Maureen handed the skull back to Steve and pointed at the northern wall crypt. It was roughly two feet square and another two feet deep. “That crypt looks like it was dug out with a shovel.”
“Probably,” Nichols said, and crouched down to
stare at the destroyed crypt. “But the guy found something in it. It looks like he pulled a box out, then shoved the beer can and cigarettes in.”
“Did you find anything else?” Dusty asked.
“A couple of handprints, nothing we can really use except for palm diameter. Along with the beer can and cigarette pack, there was some cordage.”
“Don’t forget the butt.” Steve was staring down at the skull in his hand, as though he expected the dead man to suddenly comment on their theories.
“Right,” Nichols added. “We found a single cigarette butt. The only problem is, it’s been lying in the ground for nigh onto forty years. We’ll probably never be able to identify the brand.”
Steve turned the skull to look into the empty eye sockets. Unlike the hundreds of skulls Dusty had stared into over the years, this one looked eerie, malignant. Dusty shivered involuntarily.
“What about the cordage?” Dusty asked. “Anything interesting?”
“It was knotted in a loop,” Steve answered. “You know, just lying there on the stone. It had apparently been around the box that the pot hunters slid out of the crypt.”
Dusty closed his eyes.
“What?” everyone seemed to ask in unison.
“Probably a yucca hoop,” Dusty said.
“Like the hoops around Robertson’s and Hawsworth’s bodies?” Nichols asked.
Dusty nodded. “That’s why the slabs were left on their heads. Somebody killed two witches here, dropped slabs on top of them to keep their souls locked in the earth forever, and torched the place before they left.”
“Then,” Steve said uneasily, “a goddamn pot hunter dug them up again around forty years ago.”
Maureen pinned Dusty with hard black eyes. “Are
you suggesting Dale was murdered because the pot hunters dug up this site?”
Dusty spread his hands. “Dale must have known about this, Maureen. He came out here all the time in the sixties—usually in the company of my mother.” He turned and gazed down at the enormous circle of Casa Rinconada. The beautiful stonework looked bleak under the gray winter sky. “And I wager he wrote about it in his journals.”
Nichols stepped between them. “Why would it matter that two witches, murdered over seven hundred years ago, were dug up?”
Dusty looked past Nichols to the rimrock behind the site, and his soul seemed to glimpse something his eyes could not physically see. His heart went cold in his chest. Something terrible had happened here. He could sense it. Softly, he said, “A stone is placed over a witch’s head to keep the wicked soul from rising out of the grave and attacking the living, Nichols. You know, spirit possession, sickness, dying screaming. That kind of thing.”
“So?”
“So.” Dusty looked back at Nichols and their gazes held. “After this site was potted, I suspect someone was attacked.”
Nichols made a deep-throated sound of disgust and walked away.
Dusty looked back at the skeletons of the two witches and old Hail Walking Hawk’s voice seeped from his memories:
“Many years ago, my grandmother told me about two witches who lived over at Zuni Pueblo. They could change themselves into animals by jumping through yucca hoops, and once they turned a man into a woman. Everybody said they were crazy, but people were too scared of them to try and kill them.”
They’d been excavating the 10K3 site, digging up the brutalized bodies of women who’d been dead for
almost eight hundred years. One of the women had had a basilisk on her breastbone. Hail had been certain they’d been killed by a witch.
Only now did it occur to Dusty to wonder how many years ago the two witches had lived at Zuni. Were they still alive?
“DROP YOUR CLUB and climb down,” Thorn Fox ordered, and gestured at Browser as his warriors closed in.
Browser tossed his club to the side. “What about Horned Ram?”
The old man lay gasping on the blankets, his swollen shoulder black and mottled. Shadow crouched beside him. Browser kept his eyes on Rain Crow, watching the warrior’s expression. His eyes had fixed on Shadow, anticipation there like a flame.
“Cut me loose,” Horned Ram said. “This shoulder is killing me.”
“Yes, Elder.” Shadow reached into her belt pouch for a thin blade of obsidian. “This will only take a moment.”
“Blessed gods,” Horned Ram managed through gritted teeth, “I thought you’d never bring this to a conclusion.”
“One thing you can rely on, Elder”—Shadow smiled down at him—“I always finish what I start.” She leaned forward, her black eyes glittering, and her hand flashed.
Horned Ram’s scream exploded in a guttering spray
of blood. Shadow leapt away, but blood speckled the hem of her white dress. A rich red river flowed across the kiva roof as Horned Ram’s severed throat sputtered and his limbs twitched. Browser watched the Red Rock elder’s eyes dim and the pupils enlarge.
Rain Crow watched in horror. He frowned as Shadow stepped up to him, her head cocked. “Is there a problem, War Chief?”
“No,” Rain Crow rasped.
“You always finish what you start,” Browser repeated. “How did you enlist Horned Ram in the first place?”
Shadow shrugged and bent down to wipe the blood from her obsidian blade onto Horned Ram’s clothing. “We have been working with Horned Ram for a long time. He had a fertile imagination. We always gave him information that fed his thirst for violence. Two Hearts actually brought him into our fold sun cycles ago. Fortunately, Horned Ram never asked questions about who we were, or why we would let him know the things we did. All he cared was that we were against the katsinas. I’m sure it all came crashing down on him when your little trick led his warriors into battle against Bear Lance’s warriors.”
“So he ran,” Stone Ghost said. He stood like a small hunched animal, his turkey-feather cape flapping in the wind. “Not only did he discover that the First People existed, but that he’d also been working with the White Moccasins for sun cycles.”
Shadow stepped up to him, smiling. “Not all of our adversaries have your dedication to honor and duty.”
Old Pigeontail had been leaning against Owl House’s plastered wall. “What about War Chief Rain Crow?”
Rain Crow propped himself on his war club, his gaze fixed on the red pool of Horned Ram’s blood.
“What about you, War Chief? Are you with me, or against me?”
Rain Crow blinked hard, from the blow to his head, or from the sudden death of Horned Ram, Browser couldn’t tell.
“With you,” Rain Crow whispered. “I’m no fool.”
“Good.” Shadow paused long enough to run a finger down the side of his ruined face. Then she turned. “Browser? Stone Ghost? Would you be so kind as to climb down into the kiva. We have things we need to discuss.”
Browser caught the desperate look in Rain Crow’s eyes. The Flowing Waters War Chief didn’t look as sick as he had. Some subtle communication passed between them, accented by a slight nod of Rain Crow’s head. What had the War Chief been trying to tell him?
Tendrils of smoke coiled up past his shoulders, rising from the hearth below, but the air was strangely cold as Browser descended the ladder.
At the bottom he stepped to one side, blinking to help his eyes adjust to the dim interior. Shadow immediately climbed down and stood beside him.
Stone Ghost took the steps down one at a time, his gaze searching the kiva, probably looking for the little girl. When his feet touched the floor, he gripped Browser’s sleeve to steady himself.
Rain Crow’s stout body blocked the sunlight as he descended. He kept trying to stifle his ragged breathing, but couldn’t. The pain in his head must be overwhelming. When his feet touched the floor, he staggered over to collapse on the kiva bench. Then the ladder rattled as Thorn Fox dropped athletically to the floor.
Murals of the old gods painted the kiva walls: the Flute Player, the Blue God, the Hero Twins, and Spider Woman stood to his right. On Browser’s left, one huge painting depicted the First People climbing into this world, carrying enormous ceremonial knives in their hands.
“Who—who’s there?” a thin reedy voice wheezed.
Browser saw the broken waste of a man lying on a reed mat. His features were recognizable, but just barely. Filthy white hair matted his head, and his skin, old and wrinkled, hung loose, as though insects had eaten the flesh out from inside him. The wall crypt above him held a beautifully painted rawhide box. A pile of wadded blankets lay at the foot of his bedding, as though kicked off when he’d grown too hot.
Browser saw Rain Crow flinch and turned. Rain Crow’s mouth gaped. His eyes had fixed on the pile of bones that gleamed around his feet. Human bones. They were scattered across the floor like litter.
When Rain Crow lifted his gaze to Shadow, it was filled with such horror that Browser wondered if he was hearing the screams of his wounded men as she killed them, then cut the flesh from their bodies.
“You didn’t know?” Browser asked softly.
Rain Crow just shook his head, but the hardening around his mouth indicated that he’d come to some decision.
Browser turned his attention to Two Hearts and took a step. Thorn Fox moved with catlike quickness to place himself between Two Hearts and Browser.
“Don’t be an imbecile. If I had wished the elder dead, he’d be dead by now. I had plenty of opportunity before you and your warriors arrived.”
Thorn Fox grinned; several of his teeth were missing on the right side. The broken roots could be seen rotting in pink and inflamed gums. “Killing you will be a pleasure.”
Browser shouted in his face, “Move!”
Thorn Fox regripped his club in both hands, but stood his ground.
“Obsidian,” Two Hearts hissed. “Where is she?”
Shadow knelt and smoothed hair from Two Hearts’s brow. “The warriors are holding her, Father. Like I said they would.”
Browser frowned and exchanged a glance with Stone
Ghost. Stone Ghost pursed his lips and shook his head. Not yet. Not until they knew more.
“The turquoise wolf? Where … where is it?” Two Hearts extended a skeletal hand and his fingers trembled.
Shadow stood up. “Give it to me. Now!”
Browser pulled open his shirt hem, and the wolf slid out onto his palm. He handed it to Shadow, who put it in Two Hearts’s hand and closed his fingers around it. “Here, Father. Feel it?”
The old man clutched the wolf to his heart, and relief slackened his face. His thin brown lips parted to expose toothless gums. He might have been caught in a moment of pure bliss.
As Two Hearts shifted his foot, a terrified squeak came from the wadded blankets, then soft babbling, like that of a demented newborn.
“Bone Walker?” Stone Ghost called and turned to Shadow. “Please, let me go to her.”
“Bone Walker? Do you mean my daughter, Piper?” Shadow waved a hand. “Go. But she has lost her souls. She can’t speak or even focus her eyes. I don’t know what happened to her.”
Stone Ghost gently pulled at the blankets until he’d uncovered the little girl, face dirty, her hair a tangled mass. She lay curled on her side. Her huge black eyes stared intently at nothing, as though focused on some terror inside her. She had both hands twisted in a turquoise necklace that Browser had seen Stone Ghost wear a hundred times.
Had he given it to the child, or had she stolen it?
Stone Ghost sat on the floor and pulled the girl into his lap. Her body was limp, as though her muscles had stopped working. Her head rolled back over his arm. Stone Ghost hugged her to his chest, and whispered in her ear in a comforting voice. The only words Browser could make out were,
“I’m here. I’m right here.”
Browser crossed his arms, shooting a look at Thorn
Fox. “Very well, Shadow, I am ready to listen to your proposal.”
Two Hearts coughed, and blood speckled his mouth. “Shadow … tell him.”
Shadow said, “Browser, the Blessed Two Hearts does not wish to kill you. None of us has pure blood anymore, but you are one of only five men left to us whose blood is almost pure. By mating you with several of our purest women—”
“Like you?” Browser interrupted.
Blessed gods. That’s why they let me live this long.
“Yes, like me,” Shadow answered, “and a handful of others. It will not be unpleasant for you, I assure you. Because of our blood, we are all attractive and eager to mate with others of our kind.”
Our kind
. The words sickened Browser.
“We are the last,” Shadow said as she strode up to Stone Ghost. “We have only ourselves. Two small clans of First People. That’s why it’s so imperative that Browser live and marry.”
Browser said, “Then why were you hunting me at Dry Creek village. You were out there, weren’t you?”
Shadow reached out to touch his shoulder. “I was that close to you. But for Stone Ghost’s arrival, I would have killed Catkin that night.” She cocked her head, the wealth of beads clattering in her long black hair. “How would that have looked, Browser? Your deputy dead within a body’s length of you? Perhaps it would have been the impetus for Cloudblower to dismiss you.”
He nodded. “You are very clever, Shadow.”
“Yes, and patient.”
“Why me? There’s always Thorn Fox,” Browser reminded. “From the number of warriors I’ve seen recently, it isn’t like we’re running out of White Moccasins.”
A branch broke in the fire and the resulting swirl of sparks reflected in her black eyes. “We need them, yes,
but a good deal of Made People blood runs in their veins. To regenerate ourselves, we must strive for purity.”
“I don’t think I understand,” Stone Ghost said as he gently lowered the limp little girl to the floor. “If you wish my nephew to live, what of Two Hearts?”
“We still have Obsidian’s heart,” Shadow said easily. “And if that fails, he has the Blessed Night Sun’s turquoise wolf to guide him through the twists and turns of the afterlife trails.”
Through a tense exhalation, Browser asked, “What if I say no?”
“If you say no,” she told him, “the woman you love will die. She can’t outrun Thorn Fox with that Mogollon elder panting at the rear. After that we will slowly, one by one, kill everyone else you care about, starting with the
kokwimu,
Cloudblower, and Matron Crossbill.”
Browser’s fists knotted at his sides. Even if Catkin hadn’t understood his message, all they had to do was be patient, keep a close watch on her, and someday she would be vulnerable. All of the skill in the world could not save a warrior from treachery. He turned to look at Stone Ghost, and his heart ached.
Shadow folded her arms and her white dress swayed as she walked closer to Browser. “We are not fools, Browser. Just as you used the northern staircase to trap Blue Corn, by now your people are in our trap.” She looked up into his eyes and he sensed an unnatural hunger there, like that of a dying animal. “You will either do as we say, or your friends will be stewed bones by the time the sun rises tomorrow.”
“What if I want Obsidian?” Browser measured Shadow. “What if I wish to marry her? A woman can’t very well bear daughters when her heart has been pulled out of her chest with a spindle.”
Shadow stepped over to the bench and lifted a long slender spindle from the plastered stone.
Browser added, “You know she helped to ambush Bear Lance’s warriors.”
“Then turned on you when I captured her.” Shadow twirled the spindle in her hands. “She’s always been a disappointment to me.”
Browser shook his head. “If you truly wish to save our people there is only one way! Stop all this murdering and destruction. I want Obsidian. Alive. I want Catkin and the Katsinas’ People left alone. And I want my turquoise wolf back. It belongs to me. The gods made sure it fell into my possession.” He gave her a knowing look. “Do that, Shadow, and I will help you in any way I can.”
Shadow’s eyes seemed to enlarge, swelling in her face, as if they were peering into his very soul.
YVETTE HEARD THE auto pulling into the parking space outside Dusty’s camp trailer, but didn’t think much of it. People came and went constantly. It didn’t sound like Dusty’s Bronco, but that didn’t mean anything. He often arrived with other people.
She stared into her coffee cup, trying to sort out her emotions. She should have been prostrate with grief over Carter’s murder. But he’d been more of a father in name than fact. They had always had an uneasy relationship, a sort of keep-your-distance-and-spar, instead of the sort of father-daughter intimacy she had always imagined proper. The fact that she still thought of him as Carter proved something.