"Incest," Badgertail hissed. "No wonder First Woman abandoned us."
Very gently, Nightshade reached out and brushed Orenda's hair away from her face. The girl's pupils had dilated to different sizes. Nightshade remembered very well when Tharon had struck her in the head as a child—^the time her soul had separated from her body for two days. She let her hand drop to the Tortoise Bundle. "Orenda needs rest. I'll take her to my room, where I can—"
"Badgertail?" Wanderer's old voice called. "Let us in. What's happened?"
Badgertail glanced at Nightshade, and she nodded. He moved to the door and pulled the hanging aside so Wanderer and the unknown woman could enter. The woman let out a small cry and charged headlong across the room to where another girl lay on her back in a tangle of torn green dress. The woman gathered the child into her arms and wept suffocatingly.
Wanderer ran after her and put fingers on the girl's temple, then very gently opened her lids and peered at her eyes. "She's alive, Vole. But evil has entered her body. Hurry. We may not have much time. I'll—"
"What are you going to do?"
Wanderer's faded eyes narrowed. "We have to release the evil in Lichen's head. I'll need a chert drill and several very sharp obsidian flakes. Someone will have to find an awl and some thread. Vole, 1 want you to—"
"Wanderer?" Nightshade rose. Memories of her voyage to the Underworld flashed. "Take great care. By now Lichen will have already passed through the Land of the Ancestors and be on her way to the Cave of First Woman. You don't want to shock her body so much that it will distract her. We don't know what kind of terrors she'll be facing."
Wanderer's face slackened. "How do you know she's on her way to the Cave?"
"I've spent the past hand of time leading her through the Well. She couldn't find the way by herself—though she swam the Dark River expertly."
"I'm glad she had you there. Nightshade," Wanderer said as he carefully took Lichen from Vole's arms. "But I have to release the evil soon. The Spirits that get locked in the brain after this type of injury can kill the victim if they're not given a way out quickly."
"I understand. Just—"
With sudden violence, Sister Datura swept through Nightshade's veins in a sickening wash. "Oh, no . . . stop it!" Nightshade staggered, vainly clutching for the wall. Too dazed to stop herself, she fell into the scattered pile of jewelry and clothing. The room spun around her.
"Nightshade!" Wanderer shouted. When he stood up with Lichen in his arms, the motion caused a pendant to fall from Lichen's dress and swing freely—a black wolf. Tiny. Made of stone.
As though Nightshade's gaze triggered it, a halo of gold pulsed around the Tortoise Bundle, growing larger and larger until it encompassed Nightshade in a blazing ocean of light. She gasped when the Stone Wolf responded by shooting a beam across the room to connect with the Bundle. In the middle of that wispy thread of gold, a ball of light, like an egg, grew. From it, a head lifted and peered around until its glowing eyes locked with Nightshade's eyes. She pushed back against the wall in fear as fiery wings unfurled in the slow, delicate motions of a moth emerging from a wet cocoon. A creature stood there on frail, spindly legs, while its talons clutched at the golden strand.
In a voice that sounded like the chiming of seashell bells, the Spirit creature said, "The seed of your soul has struck earth and brought forth fruit. Nightshade. Go home now. Go home. Take the Monster Twins and follow where the thlatsi-nas lead. They will show you the way."
Nightshade's eyes widened when the creature dissolved into a glittering spray that fell over the floor like sacred commeal being sprinkled by the sky gods.
Then she saw them.
They came Dancing from every shred of shadow in the room—swaying, dipping, twirling—until they coalesced into twenty-hands-tall figures with no arms or legs. The clackety-clack of their enormous beaks thumped in perfect time to
Nightshade's heartbeat. Tears trailed icy paths down Nightshade's cheeks as she gazed up into those pitifully deformed faces—Wolf, Bird, Badger.
She rose as though in a Dream and waded into their midst to Dance with them, as she had on that long-ago day when her world had been rent asunder.
Badgertail—his gaze riveted on Nightshade—sidestepped uneasily, feeling his way along the wall until he stood beside Wanderer. Nightshade's pounding feet shook the room as she threw her head back and lifted her deep voice in a strange Song. "What's she doing, Wanderer?"
The old man clutched Lichen more closely to his chest and said, "I don't know. Dancing. She's happy, and I've never seen her happy before."