“You never have any faith in me, Keeper.”
“The only faith anyone seems to have in you is that you’ll end up hanging in a square. And right now, that’s looking more and more likely.” A pause. “You ever find that Chikosi girl?”
“Turns out that Two Sticks caught up with her first. Figured that his future was a lot brighter with her dead than taking the chance she’d talk about his involvement.”
He craned his neck around where the dark figures had emerged from the surrounding canoes. Looked like about twenty men. “Who you got with you?”
“Some of Columella’s warriors. Them and my porters.”
He squinted up at the sky. “Be morning soon. Rising Flame still up at Evening Star Town?”
“She is. And when she wakes up and finds that square empty…”
He smiled, hearing the warning in her words. He puffed out a breath, watching it cloud before his nose, then stepped over to the next canoe, which looked like something the Pacaha would make. He reached inside, pulled out the box he’d hidden there earlier, and slipped one of the straps over his shoulder.
Turning back, he said, “It’s awfully cold out here. How about you get on your litter, and we’ll let these warriors escort us back to Columella’s palace where we can warm up. Then when Rising Flame comes charging in to report the outrage of Winder’s disappearance, I can offer restitution.”
He could see that her head was cocked, birdlike. “What kind of restitution?”
“Think she’d take the Quiz Quiz War Medicine as ransom for Winder?”
He saw Blue Heron start, then slowly shake her head. “You’ve had it all along, huh?”
“I guess I might have forgot to mention that?”
“And you can prove it is the real thing?”
“Just got to show it to Sky Star where he’s hanging in that square up yonder. She’ll be able to tell just by his expression.”
“Thief, I…” She shook her head. “Why do I even bother?”
“I think you know why, Keeper. But let’s keep that to ourselves. No need to embarrass ourselves by letting the rest of the world share our little secret.”
“Told you. I’m no longer the Keeper.” But she was chuckling under her breath as her porters brought her litter forward.
Sixty-six
The sensation was ever so light—the faintest touch, like the tip of a feather being trailed across the skin. Night Shadow Star needed only to close her eyes, tilt her head, and she could detect the Bundle’s presence. Tell the direction in which it lay.
“You will need your armor,” she’d told Fire Cat, hesitating upon their arrival in Cahokia only long enough for him to string his bow.
Spotted Wrist’s escort had been extravagant, most of a squad who had borne her forthwith, accompanied by drums and flutes, down the Avenue of the Sun to the Great Plaza.
That he had done so sent her stomach to tingling as if ants were crawling around inside. She didn’t like owing Spotted Wrist. Any favor he did was going to come with expectations—all of it orchestrated to reinforce his offer of marriage. Spotted Wrist wasn’t used to being told no. And in all of her life, she couldn’t ever remember a single time when he hadn’t gotten what he’d set his mind to.
I could order Fire Cat to kill him.
That caused her to squint in distaste and wonder where that notion had come from.
After being delivered to the foot of her palace stairs—and waiting for Fire Cat to don his armor—she turned her steps for the Great Staircase, climbing resolutely up through the council gate, crossing the courtyard, and ascending the final staircase.
Behind her, Fire Cat’s sandal-clad feet clapped on the squared-log steps as he asked, “Lady? Do you perhaps want to give me some idea about what we’re up to?”
“The Tortoise Bundle has a new Keeper. I…” She made a face. “I have to know who. It’s just … I was a part of it for so long.”
The feeling of emptiness had been growing in her souls during the entire journey back to Cahokia. Along with it lay the sure knowledge that something had happened, some change in the world. And lurking in the back of her souls was the knowledge that Spotted Wrist wouldn’t have dared to impose such a large escort unless his status had been significantly altered in the last few days.
Piasa, surely Morning Star wouldn’t have ordered the marriage.
If so, she had the leverage to make him cancel it, that or he would appear ungrateful after her efforts on his behalf in the Underworld.
At the head of the stairs, the guards touched their foreheads respectfully. She took a moment, turning, looking back at the Great Plaza. It was mostly empty of people, but littered with trash: broken pottery, bits of clothing, corncobs, abandoned matting, and scattered refuse. The once-manicured chunkey grounds were stippled with tracks, the grass beaten and half-dead.
The remains of a single charred corpse, mostly bones, hung in the lone square at the foot of the stairs. No telling who that poor wretch might have been. The crowd hadn’t been kind to him as they waited to learn the Morning Star’s fate.
She met Fire Cat’s eyes, gave him a slight nod, and strode through the gate. The courtyard was full, emissaries and chiefs waiting their turn to offer the revived Morning Star their best wishes and prayers for his speedy recovery. They went silent as they watched Night Shadow Star stride across the scuffed clay yard.
Word had traveled that she and Fire Cat had gone personally to the Underworld to retrieve the Morning Star’s souls from Sacred Moth’s clutches. That the Morning Star’s souls had returned to Chunkey Boy’s body was all the proof they needed that she had succeeded.
One by one they dropped to their knees, bowing, expressions awed.
After this I am even more removed from the world of men, she thought.
Piasa hissed and purred in satisfaction from behind her right ear.
“Beware, Lord,” Night Shadow Star murmured. “One day this absurd worshipping and reverence may turn out to be a greater curse than a blessing.”
But Piasa remained silent, though she could feel his presence like a building storm behind her right shoulder.
At the great double doors, Five Fists was waiting, a line of his warriors leaning against the palace’s plastered wall. The lop-jawed warrior nodded, his eyes dark and glittering in the sunlight.
“Lady.” He touched his forehead. “Given the Morning Star’s weakened condition, I think it prudent that only you should be allowed in. We’ve just barely survived one assassination attempt.” He looked meaningfully at Fire Cat, resplendent in his armor, strung bow, and quiver over his shoulder.
“War Leader, let us get something clear,” she replied, crossing her arms, one foot defiantly forward. “If Fire Cat ever kills the Morning Star’s host body, it will be at my order. A fact you should give some hard thought to. You know that the Morning Star and I serve different Powers, and for the moment, my master’s goals are in alignment with those of the Sky World.” She smiled coldly. “That might not always be the case in the future, War Leader.”
“But, Lady,” Five Fists protested, “the Red Wing’s a heretic. His kind did more damage—”
“Where were you when the Morning Star was fighting for his very existence in the Underworld? Where were you when we were down there in the darkness, surrounded by the Dead? Did I see Five Fists leading the way into that burning cavern where Sacred Moth was sucking the Morning Star’s soul away? Did you face the fiery light? It was Fire Cat who saved his life in the Underworld. All I did was get the Red Wing to the final chamber.”
Every person in the courtyard gasped, eyes going wide as they stared incredulously at Fire Cat. For his part, the Red Wing stood at full attention, head high, eyes forward.
Five Fists’ lips twitched with distaste and disbelief. “I’m to believe the heretic—”
“I wouldn’t give a chinquapin seed for your beliefs, nor do I care. Open that door, or I will have your scarred and tattooed hide for a door mat.”
>
Even as she spoke, she heard Piasa’s voice meld with her own, felt the Underwater Panther’s presence within her.
Five Fists’ face seemed to change focus, to flatten and hollow under her vision. For a moment she could see his souls squirming uncomfortably as he went pale, stepped back, and shoved the carved doors open.
Well, no matter what Fire Cat remembered, or failed to, he was part of the legend now. He had once again saved the Morning Star despite his refusal to believe in the miracle of the living god’s resurrection. The irony of it provided her with a dry sense of amusement.
She strode into the interior and crossed the great room, its eternal fire burned down so that only occasional flames leaped around the nearly exhausted wood.
A woman was seated at the foot of the Morning Star’s dais. She wore a plain dogbane skirt; a hemp-fiber cape was draped about her shoulders. The thick tangle of her hair was in wild disarray. Ashes had been dabbed onto her cheeks and forehead, leaving her face pale and in contrast to the liquid darkness in her eyes.
Night Shadow Star stopped, blinking in disbelief. The woman fixed on her with an eerie stare. In her lap, she cradled the Tortoise Bundle, one hand patting it as though it were a pet.
In a thin voice, the woman said, “It no longer wanted you. It chose me.”
Night Shadow Star nodded, finally feeling the rightness of it. “Of course it did. But are your souls strong enough to withstand the—”
“Sometimes, Sister, before a vessel can be filled, it first must be made empty.” Sun Wing’s Spirit-possessed eyes seemed to expand in her head. “I had to lose all of myself, be empty of everything that was Sun Wing before I could find the One.”
“Whereas I was too full of things,” Night Shadow Star told her as she gazed at the Tortoise Bundle, now so peaceful in Sun Wing’s delicate hands. “Full of Piasa. Full of pain and anger. Crowded with voices and visions.”
“You were driving each other to desperation.” Sun Wing’s hollow-eyed stare contrasted with the slight smile on her lips. Then her expression pinched. “Now we Dance with the One, struggling to Dream the harmony of the Spiral. Dissonant and chaotic. The balance is broken.… Needs to be brought back into harmony.”
“I don’t understand.”
“How can you? You serve the dark world, Sister. The souls of the Dead still cling to you. Cobwebs. Filaments of the hopes and Dreams of colorless and bleached souls. Your fire draws them to you. Irresistible. You ache, pulsing with life, love, passion, and desire, but are bound to the Lord of the Dead.”
Sun Wing paused, expression perplexed. “He thrives on that, you know.”
“I know,” Night Shadow Star whispered softly.
“That gives you your Power. You understand that, don’t you? Give in.… Surrender yourself to that which you most desire.” An oddly gruesome smile twisted her lips. “The crushing desolation will be unbearable.”
“Lady?” Fire Cat asked. “What is she talking about?”
“You and me, Red Wing.” Night Shadow Star closed her eyes, her souls keening within her.
“I don’t understand.”
“Of course you do.” Then she added bitterly, “Nothing comes without a price. Piasa has played us well.”
“Of course he has.” The Morning Star stepped out from his private quarters, nodded his recognition to Night Shadow Star, and walked gingerly over to his dais. He added, “You cannot help being the woman you are. Nor can the Red Wing be less a man than he is. A fact that will eventually destroy you both.”
In her ear, Piasa’s hollow laugh was like a whisper.
Sixty-seven
Fire Cat knotted his fists as Chunkey Boy wobbled his unsteady way to his high seat atop its dais. The impostor actually looked as if he were back from the dead: his movements weak and still recovering from his poisoning.
He wore the scarlet macaw cape that had once belonged to the Itza agent Horn Lance. Had his choice been chance, or was he making some subtle point? With Chunkey Boy, a person never knew. His face was painted white with his traditional black forked-eye designs. He had pulled his hair forward into a bun and pinned it tightly to support a projecting black wooden-crescent headdress into which five small miniature arrows had been driven; his shell maskettes covered his ears.
Fire Cat started, recognizing the Morning Star’s headdress: the same as the one depicted on his image in the Sacred Cave. Then he got a good look at the object Chunkey Boy clutched in his left hand: a familiar long copper blade.
Fire Cat gasped. “From my war club! But … How?”
“You gave it to him,” Night Shadow Star told him dryly. “After your war club burned. Don’t you remember? All that was left after the fire was the copper spike.”
She gave him a sidelong appraisal, as if what he saw should have been as natural as daylight.
“You Dreamed that, Lady. One of your visions … spun by Sister Datura. As to the fate of my war club, I must have misplaced it in the dark. Perhaps while the datura addled my…” He blinked, shaking his head in disbelief. Rot it all, he just couldn’t remember.
Chunkey Boy said, “Come here, Red Wing. Step up so I can see you.”
Fire Cat gave Night Shadow Star a hesitant glance, but she nodded approval, inclining her head toward the dais.
Where she clutched the Tortoise Bundle, Sun Wing’s eyes had sharpened, as if she were a spectator at some pivotal event.
Heart hammering, Fire Cat stepped forward. The tingling in his nerves was electric as he looked into the dark eyes of the man he’d waited all of his life to kill. Chunkey Boy stared back, gaze burning with fiery intensity behind his facial paint.
The supposed living god softly said, “You barely know the miracle. You have tasted the merest hint of the nectar upon your tongue.”
“What nectar?”
“The sweet essence that sets the souls free. Metamorphosis. Evolving into something new. Fresh. As happened that night in the square when Night Shadow Star cut you down. Though it is but a shadow of what I have just experienced, it is still close enough to give you a glimmering of the reality.”
Fire Cat ground his teeth, not sure how to respond.
Chunkey Boy smiled slightly. “I have just reawakened to a remarkable rebirth. Shed the cocoon after consuming the sweet darkness. The blood rushes. The Spirit is buoyant and airy. Embrace the miracle.”
“What miracle?”
“The miracle of rising again from the blackest death, from the chill … the thundering silence of eternity.” He touched fingers to his breast. “To feel the blood pulsing with each beat of the heart. To draw a breath, expand the lungs … and then walk out into warm sunlight again.” Chunkey Boy closed his eyes, breathing deeply. “To emerge from darkness into brilliance.”
Fire Cat held his peace, watching as Chunkey Boy savored the moment.
Then the dark eyes opened, possessed of an internal serenity quite out of sorts with any preconceptions Fire Cat might have had about the man.
From behind, Night Shadow Star demanded, “Why did you drink that woman’s poison?”
Chunkey Boy’s gaze never left Fire Cat’s face as he said, “A being of light can only alter his nature by ingesting darkness.”
What?
Chunkey Boy told him as if relishing his skepticism, “The immortal conflict. To become more than either light or dark requires a metamorphosis. Only Sacred Moth knew the secret way to the cavern—and only through the moth’s defeat could the cocoon be spun.”
“It was reckless.” Night Shadow Star crossed her arms and glared as she stepped up to stand beside Fire Cat.
“What did you see down there in the darkness?” Chunkey Boy asked her mildly.
Fire Cat saw Night Shadow Star’s lids thin as she said, “You and Sacred Moth locked in combat. You were losing until Fire Cat handed you the spike, and you stabbed Sacred Moth. Then, weakened as you were, darkness began to cocoon you. Enveloped you.”
She paused. “On the way back to the surface, Pi
asa led me to the fragments of cocoon you shed along the way. I followed them to the cavern where you were freeing the souls from the bodies of the cavern Dead.”
“And what did those souls do?” Chunkey Boy asked with a clever smile, as if he’d just had a revelation.
“They flew up to the images on the wall above their heads. Passed through the portal into the Underworld.”
“I freed them?” Chunkey Boy said, almost as if asking himself a question.
Fire Cat watched Chunkey Boy’s expression turn dreamy, eyes thinned to slits. Chunkey Boy’s head tilted back, which let his beaded forelock fall down onto his nose. He said, “To think Piasa and Horned Serpent would have left them trapped forever with the portal so close. Those poor souls staring longingly at freedom.” A pause. “You saw how I freed them?”
“With a touch to the head.”
“I’ve heard the longing of their prayers, the very desperation of their pleas across time.” Chunkey Boy’s smile widened. “And you call my flight on the nectar reckless? I could have done nothing for them had I not lifted that cup to my lips.”
“And had you died, the city would have come apart,” Fire Cat growled, eyes on the copper spike. It was his. No doubt about it. But stained and corroded by some toxic agent. Sacred Moth’s blood?
Impossible!
“It’s not your city, Red Wing. Why would you have cared?” Chunkey Boy lifted an eyebrow. “If it is anyone’s, it is mine. They came here for me. But do you have any idea how tiring it is? Trapped here? In this body? Listening to their endless pleas for favors? Watching their fawning prostrations? Playing their paltry chunkey games? And all those desperate young women quivering in excitement and expecting a miracle in my bed? Reincarnated Spirit or not, consider how satisfying you might find such an existence.”
Fire Cat barely lifted an eyebrow. Unsympathetic.
Chunkey Boy shook his head wearily. “Whispering Dawn came reluctantly, honestly, without fawning and drooling anticipation. She was like a draft of cool fresh breeze on a hot and muggy day. The moment she was asked to slip the nectar into my drink, she did so with enthusiasm. Without her, I could never have opened that door.”
Moon Hunt Page 45
