Qaletaqa

by Gladden, DelSheree

  I cried. My heart fought against it all. I screamed at the gods. I already had to do this once! Why are you making me go through this again! I screamed at them in anger. I never expected an answer, but I got one.

  You can’t give something up without truly knowing what you are about to lose.

  Time sped up. My heart was already aching, and the voice had jarred me badly, but my struggle was only beginning.

  I stood in a kitchen making lunches. Each sandwich and water bottle got packed into the lunchboxes with care. I smiled when three children sped through on their way to the front door. They each snatched a bag off the table with harried thanks, but the middle, a girl of only seven or eight, brushed against me. Her touch set off an image in my mind. The bus they were about to board was going to get in an accident. A truck would run a red light and crash into the seat where my children would be sitting. The girl would die instantly. The other two would be badly injured. A shadow hung over the oldest and I feared it meant he would join his sister.

  Your power is greater than any other shaman that has ever lived, the voice whispered. Most shaman are limited to glimpses, uncertainties, but you will be so strong that your vision will be sure. You will be able to protect the ones you love from harm.

  Scenes flashed before my eyes. An accidental contact, a hug, every touch warned me of danger. Every time I prevented it. My children, friends, and family came to me for advice. There were no ifs or doubt when I told them the right path. I knew. I could do so much good, have so much happiness if I would only step back. I didn’t have to give up my power. The image of a young girl’s battered body lying on the pavement ripped a hole through me.

  You can make a difference in many lives. Your power can heal, see, tell. It can protect and warn. Giving it up will leave you with nothing, a rancher’s wife and nothing more.

  My despair had almost been complete. Wherever the voice was coming from, whatever its goal was, it had just said the one sentence I needed to hear most. My power responded to my unvoiced decision. I expected it to rear away from me again, but it didn’t. As my resolve deepened, it calmed, bending to my command. I guided it gently into my core where it shivered around my soul. It took a small amount of coaxing to convince it to part and slip away, upward, but it gave in under the surety of my choice.

  A rancher’s wife and nothing more.

  The voice had uttered the words as if they were a curse, something low and undesirable. What it didn’t understand was that was all I had ever wanted. I could give up anything else in this world for that one thing.

  37: Spent

  The only conscious thought in my mind was Melody. Her blood trickling down her face was a lure I couldn’t deny. Her heart beat within my chest. The rapid pulse of panic and desire was perfectly in time with mine. Every step I took closer to her sped up both our heart rates in perfect cadence. Her breathing matched mine as well. We gulped in breaths as we struggle to get to each other. The Matwau held her back, but something else, something I didn’t understand slowed my pace.

  I wanted to run. When she reached out to me I swear I could feel her fingers brushing against my skin. It felt like fire scorching its way across my body. I wanted to reach her so badly. My muscles pushed harder. My mind screamed at me to move faster. The Matwau ran his finger down further. The blood came fast. He was scarring my beautiful Melody. Her beauty would never fade in my eyes, but I hated the idea of her perfect body being marred. I hated the idea of anyone who wasn’t me even touching her. Melody was mine. She had been promised to me. She was my reward, and I hers.

  But not yet, something whispered in the back of my mind. Not yet.

  Something else tried to distract me. A voice. Someone was screaming behind me. I think they were calling my name, but I was so focused on reaching Melody that I couldn’t understand the words. The Matwau’s claw dug deeper. A fresh rivulet of blood sped down Melody’s neck and pooled at her collar bone for a moment before running over the brink. Fury raged through me and broke the trance.

  My heels dug new holes in the sand, spraying the leftover bits behind me as I ran. Everything that had been completely blocked out a second before came rushing into my senses like a hurricane of sights and sounds. Talon was speeding in from the side where he had fallen earlier. The Matwau was laughing. Laughing? The voice that was screaming at me about something cleared, but not enough for me to understand. Melody was silent but her eyes were a wash of emotion, still fixed on me. We were finally going to be together. As soon as I got her away from the Matwau, everything would be perfect, just like it was supposed to be.

  I was almost to her. I lunged forward, and caught the Matwau’s claws clean on my shoulder. Pain screamed through me. I heard Melody gasp, saw her crumble. Tears poured down her cheeks as she stared at the blood on my shoulder. The Matwau’s laughter gathered and boomed across the valley. The wound wasn’t deep, but I could feel the strength slowly leaking out of the wound along with the blood.

  That was why he had been laughing. He drew me in like a fly to honey. I ran to him completely blinded. I had enough sense to scramble out of his range and stand back up. Melody reached for me instantly, but the Matwau pulled her back. Fury almost carried me back into his trap. It was the voice behind me that gave me pause.

  “Uriah, please! You have to stop! Please come back!”

  The voice. I knew it. Every thought I had was centered on Melody. The speaker’s voice was lost somewhere in the depths, the parts of my brain that didn’t matter anymore. I was about to give up on the voice. I wasn’t the only one that heard the desperate screaming. Melody’s eyes widened.

  “Harvey,” she whispered.

  Harvey? The name struggled to breach the barrier in my mind. His face suddenly blinked into existence…and who he was to Melody followed. Remembering that Melody was married momentarily stunned me. I knew it before, but the bond had completely wiped that information from my mind. I looked back at Melody. Seconds ago there had been only concern for me. Now war raged inside her emerald eyes. Her struggle to get free doubled, but not for me. There was torture in her eyes when she looked at me, but I couldn’t hold her gaze anymore.

  How could she abandon me?

  “Uriah, please! Claire needs you!” Harvey yelled.

  “Claire,” I gasped.

  Like Harvey’s named whispered from Melody’s lips, when Claire’s name slipped from mine I staggered under the weight of memories. Every kiss, every quiet moment, every touch cascaded back into my heart and mind. Melody had claimed so much of me, but Claire invaded, fought for her rightful place. I stepped back a step, but that was as far as I could make it. Melody seemed to be caught in the same battle. One minute she was screaming Harvey’s name and the next she was reaching for me. The choice was impossible. I could remember now what the bond was, but I didn’t know how to fight it.

  “Uriah, please. Look at Claire! Feel what she’s doing! I know you can feel her power moving. Push away the bond, see what Claire is about to do!”

  The terror in his voice was so real. It nearly ripped me in two to turn away from Melody, but I had to see Claire. I had to feel…but the bond overpowered everything! It seemed to get stronger the more I tried to push it away. A memory slipped through, an image of Claire’s arms torn and bruised. She bled herself for me. My fingers slid up my bloody arm and dug into the wounds the Matwau so kindly gave me. Agony flared, pushing away the bond long enough for me to feel it.

  My eyes snapped to Claire in an instant. Kneeling, gripping Harvey so tightly his flesh dimpled, power visibly gathered around Claire’s body. “No. No!” I screamed it.

  “Claire is going to die if you don’t turn back! She’s about to give away her life, and mine, if you don’t give Melody up and stop her!” Harvey begged.

  My gaze slid back to Melody. Her eyes were saucers. Even the Matwau had paused, confusion played on his features. I had no time for him. If he was confused, all the better. No doubt he had felt what Claire was doing before Harvey had
warned me and was trying to explain it to himself. Melody didn’t understand, either. I hadn’t had the time to explain everything I had found out about Claire when we met. She could see in my eyes, though, that what Harvey said was true. Harvey and Claire would both die if we didn’t find the strength to turn away from each other and break the bond for good.

  “I love you,” Melody whispered to me.

  “I love you too,” I said, “but…I can’t give her up. I can’t let her die.”

  Tears that had nothing to do with the cut running down her cheek dropped into the sand. “I can’t give up Harvey, either,” she whispered.

  I took a step back.

  “I remembered,” she said, stopping me in my tracks. “I remembered everything.”

  A sob broke up her words. The Matwau retightening his hold on her neck didn’t help, either. She clawed at his hands. He might have strangled her right then, but we were all distracted by a flare that burst from Claire.

  “Uriah, hurry!” Harvey screamed.

  The Matwau’s eyes darted back and forth between Melody and Claire. He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know who to kill first. His panic loosened his grip enough to let Melody slip out a few words.

  “Run, bleed,” she croaked, “and let me go.”

  I didn’t know what she meant until her hand yanked at her hair, then opened to let the wind carry the strands away. The blood…I had no idea.

  “Uriah, she’s almost done! She’s going to kill us both!”

  “Go, please!” Melody begged.

  Turning away from Melody was like having barbed wire scraped across my entire body. Every inch tore away a piece of me, a promise of what I could have if I abandoned Claire and the Matwau, gave up everything for Melody. I almost caved in to the pull of a perfect future, but Claire saved me.

  I never would have heard her if the valley hadn’t gone completely silent. Her whisper was so quiet, I wasn’t even sure if I really heard her, but the curve of her lips as she spoke was so intimately familiar to me I didn’t need to hear her to know what she said. It was only one word, but that was all I needed.

  “Goodbye.”

  Ripping through the ties binding me to Melody, I ran for Claire. The Matwau ran after me. My legs barreled across the valley. The holes littering the floor tried to trip me, but I leapt over them without really seeing. My eyes were fixed on Claire and the light that surrounded her. She was about to die, to give up her life for mine, and all I could think as I looked at her was that she looked like an angel. As I ran I tried to shake the strands of Melody’s hair out of my hand, but my fingers refused to open. As hard as I tried they would not budge.

  I looked down, sweat and desperation dripping off my forehead, and tripped. I stumbled and twisted my way back to my feet. The Matwau was only seconds behind me. My arms flailed and I caught sight of Melody. Let me go. Her plea had been so simple, letting go of the strands was not. I didn’t know what was stopping me. Hearing Claire’s name again was all I needed to know that she was what I wanted, not Melody. Her life was more important to me than anything. The Matwau, Melody, the entire world, I would give it all up to spare Claire from even a moment’s pain. I didn’t understand why I couldn’t force my fingers to open and drop the last connection I had to Melody.

  I screamed at my inability to let go. Run, bleed, let me go. Bleed. She said she remembered. Quaile said I had to sacrifice.

  I stopped running.

  Stopping short with the Matwau so close behind me led to him crashing into the back of me. I shoved him away from me immediately, but he lashed out in anger. I dodged his first strike, but caught the next one. I wasn’t a fool. I had already tried and failed to beat him on my own. As soon as I had enough space I stood up and pulled a pocket knife from my jeans.

  It was small, barely three inches folded. Unfolded it wasn’t any more impressive. When the Matwau saw it he actually laughed.

  “Are you honestly planning on fighting me with that?”

  “No,” I said, looking over his shoulder to see just what I expected-Melody holding a fistful of bloody sand and her wedding ring poised to cut, “this is for the gods.”

  We cut, I with my miniature blade, Melody with her ring. The Matwau stared again, completely caught off guard. He couldn’t understand why I was hurting myself. I wasn’t sure I did either, but I trusted Melody. Remembering had been her singular gift. It had to be good for something.

  The blood tainting the sand in Melody’s fist was mine. I knew that as surely as I knew the hair I was holding belonged to her. In unison, our power infused blood ran over the only tokens we had of each other. As it did, I felt something start to change. The cut I had made was hardly a scratch after what I had already suffered, but the pain inside my head, my entire body, built inside of me until it exploded out in a feral scream. My muscles felt as if they were dissolving in acid, my bones crushed to powder. It begged me to go back on my choice, but I refused.

  Claire was so close. Her life was about to be extinguished for good. If I died without managing to kill the Matwau I would die knowing I had done my best. Dying or living with the knowledge that I had cost Claire her life. Living would send me into eternal anguish, Hell of my own making. I embraced the pain as my sacrifice to save Claire’s life. When I did, the feeling changed again. The pain started to drift away from me. I could almost feel the weight of it sliding off me, and when I opened my eyes I could literally see it.

  I don’t think anyone in the valley but me and Melody could see the trail of pain speeding out of our bodies toward each other. The tendrils flew through the space between us unseen. Out of the corner of my eye I could see that the Matwau had recovered from his shock. His hand wrapped around my throat, lifting me from the ground, but I stayed focused on the pain.

  I watched the two streaks collide and roil. They meshed into one entity and I realized it wasn’t pain I was watching, it was power. Even more surprising of a reality was seeing it move…right for me. The Matwau’s hand around my throat made my vision go black, but when the power reached me, we both felt it. A jolt ran through us like lightning. I went limp under the impact. The Matwau squeezed harder.

  Fear that I was truly about to die gripped me, but only for a few seconds. That was all it took for the power to lodge itself deep within my soul. It spread out, reaching my hands last. At some point during the agony of breaking the bond, Melody’s hair had slipped from my fingers. It left my hand free to clamp down on the Matwau’s throat.

  I let loose the power that had once burned us both. Now it was his turn to scream. I felt nothing. Ahiga had shown me how to shield myself from the killing touch. Before my power had been flailing around uncontrolled. Now it was focused. With Claire, my power had instinctively repelled hers, with the Matwau it sought him out hungrily. Every bit of strength I had left, every ounce of power poured into him. He collapsed under the barrage. His hand fell away from my throat and both of my hands move down to his chest. I had to give up every last bit of power in order to kill him. I pushed with everything I had, and waited…

  …and it wasn’t enough.

  Spent, I fell back. I couldn’t kill him.

  38: Inside

  “Uriah.”

  Harvey’s voice itched at my ear, but I didn’t respond. The Matwau laid sprawled in front of me. All of this, it couldn’t have been for nothing. Ahiga had been right. He couldn’t teach me everything.

  “Uriah, look at Claire,” Harvey said from behind me.

  I turned, expecting to see Claire back to her normal self now that my bond to Melody had been broken. When I looked for her where she had been just a few moments earlier I didn’t find her. She was lying on the ground, still glowing as brightly as she had been before.

  “Claire!”

  The Matwau was forgotten. I trampled over his legs in order to reach Claire. When I finally laid my hands on her face, she smiled even though she was trembling from head to toe.

  “Claire, what are you doing? Stop it! Cla
ire, the bond is already broken. We did it. You don’t have to do this. Please, Claire.”

  Her response was to smile and slip her hand behind my neck. “You b-broke the b-bond?” she stuttered.

  “Yes. Please, you have to stop!”

  “It’s not enough,” she said. And then she pulled me down and kissed me.

  For the second time in one day, power poured into me. There was no lightning or pain this time. Instead of our powers fighting against each other it felt as if all of Claire’s love for me had coalesced into ambrosia. It poured over me in the most blissful experience of my life.

  When I finally opened my eyes, Claire sat in front of me beaming. I stared back, stunned. “How did you…?”

  Claire pressed her hands against my face. “Later. You aren’t done yet, Uriah.”

  “But…” I shook my head. It had all been a waste of time. I had no idea how Claire manage to pull off giving me her power without killing herself, but even with her power I knew I couldn’t finish this.

  “Claire, I can’t kill him. What Ahiga taught me, it wasn’t everything. I couldn’t give up my power.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I tried, but I couldn’t get rid of it. You have to tell me what to do,” I begged.

  “I can’t. It’s different for me. I could interact with my power, speak to it almost. All I had to do was convince it to leave.”

  I knew there was more to it than that, but I didn’t press. I didn’t have time. The Matwau’s body was twitching, healing. He would be up in a few seconds at most.

  “Claire, I don’t know what to do.”

  “I don’t, either,” she whispered.

  Harvey grabbed our shoulders and yanked us back. The Matwau had regained his feet.