Valley of the Broken (Sage of Sevens Book 1)

by K. F. Baugh

  She buried her face against his chest and made herself memorize the feeling of this place in time, this moment of supreme peace and contentment. The steady thump of his heart against her cheek, the gentle rise and fall of his breath. An embrace that asked nothing of her, but only gave.

  Finally, when she couldn’t bear it any longer, she pulled away. As if by unspoken agreement, the two turned and started back toward her car. “Seems like you’re doing a good job getting all this closed down,” she forced out the words while wiping her eyes on her sleeve. “Making sure the bad guys get their due, right?”

  “It’s been pretty involved, but the sheriff and I are getting there. You’ll be interested to hear there were all sorts of incriminating documents in Storm’s hidden room where we found you. It was crazy to have them all in one place; he must have thought he was invincible. Information about the serum program, the pharmaceutical companies, the governments that were bankrolling it. And other older documents from when they bought the Sanitorium. Even some diaries from the original miners that first settled this valley.”

  “You mean the ones—”

  “Yep, and with documentation about the massacre. I’ve turned them over to the Navajo Nation and have spoken to Naomi Notah about it several times. She and I are coordinating a day of remembrance and mourning in Black Mills and working to create an exhibit about what happened for the local museum. I know she also has some lawyers working on suing what’s left of the Oriel Biological Research Station. It’s mostly symbolic since everyone and their dog is suing OBRS, but I think it’s a good thing.”

  Sage nodded. They were at the Jeep now. She leaned against the hood, and Tim did the same. “But what about you? You were already in bad shape when they brought you into my room. And then I thought you were dead when the Skinwalker … Storm threw you against the wall.”

  “I wasn’t doing well, but I pretended to be in worse shape than I really was. I thought maybe they’d let their guard down if they thought I was dying. Then, when Storm threw me, I guess it just knocked me out for a bit. I think I woke up not too long after he’d taken you. I pulled on some scrubs and just tried to follow the panicking staff and trail of bodies. When I found that room off the warehouse—” He fell silent, but continued after a moment. “When I found it, I wasn’t even sure what I was seeing at first. It looked like there had been some kind of explosion. You were covered in ash. And feathers. You were barely breathing. What happened?”

  “I’m not entirely sure.” Sage paused. “Did Sheriff Davis tell you anything?”

  “No,” Tim answered. “He said I needed to ask you.”

  Sage nodded and tried to sort the memories that bombarded her. “Were the children unharmed?”

  “Yes,” Tim answered. “They’d been kidnapped from a family who was staying in a vacation cabin nearby.”

  “Do they seem too traumatized?” Sage shuddered. She couldn’t imagine the things they’d seen.

  “Well, Sheriff Davis talked with them through a lot of what they saw. He was there too and able to help them try to make sense of it all. It seemed to help, but I’m sure they’ll need more. But at least they’re alive. And with their family.”

  “Did you destroy everything you found in the lab?”

  “We tried to,” Tim said. “But when Sheriff Davis and I got into town with the twins, they took them straight to the hospital. Olson and his goons obviously knew they needed to mop up as quickly as possible. They threw me in jail for a couple of days before Davis was cognizant enough to take back over the case. Olson was arrested by the FBI soon after, but by the time we got to the lab, some of the things had disappeared. Now the Feds are working to track everything down and contain it.”

  Sage thought of the super-serum Storm had been looking at right before his death, the one created from her DNA and shivered. “I hope they do.”

  The Wind rustled between them, and Sage felt a gentle tug at her hand. “Guess I should head out.”

  “Where will you go?”

  “Wherever the Wind leads me,” she answered.

  Tim hesitated, then cupped her cheek with his warm, rough palm. “Can I ask you one more thing?”

  Sage nodded.

  “Promise me we’ll meet again?”

  A soft gust whispered in the pines around them, and Sage listened. “I promise.”

  “I’ll keep an eye out for Gus. Something tells me we haven’t seen the last of him,” Tim said as he opened the door.

  Sage shook her head and looked down. “I think he’s gone, Tim. But there’s been a lot of surprises this week, so I guess anything’s possible.”

  Sage climbed into the Jeep. She reached her hand out the window and Tim clasped it. “Bless me, Father.”

  “Go in peace,” Tim whispered before releasing her.

  Sage smiled and drove away. She watched Tim, illuminated in the moonlight until he finally disappeared. Then, she took a deep breath and gunned her engine down the forest lined road.

  <<<<>>>

  Can’t wait to know what happens to Sage,

  Tim and Gus? Enjoy this preview from

  Book Two of the Sage of Sevens Series.

  Desert of the Damned

  by

  K. F. Baugh

  Look for Desert of the Damned Fall 2018.

  Desert of the Damned Chapter One

  Backlit sandy granules spread out in a vast sea of iridescence, enveloping Sage in a shimmering haze of heat and light. The sun grew impossibly large as it began its final descent over the desert’s western horizon. A light breeze peppered her face with loose sand as she trudged across the slickrock plateau. The Earth took a deep breath of anticipation, knowing the crippling heat of daytime would soon be replaced by night’s gentle temperatures.

  Sage paused to watch the distant desert arch shift color from fiery red to glowing orange and then gentle gray-brown - a kaleidoscope of change that filled only the space of several heartbeats. The transient hues seemed almost magical in their ebb and flow; it wasn’t a stretch to imagine some otherworldly creature stepping through the space below the arch. Sage wrapped her arms around herself and shivered.

  A piercing cry sounded from behind her, and she turned to study the eagles that glided above her on the thermals. It was their last chance to get a meal before the light disappeared and their feathered cousins, the owls, took over.

  Faint starlight now pricked the deepening blue-black of the evening sky. Sage sighed and tightened her backpack. There wasn’t much time before the darkness was complete. Night fell much more quickly in the desert than in the mountains. She needed to find a place to shelter overnight.

  Sage trotted down the backside of the slickrock ridge, careful not to slip on the smooth, compacted sand. The desert floor lay a good thirty feet below her. The fall wouldn’t kill her, but it wouldn’t be pleasant either. The last part of her descent became a scramble. She moved down the face of the ridge with the aid of tiny finger and toe holds, muscles weary from a full day of hiking. Finally, she dropped to the desert floor and collapsed into the shade-cooled sand of the small arroyo.

  Her fingers burrowed their way into the fine sand. The disrupted granules briefly released the cool, sharp scent of moisture. Sage rolled to her stomach and crawled along the edge of the canyon wall until she found an overhang and eased her way underneath it. Once her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she spotted what she was looking for. There, beneath the lip of a large bolder, the sand glistened with the telltale darkness of a desert seep.

  Sage crawled over and dug deep in the damp sand until she had hollowed out a small basin. Easing her way out from the overhang, she removed her backpack and settled against a gently sloped rock. A small groan escaped her as she stretched her aching legs across the still warm sand. It would be at least half an hour before the basin to filled with enough water for her canteen.

  Hunger replaced fatigue, and Sage rummaged in the bottom of the backpack for several moments before she found the last of her ratio
ns: a crushed, crumbly granola bar and small bag of Inca corn. She returned them to the pack, knowing they would go down her parched throat much easier once she had a few swallows of water.

  Something rustled in the scrub grass to her right. Turning, Sage tried to focus on the source of the sound. After a moment, revelation came. Her mind’s eye quickly conjured the image of a small whiptail lizard burrowing its way into the warm sand before the desert temperatures dropped. She scanned the rest of her surroundings. Besides a few other lizards and a harmless rat snake, the arroyo was deserted.

  Using the backpack as a pillow, she curled up against the large rock. Sage tried to find something to focus on, but no matter how hard she fought, exhaustion dragged her by the hand. She shifted to a more comfortable position, but it was hopeless. A tear slipped down her cheek. Maybe she was finally tired enough that the dreams wouldn’t come.

  Oblivion tugged at her senses, but the dream was right there, waiting. A harrowing no-man’s land she would have to pass through before being allowed the sweet release of deep, dreamless sleep. As she wrestled with exhaustion, trying to stay awake, Sage wondered which version of the familiar nightmare would assault her tonight.

  It always started with her driving Elena’s car through the canyon. Heart racing, she knew that any minute the Skinwalker would jump on top of the roof and rip it off. In some versions of the dream, none of them survived; in others, all of them did. Those were the worst. She’d wake up, filled with relief that Gus was still alive. Then reality would break into her euphoria, and the depth of loss became a sudden, crushing weight. Gus, gone. Her home with Liddy in Black Mills, gone. Even her complicated friendship with Tim, gone.

  Finally, the relentless need for sleep overpowered her, and Sage ceased to struggle against its terrible embrace.

  Sage wrestled the steering wheel, trying to keep the speeding car on the narrow mountain road. After a quick glance at the passenger seat, she saw that Gus sat there instead of Tim.

  Gus was safe. Her mind struggled to understand why this filled her with a rush of relief, but she couldn’t find the answer. Something rattled on the roof. Sage glanced in the rearview mirror and saw the Skinwalker. Terror replaced the joy of moments before.

  “Gus, listen to me. We only have a few seconds before the yee--”

  “No, you listen to me,” Gus interrupted with something between a whine and a rumble. “We don’t have much time.”

  “I know,” Sage cried, “but I can’t stop the car. The breaks don’t work. They never work.” How did she know this?

  She glanced at Gus, and he wagged his tail reassuringly. “I miss being your guardian, but you don’t need me anymore.” “What are you talking about? Of course, I need you!” Sage felt a white-hot rage course through her. “You’re my best friend.”

  “It is time for you to find others like you. Suffering ones. The Wind will show you--” “The Wind?” Sage snarled, barely recognizing her voice. “All of this is because of the Wind. If I hadn’t listened, if you and I had run away again, none of this would have happened.”

  Gus glanced out the window. “That’s not true. You have been on this path since the night we died.”

  “What?” Sage cried, jerking the steering wheel to keep from going off the road. “What do you mean, the night we died?”

  Gus placed a soft paw on her leg. “Is it really a surprise? You know what happened the night your family died. How could we have survived that?”

  Sage blinked and suddenly, the car was gone. A large fire burned before her, illuminating a voluminous, smoke-stained cave. She sat in a circle with a handful of other people, all of them rocking to the repetitive hum echoing through the chamber. They wore feathered capes and buff-colored wrappings. Geometric black markings adorned their arms and faces. All but one of them had their eyes closed in some sort of trance.

  An ancient man with obsidian eyes, the only one not caught up in the ecstatic moment, gazed at her from across the fire. “It’s coming.” His voice rumbled like Gus’s, but no one except Sage seemed to hear him.

  “What’s coming?” Sage whispered.

  “The end of this world.” The wrinkles that wreathed his face sagged in sorrow. With his chin, he gestured to the far side of a cave and the source of the strange humming. A figure with a gigantic horned mask danced in the shadows.

  “What?” Sage watched as the figure drew closer and saw that heavy turquoise necklaces wreathed the dancer’s neck. Bright copper bells jingled as he danced. The hum turned into a wavering cry, sending tingles down her spine.

  “If their thirst is not slaked, we all die. They will swallow us all.”

  As the dancer’s voice rose to a shout, he pulled a jagged knife from the folds of his skirt. Sage leapt to her feet. The masked figured turned toward her, and its luminescent eyes paralyzed her with their gaze.

  Then she was back on the canyon floor, huddled next to her backpack. Asleep, yet awake at the same time. She felt Gus’s warmth along the length of her back, lying next to her as he always had during her nightmares as a child.

  “I don’t want you to go,” she whispered and felt Gus shift. He lay his head on her shoulder, and his warm breath tickled her ear.

  “I know. But for now, sleep and be at peace. You will need your strength.”

  Appendix

  While Valley of the Broken is entirely fictional, one of the events the story revolves around is unfortunately not. The terrible tragedy of the Navajo Long Walk did happen and has left a scar on the history of the Southwest. The relationship between American Indians and the United States Government has always been complex, and this region of the country was no different. During the middle 1800s, things went from bad to worse between the settlers migrating from the East and the many tribes and nations that lived in the Southwest.

  Under their leader, Manuelito, a large group of Navajo began to raid throughout the New Mexico territory in the 1850s and 60s. This was to protest the newly erected Fort Defiance, which was within the boundaries of Navajo territory. A full-blown conflict was close to erupting when the Civil War started. The need for Union soldiers drew attention and the military away from the Western United States. With most of the soldiers gone, the Navajo and Mescalero Apache increased their raids even more.

  Eventually, this drew some attention despite the Civil War. In 1862, General James H. Carleton was put in charge of the army in New Mexico and ordered to bring security back into the region. With the help of the well-known guide and Indian agent Kit Carson, Carleton decided to confront the Mescalero Apache first. They soon surrendered and were told to move to Bosque Redondo, a remote settlement that was later named Fort Sumner. Carleton told the Apache that they would be allowed to return to their original homes in the future but went back on this promise. Instead, the Apache became forced workers. It was their job to transform the area around Fort Sumner into a huge system of farms. Even though most of them had never farmed before, they were told to create irrigation systems, agricultural fields, and permanent homes.

  Once the Apache were sent to Fort Sumner, Carleton created another military settlement, Fort Wingate. This fort was on the eastern border of the Navajo territory. He then met with Navajo leaders and demanded a complete surrender and that all the Navajo people move to Bosque Redondo. This would require a journey of 400 miles away from their plains homeland and into the arid highlands of New Mexico. Not only that, the Navajo would have to live in a community with their traditional enemies, the Apache.

  The Navajo leaders rejected the plan, so Carlton built yet another fort, Fort Canby, in June 1863. It was also located in Navajo territory. From this home base, Carson and his group of 700 men were ordered to ruthlessly harass the Navajo people. Carson told his soldiers to shoot Navajo men who did not peacefully surrender. They were also ordered to take all women and children into captivity, to destroy crops, and kill or capture livestock. The Navajo still refused to surrender, so Carleton told Carson to strike in the heart of the Navajo ter
ritory, Cañon de Chelly. Here Carson’s men were ordered to destroy crops, orchards, livestock, food stockpiles, and homes.

  This brutal campaign chipped away at the resilience of the Navajo people, especially as winter hit. By early winter of 1864, 3,000 Navajos had surrendered to Carson and his men. First, the captives were sent to Forts Wingate and Canby. While there, 126 of them died from dysentery and exposure. This was followed by a forced march of 2,000 Navajo people across New Mexico to Fort Sumner, an event now known as the “Long Walk.” Many Navajo, especially the elderly, the sick, and the young, died along the route.

  The first forced march was followed by another in April. This time, another 2,400 Navajo were forced to walk to Bosque Redondo during heavy blizzards and terrible conditions. Again, many died. One account in Navajo Stories of the Long Walk Period tells the tragic end of one pregnant Navajo woman:

  It was said that those ancestors were on the Long Walk with their daughter, who was pregnant and about to give birth … The daughter got tired and weak and couldn't keep up with the others or go further because of her condition. So my ancestors asked the Army to hold up for a while and to let the woman give birth, but the soldiers wouldn't do it. [One] soldier told the parents that they had to leave their daughter behind. "Your daughter is not going to survive, anyway; sooner or later she is going to die," [he] said ... "Go ahead," the daughter said to her parents, "things might come out all right with me.” But the poor thing was mistaken, my grandparents used to say. Not long after they had moved on, they heard a gunshot from where they had been a short time ago.

  The refugees’ worries were not over once they arrived at the camp. It became immediately clear that there wasn’t enough food or supplies to support so many soldiers, Navajo, and Apache. Both tribes lived in near-starvation for the entire winter and spring.