Trio of Sorcery (19 page)

David had drawn her a little map that showed a good place to stash the BRAT under cover of some brush, and another spot that was good for surveillance. She arrived just at dusk, marking her way in carefully so she didn't make a hash of getting back out again. David might be better at this, but only marginally.

The lights came on in Caroline's trailer. Jennie watched her—or at least her silhouette—moving around inside for a while before even that ceased. Was Caroline reading? Watching TV? There was no sign of the flickering bluish glow of a television. Maybe she was working on her jewelry? But no, Begay had said her jewelry shop was in the middle of the trailer, in what would have been a second bedroom, and not at the end that held the living room and kitchen. Of course, from here Jennie couldn't see the kitchen door, or the path out into the woods, but why would Caroline go trampling around in the woods in the middle of the—

Then Jennie heard it. Coming from the woods.

Drums.

The sound put the hair up on the back of her neck and put a knot in her throat. It should have been innocuous, but it wasn't. David was right.

All thoughts of meth labs and weed plantations went right out of her head as she inched toward the trailer, moving as furtively as any of her Osage ancestors. A quick glance through the windows proved that there was no one in the trailer now, not in the kitchen or the living room,
and the insistent pounding of the drums continued, very clearly coming from the woods behind the trailer.

Every drumbeat told her that something was wrong here, very wrong. Not the music itself…it was relatively simple, traditional drumming and singing. She didn't recognize the song, but there was plenty of Native American music she didn't recognize, even things in her own Osage tradition. No, it was what came
with
the music—the sense that something had been called, something that didn't belong.

It took an agonizingly long time to work her way through the woods; she didn't dare risk slipping and breaking something, and doubly did not dare risk being detected by whatever was out there.

But finally she saw light through the scraggly blackjack oaks—the light of a fire, a proper campfire from the conical shape of it. She inched forward, moving from bit of cover to bit of cover, until at last she could see the figures dancing there.

One was Caroline, in a “trade cloth” dress, splendid with ruffled hem, ruffled collar, rows of colored ribbons, and topped with a ruffled white apron of the sort that had been traditional since the 1800s. Outsiders might pardonably have mistaken it for an attempt to replicate a pioneering woman's dress. Caroline was dancing in the modest and stately style that went with that dress—nothing like the shawl-dancing that Jennie herself did. The half-terrified,
half-entranced look on the woman's face was enough to make Jennie's heart plummet.

There was no wonder at the cause for that look. Dancing with her was a strange man, at least six feet tall, dressed in ancient Osage costume. Deerskin leggings, deerskin breechcloth, a trailer of otter fur behind stretching from his neck to the ground, two strings of shell beads crossing in front and in back, deerskin shirt, buckskin moccasins, finger-woven sash, leather belt with quill embroidery, knee rattles of deer hooves, horn armbands, and a blanket. On his head he wore a deer tail head roach and an elk horn roach spreader; there was a feather in his roach and another attached to his scalp—oh, but they were
not
eagle feathers. They were
owl
feathers! In his hands were his coup stick and his fan—again, decorated not with eagle but with owl feathers….

And he had no paint.

He had no paint.

And that told Jennie that although he seemed as real and solid as Caroline…this was no living man. This was a
mi-ah-lushka.

A ghost. And not just any ghost, but the ghost of an Osage who had died without honor and was put to rest without paint. One of the Little People. Jennie had had dealings with them before….

He danced with Caroline and around her, keeping her as mesmerized as a cobra with a bird. And Jennie could
feel, could
see,
the life force draining from her to him. She wanted to jump up and scream, to run in there and
do something,
and she knew she didn't dare. She might be signing her own death warrant if she did.

She would certainly be signing Caroline's.

The
mi-ah-lushka
's expression was both greedy and possessive. How he had gotten this hold over his prey, Jennie had no idea, but he wasn't going to let go easily. The Little People never did.

And she couldn't go charging in there and claim Caroline was under her protection either, because that was not true. Any lie she told would be ammunition to be used against her. Bad idea.

But although this certainly answered one question—why Caroline had dumped Nathan Begay—it raised far more than it answered. What was a
mi-ah-lushka
doing here? There weren't any traditional Osage sites on Caroline's sixty acres, and certainly not any traditional Osage burial sites. And why Caroline? She was Chickasaw, not Osage. He should have no hold over her and no connection to her.

It was obvious what he was getting from her—life force—but why? The Little People generally had plenty of power of their own, so why would he need to siphon it from her?

So despite wanting to rush in there and do something fast and violent to free Caroline from bondage, instead Jennie backed away, slowly, taking care to mask herself
both with stealth and with Medicine. If she had any hope of dealing with this situation, it was imperative that the
mi-ah-lushka
not know she was there, not be aware that she was a Medicine Woman…and above all, not be aware that she was the kind of Medicine Woman he had never known in his corporeal life.

For Jennie Talldeer was Kestrel-Hunts-Alone, schooled in both Woman's Medicine and Warrior's Medicine, in both the Tzi-Sho and the Hunka Medicines. In short, in every sort of Medicine, of every clan and
gente
that the Osage boasted. And in Medicine outside the Osage Ways. She was a pipe-bearer in the Way of the Lakota. She was entitled to wear the Eagle Tail Feather as well as the Eagle Under-tail Feather, yes, and carry the Eagle fan too.

But the
mi-ah-lushka
were cunning. If she confronted him prematurely and was defeated, he would learn all this, and swiftly contrive counters for her.

So she fought her wishes and followed wisdom, inched her way off of Caroline Gray's land, and down to her car, and headed home.

Grandfather pursed his lips. Jennie and David waited patiently for him to decide to speak. He would say what he was going to say in his own good time and there was no point in trying to hurry him. Finally, instead of speaking, he got up and went to the filing cabinet Jennie'd gotten from a law
firm—one that had a handsome wooden case around it, so it didn't look out of place in the living room. It held nothing she considered important, just bits of this and that she and her family had picked up over the years and thought too interesting to throw away. She'd often joked there was fodder for a hundred books in that cabinet alone.

Grandfather went straight to the bottom drawer, where old tourist brochures were filed. “Little Old Man,” Jennie began, “what on earth—”

“It is something I remember, from the fifties,” he replied, his voice a little muffled as he peered into the drawer. “Route 66 days, when everyone along here was trying to make a tourist trap. Aha!” He pulled out a yellowing brochure and handed it to her.

The cover read,
THE FAMOUS INDIAN LOVER'S LEAP AT PARK HILL
, and showed a lovely, high rock bluff over the Spring River. The brochure described the “scenic view” and the facilities, which seemed to be confined to picnic tables and a souvenir stand, and listed motels and diners in the area. Only at the bottom of the brochure was there anything about the name of the place.

Jennie blinked. She turned the brochure over and checked the map. Sure enough, it wasn't that far from Caroline's property.

Wordlessly, Jennie passed the brochure to David. Grandfather shrugged as she met his eyes. “I always thought it was some damn fool thing they made up,” he admitted. “I'd never heard any story like that in the lore, and you can bet they thought the idea that you might see a bare-naked gal standing on the top of a cliff would bring people to stay the night.”

“Hey,” said David, passing the brochure back, “I'd stick around to see it.”

He and Grandfather exchanged knowing looks. Jennie made a face at both of them. “Did you ever go out there to find out?” she asked.

Grandfather shook his head. “No. You know how it is, the boys weren't interested in some sissy lover's leap, they wanted to see the snake farm. Never got around to it.” He paused. “It's certainly beginning to look like for once the
Heavy Eyebrows got the legend right and it was
us
that forgot it.”

“Or maybe someone was psychic and dreamed what happened.” She watched him carefully file the brochure away and return to his seat. “Well, now we know where the
mi-ah-lushka
came from, and why Caroline. When she set up her little practice space down in the woods and started playing the drum CDs to dance to, it must have sounded like an invitation with his name on it.”

“I think you ought to check this out further,” Grandfather cautioned. “This story might not be recorded in Osage history, but it might be in Chickasaw. Try them. I'd like to know why he became a
mi-ah-lushka;
the reason could be important to getting rid of him.”

Jennie nodded. “Sounds like tomorrow is a good day to visit the Five Civilized Tribes Museum.”

The trip turned into a family outing, to David's chagrin and Jennie's amusement. Grandfather was probably going to drag David around the museum and take every opportunity to point out Osage superiority to the Cherokee. The Little Old Man got a bigger kick out of that than a cold war Russki proclaiming how Russia had invented everything.

She, meanwhile, was going to the research room. Her history of restoring important artifacts to the appropriate hands gave her
carte blanche
in practically every Native
museum and tribal archive in North America. She probably could have asked to take rare books or manuscripts home and the people in charge would let her. And if she wanted to camp out for the night in the rare book room, they'd probably offer her a cot and a sleeping bag and hand her the keys. Not that she ever abused the privilege, but at times like these it was damned useful.

Hours later, she thought she had reviewed everything pertinent that was available in this museum. And she had an answer to why a chief's son would end up a
mi-ah lushka.

According to the fragments she had put together, after the girl had leapt to her death, the Chickasaw had pursued the Osage man. Rather than standing and fighting, he had fled, and been shot in the back and killed.

That was one strike against him. Cowardice.

Then, in revenge, the Chickasaw had stripped his body and thrown him in the same river where the girl had died. According to the records, his body had never been found.

That would be why there was nothing in the Osage lore. Being stripped and thrown in the river meant that the man had never been properly given burial rites or face paint, and that, combined with being shot in the back and cowardice, pretty much condemned him to
mi-ah-lushka
status after death.