Trail of Lightning

Chapter 13

Kai’s standing in the doorway bearing a brilliant smile, a straightened tie, and empty hands. No shotgun. It’s probably a good thing he doesn’t have my shotgun. I would be sorely tempted to use it.

His smiles fades around the edges as he takes in the scene. Me on the floor, untangling myself from the chair with a mouthful of curses. Coyote leaning against the entrance to the hallway, an oversize smile showing off predator teeth.

“Is everything okay?” Kai asks.

“Obviously not,” I say. I stand up and right the chair, brush off my leggings, and try to put my dignity back in order.

He nods. “Okay. Should I go back to the truck? Give you guys some alone time?”

“Absolutely not!” Ma’ii says cheerfully. “Magdalena and I were discussing a mighty quest on which she will embark on the morrow, but the very thought has sent her over the edge of reason. She obviously needs some time to contemplate such a great charge.” He looks over at me and I give him the finger. Two-handed. He turns back to Kai. “In the interim, we shall become acquainted, young Kai Arviso.” Ma’ii looks back at me. “Magdalena. In your rash show of violence, you upended our coffee.” He sounds heartbroken.

I watch the spilled coffee soak into my cheap brown carpet, adding to the small stains of likely decades. I regret the spill, but I don’t regret trying to throttle the damn trickster. He knows better.

I raise my hands. “Okay, fine, but you . . .” I point a finger at Ma’ii. “Watch yourself, or next time I’ll end up putting a bullet in your head.”

Kai makes a choking noise, but Ma’ii simply ducks his chin, an acknowledgment that he knows he pushed me too far. And that I have limits. And that once I reach them, my instincts often get the best of me. I can almost hear him whisper in my ear. Monster. I shake off the uneasy feeling and rub at my shoulder.

“I can help clean up,” Kai offers.

“No, you sit.” I gesture him to an empty chair. “Ma’ii owes me some stories after the shit he’s pulled. I want you to hear them too.”

I gather our cups. Rub a foot over the new stain in my carpet. I brush past Ma’ii as I head to the kitchen. This time he stays where he is, solid on contact. The hard thump against his shoulder that makes him stumble back a step pleases me more than it should.

Kai’s voice follows me into the kitchen. “I don’t know if coffee’s such a great idea. Maybe she should lay off the caffeine.”

I’m in the kitchen, spooning out coffee grounds, listening to Kai and Ma’ii talk.

“So how do you know my name?”

There’s a beat of silence before Ma’ii says, “A Coyote knows all things.”

“That’s right. Mags called you Coyote. Are you the Coyote?”

“You may call me ‘Ma’ii.’ And you call Magdalena . . . ‘Mags’?”

“Women like nicknames.”

“Indeed.”

I smile despite myself as I make three cups of coffee. Sugar for Ma’ii. I remember Kai likes milk and check the small refrigerator to see if I have any. A little sheep’s milk. A few weeks old, but it smells fine. I pour it in. I take all three cups out, set Kai’s and Ma’ii’s on the table. Kai’s slid into my vacated spot, resting easy in the chair. Arms loose at his side, legs wide. Looking completely unfazed by the strange evening. Coyote’s back in his place. He takes the coffee from me with a shrewd sideways glance. I ignore it and step around his skinny legs to slump down on the sofa. I take a sip. The coffee’s cooled considerably, but it’s still good.

Coyote says, “So Magdalena tells me you are her future lover.”

Kai barks a sharp laugh and I spit lukewarm coffee on my pants. “What?” I’m sputtering as heat colors my cheeks. “I didn’t say that. I did not say that!”

Coyote flips his overlong fingers, offering an open hand as some sort of half-hearted mea culpa. “Well, perhaps not in so many words.”

Kai grins big. “Maggie and I just met today, so I wouldn’t want to presume. Besides, I’m sure a beautiful woman like her has her choice of men.”

My eyes shoot to Kai, looking for the joke. I clean up okay, but no one has ever accused me of being beautiful, and I know damn well I’m not as pretty as he is. But I can see nothing but sincerity in his face.

Coyote nods sagely, eyes on me. “I try to tell her that there are many lovers, numerous as the stars.”

“You try what?” I snort. “Oh, so now you’re trying to help me? What you said before, that was meant to help me?”

Ma’ii stares at me flatly. “I know you do not believe it, but I am always trying to help you, Magdalena.”

“You are always trying to help yourself.”

“Can I not do both at once?”

“No, you cannot do both at once.”

“So Maggie said you are old friends,” Kai cuts in smoothly. “How did you meet?”

No, I said we were frenemies, and that had been generous. Even more so after his antics tonight, but Ma’ii perks up and smiles a wide delighted smile.

“Yes, we are old friends,” he agrees cheerfully. “I met Magdalena when she was but a girl, before the end of the Fifth World, when my kind still lived mostly in the dreams of the five-fingered people.”

“ ‘The five-fingered people.’ That’s us. Humans.”

Ma’ii smiles, tolerant. “The Diné, yes.”

“And the end of the Fifth World?” Kai asks. “Do you mean the Big Water?”

“Just so.” Ma’ii leans forward, settling into his storytelling role. Just like that, Kai has him talking. Not teasing or snipping at me, but sharing his vast knowledge of Dinétah. I am reluctantly impressed.

“I have lived many lives in many worlds,” Ma’ii says, “even before Changing Woman made the five-fingered people, and in them all the worlds have come to an end in a great flood. Each time the waters rose so high on all sides that we thought the cresting waves were the tips of the snowy mountains. This last flood, the one you call the Big Water, ended the Fifth World and began the Sixth. It opened the passage for those like myself to return to the world.”

His voice has taken on a dramatic quality, almost like a melody. He’s obviously enjoying himself, basking in Kai’s rapt attention. But I notice that he doesn’t mention his role in causing those early floods, and wonder what role, if any, he may have had in causing the latest one.

“Earth surface world?” Kai asks.

“Dinétah.”

“And before you lived in dreams?”

“Dreams and visions,” Ma’ii acknowledges. “Legends and songs.”

“And now?”

“And now with the rise of Dinétah and the Sixth World, we are as we were before.”

“And by ‘we’ you mean?”

“We. The Diyin Dine’é, or as you call them, the Holy People. And those of us who are Bik’e’áyéeii.”

“So you are not one of the Diyin Dine’é?”

He leans his head to the side, looking like a dog trying to understand the stupid human, and says, “I am Coyote.”

“Of course,” Kai says easily, not missing a beat. “And there are others like you?”

“There are others—Badger, Bobcat, Wolf—but none such as me.” He preens a little and fluffs his cravat.

“And what about the monsters?” I ask.

He pauses for a moment, thinking, before he continues. “Some, it is true, were vanquished long ago and did not return. But others were spared by the Monsterslayer and still live. Hunger, poverty, old age. All these were once called monsters. But we also had the great Yeiisoh, the lumbering water dragon whose skeleton lies not far from here across the mountaintops. And then there are the monsters of your own creation. The yee naaldlshii, witches who sell their humanity for power, ch’įdii, the spirits that contain the evil of all men and women upon their deaths. And the ones who Magdalena favors in the hunt. The ones who devour young girls.” His eyes slide my way.

He’s baiting me, but it makes me think of something else. “What about tsé naayéé’?”

“Alas, I do not know this monster.” His eyes wander away from me to look at the wall.

“A man-made creature, maybe something made from witchcraft? It resembles a person but eats human flesh. Or at least tears out throats. And it can’t speak words. I killed one up on the mountain yesterday. It’s the thing that took the little g—” I stop myself. I don’t want Kai to know the details about Atty, not yet. I cover my abruptness with a fake yawn that turns real.

Ma’ii watches me for a moment, clearly thinking about something, before he says, “It has been many moons since I’ve enjoyed such fine conversation. Stories, and an evening meal shared among friends. It is just what a lonely Coyote needs.” He smiles at me encouragingly, which frankly, isn’t a pleasant sight. The face he wears is meant more for sneers and haughty disdain. Trying to work that long thin face into something passably friendly is ridiculous. Nevertheless, he’s earnest. And then I realize what he said.

“I never said I’d cook for you.”

As if on cue, Kai’s stomach growls, loud enough for us both to turn.

“Traitor,” I mutter.

Well, perhaps having Coyote here isn’t a total loss. He seems willing to talk to Kai, so maybe there’s a kernel of information in there among his stories that will help us figure out more about the tsé naayéé’.

“Okay,” I say, pushing myself up from the chair. “I’ll feed you both. Dinner and, yes, more coffee. And then you go, Ma’ii. I can only take so much of your friendship at a time.”

He touches a claw to his forehead.

“Thanks, Mags,” Kai says. He gives me that big smile that lights up his whole face. I shake my head. Kai has charm, I’ll give him that. And the fact that he’s charmed Ma’ii is pretty extraordinary. But that doesn’t mean he and Ma’ii getting along is a good thing. More likely it’s a disaster in the making.

“Great!” I say brightly. “You two talk. I’ll be in the kitchen.”