Shaman Winter (19 page)

“Did they get there?”

“We don't know, hijo. The stories are lost. The dream is shattered. They named the cycles of time, the ages of man on earth, and they counted five to the present time. Each cycle of time lives and dies, like the universe lives and dies. Who is to say how many times the universe has been born, taken billions of years to grow and die, like a tree grows and dies. It becomes a seed again, and it is born from that seed. Seed, birth, death. Our lives are like that.”

The old man's words made Sonny reflect. All those tribes of the past in all the disguises called spirituality or religion had one goal, to achieve the most sacred moment.

“And we know so little,” he sighed. “La vida es un sueño.”

“We fly from dream to dream,” don Eliseo said with deep satisfaction in his voice. “Those who don't understand the flight of the soul fear it. Or they say the power of the soul to fly and visit other worlds comes from the gods. Some say the gift is from outer space.” He laughed. “Que pendejos. The gift is inside. Aquí.” He pointed at his chest. “The flight of the soul is a gift. Imagine, flying between worlds, between dreams. Imagine being connected to the memory of our ancestors. What peace would fill our hearts. We are here to use our gift, to seek clarity. By filling our souls with light we can be one with the universe. The soul of the universe.”

“Pay attention,” Sonny said.

“Yes.”

“Pray.”

“Open your soul to the light, that is prayer.”

“There are signs on the path.” Sonny looked at the bowl.

Don Eliseo leaned forward and pointed at the first glyph. “Here. An explosion of the sun, the birth. Later the same sun will be held between the horns of a bull, like the Egyptian sun. Then water covers the earth. See here, lightning, the first fire. The sun again, giver of life. The moon, cycles of the woman. But the bowl belongs to this earth. See the tree? It is not the cross of the Cristo, but the Tree of Life of our ancestors. This is the Bowl of Dreams of the Americas.”

“Why the Americas?”

“Because our human dream needed to be born again,” don Eliseo replied, growing excited. “The time was ripe, and there was hope in the hearts of those who watched the progression of time. Here in the Americas, it was thought, the dream could be planted again.”

“Yes,” Sonny whispered. He was following the old man's dark, gnarled finger as it pointed to the glyphs along the bottom of the bowl. In the beginning of time, the story said.

“Male and female in one God,” don Eliseo continued. “See the signs? Male and female in one burst of light. The creation. The seed of time, the egg being penetrated. Thus the divine imagination penetrates the egg. Then it begins to tell the story in the Tolteca way. Why? Because this bowl was fashioned there in their land. See here.”

Sonny peered intently.

“See the tiger. That is the Tiger Sun of their legends. The ending of the first world. One Reed is the name of the year. The people are incomplete, they do not yet carry the dream within, and so they are eaten by the tiger gods. See here. Four Wind. The second coming into consciousness of our ancestors, and still they are ill formed. So the wind carries them away. They become monkeys.”

“A story of evolution,” Sonny interjected. “But you call it a ‘coming into consciousness.'”

“Yes, evolution is not only of our bodies and our civilizations, but of our spirits. We are the dream people. We must learn to carry the dream. At that time our ancestors were not yet ready to receive the dream of the Universal Spirit, so the wind of the universe came to cleanse the earth. Even the sun was destroyed. Imagine the fear of our ancestors when the sun itself was blown away, and darkness fell again.”

“The sun up there is destroyed?” Sonny pointed.

“No,” don Eliseo said. “The sun within! The light within us is destroyed. The essence is being cleansed to create a new spirit. It is an evolution of our consciousness. The date is Twelve Serpent. Even in the Bible written by the prophets across the sea the serpent appears. The earth energy comes winding like a snake to give us wisdom. When we take it inside, we are connected to the energy of the earth. But that is not enough. The spirit within must grow. Each one of us must open ourselves to the light of the Universal Spirit.”

Sonny nodded. He knew the old man read a lot, that the bookshelves of his home were filled with dusty volumes, but this wisdom came from the heart.

“But it was not yet time. So a new age appears. The Toltecas called it Four Rain. In this third age of time, the sun was consumed by fire. The people were like birds that flew here and there. They thought they were now connected to the spirit of the universe. Not true. To fly is not just to go from tree to tree gathering fruit, it means to allow the soul to fly into the clarity of light. We could fly, but we did not make the Great Tree of Life our home. And so all had to burn in the great cleansing fire of the creation.”

“Like the fire of a supernova,” Sonny murmured. The universe was reflected in each person's personal struggle for inner clarity, for growth of spirit. Man and woman on earth created their own ages of birth, destruction, rebirth.

“Yes. And so our ancestors are eaten by tigers.”

“Why tigers?”

“The Tolteca priests could have used any animal, but the tiger is the animal of the jungle. The jaguar hunts in the darkness. At night the people heard the roaring tigers that came to eat the flesh so the spirit could be set free.”

“Our own animal spirit,” Sonny said. He was listening and staring at the glyphs. The Mesoamerican myth of creation. It could have been any myth of creation handed to a community of people, one for the Navajos, the Pueblo world, the Comanches, Lakotas, Cheyennes, Utes, on and on, from Inuit in the frozen north to Machu Picchu to Tierra del Fuego at the southern tip. The myths were revealed by the gods, the covenants were made, and a dream was born.

“See here. This is the sun of Four Water, and the new people formed are drowned. Like the flood in the Bible. The entire world and all its humans are transformed. The spirit grows within, but it was not easy. To acquire the clarity of the light of the Universal Spirit is never easy. Some resisted. Some wished to return to chaos. They preferred no future time. They did not want to see the soul grow.”

Sonny let the old man's words sink in. Finally he spoke.

“So Raven wants to end time because he realizes that in time we are perfecting our souls. We are being filled with light until we are one with the universal consciousness?”

“Yes,” don Eliseo said eagerly. “You see, it's that desire to resist the light that is evil.”

“Those ancestral spirits who refused clarity, are they still around?”

“Yes.”

“They speak to Raven?”

“Yes.”

“I see.” Sonny nodded. The dream of the Americas was destroyed by those who caused violence and destruction. They disrupted the prayers and meditations of those who sought the peace and joy of the universal consciousness.

“The glyphs move in a spiral around the bowl,” don Eliseo said. “Bringing us to the present age. This sun is called Four Movement. El quinto sol, Tonatiuh. Our Grandfather Sun.”

Don Eliseo leaned back in his chair. He looked tired.

Sonny looked into the eyes of the old man. They held secrets, a knowledge Sonny would never in a lifetime even begin to fathom. Under the graying eyebrows and in a sea of crow's-feet, the eyes were sad.

“And this sun, too, will die,” Sonny said, sinking back into his chair, filled, like the old man, with a weight of an immutable law that they could not affect or change.

“Yes, the time of the fifth sun will end in violence.” Don Eliseo nodded.

“The dreams will die?”

“If Raven wins.”

“But if there have been five suns, five ages of time, doesn't it follow there will be a sixth sun?” Sonny asked. “And a seventh. Cycles come and go.”

Don Eliseo smiled. “Yes. One universe dies to give birth to another, one cycle of time ends on earth to give birth to the next. But now we have traveled the Path of the Sun for a long time. We know our responsibility.”

“And that is?”

“To create the new era of time,” don Eliseo replied. “Evolution is in our hands. The old stories told of the desire of our ancestors to end their time on earth.”

“You mean they
desired
the end of time? I don't get it,” Sonny said. The old man was leading him down a new path. The end of time as sketched out in don Eliseo's stories had been cataclysmic, and life on earth had ended. Why would humans desire the end of time?

“When our ancestors gathered to destroy a prior cycle of time, they were really gathering to destroy a level of consciousness they had achieved. In order to give birth to a new awareness, they had to destroy the old. Don't you see? Gathering at the temples or pyramids was a time of celebration! The people knew that an old way of thinking would die, but from the ashes of the old fire a new consciousness would be born. So an era ended, they were creating a new one.”

“That's a beautiful way to put it,” Sonny whispered. Chica appeared and leaped on his lap. He stroked the dog gently, and she sat silently, looking at don Eliseo as a friend.

“But many of those ceremonies are not held anymore. Those who fear the light of the Center fear the illumination.”

“Fear the dream of what we can become.”

“Yes,” don Eliseo said. “The dreams also have names. See here along the top of the bowl. These are the names of the dreams. Sueño de creación, sueño de la luz, sueño de los dioses, sueño de paz, sueño de los sueños. The dreams are difficult to read. You have to go into each one to understand it.”

“I have to learn to read the glyphs of the dreams if I'm to stop Raven.”

“Owl Woman,” don Eliseo replied.

“Yes.” Sonny needed to find Owl Woman, rescue her from Raven's claws, take the bowl to her so that the dream of the people could be known.

“Gracias,” Sonny said, and leaned forward to embrace the old man.

“Estamos aquí para servir,” the old man replied, and touched his forehead to Sonny's. This was the kiss of life he had taught Sonny. The kiss of friendship. When their foreheads met, he shared the clarity of his soul with Sonny.

Don Eliseo stood and looked out the window. Sonny understood why the old man prayed every morning for clarity. He, like other priests and medicine men, had been keeping the universe in balance. Their prayers offset the evil loose on the land. But they were old men, ready to die and pass into the mysterious winds of the universe. Those left, the young people, no longer apprenticed to learn the prayers.

“I feel old and tired,” don Eliseo said.

Sonny had never heard the old man confess to being tired. He was up by sunrise, working in his garden in the summer and always cleaning up around his house in winter. He visited the Indian pueblos and talked to the medicine men there. He took food to the poor. He was active and vigorous, but now the struggle was proving to be too much.

Sonny understood that it was time for someone younger to begin to take don Eliseo's place.

“I'll wash the dishes before I go.”

“No, no. I can get these done. I stand at the sink and it helps my legs get strong. Go on,” Sonny insisted.

“Bueno. I got to go take some sopa to Concha. She's got a bad cold and not getting around too good.”

“Give her an abrazo for me.”

“I will. Adiós. Adiós, Chica. Come and see me.”

Sonny watched the old man leave, walking across the dirt road to his home.

Lord, Sonny thought, so many things I don't know, don't understand.

The phone rang and startled him. He felt his hand tremble as he reached for it.

“Mr. Baca?” the voice of a man said.

“Yes.”

“Sonny Baca? They told us you're a detective. You find missing persons.”

“Who are you?” Sonny asked.

“Alberto García. I live in Taos. Ranchos de Taos. I need to talk to you.”

“Your daughter is missing.”

“Yes. Did the sheriff call you?”

“No,” Sonny groaned. My dream calls me.

“We talked to the sheriff. He told us it's just a case of a young girl staying with her friends. Or maybe she ran off with her boyfriend. She's not like that, Mr. Baca. We need help.”

“Tell me what happened,” Sonny said calmly.

“Last night our daughter went out with our church group. Every year we do
Las Posadas
here at Ranchos. You know, the story of Joseph and Mary going around the neighborhood asking for a place to sleep. She was playing the part of La Virgen. We also went, right here in our placita. There's never been any danger here. When
Las Posadas
were done, she stayed with her friends there at my compadre Horacio's. We came home and went to bed. A little later I heard her come in, go to bed. This morning she wasn't in her room. We called all her friends. Then I called the sheriff. It's not right, Mr. Baca, it's not right. Something bad has happened. The sheriff gave us your name. Can you help us?”

“What's your daughter's name?” Sonny asked.

“Catalina,” the man answered.

9

“Sonny, Taos is a three-hour drive. Yesterday you could have gotten killed. I can still hear the cold in your voice. Say you won't go.”

Sonny sensed Rita's concern even on the phone.

“I feel better, amor, de veras. I got up, ate the great breakfast you left me, talked to don Eliseo, feel strong, and the weather's settled—”

“It's not settled. There's a storm coming in, and Taos will get snow. And you need to do your therapy.”

“I walked to the bathroom,” he said lamely. “The legs feel strong, really.”

“Please stay home.”

“I can't,” he replied. He had told her last night's nightmare. He had to stop Raven. “There's a missing girl in Taos.”