People of the Morning Star (61 page)

With a gesture, she indicated they should open the door for her. She could read their disdain as they did so.

“Time will tell,” she told them in a voice dripping venom. She would remember, and when she ascended to rule Cahokia these two would regret their actions, thoughts, and expressions.

Stepping inside she stopped short, staring around. The walls had been stripped. Where ornaments, carvings, and trophies had once hung, the plaster was painted in drying blood. She recognized the images as depicting transformation motifs and magical signs. Even the high, woven-cane walls in the rear that separated the personal quarters from the great room sported bloody drawings. She had always admired the artistry and skill that had gone into the wall’s creation. The old woman who’d supervised its intricate weaving was long dead. From the amount of blood spattered on the tightly packed cane, the wall would never be the same.

Ah, the sacrifices we have to make.

Her sister, Lace, lay bound and naked on a litter behind the dais. Nothing about the way they’d tied her to the chair looked comfortable. She had to be in excruciating pain.

So sorry, dear sister, but nothing worthwhile comes without sacrifice, blood, and death.

Behind Lace’s litter a terrified batch of slaves crouched on the floor as if trying to make themselves small. High Dance and Columella’s six children, cowering and naked, were crowded onto the benches to her left. Each had been artfully tied to the bench frame. Half way down the room, and guarded by a Tula, sat Columella and High Dance. Sun Wing almost chuckled at the desperate hope that lay behind her cousins’ eyes as they recognized her.

“Sorry, you self-inflated fools,” she murmured to herself. “But I never liked you even in the best of times.”

She recognized Walking Smoke, his body naked and painted where he knelt in prayer before what was obviously a sweat lodge. At the fire a ceramic pot filled with black drink cast fingers of steam into the air. To one side in the rear lay a dead man, his throat slit wide.

She walked forward onto the matting and stopped. “Hello, brother.”

For a moment he remained, eyes closed, lips moving in a sub-vocal prayer. Then he gazed up at her and smiled.

“It is good to see you again, little sister. You’ve grown into a young woman. Better yet that you’ve come to share in the miracle I’m about to perform.”

“Was the information I provided useful?”

“Very much so.” He spread his arms wide. “As you can see, Morning Star had no idea what I was about. They still have no clue as to who I am. Or do they?”

“No,” she told him craftily. “The Keeper is stumped. Aunt
Tonka’tzi
Wind is stunned and reeling. The Morning Star, who depends upon them, has no idea you’ve returned, let alone why you are here. He’s too taken with playing his role of the living god.”

“And Night Shadow Star?” Did she detect a wistfulness behind his voice?

“She’s soul-flying. Whatever the goal of your attack the other night, she’s so lost in the Spirit world you will have been in charge of Cahokia for a half moon before she realizes any differently.”

His vision seemed to fix on eternity. “I had hoped I could lure her here, be able to share, as you will, the glory of Piasa’s incarnation in my body.” He sighed. “I have always loved her. So much that my souls ache.”

“I thought you loved me?” she asked, irritated by the longing in his eyes. She stamped her foot. “I was the one you contacted. Not her. You came to me.”

Coming back to himself, he smiled slyly. “Yes, I did. And I have no regrets. You’ve become an outstanding woman, fulfilling all of my wildest expectations. I saw it in you as a little girl: the petty tantrums, the pouting, the way you looked at Lace with such longing when she got all the attention for being good.”

“Are you trying to make me angry?”

He gave her a dismissive glance. “Make you angry? I could care less. You see, now that you’re here, telling me what you’ve just told me, only one use remains for you.”

“I don’t understand.”

His lazy smile was followed by a rapid staccato of orders, the cadence of which led her to believe was in the Caddo language. And, for the first time in her life, she began to wish she’d studied it like her mother had suggested.

As two of the Tula walked up behind her, she asked, “What did you just tell them?”

His mild eyes fixed on hers. “I’ll need you to be naked for the ceremony.”

“Oh,
of course,
brother. I’ll surely do
that
for you while surrounded by these barbarian men. What? You think I want them ogling and dreaming about what they’ll never have? Discussing my charms and what they’d like to do with them? I’m a lady of the Morning Star House.” She jerked a thumb back where Lace moaned on her litter. “I gave her to you. Told you how to gain entry to her palace. In doing so I’ve fulfilled my obligation. After you resurrect Piasa, I will be the Matron. Ruler of Cahokia.”

“Of course you will.” He gestured submissively. “It’s easier if you cooperate. Less chance of tearing those beautiful fabrics or breaking the laces on your cloak.”

She stiffened, glaring at him. “You’re serious? Why?”

He pointed at Lace. “As in all things, you will have to follow your sister.”

“I
gave
her to you! Told you when her husband would be returning … how to gain entry—”

“You did indeed.” His simple smile widened. “And now you have given yourself to me as well. I really do thank you for that. Hopefully the Keeper and the
tonka’tzi
will also offer themselves.”

“You said that if I helped you, I’d receive the greatest honor in Cahokia!”

“And you will!” he exclaimed. “You, Lace, the Keeper, Matron Columella, good old High Dance, and all the children over there. Can you think of a higher honor than resurrecting the Water Panther’s souls into my body? Think, Sun Wing! What nobler offering is there in all of Cahokia than you?”

She gaped at him. “What are you talking about?”

“Once Lace has been through it, your part in all this will come perfectly clear. You have a choice: you can strip yourself, or my wolves will do it. You see, I have to tie you up now. Otherwise you might decide that you’re … well, unworthy of the honor and try to escape.”

Fifty-seven

“
Get up. You need to go.”
Piasa’s voice sounded so clear, as if he were whispering from right beside Night Shadow Star’s head.

“Walking Smoke’s going to kill me, isn’t he?”

“Most likely.”
A pause.
“Does that frighten you?”

“Yes.”

But then Sky Flier had only seen a span of twenty years written in the stars of her birth.

In the blackness of night, Night Shadow Star opened her eyes to her dark room. She eased her blanket aside and rose silently from her bed. She could feel Piasa’s close presence, caught his shadow at the corner of her eye as he flickered from one side of the room to the other.

She stepped over to the storage box where she’d laid her carefully folded black fabric dress the night before. Slipping it over her shoulders, she snugged it at the waist with a rope belt. With a toss of the head she shook her hair back; her practiced fingers quickly braided it.

Pulling tall war moccasins over her feet, Night Shadow Star tied the laces at the top. She loved those moccasins. Makes Three had given them to her as a gift, and they fit perfectly. Wearing them, she could run like the proverbial wind.

From the corner she took her bow and the quiver of arrows. Just the feel of the wood sent a shiver through her. Walking Smoke had given it to her summers ago, a slim stave of Osage-orange wood, springy and resilient. With it, she’d outshot him and Chunkey Boy at marks. They, of course, could drive a war arrow farther, but she’d been a better shot at measured distances.

Now, if Power willed it, she would use that selfsame bow to kill him.

Those had been better days. Before the resurrection. Before that terrible night.

Perhaps the world died that night, and I died right along with it.

Her war club came next. The arm-long ash-wood club was lighter than a man’s, and instead of a knob at the end, hers was fixed with two sharpened copper blades, the edges finely honed.

She took a deep breath as she slipped the war club’s handle under her belt. “It all comes down to me.”

“Yes,”
came the whisper from Piasa’s dark shadow.
“If you are good enough … clever enough.”

“I am afraid,” she whispered, and ran loving fingers over the bed she’d once shared with Makes Three. Perhaps the only time in her life when she’d been safe, cherished, and unselfishly loved.

The memories she’d hidden in the midnight of her souls had been freed. Never again could she seal them into the darkness to be forgotten. What had happened that night hadn’t been her fault, wasn’t a perverted creation of her twisted imagination.

“Existence is fear, Lady. Death is but the constant shadow of the living.”

She nodded, steeled herself, and eased to the door. The Red Wing slept uncomfortably, his back against the door frame. Fire Cat’s head was down, kinking his throat, causing his breath to rasp in his throat. In the faint light cast by the great-room fire, she could see that he’d placed the helmet to one side, but still wore the poorly fitting armor. The war club had slipped from his sleep-lax fingers; the handle now leaned against his leg.

“He guards you well. Good thing the long vigil has him exhausted.”

Carefully she stepped over him, easing her feet down.

Then she crept through her neat palace, thankful the Red Wing had ordered everything cleaned.

At the door, she hesitated, then moved the heavy planks to one side. As she stepped out, a voice asked, “Who’s there?”

“The lady Night Shadow Star,” she told the warrior who stood guard. “You need to ensure that my palace remains secure. Walking Smoke could try to sneak in at any moment. Just like he did at Lace’s.”

“Yes, Lady.” The warrior bowed and touched his forehead. “Let me call you an escort. Summon your porters and the litter to—”

“No.” She tapped the war club at her side. “I need to do this alone.”

“But I—”

“Alone!”

“Yes, Lady.”

She smiled grimly as she hurried forward, patted Piasa’s guardian post with quick fingers, and almost skipped down the dark stairs.

Passing the last of the warriors guarding the approaches to her palace, she turned onto the Avenue of the Sun, faced west, and forced herself into a warrior’s distance-eating trot.

As she passed the Great Observatory with its monitoring priests, she touched her forehead in respect, whispering, “I understand now, Sky Flier. Your prophecy was correct. Twenty years was all the time I was allotted.”

The inevitability filled her with a curious serenity.

A low mist clung to the ground; it turned silver on those occasions when the three-quarter moon broke through the patchy clouds. At other times, she ran in almost total darkness.

Breathing easily, she felt her legs warming, catching their stride in time to the rhythmic working of her lungs. She’d always loved running, but tonight, she felt a different exaltation as she kept catching glimpses of Piasa where the Water Panther’s Spirit image loped along behind her. She could feel his presence and hear the occasional patter of his taloned feet on the packed surface of the roadway.

I go to kill my brother.

A sense of destiny filled her, pulsing in time to her quickened heartbeat, rushing with the blood that pumped through her running legs.

“You’ve been chosen as the champion of Power.”
Piasa’s voice seemed to entwine with the damp night air.

“I find no honor in that.”

“
Honor? Hardly.”
Piasa’s voice hardened. “
For those touched by Power, let alone those who would pervert it, there is only suffering and misery. Nothing comes free, Lady. Not even your birthright.”

“Where will I die?”

“If you are successful—and very, very lucky—his fingers will be locked around your throat as you drown in darkness and terror.”
He paused.
“You do understand, don’t you?”

“I understand,” she answered, seeing it in the eye of her souls. His fingers might already be around her neck given the tightness under her tongue.

*   *   *

Lace blinked, startled into awareness as the unwelcome sensation of hands on her body finally registered in her numb and pain-wracked brain. For long moments she couldn’t place herself. She squinted her eyes, trying to make sense of the young men who now flipped lengths of rope from her arms, legs, and torso.

Who are they? What are they doing?

Groggy and filled with agony, a fluffiness like cottonwood-down filled her thoughts.

She struggled to understand.

“Mother?” she whispered hoarsely. “Who’s there?”

Then one of the men lifted her right arm into view. How odd that she couldn’t feel it, that it flopped down senseless and dead when he let loose of it.