People of the Fire(157)

"Perhaps. Maybe a better word is teacher."

Two Smokes blinked to clear his vision and looked at Fire Dancer, awed at the feeling of loss. The man stood, staring, an incredible sorrow in his anguished expression. Had so much of Fire Dancer died with White Calf?

"I wanted to come talk to her, to see if she knew a way for me. I ..." He shook his head. "The path to the One is so difficult, Two Smokes. Illusion is real to us. It's powerful—so hard to deny. Once I lay dying in the snow, and I freed myself. Then I lay dying of snakebite, and the barriers in the soul lowered to let me Dream the One. I had a guide each time. Don't you understand? / had a guide!"

Fire Dancer swallowed and lowered his eyes, a sag to his shoulders. "What if I can't Dream it? What it the illusion blinds me? I'm . . .so unsure."

"You counted on White Calf?"

"She knew so much."

"When her soul went free, something wonderful left the world." The knot in Two Smokes' throat tightened. "She was my friend. She, of all the people I've known, understood me best."

"Grief is an illusion," Fire Dancer repeated under his breath. "Only illusion."

"And if it fills you when you try to Dream?"

"Then it may kill us all." He turned away then, walking wearily back toward the trail that led down to the valley, and suddenly collapsed, sinking to his knees. He cupped his face in his hands. "I feel so lost."

"But you've Dreamed the One."

Fire Dancer hunched as if against a blow. "I've Dreamed. Yes, I've Dreamed the One. But, Two Smokes, why do you think I sat up on the ridge? I've tried, and tried and tried. I can't do it on my own. Don't you see?

"Imagine a mountain in front of you, and you can see a fire at the top. You stand in darkness, bathed only by the light of the fire, but you can't see the trails. The mountain is illusion, and you don't know the paths through it. So you start up, and find your way blocked by rock. You go back, and start again, and that way is blocked by deadfall, but you get higher, closer to the light. Each time you go back and retrace, finding your way around dead ends, and each time you get farther—but I've never found the path to the top, and each of the dead ends is always there, ready to block you again if you forget the way around it.

"Worst of all, it's cold at the bottom of the mountain. I want to feel the fire, experience the warmth. That drives me, makes me more desperate. The more I want it, the farther light is away, the more impossible to reach the summit. People think to Dance the One you just spread your wings and fly—but you have to walk, take each step up the path of illusion.

"And I haven't found the way yet by myself. At the camp, Elk Charm, or my daughters, or Hungry Bull . . . something blocked me. Even my own doubts."

"But you Dreamed the One!"

"Yes!" he cried. "Wolf Dreamer came to me. I almost had to die to reach that threshold! Can't you see? I'm my own worst enemy! It's not Heavy Beaver or Blood Bear . . . it's me that I have to defeat!"

"Maybe Wolf Dreamer will come to you when you need. Power can't just throw its tools away like a silly old woman does a flake after she's cut—"

"But it can." With fevered eyes he glanced at Two Smokes. "I don't know, call it a feeling, but it's not just Wolf Dreamer, or Power, or what they'd wish. It's me. Vm important. I have to dream the Spiral back. And I can feel it, like that sensation you get when a grizzly bear is watching. I have to make it to the One on my own. It's within me. My free will—if you want to think of it that way."

"There's also the Wolf Bundle."

"How do I use it? I can feel it, but it's like the One. It hovers out there, locked in Spirit Power, and it's dying. Ever since that day Heavy Beaver threw it into the dark, it's been dying. What if so much of the Power has drifted away that it's like an old man, incapable of casting a dart?"

Two Smokes ripped his attention from the gruesome corpse. "And if the Wolf Bundle can't help?"

Fire Dancer's shoulders rose and fell. "Then I don't know what I'll do." He stared up at the garish sunset. "These past days, I've been haunted—seeing the love in Elk Charm's eyes. I long to hold my daughters, to see them play. I want to hear Hungry Bull laugh at Black Crow's jokes, enjoy Three Toes whistling like a bird.

"Now, when I close my eyes, I'll see White Calf's corpse, feel the grief twisting inside like a rabbit on a stick. Do you know what that means? What if I can't control my will? What if I can't find the path by the time I need it? What then? I only know I can do it. I can touch the One. Once I'm there, I can Dance the world without getting lost. But can I climb the mountain when I need to? I need more time!”