leave the woods.”
Pamoon heard his words but could almost hear the defeat in his tone. She reached across the table and squeezed his hand in hers. “I think I may have thought of a way to stop it. All of it.”
“How?” he asked.
“The old folktale of the chestnuts,” Pamoon said.
“You can’t be serious,” the chief sighed, raising his eyebrows.
“Kanontsistonties is too smart to fall for that again,” Powaw added, agreeing with White Eagle.
“I don’t need the demon to eat the hearthstone,” Pamoon said, “I just need the smell to lure him to the netherworld.”
“And then?” Nuna’s pitch was high.
Pamoon knew what was coming, but she wasn’t backing down. “And then I do w
hat I was born to do. I fulfil my destiny. The destiny written on that jacket.”
Pamoon watched Nuna’s skin start to flush. She knew frustration and resistance were bubbling up just below the surface. She braced herself for the eruption.
“You,” Nuna pointed at the men, “aren’t really going to let a sixteen-year-old girl who barely made it out of the woods alive descend into hell to fight the devil, are you!”
“It’s not the devil, Nuna, it’s—”
“A demon that no one has even seen and has been in existence since before time itself. Call it whatever you want,” Nuna hissed, her eyes wide, her nostrils flared. “But regardless of culture or religion, that thing,” she punched the air for emphasis, “is the epitome of evil, and that in any language is the devil.”
“This is our only hope,” Pamoon said, remaining calm.
Nuna knelt beside Pamoon’s chair and held her hands. “You don’t have to accept this mantle; destiny will choose another,” she mouthed. “Let destiny choose someone else.”
Pamoon choked down her own emotion and then slid her left hand out from Nuna’s grip. Holding her hand, palm up, she said, “This is what I have chosen. It’s what Kamenna would have chosen, and it’s what you would have chosen.”
Nuna refused to back down. “And if you fail? What then?”
“I won’t.”
“How do you know?”
Pamoon stood, grabbing the bag of chestnuts from her backpack, and smiled softly at her aunt. “Because I’m more than the Kiche, more than the Yee Naaldlooshii; I am Cree.”
* * *
For the next couple of hours, Pamoon readied herself for what was to come.
Tihk had left and when he returned she asked where he’d been.
“I had to stop home,” he answered, carrying a foot-long cylinder.
“What’s that?” she asked.
“Walk with me to the woods and I’ll explain.”
* * *
“How are your forearms?” Tihk asked as they stood at the edge of the reservation.
Pamoon leaned her staff against a tree, causing Atahk to jump onto her shoulder. “Sore,” she said, rubbing her arm with her opposite hand.
“Do your fingers cramp?”
“Yeah, how’d you know?”
“Mine did the same thing when I was in your place.”
“My place?”
“It’s another part of the story I was telling you. While I was incarcerated, Rowtag pulled some strings. I was granted weekend furloughs when he visited. He taught me to use the staff. I can still feel the ache and burn in my forearms from carrying that thing everywhere.”
Pamoon’s arms hurt more just listening to Tihk. When he held out his hands and wiggled his fingers, she placed her hand in his. While he massaged and kneaded the muscles in her forearm and bicep, he kept talking. “When White Eagle gave you this staff, what did he tell you?”
“That I should carry it everywhere. I was never to go anywhere or do anything without it.”
“Did you tell him it was too heavy?”
“Yeah, but,” Pamoon’s left eyebrow arched skyward as she studied him, trying to figure out where he was going with this line of questions, “he said I needed to learn how to control a heavy staff before I could control a lighter one.”
Having finished with the muscles in her second arm, Tihk asked, “How do they feel now?”
Pamoon raised her arms, moved her wrists in every direction and made a fist with both hands, “Better,” she smiled.
“Good.”
Tihk held the odd cylinder that he had brought with him at arms-length, perpendicular to his body. “This was a gift from Rowtag when I got out of juvie. Stand back, watch, and listen.”
Pamoon did as he asked without questioning his motives.
“When the chief gave you his staff, he told you that once you learned to control the weight, lighter ones would be easier to handle,” he said, basically repeating her words verbatim.
Pamoon nodded in response. “But isn’t that a little small for a staff?”
A slight smirk rose from Tihk’s steely expression. “Hold out your hands, palms up.”
Pamoon’s hands trembled as Tihk placed the cylinder in her hands. She began to close her hands around it, but was stopped.
“Keep your palms open.”
Her fingers stood at attention, pointing straight out from her hands.
“Hold it in the center with one hand, but keep your fingers relaxed,” he said.
Pamoon breathed deep, trying to relax. She wiggled her fingers, releasing the tension.
“Now,” Tihk continued, pointing to the cylinder, “you’ll see and feel a slight groove in the center of the staff.”
“Can I touch it?”
“You can.”
Pamoon gently held the rod with one hand and ran her fingers over the groove with the other. “This looks like wood, but feels different,” she said as she continued to examine the strange object.
“It’s made from carbon-fiber, designed by the military, I think. I modified it, just for you. Now, I want you to grip it in your right hand, with your middle finger over the groove.”
Pamoon did as she was told. “It’s so light, but I still don’t understand how this—”
“Under your pinky finger, do you feel a rough spot?”
Pamoon ran her little finger over the staff. “Yes.”
“Holding the weapon out in front of you as I did, squeeze that spot with your pinky.”
Pamoon did as instructed, and the cylinder sprung open on both ends until it was a full-length staff, five feet long. Perfect for her height. “Holy crap,” she screeched in surprise.
Tihk laughed at her reaction. “That was my reaction the first time I held it. Press that spot again and it will fold back.”
Pamoon squeezed with her finger again and the staff snapped back with such speed, she barely saw it. “Wow.”
“Open it again.”
She did.
“Now, using the same maneuvers you used when you took baton lessons, I want you to twirl the staff.”
Within minutes, Pamoon maneuvered the long staff as if it were a baton. Finished, she eyed Tihk. “This is great, but it’s so light, how is it used as a weapon?”
A wide smile rose from Tihk’s face. “Hold it out in front of you again. With your middle finger on the groove, you’ll find another rough spot under your thumb. This one will take a considerable amount of force to depress.”
Not sure what to expect, Pamoon gritted her teeth and squinted, applying pressure to the spot under her thumb. Doing so, she felt the spot compress. She barely heard an audible click, but didn’t see any changes in the staff. Her lips twisted in a look of confusion.
“Look at the ends of the staff.”
“Wow,” she uttered. At both ends of the staff were six-inch blades.
“Those are made of elk bone. Duel-edged, razor-sharp.” Before Pamoon could speak, Tihk asked her to squeeze both buttons. Doing so, the staff once again retracted into itself, becoming a benign, foot-long cylinder once again.
Tihk sat on the grass; Pamoon followed.
“I don’t know what you’ll encounter, but I’ll bet it won’t be what you expect.”
“Is this supposed to be a pep talk, because if it is, it’s not working?”
Tihk pulled his shiny, black hair back, and locked eyes with her. “Life—the life you’ve been given—can’t be lived by others’ standards. It must be lived by faith.”
“Great, now you’re talking in riddles,” Pamoon mumbled.
“No. Truth.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Tell me something,” Tihk said. “Every time you’ve been scared or confused during this ordeal, what has your initial thought been?”
Pamoon went back through the images now carved in her memory. “To ask Kise for help.”
“Kise?”
“What I call the Creator.”
Tihk threw his hea
d back and laughed. “Only you could get away with calling God by a nickname. Looking at her again, he continued his thought process. “When times seem impossible, and when we’re frightened, we look to the supernatural for help. Some call on God; you have come to call on Kise, the Creator.”
“Aren’t they both the same?”
His smile brightened. “You just learned what man has been arguing about since this world came into being. Although called by many names, the existential truth is that there is just one creative force. It takes many forms depending on the culture it is trying to reach, but the truth never changes.”
“It? Why did you just call God an ‘it’?”
“Because It’s too great to be anything else. He or She may appear human in our eyes, but It is pure spirit.”
Pamoon sat silently, trying to comprehend what Tihk was telling her.
“All faiths are based on a supernatural power—in your particular instance, the power of the Creator. It’s in this faith that our,” Tihk pointed to himself and then at her, “destinies lie.”
“So you’re saying that when I face whatever I am about to, call on the Creator for help?”
“I’m saying that you must face your destiny with the knowledge that you were created for that exact moment, and I’m not talking just about intellect and brawn, I’m talking about faith.”
Pamoon exhaled in an audible huff. “I’m not sure I understand.”
“You will when the time comes,” Tihk said, rising from the cold floor.
“And if I don’t?”
“You will.”
“How do you know?” she asked, more afraid than before.
“Because it’s who you are. You,” he pointed to her heart, “are the Kiche.”
Still confused, she stood along with Tihk.
“Some things can’t be explained; we just need to have—”
“Faith.”
Tihk nodded as he peered into the woods.
“This is as far as I go. Hold your staff in hand and your faith in heart.”
Pamoon walked away not understanding everything that was said, but trusting in what Tihk had told her.
