The Green Memory of Fear

by B. A. Chepaitis

  * * * *

  Alex didn’t remember sleeping but he must have because suddenly he was wakened by a sense of Jaguar’s unguarded presence. She was on the mesa, where Jake said she’d be.

  He sat up fast, then stood, looking through the bright light of late morning.

  She was directly across from him. He felt her there, and as he sought her he could see her form, sitting up on a rock. What was she doing? He paused, frowning, and figured it out.

  Snakes, he thought. Snakes. Jake told him about her plans. He was horrified, even while he thought how elegant of her. How terrible and beautiful.

  And now, here she was, carrying it out.

  He grabbed his pack and walked down his mesa, then crossed the trail that led to hers. He didn’t rush, knowing she wasn’t going anywhere until Senci showed up. At the foot of her mesa he paused, gathered his strength, and started up. She was out of his view as he climbed, and then, miraculously, he stood in front of her, no more than a yard away from her, seeing her again.

  She wasn’t yet aware of him. She was lying back on a long, smooth rock, eyes closed. He let his eyes travel her length. The unbleached cloth of her ceremonial dress was lighter than her sun-burnished skin. He noticed how finely drawn she looked, as if she’d been refined in the same fires that forge steel. Everything about her was necessary and true.

  And she was preparing herself to die.

  “Not on my watch,” he murmured.

  At the sound of his voice she startled, opened her eyes, looked at him blankly. In a moment, her brain confirmed what her eyes told her and she glared at him. “Get out of here,” she said through clenched teeth. “Leave. You’ll get yourself killed.”

  In spite of her anger, she didn’t shift a molecule. A rattlesnake slid up the rock, curled around her head and made its way down her belly. It stared at him as she did, and waited.

  He moved to her, but not fast enough. The rattler’s tail sang its song and he struck, sinking his fangs into her arm as she cursed prolifically.

  “Christ,” Alex said. He pulled the snake off her and flung him into the sand, where he twisted, writhed, then slithered swiftly away. Alex reached for her arm and she offered her elbow in his face as an alternative. He swung his legs over her, straddled her and wrapped his hands around her forearms as she struggled against him, twisting and arching her back.

  “Stop it,” she said, her voice low and breathy. “You’re just making it more difficult.”

  “Difficult?” He shook her roughly. “Dammit, Jaguar, I want it to be difficult. I want it to hurt like hell. It does for me.”

  “You think I’m taking a walk in the park?”

  “Then why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Because I knew you’d show. You always show. You’re reliable as death. How did you find me?”

  He caught her gaze, held it hard.

  My eyes have always found you. You know that.

  She went still, all her muscles relaxed. She closed her eyes and fell back onto the rock. He took the risk of releasing one of her arms to get at a jacknife in his pocket. She remained immobile as he cross-cut her flesh, sucked the blood and spit it into the hot sandy soil.

  “You don’t understand,” she said to him, now cool and distant. “You can’t be here. You have to let me do this alone.”

  “Don’t,” he said, between spitting and sucking, “be ridiculous.”

  She turned her face from him. He ripped a piece of cloth from his shirt and tore it in two—one for a bandage, and the other for a soft tourniquet. She lay still while he worked, continued passive when he pulled a water bottle from his belt holder and held it to her lips.

  “Drink,” he said. She regarded him as venomously as the snake.

  “Drink,” he insisted, and she did so, but her eyes stayed angry.

  “Jaguar,” he said, “What makes you think your job here necessarily includes your death?”

  “It’s not my death I’m worried about,” she said. “It’s yours.”

  He saw fear in her eyes and knew she had a basis for it. She wasn’t an Adept, but she’d seen something that looked like his death here. And he didn’t care. Not even a little bit.

  He swung his leg over the rock and got off her. “Jake and One Bird didn’t send you here to die. Not me, either.”

  She sat up, looked at him hard. Her gaze moved to the fetish he wore around his neck and she winced.

  “They sent you?” she demanded. “With that?”

  “They did.”

  “Shit,” she said. “That’s why Jake kept stalling. He was waiting for you.”

  “Was he?” Alex commented. “Smart man.”

  She glowered at him. “No,” she said.

  “I already said yes.”

  “You don’t know what you’re saying yes to.”

  “Oh yes I do. Jake told me about the snakes and the poison. He gave me the antidote. He said he gave it to you, but you left it behind.”

  “There’s no point, Alex. Senci has to feed off me to get the poison, and there’s no antidote for that. And if I don’t go to him, he’ll kill you. Then Rachel, and Gerri and—anyone I care about.”

  “You think I’d let that happen?”

  “You think you can stop him? He always kills what I love. He’s been doing it since I was a little girl.”

  At her words, Alex went still. “What are you talking about?”

  She ducked her head down, said nothing.

  “Jaguar, tell me,” he demanded.

  She lifted her face, pressed her hand to his forehead and showed him.

  She was a little girl and a man stood over her, holding a gun. He took her clothes off and his hands, encased in gloves, moved over her.

  Alex knew this scene. She’d shown it to him when they were first learning to trust each other. Just after she saved his life. Why was she showing it to him now?

  Jaguar’s voice spoke into his confusion.

  Look at his eyes, Alex. It’s the only thing he hasn’t changed.

  Once again Alex viewed the scene, and though in the past he’d always seen it from the point of view of the little girl who’d become this woman he valued so deeply, this time he shifted his focus and saw her attacker’s eyes. In his shock, he broke empathic contact.

  “Jesus,” he said out loud. “It was Senci.”

  Senci, the Greenkeeper. The man who raped her. The ghost who would never die, finding her again.

  “I’m bound to him,” Jaguar said quietly. “He’s a Greenkeeper and he bound me when—when he did that to me. Now he’ll kill everyone I love. And there’s no antidote for that, either.”

  Through the pulsing of his own rage and her pain, Alex groped for something that would help. All he found was one singular truth. Something he knew beyond reason or doubt.

  “No,” he said firmly. “You’re tied to him by circumstance, but he didn’t bind you to him. Not as a Greenkeeper does.” He rested his hand on her arm, where the snake had bitten her. “Where do you get the antidote for snake bite?” he asked her.

  “From the snake, of course. Turn poison into medicine. What’s that got to do with—”

  “That’s what you do, Jaguar. It’s what you’ve always done. You take the poison of your life and turn it into medicine. You wouldn’t do that if you were his. Don’t you see? He can’t bind you. That’s why he’s obsessed with having you now.”

  She eyed him suspiciously. “You don’t know that,” she said.

  “I do, but you don’t. Not yet. That’s the problem.” He ran a hand through his hair. His words wouldn’t convince her. She’d have to find this one her own way. In the meantime, he had to keep her alive. “Look, no matter what, Jake and One Bird sent me here to partner the warrior in her task. I plan on doing just that.”

  She closed her eyes. A fly landed on her hand, and she twitched it away. They were silent, listening to the singing wind.

  “That’s what you want?” she asked at last.

  “That’s exa
ctly what I’ll do,” he said.

  “Alex, when Senci finds me I’ll inject myself with enough venom to kill a horse, then let him feed. The only thing left after that is to cut his heart out, get it to the choc mul and say the cleansing prayer. If I can’t, that’ll be your job. Can you do it?”

  He struggled with words, came up with something reasonable. “I’ll do what’s necessary,” he said. “That’s why I’m here.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. I’m here because I’m sure.”

  Another pause. Then, “There’s a ceremony,” she said. “When you partner the warrior, there’s a ceremony.”

  “Jake told me.”

  She nodded. “We should do it tonight. I’m not sure when he’ll show up.”

  He touched the place where the rattler bit her. “Are you up to it?”

  She waved it away. “I milked that one twice before he bit me. He had nothing left.”

  Of course, he thought. Of course. She’d fling herself off a cliff, but she wouldn’t be pushed.

  She pulled herself to standing, rubbed her face with her hand, felt her lips, which were still not hydrated. Alex, seeing the gesture, handed her the water bottle, and she drank. When she handed it back to him, he folded his hand over hers.

  It felt good to be in her presence again. In spite of fear and the near presence of death, to be here with her was good and he was glad of it.

  As often happened, her words echoed his thoughts. “I know I shouldn’t say this,” she said, “But I’m glad you’re here. “

  He touched a finger to her face. She closed her eyes and leaned into it briefly. Yes, he thought. We are here. All this, and still I’m courting her, and she’s glad of it.

  She opened her eyes, and shifted attitude back to the business at hand.

  “Okay,” she said. “The ceremony’s a night one, but we should head up higher before dark. There’s a place, and it takes a while to get there.”

  Chapter 19

  As they climbed the mesa the earth spread out below them, red rock shifting in the growing darkness to gold, tan, brown. There were ripples in the sandstone where the tide once rose and fell. Though they walked the stone bones of earth, all around them was the sense of ancient seas.

  Jaguar, stopping to rest, swept a long arm across the mesa. “I used to be afraid of these climbs,” she noted.

  “You?”

  “Mm. When I was a teenager. I was a city kid for almost ten years, and I forgot what it was like here. I trusted buildings, but not my feet. ”

  “What changed?”

  “Jake reminded me how to let the stones hold my feet. How to trust them. Now I’m not so sure about buildings.” She put down her backpack and rubbed at her neck. “That was a long time ago,” she said.

  Alex noted again how the land was reflected in her face. How she was, like this place, honed down to her singular and particular being. He pulled his eyes away from her and looked up.

  Above them, the rock turned white and softly luminescent. Grottoes were carved out, little temples, of a size for two people to shelter in.

  Jaguar pointed to them. “There,” she said.

  They walked on soft sand, fine as pulverized silk, toward the pouched wall of rock. Jaguar dropped her pack at the edge of it and indicated that Alex should do the same. He reached into his pack and pulled out two robes made of soft linen, the color of wheat with black and red figures dancing here and there. “Jake said we’d want these.”

  She held her hand out for one of the robes. “All ritual is just another fashion opportunity,” she smiled grimly. “My people are big on style, in case you didn’t notice.”

  “I noticed. Years ago.”

  She sighed. “Okay. Change. Get ready. When Venus is up, come back here.”

  * * * *

  They were sheltered in the bones of the earth, in a place where the sky was bigger than his ability to imagine it. Against a wall of stone was a very old choc mul, a bowl held on the belly of a man who waited for the sacrificial heart. Nearby Jaguar had arranged a long and intricately carved stick, a small pouch, and a piece of sharp obsidian.

  “Here,” she said, and invited him to sit. She walked around him, drawing a circle in the sand with the stick. When she was done she sat down facing him and sang softly, a chant he hadn’t heard before. It went on and on, weaving into the night and him, weaving him into the sky and stones, weaving her into him and all that lived here.

  The candle she lit threw shadows up the rock, washed their white curves with darkness. His shadow was a great bird. She, standing with arms upraised, was a shadow moon over his shadow bird.

  Time slowed as they entered that liminal space they both knew, wandering in a world made of no words. He felt his own body slowing, going quiet, going into truth. There were stars here, silent and watchful. And there was Jaguar, a focused light through which truth could flow.

  She would have to know him essentially if she was to accept his partnership. He would have to be unafraid for that to happen. Her voice poured over them both, water in the dry places. The candle flickered and caused their shadows to dance and leap toward each other.

  Her song ceased before he ceased hearing it, the sound echoing through him as background to what followed as she raised two fingers to his heart and established the space they would share.

  Who are you? she asked, initiating the questions.

  Alex Dzarny.

  Show me, her voice asked, opening him.

  For this, there were no words. She rode his spirit with him, made of earth, its molten core burning slow and sure. Reliable as death. Solid as the stone that witnessed this ceremony. A spirit who danced fearlessly with time, aware of its complexity in a way few others were. This was a place she hadn’t traversed before, a place he was glad enough to show her.

  Who shares soul with you?

  The spirit that fed him his energy, shared a portion of his soul. He offered her the image of a wolf, standing atop a mountain and howling to a glowing moon. A creature that stood high and saw far, a pathfinder that gave him his capacities as an Adept.

  She allowed it, and moved on.

  Who chooses you?

  That. The spirit who stalked him, demanded his attention, taught him what he might not want to know. A story he hadn’t yet told her. He did so now, offering his earliest and most persistent vision.

  In a dream, he walked through a rainforest, toward a river. There, in the river, a golden jaguar floated, beckoning him.

  I choose you, she said. I choose you.

  He showed Jaguar this and she halted her singing, caught for a moment between her role in the ceremony and her more human self. She mastered herself and moved on. The ceremony swirled around them, returning them to quiet. She searched under his memory for any untruth, walking through him easily and thoroughly.

  Why are you here? she asked.

  To partner the warrior.

  Why do you choose this?

  He hesitated. There were so many answers he could give, and only one mattered here. He took a deep breath and spoke it.

  Because I love you, Jaguar. I always have and always will. Always.

  Silence. She closed her eyes and let the words rest between them, tasting their truth. She moved through his experience of them, absorbing it into her own soul, feeling everything it meant to him. Did she find his words sweet, he wondered? They were to him. Sweet to say, after all this silence.

  She began the concluding chant and grasped his hand. Sharp stone bit into his flesh. Obsidian, hidden in her hand, drawing his blood. He didn’t flinch. She brought her lips to the wound and drank. They were partnered, for good or ill.

  Words followed. Elaborate praise for ancestors and spirits that her people had known for thousands of generations. It went on for some time, carrying them into realms Alex always suspected lived in the worlds behind her eyes.

  Then, an ending.

  “There will be no lies between or within us,” she said. “We li
ve and die with our task, start and finish in beauty. Long life. Honey in the heart. No evil. 13 thank yous.”

  He repeated the words, and she led him to the choc mul, let blood drip from his hand into the bowl. And it was done.

  She walked over the circle she’d traced in the sand, wiping it out with her foot. When she finished, she walked away, not looking back. He opened his hand and gazed down at the wound, already closing. His blood belonged to her now.

  But he already knew that.

  * * * *

  As soon as he knew she was far enough away not to be spying he went to work, and he worked fast, knowing what he had to do.

  He went through her pack, muttering at her under his breath about recklessness and folly. He would be her partner in the truest sense, looking out for her well being when she could not. He found her glass bottle of venom, did what was necessary, then put all back as it had been.

  When he finished, he thought through his moves. He had a gun with the right kind of bullets, and though it wouldn’t kill Senci, it could buy them the seconds they needed. It could work.

  And if it didn’t? They’d both be dead, he supposed.

  If, he thought, and if and if. That was what he had, and no matter how many times he thought it through, that’s all he was going to get for now. He stood and left the shelter of the stones.

  * * * *

  When he walked out of the grotto the night was as deep as it would get, and the immensity of stars overhead was a reeling of all time imaginable. Jaguar stood still and attentive at the rim of the mesa, looking out over the canyon. He walked toward her, then stopped a few yards back.

  “Jaguar,” he said.

  She whirled to face him, a long finger extended toward him. “I’ve never said I love you.”

  He smiled. Here she was on the edge of doom, worrying this small problem like a bad tooth. Good for her for focusing on what mattered. Good for him, in many ways. Then, the words of the ceremony echoed in his mind. There will be no lies between us.

  “Deny it,” he said.

  She opened her mouth, closed it again.

  “Go ahead, Jaguar,” he coaxed. “Tell me you don’t love me.”