“I’m sending Ben up first because of her . . . talents. She’s only going to scout it out and report back. Not engage.” He glares at his niece, who looks sufficiently cowed. “Then you and I will follow, Hoskie. Atcitty and Curley are circling around the other side of the canyon as we speak. They’ll come down from the east.” Atcitty and Curley must be the other Thirsty Boys, the ones on the bikes.
“Check her straps,” Hastiin says to Ben. Ben’s eyes crinkle, and I hold up a hand to stop her.
“Seems straightforward enough, Hastiin. Go up, find the guy, maybe find the Tribal Council rep, dead or alive. Nothing we haven’t done a dozen times in the past month. What’s making you so nervous?”
“What are you talking about?” he says, voice thick with irritation.
“You’re fidgeting like I asked you to tell me how you feel about your mother loving her other sons the best, and you told Ben to check my straps twice.”
Hastiin looks taken aback. He stills for a moment, something I rarely see him do, before he grunts and hawks another mouthful of tobacco on the ground. “It’s nothing.”
“Say it.”
His shoulders tense. “I said it’s nothing. Just some dreams I’ve been having.”
A shiver of alarm dances down my spine, my monster instincts flaring. “What kind of dreams?”
“Did Ben tell you there’s rumors that the White Locust can fly?” he says, a clear attempt to change the subject.
“Okay,” I say carefully. I’m not quite ready to let the subject of his dreams go, but I also want to know more about our bounty. I decide I’m not going to get much more out of him about his nightmares, or whatever he’s been having, so I let it go for now. Decide to concentrate on the issue at hand. “There’s a lot of strange things in Dinétah after the Big Water. It’s weird, but it’s not out of the realm of possibility. Clan powers? Or something else?”
“Nobody’s sure. But they say he’s got other powers too. Dark medicine maybe.”
“Like witchcraft?” I shudder. If that’s it, Hastiin’s right to be nervous.
“Nobody said that. But there’s something not right with him and his people.”
“Who exactly are his people?”
Hastiin squints up at the mesa ridge. “Rumor is there’s a whole mess of them. Converts, I guess.” He reaches into a back pocket and pulls out a folded piece of paper. Hands it over. I open it and read the big block lettering.
ARE YOU READY FOR THE NEXT WORLD?
WILL YOU HEED THE SIGNS?
Below the words is a picture of the four sacred mountains being overcome by a cresting wave. People flee in terror. And hovering above it all, like some sort of dark angel, is a man with locust wings. He points a finger at the drowning people in judgment.
“He seems nice,” I remark.
“Tribal Council would probably let it go if they weren’t stockpiling explosives. Nobody wants a bunch of doomsdayers with the means to enact their madness.”
“Well, let’s go relieve them of their means, then,” I say. “Maybe knock a few heads together. Return the Tribal Council representative to the Tribal Council.”
“They are so screwed!” Ben chirps enthusiastically.
Hastiin looks at me and then Ben, lines creasing his face.
“Well, don’t look so damn happy about it, you two,” he mutters before he slings his pack over his shoulders and motions for Ben to lead the way.
Chapter 4
The path we follow is steep and narrow, an animal trail that wanders up the side of the mountain from the lake. It’s peaceful here before the heat of the day’s settled in, the glint of the water visible through the trees every time we hit a curve in the trail. But it’s steep, steeper than it looked from down where we parked the jeep, and twenty minutes in Hastiin and I are huffing under the weight of our body armor and packs. Ben seems none the worse for wear, despite wearing the same heavy flak jacket we are, as she flits up the trail ahead of us and then circles back every few minutes to let us know we’re still on the right track.
“What do you think of her?” Hastiin asks me, lips thrust forward, pointing toward the place Ben disappeared down the trail in front of us.
I turn sharply. Hastiin has never asked me what I thought about anything expect the caliber of ammo he needs to take down a runner from fifty yards away.
“I mean, she’s good, right?” He nods like a proud uncle, which I guess he is. “Yeah, she’s good.”
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” I say, borrowing a curse from Grace Goodacre.
The old mercenary growls at me. “Forget I asked, Hoskie.”
“I will.”
He stiffens, then hurries his gait, moving away from me at apace.
I roll my eyes, but he can’t see it. “Okay, okay,” I say, jogging to catch him. “She seems good. I mean, she found the trail, right?”
He slows a little, allows me to match his stride. “She did. She’s a natural.”
I open my mouth to remind him of her clan powers, but I shut it when I see the look on his face. Why ruin his familial pride with a few pesky supernatural facts?
He coughs. “Promise me something, Hoskie,” he growls. “No. Don’t give me that look. Just promise.”
“I’m listening,”
Something flashes silver on the path ahead, Ben headed back to us. Hastiin sees her too, and his words come out in a fast tumble. “If anything happens to me, you take care of her. She wants to be a Thirsty Boy, but the Boys won’t know what to do with her. She needs another . . . female. You’re a female.”
“Nice of you to notice.”
“I’m not asking you to take her in, but just look out for her. Be a role model.”
“Now I know you’re delusional.”
“C’mon, Hoskie. You’re not that bad. I mean, you did pay me back that money you owed me, and Grandpa Tah thinks you’re okay.”
“I’m not so sure about that.”
“He understands more than you give him credit for.”
“Whatever. Wait. Is that why you invited me along today? You wanted me to meet Ben?”
He nods.
“Sonofabitch.” So much for some budding friendship. He wants something like everyone else does. I shouldn’t feel that prick of disappointment in my chest, but I do.
“Don’t look so sour,” he says. “I wouldn’t ask you if I did think you were worth—” He cuts off as Ben bounds down the hill to join us.
“Their hideout is just around the next turn,” she announces. “You’ll be able to see the mouth of the cave from there. And there’s someone up there for sure. I saw movement.”
Before either of us can say anything, she pivots on her toes and bounces back the way she came, the white yarn of her tsiiyééł bright in the sun, a glint of silver from her hair clip catching the light.
I blink. How had I not noticed before? How had Hastiin not noticed?
“Ben,” I warn, the dread hitting me fast and hard. I push up the hill behind her, legs turning. But she’s supernaturally light, like the deer clan she draws her power from. She hits the clearing first before I can reach her.
“Your hair clip!” I shout.
“Ben!” Hastiin growls behind me. He must have noticed the silver clip, the same thought hitting him like it did me. “Get down!” he shouts to her. “If you can see them, they can see you!”
Ben skids to a stop. Loose pebbles shake free under her feet. I expect her to backtrack toward us, or at least get down behind the grove of creosote bushes that line the path. But she turns to us, eyes wide with wonder.
“What are you doing?” Hastiin shouts to her in a low whisper. He’s still a good ten feet behind me, his gear rattling as he presses up the mountain.
“Do you hear that?” Ben asks. She turns to us, a beatific look on her face.