Bone Walker: Book III of the Anasazi Mysteries (48 page)

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Authors: Kathleen O'Neal Gear,W. Michael Gear

BOOK: Bone Walker: Book III of the Anasazi Mysteries
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The next sound had been Catkin’s war club breaking his shoulder.
The journey to Kettle Town had been punctuated by the distant sounds of fighting, the faint clacking of wood, the screams and angry cries.
“What happened out there?” She shook her head.
“They’ll be coming for us.” Horned Ram winced as he tried to shift. “Gods, this hurts. I’m too old for this.”
“Is that why you ran?”
“I was coming for reinforcements.”
“All of our unwounded warriors were committed.” Blue Corn stared her hatred at him.
“You couldn’t tell friend from enemy out there. It was the middle of the night.” He moved and his broken shoulder bones grated. Horned Ram shuddered and went white. “It will take them a while. They’ll return to Center Place. When they don’t, find us, or the wounded tell them we didn’t come back, they’ll come here.”
“I wouldn’t count on that.” Browser stepped into the room. Behind him came a throng of Mogollon warriors followed by Jackrabbit and Catkin. The first thing the deputy did was step over, expression serious, to check Blue Corn’s bonds. She tugged them to make sure of their strength.
“What happened?” Blue Corn snapped. She might
be trussed up like a captive bird, but by the Blessed Flute Player, she was still a Matron. Then she saw Rain Crow, his limp and blood-soaked body supported by two Fire Dogs. They laid him carefully by the heating bowl while others ripped apart another of the willow mats and began feeding sticks to the embers.
As the flames leapt up, Blue Corn caught glimpses of Rain Crow. His head looked shiny from the blood in his hair. It had dried into cracklike patterns on his face.
Browser crouched before her. An absent part of her realized that his hands weren’t even blood-smeared.
“Matron? They are dead.”
“Who won? The White Moccasins?”
Browser’s eyes dropped. “No one, except perhaps Shadow Woman. She killed the last two of your warriors.”
“But there should still be wounded! Not everyone—”
“Yes, everyone,”
Browser said, and his voice sounded deeply weary. He took a breath. “Matron, why are you here? Why are you placing yourself at risk?”
She glared up at him. “You, or your friends, killed my warrior. You spat upon my hospitality.”
“We killed no one,” Stone Ghost said as he hobbled into the room, supporting himself with a juniper walking stick. The dark wells of his shining eyes reflected the firelight.
“Liar! My warriors will be here s-soon!” Horned Ram sputtered. “They’ll see what you’ve done to me. How you’ve treated me, and they’ll take their revenge!”
Browser’s response came so softly Blue Corn almost couldn’t hear it. “They’re dead, Elder. All of them. Dead.”
Blue Corn blinked, trying to understand. “Killed by White Moccasins? They’re real?”
Browser nodded and let out a tired breath. “You asked for proof once. Upset that I had no dead White
Moccasins to show you. Now I have enough bodies to glut an army of crows. But, Matron, I don’t have the will to show them off.”
She watched, hearing the truth in his weary voice. The reality left her too stunned to speak as Browser turned to Stone Ghost. The elder knelt beside Rain Crow, examining his wounds.
“How is he?” Browser asked.
Stone Ghost gently felt the bloody matted hair on Rain Crow’s head. “The war club crushed a small part of his skull. From the hair that’s torn off, I’d say it was a glancing blow.” Stone Ghost turned Rain Crow’s head and peered into his eyes. “But his pupils are two different sizes. His brain is swelling with evil Spirits. They’ll be feeding for days. If he lives through the next quarter moon, his souls might come back.”
“He’s tough.” Blue Corn looked up at Browser. “What are your plans for me, War Chief?”
Browser rose and stared at Horned Ram. The old man squirmed, testing his bonds. “You allied yourself with those who stir hatred, Matron, and look what has become of it.” He turned back to Blue Corn. “If you give me your oath that you will not retaliate against me or the Katsinas’ People, I will release you. We are not your enemies. We never have been.”
“I still have wounded up at Center Place.”
Browser nodded. “I will send someone for them at first light. I will not risk my people at night with Shadow prowling around.”
“Your
people?” She arched an ironic eyebrow. “I mostly see Fire Dogs here.”
“We are Katsinas’ People, Matron. All of us.”
She narrowed an eye, taking his measure, seeing the terrible fatigue that weighed his souls. “Come, Browser, do you really believe in the katsinas?”
He smiled. “There is only one thing I am certain of, Matron. If we don’t stop killing each other, it won’t matter who is right. In the end, we will all be dead.”
He gestured toward the south. “The only one left from tonight’s battle is a witch. I greatly fear that when all of this fighting is done, witches will be the only survivors.”
“The Katsina religion is witchery!” Horned Ram cried. “You are all a vile pollution in the sight of the gods. They will destroy you, you and your—”
“Cut me loose, Browser,” Blue Corn interrupted, and held out her hands. “I don’t know where we will go or what we will do, but I will not fight you.” She glanced at Rain Crow. “If for no other reason than you brought my War Chief back to me.”
He pulled the hafted chert knife from his belt and sawed through the cord that bound her ankles and wrists.
As he stood, he looked at the warriors standing around the room and said, “I’ll take the first watch.”
“No, War Chief,” a young Mogollon warrior said, and stepped forward, chest out, eyes level. “Jackrabbit and I will take the watch. Sleep soundly, War Chief, and know that we are alert and watchful.”
The Fire Dogs were on their feet, lithe and deadly, hands on their weapons. Blue Corn wouldn’t have believed it had she not seen it with her own eyes. Flute Player take her, they worshiped him.
“Shadow is out there,” Catkin said. “Never forget that.”
Yucca Whip nodded. “Yes, Catkin.”
Blue Corn rubbed her wrists, amazed as Catkin led Browser from the room. Horned Ram, still trussed, watched them go, his eyes filled with hatred.
 
 
DUSTY, AWAKENED AT the sound of Maureen’s voice: “Good morning, Yvette. Care for coffee?”
“Yes! Smashing!” the cultured English voice responded as the trailer rocked with her entry. “I feel bloody beastly! I swear, I’m half frozen and every joint in my body is screaming.”
Dusty sat up, yawned, and reached for his jeans. The chill of the morning left his breath frosty in the air. He pulled on a sweatshirt and his boots, stood and studied himself in the mirror. His blond hair stood out at odd angles, and his puffy eyes made it look like he hadn’t slept all night, which he hadn’t.
He combed his hair with his fingers and headed down the hallway.
“Good morning,” Maureen said. She stood at the kitchen stove with a spatula in her hand, turning over eggs and chilis.
Dusty stopped very close behind her and said, “Sorry about last night. I didn’t mean to sound—”
“You didn’t,” she said, and smiled. She wore a blue turtleneck underneath an oversized gray sweatshirt. Her freshly washed and braided hair was still damp and smelled of shampoo. She pointed to the coffeepot. “Have a cup. You’ll feel better.”
He poured a cup of coffee and stepped over to the table. “Good morning, Sis,” he said as he slid into the booth opposite her.
In the morning light, Yvette Hawsworth was an attractive woman, and yes, he could see Dale in her long
face, thin nose, and most of all in her eyes. The rest of her, the ash-blond hair, the fine bones, all seemed to be Ruth Ann.
“Ever slept in a truck before?” He smiled, trying to set her at ease.
“No, and I must say, it’s a bit of an experience.” Her laugh betrayed a sudden insecurity. “But for your blankets, I’m quite sure I would have died.”
“You wouldn’t have. If it gets too bad you can always turn on the engine and pray you don’t asphyxiate before dawn.” He took a sip of the coffee and let the rich dark brew soothe him. “I was born in a truck. At the side of the highway south of Tuba City.”
She lifted a slim eyebrow, as if trying to determine how much of what he was telling her was bullshit.
He wrapped his fingers around his coffee cup. “Is this as much of a shock to you as it is to me?”
She laughed. “You have no idea. Tell me … William? Is that what I should call you?”
“The only person on earth who called me that was Dale. When Ruth Ann does, it makes my nerves grate.”
“Dusty?” She placed her palms together in a prim gesture, her eyes searching his. “Did you send me that fax?”
He slowly lowered his cup to the table. He could hear the eggs sizzling in the pan in the kitchen. “What fax?”
“Two weeks ago. The fax telling me that my life was a lie.”
He shook his head. “Yvette, until you walked in here last night, I didn’t even know you existed.”
“No one did,” Maureen said as she separated three paper plates. “I take it you’re eating with us? There’s no other breakfast out here. The closest source of food is the cold locker at the gas station in Crownpoint.” She shot a scathing look at Dusty. “And believe me, you don’t want to try it.”
“I told you,” Dusty protested, “I didn’t know you then.”
“Yeah sure, eh?” Maureen shook the spatula at him. “The enchiladas at the Pink Adobe almost, I said
almost,
make up for that sandwich.”
“I feel rather a fool,” Yvette said, shifting nervously in the booth. “I followed Mum until she took off on that dirt track. I was just bloody determined to see where she’d got off to, what great secret was hidden out here. A number of times, I thought I’d lost her. It’s a good thing I rented that bush vehicle.”
“Bush vehicle?” Dusty asked. “Where’d you learn to call a Jeep that?”
“On safari,” she told him, and shook hair out of her eyes.
“Hawsworth took you on safari?”
“Oh, God no.” She seemed uncomfortable. “I went to Africa while Carter was working there. But mostly I went with my first husband.”
“First?” Dusty asked. “How many have you had?”
“Three. Currently I’m between.”
Dusty silently sized her up again. She didn’t take after her mother, did she?
“You went on safari and you didn’t have any idea about backcountry?” Maureen asked.
“Well, you see, Africa isn’t like this, at least not the places I went. People imagine tents and
Out of Africa
, but it’s really quite civilized. The lodges have running water and gourmet food.”
Maureen scooped eggs onto the paper plates, and brought two to the table, along with forks wrapped in napkins. She set one plate in front of Yvette and the other in front of Dusty. The glorious aroma of cheddar and chilis wafted up to Dusty.
Maureen went back for her plate and said, “You’re a real mystery woman. Your name doesn’t appear in any of the biographical material about Ruth Ann Sullivan or Carter Hawsworth.”
Yvette wet her lips. “No, they were rather Machiavellian about that, weren’t they? Believe me, growing up between them wasn’t any picnic. I raised myself, bouncing from boarding school to boarding school.” She lifted her eyes. “Tell me, did Dale Robertson … did he have any idea that I existed?”
Dusty shook his head and toyed with his cup, moving it around the table, remembering what Maureen had said last night. “And he would have told me, Yvette. Why do you ask?”
“Well, I was born in Geneva, Switzerland, in ’70. Isn’t that a rip? I have dual citizenship, Swiss and British. Right off I was bundled away into a facility while they ran off to the Pacific. Auntie Vi did most of my raising when I wasn’t in school.”
“Is that why you came here? To find Dale?” Dusty asked as he took his fork from his rolled napkin.
“The fax came two weeks ago. When Mum refused to talk about it, it made me suspicious. Not that we ever talked, but this was worse. She had never been part of my life, and after she and Carter split, he hadn’t much of a care for me either.” She frowned as she sipped her coffee. “Then a couple of days later a letter arrived with an old newspaper clipping from an Albuquerque paper. There was a picture of Mum, not much more than a girl, and Dale Robertson. They were at an archaeological dig. A note penciled at the bottom read: ‘
Meet your real father.
’”
Dusty guessed, “Could Hawsworth have sent it?”
Yvette shrugged. “I called Auntie Vi for Carter’s address. My father and I hadn’t been in touch in years. We don’t share much in common, you see. Imagine my surprise when I discovered he was in Taos.” She pronounced it Tay-os.
“So, what did he say?” Dusty ate a mouthful of
huevos rancheros
and gave Maureen a thumbs-up sign.
She smiled and slid into the booth beside him with her plate and coffee cup in hand.
“He told me flat out that it was ludicrous, that of course he was my father, but after he said it, he hesitated for a long time, and finally said he’d call me back.”
“Did he?”
“No, it was Mum who rang me up, asking where I might have gotten the bright idea that Carter wasn’t my father. I told her about the fax and the news article. She was quiet for a moment, and then asked if Carter had returned my call. I told her no.”
“Did you talk to Dale?” Maureen asked, and dipped up a forkful of eggs.
She nodded. “I got his answering machine. At the beep I couldn’t say anything. Bloody hell, what does one say? ‘Hello, are you my father?’”
Dusty sipped his coffee and gave her an askance look. “A newspaper article and a fax don’t mean he was your father, Yvette. It just means someone wanted you to think he was.”
“Yes, I—I know.” She looked at him soberly. “But the letter I received from Carter, FedEx, the following day, informed me most tersely that to his mortification, I was not his daughter. Apparently he had received a fax asking how I might have blood type B when Mum and he were both type O.”
Maureen’s fork hovered over her plate. Her eyes narrowed as she looked at Yvette. “Dale was AB.” She turned to Dusty. “And you’re type B.”
Dusty took another bite of breakfast and around a mouthful said, “Yeah, so?”
“If Ruth Ann and Carter are both type O, they can’t have a child who is either type A or B.” She scowled at her eggs. “You wouldn’t possibly have any idea of Samuel’s blood type, would you?”
Dusty blinked. “I’m not sure I ever knew his blood type.”
“Then Dusty and I share the same blood?” Yvette looked surprised.
“It’s an exclusionary test,” Maureen told her. “It only means that if you are type B, Carter Hawsworth cannot be your father, eh? Not if he’s an O.”
“But Mum is an O.”
“Yes, and an O crossed with another O results in type O blood in one hundred percent of the offspring. If Ruth Ann is an O and Dale was an AB, then fifty percent of their children would have been type A and fifty percent would have been type B.” She used her fork to point first at Dusty, then at Yvette.
Yvette frowned. “Mum told me she left the U.S. six months before I was born.”
Maureen looked at Dusty. “Dale told me that Carter and Ruth Ann were together for two weeks before she left. Does that ring true?”
Dusty nodded. “You thinking what I’m thinking?” Maureen answered, “It looks like she was pregnant again with Dale’s baby, couldn’t stand Sam’s guilt, and—”
Dusty finished, “Along came Hawsworth, and she was on him like a leech.”
Yvette seemed to be stunned by the loathing in Dusty’s voice. Her shoulders hunched forward. “But what of Dale Robertson? He just bred Mum like a prize mare, and sod the poor bloke stuck with the child?”
Dusty ate the last of his eggs, wiped his mouth with his napkin, and leaned back. “If he’d known about you, Yvette, he would have done something, and when he did, it would have been classy, up front, and honest. Just like he did with me.” Dusty tossed his napkin on the table. “I don’t know what our mother or Carter have told you, but you could do a hell of a lot worse than having Dale Robertson as a father.”
Maureen’s dark eyes fixed on the window, but she didn’t seem to be looking at anything outside. She murmured, “Why bring the children into it? Why does the murderer need you and Yvette here?”
Dusty replied, “I didn’t get any faxes.”
“No,” Maureen said, and slowly turned to face him. “He expected you to be here.”
 
 
I STARE AT her in wonder. Raising my head, I sniff cautiously, drawing in her scent. She and I are so much the same—and so very different. I search for the odor. Has she been with him? Is he hers now? But my nostrils fail to detect the musk that lingers on a woman after she’s coupled with a man.
Sister looks at me, distress in her large dark eyes. She has never had my strength. “He is coming for you, Shadow. For you and Father.”
“Of course he is,” I reply. “I am the Summoning God. They all come to me. Some sooner than others.” I place a hand to my belly, aware of the glow within. Father’s power never ceases to amaze me. Where others leave only the faded memory of pleasure, I am his fertile soil.
“Shadow,” she says, looking anxiously across the kiva to where Father lays moaning in his blankets, “you have no need of me here.”
I throw my head back and laugh. Piper lies frozen, her breath-heart soul paralyzed in the air above her. What did Father do to her this time? How did he witch her so completely. Was it the turquoise necklace? When, and where, had she gotten that? Is Piper truly so weak? I expected more from her.
“Ah, Sister, I may have great need of you. Tell me, in what should I place more value? In your heart, or your body?”
Her face has become a pale mask.
“Tell me of Browser.”
“I think he knows where you are. Were I you, I would leave, Sister. Now, while you can.”
“I see.”
“Don’t take him lightly.”
“Browser?” I smile, remembering the times I have tempted him, fondled him, seen the battle in his eyes as his heart struggled with his manhood. Yes, he desires me. All I need is a little time. “He’s the most dangerous man I know, Sister.”
“You continue to overestimate him. You should have seen him, worry dripping from his skin like sweat. The desperation in his eyes was overpowering when he asked me to help him.”
I watch her, and she squirms, unable to meet my eyes. She is smart not to challenge my stare. I would reel her breath-heart soul out of her the way a hunter does a yucca cord string from a rabbit hole. Instead her eyes are fixed on the fragments of bone littering the kiva. She is particularly fascinated by a section of shinbone. It gleams like shell, stark against the ash-stained earthen floor.
“His name was Carved Splinter,” I tell her, gesturing at the length of broken bone. “I sucked the marrow from it for supper last night.”

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