Qaletaqa (24 page)

I stared into my attacker’s dark eyes. They
had looked so cold before, now they looked almost friendly,
and…proud. I knew exactly how long to hold my elbow against his
throat to make sure that he would never get up again. My dad’s
training had been very complete. I thought of Melody, and Claire,
and even Harvey. I would kill the man to protect them.

But did this man actually mean them any harm?
Did he mean anyone harm? He was incredibly strong. He could have
thrown me off of him if he really tried. Why didn’t he?

The man’s face started to pale.

Kaya’s three choices flashed into my mind.
She had warned me about meeting a man that would equal me in
strength. This man certainly qualified. She also warned me this man
could break me, or I him. Depending on how I handled him, the man
from her vision could help clear the way to what I desired most, or
leave me mired in hatred and self-loathing.

I looked deep into the man’s eyes and knew
that I was facing another one of the tests Kaya saw. So I made my
choice.

Terrified that I was risking my life, and
possibly everyone else’s, I gently lifted my arm away from the
man’s throat.

I stood up and backed away slowly. I knew
there was still a chance he would attack. All the man did, though,
was stand up and brush the clinging bits of gravel off his clothes.
He folded his arms across his chest and said something that chilled
my blood.

“That was good, boy, but not good enough to
kill the Matwau.”

My back stiffened as I prepared for the next
attack. It never came. The man just stood there, appraising me.
Seconds inched by.

“What do you want with me?” I asked. My voice
came out half strangled, but clear enough to be understood.

“I want to teach you. My name is Ahiga.”

“What?” First he attacked me, now he wanted
to teach me? I felt like my brain had been left back in the room.
Nothing was making any sense.

Wait. Ahiga? I knew that name. From where?
“Teach me what?”

“How to kill the Matwau,” the man said
simply.

“You know how to kill the Matwau? How do you
know how to do that?” I asked.

“I have fought him before, twice, and won
both times.” His confidence was not prideful, just sure that he
could help me.

Ahiga. Now I remembered where I had heard
that name. Kaya told me a story about a man named Ahiga, who fought
the Matwau once to reach his Twin Soul, and again when the creature
tried to murder his child. The only problem was Ahiga faced the
Matwau hundreds of years ago. My mind told me there was no way that
this could be the same man, but I had seen too much to listen to my
mind when it came to things like this.

“But if you won, why is the Matwau still
alive?” I wished this man had been able to kill my enemy. How much
simpler things would have been then.

“I defeated the Matwau by driving him off,
but only you can kill him. My commitment was not strong enough. You
have the one thing I lacked when I faced the Matwau.” His face gave
nothing away.

“And what exactly would that be?” I
asked.

“The killing touch.”

“What?” Now my analytical mind was starting
to make sense. This guy had to be some wandering nutcase. “If I had
some kind of killing touch, the Matwau would already be dead. I’ve
already faced him twice and barely escaped with my life.”

“You deny the pain your touch caused the
Matwau?” he asked.

“The pain
I
caused? I didn’t cause the
Matwau any pain. It’s the other way around, buddy. He sends fire
racing across my skin when he touches me.”

How did he know about the pain?

“The Matwau did not cause the pain. You did.
It is only because you do not yet know how to focus your energy to
keep it from yourself as well that you felt it,” Ahiga said. “I can
teach you how to direct that touch.”

This conversation would have sounded
absolutely ridiculous to anyone else, but Ahiga’s words suddenly
had me grinning widely. I knew the gods strove for balance in all
things. I had doubted them only moments ago. It had bothered me
more than once that the Matwau had so many powers given to him that
aided him in trying to defeat me. What had I gotten in the bargain?
Speaking with the animals, yes, but that hardly seemed to compare
to what the Matwau could do, especially since I knew I had to face
him alone. Bhawana’s vision had to be right in that regard.

If that pain-inducing touch belonged to me
instead of him, and I could learn to shield myself from its fire,
that would be very useful indeed.

“How is that you’re here?” I asked. “I know
who you are, Ahiga. You did fight the Matwau twice, but that was
centuries ago. How can you be here now to teach me your
secrets?”

Ahiga smiled and took a step toward me. His
approach did not make me wary anymore. Gripping my shoulder with
one of his hands, Ahiga met my gaze. “This will not be the first
time a warrior from the past has been granted the chance to return
from the spirit world to help a young warrior find his way.”

“But how can you teach me about the killing
touch if you never had it yourself?” I asked.

Ahiga’s eyes suddenly turned as hard and cold
as they had before. The iciness made me flinch. “This knowledge is
known to the gods who sent me. The woman who was supposed to teach
you failed in her duties to guide you to them for answers.

“Quaile,” I said with a shake of my head.

“No, Lina Crowe.”

I looked up, surprised. “My mom?”

“She should have taught you better.”

“She taught me just fine,” I said
indignantly.

“Then why did it take you so long to enlist
my help? If she had taught you how to approach the gods you would
have been able to ask for assistance much earlier, yet she fell
short in this thinking that the stories of heroes would be enough.
She never truly believed a man could speak with a god so she did
not teach you. That was her mistake.”

“Approach the gods? When did I do that? When
I was yelling at them a few minutes ago?”

Ahiga laughed. “That is not the typical, or
proper and respectful way to ask the gods for help, but time is
drawing short, and asking is the key. The gods were willing to
accept your supplication even though it was an unworthy offering
because they are as desperate as you are at this point. They are
bound by their own rules. They had to wait for you to ask them for
their help.”

“But…” My thoughts seemed to congeal. “But I
thought it was my dad who was supposed to teach me how to kill the
Matwau. I thought he told me, but I couldn’t remember.”

Ahiga stared at me, forming his next words
carefully. “Your father’s lesson is not mine to teach. I have a
part of the key, and that is all I can give you. The rest you must
remember for yourself.”

My whole body went cold. This was only part
of the secret to defeating the Matwau. The rest was locked in my
head, and only I could retrieve it. Just when I thought I had
finally been granted some good luck. The reality tried to consume
me, but I forced it back and focused on Ahiga. This one lesson, at
least, I had to learn.

“Why did the gods send you to me? Why didn’t
they send my dad?”

“Your father already taught you everything
you needed to know. It is inside of you now. There was no reason
for the gods to let him return. I wanted very badly to rid the
world of the Matwau when I was alive, but I did not have the
strength. Now the responsibility of defeating the Matwau is yours
alone. And I will not let you fail. I will see the Matwau ripped
apart and scattered in the winds.”

The intensity in his words and the painful
grip he had on my shoulder had me more than convinced he could
fulfill his promise. It was only part of what I needed, but it was
a start.

“Tell me what to do.”

22: Warning

I was vaguely aware that Uriah had left the
room. The fact that I felt him go only meant I was not focused
enough to reach the trance state. I could feel my legs starting to
cramp up. I was trying to focus, but all I could think about was
the incredible feeling I had experienced earlier when I tried to
touch Uriah’s soul. I could still taste the strawberries and smell
the alfalfa fields.

Reluctantly, I let go of the memory and
focused on the pinpoint of nothingness as Kaya had taught me. A
tiny black speck in my mind, it took every ounce of mental strength
I had to hold onto it. Slowly, I worked to expand the little dot
until it pushed away everything else. Blackness filled my mind.

I held the emptiness of total focus for a few
more minutes, making sure it wouldn’t slip away. When I felt sure I
was stable enough to move forward, I started to think again. I
didn’t let my thoughts wander aimlessly, though. Deciding on what I
wanted to dream about took hardly any time at all. If I was going
to help Uriah, I needed to know what he was about to face.

Filling the empty void with my thoughts, I
carefully crafted the details of Uriah’s fight with the Matwau. I
knew the vision by heart. The desert sands where the first to fall
into place. After that came the surrounding trees, the ones Uriah
had run through to reach the desert. I knew there would be a hill
or mesa. A sandstone platform rose above the desert floor.

Melody-I cringed at how easily I could
picture her face-laid trussed up in ropes on the ground. The
power-filled Matwau stood over her. Holding the image in my mind, I
was afraid to add the last detail. I didn’t want Uriah to step into
such an awful situation. Wandering sheep came into view as I wished
we were home instead. The entire image started to waver.

Still aware of my body, though barely, I felt
my arms growing heavy, my breathing slowing even more. I was close
to falling asleep. Quickly, I erased the sheep from the scene and
pictured Uriah walking out of the trees to face his enemy. My last
thought before falling asleep was to make my dream Uriah turn and
smile at me.

***

The forest was empty. I knew Uriah would be
making his way through the trees soon, but I was not waiting for
him. Instead, I took in the details of where I was.

Most of the residents of San Juan grew up
there and died there, rarely leaving New Mexico. One of the few
benefits of my dad’s business income was that we got to travel more
than most. I grew up around piñon and hickory trees, but forests
were no mystery to me, either. Pine and aspens on the edge of
changing their colors were everywhere.

Our tortuously long drive through Colorado
had shown me plenty of the same trees, but I didn’t think this was
Colorado. The pine trees were smaller than the average Colorado
pine. They were also more spread out and thin looking. The aspens
filled in the gaps the pine trees left, but these were also not
very tall. The forest floor around Harvey and Melody’s cottage had
been covered with vines and ferns and thick grasses. Dead pine
needles and little bits of ground cover dotted the dusty floor
here.

Looking up at the mountain peaks behind me, I
felt a sense of familiarity with the place. The outline of the
peaks was something I had seen before. But where? The caps were
bare of snow, but I doubted they would have kept their white caps
past the first few weeks of spring. This was not a Colorado
forest.

The crunching of leaves startled me. I
whipped around to see Uriah stalking through the trees,
determination written on his face. He paid no attention to me. I
doubted he could even see me. I was simply an observer in this
place.

Having learned all I could from the immediate
environment, I followed Uriah deeper into the woods. His steps were
careful, but expectant. We both knew what lay ahead. Somewhere in
the distance were the misshapen and lumbering wolves. The Matwau’s
allies. They were waiting to ambush Uriah, but he had already been
warned of their presence.

Stopping in a small clearing, he waited for
them to surround him. I knew that they couldn’t see me anymore than
Uriah could. I walked up to the nearest beast and thought about
touching its matted fur. Snapping its head in my direction, it
seemed to be looking for what had almost disturbed him. It saw
nothing. I stepped back, afraid to risk intruding any more.

Had it felt me, or was it reacting to
something else?

Uriah walked within a few inches of me. His
focused gaze never wavered. The wolf had felt my presence, but
couldn’t see me standing right behind him. Could he hurt me? I
didn’t want to find out. Stepping away from the creature, I
carefully made my way around the group.

There were twelve of them. A few were
cowering in fear, looking ready to sprint away at the first sign of
actually having to fight Uriah, but the rest simply looked hungry.
I could hear nothing of what they were saying to each other as
Uriah said he could, but it was obvious they were about to
attack.

I watched as Uriah threw himself at the
weakest animal. Crashing into the tree, the wolf slid down to the
forest floor while Uriah raced away from the clearing. I wanted to
follow Uriah, but the crumpled heap at the base of the tree
captivated me. The other wolves raced off after Uriah. I stood
watching the broken creature. Unmoving, I wondered whether it was
dead. I wondered whether it could die. It was no ordinary wolf.

As if answering my unspoken question, it
began to rise. Its first steps were awkward, but each one after was
stronger and more sure. Before it had been a quivering ball of
matted fur, now it walked with a purpose, snarling with every step.
Knowing that Uriah was probably already fighting the others out in
the desert valley, I felt drawn to stay with the lone wolf.

The change in his manner struck me as
something to be wary of. Something in the wolf had changed. I was
sure that Uriah would pay the price of it if the creature got the
chance.