Authors: Violet Walker
The man seemed to look at her with a newfound respect.
“Consider us your security detail,” he said gesturing to the cougars who surrounded him.
“All right then,” she said, “we’ll follow you to the reservation.”
“Diana…” Cat began again, “we don’t even know if…”
“We should get back in the car, Cat,” she said as gently and firmly as she could, “I think you said we needed to make it to the reservation before sundown.”
Cat looked, for a moment, as though he wanted to argue. But in the end, he simply shook his head said, “Whatever you say.”
She turned back and looked at the Navajo man who gave her half a nod before moving to the truck that had, just several minutes before, tried to run them off the road.
The older man looked over Diana and Cat and said something in a language Diana couldn’t make out to the boy standing near Charlie.
The boy nodded and ran to follow the man into the truck. The rest of the animal army remained where they were.
Cat meanwhile, caught Diana’s hand once again as they headed back to his Car. When they reached Charlie, he rushed to follow them.
“You realize this is insane, right?” Charlie said urgently to Cat, “You know we can’t trust Navajo! We’ve never been able to trust them!”
“It’s Diana’s decision,” Cat told him, “and she’s got a point. We need to get to the reservation as quickly as we can.”
All though Cat said it was her choice, his tone made it seem as though he was not fully on board with this either. Still Diana was pleased that he at least seemed to trust her enough to let her decision stand.
The three of them reached the car and Cat opened the door for her.
“I’m not getting in,” Charlie said with his arms crossed, “if they’re going to run alongside you, so will I. That way, if they try anything, I’ll be there to rip their throats out.”
As Charlie was out numbered, even if he were in cougar form, Diana could not see how he could make good on this particular threat.
None the less Cat rolled his eyes in an appeasing manner and said, “Suit yourself.”
With that, he ushered Diana into the passenger seat of the small car and started the engine.
“What did Charlie mean when he said they’re going to run alongside us?” Diana asked.
“You’ll see,” Cat said.
As soon as the car began to drive, Diana stared out her window at an amazing sight. The dozen or so cougars who had surrounded them at their unexpected stop were now running at an amazingly fast rate alongside the tiny car.
She tried to see Charlie in the mass of multi colored fur, but their pace was so amazingly fast that all the cougars began to blur together.
The sight entranced her for several moments before she realized that there were more questions she needed to ask. Especially now that she and Cat were once again alone.
“Who was that man we talked to?” she asked first. Of all the questions swirling around in her mind, this was by far the easiest. It was also, by far, the least personal.
“His name is Tse. He’s a Navajo tribe elder,” Cat said. “That brash boy is named Ashkii. He’s his son.”
Diana looked curiously at Cat when she heard that name. Ashkii. It sounded familiar but, for the life of her, Diana could not decide where she had heard it before.
“His son wasn’t a big fan of you,” Diana said.
“He doesn’t like any Pueblo,” Cat said, “especially Zuni’s.”
“Why is that?” Diana asked. She was interested, truly, she was. But she also couldn’t deny that she was trying to put off asking Cat other questions. Questions about the kiss he had given her, about why he held her hand, why he asked her advice, even silently. Questions that made her blush just to think about them.
“The Navajo and the Zuni have been fighting for years over the land,” Cat answered. “The Navajo think that, just because their ancestral lands surround our pueblo, they have the right to take our land and our culture as well.”
“So they have the same prophecy?” Diana asked. “The one about the Salt Mother?”
“No,” Cat said so sharply that it made Diana flinch, “they have a bastardized version of a prophecy they stole from us.”
“Ok,” Diana said slowly, “but they know about the salt woman...I mean...me?” she added uncertainly. Speaking about herself as some creation spirit still sounded much too strange, no matter how hard she tried to accept it.
“They know about the salt woman,” he said, “they take her return more literally than we do.”
“That’s why they thought I would have white hair?” Diana asked.
“And that you would be an old woman,” Cat said. “Our prophecy is different.”
“And what does your prophecy say about me?” she asked. Charlie had hinted at something in the prophecy before they were stopped. Something that Cat hadn’t told her.
“Just what I told you,” Cat said, though when she looked closely, Diana could see a blush creep across his already tan cheeks. She knew that he wasn’t telling her the whole truth.
She knew from the way he kept looking determinedly away from her. The way his eyes kept darting ever so slightly out the side window distractedly, that he wouldn’t answer any more questions about the prophecy.
The way he blushed and refused to meet her eyes also, in a strange way, seemed to intertwine with the way he had held her hand, the way he had kissed her, and the way he seemed desperate to ensure her protection.
She had a strange thought. A thought that had begun before they were stopped on the road by the Navajo.
She thought that, perhaps her strange connection to Cat, the connection he seemed to have to her, just might have something to do with the prophecy as well. Although she couldn’t tell exactly how they were connected just yet.
Instead, she stared out the window at the galloping panthers outside. She and Cat drove in silence for a few minutes.
Eventually, a black cougar who she was sure was Charlie passed by her window.
“Charlie didn’t seem to get along well with the Navajo either,” he said.
“He and Ashkii have never gotten along,” Cat said. “Ashkii blames Charlie for stealing his girlfriend.”
“But isn’t Ashkii younger than Charlie?” Diana asked. After all, the Navajo boy could not have been more than 19 or 20. Charlie was in his thirties.
“Yes,” Cat said, “so was his girlfriend.”
A small, teasing smile spread across Cat’s face as he looked at Diana.
“Ah,” Diana said in understanding, “so Charlie has a thing for younger women?”
“Not too young,” Cat amended. It was as though he was defending his friend from some unseemly charge that Diana had not made, “But in general, yes. His girlfriends tend to be younger than he is.”
“So, did he?” Diana asked.
“Did he what?” Cat asked.
“Did Charlie steal his girlfriend?”
“Oh, no,” Cat said, “not really. It was more like the girl flung herself at Charlie. She was a meta shifter.”
“What’s that?” Diana asked. Charlie and Cat had used the word ‘shifter’ before. And she knew, from context, that that was what people who could turn into cougars were referred to. But a meta-shifter sounded even stranger.
“It means someone who can take multiple forms,” Cat said. “This girl could not only change into a cougar and back, she could also change the color of her hair and skin.”
“That’s impressive,” Diana said slyly. She knew this was a massive understatement. The truth was, meta shifting sounded like something out of a science fiction novel.
“It takes either a massive amount of talent or years of training,” Cat said, “usually both.”
“What did this girl have?” Diana asked.
“Talent,” Cat said. “She could have refined it even further if she’d kept up with her training. But she was too busy chasing...other things…”
“Things like Charlie?” Diana asked.
“Yes,” Cat said turning to her with a wry smile. Diana returned the wry smile and Cat smiled fully at her.
“So, why wasn’t she there...you know...staring us down with the rest of them?” Diana asked, “Or...was she?” Diana realized that anyone of those cougars could have been the girl in question. She had no idea what any of them looked like outside their mountain lion persona.
“I didn’t see her,” Cat said, “and trust me, you would know if you did.”
“Is she...distinctive?” Diana asked.
“She’s big,” Cat said, “in fact…” he hesitated and looked at Diana cautiously. She knew he was holding something back. She knew he was afraid of revealing something that she wouldn’t be able to handle.
Diana rolled her eyes at the thought.
“Cat,” she said exasperatedly, “I’m going to find out anyway, you might as well just tell me.”
“Ok,” he said softly, “I think...she was the one who attacked you last night. I think she’s the rogue member that the Navajos were talking about.”
Diana looked at Cat who was staring at her as though nervous that she would explode in a horrifying ball of emotion at this news. She had no intention of doing any such thing. Indeed, Diana was now much more curious than she was frightened.
“But,” she said, “how would she have known where I was? How would she…”
“That’s the thing,” Cat said. “She can change her appearance so many different ways that she’s able to reach in almost anywhere.”
“But the Navajo guy, Tse,” Diana said, “he said that there had to be a...mole...or something in the Zuni nation for her to find out…”
“That seems the most likely explanation,” he said. “See, even if she could get in anywhere, she wouldn’t have known where to go. Where to lie in wait, so to speak, if she hadn’t heard our version of the prophecy.”
“The one you won’t tell me about?” Diana asked stubbornly.
“The one you already know about,” Cat insisted, equally stubborn.
Diana gave him an exasperated sigh and stared out the window at the large canyons. The sun had begun to set behind the largest of these as a passing sign told them that they had now moved onto reservation land.
They drove a short distance until they reached a large building that, to Diana’s surprise, looked nearly identical to most government buildings in downtown Albuquerque.
Cat pulled into a space and parked his car. The beat up truck, likewise, parked next to him.
Diana looked out her window and, one by one, the cougars who had run beside their car stood on their hind legs and transformed before her eyes into men and women. All with equally tan skin and varying shades of dark hair.
Tse and Ashkii stepped outside of the truck and looked toward Cat’s car, waiting for him to get out.
“This will be interesting,” Cat said with a sigh. None the less, he indicated that Diana should get out as well. When she did, she saw the door to the building open and two men stepped out. One very old, with wrinkled skin and long grey hair pulled back into a braid and the other younger with fewer wrinkles and only two gray steaks woven through his dark hair.
It took Diana a moment to notice that two other creatures walked by the side of these men. One very large, tan colored cougar and one deep brown, almost red in color, stood on either side of the two older men. They walked towards Cat eyeing the newly transformed Navajo with a malevolent gleam. These creatures, though they moved with the men, stalked low as though waiting for the opportunity to strike.
“Catahassa,” the oldest man said, “it has been a long time since you have returned home. We did not expect you to come with such strange company.”
The old man looked around at the Navajo men and women who surrounded him warily. He looked at these newcomers with almost the same malevolent gleam as the beasts at his side.
Diana looked behind her at the Navajo. They like wise stood straight backed and rigid as though readying for a fight. The tension surrounding Diana and Cat could be cut with a knife.
“Grandfather,” Cat answered the old man respectfully, “I am sorry for entering Zuni land with outsiders, but our journey has been very difficult.”
“That’s one word for it,” Charlie said, now also transformed moving towards them and standing at Diana’s side. Diana looked at him and he threw her a cocky smile accompanied by a wink.
When she looked back at the two older men, neither of them acknowledged Charlie, but the oldest, Cat’s grandfather, motioned for Cat to continue.
“A rogue member of the Navajo nation has found the Salt Mother,” here Cat motioned to Diana. Diana, not knowing what if anything to do or say, kept silent. “These Navajo men and women offered us protection. They saw us safely to the reservation.”
“And now,” the old man said, speaking to the group at large, “their task completed, I suggest they leave with our thanks.”
The old man, though his words spoke of mild gratitude, his tone was firm and his face as cold as stone. Clearly, there was no love lost between these two peoples.
There was complete silence around the group for a few moments. Eventually, Tse made a hand gesture to the Navajo and moved to his beat up truck. The other dozen Navajo followed in his wake.
When all the others were crammed inside the truck which Tse and Ashkii had taken, Ashkii stepped close to Cat.
“Remember what you agreed to,” he told Cat in an undertone, “you let us know when you’re taking her to the Salt Lake.”
Cat nodded to him subtly. Ashkii gave another glare to Charlie who sneered back at him before climbing into the front seat of the truck beside his Father.
The Zuni men waited until the truck’s tail lights had begun to disappear from view before they let their guard down.
Once the truck lights were out of sight, the two creatures beside Cat’s grandfather and the younger man closed their eyes, sat back on their legs and transformed.
The brown cougar was a very young man, no older than Ashkii. The large tan cougar was a tall and very stately looking woman a few years older than Diana.
“Come,” Cat’s grandfather said to them, “it will be safer for all of us inside.”
Cat nodded and the men and woman turned to enter the building. Cat grasped her hand once again and looked at her with an attempt at a reassuring smile.
Diana could tell, from this look alone, that there was still a lot that he hadn’t told her. All the same, she returned his smile and interlaced her fingers with his.
They walked into the building together and Diana could hear Charlie following along in their wake.
They walked through the halls of a very sterile building, which, except for some lovely and very unique artwork on the wall, looked exactly the same as any office building she had ever worked in.
They moved past one large door, then another, then another. Diana was starting to wonder how long they would have to walk before they would go into the conference room or the safe room where, she was sure, they were being taken.
When they got towards the large black door with an exit sign above it, Diana became truly confused.
Were they not going to discuss anything? But then, why lead her through the building in the first place?
When they opened the exit door and Diana followed everyone inside, she found an answer to her unspoken question.
She stepped straight into a warm, fog filled room that caused the talisman around her neck to glow pleasantly against her chest.
Through the fog, she could see various older men chanting what sounded like songs or spells kneeling next to younger men or women with their eyes closed and their legs crossed.
“This is the training room,” Cat whispered to her as they passed two groups of old men, young men and couples on either side.
“So this is where you…” she began, then as if in answer, the young man on her right shrank from his stance and was replaced by a dark blue cougar, the likes of which she had never seen before.
“They have strange colors when they start out,” Cat said in explanation, “they won’t begin to blend with natural animals until they’re a little further along.”
Diana nodded to Cat though she kept her eyes on the dark blue cougar. It stared at her with large, green eyes as though it was trying to form some connection with her.
“Diana,” Cat said gently tugging on her hand, “we’re going in now.”
Diana tore her eyes away from the blue cougar and moved them back to the space in front of her. The man who had stood beside Cat in front, moved aside a leather flap which lead to a large, adobe brick room with a colorful rug in the middle and a round table in the center.
Cat’s grandfather entered first followed by the woman and the youngest man. Cat lead Diana under the flap and Diana thought she saw him exchange a charged glance with the older man who was still holding the flap for them. But it passed so quickly that, a moment later, Diana thought she had imagined it.
Charlie filed in after Cat and the older man who had lifted the curtain for them brought up the rear.
“So,” Grandfather began once everyone was seated behind the large, round table, “this is the Salt Mother?”
Though Cat’s grandfather looked straight at Diana, she could tell he was not speaking to her, but to Cat and Charlie.
“We believe so, yes,” Cat answered
The man next to Cat’s grandfather snorted derisively.
“You believe so?” He said in an almost mocking voice to Cat. “I would have thought you would be sure before you brought the girl here.”
“There wasn’t time, Father,” Cat said through clenched teeth to the man who, Diana now understood to be his father, “the rogue had already attacked her once. We had reason to believe that she would do so again.”
“And why did the rogue attack her?” Cat’s Father said insistently. “Was it, maybe, because you had already given her the pendant? You had already decided that she was the one?”
“How do you…?”
“You are not my only child, Cat,” his father said, “I’m lucky you have a sister who still speaks to me.”
“Amanda,” Cat muttered under his breath.
“You gave this girl that pendant. The ancient gift to the salt mother based on what? A feeling? An attraction you felt towards her?” Cat’s father continued, “Just because you want a girl with a pretty face to be the one that does not mean that she is…”
“Lonon,” Cat’s grandfather said firmly. Cat’s father, Lonon, stopped mid-sentence and turned to look at the old man, “you are passing judgement on the girl before you have heard any evidence. By doing this, you display a lack of faith in your son and his abilities. Let us hear their story before we make a judgement.”
“Father, you cannot…” Lonon began but, Cat’s grandfather held up one hand for silence. London, defeated, sank back in his chair.
“First,” the old man said gently turning to Diana, “what is your name, child?”
“Diana Grant,” she answered as confidently as she could.
“Diana,” the old man said kindly, “where is your family from? It’s all right if you don’t know exactly, we just need to know a general area.”
“Well,” she began, “I know my Mom’s grandparents were from Germany. They came over around 1919. Then my Dad’s great grandparents were Irish. They came over sometime in the 1800’s.”
“And there is no native blood in your family, that you know of?” he asked.
“No...I mean…not that I know of,” she said hesitantly. “As far as I know, most of my family didn’t show up in America until after the civil war so…”
“And we have also been told that you felt the talisman?” the old man asked.
“Yes,” Diana said immediately.
“And when did you feel it?” Cat’s grandfather asked.
Here, the younger man and younger woman edged forward in their seats looking at her expectantly. It was clear that the talisman, whatever it was, was a very important piece of the puzzle. Even Lonon, Cat’s father, who had looked casually dismissive before this now looked at her with greater interest.
“Well,” Diana began, keenly aware that all these strange eyes in the room were now fixed entirely on her, “it started when I was coming out of the office last night. It was slight at first, just sort of warm…”
She told them the whole story. About the talisman burning hotter and hotter against her skin until it burned bright as she finally spotted the large black leopard.
“And then...well...this tan cougar was there,” Dina continued, heads turned slightly towards Cat, “he attacked the black cougar and then...well...I blacked out.”
“May we see the scars?” Cat’s grandfather asked. Diana hesitated and looked to Cat. He gave her a reassuring nod and she reluctantly pulled down the sleeves of her shirt to reveal the bandaged claw markings on her shoulders.
The old man looked down the table and gestured for the woman on his right hand side to rise. She did and moved to Diana.
“My name is Tacia,” she said quietly to Diana, “I just need to look at these, is that all right?”
The woman gave Diana a gentle smile and Diana nodded.
Tacia lifted the bandages and Diana winced as she touched the still healing wounds beneath.
“These were made by a shifter,” Tacia concluded, “most likely a rogue.”
Diana wasn’t sure how Tacia was able to tell that from one glance at one wound on Diana’s right shoulder, but then again, a lot of things about this whole ordeal did not make sense to her.
“See?” Cat said, “that supports our theory.”
“What it supports,” Lonon shot back, “is that you are attached to this girl for some reason. It does not necessarily mean that she is…”
“But,” Cat’s grandfather cut in loudly above Lonon, “...it does give us some evidence that the claim may be true. We will not know until she takes the test.”
“Test?” Diana asked looking frantically to Cat. “What test? You didn’t say anything about…”
“Don’t worry, Miss Grant,” the old man said reassuringly, “the test will not harm you, whether you pass or fail. If you do fail, you will be sent on your way with our sincerest apologies.”
“And if I pass?” Diana asked.
A shadow fell across the old man’s face. The look made Diana think that it might be better to fail.
“If you pass, you will be trained,” he said finally.
“Don’t worry, Diana,” Cat said gently, putting his warm hand on hers once again. Her heart began to settle at his calming touch even as the talisman glowed with pleasure against her skin, “you don’t have to do anything. You just let it happen.”
Diana looked at him; caught his piercing eyes and saw a desperation there. It was as though he was pleading with her. Though, whether he wanted her to succeed or fail, she could not be sure. To tell the truth, she wasn’t even sure that this sad, desperate look had anything at all to do with the test.
There was an intimacy in his face that made her blush, yet soothed her at the same time. She didn’t know quite what to do with it, so she looked away.
“All right,” she said, “what do I have to do?”