Running With The Demon

CHAPTER 16

Nest did not sleep when she finally reached her bedroom, but lay awake in the dark staring up at the ceiling and listening to the raucous hum of the locusts through the screen window. The air felt thick and damp with the July heat, and even the whirling blades of the big floor fan did little to give relief. She lay atop her covers in her running shorts and T-shirt, waiting for midnight and her rendezvous with Two Bears. The bedroom door stood open; the hallway beyond was silent and dark. Gran might have gone to bed, but Nest could not be certain. She imagined her grandmother sitting alone at the kitchen table in the soft, tree–filtered light of moon and stars, smoking her cigarettes, drinking her bourbon, and reflecting on the secrets she hid.

Nest watched those secrets dance as shadows on her ceiling.

Was John Ross her father? If he was, why had he abandoned her?

The questions repeated themselves over and over in her mind, suspended in time and wrapped in chilly, imperious solitude. They whispered to her, haunting and insidious.

If John Ross was her father, why was Gran so bitter toward him? Why was she so mistrustful of his motives? What was it that her father had done?

She closed her eyes, as if the answers might better be found in darkness. She stilled herself against the beating of her heart, against the pulse of her blood as it raced through her veins, but she could find no peace.

Why was her father such an enigmatic figure, a shadow barely recognizable as being a part of her life? Why did she know so little about him?

Outside an owl hooted softly, and Nest wondered if Daniel was calling to her. He did that sometimes, reaching out to her from the dark, a gesture she did not fully understand. But she did not rise to look this night, locked in her struggle to understand the doubts and confusion that beset her at every turn. Like a Midwest thunderstorm building out on the plains and working its way east, dark and forbidding and filled with power, a revelation approached. She could feel it, could taste it like rain and smell it like electricity in the air. The increasing boldness of the feeders, the deterioration of the maentwrog's prison, and the coming of John Ross and the demon signaled a shift in the balance of things. In a way Nest did not yet understand, it was all tied to her. She could sense that much from the time she had spent with John Ross. It was in the words he had used and the secrets he had shared. He had taken her into his confidence because she was directly involved. The challenge she faced now, on thinking it through, was in persuading him to tell her why.

When it was nearing midnight, the time reflected by the luminous green numbers on her digital clock, she rose and walked to her open bedroom door and stood listening. The house was dark save for the single lamp that Gran always left burning in the front entry. Nest moved back across the room to turn down the bed and place the extra pillows under the sheet to make it look like she was sleeping. Then she removed the window screen from its fastenings and slipped through, put the screen back in place, and turned toward the park.

In the distance a dog barked, the sound piercing and clear in the deep night silence, and Nest was reminded suddenly of Riley. Riley was the last dog they had owned. A black lab with big feet, sad eyes, and a gentle disposition, he came to her as a puppy, given to her by her grandfather on her third birthday. She had loved Riley from the moment he had bounded into her arms, all rough pads and wet tongue, big ears and squirming body. She had named him Riley because she thought he just looked like a Riley, even though she had never actually known one. Riley had been her dog all through growing up, there for her when she left for school, waiting for her when she came home, with her when she went down the road to visit her friends, at her side when she slipped into the park. He was there when she saw the feeders, Pick, and even Wraith, although he did not seem to see any of them as she did. She was almost twelve when he developed a tumor in his lungs. Inoperable, she was told. She went with her grandfather to have her faithful friend and companion put down. She stood watching, dry–eyed and stoic, as the vet injected Riley and his sleek body stiffened and his soft eyes fixed. She did not cry until later, but then she did not think she would ever stop.

What she remembered most, however, was Gran's reaction. Gran had stayed behind and cried alone; Nest could tell she had cried from her red eyes and the wrinkled Kleenex wads in the waste basket next to the kitchen table where she had begun to take up permanent residence with her bourbon and her cigarettes. Gran said nothing on their return, but at dinner that night she announced in a tone of voice that brooked no argument that they had acquired their last dog. Cats were sufficient. Cats could look after themselves. Dogs were too dependent, required too much, and stole away your heart. Ostensibly, she was speaking of Riley, but Nest had been pretty certain that in an odd way she was speaking of Caitlin as well.

She stood now for a moment hi the darkness of the summer night, remembering. She missed Riley more than she could say. She had never told Gran this. She knew it was something Gran did not want to hear, that it would only suggest to her how much she, in turn, missed Caitlin.

Nest glanced at the silent house, thinking Gran might appear, that she might somehow know what Nest was about. But there was no movement and no sound from within. Nest turned away once more and crept through the shadows of the backyard, eyes searching. Miss Minx slunk from beneath a big oak, low to the ground and furtive. Another cat, a strange striped one, followed. Out in the park, beyond the wall of the hedge, moonlight bathed the open ball fields and play areas with silver brightness. It was her secret world, Nest thought, smiling at the idea. Her secret world, belonging only to her. No one knew it as she did, not even Gran, for whom it was now distant and foreign. Nest wondered if it would become that way for her someday, if by growing she would lose her child's world as she would lose her childhood, that this was the price you paid for becoming an adult. There was that gap between adults and children that reserved to each secrets that were hidden from the other. When you were old enough, you became privy to the secrets that belonged only to adults and lost in turn those that belonged only to children. You did not ever gain all of one or lose all of the other; of each, some you kept and some you never gained. That was the way it worked. Gran had told her that almost a year ago, when Nest had felt her child's body first begin its slow change to a woman's. Gran had told her that life never gave you everything or took everything away.

She slipped through the gap in the hedgerow, and Pick dropped onto her shoulder with an irritated grunt.

"It's about time! What took you so long? Midnight's the appointed time, in case you've forgotten! Criminy!"

She kept her eyes directed forward. "Why are you so angry?"

"Angry? I'm not angry! What makes you think I'm angry?"

"You sound angry."

"I sound the way I always do!"

"Well, you always sound angry. Tonight, especially." She felt him squirming on her shoulder, leaves and twigs rustling, settling into place. "Tell me something about my father."

He spit like a cat. "Your father? What are you talking about?"

"I want to know something about my father."

"Well, I don't know anything about your father! I've told you that! Go ask your grandmother!"

She glanced down at him, riding her shoulder in sullen defiance. "Why is it that no one ever wants to talk about my father?

Why is it that no one ever wants to tell me anything about him?"

Pick kicked at her shoulder, exasperated. "It's rather hard to talk about someone you don't know, so that might explain my problem with talking to you about your father! Are you having a problem with your hearing, too?"

She didn't answer. Instead, she broke into a fast trot, jogging swiftly down the service road and past the nearest backstop, then cutting across the ball diamond toward the cliffs and the river. The humid night air whipped past her face as her feet flew across the newly mowed grass. She ran as if she were being chased, arms and legs churning, chest expanding and contracting with deep, regular breaths, blood racing through her in a hot pulse. Pick gave a surprised gasp and hung on to her T-shirt to keep from falling off. Nest could hear him muttering as she ran, his voice swept away by the rush of the air whipping past her ears. She disappeared into herself, into the motion of her arms and legs, into the pounding of her heart. She covered the open ground of the ball fields and the playgrounds, crossed the main roadway, hurdled the chain dividers, and darted into the trees that fronted the burial mounds. She ran with fury and discontent, thinking suddenly that she might not stop, that she might just keep on going, running through the park and beyond, running until there was nowhere left to go.

But she didn't. She reached the picnic benches across the road from the burial mounds and slowed, winded and shot through with the heat of her exertion, but calm again as well, distanced momentarily from her frustration and doubt. Pick was yapping at her like a small, angry dog, but she ignored him, looking about for Two Bears and the spirits of the dead Sinnissippi. She glanced down at her wristwatch. It was almost midnight, and he was nowhere in sight. The burial mounds were dark and silent against the starry backdrop of the southern horizon where moonlight spilled from the heavens. The park was empty–feeling and still. Nothing moved or showed itself. Even the feeders were nowhere to be seen.

A trace of wood smoke wafted on the still air, pungent and invisible.

"Where is he?" she asked softly, turning slowly in the, humid dark, eyes flicking left and right, heart pounding. "Here, little bird's Nest," his familiar voice answered, and she jumped at the sound of it. He was standing right in front of her, so close she might j have reached out to touch him if she had wished to do so. He had materialized out of nowhere, out of the heat and the night, i out of the ether. He was stripped to the waist, to his baggy pants and worn army boots, and he had painted his face, arms, and chest in a series of intricate black stripes. His long hair was still braided, but now a series of feathers hung from it. If he had seemed big to her before, he looked huge now, the coppery skin of his massive chest and arms gleaming behind the bars of paint, his blunt features chiseled by shadows and light.

"So you've come," he said softly, looking down at her with curious eyes. "And you've brought your shy little friend."

"This is Pick." She introduced the sylvan, who was sitting up straight on her shoulder, eyeing the big man.

"Charmed," Pick snapped, sounding anything but. "How come you can see me when no one else can?"

The smile flashed briefly on Two Bears' face. "Indian magic." He looked at Nest. "Are you ready?"

She took a deep breath. "I don't know. What's going to happen?"

"What I have told you will happen. I will summon the spirits of the Sinnissippi and they will appear. Maybe they will speak with us. Maybe not."

She nodded. "Is that why you're dressed like that?" He looked down at himself. "Like this? Oh, I see. You're afraid I might be wearing war paint, that I might be preparing to ride out into the night and collect a few paleface scalps." She gave him a reproving frown. "I was just asking." "I dress like this because I will dance with the spirits if they let me. I will become for a few brief moments one with them." He paused. "Would you like to join me?"

She considered the possibility of dancing with the dead Sinnissippi. "I don't know. Can I ask you something, O'olish Amaneh?"

He smiled anew on hearing his Indian name. "You can ask me anything."

"Do you think the spirits would tell me who my father is if I asked them? Do you think they would tell me something like that?"

He shook his head. "You cannot ask them anything. They do not respond to questions or even to voices. They respond to what is in your heart. They might tell you of your father, but it would have to be their choice. Do you understand?"

She nodded, suddenly nervous at the prospect of discovering the answer to this dark secret. "Do I have to do anything?"

He shook his head once more. "Nothing. Just come with me."

They crossed to a small iron hibachi that sat next to a picnic table. A gathering of embers, the source of the wood smoke, glowed red within. Two Bears removed a long, intricately carved pipe from the top of the picnic table, checked to see that the contents within its charred bowl were tightly packed, then dipped the bowl to the embers, put the other end of the pipe in his mouth, and puffed slowly to light it. The contents of the bowl ignited and gleamed, and smoke curled into the air.

"Peace pipe," he declared, removing it from his lips and winking at her. He puffed on it some more, drawing the smoke deep into his lungs. Then he passed the pipe to her. "Now you. Just a few puffs."

She took the pipe reluctantly. "What's in it?" she asked.

"Herbs and grasses. They won't harm you. Smoking the pipe is ritual, nothing more. It eases the passage of the spirits from their resting place into our world. It makes us more accessible."

She sniffed at the contents of the bowl and grimaced. The night around her was deep and still, and it felt as if she were all alone in it with the Indian. "I don't know."

"Just take a few puffs. You don't have to draw it into your lungs." He paused. "Don't be frightened. You have Mr. Pick to watch over you."

She considered the pipe a moment longer, then put it to her lips and drew in the smoke. She took several quick puffs, wrinkled her nose, and passed the pipe back to Two Bears. "Yuck."

Two Bears nodded. "It's an acquired taste." He inhaled the pungent smoke, then carefully placed the pipe across the rim of the hibachi. "There."

Then he moved out onto the open grass and seated himself cross–legged facing the burial mounds. Nest joined him, sitting cross–legged as well, positioning herself next to him in the dark. Pick still rode her shoulder, but he had gone strangely silent. She glanced down at him, but he was staring out into the night, oblivious of her. She let him be. Overhead, the sky was crosshatched by the limbs of the trees, their dappled shadows cast earthward in a tangled net by the bright moonlight. Nest waited patiently, saying nothing, losing herself in the silence. Two Bears began to chant, the words coming in a soft, steady cadence. The words were foreign to Nest, and she thought they must be Indian, probably Sinnissippi. She did not look at Two Bears, but looked instead where he looked, out over the roadway to the burial mounds, out into the night. Pick sat frozen on her shoulder, become momentarily a part of her, as quiet as she had ever seen him. She felt a twinge of fear, wondering suddenly if what she was doing was somehow more than she believed, if it would lead to a darker result than she anticipated.

Two Bears continued to chant, his deep voice steady and toneless. Nest felt the first stirrings of doubt mingle with her uneasiness. Nothing was happening; maybe nothing would.

Then a wind blew off the river, cool and unexpected, carrying with it the smell of things forgotten since childhood–of her grandmother's kitchen, of her sandbox, of Riley, of her cedar toy chest, of Wisconsin's lakes in summer. Nest started in surprise. The wind brushed past her and was gone. In the stillness that followed, she felt the hair on the back of her neck prickle.

Small glimmerings of light appeared at the edges of the burial mounds, rising up into the night, flickering and fading again, moving with rhythmic grace against the darkness. At first they were nothing, simply bright movements that lacked definition. Slowly they began to take shape. Arms and legs

appeared, then bodies and heads. Nest felt her throat tighten and her mouth grow dry. She leaned forward, peering expectantly, trying to make certain of what she was seeing. On her shoulder, she heard Pick utter a faint, surprised exclamation.

Then up from the darkness rose the Sinnissippi, their spirits taking form, coming back into a shadowy semblance of their lost bodies. They lifted free of the earth to hang upon the air, twisting and turning hi small arcs. They were dancing, Nest could see, but not hi the fashion she had expected, not as Indians did in the television shows and movies she had seen, rising and falling in that familiar choppy motion, but in another way altogether. Their movements were more balletic, more sinuous, and they danced free of one another, as if each had a story to tell, each a different tale. Nest watched, awed by the beauty of it. After a time, she felt the dance begin to draw her in. She thought she could sense something of what the dancers were trying to convey. She felt herself swaying with them, heard the sounds of their breathing, smelled the sweat of their bodies. They were ghosts, she knew, but they were real, too. She wanted to call out to them, to make them turn and look at her, to acknowledge her presence. But she stayed silent.

Suddenly Two Bears was on his feet and striding forward. He reached the dancers and joined hi their dance, his big, powerful body swaying and weaving as smoothly as their own. Nest marveled at the ease with which he moved, smiled at his grace. She felt the heat of his body fill her own, as if his pulse had mingled with hers. She watched in shock, then with a glimmer of terror, as his flesh–and–blood body began to fade into the darkness and turn as ghostly as the spirits of the dead Sinnissippi. There were drums now, their booming rising out of the night–or maybe the sounds were only in her mind, the rhythm of her heartbeat. She watched Two Bears become one with the dead, watched him become as they were, translucent and ephemeral, ghostly and unreal. She stared transfixed as he danced on, the sound of the drums heightening, the movements of the dancers quickening. She felt the summer's heat flood through her, causing her to blink against sudden flashes of crimson and gold.

Then she was on her feet as well, dancing with Two Bears, moving through the ghosts of the Sinnissippi. She did not feel herself rise or walk to him, did not know how it came to pass, but suddenly she was there among the Indian spirits. She floated as they did, not touching the earth, suspended on the night air, caught between life and death. She heard herself cry out with joy and hope. She danced with wild abandon and frantic need, whirling and twisting, reaching for something beyond what she could see, reaching past memories, past her own life, past all she knew…

Like a fever dream, the vision appears to her then. It comes out of nowhere, filling her mind with bright colors and movement. She is in another pan of the park, a part she does not recognize. It is night, black and clouded, empty of moon and stars, a devil's night filled with pitch. Dark figures run through the trees, hunched over, lithe and supple. Feeders, she sees, dozens of them, their yellow eyes gleaming in the black. She feels her stomach knot with the realization that' they are certain to see her. Across the grassy stretches and along the pathways they bound, swift and certain. A woman leads them, young and strong, her shadowed face smiling and wild–eyed, her long, dark hair streaming out behind her. Nest blinks against the sight-a human at play with feeders, running with them, unafraid. The woman spins and wheels, and everywhere she goes, the feeders chase after her. She teases and taunts them, and it is clear that they are infatuated by her. Nest stands spellbound within the darkened park, staring in disbelief as the woman rushes toward her, all wicked smiles and laughter. She looks into the woman's eyes, and sees there the lines that have been crossed and the taboos that have been broken. She sees the woman's life laid bare, sees her soul unfettered and her heart unafraid. She will dare anything, this woman, and has. She will not be cowed or chastened; she will not be made ashamed.

She dashes into Nest's arms, draws her close, and holds her tight. Nest recoils, then stares in shock. She knows this woman. She recognizes her face. She has seen her face, just as it is now, in a collection of framed photographs that sits upon the mantel over the fireplace in the living room. It is Caitlin Anne Freemark. It is her mother.

And yet it isn 't. Not quite. Something is amiss. It is almost her mother, but it is someone else, too. Nest gasps in shock, not quite certain what she is seeing. The woman breaks free, her face suddenly filled with regret and despair. Behind her, barely visible in the darkness, a man appears. He materializes suddenly, and the feeders, who are clustered all about the woman, give way instantly at his approach. Nest tries to see his face, but cannot. The woman sees him and hisses in anger and frustration. Then she flees into the night, racing away shadow–quick with the feeders bounding in pursuit, and is gone.

Nest blinked anew against the darkness and the sudden bright pain that stabbed her eyes. Images whirled and faded, and her vision cleared. She was sitting once more on the grass, cross–legged in the darkness, her hands clasped before her as if in prayer. Two Bears was seated next to her, his eyes closed, his chiseled body still. In the distance, the burial mounds rose silent and empty of life. No lights moved across the grassy slopes; no warriors danced on the air above. The ghosts of the Sinnissippi had gone.

Two Bears opened his eyes and stared out into the darkness, calm and distanced. Nest seized his arm.

"Did you see her?" she asked, unable to keep the anguish from her voice.

The big man shook his head. His painted copper face was bathed in sweat, and his brow was furrowed. "I did not share your vision, little bird's Nest. Can you tell me of it?"

She tried to speak, to say the words, and found she could not. She shook her head slowly, feeling paralyzed, her skin hot and prickly, her face flushed with shame and confusion.

He nodded. "Sometimes it is better not to speak of what we see in our dreams." He took her hand in his own and held it. "Sometimes our dreams belong only to us."

"Did it really happen?" she asked softly. "Did the Sinnissippi come? Did we dance with them?"

He smiled faintly. "Ask your little friend when you find him again."

Pick. Nest had forgotten him. She glanced down at her shoulder, but the sylvan was gone.

"I learned many things tonight, little bird's Nest," Two Bears told her quietly, regaining her attention. "I was told of the fate of the Sinnissippi, my people. I was shown their story." He shook his head. "But it is much more complicated than I thought, and I cannot yet find the words to explain it, even to myself. I have the images safely stored" — he touched his forehead — "but they are jumbled and vague, and they need time to reveal themselves." His brow furrowed. "This much I know. The destruction of a people does not come easily or directly, but from a complex scheme of events and circumstances, and that, in part, is why it can happen. Because we lack the foresight to prevent it. Because we do not guard sufficiently against it. Because we do not truly understand it. Because we are, in some part, at least, the enemy we fear."

She squeezed his hand. "I don't think I learned anything. Nothing of what might destroy us. Nothing of what threatens. Nothing of Hopewell or anywhere else. Just …" She shook her head.

Two Bears rose, pulling her up with him, lifting her from the ground as if she were as light as a feather. The black paint gleamed on his face. "Maybe you were shown more than you realize. Maybe you need to give it more time, like me."

She nodded. "Maybe."

They stood facing each other in awkward silence, contemplating what they knew and what they didn't. Finally, Nest said, "Will you come back tomorrow night and summon the spirits of the Sinnissippi again?"

Two Bears shook his head. "No. I am leaving now."

"But maybe the spirits …"

"The spirits appeared, and I danced with them. They told me what they wished. There is nothing more for me to do."

Nest took a deep breath. She wanted him to stay for her. She found comfort in his presence, in his voice, in the strength of his convictions. "Maybe you could stay until after the Fourth. Just another few days."

He shook his head. "There is no reason. This is not my home, and I do not belong here."

He walked to the hibachi and retrieved his pipe. He knocked the contents of the bowl into the hibachi, then stuck the pipe in his belt. He took a cloth and carefully wiped the black paint from his face and arms and chest, then slipped into his torn army field jacket. He retrieved his backpack and bedroll from the darkness and strapped them on. Nest stood watching, unable to think of anything to say, watching as he transformed back into the man he had been when she had first encountered him, ragged and worn and shabby, another nomad come off the nation's highways.

"This could be your home," she said finally, her voice taking on an urgency she could not conceal.

He walked over to her and stared into her eyes. "Speak my name," he commanded softly.

"O'olish Amaneh."

"And your own."

"Nest Freemark."

He nodded. "Names of power. But yours is the stronger, little bird's Nest. Yours is the one with true magic. There is nothing more that I can do for you. What remains to be done, you must do for yourself. I came to speak with the dead of my people, and I have done so. I saw that it would help you to be there with me, and so I asked you to attend. What there was that I could offer, I have given. Now you must take what you have gained and put it to good use. You do not need me for that."

She stood staring at him in the humid dark, at his strong, blunt features, at the implacable certainty mirrored in his eyes. "I'm afraid," she said.

"Yes," he agreed. "But fear is a fire to temper courage and resolve. Use it so. Speak my name once more."

She swallowed. "O'olish Amaneh."

"Yes. Say it often when I am gone, so that I will not be forgotten."

She nodded.

"Good–bye, little bird's Nest," he whispered.

Then he turned and walked away.

Nest stood watching after him until he was out of sight. She could see him until he reached the edge of the park, and then he seemed to fade into the darkness. She thought more than once to call him back or to run after him, but she knew he would not want that. She felt drained and worn, emptied of emotion and strength alike, and she found herself wondering if she would ever see Two Bears again.

"O'olish Amaneh," she whispered.

She started back across the park, wondering anew what had become of Pick. One moment he had been sitting on her shoulder, all quiet and absorbed in the spirit dance, and the next he had been gone. What had happened? She trudged through the dark, moving toward home and bed, starting to be sleepy now in spite of all that had happened. She tried to make sense of the vision she had seen of the young woman and the feeders and the shadowy figure who accompanied them, but failed. She tried to draw something useful from what Two Bears had told her and failed there, as well. Everything seemed to confuse her, one question leading to another, none of them leading to the answers she sought.

In the shadows about her, a handful of feeders kept pace, as if predators waiting for their prey to falter. They watched her with their steady, implacable gaze, and she could feel the weight of their hunger. They did not stalk her, she knew; they simply watched. Usually, their presence didn't bother her. Tonight she felt unnerved.

She was out of the park and walking through her backyard toward the house when she realized suddenly what was amiss about the young woman in her vision. She stopped where she was and stared wide–eyed into the darkness, feeling the crawl of her skin turn to dryness in her throat. She knew the woman, of course. She had been right about that. And she had seen the woman's photograph on the fireplace mantel, too. But the photograph wasn't of her mother. It was of another woman, one who had been young a long time ago, before Nest or her mother were even born. The photograph was of Gran.

SUNDAY, JULY 3