People of the Weeping Eye(147)
He smiled slightly. “My people called me Kala Hi’ki because I once left to go to war. When I finally came back to them it was as a mysterious stranger. Not the handsome young man they had known, but the one you see before you. Nothing was left of the brave warrior they had known. Not his name, nor his laughter, nor even his souls. What came back was entirely different. Power had come to live within me, and I have belonged to it ever since. I am indeed the mysterious stranger to them.”
“Do I know this place?” She looked around. “Oh, yes. Been here before. Like leaves blowing through the forest.”
“Your souls were overwhelmed when you broke through my protection. Your companions carried you here on my orders.”
“Does your bladder hurt, too?”
“Use the pot there beside the bed.” He laughed. “I won’t watch.”
“You won’t hear, either.”
“Contrary, there are few secrets left for me. We are as we are made, and no more.”
She used the pot, staring hesitantly at him. “I have nothing for you.”
“You are a Contrary. You have everything.” A pause. “Hungry?”
“Couldn’t eat a bite.”
He stood, walked to the doorway with the same assurance as a man with sight, and returned moments later with a warm corn-and-bean stew laced with bits of meat. A horn spoon stuck up from the fragrant gruel. “There is more where that came from.”
She attacked the bowl ravenously.
“Can you hear them?” he asked.
“I can’t even hear you.”
“You are distracted for the moment. It’s worse when you think about it. When your senses are lowered.” He hesitated. “Two Petals, when you finish your stew, I will need you to drink this tea I have made. It will help you to focus, to enter my world for a time.”
“I don’t want to know what’s in it.”
“It is a weak mixture of herbs, but mostly chopped licorice root, blackhaw, and an infusion made from pipe plant root. I have added a little sassafras root for taste.”
She took the cup he indicated, sniffed it, and drank the concoction. “Aren’t you glad I’m not interested in what this is supposed to do to me?”
“I am hoping it will calm the voices.”
“Why would you care?”
“Because you are so Powerful.” He paused. “Tell me about the voices.”
“Some are real; others aren’t. Just like you’re not real, and then I wake up and here you are. Dreams become real; the real become Dreams. As if there was a difference.” She cocked her head; one of the voices in her head was whispering just below the threshold of her understanding. Was it trying to warn her of something?
He asked gently, “What is going to happen at Split Sky City, Two Petals? You can tell me backward if you like.”
She sighed. “You can’t know about that. It’s in the future, and you’re all backward.”
“But I do know. I saw you, remember? When you Danced with Sister Datura at Cahokia, you saw me.”
“I remember. You turned into a shimmering darkness, slipping away from me.”
“I didn’t know who or what you were.”
“Me. I’m just plain old me. Nothing here. Emptiness that’s full of everything.”
“Oh, I’m well aware of that. The Power ebbs and flows through you.” He tilted his head, as if straining to hear her. “Is the tea beginning to take effect?”
“How will I know?”
“Hopefully you should relax. You worry a lot, don’t you?”
She glanced down at the food bowl. “Sometimes, like at Lightning Oak Town, I’m so excited. I feel ready to burst from my bones. Then, like now, I see nothing but darkness, and death. Sometimes the invisible voices tell me terrible things. Other times they tell me wonderful revelations about secret things, like the bugs under leaves.”
He nodded, as if understanding something. “I think I understand. Great happiness that lasts for a while, followed by periods of misery.”
“Up and down. Up and down.” She laughed. “I want to be a log lying in the forest, covered with moss. Old logs move very slowly. They just grow flat and hollow. Instead I’m a canoe rising and falling on huge waves, like Old White tells about on the great oceans.” Her voice rose in desperation. “I want the world to slow down!”
“The tea will help.” A pause. “Did you always hear the voices?”
“No. When I was little, everything was all right. It used to be I could do normal things. Gather wood, cook food. Then the voices started to speak inside my head. I remember the first time: I was fleshing a deer hide for Father. You know, chopping the tissue and meat away with a bone flesher. Then, as clear as anything, the deer’s voice told me to keep chopping. I remember it saying, ‘Harder! Harder! You’ll never clean me like that.’ And the harder I chopped at the hide, the more frantic the voice became. ‘You’ll see sunlight through the hide,’ it told me. I hammered a hole through the skin, and it said, ’The hole isn’t big enough.” So I kept at it even though my arms were aching, and I was out of breath. I was frantic to see the sunlight shine through the hide.”