Powers

Chapter 1

Mariutza

Smooth moonlight, soft and timid as a sleeping babe’s breath, seeped through the forest canopy, painting Old Man Oak’s mossy beard with twisting ribbons of silver and shadow. The swamp folks were full awake now. All stoked up with joy, singing hallelujah for the tolerable coolness of another summer night. Bachelor bullfrogs barked out their steady bass against a piercing cicada threnody. Crickets and peepers and creepers hollering their praises full on top of the other, singing out to the Lord for the blessings He hath made.

It was a glorious song, filled with deep magic and considerations of awesome wonder. It made a body thankful to be alive. Squish-squashing through soft cool mud. Hop-scotching dead wood and fresh fallen branches. Pausing to look out across dark star-dusted waters where the proud Cypress sisters, skirts hitched high above dark boney knees, waded through reflections of ringing light. Swaying and sighing to the night music. The sounds of blessed freedom and sweet never-ending joy.

* * *

Mariutza let loose with a wistful sigh and felt her way through the dark forest. Purodad would be getting home soon. He was going to be mad as a dirt dauber when he discovered she’d run off again.

But she couldn’t just sit there in the wagon and let him lock her up. She was a proper lady now, a full-grown woman—Miss Caralee said so herself. Proper ladies didn’t hold to being locked up in diddlecars. Proper ladies had work to do. Washing and cooking. Tending to the nets.

Gradually, step by step, the forest opened out into a moonlit clearing. Mari tiptoed around a sun-burned vegetable patch and ran for the cover of a gnarled old oak tree. Miss Caralee would take her side. Purodad was getting superstitious in his old age. She’d said it herself. She wouldn’t stand for any more of his nonsense. That’s what she called it: utter nonsense.

“Yoo-hoo! Miss Caralee?” she called out from behind the old oak. “Don’t shoot. It’s me, Mariutza.”

She peeked out at a ramshackle hut pieced together with drift-boards from the storm. “I’m coming out now. Just me alone.” Stepping out from behind the tree, she hesitated. The cook fire wasn’t burning and there weren’t any candlelights shining through the windows. Caralee couldn’t be off visiting. It was long time past dark. Had she already gone off to bed?

“Here I am. Walking to the door!”

A scrape sounded inside the shack. The clank of metal against metal.

“Don’t shoot. It’s me!” Mari put some wind behind her words. Miss Caralee’s eyes were sharp as stickers, but her ears were starting to wear thin.

A strong voice, dry and weathered as sun-bleached driftwood, called out through the screen. “Lands, Chile. What you doin’ out the door? Night’s most black as soot. Don’t just stand there gawping like a catfish. Come on up!”

Mari ran up to the shack and sat down on the smooth old stump just outside the narrow door.

The screen flared bright as a match struck against the jamb post. Hollow cheeks and soft dark eyes. The flame flickered and steadied as it took hold of a tallow candle. Miss Caralee pressed it against the screen and peeped outside, squinting into the darkness like it was light.

“Your grandfather know you out this late?”

“He said he was going to lock me up. Keep me in the diddlecar till I learned some sense.”

“Mmm-hmm…” The ancient woman sighed. “That man! What have you gone and did now?”

“I was just looking. Didn’t nobody seen me. There haven’t been any hunters since spring.”

“Lord have mercy. Spying on the road again. Don’t you have work to tend?”

“No ma’am. I done finished it. But if Purodad locks me up, I won’t be getting nothing done. He thinks he can do it all himself, but you know he can’t. He’s got town folk to visit. Healings to tend.”

“Hush up, Chile. Ain’t nobody locking nobody up, but you listen to me. You a grown woman now. Time is for you to be telling him what to do. If you want to go running your skirts through the pluff mud, that’s nobody’s business but your own—so long’s all your work is done—but laws… spying on the road? I told you that myself. If Mr. Jonah say it ain’t safe, it ain’t safe.”

“But if they don’t see me—”

“You think your grandfather don’t know what is? Folks all around paying him good money for his sight, and you too good to listen?”

“No, ma’am.” Mari looked down at the ground and tried to put some respectful back into her voice. “But I was just—”

“Just say you’re sorry and don’t do it no more. That’s all he want.”

“But, if nobody seen me—”

“If? That’s what that little white spot say? If?” Caralee jabbed a gnarled finger at the screen.

Mari caught her breath. She was pointing at her chest. Had Purodad told her? It was supposed to be a secret.

“That’s right. That little white spot on your chest. You was the one what prayed a healing? That how you know so much more’n Mr. Jonah?”

“I wasn’t saying…” Mari’s throat tightened, choking off her words. “I didn’t mean to…” Her eyes filled with tears. “I—”

“You a sweet girl. I know you don’t mean nothing by it, but you got to listen to your grandfather. Mr. Jonah’s got the sight. If he say it ain’t safe, it ain’t safe.”

“Yes’m.” Mari hung her head and blinked her tears onto the ground.

“That’s right. Maybe he ought to lock you up. Running off in the middle of the night and scaring a body half to death. That how I taught you?”

“No, ma’am.”

“That’s right. Now get on to that fancy diddlecar wagon of yourn before he sets the hunters after you hisself.”

Mari nodded and looked up at her teacher. The old woman’s mouth was pressed firm, but her eyes still had the laugh in them. If she wasn’t too angry, maybe she’d be willing to—

“Go on. Get going. And don’t peep out of that wagon till Mr. Jonah say it’s safe.”

“Maybe if you come with me, he won’t be so—”

A screechy scream blasted through Mari’s senses, sending her staggering into the screen. Another scream. Another. They were inside her head, dozens and dozens of them, clawing and scratching like possums in a wire cage.

“Lord have mercy. What’s gotten in you, Chile? What you going on?”

“Don’t you hear them?” Mari swung around and searched the shrieking darkness. The whole forest echoed with ringing silence. The frogs and peepers and creepers, they were still as the deep waters. Even the mosquitoes had left off their buzzing.

“Lord have mercy.” Caralee jangled with the latch and pushed open the screen. “Come in the door, Chile! It’s the Badness. It’s the Badness for sure!”

A hand closed around her arm and tugged her back toward the door.

“No ma’am, please. I can’t!” Mari twisted free of her teacher’s grasp and jerked away from the doorway. She was being ornery and abstinent and desperately wicked, but she didn’t have time to put on the respect. The Badness had found the woods. She was supposed to be making for the hiding place.

“Come on, Chile. This ain’t no house to fear. Get in the door!” Feeble hands pawed at Mari’s back. “Get in the door now!”

Another scream rattled up her spine, filling her head with the rabble of a hurricane. She weren’t a baby no more! Miss Caralee didn’t know anything. A real Standing didn’t go inside. A real Standing wasn’t supposed to be afraid!

“Chile, please.” Caralee whimpered in her ear. “Come in the door. Mr. Jonah’ll understand. He just want you safe...”

Mari twisted away and pushed across the cook yard, leaning into the dark waves crashing against her mind. She had to get to the hiding place. It was in the training. She had to get to the hiding place now!

Pale blue moonlight appeared before Mari’s eyes. A patchwork of branches, bobbing up and down. The soft glow of a distant lantern set in a shuttered window. Their diddlecar! The Badness had found it.

It was attacking the wagon!

“Purodad!” Mari broke into an all-out run. Through the garden, across the clearing, dodging in and out between the shadows of phantom trees, she leaped and twisted and splashed through the roiling blackness. Jolting moonlight flashed inside her head. Cloaked figures, maddening screams, the slap of raking branches.

The Badness! The swamp was drowning in it. Suffocating, choking, soaking deep into her soul. A dim shadow swept past her, catching her arm and spinning her around. Tangles of grasping vines, sucking mud, splashing water.

“Purodad!” The forest shifted around her. “Purodad, I’m coming!”

The weight of a hundred staring eyes pressed into her brain. They knew where she was. They would destroy her, suck the marrow from her bones. She was theirs now. Helpless and alone. There could be no escape.

Clawing at her face and hair, she threw herself to the ground, rolling over and over across the bracken. It was in her head. Pouring out from deep inside her filthy heart.

A gunshot sounded against her screams. Distant shouts.

“No!” Mari fought to her feet and stumbled forward, ripping through clinging stickers, pushing through clacking reeds. She was running now, faster and faster toward the distant light. The diddlecar pounded and jolted into view. A light jumped and flared in the window. “Purodad?”

Throwing open the door, she dove inside and rolled. Onto her knees, grasping at the swinging door, she slammed it shut and yanked down on the bolt. She scoured the interior of the wagon with darting eyes. Her grandfather wasn’t home yet? That meant he was still—

An exultant scream shook the wagon, sending Mari crashing into the floor. A chorus of answering howls jolted like lightning through her body. Purodad was out there. He was out there with them.

Holy One, please… I can’t do it. A tremor shuddered up her spine, sucking the heat from her body. I know I can’t. She climbed unsteadily onto her feet and slid back the door bolt.

Blackness pushed into the wagon, filling her mind with a muzzy haze. Help me. She tumbled out of the wagon and landed in a heap on the ground.

Another howl rattled into her brain. Mari’s stomach seized up. She was on her hands and knees. Her stomach heaved, over and over. The Badness buzzed in her head like a swarm of cuckoo bees. Filling her, surrounding her, covering her skin with stinging pain.

Holy One, please… She pushed onto her feet and tottered forward. He was out there. Out there with the Badness. Her gentle, crinkly-eyed grandfather! She broke into a run, faster and faster, charging through thickets, plunging through rending, tearing thorns.

Another gunshot rang out. Another and another. Flashes of sparking light.

A jolt slammed into her, knocking her onto the ground. Tongues of burning darkness licked at her skin, coiling around her arms, forcing their way into her mouth and nose. A scream convulsed her body, but the Badness wouldn’t let it escape. She was drowning in it. Couldn’t breathe.

A sudden explosion of blinding light ripped through the forest. Shining through her eyelids, into her skull, penetrating deep into her brain. The swamp shook beneath her, sending her skittering across the ground. The earth was moving, tilting onto its side. Mari grabbed at a sapling, clung to it with both hands as she was tipped out over the inky blackness of the night sky far below.

The light faded slowly and finally winked out. Suddenly the ground was beneath her again and the sky was back in its rightful place. Silence rang like a bell. Its throbbing echoes reverberated in her ears. Something had happened. Something deep and awesome in its all-consuming terror. She rolled onto her back and lay, panting and trembling, at the bottom of the deep moonlit night.

“Purodad?” Her whisper shouted against the silence.

A thud sounded in the distance. The crackle of dry leaves.

“Puro—” Her voice caught in her throat as a rustle shook the undergrowth nearby. Something was moving toward her. Something big.

Mari rolled over and tried to climb onto her feet, but her legs were heavy as wet shrimp nets. She couldn’t move. Couldn’t lift herself from the covering weeds.

A gurgling rasp sounded from the edge of a clump of trees. It was getting closer. Mari struggled onto her knees, but she could only stare. A low shadow was creeping through the foliage. Panting breaths. Sputtering gasps.

The figure broke through the leaves and collapsed at the base of the trees.

“Purodad!” Mari jumped up and stumbled toward her grandfather. “Purodad!” Her eyes filled with tears. She collapsed in a heap at his side and clutched at his hand.

A dark stain slowly spread across the old man’s stomach. He was coughing now. Gasping for breath.

“No!” Mari pushed off the ground and knelt at his side. “Stay right here! Miss Caralee’ll know what to do.”

“Quiet!” her grandfather barked. “Listen to me!”

“But Miss Caralee…” Mari clasped his hand to her chest. “I’ll be right back. She’ll pray a healing. You’ll see. Everything’s going to be fine. I’ll be—”

“Listen to me! This is my time. Nothing can stop it now.”

“Grandfather, no! We’ll pray—”

“You’re no granddaughter of mine!” the old man rasped. “No relation at all. Hear?”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—” A sob wracked her body, sealing off her throat.

“No relation at all.” The man’s face tightened and his head lolled back onto the ground.

“I’m sorry,” Mari blurted through her tears. “I tried to hide. I didn’t think they seen me. I—”

A wheezing sigh cut her off. Her grandfather’s eyes were still open. His lips were trembling. He was trying to talk.

Mari leaned closer and shook the tears from her eyes. His breath was coming in short gurgling gasps. Finally he took a hiccupping breath and let it out in a long sigh

“Find him. I want you to promise me. Find him first. Then find the others.”

“Find who? Miss Caralee?”

“Shhhh…” Purodad’s face tightened into a grimace and gradually relaxed with another sigh. “Dig the grave yourself. Round. Two and a half feet wide. Hear?”

“No!” Mari shook her head. “You’re not going to die. You can’t. You’re the prophet—”

“Hurry. They’re gone now, but they’ll be back soon.” His eyelids fluttered and slowly drifted shut. “Bury me standing. I must be buried standing.”

 

 

 

 

Chapter 2

Jazz

Jazz took a deep breath, letting the smoke-laced air slide across the mic in a long, rasping sigh. E minor. He switched keys, blending the Steinway’s plaintive tones to the sound of his breathing. A high-pitched buzz rang in his ears. The room was starting to spin again. He shut his eyes, pressed his chin against the microphone, a solid anchor against the gently swaying room. The murmur of distant voices lulled him. Gulf waves crashing against a distant shore. Soft, soothing. A balmy breeze on a warm winter afternoon.

A woman’s tittering laugh shocked him back to the present. Had he quit playing? He glanced up at the manager of the club. Gerard was leaning over the bar, talking to a brunette in a neon pink top. The whole building could burn down and Gerard wouldn’t notice. But the customers…

Jazz blinked the grit out of his eyes and upped the tempo, hammering at the old ivories, left hand battling the right in a discordant duel between majors and minors. One by one the murmuring voices died away, leaving the bar frozen in silent expectation. Jazz could feel their confusion, the building sense of anticipation. He took another breath, filling his lungs with burning pain. His right hand hammered harder, faster, building to a last frenzied gasp before collapsing under the weight of the throbbing bass. C washed away by E minor. Hope swallowed up by despair.

“Washed, washed away with the waters…” Jazz’s rasping voice slurred in and out through the tumbling notes. “Many lost… many more, many maybe… many more waiting to be found.” The lyrics scraped past raw vocal chords. Two hours tops. It was all he had left. “Washed, washed away with the waters…” He flung the words into the room, letting them splash like a pounding tide against startled concrete faces.

“I remember, I remember, when I was young I remember most of the time…” Jazz pressed his face to the microphone, filling his senses with the cold taste of metal and stale beer. “The sun so shining-bright on your face… in the memory of moments we stole from this place, I can see that the ages will never erase… most of the time.”

A natural blonde was on her feet. Stepping toward him. Flushed cheeks, deer-shined eyes. The cut of her dress screamed money.

Digging deep, he channeled even more intensity into his voice. Longing, yearning, unendurable pain, he sent it reverberating through the room, surrounding her, lifting her up, pounding into her swaying slender form.

“Washed, washed away with the waters…”

Her lips parted. She was gripping her purse in both hands. White-knuckled, trembling arms.

Almost… Just a little bit more. This could be his big score, but everything had to be just right.

He pulled suddenly back on the piano, letting his voice hang on the thin desolate air.

Her eyes locked onto his. He could feel the rise and fall of her swelling chest. He had her. It was going to be a huge score. Fifty dollars at least. Maybe even a hundred. He’d gotten bigger tips from women much less well-off than this one.

Flashing her a smile, he let his fingers drift across the keyboard in a tripping musical interlude, an invitation for her to approach the bench and pour out her heart, to exchange cold cash for the privilege of remembering what it meant to be alive.

She smiled back at him, but didn’t move. Something was holding her back. What was it? The... piano? He knew he should have switched to guitar. Too late now. Maybe a ballad would do it. Something soft and innocent. A ballad of friendship and faith and love. Quick, before she got away. She was already starting to—

A pulse of blinding white light erupted inside his head. Burning heat. Stabbing pain. He slumped forward, crashing through discordant notes into the depths of a dark and churning sea. The clamor of frightened voices rose up all around him and then receded like sea foam riding the surface of a spent Gulf-coast wave. Gentle hands buoyed him up. He was floating now, drifting. Riding the soft swells of inky black waters. Staring down into their shifting rippling depths.

Smooth moonlight suffused a dimly lit forest deep below the surface of the murky waters. Movement caught his eye. Dark figures wove in and out through the trees. The darkness closed around him and he fell. Swooping down in a long graceful arc, he hit the lead runner with a mind-twisting jolt.

Dark branches slashed across his face. Panting breath rasped in his ears. He was running. Twisting and turning, dodging this way and that through shadowy bushes and moss-draped trees. They were gaining on him. Getting closer. He vaulted a dark thicket and ducked beneath a canopy of reaching limbs.

An unearthly howl sounded behind him, blasting through his body like an icy winter storm. What was going on? It was a dream; it had to be. If he could just stop and think, it would all go away.

But he couldn’t stop. His muscles refused to respond. Something had taken over his body. He could feel its alien presence pulsing just beneath his consciousness. Exhausted, terrified, lashing out like a wounded beast.... 

A low growl rattled through his bones.

It came from inside him, behind him, through the darkness all around. The crash of massive bodies sounded to his right. More crashing to his left. They were spreading out, surrounding him. He had to go faster. Had to. Why wouldn’t his body respond?

Mariutza!

The word reverberated through his frame. Was it a name? Why was it so important? The beasts were going to kill him. Was that what they were called?

The darkness rang like a snapped guitar string. The twang of bullets ripped past his ears.

Exhaustion pressed down on him. Suddenly he was weak and weary, unspeakably old. It was finished. They were going to kill him. The long fight was finally over. He ducked around one last tree and plodded out into a moonlit clearing.

Just ahead of him, backlit by an enormous pink-orange moon, an old oak tree rose up from a mound like a grasping, twisted hand.

The vision hit Jazz with the force of a wrecking ball. He dropped to his knees, reached out with tingling arms toward the moon as a million wildfires raged inside his brain.

Revelation.

Enlightenment.

Understanding.

The whole universe shifted around him. His skin was on fire. He was changing, metamorphing into an alien being. The transformation burned through him in a blaze of heart-wrenching ecstasy.

“Yes!” He threw back his head and howled into the surrounding darkness. “Yes!”

He staggered to his feet and turned slowly to face his pursuers. He was invincible, unstoppable. Nothing could stand in his way!

A man-shaped shadow flickered against the sizzling darkness. It stepped forward into the clearing, growing darker and darker as the dim moonlight sputtered and distorted around it.

Another growl rattled through his bones.

Jazz swung around, heart pounding. Three more figures advanced across the clearing behind him. Two more on his right, even more on his left.

He was surrounded.

He turned as if in a daze, watching, waiting. Ten hooded figures stood around him, shrouded in fluttering black cloaks. The tallest stepped forward, raised a gun and pointed it at Jazz’s chest.

A spasm shook Jazz’s frame. The image of a beautiful girl with thick dark curls blossomed before his eyes. He was gasping for breath now, laughing like a maniac.

It was true!

The realization washed through him, filling him with a sense of fiery power. It was all true! They couldn’t hurt him. He was finally safe.

An explosion sounded. The shock of searing pain. Another explosion. Another.

And then silence. Jazz tumbled forward onto the ground as a blinding light filled the clearing.

Screams. White-hot flames blasted through him, burning the thoughts and images from his mind. The ground shook. Thunder roared in his ears.

And then… peace.

He was floating again. Up through the clouds, higher and higher, an air bubble rising up through a sparkling sun-filled sea.

Voices murmured around him. The light was fading. Something brushed his arm.

He opened his eyes with a gasp. A sea of bleary faces pressed around him. The familiar smell of cigarette smoke and stale beer assaulted his senses. Pushing up onto one elbow, he looked around the room.... 

“Easy.” A woman in some kind of uniform reached behind his head and eased him back down. “I gotcha. Everything’s fine. Just lay on back down.”

Jazz pulled away from her and sat up. Gerard and a few of the staff were gathered around the piano, but most of the customers were looking on from their tables.

“Sir?” The woman tugged on his shoulder and pushed around to get in his face. What was she? Some kind of paramedic? “Sir, you passed out. Do you have any medical conditions we should know about?”

“I’m fine.” Jazz leaned around her to search through the faces.

“What about medication? I need to know everything you’re taking—prescription or, uh… not.”

Jazz shook his head and looked over to Gerard. “There was a girl standing right over there. Black party dress—extremely well-heeled. You saw her, right?”

“Sir!” The woman grabbed hold of his head and forced him to look at her. “I need you to focus. You were having a seizure. According to these people, you’ve been out for over five minutes. We need to—”

“I’m fine.” He pulled away from her and pushed onto his feet. “It’s okay, everybody. I’m good. Just needed a quick nap.”

Drawn faces. Worried frowns.

He glanced at his watch and eased himself back down onto the piano bench. Two more hours. He could do it. He had to do it. He wasn’t about to lose his mailing address now.

He raised his hands and tried to play, but his left arm flashed out in excruciating pain. Wasn’t that…? He’d been shot there. Jazz shook his head. No, it was just a dream. He must have hurt it when he fell. It was just a bruise. He was fine.

Closing his eyes, he tried to concentrate, but a lightening storm of images flashed through his mind. Running though the forest. The gnarled tree against a pink-orange moon. He could still feel it. The triumph of revelation. What did it mean? What was going on?

A hand clamped around his shoulder. “Hey, pal. Why are you still here?”

Jazz glanced up. Gerard was looking down at him with that paramedic woman hovering at his side.

“I still have two more hours.” He forced his fingers to move across the keys. “That’s what we agreed, right? 1 A.M.”

“The doctor here says you should be in a hospital, getting some tests.”

“I’m fine, really. It was just—”

“Mr. Rechabson.” The woman pushed forward. “What you just experienced was a seizure. It could be very serious. Even if you feel okay now, you should still be tested.”

“But I don’t have to, right? You can’t make me go if I don’t want to.”

“This is about your health. You need to be checked out, no matter what caused the seizure. Your test results will be kept strictly confidential.”

“Hold on there.” Gerard’s eyes hardened and he glared at Jazz. “That’s what this is about? You’re using? We had an agreement. This club is strictly—”

“I’m not on drugs, and I’m not sick!”

“That’s why you was jerking around on the floor like a slab of bacon? Cause you’re so happy to be clean?”

“Look, I haven’t been sleeping lately, okay? I fell asleep on the job and I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.”

Gerard shook his head. “I’m sorry too. I like you, Jazz. You know that. The customers like your music. But either you go to the hospital and get checked out, or you pack up your stuff and go home. It’s one thing being undisclosed, but now that I know, I’m responsible. Know what I mean? The club don’t bring in enough for me to be responsible. You know that.”

The paramedic smiled at him and retrieved her medical box from the floor. “Ready to go?”

“Sorry.” Jazz shook his head and slid off the piano bench. “I don’t do drugs and I don’t do hospitals. You want to get all federal about it, that’s your business. But you’re going to have to find yourself another act!” Shoving his guitar in his gig bag, he headed for the door.

 

 

 

 

Chapter 3

Mariutza

 

Mari lay on her back at the bottom of the deep, dark night. Cold moonlight lapped at the edges of her mind. She was all hollowed out and wasted away, shriveled up and caved-in like the empty skin of a butternut squash. Everything that was good, everything that had any meaning had been scooped out and gobbled up. She was worthless and alone. Leftover table scraps fit only to be cast into the swamp.

No granddaughter of mine!

Her breath caught in another wrenching sob. Purodad’s words tore deep into her soul. If only she’d listened. If only she hadn’t gone to the road. He’d told her over and over. Why hadn’t she listened?

And now he was gone. The weight of his absence pressed down on her, pinning her to the ground. She reached out with the dikh sight like he’d taught her, again and again probing the empty gap beside her.

But Purodad was gone. She was all alone. What was she supposed to do without him?

“Find him. I want you to promise me. Find him first. Then find the others.”

A chill shuddered through her frame. Was he talking about—? No, Jaazaniah was once upon a time. Darane svatura—A Gypsy legend for campfires and scaring the little chaps at night. He didn’t people daylight hours like ordinary folk.

But who else could he mean?

Her mind flashed to the faded painting hanging above the diddlecar window. Jaazaniah the Prophet. He couldn’t be real. Real-world folk didn’t have time to fight battles and rescue beautiful princesses. They dressed in fine cloth and worked away the daylight at stores and schools and smoking factories. They looked at television pictures and read about the news on wide papers and were afraid of the night air. Besides, nobody remembered the old powers. Purodad said so himself. Real-world folk didn’t know anything about the dook magic.

A tremor rumbled through the forest, shushing the songs of the night folk. The Badness again? Mari leaped to her feet and reached out with the sight. Silence rang in the air like a plucked bowstring, but it was out there somewhere. Flitting at the edges of her mind, dark and feathery like the last wisps of a fading dream.

Mari took a reluctant step toward the diddlecar and stopped to cast one more glance at the still form stretched out on the ground. He’d been crawling through the thicket. What had happened on the other side?

The night mashed down on her as she wriggled her way through a hedge of stickers and twisters. Cool wet leaves licked at her skin. Darkness crowded in on her from all sides. She finally stepped out into a wide moonlit clearing. Dozens of uprooted tulepos lay crisscrossed on the ground.

What happened here? Whatever it was, Purodad said it was coming back. She needed to start digging. Mari leaped over a jagged stump and started out into the clearing, but a dark shadow appeared on the ground in front of her. She tried to turn, but her legs crumpled beneath her, sending her sprawling into a patch of silky black fabric.

A lump pressed into her ribs. She tried to stand, but something soft turned beneath her foot. A patch of reflected moonlight gradually resolved itself into the five fingers of an outstretched hand.

She screamed and leaped backwards. It was a man! Revulsion shuddered through her frame. She’d stepped on his arm. A man! Backing away she kept her eyes locked on the still figure. Cold sightless eyes peeped out from beneath a clothy black hood. She took a deep breath, let it out slowly. He was so still. Surely he wasn’t—

Another shadow lay on the ground to her right, a bare white arm sprawled across its face. It held a gun!

Mari dropped into a defensive crouch and turned to survey the clearing. Another body. Another. They were everywhere. Ten in all, spaced evenly around the perimeter of a wide circle. All of them wore robes and all of them had guns.

A chill seeped into her body. She stumbled toward the center of the circle, pushed through a clump of knee-high shrubs. A patch of plants had been trampled flat. Splatters of inky darkness stained their leaves.

Her grandfather. She could see it so clearly, but it didn’t make any sense. If the men shot her grandfather, what killed them?

A faint tremor tickled at the back of her mind. Whatever it was, it was coming back. If she was going to bury her grandfather, she was going to have to hurry.

Mari picked her way back through the undergrowth, sweeping the moonlit clearing with wide, darting eyes. The body to her right. Had it moved while she wasn’t looking? She broke into a trot. Then she was running. Through the gap in the thicket, across the clearing, in and out through the trees, she raced back to the diddlecar and flung herself onto the ground by the door.

Wriggling beneath the old Gypsy wagon, she reached out a hand and felt her way through the darkness. They had an old broken signpost somewhere. One end was flat and pointed. She’d used it as a shovel before. And she could use the big peach can to carry dirt.

There it was. She grabbed the post and was starting to back up when she saw it. Glowing faintly in the moonlight—a long smooth handle. The wood was almost white—like it had been cut down yesterday. She dropped the sign post and brushed a grimy hand over the polished surface of the wood. Smooth as candle wax. A small rectangular tag was stuck to its glossy surface. A price tag from a store?

Mari pulled the handle toward her, careful not to scrape it against a pile of jagged cans. It caught for a second and then turned loose with a metallic ping. It was a shovel! A beautiful store-bought shovel. Why hadn’t Purodad told her?

She squirmed out from under the wagon and examined the new tool in the light of the moon. The blade was covered with thick gray mud. What kind of hole would have needed something so beautiful and new? The tool must have cost a fortune.

What else had he gotten? A weapon maybe? Something to battle the Badness? She dropped back onto her knees and searched beneath the diddlecar. A pile of lighter wood, their Mason jars, the cook pot filled with emergency water…

Then she noticed a patch of gray near the back wheel. Thick mud, it felt the same as what was on the shovel. She tugged it free and pulled out a heavy, mud-covered board. It was perfectly round, about two and a half feet across. She carried it out into the moonlight and scraped off some of the dirt to expose the wood underneath. Just as light as the shovel handle. Was it store-bought too? Why did her grandfather buy a board and a shovel?

She rolled the wooden disc around to the front of the diddlecar and flopped it down next to the shovel. What did it mean? Was she supposed to use the board to measure the hole? It didn’t make sense. There was a measuring string in the diddlecar. The string would be a whole lot easier to use. Was she missing something?

She climbed back under the diddlecar and searched back and forth through the limp white weeds, but she couldn’t find anything else. Finally she gave up and crawled back out. Time was getting away. Even with a store-bought shovel it would take forever to dig a proper grave. She had to hurry.

Grabbing up the shovel and muddy board, she ran through the trees toward the spot Purodad called the mound. He’d always said it was the most beautiful part of the swamp, and the ground there was a good head higher than anything else in the area. It was the perfect spot for a grave.... 

When she finally reached the mound, she ran up its southern slope and searched out the clearing at the shady side of the turtle-shaped hill. Then, using the board as a guide, she started digging. The ground was crisscrossed with so many roots, she could barely cut through them. Even with the store-bought shovel, it took hours and hours to get through the biggest roots. And then, once she reached four feet, the ground was so hard it took all her strength just to scoop out a few crumbles of dirt. She chipped painstakingly away at the stubborn soil until her bruised and bleeding hands were too cramped to grip the shovel.

It was too much. She couldn’t do it. Mari climbed out of the hole and rolled over onto her back to lie panting on the dew-drenched ground. She hadn’t dug down five feet yet and Purodad was over six feet tall. She had to go deeper. Purodad deserved deeper. He was a prophet of the Standing. If anybody deserved a proper burying, it was him. But the Badness was on its way, and it was taking so long... And she still had to burn the wagon and all Purodad’s earthly goods.

What was wrong with her? She was being a Miss Lazy-bones.

A cool wind played the shivers across her muddy arms. Where had the night music gone? Mari groaned onto her feet and reached out with the dikh sight. Something was out there. Dark, at the edges of the night. Buzzing voices. It felt like—

An angry roar rattled through her bones. Hunger. Wave after wave of shuddering rage. A howl sounded from the direction of the diddlecar. The shouts of living men....  

Mari took off running. Holy One, hide me… Dodging and leaping, weaving in and out through the trees, she tried to lose herself, but the shielding prayer didn’t seem to be working. The Badness was getting closer, coming at her from every direction.

A snap sounded in front of her. The crunch of fallen leaves. Mari veered to her left and kept on running. More footsteps. They were everywhere. The whole mound was surrounded!

A growl rattled through the darkness. Hatred closed around her, lashing out with tendrils of blinding rage. Mari staggered back up the hill and ran back to the hole. It was too late. They knew where she was.

Grabbing the shovel, she spun it around and dropped into ready position. Turning in a tight circle, she searched the darkness. They were getting closer. Any second and she’d see the tongues of fire.

She stepped back onto the muddy board and froze. It was her only hope. Holy One, shield me. Help me, please…She closed her eyes tight and pictured her grandfather’s kindly face. The crinkle of his eyes when he smiled, the music of his voice when he recited the old legends, the tickle of his beard when he kissed her good night.

Without opening her eyes, she launched the shovel out into the woods. Purodad laughed like a braying donkey. He always fussed about being fat, but it never stopped him from taking one more piece.

Dropping onto her hands and knees, she grabbed the muddy board and felt her way to the hole. Hide me in thy almighty hands…A body was shouting now. She could hear his thudding footsteps. More footsteps climbing up the mound.

Mari dropped into the hole and tried to pull the board down after her, but it was too wide. She wrestled with the slippery disk, tugging it this way and that until it sliced through the dirt and smacked into the side of her head.

No! She tried to cover for her mistake by imagining a low tree branch and the crush of scratchy weeds poking into her back. She was climbing onto her feet, running through the trees to the diddlecar.

Footsteps pounded toward the hole. Good night, Purodad. Mari curled into a tiny ball at the bottom of the hole and pulled the board down on top of her to lay flatwise across her body.

Happiness. Good thoughts. A thick warm quilt on a frosty winter night. Purodad’s whispery voice as he told her the story of Jaazaniah and the princess. Jaazaniah is a great warrior. His veins run thick with the dook powers of old—

Suddenly a bright light glared down on her, lighting up the gaps between the board and the sides of the hole. She hadn’t thought that they’d have torches.... 

Holy One, shield me… She squeezed her eyes shut and held her breath, waiting for the blast that would end her life....