Coyote's Daughter Page 7

  The morning wore on, calling, waiting, stacking rocks, moving to the next house. The sun was high overhead before I got to the west side of the village. No luck anywhere.

  Jack and I found a thin sliver of shade, and I poured him water, and settled down to eat the rest of my sandwich from breakfast. After two days in my backpack, the cheese wasn't very appetizing, but I didn't think it would make me sick. I decided to spend the afternoon checking the houses to the east, and if there was no luck, I'd have to begin searching the houses from the inside.

  I took the wrapping off and flexed my ankle. Sore, but the last several hours probably hadn't helped much. The binding had kept me from making it much worse, I was sure.

  As we finished our break, Jack's ears pricked up, and his head swiveled to the east. I closed my eyes and listened. In a few moments, I heard a low, singsong noise. At first I thought it was a bird, but then started to make out words. Not enough to understand, but a pattern in the noise. Like when the television is turned down so low you can't hear what they're saying, but you can tell people are talking.

  It was like that. Someone singing, or talking, far enough away I couldn't hear the words clearly. I ducked around the corner of a house and crept toward the noise. As we got closer, we could make out snatches of speech, but not entire sentences, not enough to know what was going on. When we hid behind the next house, I was glad for our caution. It wasn't Ash.

  "Where is it, little boy? Where is it? You can't hide it from me, you have no right."

  The voice hissed and sputtered, and I shivered to hear how angry it sounded, even though the words themselves were calm.

  No answer came, and after a moment, the voice continued on. "Talk, little wild boy. You have no rights, you have less claim than I do here. Why should you care?"

  Something thudded, but no answer. I pulled Jack toward me and sank my face into his fur. I pressed his head into my stomach and hoped he wouldn't bark. We needed to get closer, to see what was going on, but I was too scared to move. Breathing in Jack's scent steadied me a bit.

  I sat up, and patted him again. He butted me with his head as if to tell me to get a move-on. I crouched by the wall, and peered around the corner. One side clear. I could hear the angry voice, but it was further to the east. Not in the house, but past it. We scampered across the open space between houses, and then stopped to peer around the corner again.

  There.

  This was the furthest house on the east side. Past the invisible border of the village I could see an old man, walking in a circle, ‘round and ‘round along the edges of a hole in the ground. His feet whispered as they shuffled through the dust.

  I looked more closely at the hole. Not a natural pit, about five feet across, and lined with adobe bricks. I had no idea how deep it was, but as I watched the old man yelling, I had a horrible suspicion of who was trapped at the bottom.

  "Where is it? Little fox boy, little coyote boy—are you even a man? I knew who my parents were, and the village scorned me."

  The bent figure stooped and picked up a rock, and tossed it in his hand. "They found you, and they loved you, cared for you. We starved, and scraped, and Yellow Corn Girl died, and nothing made them love us. They were her own people, and they turned their backs."

  Shriveled Corn Man. I peeked around the corner again and gasped. The same bent figure I had seen from the roof yesterday was hunched over the side of the pit. He was dressed in rags and tatters, his face withered, the sinews stood out on his scrawny arms and legs. The hatred in Shriveled Corn Man's voice was like a slap to the face.

  "I buried her alone. I sang the four days alone. No one came, no one helped. I would have been a good leader. No one listened. So I went south, and learned so many things." He giggled, high-pitched and wavery; it was such an odd sound from an old man.

  "But you! No one knew where you came from; they found you while hunting. They brought you back, made much of you, let you stay with their families. I told them you were a spirit, a shapechanger, who could not be trusted."

  I risked another look at the man's face, deeply lined, eyes so sharp and black they seemed made of river pebbles. His back was curved, his legs bent, his arms thin sticks. Shriveled Corn Man wore a tattered robe, so worn through I couldn't tell what color it had been. In his hair hung feathers. Dingy now, the colors bright enough to identify them as the parrot feathers Shriveled Corn Man brought back from his journey south.

  "I had returned with my strong pinang by then, gained power, gained their trust. But they didn't listen to me. They chose to keep you, gave you a family, a little sister. They sealed their own fate."

  I thought about the little girl who died in Ash's story, and wondered if she had been his sister. I suppose if the village was empty, his family would have been gone anyway, but somehow, the loss of a baby sister made it sadder.

  "But you!" The old man took the rock in his hand and hurled it down the pit.

  I heard it hit something with a horrid, fleshy thunk, and buried my shaking arms around Jack.

  "You wouldn't go. I took the rest, and you still fight me. Your pinang isn't as strong as mine, it can't be. You can't win. Talk, speak aloud; tell me where it is, and I'll stop this."

  He stooped for another stone. "Or are you too accustomed to silence, little animal child?" He threw again. The wet sound, and the mental picture of what the stones had done to Ash's body, made my stomach heave while I held my hand over my mouth and hoped for silence.

  "Even coyotes will yell in a trap. You'll tell me soon enough. Perhaps tomorrow you'll be tired of this game."

  The voice stopped. The shuffling noises grew faint. I looked around the corner again as the man walked toward the hills, fading with every hateful step. I waited until I couldn't see him any longer, then rushed to the pit, in dread of what I might see.

  Chapter Seven

  I wish I had been wrong. Ash was curled up at the bottom of the hole, bruised and bleeding and his leg stuck out at an angle that made my stomach flip again.

  "Ash, can you hear me?" Even with Shriveled Corn Man gone, it was an effort to speak above a whisper. Ash stirred, then looked up. His eyes didn't focus on me.

  "Ash, I'm going to get you out of there, hold on." I glanced around, and limped over to the ladder next to the nearest house. Jack ran with me, and I wished he had hands so he could help me carry the heavy ladder back to the pit. I dragged the ladder along behind me, and stopped once I got to the edge.

  "Watch out, I'm setting it down." The ladder didn't quite reach the top of the walls of the hole, but almost. Close enough for me to be able to reach down to help pull Ash out once he stood on the top rung.

  Except he didn't climb. Ash had inched out of the way of the ladder, but now lay quiet at the bottom of the pit.

  "Come on!" No response. I looked around. No sign of Shriveled Corn Man, but I didn't know when he would return. If I climbed down to get Ash, he could pull the ladder out and have us both trapped.

  There was nothing else to be done.

  I turned to Jack. "I'm going to pretend you can understand me, because you're all I've got. If you see that old man coming close, bark to warn me, okay?"

  Even though relying on my dog to understand me wasn't the brightest thing to do, the thumping of Jack's tail against the ground reassured me.

  I started down the ladder, wincing a little every time my bad ankle took my full weight. Bursts of bright red pain shot from my ankle with every step. The bottom was further away than it looked, and my shoulders sagged in relief when I stepped off the last rung.

  I hurried over to where Ash sprawled. Shriveled Corn Man's rocks had battered and torn nearly every inch of his thin frame.

  Ash stared blankly at me.

  "Hold still. Let me see." I reached for his arm to check the worst of the cuts, a long ragged tear on his shoulder blade that continued down his back.

  "That horrible old man. Why didn't you stop him? What does he want?"

  Ash hissed in pain, but d
idn't speak to me.

  "Ash, what's wrong?"

  He glared.

  "I know you wanted me to go home. I tried, I did. But the road back home was closed. It doesn't exist anymore. I thought about going overland to see if I could find the trail closer to the canal."

  Ash jerked away from my hands, and grabbed my shoulders. I could see the question plain on his face.

  "I didn't leave the trail, I just thought about it. Besides," I added, "Coyote was there. He wouldn't let me go past."

  Still no words.

  "I said I'm sorry. Why are you angry?"

  He shook his head.

  "You're not angry? Then why won't you speak to me?"

  I thought of the hateful old man shouting down into the pit earlier. "You wouldn't speak to that old man either. That was Shriveled Corn Man, wasn't it? What does he want from you?"

  Ash's eyes met mine for a moment, then he turned to look at the backpack laying beside us.

  "The statue? This would be a lot easier if you'd talk."

  He shook his head again.

  "Fine. Be like that. Can we at least get you out of here?"

  He dragged himself over to the ladder, and I watched him pull himself up the first few rungs. The moment he put his broken leg on the ladder, he collapsed, his face white with pain.

  "Maybe I can carry you?"

  He looked doubtful, but as I reached for the ladder he scrambled onto my back, and wrapped his arms around my shoulders. I would have to return for my backpack in a second trip. For such a thin boy, his grip was strong, and I started to believe we could get out before Shriveled Corn Man returned.

  Until I tried to climb the ladder with him on my back. I reached nearly a third of the way up when our combined weight was too heavy for me to lift any further.

  We slid back down to the bottom of the pit, and I twisted so that I would take most of the impact. Ash curled over his leg, his face contorted into a silent scream. I wasn't sure how badly his leg was broken, but none of this would help it.

  I heard a rustling sound and a shadow appeared at the edge of the pit. I flinched away from it, expecting the old man to throw stones at two captives now. Instead, a soft bark reached my ears.

  "Jack?"

  He lay at the rim, head down into the hole. I stood for a moment, amazed.

  "There's no time anymore. Shriveled Corn Man is coming. You have to get up now." I zipped the pack up and slid it on over my stomach. There would be no returning for it now.

  Ash pulled himself to his feet and limped toward the ladder. I turned my back to him again for him to climb on, but he shoved me away. With strength I didn't know he still possessed, he lifted me over the first few rungs, then shoved me further up.

  "What are you doing?" I looked back over my shoulder, and saw he had already collapsed. Blood oozed from the gash on his shoulder and through his pants where I suspected the bone was broken.

  I started back down the ladder, but he shook his head and gestured to the top of the pit again. I hung there for a moment, then Jack barked again, a little louder.

  I couldn't wait. If I were trapped in the hole with Ash, there would be no one to free us. I looked again at Ash's broken body, the determined look on his face, heard Jack's anxious whine from above. With pangs of guilt I scaled the ladder, and heaved myself up out of the pit. I slid out of the pack and lay on my stomach to grab the top rung to draw the ladder up after me. The sight of Ash, motionless at the bottom, made my stomach lurch.

  "Ash, I'll be back. I promise."

  He didn't look my way. I thought of the last time I had promised him something, and failed.

  I hauled the ladder back to the house it had leaned against, and huddled around the corner, my arms wrapped around Jack. "Good boy, such a good boy."

  He licked my face.

  I peered around the corner, and saw Shriveled Corn Man approaching. The next thing I noticed made me hold my breath. The lines in the sand where I had dragged the ladder stood out in stark relief and would lead anyone straight to where we hid.

  "Come on, Jack. We've got to move."

  We ran to the shelter of another house a little farther down, where I could still clearly see what would happen at the pit.

  Shriveled Corn Man walked with a funny, halting step: right foot, pause for half a breath, then left. Right foot, pause, left. I wondered what had happened, then shook my head. He was an evil old man, and anything that slowed him down was a good thing.

  Even though the ladder track was proof of someone else's presence, Shriveled Corn Man seemed to notice nothing. His focus was all on the pit, and the captive within. I think the entire village could have gone up in flames, been swallowed by an earthquake—anything!—and he never would have noticed.

  "Little fox boy, little deer boy, are you with me? Have you used this reprieve to think well on what you do? Have you come to a decision, the right decision?"

  The wizard's voice sounded calm, even, reasonable. Shriveled Corn Man stood and waited at the top of the pit, and no answer came. No sounds, no words, nothing.

  "Give it to me!" He shrieked, all pretense at sanity shattered. "Where is it? Give it to me and this will end." His voice dropped back down to a more rational tone, but I still shuddered from his outburst.

  "If you don't give it to me, it won't matter. I still will have won. If you do give it to me, I might be generous. I might let you go."

  The sorcerer paused, waiting for an answer that I could have told him wouldn't be coming. I didn't know Ash very well, but I knew bullying him wasn't going to get anywhere.

  Shriveled Corn Man stooped down to pick up a handful of small stones, and tossed them lightly into the pit as he circled it. I clenched my teeth. The wizard tormented Ash, reminding him of how easily those rocks could be hurled.

  "How much longer do you think you can last, little boy? How much longer before I lose patience, and decide you aren't worth the trouble or the time?" He stopped to scoop up a handful of larger stones.

  I heard them rattle down the brick walls. Shriveled Corn Man was no longer tossing the stones in, but throwing with some force.

  "You can't win. You know you can't win. End this now, boy. They weren't your people. Why fight for them? You were lucky. If they had been your people, they would have treated you like trash, like they did Yellow Corn Girl, like they did me.

  "The village did not mind me so much when I came back with power, did they? They brought gifts, traded good meat and meal for my spells."

  More stones struck the wall, and I could hear them ricochet down the pit. I wanted to close my ears, cover my head, not hear further, but it would be another betrayal of Ash.

  I had to listen, find out what was going to happen. If Shriveled Corn Man left again, I could find some way to create a sling out of things left in the houses, get Ash out, and somehow get us out of here, back to the real world, where Shriveled Corn Man couldn't reach us. But the old man showed no signs of leaving, no matter how hard I wished.

  "I couldn't see the food they brought without remembering all the times we went hungry before, all the times no one would trade with us.

  "Horrible, spiteful people, scorning us, and then . . ." His voice dropped to a whisper, somehow more terrible for its quiet. "You came, they took you in, they cherished you, made much of you. And what were you? Some brat abandoned in the woods, found by deer and foxes and coyotes. Lucky to survive out there, lucky to be found, lucky they found you a family. So lucky. And now it's over. You've used a whole life's worth of luck already."

  Shriveled Corn Man turned and wandered away. I rose to my feet, holding the wall for support. So much hatred spewed out of the old man. Even from my hiding place the force of his words hit me like a fist. I couldn't imagine what it must have been like for Ash, with all of that spite directed at him.

  My hopes that Shriveled Corn Man had left were dashed. He didn't go out of sight of the pit, searching the ground. Within minutes he bent, and staggered upright with something clu
tched to his stomach. The wizard came closer, and I saw with a lurch that he tottered under the weight of a huge stone.

  I was running before he raised the rock over his head. If I had stopped to think, Shriveled Corn Man would have thrown that rock down the pit. Ash would never be able to avoid it. It would have broken more bones, probably killed him. What else was I supposed to do?

  "Stop it, you evil old man!" I screamed as I rushed forward.

  Shriveled Corn Man turned, grunting under the weight of the rock as he lowered it from over his head. His eyes widened as he saw me.

  Now he knew I was here, and the fleeting moment of victory was over.

  And then he smiled. I hope I never again see such a satisfied, horrible, evil smile. The sides of his face crept back, baring his teeth, and his eyes narrowed. It was as if I had just handed him everything he had ever wanted.

  The sorcerer raised the rock again, and I realized I had overlooked the obvious. He was going to throw the stone at me, but at least I had room to dodge, a chance it would miss me. A better chance than Ash would have. I kept running toward the old man, yelling whatever came into my mind, watching for any signal to know if I should zig or zag, when the old man let out a whooping laugh, and threw.

  "No!" Ash soared out of the pit, into Shriveled Corn Man. His aim spoiled, the rock missed me. My heart leapt to see Ash, then crashed into my toes again when he crumpled in the dust.

  There was no ladder. The bricks were crumbling. Still, Ash got out of the pit. If Ash could save himself so easily, why hadn't he when I was trying to help him?

  The old man was laughing as he rose from the ground. "So easy. All I needed was to threaten some little outside girl? Not of the tribe, not of the land, with no pinang of her own?" He shook his head, as if bemused by the concept.

  Ash lay where he had fallen.

  "Two more days of silence and you would have won. But you spoke, and now I have you."

  I didn't know what was going on. Didn't want to know, but something was terribly wrong, and it was my fault.