Qaletaqa (26 page)

“What?” I asked. I hadn’t even thought of the
information I’d asked Melody to gather. Even when I asked her last
night I hadn’t actually expected her to come up with much. “Were
you able to find any clues about where he’s taking you?”

Melody’s anxious nods bobbed up and down. “I
overheard him talking to those creatures this afternoon,” she said.
“I don’t think he thought I could hear him, but he acted like it
didn’t really matter whether I could or not. He has no idea that I
can speak with you.”

That was certainly a relief. I had been
wondering about what exactly the Matwau did know. This strange
in-between place seemed to be a mystery even to Kaya and Samantha,
but the Matwau knew more than any other creature or human
alive.

“What did you hear?” I asked.

“One of his creatures showed up to give a
report on what the others were doing. The Matwau got really mad at
the wolf when it said that they were having trouble getting rid of
all the animals in the area.”

Nodding slowly, I considered the news. It
wasn’t that surprising. I had suspected the Matwau would either try
to find a place with few animals that I could call on, or would do
something to drive out the animals in whatever area he chose. I
wondered how far he could reach. I wondered if it was as far as I
could reach.

“Did the creature say what the problem
was?”

“Prairie dogs. They couldn’t get them to
leave. They live underground,” Melody said.

I grimaced at the mention of the little
creatures. I hated prairie dogs. They tore up our grazing pastures
with their snaking holes. The prairie dogs were an interesting
problem. I wasn’t sure of every place they chose to make their
homes, but I knew they lived all over the southwest. In a way that
reinforced my idea about where the Matwau was leading us, but it
also made me reconsider my refusal to believe we would meet in New
Mexico. I knew firsthand how difficult prairie dogs were to get rid
of. Could I have been wrong about that as well?

“Tell me what else they said,” I
demanded.

Melody ran through their conversation
quickly. It had been so brief. The mention of the prairie dogs was
barely a clue by itself. Knowing that there would be traps was
useful to know, though not as useful as knowing what the traps
were. The most helpful thing Melody had been able to tell me was
that the Matwau’s allies would be back watching us soon, if they
weren’t already. I would ask Talon about that as soon as I woke
up.

Finding the Matwau’s secret meeting place
seemed next to impossible, but I had a plan just in case Harvey's
friend actually managed to come up with something plausible. It was
also my plan for keeping both Claire and Harvey out of danger. If
Claire agreed to go, I wasn’t breaking my promise not to ask her to
leave. I had already guessed that the Matwau would know if I
suddenly made a beeline for his secret place.

No, I would follow like the mindless sheep he
expected me to be. But I would follow alone. If we found the right
place I would send Harvey and Claire to scope it out before me.
With any luck they would be able to find something useful, but even
if they didn’t, they would be out of the Matwau’s direct line of
sight.

“Uriah?” Melody’s voice cut through my
thoughts, bringing my eyes straight to hers. “Uriah, are we going
to make it through this?”

Her bottom lip trembled as she spoke. The
tips of her fingers were red from how tightly she was clasping her
hands. I realized that my own hands were tingling with
numbness.

“We’ll be okay, Melody. I’ll find you one way
or another and take you home,” I promised.

“But what if neither of us wants to go back?”
Melody asked in a trembling sob. I could actually feel her despair
seeping into me. I could feel all of her emotions pulsating off of
her and reaching out for me, begging me to make them better.

I jumped away from Melody and shook out my
arms and legs, heaving in deep breaths. Opening and closing my
fingers, stomping my feet, anything to keep me from pulling her
into my arms and admitting that part of me was hoping for just that
outcome. I had to turn away from her. Pressing my fingers into my
other hand, I squeezed the wound there. Pain raced up my arm and
reminded me of Claire. I had torn my body for her. She had done
even worse for me. Picturing the scars that would never fade from
my mind even if they one day left her skin, I was finally able to
turn and face Melody again.

“It won’t come to that,” I said. “It won’t.
Who’s to say that I’ll have to touch you in order to free you? If I
kill the Matwau, you’ll be free. I don’t have to touch you to kill
the Matwau. We can both walk away.”

I was babbling, but I couldn’t help it. I was
so scared of having to make that choice. I wanted to believe I
would never have to face it.

“What if he makes you touch me?” Melody
asked. “What if there’s no other way to save me but to grab me
right out of his hands? Will you still do it?”

“Of course I will.”

“Would you really?”

Bhawana’s dream haunted me.
The Twin Soul
bond would form and carry the young couple away to eternal
bliss.
What if she was right? What if the bond formed and I
lost all my love for Claire? Was I really willing to take that
risk? A part of me screamed that I would, that I would do anything
for Melody, but I didn’t recognize that voice. My heart and mind
held steady, telling me that Claire was what I really wanted.
Claire was my life. But Melody was part of my soul.

I tried to lie to myself and say Melody meant
nothing to me. I only wanted to save her because it wasn’t in me to
leave a helpless victim to die when I could rescue them. The lie
was easily seen. On a level I never before knew existed, Melody was
part of me. She was connected to me. If I let her die, something in
me would die as well. I would go back to Claire less than what I
was before. That missing piece would gnaw at me until it consumed
me. I could no more turn my back on Melody than stop breathing and
still expect to live.

Kneeling back down in front of Melody, I
said, “I will save you, no matter the cost.”

She stared deep into my eyes. I could almost
feel her searching my face, making sure of my answer. My eyes
wandered from hers and took in the contours of her face. I had
never really met this woman, but I felt like I knew her intimately.
I doubted she could tell me a secret I would not already know.

Everything about her felt so familiar, the
gentle arch of her eyebrows, the defined slant of her cheekbones,
even the way the very top of her ear seemed to curve inward a
little too much. The most familiar of all, though, were her lips. I
did not need to imagine what it felt like to kiss her pale pink
lips. I already knew. I had done it countless times already. Where
and when, I couldn’t name, but I knew the absolute pleasure of
their touch.

“I remember our first kiss,” Melody
whispered.

My eyes, which I didn’t remember closing,
fluttered open. I was mere inches away from Melody’s flushed face.
I didn’t remember moving so close to her, either, but I found it
impossible to move away. Her words floated around in my mind. I
suddenly found it very difficult to focus on them and understand.
Did she say that she remembered our first kiss?

“I don’t know how I remember,” Melody said
softly, “but I do. We were outside. I don’t know how old we were.
Age didn’t seem to exist where we were. I remember a bird singing
nearby. It wasn’t hot or cold, but there was a breeze.”

I wanted to close the distance between us,
but I held back and forced my lips to speak instead. I had to do
something with them. “What else do you remember?”

“I remember you holding me in your arms. Then
slowly your hand reached up behind my head, and very gently pulled
my face closer to yours.” Her voice was so quiet I could barely
hear what she was saying. I strained to hear every word. “You
didn’t say anything. You just leaned in and pressed your lips
against mine. I knew joy in that moment. I never wanted to forget
it.”

Melody paused and I almost sighed. I should
have been discouraging her from talking any more about it, but I
couldn’t. Wanting, maybe even needing, to know what else she
remembered, I forced myself to keep silent. I could see the meadow
where we stood, hear the songbird, and feel the breeze. I could
feel her lips against mine. It was as if her words were unlocking
my memories as well.

“But I did. I did forget, Uriah,” Melody
said, slightly louder than before. The loss of her mesmerizing
whisper gave me enough strength to pull back from her. “I forgot
for a long time, but being near you, even in this strange place, is
making me remember.”

“What else do you remember?” I asked.

Melody sighed. “Nothing as specific as the
kiss. Just flashes mostly, moments we spent together before coming
here.” Dropping her eyes, she seemed to ponder the weave of her
blue jeans very studiously. I waited, knowing that she had
something else to say.

“I…miss you,” she said. “Not the you that’s
here with me now, but the you I used to know. Does that make
sense?”

It did, in the strangest sort of way. I could
feel a longing to find the woman I used to love. The only thing
was, I didn’t think either of us were the same person we used to
be. There was an empty space in my life growing up, but Claire had
filled it. I wanted so badly to be the person Melody missed, but I
didn’t think he existed any longer.

“Whoever we were before, we aren’t them
anymore,” I said.

Melody nodded, but she didn’t look entirely
convinced. Neither was I, but I had to hold onto that distinction.
If the lines blurred anymore, I might truly become the man Melody
was missing. And that man would not remember Claire. I needed to
make sure Melody knew she wasn’t the woman who wanted that long
gone version on me. She wanted someone else now.

“Melody,” I said, “let me tell you about
another first kiss.”

24: Promises

The sound of the clattering door startled me
awake. I sat up wanting to scream my warning about the attacking
wolf from my dream to Uriah again, but the bland floral décor of
the hotel room quickly shut my mouth and reminded me it had only
been a dream. I blinked at the morning sunlight peeking through the
edges of the closed curtains.

“Oh, sorry, did I wake you up?” Uriah asked
as he stepped away from the bathroom door.

“Don’t worry about it,” I said. I was glad he
woke me, even though it meant missing the rest of the dream. The
ending was no more certain than any other part of the future. The
wolf, that was worth warning Uriah about, though.

“Uriah, I was dreaming about you facing the
Matwau,” I said. “And-”

“You dreamed about that?” he asked.

“Yeah, Kaya taught me how to induce dreams.
But anyway, I saw something that I wanted to tell you about.”

Uriah’s eyes narrowed and his fists clenched,
drawing my eyes to his hands. In my eagerness to tell him about the
wolf, I had barely even noticed his appearance. His knuckles were
dark red from dried blood in a few places. One of his cheeks was
definitely a little swollen and he was leaning on one leg as if the
other one couldn’t support its normal portion of weight.

“What happened to you?” I exclaimed. “I
thought you were going out to call your mom last night?”

“Oh, crap,” Uriah mumbled, “I completely
forgot to call her.”

“What happened?” My tone was meant to remind
him he shouldn’t try leaving anything out.

“I, uh, met someone. Things got a little
rough, but I’m okay. Don’t worry about it.” His eyes were
immediately looking at everything in the room but me.

Jumping up, I grabbed his chin and forced his
eyes to look at mine. “Uriah Crowe, what happened to you out
there?”

His cheeks reddened and his mouth opened, but
nothing came out. Whatever it was, he didn’t seem scared of it, but
he didn’t want to tell me about it, either. He almost looked
embarrassed.

“Do you really think there’s anything you
could tell me at this point that I would think was crazy?” I asked
him.

“This might be pushing it,” he said.

I waited. Uriah sighed.

“Okay fine, I met a guy named Ahiga in the
parking lot. He attacked me, but I beat him off. Then he offered to
teach me how to kill the Matwau. And I took him up on his
offer.”

“Ahiga? How would some guy in a parking lot
know about killing the Matwau?” I asked. This was pushing it.

“Ahiga fought the Matwau…twice.” Uriah
waited. “Three hundred years ago.”

“Oh.”

What else could I say? I was officially
pushed past the limit of being able to make a sensible reply. I
switched back to the one piece of information I could logically
hold onto. “This Ahiga guy taught you how to defeat the
Matwau?”

“Uh, yeah, the theory anyway. There’s no way
for me to actually practice without facing the Matwau, but I think
it will work.”

“Well, how? What do you do? Quaile’s book
hasn’t said anything about how to actually defeat the Matwau yet.
Maybe it’s in there somewhere, but mostly there has just been
things she was supposed to teach you in preparation for meeting
him,” I said.

“I don’t think the answer will be in Quaile’s
book,” Uriah said.

My nose crinkled in confusion. “How could you
know that?”

“It was something Ahiga said. He told me he’d
been sent because the gods knew how to defeat the Matwau, and mom,
of all people, had failed to show me how seek their advice. I don’t
think the shamans ever knew. The shamans had their part and my
parents had theirs. I guess they didn’t trust the shamans to be
able to do everything, either.”