by Joy Nash
Chapter Twelve
The song demanded everything, more than Balek could give. He needed others to tend it, men and women who would give their lives. When they were bound to the melody, it would never end.
He found it easy to enslave. Easy, because those he snared did not wish to be free. The webstone gathered all in its embrace.
Each conquered soul strengthened the song.
The fire danced in the clearing, throwing shadows into the treetops. The women—daughters, mothers, grandmothers—gathered close. Gina stood between Zera and Rahza, fingering her wildflower pendant. Derrin’s gift helped her feel less foreign, and she was grateful for it.
The other women and girls wore similar tokens—pendants, bracelets or hair ornaments. Zera’s were the most striking. A pair of bracelets, carved as snakes, circled her forearms. Their eyes, translucent yellow stones, gleamed in the firelight.
A festive mood prevailed. Women who had lived their entire lives together laughed and chattered. Lanya, nestled in Rahza’s arms, was the youngest among them. Gina could only guess how many winters the elders had seen. One of the wrinkled crones stood nearby, conversing in low tones with a woman and a teenager, the same girl who had tended Zera’s toddler.
The trio approached Zera. “My granddaughter is a woman,” the elder said. “Her first blood flows with the new moon.”
Zera brought her palm to her forehead and bowed to the old woman. Then she smiled and embraced the girl. “I rejoice with you, Shayla. Your woman’s power cannot be contained, but must be released with each moon. When you accept the seed of your partner, your power will become so great a new life will emerge from your body.”
Shayla’s mother stepped forward and placed what appeared to be a loop of rope over the girl’s head. The circlet, an odd twisted braid, fell over Shayla’s shoulders.
“What is it?” Gina whispered to Rahza, who stood nearby.
“The cord that joined Shayla to Deehna in the womb. It can never truly be severed. When a boy is born, the cord is buried. A girl’s cord is braided with rawhide and returned when her first blood flows.”
A fine tremor shook Rahza’s voice, drawing Gina’s attention. Tears lay glistening on the Baha’Na woman’s cheeks. She clutched the bundle that held her tiny niece.
Gina touched her arm. “You want a daughter.”
“Does not every woman? I love my sons with all that I am, but when they are grown they will seek homes with another clan. Running Fox and I hoped our next child would be a daughter, but now…” She pressed her cheek against Lanya’s downy head. “I have my sister’s daughter—I love her as my own.”
“You still may have a daughter someday. I mean, you’re very young…” Gina inwardly cursed her tactlessness.
Rahza gave her a small smile. “Perhaps I will join again with another. Wading Heron has been courting me, though he knows I still mourn the loss of my partner. It will be some time before I am ready to love again in that way.” She paused. “It was much the same when Derrin left.”
A flood of emotions burst upon Gina at the mention of Derrin’s name. Memory poured through her. The exquisite pull of his lips, the pulsing heat of his touch. She shifted, suddenly restless. She’d wanted more, so much more that it terrified her.
He’d backed off. Why? Why had he kissed her at all if he wasn’t going to finish what he’d started?
Maybe he’d wanted her to pursue him. The thought made her go cold. She’d chased a man once before, given him her heart and the promise of a life together. Michael had thrown it away for a quick screw. Gina wasn’t eager to put herself in such a vulnerable position again.
Besides, Derrin had vowed to send her home. He’d made it clear more than once there was no place for her in his world. Her very presence was sickening his homeland. One kiss hadn’t changed that fact.
Night fell, drawing the shadows inward. Several girls threw more wood on the fire. Tongues of flame shot hissing into the sky. Small children scrambled back, to hover at their mothers’ knees. Rahza, like the other women who carried infants, secured Lanya in a snug sling, leaving her hands free.
Sparks darted past, vanishing into darkness. Zera stepped forward and raised her arms. The talisman on her headdress gleamed. Her snake armlets seemed to hiss.
She threw her clear voice into the gathering. “We stand together before our Mother. Of her, all are born. To her, all return.”
Rahza grasped Gina’s hand and lifted it. The woman on Gina’s right did the same, as did all the women, forming an unbroken circle around the fire. Waves of smoke and heat rolled over Gina. She fought a sudden dizziness.
Zera threw her head back and let out a loud cry—a rich primal note that pierced Gina’s brain, scattered her thoughts. An instant later, the clanswomen joined Zera’s call.
The chant ran through Gina’s body like a jolt of electricity. It continued, unbroken, a single note repeated over and over by each voice, the whole never fading, always strong. Gina added her own voice to the cry.
The call caught her in the center of its energy and lifted her into the wind. She shut her eyes and gripped the hands of the women on either side, her heart pounding in her ears. The voices grew louder.
Then, abruptly, silence.
Gina opened her eyes and looked down on the clearing. The circle of women danced around the fire, framed by the treetops. Zera stood with her arms raised and her head flung back. She clasped the heads of two live, writhing serpents.
Gina blinked, dazed, trying to understand. Her gaze found Rahza, then herself, far below on the ground. Yet she felt no fear. Instead, a sparkling euphoria embraced her. The women danced, swirling and leaping around the fire. Their lips moved, but Gina couldn’t hear their song. Silence still surrounded her, deep and fathomless.
She watched herself spin around, then suddenly she was there, in the midst of the women, dancing, and the wild song was on her own lips. Pure joy burst from deep within her and spilled into the night, into the flames.
Hours later, when the fire had burned low, Gina lay in the warm embrace of the earth and listened to the soft breath of the women around her. A breeze touched her face. She looked up into a sky hung with more stars than she’d ever imagined. She drifted to sleep, carried on the love of her sisters.
* * * * *
Zera slipped through the forest, making her way to a hidden place she loved, where a stream spilled into a deep pool. Lanya whimpered in her sling.
“Almost there, my little one.”
It was a rare moment when Zera could be truly alone with her babe, away from the call of the people who depended on her. But a Na’lara needed silence, needed to take herself away from time to time. Zera learned this as a girl, from her grandmother, but had not understood. Why would she wish to go apart? She loved people, loved to be with them, loved the talk of the women and the laughter of the men.
But now, Grandmother lived beyond the veil and Zera better understood her wisdom. She could not show the face of the Goddess to the clan unless she sought strength in silence.
It was, in a way, her most difficult duty.
She had left the other women in the hour before dawn. Her daughter would not disturb her meditation, and the little one needed feeding as much as Zera needed to feed her.
Her breasts were hard and aching by the time she settled on the sandy bank. Lanya waved her fists and howled. Zera loosened the neckline of her dress and guided the small mouth to her dripping brown nipple, letting out a sigh of relief when Lanya latched on. The milk tingled and flowed. Her daughter’s small mouth worked furiously to keep up.
The familiar rush of peace washed over her. She gazed at Lanya’s bright eyes, focused in unblinking concentration as she concentrated on her meal with single-minded determination. A smile played on Zera’s lips. She brushed her finger over the babe’s silky dark hair and felt her love flow with her milk.
Lanya drained one breast then continued feeding, a little less urgently, on the other side. Soon after,
her eyes closed and the sucking slowed. The nipple slid out of her mouth, spilling white drops across her small chin. With a sigh, Lanya settled her cheek on the pillow of her mother’s breast and sank into a heavy slumber.
Zera’s thoughts turned to Derrin. He had spent so many seasons among the Outsiders, and had changed in a way she didn’t understand. A man of the Baha’Na would never ask her to call the power of the talisman. True, six Na’lara stood at the edge of the Circle, but the Center was empty. The Seventh was lost. The veil could not be lifted. The web could not be called.
Yet last night Zera had seen a vision in the night shadows. Derrin did not need the aid of the Circle—he would open the web himself and Gina would cross.
Why would the Goddess bring Gina to the People only to take her away so soon? Zera pondered the question. She found no answer, but she did not question the wisdom of the Mother. And she would not let Derrin’s tales of waste in the Outside Lands frighten her.
The People lived in the heart of the Goddess. Nothing else mattered. Zera was sure of it.
* * * * *
A high-pitched wail, a woman’s voice, pierced the air. Gina froze in the act of unpacking a rawhide pouch, her body tightening with instinctive horror.
Zera’s gourd bucket thudded to the ground, spilling its contents onto the earthen floor of the hut. Rahza stifled a cry, her palm pressed against her lips.
Outside, in the village, a second wail joined the first. Lanya, disturbed, whimpered in protest.
“What… What is it?”
“The death song.” Rahza’s voice came in a trembling whisper.
Lanya let out a howl. Zera, half-dazed, moved to the cradle and lifted the infant into her arms. “Someone has died,” she said, looking into her daughter’s face. “One of the men, or the boys… We must go.”
The impact of Zera’s words knocked the breath from Gina’s body. A moment earlier they’d been laughing and talking, preparing for the return of the men after four days of separation. Now…
Please don’t let it be Derrin. Gina struggled to pull air into her lungs. She followed the Baha’Na women out of the hut, dreading every step.
A group of men huddled on the far side of the village. Women streamed toward them, adding their voices to the death song. The men stood silent.
Gina scanned the gathering for Derrin. She soon found him, standing next to Swift Tarma. The husky man held little Mirris in his arms. Zera’s and Rahza’s other sons pressed close on either side.
Relief, stunning in its intensity, washed over her. She paused and drew a deep breath before hurrying after Zera and Rahza.
The mourners cleared a path for the Na’lara. Gina glimpsed a man lying on a rough stretcher of branches. His chest had been crushed. Blood caked his body, splinters of bone protruded from his skin. Two glazed eyes looked out from a gray, twisted face. Gina shuddered, feeling suddenly sick.
Zera handed Lanya to her sister and ran forward to look at the man’s face. She turned, searching, then ran past Gina to Deehna and Shayla. Deehna caught a glimpse of Zera’s face and stiffened.
“No.” Her voice cracked. “It cannot be.”
Zera halted before them and spread out her arms. Her dark eyes brimmed with tears. “It is Red Hawk.”
“No!” Deehna pushed past Zera. She ran to the fallen man and dropped to her knees. With a trembling hand, she touched his forehead, his cheek, his wounds. Then she raised her face to the sky and let out an animal’s scream.
Shayla launched herself through the crowd and flung herself on the body. “Father! It cannot be…you cannot leave me…” She clawed at the dead man, grabbed his hair. She shook his head from side to side, as if, with enough force, she could wake him.
Gina watched, her chest dragging with each breath. Would no one step forward to restrain the girl? The men stood still and silent, their expressions set in stone. The smaller children sobbed while their mothers continued the wail of the death song.
The high-pitched keening grated along her shattered nerves. By now every village woman had joined her voice in grief, but Gina couldn’t have forced a sound from her lips if her life had depended on it.
She backed away, stomach heaving, memory clamping her throat like a vise.
* * * * *
The wait at the hospital emergency room was much too short. The instant the closed door swung forward, the truth flooded every cell of her body.
Her father was dead.
“Massive heart failure.” She accepted the words with a nod and turned away.
Dry-eyed, she inspected the corpse. Its face—frozen in a final, desperate gasp—stared back at her.
She noted the aspects of death with the precision of a scientist. Sightless eyes. Bent neck. Rigid joints. Skin that had taken on the color of the sky.
A brilliant, nauseating shade of blue.
* * * * *
Derrin tore his gaze from the grieving girl and scanned the huddle of mourners. He found Gina soon enough, looking like a lost child. She stood apart from the others, her arms wrapped tight about her torso. The pain in her expression was fierce, personal.
Her need drew him.
He went to her without a second thought. She didn’t seem to notice his approach. He halted in front of her and examined her pinched expression, at a loss for words.
After a moment Gina looked up at him, then glanced away. “What happened?”
“A rockfall,” he replied, his chest tight. “It came without warning. Natis and Mirris were in its path and Red Hawk was closest to them. He flung them out of the way, but—”
A sharp wail from Shayla cut him short. He followed Gina’s gaze to the girl, then turned his attention back to Gina. She was shaking, as if suffering from a shock much greater than the death of a man she didn’t know. A flash of understanding struck him. She grieved for a more personal loss, one she hadn’t made peace with. Her father’s death had thrown her into the arms of a man she hadn’t belonged with. As Shayla mourned her father, so Gina mourned hers, the pain as sharp as they day she had lost him.
He touched her arm. “Is it still so hard, then, even with the time that has passed?”
She turned to him, raw pain in her eyes. “My father was my only family. I was there when his heart gave out, but it was so sudden, I couldn’t do anything but watch him die.” She made a helpless gesture. “I didn’t even have time to say goodbye.”
Derrin drew her close, settling her cheek against his chest and stroking her hair as if she were a small child. She pulled away and met his gaze.
“I didn’t cry at all. Not even at the funeral. I was afraid if I gave in I would shatter into a million pieces and never be whole again.”
She buried her face in his shirt, but not before he saw the shimmer of tears in her eyes.
Derrin pressed his cheek to the top of Gina’s head and smoothed her braids with his palm. “Cry now, Gina,” he whispered. “As much as you want, as much as you need. I won’t let you break apart.”
A tremor shook her. He tightened his arms and felt Gina’s emotions break. She clung to him as the storm of sobs buffeted her. Derrin absorbed the pain with his own soul, holding her until she quieted and for a time afterwards, reluctant to let her go. She fit perfectly in his arms, as if she weren’t a woman from an alien world at all, but a part of himself he’d long ago given up as lost.
That evening, flames consumed the body of Red Hawk, releasing his spirit to the Goddess. The corpse, wrapped in a hide blanket, fell into the center of the fire. Once again, the women wailed the death song. Derrin felt Gina stiffen at his side.
He drew her closer as a gust of wind sent up a whirl of sparks. A man gave a shout, pointing upward.
A hawk sailed in slow circles above the gathering. It pulled back, wings flared, then dove toward the fire. For an instant, Derrin thought the flames would consume it, but at the last moment the great bird veered away. Long wings beating, it mounted up into the sky and flew toward the setting sun. Exclamations of w
onder followed it.
“What does it mean?” Gina asked in a hushed voice.
“It’s a good sign. Red Hawk’s guardian has taken his spirit to the Goddess,” Derrin said.
“She’s real, isn’t she?”
“Who do you mean?”
“The Goddess—she’s real. I thought it was just a story, but now…” She paused, as if not quite sure how to continue. “I can feel her. I feel her love, even in the sadness, or maybe…because of it.”
Derrin shot a sharp look at Gina. Her last words had been spoken not in the unusual cadence of her alien language, but in the lilting tones of the Baha’Na. He wondered if she’d even realized the change in her speech.
A fierce emotion washed over him. His gaze touched on her smooth, sun-browned skin, her straight nose and high cheekbones. Her eyes were the deepest brown, almost black, wide and honest. Vulnerable, yet unafraid. Every day he wanted her more, until he thought he would go insane with longing and loneliness. He’d wronged her deeply, but incredibly, she’d forgiven him. He didn’t deserve her acceptance, but he hadn’t the strength to reject it. All he could do was protect her from more hurt, by denying himself what he wanted most, until he could send her back across the web.
But each day that task grew more difficult, because each day it became harder to remember Gina was not of his world. Hard to remember she was not of the Baha’Na. She wore the clothing and spoke the language of his mother’s people. The sun had kissed her pale skin and turned it golden. She held her head high and moved through the forest with a grace she hadn’t possessed at the start of their journey.
Still, he would not forget.
“When I was a boy,” he told her, “Zahta often told me the People live in the heart of the Goddess.”
“Yes.” Gina swept her arms outward, then brought her palms together. Derrin’s chest tightened. He’d seen his grandmother make the same gesture countless times, a sign showing the relationship of the Baha’Na to the wilderness.
