by Jeff Posey
“Why?”
Tootsa looked down, his eyes moving from place to place. “Because. He killed my mother and father. And my sisters. I think he’d kill me if he could. But I know where to hide. I’m good at hiding.”
“Where will you hide?”
“In the canyon. With the Wild Boys.”
“But wouldn’t it be better to hide outside the canyon? Somewhere farther away?”
“No, no, no. It’s much safer in the canyon. The flute player protects us.”
Tuwa glanced at The Pochtéca, who had a puzzled look. “Flute player? How can a flute player protect you?” Tuwa asked. This boy Tootsa always had surprises. That worried Tuwa.
“Chief Dog Poop and those warriors are afraid of the flute music. They think it casts spells over them. So wherever the flute player makes his music, the warriors won’t go.”
Tuwa puzzled over that. It made the barest of sense. “So you hide there.”
“Sure. And we take the flute player food. He’s a funny man. All bent over.”
Enough of the flute player, Tuwa thought. He would have shaken his head, but pain still gripped it. He felt tired and confused and the mention of Pók made his stomach churn again. He hated the man for even the possibility he could be his father. The closer they got to Center Place Canyon, the less sense things made and the more Pók entered his mind. He would have given anything to be in a nice meadow beside a creek high in the mountains to sleep for a week. But instead, they had to run. Straight toward the head of the snake. What if Nuva is alive, if there’s even a chance Chumana survives? Maybe Sowi is the wise one. Maybe they should get out while they could. Instead, Tuwa imagined finding Chumana and Nuva and escaping with them, perhaps along with The Pochtéca and his bluestone. And just leave the evil in the canyon? Leave Pók alone and do nothing? Never go home to the Village of Twins? Could he just leave all that?
The Pochtéca came to Tootsa and looked at him. “And what do you think the runner who just left here will do?”
“Oh, he’ll tell Dog Poop,” said Tootsa.
“The one you call Pók, the Chief Warrior? And what will he do?”
“Well, I’d like to see that,” said Tootsa. “He’ll get so mad, he’ll probably cut that runner’s heart out.”
“Perfect,” said The Pochtéca. “Your uncle tells the Big Chief, and the runner tells Pók, the Chief Warrior. They’ll make us out to be the most fearsome band of orphans the world has ever seen.” The Pochtéca grunted as he sat hard on the ground near Tootsa, dead warriors stretched out around him. “You said we would be safer in the canyon than outside of it. Is there a secret way there you can take us? Can you hide us when we’re there?”
Tootsa’s eyes drifted away from The Pochtéca. “Maybe.”
“Only ‘maybe’?” asked The Pochtéca.
“I’m not like those stupid stonemasons who work for The Builder for nothing.”
“Ah,” said The Pochtéca. “You want to trade. Okay, young…what’s your name?”
“Tootsa.”
“Okay young Tootsa. Make an offer.”
Tootsa licked his lips. “All the pointed teeth that are here.”
The Pochtéca gave Tuwa a puzzled look. Tuwa signed that it was good. The Pochtéca shrugged. “Good. We have an agreement.” He started to get up.
“And your shirt with the jingling bells,” said Tootsa.
“Oh, no. That’s far too precious. You take your treasure, and I’ll take mine. Or we’ll find our own way into the canyon, and maybe we’ll take all these pointed teeth for ourselves.”
Tootsa licked his lips again. “Then one bell for every day I help you.” He flicked his eyes to The Pochtéca, then back into the distance.
The Pochtéca looked again at Tuwa, who shrugged.
“Very well, then,” said The Pochtéca. “But you get the bells only after you’ve gotten us safely into the canyon.”
“No,” said Tootsa. “One bell a day. First one right now.”
The Pochtéca laughed. He stood with effort, steadying himself on Sowi’s arm. He ran his hand through Tootsa’s hair. “You are a hard trader,” he said. “Kopavi! Cut this boy a bell from my shirt.”
Many Strands
One girl arched backward over a rock and basked in the morning sun, sniffling her runny nose. The other sat in shade.
“How are we going to stop him?” the shade girl asked.
“He likes you more than me,” said the sick girl in the sun. “You just get him going on you. I’ll figure out how to stop him.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know. Hit him in the head with a big rock, I guess,” she said. She thought of the new flake-knife hidden in her dress. She knew of only one thing that would truly stop a runner. Hitting him in the head might slow him down. But she planned to stop him permanently. She’d long wanted a chance to kill the ones who came to them every day.
“If you hit him too hard, he won’t be able to tell us what we’re supposed to find out.”
“I won’t hit him that hard until after.”
“We’ll have to hide for the rest of our lives.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. Either way, it’s better than what we’ve been doing.”
“Some of them are nice to us.”
“See how bad you’ve got it? They just don’t hit as hard, and you take that as being ‘nice.’”
“Well, don’t miss and hit me instead.”
“I won’t. You just get him going on you, and I’ll take care of the rest.” She left the sunny rock and began hefting stones to choose one. She held one in each hand comparing them when she heard a foot scuff on the road. The runner approached, slow-footed, head lolling. “He’s here,” she called to the other girl.
The shade girl stood and watched him. “Okay,” she said. “Here I go.”
She walked out onto the road, began writhing like a snake dancer, and called to the runner, who stopped and stared at her.
“What are you doing?” he asked, panting, his eyes squinting in the white sunlight.
“I couldn’t wait,” she said. She lifted her dress and exposed her backside to him, rocking and weaving her hips.
“I’ve not delivered my report yet.”
“This won’t take long.” She faced him, peeled off her dress, and twirled it.
The runner looked at her naked body and licked his lips.
“Why not like always?” he asked.
“Like always is boring,” she said. “But this isn’t.” She smiled at him, cocked her head, and turned to go back into the shade of the rocks.
The runner looked up and down the road. He shook his head, his shoulders sagged, and he followed her.
After he spent himself, the sick girl appeared and slipped off her dress. “Do you have enough left for me?” she asked with a cough.
The runner shook his head. “No. I can’t. I’m already late.”
She pretended to pout and began to run her fingers over his bare shoulder and chest. “Just wait until I get back from giving my report,” he said, “and I’ll give you more than I gave her.” He made a fist and grinned.
The shade girl massaged his thighs and calves and the sun girl his shoulders and head. He groaned his appreciation.
“So what happened in Black Stone?” asked the sick girl. She sniffed her running nose.
“Yeah,” said the other girl. “Is Ráana acting like a king now, with his own town?”
“No, Ráana is dead.” The runner sat up. “But I can’t tell you. I’ve got to go.” He began to disentangle himself from the girls. They pulled him back to them and giggled. “No, really,” he said.
“Give us your full report,” the shade girl said, “and we’ll let you go. If you’ll promise to find both of us as soon as Pók is finished with you.” She giggled and brushed her hand over his bare backside.
“If I give my report to you before I give it to Pók, he’ll kill me.”
“Maybe we’ll kill you if you don’t,�
�� said the sick girl. Again the girls giggled.
“The only way you’ll kill me is by getting me in trouble,” said the runner.
“We’ll get you into more trouble if you don’t tell us,” said the girl with the sniffles. She lifted a rock over her head.
“Stop being silly,” said the runner.
“Tell us what happened in Black Stone,” said the girl with the stone.
“I’m not going to tell you anyth….”
The girl brought the rock down hard on the runner’s right knee. It crunched and he screamed.
“What are you doing?” said the shade girl.
“We have to find out. He isn’t going to tell us any other way.” She pulled the flake-knife from her crumpled dress on the ground and showed the runner. He breathed hard, his eyes wide. “Tell us, or I’ll spill your guts.”
“Why? Why are you doing this?” asked the runner, spittle flying from his lips.
“Because there is more going on here than you know,” said the sun girl.
“You ruined my knee!” He grimaced in pain, holding his knee.
“Tell us.”
“Then Pók will kill you two, as well as me.”
“Tell us!” screamed the girl with the knife. She dragged it over his belly, drawing a thin bead of blood. The shade girl recoiled and flattened herself against the smooth face of a boulder fallen from the cliff wall.
“The two patrols killed each other. I’m the only one who survived. All dead just north of Black Stone Town. I looked back and saw the red-hat man and a bunch of his boys and children standing over the bodies.”
“They killed the warriors?”
“Why’d you smash my knee!”
“Shut up,” said the girl with the knife. “You’ll never tell Pók anything ever again. And you’ll never stick your disgusting piece of meat in either of us again.” She swung her hand and sliced through his windpipe with her new blade, opening the side of his throat. A spout of blood pulsed onto the sand. His eyes went wide and his mouth worked, and then he slumped.
“Why did you do that?” asked the shade girl, tears running down her face.
“Because I’m not going to take it anymore. No matter what.”
“We’ve got to get out of here.” She began pulling her dress on.
“Help me drag him back onto the road,” said the girl with the bloody knife, the one who liked sun. She sniffled.
“What?”
“We’re going to leave him, arms and legs spread wide, in the middle of the road.”
“Why?”
“So they’ll think it’s a sign.”
“A sign of what?”
“It doesn’t matter. It will frighten them. Pók will be scared. That will help Nuva. That’s all I care about.”
They dragged the runner into the middle of the road and left him naked on his back, eyes open to the sky, head to the north toward Center Place Canyon. They hid his clothes beneath a pile of rocks away from the road. Then they ran to find Nuva.
“Where did you hide the girls?” Chumana asked Nuva that night.
“Bottom level where the cotton goods are stored.”
Chumana nodded. “Nobody goes there.”
“Not until winter when everyone wants more cloth to keep warm.”
“Do you know who the red-hat man is?” asked Chumana.
Nuva stared into space, remembering. “I’ve heard stories of the traveling trader who wears a red hat. He has children, orphaned children, carry his trade goods.” She wiped their dinner bowls with twists of straw that she would use to kindle the next morning’s breakfast fire. “But I’ve never actually seen him.”
“Is he magic? Do you think he really can make two groups of warriors fight and kill each other? Do you think that’s how warriors are being killed by children?”
Nuva shook her head. “Pók sent the first group of warriors to Black Stone. He knew Ráana and the second group were going there, too.”
“You think Pók is behind the killing? How?”
“I wish our girls hadn’t killed that runner,” said Nuva. “I would like to have talked to him. Surely Pók sent him with a message. A message that warned the regular warriors that Ráana and his guard were coming.”
“A message to kill Ráana and his guard?”
“I don’t know. But that sounds like the Pók we know, doesn’t it?”
The palace grew quiet as everyone but the night sentries prepared for sleep. Nuva and Chumana talked in whispers.
“So the red-hat man and his orphans just happened to be there right after the two patrols killed each other?” asked Chumana.
“Maybe.”
“And the other reports of warriors killed by children? That doesn’t sound like coincidence. Don’t you think the red-hat man and his burden-bearers are up to something?”
“Oh, I think they most certainly are,” said Nuva.
“What?”
“I think they came here expecting to trade. That’s what the red-hat man does. Trade. He expected to trade and something else happened instead.”
“Oh!” said Chumana, sitting up in the near-darkness of their chamber. “Ihu! He wanted to steal what the red-hat man has. And maybe give it to The Builder or Tókotsi himself!”
“Now you’re thinking, my pretty bluestone girl. Except maybe it wasn’t Ihu’s idea. Who else knew the red-hat man was coming? Did they ever mention that in The Builder’s court?”
Chumana said nothing for a while. “Yes. One mention, just before the half-moon. ‘A trader brings bells from the south,’ someone said. The Builder seemed delighted, but no one else seemed to care. I didn’t think it meant anything.”
“Who said it? Who was in the room?”
Chumana closed her eyes. “Pók said it. I’m sure it was Pók. At least I think it was Pók.”
Nuva nodded in the darkness.
“So Pók gave Ihu the order to kill the red-hat man and his orphans and take his goods—his bells,” said Chumana.
Nuva kept nodding. “But instead of his warriors killing the children, the children killed his warriors,” she said. “I didn’t know those bells had so much power. But that doesn’t matter now. What matters is that Pók doesn’t know what is going on. For the first time, he doesn’t know. But we do.”
“How can we use that?” asked Chumana, her voice strained with worry. “We must be quick. Pók leaves tomorrow morning with his guard to escort the chiefs of the Southern Alliance here for Summer Council. And I’m not allowed in the big council chamber when they start their talks.”
“We must bide our time, Chumana. A mistake is worse than doing nothing. We must be very careful. We must not destroy ourselves by accident. Will The Builder hold court tomorrow morning to give Pók his final instructions?”
“Yes. At the first shaft of light on the wall, like usual.”
“Good. You must be early and tell The Builder you had a vision.”
“What vision do I tell?”
Nuva’s thoughts were spinning. “They’ll find the dead runner before then.”
“Ráana,” said Chumana. “Pók will blame Ráana.”
“But Ráana is dead,” said Nuva.
“Pók doesn’t know that. Only we know that. He’ll blame Ráana and Tókotsi for killing his runner,” said Chumana. “He despises both of them.”
“Yes, perhaps,” said Nuva. “Tókotsi was playing Ráana to win against Pók. You’re right. You’re very right. And we have so much more.”
“What do you mean?”
“What size feet do our girls have who killed the runner?”
“Their feet? I don’t know. Small. Why?”
“Wouldn’t their footprints look like those of children?”
A slow smile spread across Chumana’s face. “Yes, I think they might.”
“Absolutely they would. I have heard the best trackers say the footprints of young women with small feet are difficult to tell from those of older children.”
“You want
Pók to believe children killed his runner,” said Chumana.
“Exactly. But not the red-hat man.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s an outsider,” said Nuva. “And an adult. Pók would focus on him and ignore the children. It would be less of a mystery. It would give him a target. Someone to blame. We must make him think the danger is coming closer and is something he can’t see.”
“That it could be any children, anywhere, at any time?”
“Yes. But there’s even more.”
“What?”
“You remember the flute player? And your prophecy about the witchery of flutes?”
“Of course. I felt bad about all that after Pók banned all flutes and flute players from the canyon. I like flute music.”
“But one flute player defies them and keeps playing in the side canyons, where Pók’s warriors will not go for fear of witchcraft.”
“Yes. But how does that help us?”
“It gives us many strands to weave together, my dear, that’s all. Many strands.”
Koko-Peelay
After he fell from the third floor while working on the palace during the time of the Day Star, Peelay lost his sense of time and never regained it. Even after he recovered, he couldn’t tell the difference between doing something for a short time or a full day.
He lost other things as well. A fear of death that had paralyzed him since childhood evaporated. The gnawing hunger that used to double him over in pain faded. Even though his upper back had healed into a misshapen curve that made his head hang low, and his vision had been knocked out of one eye, his physical stamina tripled.
Because he’d become a twisted and strange-looking man, adults avoided him and children stared. He had few friends other than Leena, the last flute maker to survive in the canyon, who found him after his fall and nursed him back to life. And the Wild Boys. They liked to dance and laugh with him.
Tonight, he sneaked back into the canyon near the palace and darted from shadow to shadow until he came to Leena’s doorway. She pulled him inside and they sat in silence until Peelay stopped breathing hard.
“I have not seen you from the canyon rims like I used to,” Peelay said.
