Trail of Lightning

Chapter 19

I drive past the place where Tah’s hogan was yesterday. Or as close to it as I can get. Law Dogs have barred access to Tse Bonito’s main road with blue-and-white sawhorses that read POLICE LINE and are diverting traffic down the two-lane highway that runs east and west out of town.

It takes all my willpower not to ram my truck through that police line and head straight to Tah’s door. A small voice in my head pleads with me to stay calm, to keep breathing and think. But my hands are rattling so hard I can barely hang on to the steering wheel. My breath is short and stuttering and all my thoughts are the color of pitch.

A dozen Dogs in CWAG khaki are standing around the police barrier nervously fingering their gun belts or casting anxious looks toward the blaze. A crowd of townspeople has gathered along the sloping sides of the highway, and we’re all stacked up like tiered corn cake—cops, civilians, and cars, crushed together to gawk at the flames that flare from the roof of the hogan and the cloud of dirty smoke the fire has flung into the sky. All of us craning our necks to get a better look at the disaster.

All but one man, who has his back turned to the fire and instead scans the crowd, searching faces and committing bystanders to memory.

“Longarm,” I whisper.

“Damn.” Kai’s voice is tight, and for once, he sounds completely serious. He’s recognized the Law Dog too, yesterday’s confrontation probably as fresh on his mind as it is on mine. Longarm’s wearing his cowboy hat and dark sunglasses, so I can’t get a good look at his face, but I have a feeling that he’s scanning the crowd looking for me.

I make myself drive until I’m maybe a quarter mile past the barricade. To my left, Tse Bonito proper gives way to the dusty dirt fields of the fairgrounds, abandoned and fallow this time of year. To my right are rows and rows of empty sheep stalls—metal, rusted, and temporarily deserted, the community herds out grazing at this hour. I pull the truck over near the stalls. Another truck won’t be out of place here, and it will be hours before the sheep are brought in for the night.

I throw the truck into park and turn off the engine. The damp grassy smell of sheep wafts through my open window, but overpowering that sweet familiar scent is the odor of burning wood and hot metal.

We sit there for a moment, both of us watching the billowing smoke, until Kai says, “I’ll go find out what happened.”

I reach behind me to pull the shotgun down. Only then do my hands steady and the voice in my mind starts to calm.

He pauses with his hand on the door. His eyebrows knit together in a frown. “What are you doing?”

“Same as you. Going to get some answers.”

“With a shotgun?”

“You got a better idea?”

“Yes. About a dozen.”

I open my mouth to tell him what I think of his ideas when the dull black casing of the Glock catches my eye. I hesitate. I prefer my shotgun—range, familiarity, and no one has ever called me subtle—but stealth has its merits. I remember the cops at the blockade. I put the shotgun back and palm the Glock into the pocket of my leather coat.

Kai watches me. “At least let me go first. Try to talk to them before you get all aggro.”

“No,” I spit, sharp and dismissive. “I let you talk yesterday, and look what happened.” I open the driver’s side door and slide out. The smell of burning things is even stronger outside. The ground under my feet is solid, but it feels like at any moment it could crack open and suck me down.

“Yes, look what happened yesterday.” He’s angry now too. “I got us out of there and nobody got hurt.”

“Nobody? You call this fucking nobody?”

I curse myself for leaving Tah there by himself. An old man who doesn’t even own a gun. I was so intent on my feud with Longarm, so convinced I was the one he was after. So willing to let Kai take over and talk our way out of things.

“Maggie.”

I round on Kai. “I know you made some kind of deal with Longarm yesterday. What was it?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean no way the Dog just lets us walk away like that. Longarm was gunning for us and the next minute you’re telling me he’s just letting us walk? What was it?”

He licks his lips. “It wasn’t like that.”

“The hell it wasn’t. I was there. What did you tell him? Was it Tah? Did you trade our freedom for Tah’s?” I’m shouting the words, hand gripping the Glock in my pocket without even thinking about it. I know I sound crazy, but all I can think about is Tah. Alone. Scared. Maybe . . . oh God.

“What? No. That doesn’t even make sense. You saw me talk to him. You were there the whole time. Why would he even want Tah?”

“You tell me.”

“Hey, we’re on the same side. I’m on your side. What kind of monster do you think I am?”

My voice is cold when I answer him. “I don’t know what flavor of monster you are yet, Kai. But I have a feeling I’m going to find out.”

“Jesus Christ,” he hisses. “Listen to yourself. I didn’t do anything to hurt my own grandfather.”

“Then how the hell did—?”

“I have a way with words, okay? People listen to me. Like your friend back there, Hastiin. And I got Longarm to listen to me. It’s nothing as nefarious as you’re making it out to be. He wanted a story, so I gave him a story. Juan Cruz and all that. That’s it. Believe me. That. Is. It!”

I hear him, and I know he’s right. The Dogs don’t care a thing about Grandpa Tah. I know Kai’s making sense. But I also feel like he’s lying to me about something, only I can’t quite figure out what.

My hands are jittery again, and the adrenaline’s starting to demand action, but I keep staring at that burning hogan, trying to remember how I’m supposed to breathe.

“We don’t know he’s dead,” Kai says quietly. He’s come up beside me now. Close enough to touch me. Brave man. “Let me at least go talk to them, find out what happened. I can do this. Make them listen. Please.”

It’s not the “please” that makes the difference. It’s the thought that maybe Tah is still alive. Hope that dangerous hadn’t even occurred to me.

Images flood my mind, unbidden, and I try to shake them off. But all I can see is Tah trapped in his hogan as the flames rise around him, engulfing his kitchen, the peeling Formica table, the blue tin coffee cups. I remember the ridiculous dance he did when he surprised me with the sugar. The way he called me shí daughter.

Daughter.

That word means something in Navajo. It means family but also responsibility. It was my responsibility to keep Tah safe, and I’ve failed spectacularly at the thing that mattered most.

“Somebody needs to die, Kai, and I need to be the one to kill them.” I look at him when I say this, hope he understands that I’m pleading now. His eyes are a little wide and his face is solemn. I can’t tell what he’s thinking, but it doesn’t seem good.

“Give me fifteen minutes,” he says. He reaches out to me, but he stops short, like a dog that’s been beaten. He lets his hand fall back by his side. “That’s all I ask. Let me see what I can find out, and if it looks like . . . if it looks bad, then we’ll figure out what to do next. Fifteen minutes,” he repeats.

I look at his hand, the one that almost touched me. And the strangest thought occurs to me: Coyote was right about Kai having nice hands.

“You’ve got ten.”

We leave the truck there. I scan for traffic before hustling across the road toward the shelter of the low-slung buildings that line the fairground side of the highway. Kai hurries to stay by my side.

“What’s the plan?” I ask over my shoulder.

“Can you stay out of sight? If Longarm sees you, it’s all going to go to hell.”

I remember the look on the Dog’s face yesterday, the sure knowledge that he would kill me if he thought he could get away with it. Staying out of sight sounds fine to me.

“I’m going to try the Juan Cruz angle again, just try and get information.”

“You think that’s smart?”

“He won’t try anything. Too many people watching. Remember how he was with you yesterday? He’s afraid of a crowd.”

I raise my eyebrows, stare at him for a moment as he keeps pace with me. He grins. “Hey, I’m not just a pretty face.”

I ignore that. “Ten minutes,” I remind him. “I’ll stay at the edge of the crowd. I can’t have eyes on you the whole time, so as soon as you know something, meet me back here.” I look around. Spot an abandoned stew stand on my right, a dozen feet off the road. I point to the structure. “If you’re not back in ten, I’m coming to get you. Don’t take any chances. They will hurt you, Kai. Trust me on this.”

He gives me his high-wattage smile like it’s no big deal. All I can do is hope he knows what the hell he’s doing.

We’re approaching the bulk of the bystanders. Men and women, most of them in bathrobes or pajamas, hair askew or in long sleeping braids, all looking like they dressed in a hurry in the dark. They’re crowded together, probably three dozen deep, quietly talking to their neighbors or just watching the fire. None of them even look back at us. I wave Kai away and slow down. Move myself into the crowd, blending in without a problem.

Kai slows to a fast walk and keeps going forward, his stride resolute as he heads straight for the wall of blue-and-khaki uniforms. I can see him muttering to himself, gesturing in low circles, rehearsing his lines.

Tse Bonito’s getting hot again, the sun unmerciful and the fire magnifying the already miserable heat. I still have my wool cap on, but now I’m starting to sweat. I keep it on anyway. It’s as good a disguise as I’m going to manage right now. I pull it down tight and keep my head low, let myself flow into the crowd. I’m itching for my shotgun, but the Glock sits unobtrusively tucked in my pocket, reassuringly close at hand, and that will have to do. It’s only moments before I’m sucked into the mass of murmuring onlookers, just another girl come to stare at the fire.

“They said it was an explosion,” says a woman to my right. She’s wearing an old red bathrobe that’s gone pink and threadbare, belted tight around her waist. Her heels hang off the back of a pair of plastic yellow flip-flops. She bobs her head left and right as she simultaneously tries to get a better look at what’s going on and gossip with her closest neighbor.

“I heard it was a lightning strike,” says another woman, looking back over her shoulder to join the conversation.

I jerk my head up. Lightning strike. Neizghání.

“Right here in the middle of town!” she continues. “Did you hear it? The thunder?”

“Probably vandals,” the man with her suggests, his tone dismissive. “There’s gangs around here, enit?”

“I never saw any gangs before,” his companion counters.

“I don’t know. That’s just what they’re saying.”

I swallow past the sour taste in my throat. Nothing any of them are saying makes any sense.

Another voice farther down, so low I almost miss it. “I heard them saying there was an old man living in there.”

A few heads turn. “The medicine man?” the robed woman asks.

The woman pulls back, alarmed. “He was just at my shop the other day.”

“Have you seen him?” I blurt before I can think better of it. “Do you know if he made it out? Before the fire got bad.”

The woman who asked about hearing thunder stares. Her eyes take me in, missing nothing. The look she gives me rips something open inside my chest.

“Nobody’s seen him,” she says softly.

I step back away from her. Another step. And another. Until I stumble into someone behind me. I turn and mutter an apology. Head down, I work my way back through the crowd the way I came. There’s more people now. Too many. The crowd’s almost doubled, all standing and gawking. I have to push my way through, knocking into a shoulder, dodging someone’s elbow. And I’m sweating more, a little of the panic from this morning trying to make itself known. I force it back, force myself to breathe and move. Keep moving, keep moving, until I’m almost running. And finally the crowd breaks.

I stumble out into one of the narrow dirt streets of Tse Bonito. I’m a little unsteady on my feet, but I can breathe again and there’s some space here. The street I’ve ended up on is deserted. Dark trailer windows and plywood stands stretch a hundred yards in front of me, but, thankfully, no people. The stew stand I pointed out earlier is to my right. Three half-walled sides and a long rectangular kitchen in the back. It’s the kind of thing families build to sell food on busy market days or for the annual fair days. I brace a foot against the plywood siding and, grabbing a pole for support, pull myself over. I hunker down low behind the waist-high wall, lean my back against the solid, and pull my knees up. Close my eyes and count to ten. Then to ten again. Until the feelings of panic pass.

I know I can’t stay here. I have to move. But which way? To where?

I’ve got to get back to Kai. His ten minutes is up by now, and either he’s found out what happened to Tah or he’s talking his way into a jail cell. I take a deep breath and haul myself back over the side of the stall. I can’t do the crowd again. I’ve got to find another way around, so I decide to cut through town. It will bring me within sight of Tah’s hogan, and then I can circle back around on the far side of the barricade and see if Kai’s still there.

I keep my shoulders hunched and cap securely down as I cut between the buildings, weaving silently through the smoke and emptied-out town toward Tah’s hogan. The fire is louder here, a living thing. The smoke gathers around me like fog. I push through, chin tucked in my shirt, breathing in shallow gasps to keep from inhaling the poison. My eyes water and I squint into the distance, anxious to find Kai.

I finally spot him, an unmistakable bright purple and teal smudge in the smoky air. But he’s not alone. He’s walking with Longarm, the Law Dog’s arm slung across Kai’s shoulder in a friendly one-armed hug.

I was right. Kai did make a deal.

My vision blackens with rage. My hands clench. I remember the feel of his throat under my blade this morning, the pulse of his heartbeat beneath my hand. How easy it would have been to simply press until crimson flowed from his throat. Until he gurgled and drowned in his own blood and looked at me with dead eyes, like he did in my dream. K’aahanáanii croons a prelude.

I’m moving before I can think, already gripping the Glock still tucked in my pocket. I watch Kai stumble and Longarm’s hug tighten to hold him upright. Something silver flashes bright in the smoky air and I stop. There it is again. Something Kai’s holding in his hand. No, not in his hand. Around his wrist. He’s in handcuffs, and Longarm’s dragging Kai along beside him, barely conscious.

I curse myself for an idiot. So ready to see betrayal at every turn, just like Kai said. When nothing could be less true.

I watch as they turn down a narrow alley between food stalls and hurry to follow. I catch sight of them again as they walk down the middle of a street paved with sifting ash. I see Kai sway dangerously close to Longarm, stumble again before Longarm heaves him back onto his feet. I lose sight of them as they take a sharp right and disappear around the back of a tin-sided shack. I hesitate. If I cross the road to follow them, I’ll be exposed for the time it takes me to get over there. But if I wait too long, they might disappear, and the next time I see Kai, it could be from the other side of a jail cell. Or worse.

For a moment I am tempted to let them disappear into the haze. Let Kai deal with whatever the Law Dog has in store for him without me. I remind myself that Kai Arviso is not my problem and that I barely know him. But then I remember Tah’s face when he called his grandson “Big Medicine” and how he bragged about how he could heal Dinétah. And even if Tah’s wrong, he entrusted Kai’s safety to me. And damn it all, Kai wanted to be my friend.

So I keep my head low, eyes constantly searching to make sure I’m not seen, and I cross the road.

I turn the corner past the shack.

And freeze.

I watch in horror as twenty yards in front of me, Longarm draws back a massive fist and aims for the back of Kai’s head. Kai never even sees it coming.

The impact snaps his neck forward, his chin cutting into his sternum. He stumbles, tries to lift his arms up, but they’re cuffed behind his back. Longarm doesn’t wait for him to recover. He circles around and grabs Kai’s head between his hands. Brings his knee up hard into his face, driving his head back with so much force that for a moment, Kai’s spine seems to bend backward. Then his feet come out from under him and he slams into the dirt. His head strikes the dusty ground so hard it bounces.

Longarm draws back a metal-toed booted foot. He kicks once, twice, a half dozen times, one after the other, striking Kai’s ribs and kidneys. Kai’s body flops and shudders like a rag doll.

I stare stupidly, stunned by the sudden violence.

The only thing my brain is able to process is that Kai hasn’t made a sound. A brutal beating from a man twice his size and he hasn’t cried out once.

And then I see the blood. A lake of red. Spreading around his head.

A flash of memory sears my mind like wildfire. The taste of terror and helplessness flares on my tongue. A flash of the evil born on a cold February night. My vision blurs, then sharpens to something preternatural. Time slows. And expands. K’aahanáanii, Living Arrow. Bloodlust, white hot, flows through my veins, catching fire and spreading.

Longarm’s bent over, the big man breathing hard from his awful labor. He rests his hands on his knees, surveys his work. With a grunt he pushes himself up straight. Takes a few steps back and I watch as his hand goes to his hip and he releases the gun from the holster at his side. Slowly, slowly, his arm swings around. To point the gun at Kai.

I am moving. My own gun is free, gripped two-handed as I run forward. I must scream, because he turns toward me. His jaw slack and his eyes wide with surprise.

I am Living Arrow and I don’t hesitate. I don’t second-guess myself. I don’t worry about being a monster.

I pull the trigger. Once, twice, five times altogether.

Each time putting a bullet into Longarm’s face.