“Okay.” Tory wondered why her friend was being so obtuse and weirded out. “You want something cool to drink? I’m done packing and was just about to haul the suitcases out to the SUV, but I can take a moment to sit down and have a glass of iced tea with you.”
Shirley turned her head and stared out the front window. “No drink, thanks. Let’s go out to the garden. There is one more important plant remedy I must explain. We’ll have an extra minute or two alone out back.”
Another plant remedy? But Tory was leaving the reservation for good. What possible use would it be for her to know about another plant at this stage?
Something appeared to be terribly wrong with Shirley Nez today. But the Plant Tender had been so good to her over the last few weeks. So good for her, becoming a friend when everyone else seemed to hate her for being white.
Tory shrugged a shoulder and let Shirley lead them out the back door and into her garden. The least she could do in repayment for all her kindness was to humor the woman and spend a final few minutes with her.
“It’s the skunk-smelling raggedy goat sage,” Shirley said on a shaky breath when they’d stopped at the far edge of the garden.
“Excuse me?”
“Hastiin Lakai Begay’s reminder. It finally hit me what he meant.” Shirley grabbed her hand and squeezed. “It’s the cure for Ben Wauneka’s blindness.”
“What?” The breath left Tory’s lungs and her knees grew weak and trembling. “Are you sure? Calm down and tell me everything. How can it help and what do you do with it? Is the remedy a drink? Where can the plant be found?”
Shirley was shaking her head. “No time. Just listen. It should be made into a vinegar tincture, not the usual tea remedy. Apply it to both sides of the face, to both temples and each eyelid. Ask Michael Ayze to sing the necessary chant. It’s old, nearly forgotten. But he will remember.”
Tory’s head was swirling. Hopes. Dreams. Entire futures were suddenly looming before her.
She heard brakes squealing in her front yard. Who? Oh, yes. It was probably Dr. Hardeen coming to pick up the keys. But there were so many more questions she had to ask.
“Plant Tender, quick, I have guests coming. Tell me where this Plant Clan can be found.”
She looked over to Shirley just as the woman’s face paled. What on earth was the matter with her? Please don’t be having a heart attack or a stroke, Tory begged her silently. Not now.
“Why did you tell me?” Tory demanded. “Why not Ben?”
“You are the tender of the Plant Clan from now on,” Shirley replied in a whisper. “It will be your job to keep the knowledge and to pass on the information. But this Plant Clan is hidden and will be hard to see.”
Tory could hear someone knocking on her front door with persistence. But her brain was trying to absorb what Shirley was saying.
“Me, a Plant Tender? But, I’m leaving Dinetah. Besides, you’re the Plant Tender.”
Reaching up to tenderly cup Tory’s cheek, Shirley Nez shook her head. “Remember well the principles I’ve taught you. We didn’t have enough time, but I will be leaving you with the knowledge. You are destined to be one of the best Plant Tenders in all Dine history.”
The knocking had stopped. Tory was worried that Dr. Hardeen would leave and then she would have to search him out to turn over the keys. But her friend Shirley sounded crazy. Could she be having some kind of attack, or be about to go into a diabetic coma?
“Just hold on a second, Plant Tender,” she said gently. “Come inside where it’s cooler and let me answer the door. If you can wait a few minutes, we’ll finish this discussion. You have me confused.”
Tory turned but Shirley pulled her back. “The danger is already here, new Plant Tender. It walks on two feet but don’t let that fool you.”
“Tory! Oh, there you are,” a male voice called out to her. She turned to find Dr. Hardeen waving as he and a couple of other men came walking around the side of the house.
“Run.” Shirley pushed at her back. “Run. Hide in the junipers and piñons. Help is on the way.”
Run? “But what’s wrong?”
“Go now.” Shirley put herself between Tory and the men, closed her eyes and began to sing a chant.
Tory looked past Shirley to Dr. Hardeen. The man she saw coming toward her through the garden was not the man she thought she knew. The face was the same, or almost the same, with the addition of many wrinkles and odd scarring.
But the eyes were entirely different. Black and beady, they were not the eyes of the kind doctor who’d been her boss—or even of the dangerous wolf in her dreams. But they did remind her of something. Something terrifying.
Fear snaked through her. She backed up a couple of steps. Run. Petrified, she didn’t want to stay where she was, but she couldn’t leave her friend, either.
“Come on now, Tory,” Dr. Hardeen, or whoever it was, called to her. “I just want to talk. I have a fabulous new proposition for you.”
“Begone!” Shirley admonished him in Navajo. “You may not have her. The forces of good forbid it.”
“Be gone yourself, Plant Tender,” he said with a flourish of his hand. “The bilagáana woman has meddled into things that do not concern her and she will be given an opportunity to make that right.”
Tory’s feet were itching to turn and run. She backed up a few more steps, putting another five or six feet between them. But she still could not bear to leave Shirley alone to face whatever evil this was.
“Ah,” Shirley said with a half laugh. “I see you believe your minutes on earth are also numbered. But it’s too easy for you to die quickly, Skinwalker. You deserve pain. You deserve to face the anger of your master. Too bad you will not have the chance.
“As a doctor, you could’ve done much good for the People,” she added. “But you chose the dark wind instead.”
“Shut up, woman. It’s not my pain that should concern you. Get out of the way.”
Tory was horrified when she noticed that the hands of both men who’d come with Dr. Hardeen had become claws. What should’ve been fingers were flexing sharp, hooked nails under the cuffs of long-sleeved shirts. Ohmigod. This was no hallucination.
She looked around for some kind of weapon. But what did someone use against an evil demon?
Taking two more steps backward in the direction of the dense juniper bushes, Tory spotted a large, heavy-looking rock. If only she could get to it without them noticing, then maybe she could help Shirley.
“Dr. Sommer,” the evil one with Dr. Hardeen’s face said through gritted teeth. “You have one minute to come with us of your own free will. After that, I cannot be responsible for what happens.”
The noise came first from directly above her head. The sound was sharp, high-pitched. She glanced up, afraid to take her eyes off Dr. Hardeen for long.
Birds were circling the area. Big birds for the most part. Hawks, eagles. So many she couldn’t be sure of all the species.
The icy fingers of truth reached out and grabbed her by the throat. The raven. That was where she’d seen those eyes in Dr. Hardeen’s face before.
The evil doctor cursed them all in Navajo. Before her very eyes, the images of the two men with him blurred and became indistinct for a few seconds. Tory blinked and when she looked again, the two men had become huge vultures. They spread their large, vicious wings and flew up to do battle in the sky with the hawks and eagles.
Tory reached down and palmed the rock while everyone’s attentions were turned to the skies above. A gun might’ve been better protection. But on the other hand, she wouldn’t have the foggiest idea of how to use one.
That thought gave her a momentary pause. When the time came, would she be able to use the rock? Could she manage to hit another human being with murderous intent? That was not who she was.
“Get out of my way,” Dr. Hardeen screamed at Shirley. “It’s over. I will win.”
Shirley shook her head and stood her ground.
Just then ne
w sounds could be heard in the distance, this time coming from the road in front of the house. Trucks, SUVs. A group of vehicles was arriving, streaking into her yard.
More bad guys? If so, Tory figured she had waited too long to run. All was lost.
The clearest voice she could recognize belonged to Ben, as he called her name. The good guys to the rescue.
Tory took her first real breath in what seemed like a half hour. She turned her face toward the voice of the man she loved, just the same as Shirley Nez had turned to see the Brotherhood rushing for them. A whole army of men came racing around the side of the house.
But their loss of focus came at the worst possible moment. Tory heard a high-pitched shriek that sounded more like anger than anything else, and she turned back to stare at the evil dressed in her boss’s body.
He shrieked again, cursing and squawking as he shook a bony fist at them. Then he turned into a bird right in front of her eyes. Black. Dangerous. The raven.
She cowered, momentarily stung by the impossibility of what she had seen. In the time it took her to grit her teeth and stand tall to face the evil, the raven had spread its wings and was diving straight for her.
Shirley Nez stepped in front of the attacker. No!
So angry she could barely see, Tory hefted the rock and ran to save her friend. Blinded by revulsion and furious at the senseless invasion, she waded into a whirlwind of feathers and claws, swinging the rock over her head with as much force as she could muster.
No. No. No. Damn it. If she was destined to die today, this unholy bird was—by all the saints—going to go with her.
18
“I can’t believe she’s dead. It doesn’t seem possible.”
In his mind’s eye, Ben could see Tory shaking her head as she drove him up the ridge toward Shirley Nez’s house. The funeral and memorial were already over. In the Navajo tradition, the Plant Tender’s earthly body had been buried as soon as could be arranged. The sunrise memorial over her gravesite had been both beautiful for him to hear and gut-wrenching for everyone in attendance.
But Ben couldn’t help wondering where the Plant Tender’s spirit would be residing. The best of Shirley Nez was nearby. He could feel her presence in the air around them. He’d known her well, knew she would never leave the Brotherhood alone without her spirit, not while the Skinwalker war persisted.
Sixteen hours after the battle with the Skinwalkers had gone by, though, and Ben realized his beloved Tory was still blaming herself for the Plant Tender’s death. The beautiful Anglo doctor was also having trouble adapting to reality.
Accepting that she might not be the same healer she had always imagined herself to be must be a difficult challenge. Somehow, even with all her physician’s “do no harm” instincts, she’d nevertheless contributed to the death of Dr. Hardeen in his raven persona. And with a baseball-size rock, no less.
Ben had tried to explain that chances were good the raven’s death was caused more by the Brotherhood’s chanting, along with assistance from Hunter Long’s knife, than by anything she’d done. Still, at least one of her blows had connected and that was enough to convince Tory she had ended the existence of the Skinwalker.
The thought of her wading into the battle actually made him smile, right through the continuing pain of losing his mentor. Tory couldn’t stop herself from being a protector. A mother tigress.
But he wasn’t sure what to say now to help her through the pain and guilt. He was still sure she was in mortal danger and should be leaving the rez as fast as possible. That was all he could think of. A raven might be dead, but the Navajo Wolf still controlled evil across Dinetah.
“The Plant Tender’s death seems senseless,” he finally muttered. “If I didn’t know better, I would say she deliberately put herself in harm’s way. The Plant Tender should’ve asked the Brotherhood to plan an ambush if she somehow knew you would be attacked.” Though Ben did admit he would never have allowed anyone to use Tory as bait. Not even Shirley Nez.
“I think she wanted me to see…really see for myself…what the Dine are up against,” Tory said softly. “I know it’s made a big difference in how I think.
“And the Plant Tender also seemed quite determined to make me accept that there is a cure to be found for your eye disease,” Tory added.
“I’m not as sure about that part as you seem to be,” Ben grumbled from behind his blank, unseeing eyes. “I’ve never even heard of skunk-smelling raggedy goat sage. My great-grandmother was the Plant Tender before Shirley Nez, and as a kid I talked to hundreds of elders and old medicine men about cures. Why don’t I know that one?”
“I’ve told you,” Tory argued. “Hastiin Lakai Begay had to remind even Shirley Nez about that particular Plant Clan. And then she mentioned to me it had all but disappeared and would be hard to locate.”
Ben refused to let the worm of hope crawl inside his defenses. His Anglo physician’s training warred with every Navajo belief. There was no cure for his disease.
And even if this Plant Clan did exist somewhere in Navajoland, now that Shirley was gone they would never find it. So he stopped thinking about cures. Stopped wondering what if.
“You’re sure no one will mind if I stay at Shirley’s house—at least temporarily?”
Tory was deliberately changing the subject for now and that was fine by him. “No Navajo would want to be inside that house for a while, and you will be safe there until you feel ready to leave the rez. There is no way for you to be comfortable now in the place on Bluebird Ridge. And more, I would be concerned with your safety.
“The Plant Tender is—was—a neighbor to Kody and Reagan,” he added. “So you won’t be too far from help. And Shirley’s house has been specially blessed and protected.”
Her silence told him something he had said was bothering her. But Ben wasn’t sure if it was the fact that he hadn’t invited her to come up to his house that upset Tory. Or if she was uncomfortable with Kody and Reagan, people she barely knew.
“I really liked Reagan Long when I met her this morning. She’s cool. How long have they been married?”
That response pretty much said everything. But Ben refused to be sorry he had not invited Tory to come back to his house. Tonight his cousin Issy Whitehorse would be coming to take care of him, and Ben had already settled his mind to never having Tory in his home again. To never being able to see her sweet image again. The blindness had closed in on him for good.
He couldn’t bear having to go through the pain of getting Tory back in his bed and in his arms, when he would only have to send her away once more. Stiffening his spine to the inevitable, Ben tried to continue the small talk.
“The Longs have been married since the first of the year. They’re newlyweds.” His voice sounded a lot steadier than he felt.
“Hmm. That’s nice. They’re a nice couple.”
Hmm, was right. Something far different than living arrangements seemed to be bothering her. Ben waited for Tory to tell him what it was.
“What’s going to happen to Raven Wash Clinic now that…well, now that the director is gone?”
Ben wasn’t sure why, but he didn’t think this question would lead to the root of her problem, either.
He silently agreed to talk on whatever subject she wanted. “As soon as I get you settled, Hunter Long will be picking me up. Raven Wash Clinic is our first stop. I intend to do everything in my power to see that it remains open. It provides a much-needed service to the Dine.”
“Funny,” she said, but there was no humor in her voice. “Dr. Hardeen said those exact words about your clinic.”
“Tory…there is no such thing as all good or all evil. It would be wonderful if we could simply diagnose the dark wind in people and then cut it out like a cancer. But we can’t—at least not yet. Ray Hardeen chose his path. He took the wrong fork and opted for greed. No one else could’ve stopped it nor prevented it. He sealed his own fate.”
She sighed, and he wished like hell he could take
her in an embrace and make all the bad images go away. His arms ached to hold her. His heart cracked knowing he could never be there for her again.
“I worry about you going to Raven Wash,” she said in a slight change of subject he welcomed. “I think there still might be evil lurking there. You will be careful, won’t you? Will Officer Long be in his tribal police uniform, or will he be acting as a member of the Brotherhood?”
“We are always acting as members of the Brotherhood. In everything else we do, that is our first duty.”
“Well, there’s a nurse-practitioner at the clinic I think you should be careful to avoid. His name is Russel Beyal. Strange guy. I just bet he’s a Skinwalker.”
Ben felt the smile grow across his face. “You would lose that bet, Doctor. Russel Beyal has been spending all his free hours learning medicine man chants and potions. He was recently apprenticed to an uncle of Lucas Tso, and we expect him to someday become a member of the Brotherhood.”
“What? But…” Tory took a breath. “But my friend April Henry hinted that Russel was not what he seemed.”
“April Henry was being deluded about a lot of things by her so-called boyfriend, Coach Singleton,” Ben told Tory with great sadness. “We will be working with her to be sure she is fully back in the arms of our clan and breathing in only good spirits instead of the bad.”
“Oh.” The word had been said in a small voice, not like the woman he loved.
Another long silence from Tory told him that the nut of her biggest concern had not yet been cracked. But instead of telling him what was on her mind, her only words from then on were about directions to Shirley’s house.
Perhaps it was just as well. He did not want to know any more of what was in her heart. His own heart had enough problems to fill up the rest of his lonely life—leaving him with nothing but abject misery for company.
Tory breathed deep, and the pungent odor of earth and living things made her feel alive again. When she and Ben had first opened the door to Shirley’s double-wide mobile home, it had been such a joyful revelation. Plants. Plants growing everywhere. On nearly every surface.
Books by Linda Conrad Page 54
