A little over four months later, we were still in Juneau ourselves, searching, asking questions, and coming up empty. It occurred to me that every time Sailor and I had ever gone searching for something or someone, they always became impossible to find. In December, another worry clouded my mind. We learned from the newspapers that the Japanese had taken over Nanking and a massacre of the civilian population was rumored to be taking place. My singular thought and worry was Opari. I knew she was in extreme danger and I could do nothing about it. Sailor reminded me Opari was much more acquainted than were the Japanese with the people and landscape around Nanking. She would be able to intuit who to see and where to go well ahead of the Japanese. “And do not forget, Zianno, she carries one of these,” Sailor said. He reached inside his shirt and slowly extracted the Stone, which hung from a leather necklace. I knew he was right, and tried to put it out of my mind, but my dreams became continually more restless and filled with horrific images for weeks.
On a tip from a salmon fisherman, we flew by bush plane to the town of Sitka, where we spent the rest of the winter. The days were short, wet, cold, and dark. We traveled on to Valdez on another tip, but found no current or reliable information on Tomizo Hiramura, though many people had recollections of him. From Valdez, we followed leads to several small coastal towns and a few villages. By the end of summer, we were staying in Seward. We had no luck in Seward either; however, they did have an excellent local semipro baseball team and I went to every home game. We lived the better part of the next year on, in, and around Kodiak Island, one of the most beautiful and isolated places we’d been. We met fishermen from all over the world, including Russians, Norwegians, Japanese, and native Aleuts. Tomizo was not among them.
Moving around Alaska at that time was not too difficult for two twelve-year-olds on their own. Alaska was still a territory and not yet a state, which meant most things were a little more wide open. Sailor and I often drew stares, but never a question. Most Alaskans had seen stranger things than the two of us.
The country is so big and so wild it is difficult to describe in any language. It must be experienced. Mountains and coast, coast and mountains, Alaska seems to never end. From Kodiak Island we went to Kenai, based on a conversation we had with a potter. He showed us a beautiful bowl he had been given. It was decorated in an ancient style the potter called jomon. I turned to Sailor and asked, “Ainu?” Sailor nodded yes. The bowl also had “Sak” etched into the base.
That same night, there was a display in the skies over Kenai like I had never seen before, even in Norway. The northern lights shimmered and danced above us in five, six, seven shades of blue and no other color—only infinite folding curtains of blue, opening and closing all night long across the sky. Sailor and I walked along the shoreline, watching and talking about the Meq. Sailor spoke at length of missing friends and family. He shared memories of Eder, Baju, Unai, Usoa, and also related several adventures he’d had with my own mama and papa, Xamurra and Yaldi. We discussed Nova’s dreams and Sailor showed deep concern for Nova. We talked again about the stone spheres and Sailor asked a few questions about where they’d been found and by whom. At some point, I brought up the Fleur-du-Mal.
“Why does he do it, Sailor?”
“Do what, Zianno?”
“All of it…every despicable act! Murder, torture—name it. Why does he hate so much and so many? What happened to him? And why is he so obsessed with the Sixth Stone? Why doesn’t he believe Susheela the Ninth and just let her go?”
“Firstly, he cannot let anything go. There lies his true problem. Secondly, you have asked two questions, Zianno. It is ironic both questions seem to have the identical answer.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Do you recall in Norway when Zeru-Meq confronted his nephew?”
“Yes. Zeru-Meq told him he knew why Xanti wanted the Sixth Stone and he ‘saw what he saw.’ I have always wondered what he meant and what it was Zeru-Meq ‘saw.’”
Sailor paused and looked up again at the northern lights. He turned his star sapphire between his thumb and forefinger. “I also wondered these things. Once we left Norway, I confronted him directly and asked him to tell me what he had ‘seen.’ If Zeru-Meq had not been the one to tell me, I never would have believed it. But, alas, Zeru-Meq never lies.”
“What did he see?”
“And Xanti was only twenty-two months old at the time.”
“Sailor, what did Zeru-Meq see?”
“In my opinion, he saw nothing less than the birth of the Fleur-du-Mal!”
I looked at Sailor dumbfounded. “I’m lost. Please…start at the beginning.”
“Yes, of course,” he said, glancing up at the sky once more. Dawn was at least an hour away and the northern lights still danced above us, but we both knew a fog bank would soon be creeping into Cook Inlet and within thirty minutes everything would be obscured. “I suggest we return to the hotel room,” Sailor said. “I shall relate exactly what Zeru-Meq witnessed and then you divine its meaning. I tell you, Zianno, this incident explains everything.”
An hour later, Sailor had finished talking. He was sitting in the one chair the room had to offer and I sat on the edge of my bed. Like Sailor when he had heard the story, I could barely believe it. It sounded impossible, especially for a twenty-two-month-old Xanti Otso. The incident had occurred 2,128 years ago in Sabratha, Xanti’s birthplace. His father’s name was Matai and he was on the run from the invading Romans. Matai was Meq, but he had also been a known assassin for Hannibal and other Carthaginian generals. Hilargi, Xanti’s mother and Zeru-Meq’s sister, had asked to leave Sabratha and escape to Spain as soon as possible. Zeru-Meq was to assist them down the coast to a small village where he had arranged a clandestine crossing to Spain with a Basque fisherman. Hoping to surprise his sister, he arrived in Sabratha a day earlier than expected. As he approached the small house, he heard a woman screaming. It was Hilargi. Zeru-Meq rushed inside to see Matai standing over Hilargi, who was on the floor, bleeding and dying with a knife plunged deep in her throat. Rose stems and rose petals were scattered around her. Matai’s face and hands were covered with scratches. Xanti sat on the floor ten feet away. In his hands, he held two wooden toy blocks Zeru-Meq had made for him. He was staring without emotion at Matai. In the next instant, a kitchen knife came flying through the air and plunged into Matai’s throat. He fell to his knees, then looked once at Xanti and collapsed on top of Hilargi, rolling over and gagging. He died within seconds. Zeru-Meq glanced down at his nephew, but Xanti said nothing and did nothing. He simply stared at Matai. No one had thrown the knife. Zeru-Meq is confident there is only one explanation—Xanti did it with his mind. For what reason, he never found out. The boy never said a word then and he has never used telekinesis again, but Zeru-Meq thinks Xanti has been driven ever since by an insatiable desire to regain this ability and power. Zeru-Meq says Xanti believes the Sixth Stone will give it to him.
“Do you not see the pattern, Zianno?” Sailor asked. “The Fleur-du-Mal seeks dominion over everything and everyone. He has developed acute abilities and skills which no other Egipurdiko Meq has ever possessed, before or since. He flaunts all things Meq simply because he can, as well as curses and spells, such as the one in Mali—the ‘Lie’ and the ‘Prophesy.’ However, all this aberrant and perverse ambition is driven by his true desire and obsession for the one ‘ability’ he craves more than all others—telekinesis. It is because he has lost this ‘ability’ and cannot regain it that his madness was born, thus the Fleur-du-Mal.”