People of the Sea(150)
He rose, feeling sick to his stomach. As he passed her, he put a hand on her shoulder, tenderly, and went to stuff more things into his pack.
Kestrel shifted to look at him. “If it turns out that this Catchstraw is the witch, can you stop him?”
Sunchaser picked up a tiny colored basket, the one he had placed the ants in. “Yes, if the time comes.” Anger seared his veins again. He closed his eyes, trying to kill its Power. “Dreamers know very well how to fight fire with fire. We just hate to have to do it. It takes a great deal of Power. Power better spent trying to mend an out-of-balance world.” Brutally, he jammed the basket into his pack.
Oxbalm hobbled through the trees behind Horseweed. His knees ached with a fiery intensity. The cold in these mountains ate at his bones like a starving coyote. He shoved a smoke-tree branch laden with dark blue blossoms out of his way and stepped over a fallen log.
“Here it is, Grandfather,” Horseweed whispered as he knelt by a slab of weathered granite.
Oxbalm did not even have to bend over. He stood breathing hard, logging the details of the perverted maze. Catchstraw had taken special pains to make his artistry perfect. He’d used crushed charcoal and red sandstone. Black lines curled and wove about, enmeshing red spirals until they strangled for lack of Spiritual direction. On the periphery of the maze, condor feathers lay scattered on the ground. It was as if one of the great birds had been captured here and killed. But no blood marred the stone. “He’s not even bothering to erase his mazes anymore.”
“No,” Horseweed replied. His nostrils flared with repugnance. He’d left his long black hair loose. It fluttered in the chill breeze. He stood and shoved his hands into the pockets of his buckskin coat. “He’s grown arrogant, Grandfather. And careless.”
Oxbalm nodded. “We must not wait any longer. Sunchaser is in grave danger. At least one of the elders of the clan must be made aware of this now, before it’s too late. Find Dizzy Seal. And your grandmother. Bring them here. I want them to see this obscene maze—and the condor feathers—with their own eyes. We will need their support to end this madness. But…” He lifted a warning hand. Horseweed held his gaze. “Let no one else know what you’re doing.”
Horseweed murmured, “Yes, Grandfather,” and hurried away through the forest.
Oxbalm peered down at the tangled lines. No human could make sense of them. And what of the condor feathers? How had they gotten here? A shudder went up his spine. Fragments of stories he’d heard long, long ago drifted through his thoughts … “It’s old Cactus Lizard! I’m telling you the truth. He turns himself into a short-faced bear at night. He’s the one causing this…. No, it’s not Cactus Lizard. Wounded Bull is the witch. Listen to me! I found a thick pile of lion fur in his lodge. He’s shed his human skin and grown the hide of a
lion! He roams the shore at dusk, hunting for humans to eat. That’s where all the children have disappeared to. It’s not the saber-toothed cats coming into the village at night! … Don’t you see?”
Oxbalm hobbled over to sit down on a nearby rock. Songbirds filled the trees, but none sang. They sat motionless, peering down at him with gleaming eyes.
Oxbalm squinted warily at the sky, then muttered to himself. “Is that what Catchstraw has done? Turned himself into a witch? It would be just like him. He couldn’t Dream, so he took the coward’s way out. Started using Power for his own ends, instead of letting Power use him to accomplish good things in the world.”
Oxbalm shook his head violently, as if the action would cast off the horrible possibilities. “The old fool. If he’s hurt Sunchaser, everyone for a ten-day walk will come running just to drive a dart through him.”
Yes, it could happen just that way. Old age could be such a curse. Eventually one had seen so much, so often, that everything seemed clear, the facts etched as precisely as quartz crystals. “But I’ll be the first to pierce your heart, Catchstraw. I promise you that.”
Thirty-five
Sunchaser and Kestrel walked side by side down the beach. Angry surf battered the shore, pounding waves that drove white, foaming sheets racing up the dark sand. Beyond the breakers, the sea chopped up and down, gray and brooding like the sky. Clouds had begun moving in at dawn, and by noon, they had swallowed the blue of Sky Boy’s belly. A
chill rode the wind, one cool enough to echo the cold within his soul.
Sunchaser pulled up the collar of his moose hide coat. Ahead of them, an eroded hill sloped down to the shore. Twisted firs grew thickly on the crest and dotted the rocky flanks. On the other side of the hill, the branches of a few scraggly aspens thrust up, their pale green leaves trembling in the wind.