Ian and Cole’s faces flashed behind her eyes. She prayed to Creator to keep them safe, even in the Land of Darkness, where He had little reign. “You have cursed those in Death, and seek to destroy the living. We are here to kill you.”
At that, the Raven-Eater laughed, a booming, hoarse laugh that thundered into Whisper’s ears so fiercely that she covered them with shaking hands, despite her will to stay strong.
“Kill me?” he snarled, slapping her hard across the face. “No one can kill me.”
With a desperate burst of energy, Whisper rose unsteadily to her feet, nearly knocking Gentle Heart over in the process. “There is one,” she replied coldly, bracing herself with a hand against the slimy wall. “There is one who has the power to strip your magics, to destroy you.”
“I killed that abomination years ago,” the Raven-Eater sneered. “The half-breed is dead. Your Elder is a fool, sending a woman to find a half-breed who no longer exists.”
Whisper grinned, her white teeth stained red. “Are you sure about that, Raven-Eater?”
Chapter 33
Instinctively, Ian moved Cole behind him, sheltering his son from the selfish hands of the RiverKeeper, whose lips were smacking with anticipation. The groaning and shuffling sounds of the Army of the Dead were rapidly coming upon them, and Ian could hear Hunting Hawk’s approach in the pounding of horse hooves.
“You can’t have my son, old man,” Ian growled, pointing a finger at the boat. “But you will take me back across the river.”
“Kanegv promised me the blood of the half-breed!” the RiverKeeper shouted in response, spit flying from decaying gums. “Only the blood of the half-breed will secure your passage across the river.”
Having only seconds to make up his mind, Ian nodded and kneeled down next to his son. “Okay, relax. What if I cut his finger, and give you a few drops of blood? You can’t have his life. I’ll kill you before you kill my son.”
The RiverKeeper sneered. “I want the blood of the half-breed.”
Frustrated and annoyed, Ian spun Cole around and pulled down his fantastically-designed shirt. The glorious mark between his shoulder blades reflected in the fading red and purple light. “Here, see? He has the mark of the half-breed! Now take us across the river, damn it!”
Gentle Heart wrung her hands together as her husband picked his captive up by the throat and tossed her carelessly against the wall. Despite her will to be strong, Whisper cried out in pain, fighting back tears. She didn’t bother to get up this time. Instead, she stayed on her stomach, focusing on her labored breathing. There was little life left in her.
As she watched the dying woman, Gentle Heart ran her fingers over the gorgeous bone necklace. It was familiar to her, and she could remember the feel of the cool beads against her skin, the many compliments her friends and family gave her on its beauty.
And Smoke Speaker.
Suddenly her past life came flooding back to her. Her father, the famous Cherokee Elder, a magical man who helped anyone in need and never asked for anything in return. He was a gentle soul, one who loved nature, who respected the ways of all people. She recalled her long walks through the woods, cherishing the natural glory of the earth, reveling in her friendly relationships with animals. She got her name from Grandfather Bluebird, who sang her into the world even as her mother passed from it. And her mind pictured the day her happy life was destroyed by the dark shadow stalking her through the forest, snatching her from everything she ever knew and loved.
That was the day she learned to believe in evil spirits, and gave up childish notions of knights in shining armor. No one ever came to save her but her father, who risked his eternal soul for her safe return. But his journey resulted in him returning to the Land of the Living without her, leaving her behind to suffer her own eternity with the creature of hate who forced himself on her at his own whim. This was her life now, filled with people and places she had not grown up around, and the necklace brought back the memories of a time when happiness surrounded her every day.
And this woman, this Whisper. Did she know her too? Gentle Heart had to discover the truth behind her mysterious journey.
Before the Raven-Eater could resume his attack, Gentle Heart raced over to the fallen woman and helped her roll over onto her back. Whisper grit her teeth together as she moved, glancing over at the Guardian of the Dead as he crossed his thick arms and glared down at his wife.
“What do you think you are doing, Gentle Heart? Get away from my captive! She is mine to destroy.”
Gentle Heart cradled Whisper’s head in her lap, pressing a hand on her wound. Blood oozed between her fingers. “I know this woman,” she whispered with a frown. “But I don’t know how.” She brushed the young Cherokee woman’s hair back from her sweaty face. “She’s dying.”
“As she deserves,” the Raven-Eater answered with a crooked, satisfied smile. “She has little life left.” He crouched down and grabbed her by the chin, forcing Whisper to look at him. “Before you die, prisoner, you will know that my guard has captured your companion, slit his traitorous throat, and regained my son.” He straightened and cast a scorned look down at Whisper before heading for the door. “So much for your half-breed saving your precious Land of the Dead.”
Whisper didn’t know what to believe, but she was a master of deceit and knew better than to believe a captor. The Raven-Eater wanted her to die her second death with the knowledge that she had failed, and that was something she refused to believe…even as she succumbed to the pain.
The RiverKeeper stepped down from his boat and stalked over to Ian. He leaned over, bones cracking with the effort, and peered at the mark on the boy’s back, a jagged circle with five dots in the center, the mark of the half-breed.
He straightened and peered at Ian through accusing eyes. “What sort of treachery is this?”
Ian frowned, again looking over his shoulder at the approaching Hunting Hawk. “What? Whisper told me this was the mark! She said Cole was the half-breed!”
“Did she?” the RiverKeeper asked, again leaning over. “Did she say that, exactly?”
Ian struggled to remember her exact statement, and came to the realization that the words of Cole being the half-breed never actually escaped her lips. She said she believed the half-breed was already here, in the Land of the Dead, but….she had never said she thought Cole to be the one. But why would she lead him to believe that his son was the half-breed if it wasn’t true?”
As Ian searched his memory, the RiverKeeper licked a bony finger, then drew it across the boy’s mark. A brown smudge was left where his finger touched skin. “A trick,” he snarled, pushing Cole towards his father. “As I suspected.”
Ian clutched Cole by the shoulders and took in the smeared sight. “I…I don’t understand,” he stammered. “If Cole isn’t the half-breed, then who is?”
The dark, damp room was silent as Whisper’s last breath passed through her lungs. The Raven-Eater was at the door, ready to go after Fighting Fox, ready to take over the Land of the Living now that his enemy was no longer a threat.
As Gentle Heart took one final glance down at those haunting black eyes before they closed, she suddenly realized why they were so familiar to her. “I know you,” she whispered again, tears streaming down her cheeks. “My daughter.”
The Raven-Eater froze, one hand on the doorframe. He turned slowly at those two terrifying and angering words. “What…did…you…call…her?” His question was a slow, low, terrifying growl.
Gentle Heart laid Whisper’s head on the ground softly, her heart ripping in two as she ran a hand down her long black hair. “My daughter,” she repeated quietly, remembering that frightening moment twenty-three years ago when she realized she had given birth to a girl. A half-breed, part living, part dead, the only creature with enough power to destroy the Raven-Eater.
“The half-breed is dead!” the furious Raven-Eater shouted, slamming a fist against the wall. “I ordered her death! I ordered her to be dest
royed!”
“No,” Gentle Heart whispered, both sorrow and joy tearing at her souls. “I saved her.”
“You saved her,” he repeated, crossing the room in three long strides and grabbing Gentle Heart by the throat, much like he had done to Whisper only moments ago. “You defied me?” He couldn’t believe her insolence. She had been such an obedient wife all these years, giving him everything he wanted, everything but a son. And now she revealed her deceit, the ultimate betrayal.
“You will die for your treachery.”
“Put her down.”
The Raven-Eater dropped Gentle Heart in surprise when the rough, accented voice met his ears. He turned to see Whisper standing behind him, gripping a spear that had been hanging on the wall, his own weapon. Genuine shock and confusion raced through him, rendering him speechless as Gentle Heart crawled over to the wall for protection.
Whisper narrowed her black eyes and bent her knees slightly, preparing for an attack as a strange sensation of power filled her body, a feeling she was yet to understand. The wound in her chest no longer seeped blood, but her clothes and skin were stained with the reminder of her death.
And dead, she now was.
For twenty-three years she had waited for this moment, trained for this moment. For twenty-three years she had dreamed of the day she would take her rightful place at the throne of the Fire Tower. And now she finally had the chance to fight the man who gave her the scar between her shoulder blades, the scar Smoke Speaker couldn’t stand to see and had insisted on covering with a representation of the Western Sun.
Swinging the spear around in preparation for their fight, Whisper spoke the only two words that could ever fill the Raven-Eater with fear.
“Osiyo, Father.”
Chapter 34
“Whisper.”
Ian’s heart sank into his stomach. His guide, the mysterious woman with haunting eyes that had seen so much he did not understand, had been the one they sought the entire time. And she had promised her blood to the RiverKeeper.
“I…I don’t have her blood,” he told the old man, holding out his hands helplessly. “I don’t know what—”
Then his mind raced back to the day he first met her. They had walked to the river, where he watched her whisper to the wind, where he first found out that Cole was trapped in the Land of the Dead. In his mind, he watched her drag the tip of a knife across her palm, drip blood into the water, then fish out a rock with, he just realized, the mark of the half-breed. She turned the rock over in her hand, coating it with her blood, tossing it to Ian.
“Keep it safe,” she had instructed.
Ian’s hand flew to his pocket as he silently prayed for the rock to still be there. With relief, his fingers touched the small, cool stone, and when he pulled it out he hoped that it still held her blood.
Another test, he thought with some amusement. A test to follow direction, to trust in his guide enough to do such a seemingly unimportant thing as keep a rock in his pocket.
Ian held out the stone. “But…I’ve been in the water since she gave this to me,” he said regretfully. “Her blood may have washed—”
“It never washes away,” the RiverKeeper cut in as he grabbed the stone from Ian’s hand. “It binds to that which she gives power. With this, I am free to live again. I am free of this curse, and will live again with my family.”
While Ian pondered over the idea of this coarse old man ever having a family, the RiverKeeper hurried back to the boat and gestured for Ian to do the same. They pushed off from shore and were just out of arrow range when Hunting Hawk reached the river edge. Ian watched with both relief and terror as the guard threw his bow down angrily, stalking the shore for an alternative path across.
They rowed silently for some time, the RiverKeeper dreaming about his new life soon to come, Cole sleeping on his father’s lap, Ian trying to make sense of what was happening. All around them, water gently lapped against the edges of the boat, soaking Ian’s shoes. The wind was getting stronger with each passing gust, and the Western Sun seemed so much farther away now than when he was crossing the Barren Plains. A trick, he thought, another deception, this time from a different source.
“So…Whisper is the half-breed,” Ian mused to himself, his voice barely above a murmur. “So that means Gentle Heart is her mother, and the Raven-Eater is Gentle Heart’s father...and that means…Smoke Speaker is her grandfather.” He laughed incredulously, partly in shock over the realization. “She’s not his apprentice. She’s his goddamn granddaughter.”
“We have waited a long time for her to return.”
Ian lifted his head. “What?” he asked the RiverKeeper, who was looking right at him as he rowed with skinny, wrinkled arms. “Return?” Then he remembered the Elder’s words. She was born into a world she was destined to change. Smoke Speaker never said her world of birth was that of the living. “You knew her when she was young?”
The RiverKeeper huffed and shook his head. “You have much to learn, Mr. Daivya.”
“So enlighten me.”
“Very well.” He nodded and peered into the darkness towards the Fire Mountains, now disappearing into the distance. The Army of the Dead was like a black fog lining the horizon. “The Raven-Eater stole Blue Feather from the Land of the Living many moons ago, when she had seen but four and twenty summers. It was then that his reign darkened, and he began building his army. Once he was born a son, his family would be complete, and he could take over the living.” He paused for a breath, remembering stories of the day Blue Feather arrived. Her screams had carried across the Land of the Dead for many miles, for many days. Then they stopped suddenly, cut off as though she had been struck down, and the next time any dead soul laid their eyes on the woman she had been clutching a squirming child to her breast.
“Smoke Speaker dedicated his life to saving his daughter from the Raven-Eater, and asked an old friend, one of the last Cherokee men in the mountains, to get him to the Land of the Dead.”
“But I thought if you killed yourself, you couldn’t return.”
The RiverKeeper grimaced, irritated by the interruption. “He did not take his own life, Mr. Daivya. His friend killed him at a time he did not expect, and guarded his body so it would not be buried. The Elder crossed into the Land of the Dead, disguised himself as a guard, and entered the Fire Tower to save Blue Feather.”
“A father saving his child from the Raven-Eater,” Ian commented. “I can relate.”
“No, young man, you cannot.”
Ian narrowed his eyes at the insult. “And why not? I’m here with Cole, aren’t I?”
“The Elder went alone, not knowing what dangers were before him. And he faced a decision worse than any you will ever know.”
“Like what?”
The RiverKeeper sighed, thinking back to Smoke Speaker’s journey. “Blue Feather bore a daughter, and lied to the Raven-Eater about the infant. He believed his child to be a son for five summers, until Hunting Hawk discovered the truth and revealed her deceit to the Guardian of the Dead.”
“The Raven-Eater was furious, and tried to kill his child by throwing her from a tower window. But Kanegv is the half-breed, half-dead, half-alive, and was born with a power far greater than the Raven-Eater. She survived, but for a scar between her shoulder blades.”
“The mark of the half-breed,” Ian whispered, rubbing a finger over the smudges on Cole’s back. “She led me to believe that Cole was the half-breed so I would help her get back to the Fire Mountains, back to her mother. But…how did she escape?”
A howl in the distance had the RiverKeeper pausing in stride. He looked over both shoulders worriedly before continuing his story. “The Raven-Eater ordered his new guard to kill the child, and burn her body.”
“The Elder.”
“Yes,” the RiverKeeper affirmed with a nod. “Smoke Speaker went to retrieve the child, and to save his daughter. But only two can cross the river, so said the RiverKeeper during that time, as there must always
be a RiverKeeper. So he told Blue Feather to take Kanegv and run. He would take her place in the Land of the Dead. Blue Feather refused, because she knew that the Raven-Eater would hunt her down, and destroy the Land of the Living to get her back. She gave her daughter to Smoke Speaker, and asked her father for one final task, to raise her as his own. And so he took the child back with him, and taught her his magic, so that she would always be able to speak to the earth.”
The pieces fell into place for Ian. “So Smoke Speaker left Blue Feather behind and brought Whisper back and raised her, and trained her to one day come back and kill the Raven-Eater…her father. And the Raven-Eater no longer trusted his wife to give him a son, so he began stealing them from the living world. And Whisper saved them until she was ready to return. She let Cole be taken, so she could return.”
“Only a child protected by the Raven-Eater can strip his magic, by burying a lock of hair in the Land of the Living.” The RiverKeeper pointed to Gentle Heart’s necklace tucked into Ian’s pocket. “But someone must stay behind to kill the Raven-Eater.”
Then he released a heavy breath. “Smoke Speaker has never forgiven himself for leaving Blue Feather behind. He lives his life with one purpose, to kill the Raven-Eater, so that Kanegv can take her rightful place as Guardian of the Dead and Blue Feather can be freed. The Land of the Dead is desperate for a righteous ruler of justice.”
“But…” Ian frowned as he thought of something. “If Whisper is half Blue Feather, and half Raven-Eater, then wouldn’t that mean that she’s part good and part evil?”
“Yes.” The RiverKeeper blew out a breath. “The Elder has worked for many moons to teach her to walk the Red Road, to cast out the darkness hidden behind her eyes. The Raven-Eater will always be a part of her, but Smoke Speaker has also taught her good.”
Ian wasn’t so sure. Whisper was callous, rude, and quick to fight. She could lie without batting an eye, bleed without showing pain, kill without a moment’s remorse. She helped him save Cole only to reach the Fire Tower. Everything about her was deceitful.
Beyond the Western Sun Page 25
