Authors: J. A. Jance
“It sounds like Quentin, doesn’t it?” Davy asked.
Nodding grimly, Brian Fellows drew his weapon. He was wearing a bulletproof vest. Neither Candace nor Davy were. “You’d better drop back and let me go on by myself.”
“Like hell,” Davy said. “Come on.”
Frozen in terror, Lani crouched against the wall. The stalagmite that had once provided shelter was now a trap. If she moved away from behind it, he would see her and shoot her. She could hear him out there, crawling ever closer to her hiding place. She could hear him breathing in the dark. Now that he had located her, he came forward without bothering to squander any more of his precious matches, trusting that she would stay exactly where he had seen her last.
And the truth was, she didn’t have any choice. She was so cold and had sat in one position for so long that her legs ached with cramps. The pressure was so great that she was tempted to come flying out of her hiding place and make straight for what had to be the passage to the outside. But she didn’t do it.
Even as the thought crossed her mind, she realized that the darkness in
I’itoi’
s sacred cave was far stronger than Mitch’s matches. If he’d had plenty of them, he would have been using them by now instead of scrabbling along in the dark. And without light, the power of darkness and the power of bats was far greater than the evil
Ohb’
s.
Deep in the cave, Lani had met
Nanakumal
. By touching her, Bat had taken away Lani’s fear of the darkness and had infused her with his power. From now on Dolores Lanita Walker would still be Forever Spinning to some, but in her own heart she knew that she was changed. As soon as the bat’s wings grazed her skin she was also someone else. From that time on, Lani would call herself
Nanakumal Namkam
—Bat Meeter, knowing that Bat Strength and Ant Strength would both be part of her strength.
Suddenly Lani’s spirit was alive again, like one awaking from a deep sleep or else from death itself. Something Nana
Dahd
had told her was called
e chegitog
. The cold no longer mattered. She had come into her own just the way Nana
Dahd
had told her she would someday. No matter what Mitch Johnson did to her, he couldn’t take that away.
The song spilled into her mind without her even being aware she was thinking about it.
O little
Nanakumal
who lives forever in darkness,
O little
Nanakumal
who lives forever in
I’itoi’
s sacred cave
Give me your strength so I will not be frightened,
So I will stay in this safe place where the evil
Ohb
cannot come.
For years Betraying Woman has been here with you.
For years your strength has kept her safe
Waiting until I could come and set her free
By smashing her pottery prison against the rocky wall.
Keep me safe now too, little
Nanakumal
Keep me safe from this new evil
Ohb
.
Teach me
juhagi
—to be resilient—in the coming battle,
So that this
jiawul
—this devil—does not win.
O little
Nanakumal
who lives forever in darkness,
Whose passing wings changed me into a warrior,
Be with me now as I face this danger.
Protect me in the coming battle and keep me safe.
Brian was the one who found Quentin Walker, found him trapped faceup and helpless in a bed of manzanita. Knowing at once that his half-brother was too badly hurt to pose any danger, Brian holstered his weapon.
“What happened?” he asked.
“I didn’t do it,” Quentin sobbed. “Tell Dad I didn’t do it.”
“Didn’t do what?” Brian asked.
“I didn’t kill Tommy. He fell. He fell in the cave. I tried to help him. I swear. But he died anyway.”
Davy, who had stopped to help Candace up a ledge, arrived just in time to hear the last sentence.
“Lani’s dead?” he demanded.
When Quentin looked up at Davy, his eyes wavered as though they wouldn’t quite focus. “Lani’s not dead,” he said. “Tommy’s the one who’s dead. He’s been dead a long, long time.”
“But where’s Lani?”
“Lani? How should I know where Lani is?”
Davy reached down and grabbed the neck of Quentin’s shirt. He would have shook him, too, if Candace hadn’t stopped him. “Leave him alone, David,” she gasped, fighting to regain her breath. “Can’t you see he’s hurt?”
Letting go of the shirt, Davy turned and looked up the mountain. “She has to be in the cave,” he said. “I’ll go. You two stay here with Quentin.”
“Lani! It’s Davy. Where are you?”
Davy! For a moment, Lani thought she must be dreaming. It was impossible. Davy was in Chicago. He couldn’t be here.
“Lani!” he called again. “Can you hear me? Are you in here?”
She heard him then, heard the sound of movement in the passageway. It was true. Davy was here. He had come to find her, to save her. Instead, he was crawling directly into the arms of Mitch Johnson. Somehow she had to stop him.
“Davy,” she screamed. “Go back! Don’t come in here. He’ll kill you. Go back.”
The cavern reverberated with a hundred echoes and then fell silent. There was no further sound of movement from the passageway.
“Thank God you’re alive,” Davy called back. “But it’s okay, Lani. We found Quentin down the mountain. He can’t hurt you anymore.”
Once again there was movement in the passageway. “The killer’s still in here, Davy. It’s not Quentin!” Lani howled. “Go back, Davy, before he kills us both.”
“Davy!” Mitch Johnson called out. “Did you say Davy? Not little Davy Ladd. Come on in, Davy. I won’t hurt you. I won’t hurt anybody. You’re right. It was all Quentin.”
Now there was movement again, but not in the passageway. Now it was in the cave itself. “Keep talking, little girl,” Mitch Johnson whispered hoarsely. “Just keep talking. I’ll find you, you little bitch, if it’s the last goddamned thing I do.”
Another match flickered to life.
“Lani,” Davy demanded. “What’s going on in there? Who’s in there with you?”
For a moment Lani was quiet. Mitch Johnson was an implacable enemy—more determined to find and destroy her than he was concerned about his own capture.
Nana
Dahd
had told Lani more than once that the
Tohono O’othham
only kill to eat or to save their own lives. In relating the story of the evil
Ohb,
Rita had always said how proud she was that, in the moment when Diana Ladd might have killed Andrew Carlisle, she had chosen instead to spare him, trusting his punishment to the
Mil-gahn
system of criminal justice.
In a moment of understanding that went far beyond her years, and far beyond anything Mitch Johnson had told her, Lani understood that somehow, still alive and in prison, Andrew Carlisle had taken that piece of
Tohono O’othham
honor and turned it into something evil. He had used it
cheawogid
—to infect—someone else with the same evil that had fueled and driven him.
Nana
Dahd
had died too soon to know how wrong she was. But Lani knew. The telltale
cheposid
—the brand—Mitch Johnson had burned into her breast was proof enough that, as long as he lived, so did Andrew Carlisle.
Those thoughts streaked through Lani Walker’s mind as she sat bat-still in the cave, watching the momentary light of the match flickering in the darkness and listening as Mitch came stumbling toward her. Had she screamed again, the echoes might have thrown him off and sent him in the wrong direction, but suddenly she knew that was the wrong thing to do. Instead of hiding from the evil
Ohb,
Bat Meeter wanted him to find her.
“I’m here,” she said quietly, pulling herself to her feet. “I’m waiting.” A storm of needles and pins shot down her numbed legs. She had to cling to the stalagmite to keep from falling, but she held her ground.
“Lani!” Davy shouted. “Please. What’s going on?”
“He has a gun, Davy,” she said, speaking slowly in
Tohono O’othham
. “His name is Mitch—Mitch Johnson. The evil
Ohb
sent him here. He wants to kill us both.”
“Speak English, you little bitch,” Mitch Johnson swore. “You’re a goddamned American, speak English.”
He was only a matter of yards away from her now, creeping along the wall on the same path Lani had followed, as that match, too, flickered and burned itself out. Pulling herself around the rock, she stood directly in his path.
“You’ll have to come get me, Mitch,” she taunted. “I’m right here. I’m waiting.”
Grunting with effort, she tugged off one of her boots. “Here,” she said. She tossed the boot a few feet in front of her. The explosion that followed reverberated back and forth inside the cavern. Clinging to the cold stalagmite, grateful for its solid presence, Lani thought there had been a dozen shots instead of only one.
She had ducked her head and closed her eyes, so the flash of light hadn’t affected her. But her ears were roaring. From far away she could hear Davy calling to her. “Lani! Lani! Are you all right?”
“I’m still here, Mitch,” Lani said again, not raising her voice, barely speaking above a whisper. “I’m here and I’m waiting.”
Carefully judging the distance, she pulled off the second boot as well, tossing it slightly behind her and to the left. She heard him rush forward, close enough that she felt him brushing past her as she ducked back behind the stalagmite once more. There was another explosion of gunfire, another ear-shattering roar. And then nothing.
For a second or two Lani thought she really had gone deaf. She was afraid that the silence that suddenly surrounded her would always be there, that it would never lift. But then, from very far away, she heard Davy calling again, pleading this time.
“Lani, please. Answer me. Are you all right?”
There was a groan—little more than a moan, really. It came from beyond Lani’s hiding place. From beyond and below it. From the bottom of the hole into which Lani herself had almost fallen.
She heard the sound and was chilled. It meant that down there somewhere, far beneath the surface of the cave, the evil
Ohb
was still alive. He had taken her bait. The boot had done its work, but the fall hadn’t killed him. Even now she could hear movement as he struggled to rise from where he had fallen. Lani knew with a certainty that she had never known before that as long as Mitch Johnson lived, every member of Diana and Brandon Walker’s family would be in mortal danger.
Coming out from behind the stalagmite, Lani felt around her in the dark. She remembered being told once that limestone caves are fragile—that the formations break off easily and that they need to be protected from human destruction.
“I’m okay, Davy,” she called. “But don’t come in right now. I think he’s hurt, but he may still be able to shoot. We need help. Go get someone with guns and lights and bulletproof vests.”
“You’re sure you’ll be all right?”
“I’m fine,” she answered. “Go now. Please go!”
She heard Davy shuffling back down the passageway just as Mitch Johnson groaned again. Feeling her way around the floor of the cavern, she located another stalagmite, one that was much smaller than the hulking giant behind which she had hidden. This one was about a foot in circumference and three to four feet high.
“Ants are very strong,” Nana
Dahd
had told her. “When they have to, they can carry more than their own weight.”
Positioning her back against the large stalagmite, she pushed against the smaller one with both her feet and all her might. She pushed as hard as she could, straining until stars of effort blazed inside her head. At first it seemed as though the rock would never come loose. But then she remembered who she was—
Mualig Siakam
—a powerful medicine woman, someone who, with the power of her singing, could determine who would live and who would die.
Had Mitch Johnson been a little baby, surely the Woman Who Was Kissed by the Bees,
Kulani O’oks,
would have refused to sing.
Pushing again, Lani Walker felt the stalagmite give way slightly, rocking gently and trying to come loose from its moorings like a giant baby tooth in need of pulling. She pushed again and the rock was looser.
All things in nature go in fours. It was the fourth push that broke the huge rock free. She felt it tottering toward her and she had to push it yet again to send it tumbling in the other direction. She heard it scrape across the lip of the hole. Then, for a space of several seconds, there was no sound at all, then there was a muffled bump as the limestone boulder hit something soft and came to rest.
Holding her breath, Lani listened. In the whole of the cave, except for the steady drip of water, there was no other sound, no other being. Mitch Johnson was dead. In the emptiness of his passing, Lani realized that the spirits of Betraying Woman and Andrew Philip Carlisle had disappeared as well. The three of them had joined
huhugam
—those who are gone.
This time, they would not come back.
“Lani, I’m here,” Davy shouted. “Brian is with me. Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” she called back. “It’s safe to come in now. The evil
Ohb
is dead.”
17
They say it happened long ago that after the Tohono O’othham defeated the PaDaj O’othham—the Bad People—the Desert People settled in to live near Baboquivari—
I’itoi’
s sacred mountain—which is the center of all things. Much later, when the first
Mil-gahn,
the Spaniards, came, they mistakenly called the
Tohono O’othham
the Bean Eaters after some of the food the Indians ate. And even later, other
Mil-gahn
—the Anglos—came to call them Papagos.