The canyon walls moved in closer, narrowing to about three quarters of a mile as they followed the road up a hill, toward a sign on the left side of the road. As they climbed the hill, the river fell away to the right, down a steep slope, and on the left, cottonwood trees thinned and ended, leaving clumps of grass. Just before they reached the top of the hill, the sun emerged over the cliffs on the right.
At the hilltop, they pulled up on their reins and dismounted without speaking; their horses deserved something of a rest. To the north, the ground sloped down for a little ways before falling flat, again. On both sides, the canyon continued to narrow, although another mile on, another canyon split to the right.
The sign consisted of two round posts and a plank of wood stretched between them. A fresh coat of brown paint covered it, and bright red block letters provided instruction.
Here you enter holy ground. Come only with purpose. Speak few words. Tread with reverence.
Thomas remembered the sign from his last visit. Mama had stood behind him, her hands on his shoulders, and read the words. Perhaps it had been the solemnity of the situation, the sacredness of the ceremony he entered the canyon to complete—or maybe just the scenery around him—but whatever the reason, the words had penetrated into his heart, instilled in him a sense of respect. He’d spoken little while in the canyon, wanting to preserve the quiet, hoping to understand the tranquility in his soul. Even Charles had acted halfway decent while in the canyon.
Now, standing on that hill, considering his situation, he felt the same reverence. Surely, this place was sacred. Too bad his family entered it to desecrate Mama’s body.
“What makes it holy?” Miss Sadie said, her tone soft.
He shook his head. “What makes anything holy?”
She shrugged. “This place is holy. So is Arches. Monument Valley. The Grand Canyon. Why those places?”
Vaguely, he remembered something Mama had said years before when they’d left the canyon.
“They’re nature’s temples. Like temples made by humans are extraordinary, built with great care and detail given to their design and construction, these are nature’s temples. Extraordinary, designed with great care.”
She continued to look into the canyon. Her eyes bore a distant cast.
“There must be more to it than that.”
Thomas moved closer to her, near enough that their shoulders touched. They stood there for a minute, just looking. A squirrel darted out of a bush to the right of the trail, stopped in the dirt, and chattered at them before running back into the bush.
“Maybe,” he said, “it’s sacred because of the way it’s treated by people. Simply because of the regard we have for it.”
“I think there’s some truth to that.”
After another minute, she frowned and shook her head.
“I don’t understand. If it’s so holy, why don’t you live here?”
He grunted in amusement. “You can’t live in a holy place. It wouldn’t be holy, anymore. It would become common.”
“What does that have to do with it? If you always treat it as holy, it would stay holy. You said so yourself—how you treat it makes it holy. Live here, and always treat it as special.”
“You can’t live in a holy place.”
“I would think everyone would want to live here.”
Thomas struggled with the idea. To him, sacred places were sacred because you rarely went there. It was special to go to those places. If you were there all of the time, it would become just another place you lived. It would have nothing special about it. And if one person lived there, many people would.
“I think,” he said, “the more people that are in a holy place, and the more often you are there, the less holy it becomes. It will become common. People would come and live there who don’t understand it, and would treat it lightly.”
“Just don’t let those people come and live there.”
“We’ve tried with Moabites. You see how well it’s worked.”
She nodded in concession, but didn’t look convinced. “Have you been here, before?”
“Only once. When I sought the blessing of a second life. I was planning on coming again this fall, with an offering to seek the blessing of a green thumb.”
“So you have to travel all the way in here for a blessing?”
“Yes. It becomes something big. Important. The greater the sacrifice you make to obtain the blessing, the more likely you are to receive it. The journey here constitutes sacrifice.”
“I understand that.”
“But you don’t travel far to get your blessings?”
“No. We seek blessings in our homes.”
“Your homes!”
He could see seeking a blessing in the field, or in the mountains west of the farm. But certainly not in his home.
“We build our homes right in Arches and Monument Valley. Our homes are holy to us. We don’t stay out of those sacred places, going only when we need a blessing. We live there, to let the sacredness of the land enter our daily lives and permeate our souls.” She waved a hand at the canyon ahead. “If my people had their way, this canyon would be full of houses and farms.”
Thomas could imagine no better way to cheapen the holiness of a sacred place than to live there everyday. To work, sleep, argue, fight, eat, and generally do everything there. Really, it would become nothing more special than a common city.
He looked forward into the canyon, at a hawk circling above the river. The hawk lived here. So did other animals. Did that make the place less or more sacred?
“And the way you hold this canyon in sacred regard,” she continued, “we hold our homes. We treat them with reverence.”
Thomas suddenly understood something. “That’s why you always ask permission to enter another person’s home?”
“Indeed.”
He looked at her for a long time, from the side. She either didn’t notice or didn’t care, but her point of view enthralled him. He knew so little about her and her background, the way she’d learned to live. Yet, he felt he knew her and understood her. Was that simply part of being attracted to someone? You thought you knew them?
“How,” he said, “can you maintain constant reverence in your homes? Where you live and work and play everyday?”
She chuckled. “It’s not easy. In fact, we fail often.”
He nodded, figuring he’d proven his point—even if she didn’t seem convinced. Turning away, he nearly suggested that they get going, when back down the ridge a movement caught his eye. Not on the road, but on the opposite side of the river, perhaps half a mile away near a rather sizable clump of trees. He thought he saw people. Fifty or more could have hidden in a group of trees that large.
“What’s that?”
She turned to look. “I don’t see anything. Where?”
He pointed at the trees. “Down there. I thought I saw people.”
The movement came again, just a hint of horizontal motion in the midst of the tree trunks.
“I saw it,” she said. “But—.”
A person on a horse emerged from the grove, indistinct at the distance, yet moving fast. A second followed. Behind them, twenty more emerged, these ones on foot. They flowed out of the trees like water out of a bowl—smooth and fast enough to keep up with the horses.
Thomas bared his teeth and inhaled. His heartbeat trembled.
“Zombies!”
All my life, I just wanted to relax. I’d have liked to recline even once. But I never had the opportunity. I figured that at least one of my children should be able to do that. Turns out I’m not so good at “figuring.”
Chapter 26: How to create a tornado
Miss Sadie swore in a very un-ladylike fashion, and hit a fist into her open palm.
“How did they get here?”
“They can’t come here,” Thomas said. His chest seemed to constrict at the thought of the zombies entering Zion’s. “Their presence will desecrate it. At least they have to cross
the river, still. I don’t know of a bridge anywhere nearby.”
The lead horse cut toward the river, at a spot where the water widened, appeared less rapid than elsewhere. He slowed near the bank and stopped for a moment, but before the second rider even caught up, spurred his mount into the flow.
“He’s crossing!” Thomas said.
“Yes, I can see that.”
The second horse reached the water’s edge, and without even stopping leaped into the water. The zombies followed, rushing into the river like a herd of stampeding cattle. The horses went in up to their necks, and the zombies had to swim.
“They must have come around the city,” Miss Sadie said. “Somehow got past the militia.”
“We have to stop them.” He didn’t have a gun or sword. He couldn’t do anything. But Miss Sadie had some formidable magic. “You have to stop them.”
“What? Me?”
“You did it before, back at the bridge. Use your spell again. The tornado.” He waved his arms in a twirling motion. “Catch them up in your tornado. Carry them back to Moab!”
She nodded. “You’re right. I can do that.”
She ran to her horse and rummaged in her saddlebags. The first rider reached the western side of the river, and came up with water splashing, shining in the morning sunlight.
“It must be Brady,” Miss Sadie said as she came back.
She held a white ribbon—which reminded him of the cloth wound around the crown of his hat—a small bit of shredded tree bark, some flint, a simple knife, and a little wooden figure, perhaps the size of the last portion of a thumb. It had a tiny carved head, a little torso, and stubby arms and legs. It made Thomas think of the two bumblebees in his pocket, and he involuntarily felt the outside of his pants, to make sure they were still there. They were.
“Why do you think it’s Brady?” he said.
She shrugged, as if she wanted to keep something private. He didn’t press the issue; he wanted to watch her cast the spell. If he caught all the nuances of what she did, he could repeat the spell. Anyone could cast a spell so long as they had enough second-life days for fuel, and knew the procedure.
The second rider came up out of the water, zombies not far behind.
She knelt on both knees, facing the road they’d come up, and put the flint and knife on the ground next to her. He stood back to watch as she placed the figurine on the ground in front of her, and put the shredded bark at its feet. Then she placed the end of the white ribbon on top of the kindling and began to wind it around the figure in concentric circles. She did it at a maddeningly slow pace, taking the time to adjust it in ways that Thomas didn’t understand, except to make sure that some of the bark peaked out from beneath the ribbon. Each time the ribbon went around the figure, she twisted it twice, but in a different spot each time.
As she worked, her arms flowed and bent like a ballerina’s, and her hands twisted like a fine painter’s might. Her fingers touched the cloth with such delicacy as a fine pianist might work ivory keys. Even the shape of her back, the angle of her legs as she bent over her work, seemed designed to inspire and impress.
Yet, he knew she did none of it on purpose. It was just the gift of grace she bore.
What other gifts might she have? For all he knew, she was a ballerina, painter, and pianist. Maybe a master spell-caster.
He wanted to ask her about it, about everything she was doing. He only knew a handful of spells, mostly for farming—such as the one that softened the ground. But he also didn’t want to question her, slow her down; Brady had reached the road, a little more than half a mile away. There, he stopped to look back at the zombies, the last of which had crawled up onto the riverbank. He turned his horse back toward the hill, started forward, but then stopped. After a moment, he dismounted.
Miss Sadie sat up and frowned at her work—but only for an instant. She leaned forward to adjust a twist of the ribbon, and took the flint and knife in her hands.
Down below, Brady had knelt, doing something on the ground. Maybe he worked his own magic—that thought did nothing to ease Thomas’s nervousness. The second horseman had dismounted, and he and the zombies gathered around Brady in a semicircle.
Miss Sadie closed her eyes and took several deep breaths. She held the flint, a jagged black rock, in one hand that rested on one knee, and the knife in her other hand, resting on her other knee. Her face became serene. She looked like a statue. Thomas wanted to tell her to get on with it.
“How far?” She opened her eyes. “How far away is he?”
Thomas shrugged. “A little more than half a mile.”
She narrowed her eyes and nodded. “That’s about right.”
With another deep breath, she closed her eyes again. A moment later, when she next spoke, the sound of a rising wind surrounded her as she began to cast her spell.
“A month for a mile is given in style. This figure is me, living life free. The ribbon is air, spinning so fair.”
Thomas wondered how many of the words were necessary, and how many weren’t. Most spells didn’t require exact phraseology, just certain words and meaning. Different people could use different words to cast the same spell, so long as they conveyed the same ideas. Many people created rhymes to make it easier to remember the words to the spell—clearly Miss Sadie had done that.
“And the fire,” she said, “will make things dire.”
The wind grew louder. Thomas braced himself against a torrent—but of course none came, not in the outer world. The wind was only an audible representation of Miss Sadie’s inner world as she burned her second-life days away. He knew she felt that same tugging feeling everyone experienced when casting spells, the sapping of her vitality that could only be described like a wind pulling your soul into oblivion.
Thomas winced at how many second-life days she burned away—a month for a mile, she’d said. Brady was half a mile away, so she must have been using about two weeks of her second life. He’d rarely used that much, and it had always left him exhausted.
Yet, serenity covered her face. She didn’t so much as cringe or tighten her lips.
What strength did this girl bear? What power?
Her eyes snapped open, and she leaned forward, bringing both of her hands together right behind the figurine. She struck the knife against the flint. Once. With a decisive flick of her wrist. Sparks flew from the blade to touch the bark poking out from beneath the ribbon. As if by magic, they caught fire. Flames spouted up around the figurine. The ribbon near the wooden figure ignited.
Thomas had never seen anything catch fire so quickly. It seemed unnatural.
In one fluid motion, she threw the flint and knife to the side, grabbed the end of the ribbon, and stood, twirling the ribbon in circles, so that the burning lower end of the ribbon spun in a round pattern.
The sound of wind came up the hill, complementing the torrent created by Miss Sadie’s sacrifice of second-life days. Below, near Brady, a cone of dust and wind began to gather.
If only I’d had my parents to listen to, to guide me as I raised my kids. But they died at the hands of zombies during that first invasion. At the time, I’d thought that was the worst thing that could possibly happen that day. Turns out I was ignorant of God’s plans for me.
Chapter 27: Time to run
The twister formed in seconds, to the right and behind the zombies, amidst of a clump of bushes. The branches whipped. The wind tore leaves away, sent them twirling upward. The roar of the torrent rolled up the hill.
It made Thomas think of the previous tornado he’d seen, back at the bridge before Hurricane. It felt like weeks had passed since then, though it had only been two mornings before. He could still see it clearly, how that twister had moved up the bridge—and just thinking about it brought back that same sick dread he’d felt then, the knowledge that he couldn’t stop it and that his life and the lives of his family members might not last. And that tearing of wood. The turning of the world upside down, and the slap of his body agains
t that cold and rushing water.
Hopefully this time would turn out better.
Miss Sadie continued to twist the ribbon, holding it above her head and before her face. The bottom of it rotated near her knees. The fire crept up its length. Thomas presumed that once the flames consumed all the cloth, the spell would end. Concentration lit her eyes as she took a step backward. As she moved, so did the tornado, only the distance was magnified, so that as she took one step to the back and side, the tornado moved ten times as far, directly toward the zombies.
Brady’s horse began to run. It bolted past him, where he knelt on the ground. The other man—probably Farrell—struggled to keep his horse calm. It pulled against his reins, reared up and stepped back. It collided with a zombie, and fell over, on top of several more.
Thomas’s and Miss Sadie’s horses, which stood together back a dozen feet, just off the road, eyed the tornado with fear. The sound was loud and clear, but not uncomfortable, and the air—previously still—had begun to shift just a little. But the horses didn’t like it, nonetheless. They nickered and pranced in consternation. Thomas went to them and snatched up their reins, so that he held one in each hand. He made comforting noises.
The twister reached the rear rank of the zombies. It picked one of them up, and tossed it toward the river. Its arms and legs flailed as it lifted into the air and fell into the water. Miss Sadie continued to move backward, so the column of twisting dust and leaves and wind cut into the zombies. Half a dozen bodies levitated and began to spin in the funnel.
Brady stayed kneeling. He didn’t move, except for whatever he did on the ground, and at the distance Thomas couldn’t tell even if his arms moved. Sadie took another step back. The twister moved deeper into the crowd, coming within twenty feet of Brady. More zombies began to spin in the air. The downed horse struggled to regain its feet.
Keep Mama Dead Page 24
