The Next Skywatcher: Prequel to The Last Skywatcher Triple Trilogy Series (The Last Skywatcher, Anasazi Historical Thrillers with a Hint of Romance Book 1)

by Jeff Posey

  “We’ve got to get some information before Pók does. He’s expecting a runner tomorrow, perhaps sooner. We need to find out what he knows before Pók does.”

  “Make a runner talk?” Cook covered her open mouth.

  “I just need the girls,” said Nuva. She took Cook’s wrists in her hands and squeezed hard enough to make her point. “I need the girls now.”

  Nuva released her grip, and Cook whispered, “Yes, of course,” and backed away.

  As Cook’s staff served the midday meal in The Builder’s chambers, two girls sneaked into the kitchen storeroom. Nuva led them into dark, quiet rooms deep in the heart of the palace. Nuva’s eyes could adjust quickly and see dim shapes in the darkest of rooms, but she knew the eyes of others stayed blind for much longer. She took their hands and led them. Finally, she stopped in a room with dozens of jars of bluestone beads, though the girls wouldn’t know it. She came here often and took beads to maintain Chumana’s costume.

  Nuva asked the girls if they knew the runner likely to return from the patrol of regulars that had been sent to Black Stone Town. Yes, they said, they suspected they knew him. A regular. Nuva asked what he was like. Young and single-minded, they said. Sex-crazed, one of them whispered with a giggle.

  “Good,” said Nuva. “I want you to sneak along the south road tonight and wait until you see the runner coming. Then I want you to convince him to go with you. I want you to find out what he will report.”

  “Oh, he won’t do that, madam,” said one girl, with a congested cough. Nuva recognized the voice from her hallway corner sessions, the girl who sounded sick. “He always delivers his messages first, and comes to us after.”

  “This time, he must deliver his message to you first,” insisted Nuva. “Do you understand? We need to know what happened at Black Stone Town, and we need to keep Pók from finding out for as long as possible.”

  “But, that’s….”

  “I know,” interrupted Nuva. “A death penalty for anyone caught doing it. I know. If I could find out any other way, believe me, I would. But I cannot. We must know what message that runner brings.”

  Nuva felt the girls recoil at the idea and gather themselves.

  “I’ll do it,” said the sick one who wheezed and sniffled. “I’m tired of living like this. I don’t care what happens to me as long as I don’t have to go back to the Fat Man.”

  “But life is better than death,” said the other girl. “Especially the way they would do it.”

  “They’re doing it to us now,” said the sick girl, “little by little, every time they bloody our noses or smash our faces or shove their disgusting man parts into us. You know it.”

  Nuva let them sit in silence a few moments. Then she said, “Something big is about to happen. Things will change, for better or worse. If we can get to the runner before Pók, then maybe it will be for better.”

  “Lead me out of here,” the defiant girl said, sniffling her nose. “I’ll do it, even if I have to do it alone.”

  “No,” said the other girl. “I’ll go with you.”

  Nuva led them out by a poorly watched back entrance. She looked from the darkness of the palace depths across the bright, parched canyon floor to where the girls ran along the base of the canyon wall away from the Fat Man’s ramshackle structures toward the south road. The bright lights hurt her eyes and she withdrew into the darker interior, all the while working her fingers as her mind raced.

  It’s time to issue the sharp-stick order to the Sisterhood, she thought. Every girl and woman admitted into the secret society had to find a sacred stick, decorate it, sharpen one end, and keep it hidden. Nuva’s sharp-stick order would tell them to get their sacred sticks and bring them to Center Place Canyon. Once there, she would direct them to stand behind a warrior or a man of power and, at a signal she had not yet worked out, plunge their sticks into the men’s backs. She worried that too many of the Sisters would refuse to carry out the ultimate act of rebellion, and she could only hope enough would comply. And the timing worried her. There couldn’t be any mistakes.

  She found Cook again and issued the order. Cook opened her mouth, eyes wide, but didn’t speak. “We have no choice,” whispered Nuva. “This may be our only chance.”

  Cut a Bell

  The moon had grown to nearly three-quarters and rose in the middle of the afternoon. Tuwa lay on his back looking at it. After the blow to his head at Black Stone, his vision had gone fuzzy and he had trouble thinking straight. But today, for the first time, the moon looked crystal clear and didn’t drift.

  The ache in his forehead seemed to diminish as the moon grew in size. His Grandfather had always said the time of waiting for the full moon was the most powerful, when many things were possible. That made him think of Grandmother Haki. Even though he’d known her for only a day, he felt as if she’d been important to him his whole life. More than even some of the young Pochtécans he’d known the last several summers. Many of them now dead.

  Tuwa raised his head and looked around. The thirteen of them, the remaining Pochtécans, The Pochtéca himself still in a daze, plus the wild boy Tootsa, sprawled in a bowl-shaped bare-rock depression atop a low mesa that overlooked the north road from Center Place Canyon to Black Stone, not far from the hill where Ihu had outrun Tuwa. If only he’d caught the hairless man the first time, many would still be alive.

  At the bottom of the bowl atop the mesa, not visible from the road below, shallow water collected and they all enjoyed its refreshment. They felt well-hidden here. Safe. Tuwa noted Choovio and Sowi lying at the rim, watching the road. Tootsa and some of the younger boys played in the black water and Kopavi watched over them, reminding them to keep their voices down. The Pochtéca, better now, but not himself because he had yet to speak, sat like a religious man meditating on his gods.

  Tootsa waded out of the water and walked gingerly toward Tuwa. The boy had led them to this hiding place, urging them to abandon the road.

  “Something’s going to happen,” said Tootsa when he got close. He squatted and water dripped from his knees in rivulets that glinted in the afternoon sun.

  “What do you mean?” asked Tuwa. He sensed an odd air about the boy. He seemed tied into some parallel world that Tuwa and the others couldn’t see. The orphan boys his age acted wary of him. Tuwa imagined what they were thinking: two-heart, good on one side, evil on the other. Son of a witch. But Tuwa had detected nothing evil in the boy. Sad and unresponsive at times, yes. Odd in his behaviors, yes. Starved for attention, yes.

  Tootsa didn’t answer his question but his eyes wandered from Tuwa’s chest to his face. “Was your granddaddy the top skywatcher?” He used the webbing between his thumb and forefinger to squeegee water down his leg.

  “He raised me, yes,” said Tuwa, wondering what this odd boy was getting at.

  “Lightfoot says what Pók did was the worst thing in the history of this world. We think some worser stuff happened in the other worlds, though, or they wouldn’t of been destroyed.”

  Tuwa nodded. He had no response in words to that.

  “My daddy’s dead. And my mother. And maybe all my sisters. I’m the only boy.” Tootsa looked at Tuwa as if he would say more, but he didn’t.

  “You’re an orphan. Like us.” He still didn’t know what the boy wanted.

  “If we didn’t know what they were doing, then it doesn’t have anything to do with us. Maybe that goes for if you don’t know who they are, too. Except now you do.”

  Tuwa’s head churned for a response. Was this sympathy? Or some kind of accusation? He would have shaken his head if it didn’t hurt.

  A small rock struck and skittered near them. They both looked up and saw Sowi waving his arm.

  “They’re here,” said Tootsa.

  “Who?” asked Tuwa, getting up to join Sowi at the rim overlook.

  “We’re about to find out,” said Tootsa with a shrug.

  Tuwa shook his head without thinking and regretted it. Talking to the boy ma
de his head feel fuzzy again, and shaking it didn’t help. He walked up the slope and glanced back, expecting Tootsa to follow, but the boy trotted back to the pond. Going for a wade again? Now? He mentally shook his head and before he reached Sowi, he looked back again. Tootsa had gathered his belongings and carried them away from the low pond, up the rise on the other side. Tuwa paused to watch the boy duck into a pile of rocks near the high spot. Strange boy. He seemed as much of the spirit world as the physical, but a kid familiar with the canyon and good at the art of hiding wasn’t bad to have around at the moment.

  “What?” asked Tuwa to Sowi, who uncharacteristically said nothing. He nodded to the road coming from the north. After a moment for his eyes to focus and adjust, Tuwa saw what he meant. A group of warriors trotted in loose formation. Going south. Toward Black Stone.

  After they tramped by, Sowi let out a sigh. “Do you think they can follow our trail?” he asked, the muscles around his eyes tight.

  “No way,” said Tuwa. “We left the road stepping only on stones, like Tootsa showed us.”

  Tuwa looked to the rocks where Tootsa had hidden. Any chance the boy would set them up to be caught? What might be his reward? Then he remembered the pointed warrior teeth the boy carried in that pouch of his. He would never want to be caught with those. Is that why he hid himself so well? Not willing to be caught? But somehow willing to get a reward for turning in the Pochtécans? Tuwa shook his head slowly. No. The boy truly feared and hated the warriors.

  Tuwa told Sowi to take a break while he kept watch. Choovio had moved to a new vantage point. The afternoon shadows lengthened. Tuwa started when a pebble skittered past. Tuwa saw Choovio point north up the road with an arrow. Tuwa looked and saw a single man coming fast. He wore the headdress of an official runner. Trying to catch the warriors who had just passed? Perhaps. Tuwa scratched his ear and wondered what that could mean. What message he might carry.

  Before the sun went down, just before the world filled with hazy light that cast no shadow, a low whistle from Choovio made him look at the road again. Another group of warriors trotted from the north, heading south into Black Stone. Why wouldn’t the two patrols travel together? Perhaps that runner was sent to tell the first group that the second was close behind.

  He didn’t have time to think. He heard a stone shift and saw Choovio running toward him, crouched low to stay below the sight line from the road. “Look to town,” he said as he dropped beside Tuwa and crawled to peer over the rim.

  Tuwa looked and saw the first group of warriors returning at a fast trot. They would meet the second group right below. Tuwa’s heart leaped into his throat. They were so close they would able to hear if they spoke in loud voices. Sowi joined them, his eyes wide.

  What was going on here? Were they joining forces to charge up the mesa and attack the Pochtécans? Had Tootsa left a sign on the road? Tuwa glanced to the rocks where Tootsa disappeared. He saw nothing.

  To Sowi and Choovio, Tuwa said, “All the archers at the rim, ready to fire. Tell them to wait for their best shot, then run to those rocks.” He pointed to Tootsa’s hiding place.

  “We can’t kill this many,” Sowi said. “We should escape now. We shouldn’t even have come this way. Getting closer to them doesn’t make any sense.”

  “The first of us to fire will run, and the last to fire will slow them,” said Choovio. He cuffed Sowi on his shoulder, and they went to gather the archers.

  Tuwa peered over the rim. The two groups of warriors had stopped not far apart. The leaders gestured to each other and seemed to be talking. They could be planning to turn and rush up the mesa where the orphans were still collecting their weapons, unprepared for an attack. Tuwa cupped his hands behind his ears and concentrated on the two leaders. He heard “traitors” and then “kill all of you!” Another voice called, “You fool!” and then the two groups rushed together and began fighting.

  Dust rose in the last direct sunlight of the day as they fully engaged each other, and fighting quickly became man to man. Better warriors killed their opponents quickly and moved their focus to another man, and then another. Soon only about a quarter of the men moved among the dust and still fought, the frenzy slowed to circling pairs trading tired blows. Choovio and Sowi joined Tuwa and they watched.

  “What are they doing?” asked Sowi. “They’re killing each other,” he said, answering his own question.

  “Runner,” said Choovio, pointing to where a lone man stood halfway up the mesa, perilously close to them, watching the fight below. He looked like the same one who had chased down the patrol going to Black Stone.

  “Should we get him?” whispered Sowi.

  “Only if he sees us,” said Tuwa.

  A few moments later, only two warriors remained. Their arms hung limp and they stepped carefully among their fallen comrades, the dust wafting away to reveal a killing field. One made a slow-motion attack, the other countered, and they swung their clubs hard at each other’s heads, connected, and collapsed. Every fighter lay on the road, not a single man standing.

  Stones skittered down the slope as the runner moved at an angle down to the road near the pile of dead men. He stood a moment surveying the scene, and then sprinted north toward the canyon.

  Tuwa leaned back from where he had been holding himself forward on tense arms, and relaxed. What had just happened? And why? It made no sense.

  “Should we collect weapons?” Choovio asked.

  “We’ve got plenty of weapons,” said Sowi. “We should go south or west before they even think of looking for us.”

  “Why would they kill each other like that?” Tuwa asked. He saw Tootsa pop out of his hiding spot and run toward where they sat.

  “What happened?” Tootsa asked when he arrived, peeping over the rim.

  “You don’t already know?” asked Tuwa, watching Tootsa’s face. He saw nothing that made him think the boy had foreknowledge.

  “Let’s go see,” Tootsa said, hopping over the rim and running down the loose talus slope.

  Tuwa tried to stop him, but it was too late. He watched Tootsa and shrugged. “Maybe we should.” He stood, looked at Choovio who said nothing, and Sowi who shook his head in disapproval, and then Tuwa jumped over the side. Choovio followed. Other boys jumped, and when Tuwa reached the flat ground near the road he noticed Sowi had come over the rim as well.

  The warriors lay in a surprisingly small space, as if they had just stood their ground and fought to the death. A few eyelids fluttered and limbs trembled, but their injuries looked beyond help.

  “Look,” said Choovio, pointing along the north road.

  Tuwa turned in terror, expecting more warriors. But he saw only a slender figure on the high point of the road. The runner. Looking back. Watching.

  “Think we could catch him?” Sowi asked.

  “No,” said Tuwa, clenching his fists. Tootsa had gone over too quickly. He didn’t want to split the group, and he doubted Sowi could catch the runner anyway. After Ihu, he doubted he could, either.

  Tootsa began leaping among the fallen warriors as if looking for something. More pointed-tooth treasure, Tuwa suspected. Then Tootsa stooped over a body and stared at the face.

  “Do you know that one?” Tuwa asked.

  “My uncle. Ráana,” he said.

  Tuwa recognized him as one of the leaders, the one who had shouted “You fool!”

  “Why would he do this?” asked Tuwa.

  Tootsa looked around, then back to his uncle’s face. “These are Southern Guard,” he said, pointing to the warriors who had been with his uncle. “My great-grandfather gave Black Stone to my uncle. I guess he was coming to take it.” Tootsa pointed to the ones who had turned back from Black Stone. “Those are regulars from the canyon. Chief Dog Poop orders them around. He never liked my uncle much.”

  “Have they fought each other before?”

  Tootsa shook his head and gave a weak no sign with his hand.

  Tuwa looked back along the north road to where
the runner had stood watching. He was gone.

  With a shout, Tootsa jumped back in alarm, slipping on blood-soaked bodies, and skittered on all fours to hide behind Choovio. Ráana’s eyes had opened. He blinked and sat up.

  Ráana turned and looked over the fallen warriors, the young Pochtécans standing among them with their bows and clubs, and he struggled to his feet, stood unsteadily. He had a horrendous wound to the side of his head. Blood flowed in a sheet down his neck and arm. “Children warriors!” he said, his words slurred. His eyes rolled wildly. “You’ve killed us!” He turned away and lurched like a wounded animal to the northwest, leaving the road and cutting cross-country.

  “Should I stop him?” asked Choovio.

  Tuwa’s mind froze. He couldn’t decide what to do.

  “Let him go,” said a familiar voice. They turned to see The Pochtéca standing at the bottom of the mesa slope, his crumpled red hat at an odd angle on his wounded head.

  Tuwa felt a weight lift from him.

  “He’ll bring more warriors,” said Sowi.

  “Let him, if he survives,” said The Pochtéca, his voice booming like the old days. “The more warriors here, the fewer in the canyon where we’ll be.”

  “What?” asked Sowi. “We should run away, now, as fast as we can!”

  “Absolutely not,” said The Pochtéca. “I still have my bluestone to collect. And you young rebels need your revenge.”

  Tuwa nodded. And grinned in spite of his surroundings and the lingering ache in his head. The Pochtéca was back. And he was right. He turned to Tootsa. “What will your uncle do?”

  “No good. He’ll tell the Big Chief, and he won’t like it.”

  “Big Chief of…?”

  “The Southern Alliance. Ráana is his top man. The Chief is his grandfather.”

  “Your great-grandfather?”

  Tootsa nodded.

  It made no sense. Why would the boy live like this if his great-grandfather was head of the Southern Alliance? “Do you want to help your uncle?” Tuwa asked.

  “Oh, no. I don’t even like him seeing me.”