Cloudblower did not respond.
Stone Ghost studied the hard set of her lips, as if she were straining against words that longed to be spoken. “The people in Whitetail Village, Badgerpaw Village, and Frosted Meadow Village, told me sad tales of lonely, sick little girls. They also told me that you had been very good to them. They said you ran to their village when they called, and stayed up all night nursing the sick. They told me you left only when you believed the girl was out of danger.”
“I do what I can.”
Stone Ghost smoothed the brown-and-white turkey feathers over his knees. “Yes, but these girls had many problems, didn’t they?”
“I tended their head wounds and their coughs, Elder. I did not notice if something else was wrong with them.”
Stone Ghost waited for her to continue. When she didn’t, he said, “Shortly after you left, they vanished.”
Cloudblower looked up, as if surprised. “What?”
“You knew they were missing.”
“Yes, of course, but …”
Stone Ghost scanned her face. “But not when it happened?”
Cloudblower didn’t seem to be breathing. Her head trembled.
“Many of them disappeared within hands of time after you left, Healer.”
Cloudblower violently shook her head as if to deny it, then, suddenly, the certainty seemed to drain away. She went still. Her eyes darted about, searching for something or perhaps gathering and fitting disparate pieces together.
Stone Ghost gave her more time to think. His gaze drifted over Talon Town, trying to see it as it must have been one hundred sun cycles earlier, filled with playing children, women grinding corn, and traders displaying their wares.
“What did you mean in the kiva, Healer, when you said ‘I thought I could stop … ?’ Stop what?”
“Nothing. I—I meant nothing.”
Stone Ghost’s eyes narrowed. “You live here, in Talon Town, but you were away last night when your friend was killed. Yes?”
“I was tending Peavine’s young daughter, Yucca Blossom. She was ill. I boiled willow bark tea for her pain and Sang to her. She needed me. There were warriors here protecting Hophorn. I thought it was safe to leave.” She twisted her hands as if punishing herself for making the wrong decision.
“When did you first learn that something had happened in Talon Town?”
“I heard young Stonehead yelling for help. By the time I reached the town, Catkin and several other warriors had already arrived and were trying to find a ladder to climb over the wall. The screams coming from inside were … were hideous, Elder. I knew a torch would be needed. I ran back to Hillside for one, and when I returned people were frantically pouring over the wall into the town.”
“Did you see anyone outside the walls? Perhaps running away?”
“Elder,” she said in exasperation, “people were running in all directions.”
“Ah.” Stone Ghost nodded. “Of course.”
The Healer’s expression had turned frantic, as if she teetered on the verge of desperate actions.
Clouds billowed over the plaza, pushing westward like a gleaming white army. He pointed. “Did you know that the Thunderbirds build nests of lightning bolts in the Cloud People?”
Cloudblower squinted.
He continued, “It’s truly amazing. They weave the lightning bolts into blazing baskets, then tuck them into the soft hearts of the Cloud People. When the hatchlings are born, they shake the baskets apart with their thunder. Lightning bolts fly and the hatchlings soar free.”
Cloudblower watched the sky for a few moments, then lowered her gaze to the ground.
“I fear,” Stone Ghost said, “that the Cloud People may be rushing to join us for the Celebration of the Longnight. I hope they do not bring snow with them.”
Cloudblower frowned.
“You were captured by the Fire Dogs, weren’t you? Many summers ago?”
She flinched. “Why do you ask?”
Stone Ghost rubbed his hands together. The morning air had chilled them. “I have heard they do terrible things to slaves.”
Cloudblower stared at him.
“Were you beaten?”
She whispered, “Often.”
“Raped?”
She didn’t answer.
“You must have a special sympathy for others who have suffered the same fate.”
Cloudblower’s shoulder muscles swelled through her cape, as if suspecting and fearing his meaning.
Stone Ghost nodded to himself. Her reaction told him a great deal.
She said, “Would that be bad?”
“Not at all. But it might lead you to hide things that you would not otherwise.” He smiled. “Do you see what I mean?”
Cloudblower’s cheeks flushed. “No, I do not.”
“Well, it is a curious coincidence, perhaps, but I often find that murderers have suffered much pain in their lives. Many of them were beaten senseless by their parents or other close relatives. A few endured true horrors, things that sane people could not even imagine. Torture, mutilation. I will not describe the heinous acts for you, because I do not wish those images to live in your dreams as they do in mine. I mention them only because I wish you to understand that I, too, have sympathy for those who have been tormented.”
Cloudblower’s expression softened. She stood rigidly for a long while, then eased down onto the dirt pile beside Stone Ghost.
The wind changed. The sweet woody scent of roasting pine nuts blew over them. Stone Ghost inhaled deeply. For the next two days, women would be cooking, cleaning, decorating the villages, and preparing costumes for the ceremony. He had lived alone for so long, he hadn’t realized how much he’d missed this.
Gently, Stone Ghost said, “Is there something you wish to tell me, Healer?”
She lifted her gaze to the bright colorful paintings of the Great Warriors on the wall to the right. Their terrifying masks glowed in the sunlight.
“Elder,” she murmured. “I ask that you listen to me for a time. I do not know if I will ever be able to say these things again.”
“I’m listening, Healer.”
Cloudblower’s words came softly: “You speak about suffering and its results. The Katsinas’ People are all wounded souls, Elder. Each suffers in a different way, but that is why he or she is here. We were all desperately seeking a way out of our agony and found it in the teachings of Matron Flame Carrier.” She clenched her hands tightly. “I came because I could not bear to live as an ordinary person should. After serving the Fire Dogs, the needs of my souls were different, greater, much more demanding. I craved the companionship of others who understood what it was to be hurt. For many sun cycles I lived as an outcast in my own heart.” She lifted a hand to the big warrior who stood guarding her chamber.
“He-Who-Flies came because his wife and children had been massacred. He lost everything. When he first joined us, he moved through our society like a man walking in his sleep. He spoke little. He asked for nothing. Except hope, Elder. Hope that the wars would end, that the dead would rise from their graves and walk the earth again. The Katsinas’ People give hope, Elder. That is what we do.”
Reverently, he said, “I know that, Healer.”
Cloudblower paused. “Jackrabbit, the young warrior who stood on the roof this morning? He does not even know where he came from. He woke one morning at the bottom of a cliff, his head bloody and bruised. He could recall nothing. He may have slipped and fallen, or been attacked in a battle and left for dead. He wandered for days before he chanced upon Matron Flame Carrier at Flowing Waters Town two summers ago. She took him in and cared for him. He never left.”
Stone Ghost said, “And Catkin? Why is she here?”
Cloudblower fumbled with her hands, lacing and unlacing them in her lap. “I know little of her, Elder. I have heard it said that her husband died, and her clan tried to force her to marry a man she despised. But I cannot tell you if that is true. Catkin is a quiet one. She speaks little of herself. At least to me. She may reveal more to Browser. You might wish to ask him.”
They exchanged a glance. Stone Ghost nodded and wondered how many others here knew that Catkin loved his nephew. It might make a difference.
“What of my nephew’s wife? What did you know of her? The things I have heard disturbed me.”
The painted hem of Cloudblower’s cape waffled in the wind. She seemed to be watching it while she contemplated what to say.
“Elder, she—she often did unkind things to people. Shouting, lashing out with her fists for no reason. For over a sun cycle I feared that her souls had left her body. She seemed to be hovering like Hawk over a precipice of madness.”
“Madness?” Stone Ghost asked. “You are the first to suggest that. Why?”
Cloudblower’s voice dropped to a whisper. “At night, when she
slept, she had terrifying experiences in the Land of the Dead, Elder. Near dawn, two moons ago, she shrieked like a madwoman, and ran to me in terror, claiming she’d heard strange, inhuman voices coming from Browser’s mouth while he slept.”
“What did you say?”
“I questioned her, Elder, on what had actually happened. I believed, then and now, that she was deep asleep when she heard the sounds. I think something, or someone, in the Land of the Dead was tormenting her, making the voice enough like her husband’s that she would think the eerie sounds came from him.”
“Why would one of the ancestors do such a thing, Healer?”
Cloudblower shrugged. “The dead are mysterious beings, Elder. I have never been able to fathom their ways.”
“Did you perform a Healing for Ash Girl?”
Cloudblower shook her head. “I tried. She wouldn’t allow it. She said that her Spirit Helper cared for her and that was enough.”
Stone Ghost moved his sandal across the frozen earth. It left white streaks. Why hadn’t Browser forced his wife to undergo a Healing? The mad could not make such decisions themselves. They needed others to do it for them.
“And Hophorn?” he asked. “What is her story?”
“Oh, that is easy, Elder.” A loving smile came to Cloudblower’s face. “She followed Browser. She had taken care of him since they’d been children, soothing his hurts, easing his fears. When Browser and his family joined the Katsinas’ People, and left Green Mesa Village, she could not stay behind. She loved him too much. Not as a lover, you understand, but as a cherished friend.”
“I do understand,” Stone Ghost answered. “I had a friend like that once. When the Tower Builders killed her, my souls tore loose from my body. For over a moon, I could not walk, or even feed myself. My body would not move.”
Cloudblower gazed at him, concerned. “I have heard that grief can paralyze the souls.”
Stone Ghost tipped his wrinkled face to the sunlight, and let it warm him. “It can, Healer. That is why I fear for Hophorn. These ‘blanking-out’ spells, are a sort of paralysis of the soul. I must find out what she has seen, and why she cannot bear to face it.”
“What do you mean? Face it?”
“I think that is why she blanks out. She sends her souls flying to escape.”
As though surprised by the suggestion, Cloudblower said, “She is ill, Elder. Her head injury—”
“Why does it disturb you that she might wish to escape? Is she escaping you, Healer?”
Cloudblower’s face slackened.
Five women climbed onto the roof where Catkin and Browser stood. They carried baskets, pottery jars, and decorations—strips of colorful fabric, ears of corn, strings of bright feathers, and other things Stone Ghost could not make out from where he sat.
As they climbed down into the plaza, Cloudblower bowed her head. Stiffly, she said, “I must get back, Elder. Hophorn cannot care for herself, and she is terrified that the murderers are going to return to kill her. As well, I have preparations to make for Whiproot’s burial and the Longnight ceremony. Hophorn usually leads the ritual. Because of her illness that duty has fallen to me.”
Stone Ghost nodded. “I thank you for speaking with me, Healer.”
Cloudblower rose and her painted cape flapped around her as she walked toward her chamber.
Stone Ghost watched until she had ducked beneath her door curtain, then he stretched in the sunlight.
The women set their pots and baskets down on the long wall outside the First People’s kiva and began removing things from inside. One of the women, around thirty summers old with an ugly pocked face and short black-streaked gray hair, watched Stone Ghost from the corner of her eye.
He walked toward them, smiling, and the ugly woman quickly turned away. Harsh voices came from within the kiva. Flame Carrier’s panicked tone was accompanied by two scratchy male voices.
“Cancel the ritual!”
Flame Carrier cried.
“Have you lost your wits! Hundreds of people are coming. Many have been walking for days. By nightfall their camps will surround Hillside Village. We can’t greet them by telling them we’ve decided not to hold the Ceremony of the Longnight!”