The Iron Druid Chronicles 6-Book Bundle

by Kevin Hearne

  “Why does the language matter at all? Speaking to them is all emotions and images anyway.”

  “Again, each language is a different headspace; it patterns your thinking and gives it a unique signature. So once you make contact with an elemental in a certain headspace, that’s what they become attuned to. For Sonora and Ferris, you’ll always need to think in English. But if you stick with English as you meet new elementals, you’ll unconsciously start to call them when you’d rather not—they’ll pick up on your thoughts when you’re angry or overly excited and wonder if you’re talking to them. And it won’t be long before you’ll start to annoy them.”

  “Oh. What language do you use when you speak to elementals?”

  “I use Latin. Since it’s a dead language, the pattern of my thoughts doesn’t change with the popular culture. But you can use Greek or Russian or whatever you’d like.”

  “Latin sounds good,” she said, and I gave her a nod of approval. She was progressing well with her Latin. And in … zeal, I guess. I don’t know how else to put it. She was different somehow since my return from Asgard, but I couldn’t pin the tail on the donkey named Why. We had found very little time to talk about anything except what might have happened to Mrs. MacDonagh and how we would survive the vengeance of the Norse. I had probably spent more time than I should have brooding in silence over both problems. Circumstances had hardly allowed me to conduct Granuaile’s training peacefully or, indeed, in any way conducive to shaping a mind for Druidry.

  An unwashed, bearded phantom of my memory rose to scold me, a loaf of bread in one hand and a yew staff in the other, his wee, beady eyes glaring at me from under grizzled brows. It was my archdruid, who I’d assumed was dead these many centuries past but still lived on in one sense as a rather loud voice in my head. His staff blurred, and I could almost feel the pain of one of his sharp raps to the skull: “Pay attention, Siodhachan!” he said. “You’re cocking it up again!”

  He was right. But Granuaile’s training would have to stay on my back burner until I could finish cooking what Coyote had ordered. We stopped at the base of the mesa and sat down, yoga style. Oberon stretched out and panted, his tongue lolling to one side.

  “I’ll have to spend a bit of time working at this,” I explained.

  Granuaile squinted up at the sky to check the sun—a routine precaution for the fair-skinned living in Arizona, who must live in fear of crispy skin—and saw that a thin layer of stretched cotton clouds diffused the January sun’s weak rays. She gave a short nod.

  “All right. I have plenty more Latin to learn,” she said. “I’ll go get my laptop out of the car. But before I do, I need to ask: How much can you tell me about the Blessing Way ceremony?”

  It was a difficult question, and I frowned before offering up a disclaimer. “I’m not an expert on this. More like a vaguely informed outsider.”

  “Good enough. I’m clueless.”

  “Well, first you have to understand that the training period for a hataałii is even longer than that for a Druid. We’re talking twenty years or more. There’s lots of memorization, lots of practice, lots of collecting the proper materials for the rituals. So what does that tell you about Frank?”

  “He’s probably smarter than me and ten times more patient.”

  “Heh! I think he might be wiser; let’s say that. And I bet he knows more about the medicinal properties of native plants than I do. But you probably nailed the patience thing. Some of that comes with age.” I took a breath to order my thoughts before I continued. “Okay. There are many different kinds of these ceremonies. The Blessing Way is an entire branch of ritual practice. The Navajo word for it is hózhji. You can perform the Blessing Way on a mother and her newborn, for example, or on a soldier going to war, or you can bless a building and make it holy, like Frank is going to do. There’s also the Enemy Way, which is used to get rid of evil influence—or on people who have been away from the tribe a long time and need to reconnect to their roots. But what all the ceremonies have in common are songs and prayers, which call to the Holy People, remind people of their origins, and bring them into harmony with the universe. Often there’s a sandpainting of the Holy People to help things along—it’s the only time they’re allowed to depict the Holy People visually, so all those sandpaintings the tourists buy are just art for art’s sake; they’re not anything of religious significance. They have a word in their language, hózh, which encompasses everything good, and we simply translate to ‘blessing.’ But it’s beauty, peace, harmony, order, good health, happiness, and more. I should probably add that there is also another branch of practice, called the Witchery Way, that turns everything on its head—let’s hope we don’t run into anyone practicing that. So Frank is going to lead the Blessing Way, but you’ll see it’s not a tremendously formal occasion where people are bowing their heads and kneeling as some old crone leans down on a pipe organ to fill the air with a sense of piety. People will be talking or eating while he’s singing. They’ll be socializing and filling the place with love. That’s all part of it. And we can do that too—we’ll just stay out of Frank’s way as he does his thing.” I intended to watch him carefully. The magic in his aura indicated that he wasn’t an average hataałii—but, then, I shouldn’t have expected anyone average to be in the company of Coyote.

  “Sounds good. Thanks, sensei. I’ll let you do your thing now.” Her footsteps crunched away behind me and Oberon sighed.

  What’s the matter, buddy?

 

  You poor, poor doggie. So take a nap.

 

  Why don’t you conduct another experiment?

 

  Perhaps you should explain what you’re trying to accomplish. I don’t understand how you’re contributing to human knowledge.

 

  Well, that’s quite a leap—

 

  I sighed. You can go harass the construction workers if you want. I even give you permission to sniff their asses.

  Oberon stopped panting and pricked up his ears at me.

  Sure, why not? They’re construction workers. They’ll tease one another about it, especially if you sneeze afterward. But if you startle them, they might knock you upside the head, so watch out.

  Oberon levered himself off the ground, his tail wagging.

  No problem. He trotted away, leaving me alone to establish contact with the local elemental. We were on the Colorado Plateau, a large region stretching across four states, so I had already assigned it the name of Colorado in my mind. I took a deep breath, put myself in that Latin headspace, and sent a message through the tattoos that bound me to the earth: //Druid greets Colorado / Wishes health / Harmony//

  There was a long pause before I got an answer. I was getting ready to repeat my greeting when it came. //Colorado greets Druid / Welcome//

  I frowned at the short rejoinder. Elementals aren’t talkative as a rule—they don’t talk at all, really, I simply do my best to render their images into words—but Colorado sounded reticent, perhaps even a bit surly. Usually elementals are overjoyed to hear from me. They tell me to relax, ask me to hunt, wish me harmony, and so on.

  //Query: Health? / Harmony?//

  //None// came the reply.

  Well, shit. I tried to remember the last time I�
��d spoken to this elemental and came up blank. I knew I’d traveled through here with Coronado and Don García López de Cárdenas in the sixteenth century, but after that … This might be my first visit since. I wondered if elementals felt jealousy. Might Colorado be feeling petulant because I’d spent so much of the past decade talking to Sonora, Kaibab, and the other elementals of Arizona, but not to him?

  //Query: Source of discord?//

  Deafening silence. Yep. Colorado was having an elemental hissy fit. Emergency flattery needed.

  //Druid happy here / Will stay for long visit / Find harmony//

  That got a response. //Query: Druid will stay?//

  //Yes / Druid visits for long time//

  //Query: How long?//

  Damn it. Promising a lengthy stay would get me quickly into his good graces, but I didn’t know what I could promise anymore. Still, provided that the Norse and the rest of the world believed me dead, the reservation would be a good place to stay and complete Granuaile’s training. I chose a happy turn of phrase. //Druid wants to stay forty seasons / Perhaps more//

  Wanting wasn’t the same as promising.

  //Joy / Contentment / Harmony// Colorado said.

  //Harmony// I agreed. Ice broken. Granuaile returned and sat down beside me as Colorado took great delight in showering me with a list of complaints. He’d had less than average rainfall the past few years, his water tables were getting dangerously low, and to make matters supremely irritating there was the matter of the coal mines, which not only opened wounds on his surface but exacerbated the water problem.

  And since he’d last seen me, he’d suffered fifteen extinctions. Not nearly so many as other elementals, not by a long shot, but he mourned them no less. I commiserated with him throughout the afternoon and into the evening before asking him to do anything. The sun had headed off to bed early, the workers had all headed back to Kayenta, and Oberon was napping next to Coyote by the time I wondered if he’d help me build a road from the plateau floor to the top of the monocline.

  A graded slope for his long-lost Druid buddy? Hey, no problem! Colorado couldn’t wait to show off, and he knocked it out in about a minute, amid a great clash of rocks and dirt that woke Oberon and Coyote and roused Granuaile from the campfire she’d built some distance away. Coyote was now in his animal form, and he began to yip in amusement at how quickly the road took shape.

  “It’s too bad I can’t build shit,” I told him. “Because now you’ll have to explain how this got here without me.”

  Coyote fell over laughing and howled, and Oberon regarded him with bemusement.

  he asked.

  No, Coyote just appreciates a good trick. He put me on the spot earlier and now I’ve turned it against him. How did the ass-sniffing go?

 

  I thanked Colorado for his wonderful work and told him we would speak again in the morning. I’d be hanging around and training an apprentice, and I was counting on him to help me teach her about the earth’s needs. He was nearly overwhelmed with gratitude and pride at this news and said it was the best day he’d had in centuries.

  While I’d been in a trancelike state all afternoon, paying full attention to Colorado, Granuaile had slipped away to town and come back with a few groceries. She had a basic grill propped over the fire, thanks to a couple of rocks, and she was making hamburgers sprinkled with garlic powder. In a cast-iron skillet resting on one half of the grill, she sautéed mushrooms and onions in olive oil.

  Oberon said.

  I think she knows that already, but I will tell her. I was used to watching Oberon’s diet and unbinding the caffeine in his tea, but he was conscientious about keeping track of his allergies in case I missed something.

  Coyote shifted to his human form and chuckled. “That was pretty good, Mr. Druid. But why’d it take ya so long? Woulda been better to do it when ever’one was still here.”

  “You got a completely solid road made to the top of that mesa in less than a day and you’re complaining about how long it took?”

  “Ain’t complainin’,” Coyote said. “Just sayin’ your timing coulda been better.”

  “I’ll remember for next time, Mr. Benally.”

  Coyote told us stories after we ate—some of them old, like his encounter with Horned Toad and with Bluebird, and some of them new, like teaming up with Rattlesnake to scare a traveler who’d stopped on the roadside to relieve himself.

  After I told a story about my involvement at the Battle of Kalka River, and Oberon shared how he’d landed on that rescue ranch in Massachusetts where I’d found him, we were ready to hit the sack. Said sacks were in Granuaile’s car; she’d stowed sleeping bags in there in preparation for this road trip, because we knew at some point we’d be staying outdoors. Granuaile hauled them out, I used a wee bit of power to smooth out the ground, and we stretched out for the night. Coyote took his canine form and curled up with Oberon near the fire, and Oberon was so pleased by this that he completely forgot that he was ahead in our little game and neglected to declare victory. That meant I might be able to catch up tomorrow. I couldn’t wait to see how Coyote explained the road in the morning.

  He disappointed me. To my chagrin, he brazenly, baldly lied about it. “It’s always been there,” he said, when Darren Yazzie asked how in the world we’d built a road overnight. Sophie Betsuie chimed in and said, no, it wasn’t there yesterday, she remembered talking about it. And then Coyote turned everything into a dominance game.

  “You callin’ me a liar?” he said, a threatening growl in his voice. And that’s all it took, because he was the boss.

  Sophie wanted to call him a liar, bless her heart, but she couldn’t. But she wouldn’t cave and say he wasn’t a liar either. She just turned around and walked away, making her position clear without saying anything.

  Coyote shot a smirk at me. He hadn’t been made the least bit uncomfortable by the situation. We were allies, sure, but he was also intent on getting the better of me whenever he could.

  Now that the road was there, work trucks brought up lumber to build a large hogan. They were building it semi-traditionally, with a hard-packed dirt floor, but in terms of construction, they were going a decidedly modern route by bringing up a small crane to get the logs placed quickly—they’d already been cut and sized, kit style.

  Frank Chischilly began singing some of the traditional songs; as the posts were placed in clockwise, beginning at the east, he sang to them. He had unrolled his jish for the Blessing Way, a buckskin medicine bundle containing everything he would need for the ceremony. Much of it he left untouched for now, but there were rattles and feathers, some stones, and tiny pouches that contained herbs and pollens, colored clays, and sand for sandpaintings.

  I watched him do his routine at the southern post in the magical spectrum. Nothing unusual happened until he finished, and then a brief flash of white light appeared along the ground between the eastern post and the southern post. It faded quickly, and I had no idea what it signified other than some magical energy had been expended there. I didn’t think that was normal for hataałiis; Frank was something extra.

  I placed myself at Darren Yazzie’s disposal and helped out, and we got everything framed up with a couple of hours of sunlight left. We still needed to insulate it and put something on the roof besides plastic sheeting, but the structure was up and looking good. Granuaile was excited, because Frank would continue the Blessing Way that night and she’d be able to observe more closely. She’d spent most of the day on her Latin and trying to keep Oberon entertained.

  As Darren’s crew was moving all the big equipment into a hastily fenced area for the evening, the hataałii was standin
g at the top of the road, about thirty yards away from the hogan site, nursing a bottle of water and looking down at the floor of the plateau. He called to us hoarsely, his eyes fixed on something to the north. Granuaile, Coyote, and I jogged over to him, but Oberon got there first. His hackles rose and he began to growl at whatever he saw.

 

  Why? Who’s there? Moralltach was stored in Granuaile’s car below. I wasn’t ready for a fight. But as I drew even with Oberon and put a calming hand on the back of his neck, the blood drained from my face when I saw a lone figure limping toward us across the dry red rock. It looked like a little old lady, and she could not have been more out of place; it was like watching Elmo ride in to the Sturgis biker rally in South Dakota.

  Granuaile joined us a moment later and gasped. “How did she find us?”

  “You know her?” Frank asked. “Coming from the north like that, it’s a bad omen. An’ I can tell from here she’s got an awful bad vibe.” I took note of that; if he was speaking literally, then he must possess some sort of rudimentary magical sight.

 

  Coyote squinted at her and agreed. “That ain’t a little old lady.”

  “I used to know her,” I admitted. “She’s supposed to be dead.”

  Frank spat on the ground. “You sayin’ she’s a zombie or some crazy shit like that?”

  “Not a zombie, but some crazy shit? Yeah, I think she qualifies.”

  “You ain’t really a geologist, are ya, Mr. Collins?” Frank asked in a wry tone. He had a sideways grin on his face, one of those looks that said he expected me to lie and that he wasn’t going to be fooled—or offended—if I did. If he could see something magical about the widow, then he could certainly see that I wasn’t an average Joe. So I didn’t try to pretend. It was all Coyote’s story anyway.