by SL Hulen
In the Southwest, the weather can turn in an hour, the seasons in a day. Victoria noticed a subtle deepening of the sky’s blue. And the wind didn’t begin whistling late that afternoon and then stop around the time Lila came to start dinner as it usually did; it blew dispiritedly for the rest of the day, stripping the trees of their leaves.
She sought refuge inside the cabin. Any thoughts about what could be done were peppered with obstacles. Soon she could only sit in front of the small fireplace, holding her head in her hands and wondering what else Mieley had up his sleeve. Would anything be left of her reputation when she returned? Had Elias known of Mieley’s plan? What if it had been her uncle’s idea to threaten the Center for Help to lure her out of hiding? The Elias she knew could never do that; he knew it was the one thing she truly cared about. She stretched out on the sofa, and when Lila came inside to ask if she wanted anything, Victoria mumbled, “A miracle.”
“Being that you’re not much of a believer, I’d say you were in deep shit.”
“Exactly.”
“You coming in to help with dinner?”
“No, thanks.” Staring at a porcelain milkmaid atop a doily on the stereo, she hoped Lila would go away. The porcelain figurine and the three milky shades of lavender that colored her apron and dress caught her attention, and Victoria found herself envying the permanent state of grace captured in the eyes.
“Sinners and hypocrites never pay much attention to the Lord until they need something,” Lila muttered, disapprovingly, grabbing the bowl of apples on her way out.
Victoria gave in to exhaustion. Mieley’s expressionless grey eyes haunted her as she drifted off to sleep.
The next thing she knew, Khara was standing over her. “It’s time,” she said, turning briefly to drop a coat onto the back of the wing chair. “Are you feeling better?”
“About this plan? Not really.”
“Why can’t you trust me as I have trusted you?” Khara interrupted, dropping to one knee so they would be face to face. “I’ve been watching the television all afternoon. We can no longer return to El Paso, and we cannot stay here. Have you considered that we may be placing Celeste in harm’s way? We must keep moving.”
Victoria started to object, but since she could offer nothing better, just nodded.
They dressed warmly. Underneath her black turtleneck, Khara layered two thin sweaters, and then put on an extra pair of socks. Victoria wore a pair of old hiking boots, a plaid woolen jacket, and a pair of jeans that had probably belonged to a man. Were they Carl’s? she wondered.
On the way to the garage, they stopped at the main house. Celeste appeared, dressed in a knee-length purple parka that threatened to swallow her, accented by green mittens and a wool cap. “What?” she asked when she saw disapproval cross Victoria’s face. “You think I’d let you go without me? Not much choice,” she said cheerily, dangling a set of keys, “since you’re going to need my Jeep just to get close.”
Drums echoed somewhere behind the trees as the Jeep made its way up a path never intended for wheels. At an elevation of almost twelve thousand feet, perhaps the pounding in Victoria’s ears was her heart struggling for oxygen. She closed her eyes, tuning out Celeste’s chatter.
“This is not the same path Oliver and I took,” Khara sounded impatient and anxious. Yesterday’s scene with him obviously weighed heavily on her.
Celeste’s green mitten made a half-circle in the air. “We’re approaching from the opposite side of the mountain; otherwise, we’d have to take the horses. Not a good idea at night.”
“Not to mention that I don’t ride,” Victoria added dryly. The narrow, washboard forest road quickly petered out, and they were forced to pull off and leave the Jeep. The temperature had fallen noticeably. Celeste strapped a small lamp to her head and pointed with her cane. “The footpath is there, between those trees.”
Straining to see anything besides stands of aspens rattling softly in the breeze, Victoria asked, “Are you sure? I don’t see it.”
“Trust me, it’s there.”
“How do you know?”
“I didn’t say I’d never been— I said I’d never been invited. I’ve watched from the trees a time or two.” Celeste’s blue eyes shone in the darkness. Khara took her firmly by the elbow and started off with Victoria following; the path was too narrow for three. They went slowly, walking for perhaps a quarter of a mile. As they did, the drumming intensified and, with it, the faint sound—not speaking or singing voices, but ancient, wordless tones that penetrated Victoria’s chest. Grey smoke funneled upward in the black night to show them the way. How close the stars were! She’d read stories of people who’d disappeared into the mountains to live like wolves, never setting foot in civilization again. Tonight she understood why; the modern world did not exist here.
Though she was not breathing particularly hard, Celeste stopped. “Once, Carl and I crashed a wedding at the home of a Chilean ambassador. We did it on a bet, and decided the best way not to be found out was to stay on the dance floor. We danced at least twenty rumbas. It was a spectacular evening, though no more exciting than tonight.” She looked up at the stars. “We had some good times, didn’t we?”
Victoria couldn’t help but ask, “What did you bet?”
“None of your business.”
The drums and singing stopped; the air smelled of burning pine. Moments later, they broke through the last few trees and into a large clearing.
Thirty to forty people stood around a blazing fire, heads bowed, silent. Many of the women held hands. Victoria recognized some of them from her visits to town—the aged widower who volunteered at the library and walked with a limp, and the cheerless cashier from the grocery store who favored Janis Joplin and whose age Victoria could not guess at. At the center, a crackling, six-foot mound of rough-cut timbers spit and hissed. An elderly man chanted a slow, anguished melody.
Khara whispered, “He’s summoning the spirits to the celebration.”
Let’s not interrupt him,” Celeste advised.
Searching the crowd, Khara asked, “Do you see Oliver?” Victoria had been looking for him as well. Besides the middle-aged man leading the prayer, only a handful of elderly men and pre-adolescent boys were present.
“There!” Celeste motioned to a cluster of pines on the opposite side of the fire. At first Victoria’s eyes saw only the trees, but as her eyes adjusted, human forms took shape. She made out fringed leggings, the sides beaded in bright red. A few had matching buckskin tunics, but most stood bare-chested. Each wore a headdress, some of which were more than three feet high, fanning outward like rays of the sun; others were adorned with feathers. One man resembled a deer in a tight— fitting leather cap embellished with fur and antlers.
The elderly man’s voice died away. Silence prevailed for almost a full minute before the drums started again, much faster now. There was whooping and hollering and an ancient, “ulululu” cry. Victoria’s pulse quickened as the men burst from the trees to jump and dance around the fire. Bells on their arms and legs kept time with the pounding beat.
“He’s not here,” Khara lamented.
“Now, don’t get ahead of yourself,” Celeste cautioned, sounding almost cheerful. “I suspect your young man is probably the devil dancer. If so, he’ll be the last one out. The Mescalero believe there are supernatural beings living in their midst. They aren’t spirits, or even gods, just normal people with attributes that make them special.”
“His way with animals.”
“Yes, it could be that—a trait that empowers him.”
“There!” Khara pointed to the lean figure that emerged, leaping higher than the others and dangerously close to the flames.
“How can you be sure?” Victoria asked. “His face is covered with—”
But before she could finish, Khara was walking to him.
“Let her go,” Celeste said softly.
Khara proceeded unnoticed until the masked dancer seemed to freeze in mid-air, and
then landed clumsily on all fours. He pulled off his headdress and left it on the ground as he went to meet her. They stopped an arm’s length apart.
That night, Victoria witnessed the powerful sorcery of love, though the word would escape her for some time. The princess knelt before the shirtless young man in leather breeches, the fire reflected in her smoldering eyes. Oliver took her in his arms. Peculiar trails of smoke curled around them, providing a small measure of privacy.
Resentment whipped through the tranquil night air. “What are they doing here?” Victoria overheard someone ask.
“Who invited them?” another demanded. A woman wearing a gray-and-black letter jacket threw her head back and laughed. “Since when do they wait for invitations?”
Celeste took Victoria by the wrist and approached the group. “We’re looking for Ben.”
No one answered. The boiling whispers seemed not to faze Celeste. Without so much as a break in her smile, she whispered under her breath, “For goodness sake, Cookie, loosen up!”
From the human knot, a woman came forth. The high arch of her eyebrow and her single dimple told Victoria she was Oliver’s mother. The woman swept her graying hair back against the breeze and wrung her hands. “Mrs. Szabó, you shouldn’t be here,” she cautioned nervously, avoiding eye contact with Victoria.
“I know, but we are in rather desperate need of Ben’s wisdom.”
The woman took a step back. “What do you want from Ben?” she asked, and then nodded toward the top of the mountain. “He could be up there all night. I can’t imagine you’d want to wait.”
“Just look at those two,” Celeste said, motioning to Oliver and Khara. “Surely you understand that I didn’t have much choice in the matter.”
Oliver’s mother sighed. “I’ve never seen him so—well, never like this.” She acknowledged Victoria, saying, “I am Nita Spottedbird. My son tells me you are someone to be reckoned with.” She laughed as if remembering a private joke. “Since you two arrived at the Square-4, I haven’t heard a thing about his classes.”
A woman standing not three feet away snarled, “I don’t care who they are; they don’t belong here. This is not a tourist attraction.”
Nita fired the woman look that shut her up. "Come with me," she said, resignedly.
Her broad shoulders cut through the clearly disgruntled group, leaving plenty of shrugs and raised eyebrows in her wake. A handful of women followed as she led them to an eight—foot-wide, brush-covered frame of branches situated a short walk from the fire.
Celeste and Victoria stepped inside. At Nita’s insistence, they sat on rough wool blankets stacked around the perimeter. A small cast iron stove in the center provided enticing warmth. Soon, the wickiup spilled over with conversation; it sounded like a flock of grackles in a tree. Victoria watched Celeste participate effortlessly in two and sometimes three discussions. She laughed and drank from a crude clay jug that was passed into her mittens.
“Try some. It’ll warm you right up,” she commanded Victoria, who gave the jug a disapproving look and shook her head. “Oh, come on, live a little,” Celeste urged, exasperated yet amused. She pressed the jug into Victoria’s hands with an impish grin. “This is not the time to be unsociable. I’ll bet you’ve never had mescal before.”
“Nope. I’ve heard enough stories, though.”
“Don’t be a prude. It’s quite prized for its medicinal qualities. In fact, the name ‘Mescalero’ was bestowed on these people by the Spaniards, who were amazed by their ability to thrive in places where water and food were almost nonexistent. Not only could they prepare a potent drink from the mescal plant, but it was a food staple as well.” She took another healthy swig and placed the jug in Victoria’s hands.
Suddenly, the wickiup was silent. Several pairs of expectant eyes zeroed in on her.
“What the hell.” She forced an immeasurably small sip into her mouth before handing the jug to the woman on her right as she had seen the others do.
“It’s okay,” the broad-faced woman indicated of the pitifully short drink Victoria had taken. “Your people don’t have much of a belly for it.”
“My people?” she retorted, her cheeks flushed with anger. “Who do you think my people are?”
The woman’s face fell. “I’m saying this stuff is not for the faint of heart, that’s all.”
“You think I’m faint-hearted?”
“Show me different, city girl,” the woman challenged, handing the jug back.
“City girl, my ass.” Victoria’s second swig brought applause. Lava coursed through her body, lighting her fingers on fire. After another drink, she began tracing meaningless shapes in the dim light. Gradually, she sensed her mind slowing until it seemed to stop.
It was impossible to tell whether the blurs around her were people or surreal shapes conjured by mescal; in this state of blessed mindlessness, she felt only peace. The universe had conveniently come to a standstill. With the patience she envied in Khara, she peered through the hole in the wickiup’s rounded roof and stared at the stars. Perhaps there was a message for her in all that boundless space. Did Celeste feel the same serenity?
But Celeste was gone and she was alone in the wickiup. Had she dozed off? Only the small stove glowed brightly to keep her company. It was impossible to keep her eyes open. When she awoke the second time, she felt a presence beside her—a man, somewhere between middle and old age, watched the small stove and rolled a cigarette.
“Where’s Celeste?” she asked, hardly able to get the words out.
“With the others,” he answered without looking at her. “She asked me to sit with you for a while.”
“Are you Ben?”
He nodded. His jeans exposed black cowboy boots inlaid with grey leather and chunks of turquoise, finished with silver— capped toes. Ben’s neat waves of graying hair could have belonged to a businessman, except for the purple velvet band tied around his forehead. Silver and turquoise bracelets decorated his arms.
“That stuff is truly wicked,” Victoria pronounced. The jug lay on its side, empty.
Ben stared at her with something between a smile and a grimace. “You’ll think differently in the morning. For now, just try to relax. We come here to close off our day-to-day thoughts. Let your subconscious find its own path.”
Despite her drug-induced state, she saw nothing except the pattern in the woven sticks and branches that formed the canopy overhead. After a time, she announced, “It’s no use.”
Ben licked the edge of the paper, sealing the cigarette.
Victoria continued, “I should just leave it alone; it’s probably better that I don’t know. Besides, I’m not at my best these days. The person you see before you is not the normal me.”
He laughed. “You’ve obviously never had a reading; otherwise, you wouldn’t equate them with criticism. I’m not here to judge. I try to see people a bit differently, the way we were before Usen turned us to men. Even when we suppress our true selves, our animal spirits are with us. Sometimes people physically resemble their animal or it is present in their actions, the way they live life. To accept your animal spirit is neither good nor bad, just a few steps on the path to self-awareness.”
Victoria surrendered what little rational thought she had. “All right.”
Ben asked about her childhood, her work. His questions were so completely benign that boredom threatened. For a while, they sat. Dragging heavily on the cigarette pinched between his thumb and index finger, he offered it to Victoria. The verdant-smelling smoke transported her back to her days in college. She took a long drag just before Ben suddenly turned to her—or rather turned on her—seizing her face with both hands.
“Oh no you don’t,” she cried, punching and kicking in a futile attempt to push him away. His eyelids fluttered, he made odd trilling sounds, and blew smoke into in her face. Through the haze, Ben’s high cheekbones and thin lips began to dissolve. A far heavier brow, fuller lips, and wider nose revealed themselves. His skin gre
w darker than the moonless night, and fear shot through Victoria as she recognized the face. Fierce eyes and flaring nostrils superimposed themselves over Ben’s gentle features, and an enormous presence surrounded her.
“I am Nandor, guardian of the House of Pharaoh. Do not be afraid,” commanded a voice as low and steady as the drums she’d heard earlier. Perhaps they were the same. He explored the depths of her soul before proclaiming, “It falls upon you to make certain that Princess Khara returns to claim Egypt’s throne.”
“Hah! Doesn’t she deserve a future of her own choosing? Whether it was your intention or not, you gave her a new life. Now you want to take it back? Don’t you want something for her besides retribution?”
“There is far more at stake.” He released his hold on her face. “Egypt’s greatest advances do not begin until after the princess returns. Ah,” he said knowingly, looking deep into Victoria’s eyes, “but you have already considered this, haven’t you?”
Nandor’s face was a reflection of someone much maligned; his eyes overflowed with loss. “There was no time to do anything but save her life. How could I know that my actions would only add to the burden she already carries?” he asked, the profound sadness in his voice bringing tears to her eyes. “Did she tell you that it was I who took her and her sister from her dying mother and bathed them in sunlight for the first time?”
In the moment of silence that followed, Victoria felt something pass between them. A heavy weight, neither comforting nor warm, settled on her shoulders.
“A vast alteration in the fabric of time will occur if she does not return,” Ben’s hand swept the air powerfully. “The great light that is Egypt’s legacy will be delayed for hundreds of years; perhaps it will never shine at all. What will happen to civilization when the great library of Alexandria is not built? Consider the delay of technology in your own nation, of all your advances.” He shook his head with an air of concern. Perhaps, Victoria thought, it’s not concern at all, but disdain for those advances.
