Footsteps in the Sky (17 page)

“Granddaughter, I would not miss this.”

Chapter Nineteen

Alvar felt the jet settle to earth with mixed feelings. Mixed like a drink in a blender, like sewage in a composter. Confused.

The dead man kept turning to look at him, and that was no help. He wanted to comfort Teng, but she was unconscious, though her breathing seemed regular.

When the jet stopped moving, Alvar was wondering for the tenth time whether it would be better to be a native traitor or an offworld invader. He was pretty sure it would be a toss-up.

And Teng was going to hate him when she woke up. He had let these two capture him without the slightest struggle. Alvar had never much thought about his manhood as such—the “macho” revival of '21 had passed him right by—but after three years with Teng and now this, he was certainly beginning to feel inferior. Would Teng think he had been distracted? These were the first women besides her that he had seen in three objective years, and they were both attractive enough. They could be sisters; their mouths and eyes in particular mirrored one another. One had a stocky, generous body, the other lean as a whipcord, with just enough bump here and there to make her clearly female. …

Alvar shook his head. Maybe Teng would be right. Maybe he was distracted, and if so, he was stupid, stupid, stupid.

As if to punctuate his guilt, the door panel suddenly slid open, and harsh light flooded his little prison, followed by a dry cloud of yellow dust. He was facing the whipcord, and behind her were a number of armed men. He didn't bother to count them. They were all dressed in linen loincloths. The woman motioned him out. Blinking, he stepped into the tableau.

A windswept mesa top fanned out about him, and for a moment the profound beauty of the place took him up and away from his predicament. His chief impression was one of vast, echoing space, a sky from boyhood dreams of sky. The mesa was a small, flat world, and he could see beyond its edge the mysterious and enticing profiles of other cliffs and buttes in the distance, islands rising from an empty green seabed. On his other hand was the city, dropping away from him or rising, depending upon which contours of the stone his gaze traced. Both geometric and jumbled, at the moment he could not imagine a place more balanced between the poles of architecture and nature.

Alvar had been confined and confined, and now he stood, stretching, tasting the kind of freedom the poor plains-ape in his genes craved. Wondering how long it could last.

He brought his attention back to his captors; something odd was happening among them, a confused murmuring. There was an old man—he looked very old—staring almost literally bug-eyed at one of the women who had captured him.

“Pela!” the old man gasped. “Pela!”

“No,” the other said, stepping up almost protectively in front between the two.

“No, In'na. Can't you see how young she is? This will be a long story, grandfather, one best explained in the clan kiva, I think. Suffice to say I trust this woman. It is she that both the lowlanders and these outworlders pursue. She is important.”

The old man was shaking his head. “We must check you both for witchcraft, Sand. Two-hearts are fearsome and devious. But I think I believe you. She looks so much like Pela. …”

“Where is my father?” the woman interrupted. “Where is Red Jimmie?”

“He is in custody, SandGreyGirl. I'm afraid that it may have been he who activated the Whipper.”

“I see.”

SandGreyGirl, Alvar thought. At least I have a name to call someone.

The woman just named turned towards him. “This one is called Alvar Kyashnyam. He claims to be from Parrot Island. We should see if my father knows him.”

Oh shit, Alvar thought. I can't be that unlucky. The old man had turned his eagle scrutiny upon Alvar now.

“My friend needs help,” he said, trying to sound confident and fearless.

The old man challenged him with his gaze for a moment longer before nodding briefly. Several of the men came forward with a pair of stretchers. When they saw the dead body of El Diablo, several began to weep. Their silent glances at him sharpened into malicious scrutiny.

They took Teng and the dead man away, but did not let Alvar follow.

“No,” the old man told him. “You come with us to the kiva.”

The kiva was close and dark. Alvar was closed in by firelit faces, by the sharp scent of sage and juniper. In the shadows of the great room, mysterious bundles bunched in small recesses, the colorful feathers and carved sticks of an alter (he did not know which kind) faintly visible. The floor was stone, as were the walls, and the ceiling was some sort of reinforced concrete. The freedom of the sky was gone, and once more Alvar was a prisoner in the depths.

Captured by primitives, he thought. Were they boiling water somewhere? Were they sizing him up for dinner? He knew better, of course, and these thoughts betrayed him to a returning, sardonic, sense of humor. Still, when the eerie chanting began, a chill stab of fear caught him through the back.

A column of light stabbed down into the darkness, from the hole in the center of the roof. It illuminated the ladder which Alvar had so recently descended at the non-to-gentle urging of his captors.

The old man and two old women came down the ladder, followed by the two women who had captured Alvar.

The light was shut off, and now only the flickering fire remained. Alvar wondered, off-handedly, how valuable the wood they were burning must be. Trees must be as scarce here as they had been near Santa Fe.

The rustling and whispering, the light, the dense smoke, and his own fatigue conspired against Alvar. When the old man began droning in slow, ponderous tones, he tried to pay attention. But it was some story, a part of the old migration myth, full of repetition and dense detail. Alvar caught his eyelids closing; he snapped them open and found that he had missed a significant part of the legend.

They began to droop again.

When he awoke, it was to a generally louder muttering, and the voice had changed. It was the woman, SandGreyGirl.

“. … from the stars,” she was saying. “My mother believed them to be Kachina.”

“So they may be,” whispered the old man. “Prophecies are fulfilled in strange ways. We have always known it, have we not, my children and grandchildren? That the Fifth World was created for us, just as was the Fourth? That it was made vague and incomplete, so that we must work to finish it?”

“But why should a Kachina take the form of Pela?” another, unidentified voice asked.

“I have explained that,” said the woman they seemed to call—and not call—Pela. The alien. Alvar searched her flame-revealed features, both eager and fearful to see some indication of her inhuman origin. All he could see there, however, was an attractive face, intriguing and sensuous rather than merely beautiful.

“This has been confirmed,” the old man whispered gravely. “She has been tested. This body was cloned from Pela's cells.”

“We could do that,” someone countered. “So could the lowlanders. This does not prove her claim.”

“The ojo shows that I am not lying,” SandGreyGirl spoke into the assenting whispers. “I saw her ship land.”

“Still, that means nothing.”

“There is someone who can confirm this,” SandGreyGirl said. “Ask him. Ask the Parrot-Island-Man.” She gestured towards Alvar.

“Well?” asked the old man, quietly. A green light flicked on somewhere, arrowed its narrow beam in Alvar's left eye.

“Keep your eye open. Tell us if you believe that there are three starships of alien origin in orbit around our world.”

Please don't ask me too much, Alvar prayed. Perhaps if he could please them, make them trust him just a little. …

“There are,” he said. “I've seen them.”

The old man's face relaxed. The green light persisted for a moment more and then mercifully retreated into the darkness.

“So. This would explain a lot,” the elder commented. “A lot. And you think the lowlanders want to use these ships against the Reed.”

SandGreyGirl nodded.

“That would be a worthy goal,” someone else pointed out. “Let the lowlanders find a way to fight the Reed. We all know it must eventually be done.”

“Oh,” said the elder. “But either master would be as bad for us. If the lowlanders had such power. …”

“Then we should control the ships.”

“These are Kachina, Movena! We do not control them.”

“Please!” Alvar's heart quickened as he realized the shout came from the alien herself. Everyone else fell silent.

“This whole notion of controlling me is misguided. I have no more power than any of you. The ships in orbit—my sisters—do. But they are in poor repair. Their minds are not what they used to be. I came here to see if I thought your race was worth saving, and if you were, I hoped to help you prevent my sisters from sterilizing this world. Even I don't know how to go about that. I've either forgotten or I never knew. Now, while you people argue about which of your factions will possess me or cajole me or whatever it is you think you can do with me, your death is hanging above you heads. Your death and the death of everything you have worked for. Can you understand that?”

Alvar found that he was holding his breath; the only sound was the scrapping of bare skin and linen on stone as a few people shifted. What the hell had he and Teng come into?

Tuchvala's words hung in the air like thick, resinous smoke. Sand felt that they would choke her. Looks of indignation were fading, as the old people quickly realized that what Tuchvala had to say was more important than any breach of proper speaking order. Yuyahoeva cleared his throat softly.

“I. … we're sorry, grandau. …” he broke off, confused. “What should I call you?” he began again.

“Sand calls me Tuchvala. That will do.”

There was a murmur at that, at the sense of the name. It seemed to hold a foretelling, just as it held the past.

“Go on, then, Tuchvala.”

“I don't have much more to say,” Tuchvala continued, after a moment. “We are very old, my sisters and I. We came here when this world was as the universe made it. I tell you truthfully, I do not see how I can be one of your Kachina. Do Kachina become senile? For my sisters and I are that. Up there, we see a world spoiled, with no free alcohol, with too much nitrogen, too much oxygen. Down here, in the body I have now, I can see more clearly. Your danger comes not from me, or even from other human factions. It is my sisters who can destroy you all.”

“And you don't know how to stop them?”

“I can only plead with them, offer my experiences as proof that you are alive and worthy of etadotetak.”

“What is that?” Yuyahoeva asked of the spitting sound Tuchvala made. She explained briefly, as she had explained it to Sand.

Yuyahoeva bowed his head down.

“Perhaps we are not worthy,” he said. “We are as you see us, squabbling and factional.”

Tuchvala nodded affirmation. “I have seen you kill one another, and I admit that I find this conflict over me to be excessive. Still, my sisters and I have no business interfering with your lives. Our time—and the time of our Makers—is long gone. I believe them dead.”

An old woman piped up, and Sand winced. It was Hanomokuwa, Chavo's mother. Her face, even flushed with firelight, seemed drawn and pale. Her words were bitter and clipped.

“We believe that the Kachina made this world for us.” She looked around dazedly.

“My son is a Kachina.”

There was an embarrassed mumble of agreement from the crowd. Sand felt tears threatening to sting her eyes.

Tuchvala shrugged. “Maybe so. Maybe my Makers are just a dream I had in the long spaces between the stars. Anything seems possible to me now.”

Hanomokuwa had risen to her feet as Tuchvala spoke, and she seemed to drift through the kiva like a ghost; her linen dress barely rustled. Sand gripped Tuchvala's arm protectively as her aunt approached. The old woman stopped in front of Tuchvala, slowly squatted down on her heels. Tuchvala sat impassively as the old woman reached out a finger and stroked it along her face.

“Sweet little Pela,” she whispered, so that only Sand and Tuchvala could hear her clearly.

“Such a sweet thing. You knew my Chavo, didn't you? Sand, you knew him.”

“I knew your son,” Sand said.

“Tell me why he died, Pela. You've come back from Masaw, little one. Tell me why he died.”

Sand could feel Tuchvala trembling, and she gripped her arm more tightly, hoping to reassure her. The old woman's eyes wandered glassily over their faces for another moment, and then she slowly rose.

“He knows,” she muttered, and she moved towards the Parrot-Island-Man. Sand turned so that she could see his face. It was drawn into a bizarre grimace of fear and what might be remorse. Tears glistened in his eyes.

“We didn't mean too—I didn't. …” he mumbled.

Hanomokuwa knelt in front of the man, and he squirmed back, avoiding her gaze.

“Why did my Chavo die?” she asked him. The only other sound was that of wood popping in the fire.

The man didn't answer, though it seemed that he might like to, by the way his mouth worked silently. Hano drew back her hand, very slowly and deliberately, then brought it around in a stinging slap to the Parrot-Clan man's face. He rolled his head around with the blow, and then dropped it onto his chest, continuing to cry. Sand smothered a small spark of pity for him. He was of our Father's clan. He had helped kill Chavo.

And saved your life maybe, an unexpected thought reminded her. Because the woman, Teng, had not killed Chavo. She had killed the Whipper.

Hano calmly sat down next to Alvar, folding her stiff old legs beneath her. She sat facing him, less than a meter away, Her liquid eyes searching him mercilessly.

Yuyahoeva sighed into the silence.

“We still must decide what to do, Tuchvala. You understand that. As difficult as our struggles might be for you to understand, they are very real. The division between us and the lowlanders is difficult to lay aside. Yet, if what you say is true, perhaps we should make the effort. It would be ironic indeed if your sisters kill us while we squabble over them.”