The Dove (Prophecy Series)

by Sharon Sala

  Tyhen frowned. Is it far?

  “Does it matter?”

  There is not much moon. I asked to make sure I had a torch big enough not to burn out.

  “Oh. Sorry. It is not far.”

  Tyhen rolled her eyes and turned to Yuma.

  “We need a torch. Adam will show me where it grows.”

  Yuma took off to get greasewood they’d cut earlier. It burned bright and would make a good light.

  “You two do not go alone,” Johnston said. “After what happened today, we go nowhere in small numbers.”

  Tyhen wouldn’t argue. She wasn’t afraid of the dark, but she didn’t know this land or the inhabitants.

  By the time Yuma came back with a torch, Johnston had gathered up almost a dozen armed men, half of which were also carrying torches.

  We’re ready. Which way do we go?

  “Do you see the big bear? Ursa Major?”

  She looked up at the sky, searching for that specific gathering of stars.

  Yes, I see the bear.

  “Walk toward it. I am with you as you go.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  They took off into the darkness with Yuma and Tyhen in the lead, walking in groups of three and four.

  I can see you. You look very thin.

  Montford is sick. Stop looking at my belly and look for this Yucca.

  She heard a chuckle and then nothing.

  Yuma walked beside her, but he’d given the torch to her to carry and stayed a couple of steps ahead. He didn’t want to be night blinded by the torches if something came at them from out of the dark.

  And it was a wise decision. They hadn’t gone far from camp when he heard a sudden and deadly rattle.

  “Stop! Don’t anyone move!” he said as he grabbed Tyhen by the arm.

  Everyone froze, and as they did, the warning rattle was easier to hear.

  “What is that?” Tyhen asked.

  “Rattlesnake,” Yuma said, pointing just a few yards ahead of them.

  Johnston ran up with his torch and held it low to the ground toward the snake. Instead of striking out, the heat from the fire sent it slithering off into the night.

  “It wasn’t very big,” Tyhen said, mentally comparing it to the big jungle snakes she’d grown up seeing.

  “It was big enough. One bite of his fangs and you die,” Yuma muttered, then added. “Maybe not you, but we would.”

  She punched his arm.

  He grinned, trying to lighten the mood, and it worked. As soon as the danger had passed, they moved on.

  They’d walked almost a mile when Adam’s voice was, once again, in her ear.

  Just off to your left. Tall, spiny plant with long, thick leaves.

  “He said just to our left,” Tyhen said, pointing.

  They hastened their steps, and within a few moments Yuma saw it. “I know this plant!” he said. “My grandmother had it growing in her garden back home. It didn’t like Oklahoma weather, but she managed to keep it alive.”

  “Take the leaves, not the root, and take all you can carry. It has many uses, not the least of which is fighting fever and infections.”

  Thank you, Adam. I will tell Montford.

  “You are welcome. We miss you, but tell Yuma that Boomerang is growing.”

  I will. Tell my mother... no, tell her nothing. It would only make her sad again.

  “Safe travels, little sister.”

  And he was gone.

  “We take the leaves,” Tyhen said. “Take as many as we can carry. They have other uses.”

  They harvested them quickly then hurried back to find Shirley sitting with an older woman. Her hair was thick but short. She wore it parted in the middle and cut in a straight line across; about the length of her chin. She wore a shift similar to the others, but looser, and knee-high, lace-up moccasins

  Johnston recognized her as a woman named Luz Reyas.

  “Luz. You know this plant and how to use it for medicine?”

  She nodded. “It has many uses but the Apache use it for fever and infections. Give it to me. This won’t take long. Montford will be better by morning.”

  Tyhen knelt next to Montford and felt his forehead, as she did, he opened his eyes.

  “Little Dove, you have come to flap your wings and cool my fever?”

  She smiled. He was talking out of his head. “We brought medicine. You will feel better soon.”

  “Get some rest, my friend,” Yuma said.

  Johnston stopped them as they started to leave. “Thank you.”

  “You are most welcome,” Tyhen said. “I am grateful for wiser people than me.”

  They knew she was talking about Adam.

  “Yes, but he is there and you are here, and I am grateful for that, too,” Johnston said.

  Yuma laughed. “Agreed. Good night, my brother. Here’s hoping we don’t have to run any more foot races again soon.”

  Tyhen frowned. She had already come to the realization that the arrow that hit Montford could just as easily hit any one of the three. As sorry as she was about Montford, she was equally grateful it hadn’t been Yuma.

  Yuma held her hand as they walked back.

  Tyhen looked up at the heavens again, absently eyeing the Bear. She had known the stars long before her mother had taught her how to read. It was strange to think that sky was the same, no matter where you were when you looked up, then remembered she hadn’t delivered Adam’s message.

  “Adam said to tell you Boomerang is growing.”

  Yuma grinned. “They really used the name I suggested to name the new city? I like that! You know, the countries we all came from will no longer be called North or South America, because those are the names white men gave them.”

  She frowned. “I don’t care about the names. I just want what I’m supposed to do work.”

  “It will,” he said, and as they reached their tent, he put out the torch and laid it near the banked coals of their fire.

  They took off their moccasins, shed their clothes, and crawled back into the tent.

  Tyhen curled up on her side.

  Yuma curled up behind her.

  He heard her sigh and closed his eyes. Tomorrow would come too soon.

  ****

  Little Mouse’s heart was healing. The burns on her body had begun to grow new skin and hair was beginning to sprout on her head like new grass.

  She had cut down and re-sewn two of the dead woman’s dresses to fit her body and even had a pair of moccasins for her feet. She ate two good meals a day, had all the fresh water she needed, and slept without dreaming, happy to wake to another day of calmness.

  It had taken some time to go through the drying herbs hanging from the rafter as well as the crushed ones Nelli had stored in little pots. She didn’t know their names, but she was learning how they tasted when added to food.

  On the third day after her arrival, Chiiwi came calling. He brought her a big fish he’d caught in the river and some corn from his garden.

  “This is for me?” Little Mouse asked.

  Chiiwi nodded.

  “What do I give you in return?” she asked.

  “I asked for nothing,” he said shortly and started to walk away when she stopped him.

  “I have a question!”

  He turned around. “Then ask.”

  “I am a healer, but I don’t know your healing plants or where they grow. Meecha said you might show me.”

  He nodded. “I will show.”

  “When?”

  He hid a quick smile. “When your feet are no longer sore.”

  She frowned. “I have not spoken of my feet.”

  “I am the one who took out the thorns. It takes longer than three sleeps to make them well.”

  She sniffed. “So when you know my feet are healed, will you come take me to the plants?”

  “I will take.”

  “When?”

  He laughed, and when he did she saw his white teeth once again. “For a Little Mouse, you mak
e a very big noise. I will be back when it is time.”

  He walked away.

  She took her wonderful fish outside and gutted it, then sliced half of it up to smoke and laid it on a flat rock near the hottest side of her fire, wrapped the other half in wet corn husks and put it in the coals to cook. She peeled back the husks on her new corn, cleaned away the silks and then pulled the green husks back up and laid them near the fire, as well.

  She would have a fine meal today and the smoked meat for another meal tomorrow.

  Afterward, she sat down and pulled off her moccasins then eyed her feet. Chiiwi was right. Her feet were not well. But they would be, and then she would go hunting for medicines with him. The idea of a trip with him made her heart skip just enough to accept that it was an interesting thought.

  She did not smell bad anymore and one day she would have hair again, and Chiiwi had fine white teeth. He did not have a woman. She did not have a man, and her teeth were still in her mouth.

  She sat down outside her dugout to watch the fire, making sure it kept an even heat to cook her fish, thinking about how far she had come from Naaki Chava and how hard she had tried to die. She was beginning to see why the Old Ones had not taken her with them. This was a different life, but it might become a better life. Only time would tell.

  ****

  The new city of Boomerang:

  Cayetano settled the city’s new name as if it had been his idea. The Twins had urged him to lay this city out in a manner similar to Naaki Chava so that when strangers came, they would see it as more than a bunch of huts scattered about the jungle in which half-naked savages lived.

  They began by clearing one long pathway and then people picking sites on either side of it where they wanted to build. As the huts went up, more paths were cleared; keeping them running either north and south, or east and west, intersecting when necessary to give it an orderly appearance.

  The chief’s new home would not be made of hand-hewn rock as had been in Naaki Chava because it was not readily available. But with the New Ones tools, they were able to saw down large trees and build substantial dwellings, the kind that would withstand strong winds and were far enough from the shore to be safe from the big waves that came with them.

  They built the chief’s residence in the shape of a long house and then built another one less grand for the warriors. The sound of construction was a constant, along with the concern of hunting and gathering enough food to keep everyone fed until they had the first harvest from the new crops being planted.

  Singing Bird had some of their better craftsmen building looms for her weavers. One trader had already found their location, promising next time he came to bring back raw wool cut from their animals and to bring them some seeds of the cotton plant to start their own fields. Clothing would not last forever and going back to curing skins did not appeal to her. She had sacrificed a lot to take her people into a better future, not throw them back into living in caves.

  The mountainous region was beautiful, but subject to ocean winds they had not coped with inland, and so life was altogether a learning experience every day. But the day Adam and Evan came in with a gift for the long house, it stunned her.

  Before Firewalker, they had never lived anywhere but on Bimini Island with Landan Prince, and yet they had devoured entire sets of encyclopedias, scanned the internet for constant sources of new learning, and above their psychic skills, she guessed their IQs were off the charts. She wouldn’t have been wrong.

  Singing Bird was inside the long house weaving mats for the floors when Adam and Evan walked in.

  She looked up smiling while eyeing Evan’s new scar and checking out Adam’s attitude. They were smiling too, which told her all was well, and they were carrying something with them.

  “What is this you carry?” she asked, eying what looked like a framed picture, which was something she hadn’t since before Firewalker.

  “It is a gift for your new home and it should be hanging in Cayetano’s throne room. When strangers come to have an audience with him, they will see the scope of what the native people own and where they live.”

  Even before she saw it, she was impressed by the idea and quickly stood.

  “Let me see.”

  They turned the frame around and quickly rendered her speechless.

  It was a very detailed map done in colorful paints, showing what had once been the North and South American continent; from Canada all the way south through the United States, through Mexico, Middle America, and all the way to South America. Everything about the shapes looked perfect, but the land masses were unbroken and unclaimed, save for the single name they’d put at the top.

  One Nation.

  They’d named the entire land mass One Nation, with First Nation being what had been North America, and Second Nation, being what had been South America. And the umbilical cord connecting the twin continents that made them one nation was what had been called Middle America; where Naaki Chava used to be.

  “This is amazing,” she said. “How did you come up with this name?”

  “It was easy,” Evan said. “The twin continents are like Adam and me. We are separate to look at, but the blood that ties us together makes us one, just like the land on this map. They appear as two separate places, but see the umbilical cord still connecting them? It makes them One Nation. North is First. South is Second. And there is Boomerang. And one day as you learn the locations of other cities, you will add them and see the nation of tribes as they are.”

  “Cayetano is going to be very proud of this.”

  Adam smiled. “Tyhen has seen our vision. She will make sure the New Ones also make copies of this same map. Tribal chiefs should know how vast the resources and people are to whom they belong.”

  “Thank you, my sons. Thank you very, very much.”

  “It was our pleasure,” Evan said.

  Adam nodded, and still they did not leave.

  Something about the stillness with which they were watching her made her wary. “What is it you’re not telling me?”

  “Nothing bad. Tyhen and the New Ones are in what was once called Mexico. They are searching for water and adapting their way of life to the surroundings.”

  “Are they in danger?” she asked.

  Evan sighed. “We agreed we would not lie to you. Yes, they are in some danger, but Tyhen is more than a worthy opponent. She is a fierce and dangerous person to have as an enemy, Singing Bird. She will keep them all safe.”

  Still suspicious, Singing Bird watched their faces closely.

  “Her powers increased very drastically and all at once, it would seem.”

  “It would seem,” they said.

  “She has her father’s powers, doesn’t she?”

  They looked at each other and then back at her and nodded.

  “How did this happen?”

  Adam hesitated. But mother and daughter would be forever separated and it seemed Singing Bird deserved, at the least, to know the truth.

  “Tell her,” Evan said. “Tyhen won’t because she believes it would hurt her mother’s heart.”

  Adam nodded. “Windwalker gave them to her in the temple at Naaki Chava. He’s the one who told her when to leave.”

  Singing Bird turned pale. “But I thought he ceased to exist when the curse was broken.”

  “He stayed for her.”

  She moaned beneath her breath and didn’t know it. “Where is he now?”

  “He is no more. When he gave her his powers, he ceased to exist.”

  Singing Bird covered her face, but she wouldn’t cry. When she lifted her head, her dark eyes were blazing. “I saw him in her like I’d never done before. I should have known.”

  “I tell you only so that you will know how safe she is. She cannot die, Singing Bird. Not until she gives away her powers to her child as he did to her. For as long as One Nation exists, there will always be a Windwalker’s daughter to lead the people in it.”

  Singing Bird’s eyes were
shining with unshed tears, but the triumphant look on her face was dazzling.

  “Then this has all been worth it!” she cried and turned and picked up the framed map. “Come help me find a place for this. We have a new world in the making. It needs to hang in a place of honor!”

  ****

  This was the morning of the second day without fresh water and time was running out. Water containers were empty or nearly so. Food supplies were getting low and the heat of another day had set in for a long hot visit.

  Today the New Ones who were taking the lead were Yaqui and Apache men, who like Luz Reyes, had once lived in this place. It was vastly different from their time, and yet somehow familiar. They were delighting in what could only be called forests of cacti, thickets of spiny plants double and sometimes triple the size of how they’d known them.

  In the distance the marchers had seen wild pigs, some as large as small ponies, and big cats not unlike the jaguars from the jungles. With all these animals about there had to be water nearby as well. They would find it, and they would hunt food to sate their hunger. It was just a matter of time.

  While many saw it as a vast, harsh land with its own brand of beauty, Tyhen hated it with a passion. For a woman born and raised in a lush green land with water at every turn, this was nothing short of her worst nightmare.

  Yuma knew she was struggling to stay positive. It wasn’t the heat that was pulling her down, it was the horizon. She’d grown up in a city with a jungle around her, and a mountain in front of her. She’d never been allowed to climb that mountain, and this horizon was too damn far. They needed one good thing to happen, like finding water before sundown.

  ****

  Yaluk was elated. It had been a long while since they’d had the opportunity to take many prisoners with much wealth. Once his scouts had given him the direction the witch was on, he knew just where to launch his attack. They were heading straight through Cholla Pass, and once they spotted that small spring in the rocks about mid-way through, the distraction of finding water would serve to shift their focus from being on guard, to quenching their thirsts.