Darkthunder's Way (23 page)

David weighed it in his hand. It felt heavy, as if it contained a rock. He curved his fingers around it and was pretty certain it held only one object. Quickly he loosened the drawstring, tipped the contents onto his hand—and gasped.

A tooth gleamed there—or at any rate it was shaped like one of the fossil shark teeth he had seen on display at the state capital, the kind they were always digging out of the sand pits in south Georgia—only this was larger than any he had seen. Three-cornered it was, with one point longer than the others and sharp along its sides. This point was milkily transparent with maybe a hint of red to it; whereas the other two were almost the color of rubies.

“Neat!” David cried. “What is it?”

Oisin shook his head. “It is a scale of the great
uktena
serpent that lives in Galunlati. My acquaintance there gave it to me upon parting. I do not know if it will serve you, or how; but he who gave it to me told me that it had much Power in that other World. Perhaps it does. Certainly it has none in the lands of the Sidhe, that I have found. As for Man’s World, who can say? But bear it with you. At the very least, perhaps it will be a comfort.”

David replaced the scale and knotted the long drawstrings around his neck.

“The moment comes,” Oisin began. “Closer, closer, NOW! The asi awaits you!”

He wrenched the door open and stood aside as the boys stepped into the sweat lodge, then joined them and shut the door behind.

David gasped, already uncomfortably aware of stifling heat, though he supposed it was logical, considering why they were there. He looked around apprehensively. Once a smokehouse for tobacco when an ancestor had briefly toyed with that crop, and more lately used to cure the whole hogs that Uncle Dale had butchered every fall until Aunt Hattie died, the building had been abandoned in recent years. It was small, no more than three yards square and eight feet to the peak of its tin roof. No windows lit its gray board walls, and there was but a single door. The last time David had been inside, there had been shelves at two-foot intervals around the sides, and hams and shoulders and sides of bacon hanging by hooks from the rafters. That had been years ago, though; and things had obviously changed radically lately.

It was clean, for one thing: the red clay floor was spotless, and bare except for an ancient iron washpot toward the rear, and, in the exact center, a large pile of smooth stones. The shelves that had once filled the other three sides from floor to ceiling had now been removed except for the bottom range, which was just high enough to be used as a low bench around the perimeter. Their packs were there, along with their staffs and Fionchadd’s bow; evidently Uncle Dale had been in charge of storing them. In spite of the hour, it was already uncomfortably hot, and a skyward glance showed him the source of the faint light that pervaded the building.

“It is the sun on the metal roof that does it,” Oisin explained, apparently sensing his thoughts, “that, and another thing.” He pointed upward, and David saw a basketball-size opening in the tin beside the ridgepole. Something sparked and glittered there, and David at last made out that it was a crystal.

“As the sun arcs the sky, the crystal will follow it and focus its heat onto the stones. When they grow red, you are to quench them in the tub of water you see yonder. Steam will rise, and with it heat. As soon as the steam begins to thin, remove the stones and return them to where I have placed them; the crystal will then reheat them.”

“But what if we run out of steam before something happens?” David wondered.

“You will not.”

“What about if
we
run out of steam,” Alec muttered.

Oisin smiled sympathetically. “Unfortunately, you have eaten your last until the quest begins.”

Alec’s face fell.

“Ah, but I said nothing of
drink.
”
Oisin reached to his waist and withdrew a gray leather wineskin. David could hear its contents sloshing gently.

Alec’s face brightened, but Oisin frowned. “No, boy, not yet, this too has a proper place in the ritual. First I must instruct you.” He paused for effect before addressing them again.

“Hear my words, then: From now on you may not speak except to offer these prayers which I have written for you.” He handed them sheets of vellum on which were words in a strange language. “Henceforth you follow the time and pattern of the ritual. As soon as the stones redden, you will place them in the cauldron. At this time David will read the first prayer. When the steam has settled, you will rise and flog each other with these.” He reached into the corner by the door and brought out four bunches of willow withies bound together with rawhide. David groaned, remembering all too well the similar switches his mother had laid across his bare legs when he was younger. “Ten blows each, and each flogs another. There must be pain but not blood. The intention is partly to make you sweat even more, partly to free your spirit by forcing you to concentrate on your body, not your mind.

“Then must come the second prayer, which Fionchadd should read, and then you must sit silent and wait until the stones are red again, which will not be long, and then once more raise a steam. Once it too has passed and the stones have been set to reheat, Alec must read the third prayer, and you may each have one sip of this cordial.” He handed Alec the skin, then paused and looked at Calvin. “It is the juice of a fruit that grows in Faerie, my young friend, not the wine you seem to dread.”

At a nod from the Indian, Oisin continued. “When the stones glow red a fourth time, raise another steam and lay these upon them, while you, Calvin, read the final prayer.” He passed Calvin a leather pouch. “It contains certain herbs; some to clear your vision, some to clear your way. Breathe deeply of their vapors, and when they have burned to ash, raise steam again, and repeat the ritual until a sign comes to you. Usually it will be an animal. You will know when that happens.”

He turned and faced the fire pit. A single cone of sunlight shone there, focused on the mound of rocks in the center, which were already glowing red. Oisin took a wooden scoop from beside them and in quick succession dunked them in the washpot. They were immediately engulfed by steam.

“Begin the first prayer now,” he cried, as he backed through the door, and David did. It was the same formula, he realized, as before:

Sge! Ha-nagwa asti unega aksauntanu usinuli

anetsa un-atsanuntselahi aktati adunniga.

Somewhere outside a low drumming started.

And so, inside, did the waiting.

Chapter XV: Tsistu

(the asi—no time)

Another hiss of hot stones into cold water, and the air in the asi grew even thicker.

David did not know how long he had been waiting, only that he was insanely tired of it. All he could be certain of now was that he was hot—hotter than he’d ever been. For the moment he simply slumped there, shoulders against the unplaned board wall and bare heels mired in red clay that was fast becoming mud as feet and steam worked their way on it. His body was sheened with sweat; he could feel it dripping out of his sodden hair and onto his forehead whence it slithered into his eyes, or sliding down his arms, or across his chest, or into the cleft of buttocks that were sore from sitting on splintery boards. All in all he was completely miserable.

The ritual must be working, though: because he was certainly becoming aware of a gradual altering of perception as reality shifted away from him. Every time he stood, he became dizzy; every breath was a battle with the hot, thick air. He was half dazed, and only a tiny part of him knew when it was time to ladle on more water, or drop more of the strange-smelling herbs on the hot stones, or read his particular prayer—except that he had long since stopped reading because he had it memorized.

Around him he could vaguely make out his companions. Alec on the bench beside him, leaning against the opposite corner post because they could not stand the notion of even accidental contact in a room that was already flooded with heat. Calvin to his left sitting stoically with his legs crossed and his hands folded in his lap, and Fionchadd simply sprawled as if at leisure opposite him. But even the Faery’s face was now ruddy with heat and his hair hung in long, limp tendrils.

Alec sighed and began a mumbled repeat of his part of the invocation. David could have made out the words had he tried, but he shut them out because he had heard them a hundred times already, them and the incessant drumming that had begun to sound gently outside the moment Oisin had closed the door. He was not aware when the prayer ended.

Time passed; the building grew hotter.

Fionchadd rose and immersed the rocks again. He read his part, then they all stood and flicked each other with the willow switches for what seemed the thousandth time. There was no force behind their blows, though; and they stung but little.

The worst thing was the silence. Misery loved company, yet company was denied in that place. They could only stare at each other, groan, roll their eyes, and make simple signs of impatience or exasperation. Speech itself was forbidden.

Hotter and hotter, and the steam grew thicker yet.

David felt himself slipping away. He was getting sleepy, and golly but it was nice. It was great to have somewhere to retreat to, a place to go beyond the ever-increasing creep of heat across his body that was rapidly edging toward pain. He closed his eyes, dreamed.

There was a bear in that dream: a great white bear, ambling down a mountainside that looked familiar yet was not, as if the rocks and hills were the same as some he knew, but the trees were older and stronger and had never known the touch of an ax.
I come,
the white bear was muttering.
I come, I come, I come.

Water hissed once more, and Calvin’s chant followed.

David returned to the dream. The bear was still there, and likewise its chant:
I come, I come, I come.
Only there was another chant with it, lighter and mocking:
Too slow, Yanu Tsunega; too slow, Yanu Tsunega; too slow-o-o-o-o.

A sudden draft of coolness coiled around his left ankle.

David jerked himself awake, thinking someone had opened the door. But no, from what he could see in the red-gray gloom it was still closed. His friends had evidently noticed it too, though, because they were every one sitting bolt upright. Fionchadd’s eyes flashed green fire and Calvin rose to his feet. Alec started to follow, but David restrained him.

A noise, then, like something clawing the rough boards at the door. Something was trying to get in.

Another twitch of breeze found them, and with it the noise, ever more furiously, and then abruptly the scrabbling sounds stopped, though the draft grew stronger yet.

David strained his vision harder, gazing toward the light by the door—and saw, even as he heard Calvin’s gasp, that they now shared the asi with a rabbit.

But it was no ordinary rabbit. It was larger than any David had even seen—easily eighteen inches at the shoulder. And its color…well, it was hard to tell in the uncertain light, but he thought it was brown. No, wait, it was white—no, gray. David rubbed its eyes. It was shifting colors, that’s what it was doing. And its size wouldn’t remain constant either.

When it hopped up to Calvin, it was the size of an average north Georgia cottontail; when it inspected Fionchadd, it seemed the size of a rat. But when it came up to where he sat beside Alec in the back, it was larger than it had been before—and perfectly black. Abruptly it rose up on its hind legs, set its forepaws on the board between him and Alec, and twisted its head sideways. Its eyes were red—and intelligent.

Yet David knew this was no animal of Faerie. He tried to will the Sight, tried with all his might—and failed.

“You will not see me that way,” the rabbit said. “Nor ever see me in any form but this, though sometimes I like to change one thing or another. But rabbit I was born and rabbit I will ever be. I am
Tsistu.
I am to be your guide.”

David stared at it keenly, more than a little unnerved. He had met talking animals before, but they had always been the Sidhe shapeshifted. This was not, yet it had spoken—or had it? Were those words he had heard, or thoughts?

The rabbit peered at him guilelessly, but David thought he saw a wicked flicker in its ruby eyes before they suddenly changed to brown.

David wondered if he dared reply, or if the ban on speech still held. They were supposed to await their guide, and this certainly seemed to be him. He exchanged glances with Calvin who shrugged helplessly.

“You may speak,” Tsistu said, and there was a hint of mockery in his voice. “Though I would prefer you spoke very little, your kind can be so wearisome with it. Chatter- chatter-chatter, all day long.”

“Would you rather we were so quiet we could hunt you?” Fionchadd asked unexpectedly.

“Would you rather
I
left you right now, and your quest undone?”

“No!”
David cried. “But is it true? Did you really come in answer to our summons?”

“Of course not,” Tsistu snorted. “I
always
come into the Lying World to be barked at by dogs, pecked by chickens, and stared at by idiot boys.” He paused, looking contemptuously at David.