Authors: Kathleen O'Neal Gear
It Dreams in Me (4 page)
Flint called, “What makes you think we’ll be safe? If it’s an old gathering place, everyone knows about it.”
Strongheart nodded. “Yes, but only Healers and desperately ill people are brave enough to set foot upon that sacred ground.”
“Why?”
He turned to Flint. “It’s dangerous to those who do not know its Spirits. After my parents were killed, I spent part of my youth there, studying with an old Healer named Juggler.”
Uneasy, Flint said, “Is the old man still there?”
Strongheart shrugged and bent to gather Sora’s few belongings, placing them, one by one, into her heavy belt pouch. “I don’t even know if he’s still alive.”
AT DUSK, THEY CAMPED NEAR A SMALL CYPRESS POND SURROUNDED by gigantic hackberry trees—one day’s walk from Oak Leaf Village. The three of them sat around the fire, silently eating bowls of fish soup.
Strongheart kept a close eye on Flint. He didn’t know what Flint expected, but the warrior kept gazing westward, toward Oak Leaf village, as though he desperately needed to run home.
Was he homesick? Or was it something more urgent?
Sora set her bowl down and walked away toward the shore of the pond.
Strongheart gave her some time to be alone, finishing his soup before he followed her.
He found her leaning against the trunk of a hackberry tree, her eyes focused on the sparkflies that blinked amid the branches. Croaking frogs serenaded the night.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
Over her shoulder, she said, “You should be a warrior instead
of a priest. You have the skills for it. I didn’t hear you approach.”
of a priest. You have the skills for it. I didn’t hear you approach.”
“I think you were occupied with other thoughts.”
The tall grass whispered against his leggings as he walked to stand beside her and watch the ducks that silently paddled across the pond in the distance. Silver chevrons bobbed out behind them.
Softly, he reminded, “I asked if you were all right.”
She took a deep shaky breath. “I feel broken.”
“You will feel that way for a time, until we’ve found all the pieces.”
“Pieces? What pieces?”
“The pieces of your shattered reflection-soul. We’ve just begun, Sora. For a time, you’ll feel like you’re looking at yourself in a pool of water.”
“Do you truly believe the image will ever be whole again?”
“As we find more and more of the pieces, the picture will begin to coalesce. I think, someday, you will be whole.”
Her eyes went hollow, her gaze looking inward at something terrifying. Tears beaded her lashes.
“What is it?” he asked. “Do you need me?”
She closed her eyes, and he sensed that she longed to tell him how very much she needed him, but she would not. Could not. She was the high chieftess of the Black Falcon Nation. He was an enemy priest.
She said, “Will you stay with me? Help me to find the pieces?”
“Sora, please look at me.”
She opened her eyes and swallowed hard before she turned to face him. The reflected light of the pond shimmered over her beautiful face.
“I’ll stay,” he said softly, “but I want you to know that I’m afraid.”
“Of me?” Her voice shook. “I don’t blame you, I—”
“No, Sora. I’m not afraid of you. I’ve never feared you.”
Their gazes held, and she looked at him with more longing than any woman ever had.
He lifted a hand to comfortingly brush the hair away from her face. “The time is coming, very soon, when the Midnight Fox will seek me out. I pray that my heart is not too small to understand what he tells me.”
A single tear ran down her right cheek. She did not blink, just stared at him.
Finally, she said, “I pray you survive.”
“I will.”
She stepped forward and before he realized what was happening, she hugged him hard enough to drive the breath from his lungs. “Don’t be so certain,” she whispered. “There’s only one person who’s looked into the Fox’s eyes and lived.”
“I know, but Flint didn’t realize what he was dealing with. I do.” He wrapped his arms around her, and she seemed to melt against him.
The experience of looking into his wife’s eyes and seeing a malignant Spirit staring back had almost torn Flint apart. The next day, he’d divorced her and run home to Oak leaf Village.
Sora gently pushed away from Strongheart, gave him a heartrending look, and walked back to their camp, where Flint still sat finishing his soup. Flint said something to her and she responded, but their voices were too faint for Strongheart to make out the words.
He turned and watched the sparkflies glitter over the pond.
“WAR CHIEF?”
THE GUARD OUTSIDE HIS DOOR CALLED.
THE GUARD OUTSIDE HIS DOOR CALLED.
Feather Dancer sat up in his blankets and blinked the sleep from his eyes. “What is it, Clearwing?”
“Someone is coming.”
Feather Dancer threw back his blankets and reached for his brown shirt. As he slipped it over his head, he looked around. His house was small in comparison to the other elite buildings in Blackbird Town, fifteen paces square, but the roof soared four times the height of a man, giving it the appearance of being much larger. The coals in the fire hearth still gleamed, casting a reddish glow over the log walls.
It had to be two or three hands of time before dawn.
He strapped his war belt around his waist and adjusted the weapons tied to it: a deer-bone stiletto, war club, and red chert knife.
“War Chief, it’s the high matron. She’s walking fast, and she’s
alone
.”
alone
.”
Feather Dancer grabbed his sandals and quickly laced them
up. When he ducked beneath the door curtain, he saw her. She wore a black cape with the hood up, but moonlight shone from her round face and narrow nose. Even if it hadn’t, he would recognize her walk anywhere.
up. When he ducked beneath the door curtain, he saw her. She wore a black cape with the hood up, but moonlight shone from her round face and narrow nose. Even if it hadn’t, he would recognize her walk anywhere.
“Hurry,” he told Clearwing. “Get down there and escort her.”
Clearwing rushed down the stairs that adorned the front of the War Chief’s Mound and ran out into the plaza to meet the high matron.
Feather Dancer’s gaze scanned the town. Even in the dim light, he could see the seven pyramid-shaped mounds that framed the plaza. Massive log buildings with peaked roofs adorned the mound tops. His gaze drifted down to the lake, where hundreds of tiny thatched houses lined the shore. An assassin would most likely secret himself among the commoners where it would be harder to spot him.
The high matron came up the steps with Clearwing right behind her, and Feather Dancer bowed and said, “Matron, I thought we decided you wouldn’t go anywhere alone for a while. Where are your guards?”
Feather Dancer had posted two of his best men outside her bedchamber.
“I ordered them not to accompany me.” She gestured to his door. “May I?”
“Of course, Matron,” he said, and held the curtain aside for her to enter.
After she’d ducked into his house, Feather Dancer gestured to Clearwing, signaling him to keep standing guard outside the door. Clearwing resumed his former position. He was medium-sized man with a square face and serious eyes—a good man, and an excellent warrior.
For a few days, while Feather Dancer was being held captive in Eagle Flute Village, Clearwing had been elevated to the position
of war chief of the Black Falcon Nation—a position he had lost when Feather Dancer escaped the village massacre and returned to Blackbird Town. Lesser men would have felt resentful, or worse, at the demotion. But Clearwing seemed unaffected.
of war chief of the Black Falcon Nation—a position he had lost when Feather Dancer escaped the village massacre and returned to Blackbird Town. Lesser men would have felt resentful, or worse, at the demotion. But Clearwing seemed unaffected.
Feather Dancer stepped through his door and let the curtain fall closed behind him.
The matron stood in front of the hearth with her hands extended to the faint warmth of the glowing coals.
Feather Dancer walked over, knelt by the woodpile, and pulled out a branch. As he scraped the coals into a pile in the middle of the hearth, he said, “What happened?”
Matron Wink shoved her hood back, and he could see she still wore her yellow sleepshirt. A frizzy graying black braid fell over her right shoulder. She must have risen straight from her blankets.
“I’ve been thinking about our conversation with Red Raven,” she said. The lines around her ample mouth cut deeper.
“What about it?” He placed branches on top of the coals and blew on them until flames crackled to life around the new tinder.
As though she couldn’t stand still, she paced in front of the fire. “Let’s assume that the man and woman he saw in Eagle Flute Village were Flint and Sora. Didn’t it strike you as unlikely that they would have willingly returned to the village after the attack?”
“It struck me as impossible,” he said, and tossed another branch onto the flames. A fluttering yellow gleam filled his house, casting their shadows over the walls like leaping giants.
Matron Wink stopped pacing to stare at him. “Why did you think it was impossible?”
“Flint was once a warrior, a good one. He would have never gone back, Matron. It was too dangerous.”
Wink countered, “Perhaps he went back searching for Sora.”
“Yes, that’s possible. But I doubt it.”
Her dark eyes searched his face. “Why didn’t you tell me these suspicions?”
He rose to his feet and rested his hand on the hilt of his belted stiletto. “I’m not sure they matter.”
“What do you mean? Of course they matter. What if—”
“They only matter, Matron, if they are true.”
She frowned for several moments before she said, “You’re right. Do you think Red Raven was lying?”
“My gut tells me he wasn’t. But my gut isn’t always the best judge of these things. I wish we had more information.”
“Well, we don’t.” She massaged her temples as though a headache pounded behind her eyes. “What does your gut tell you about Flint?”
Feather Dancer hesitated, not certain he wanted to say. At volatile times such as these, opinions could be as dangerous as weapons. He clenched his fists to keep his emotions bottled up. “Matron, he betrayed Chieftess Sora to the Loon People. After his cohorts ambushed us on the trail, and we were taken as hostages to Eagle Flute Village, I watched him closely. He is a coward and a liar. I don’t trust him.”
“Which means … what?”
He shifted, uneasy. “I’ve been asking myself if perhaps Flint wasn’t surprised to see Chieftess Sora at Eagle Flute Village. The way Red Raven told the story it sounded as though he might have been.”
“Are you suggesting that—that he didn’t go there looking for her? That he went there for another reason?”
“It’s one of many possibilities I’ve been considering.”
“What other reason could he have had?”
Feather Dancer lifted a shoulder and stared at the flames dancing around the logs. The wet wood smoked badly. As though alive, blue-gray clouds rose from the fire hearth and
crawled across the roof, waiting to be sucked out through the smokehole.
crawled across the roof, waiting to be sucked out through the smokehole.
Softly, she replied, “Blessed gods, if he went there deliberately, it must have been to meet someone, and that means …” Her eyes narrowed.
Feather Dancer finished the sentence: “The meeting had been arranged either before the attack, or in the confusion just after.”
She sank down onto the log bench in front of the fire. “Blessed Ancestors, I’m beginning to fear that she’s smarter than I am. She’s outmaneuvered me at every turn.”
Feather Dancer gave her a few moments before he said, “Matron, this is a very dangerous time. Please promise me that you will not leave your house again without a guard.”
She lowered her face into her hands and nodded.
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