Crossroads (23 page)

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Authors: Jeanne C. Stein

Tags: #Fantasy, #Contemporary, #Fiction, #General, #Horror

BOOK: Crossroads
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This is useless. The pulse is neither closer nor farther away. I’ll ask Frey when I get back. There’s bound to be a natural explanation.
I turn, looking to the opposite wall.
Drawings, carved into the sandstone. Animals with round bodies and long, pointed antlers. Others smaller, slimmer, with blunted antlers and cloven hooves. Some kind of bird, wings outstretched to catch the wind. And warriors. With mantles of fur and spears with arrowhead tips.
My own heart jumps, my throat swells. The drawings are so primitive, so beautiful. How long have they been here? How many generations of Navajo come to pay homage to their ancestors in the confines of this sacred place?
A rumble and a gust of cold wind hit simultaneously. The ground under my feet shifts, sending me back against the rocks. I land hard, fight to regain balance. A section of the cave wall straight ahead is opening. Wind whistles around stone, loose rock is kicked as footsteps rustle forward.
I push myself back against the wall of the cave. Someone is coming. The path is too narrow for them not to see me when they pass. So I do what any good vampire would do. I scurry up the wall of the cave and look down at them from the viewpoint of a lizard.
Then they file under me, three men. Two younger, dressed in long buckskin robes, a third, ancient and wizened moving between them. He is dressed in a robe, too, adorned with embroidered symbols, and in his hand, he carries a slender rod.
Suddenly, the old one stops.
And looks up.
Right at me.
His eyes flash in the darkness of the cave. “You have come to seek my council, Anna Strong,” he says. “Come down. Join me.”
He moves toward the opening in the cave wall, not waiting to see if I follow or not. The two others don’t even glance my way.
How did he know where I was? How did he know
who
I was?
I’m so startled, my slide down from the perch is far less graceful than my scramble up.
CHAPTER 31
 
A
S SOON AS I ENTER THE CHAMBER, THE DRUMBEAT stops. The elder sits cross-legged on a blanket. The two younger men who preceded him have disappeared. The walls of the chamber look solid and yet the men are gone.
The elder motions for me to sit. I take a place across from him and fold my legs under me. He studies me for a long moment as I do him. His face is bronzed and lined with age. His body is shriveled yet his back is straight, his posture erect.
His eyes catch and hold my gaze. There is so much wisdom reflected in those great, dark eyes that I can’t look away—I don’t want to.
At last, I find my voice. “You are Sani.”
He nods.
“How did you know you would find me here?”
“You found me, did you not?” There is a hint of humor in the deep rumble of his voice. “You are the visitor.”
“But I was told you wouldn’t see me. That the Navajo fear death above all else. I am the walking dead. I did not believe you would see me.”
“I am here now.” Sani reaches out a hand and touches my cheek. “You have a question.”
His touch sends warmth rushing through me. I want to press that hand against my cheek and hold it there. Instead, I force myself to remain still, hoping if I do, his gentle fingers will remain against my skin.
After a moment, he drops his hand.
The warmth remains, giving me the courage to speak. “I am vampire. I come to seek your counsel. I am told you can restore mortal life to the undead.”
“And that is what you wish?”
“Yes. No. I am conflicted. I have a family. A human family. When they are gone, I will be alone in this world. I fear loneliness.”
“And yet you are conflicted.”
“I am called the Chosen One. Destined to resist dark forces in the vampire community that seek to dominate mankind. If I relinquish that responsibility, I risk subjecting mankind to a terrible end. I don’t know why I was chosen to shoulder that burden. I don’t know if I’m strong enough to handle it. But as a vampire, I know I have a chance. As a human, I fear I have none.”
Sani listens, his expressive eyes seem to penetrate through word and thought and reach into my soul. His face is beautiful in its serenity. I am breathless waiting for him to speak.
“You have a good heart,” he says finally. “The heart of a warrior. It is why we meet here. You want to return to the life you knew before. And yet, you are more powerful as vampire and can prevent great evil.”
He lifts my chin with gentle fingers to look into my eyes. “You fear the loneliness you will suffer when your family passes on and you are left behind. But is that not the fate of all who are chosen to lead? Perhaps loneliness is the price one must pay for the opportunity to do great deeds.”
I am caught in the cadence of his speech, spellbound by the light in his eyes. Even the rhythm of my heartbeat seems to slow in anticipation of his next words.
“Throughout the ages, there have been those given a higher calling. Brave men and women forced to face their fears, to sacrifice their happiness, to choose the greater good over personal desires. You are at a crossroads, Anna. If you choose to return to mortality, can you accept the consequences? Could you live with the consequences?”
I squeeze my eyes shut. I know what he’s saying. Can I accept it? Still, there is something else, something darker I need to tell him. “There is another thing I fear. Vampire becomes stronger every day. She senses evil and seeks to destroy it. Sometimes I can control the impulse to kill, sometimes I don’t want to.” I let my voice drop, ashamed to admit the truth. “Killing has become too easy. Human or otherwise, it doesn’t matter.”
“You are too critical of yourself,” Sani says, brushing the air with a hand. “You have a strong sense of what is right and what is wrong. Trust your instincts.” He bends his head closer. “What you must not do is make a hasty decision. You mustn’t let emotions overwhelm you.”
He sits back, his eyes flashing in the dim light. “But there is something more to consider. There is a steep price to pay if you choose mortality. Your body went through changes when you became vampire. The stress on your organs by the reverse transformation is more severe. You could expect to live no longer than twenty years in a continual state of decline. You will not reach old age. Are you willing to bear that cost as well?”
He gathers his robe around him. “I want you to think hard about what you ask of me. You have many things on your mind now. Your friend needs you. Deal with what you must. Later, when you have had time to reflect, look for the wolf. She will reunite us.”
There is a sound behind me and the two robed Navajo who accompanied Sani into the chamber suddenly return. They help him to his feet.
“Go in peace, Anna,” Sani says. “We will meet again.”
Before I have risen to my feet, he is gone.
I run back to the cave entrance, faster than most animals, a hundred times faster than men, and wait to say my farewell.
I neither passed Sani and his companions on the path nor do they appear at the entrance. Did they take the opposite fork? How were they able to get out without my seeing?
Could what happened have been an illusion?
I stare up at the sky, now bluer than blue, and breathe in the sun-soaked air.
No. I carry Sani’s words with me. I feel them like a warm glow in my heart.
I have a decision to make.
But not this minute.
Sani is right.
Frey’s face floats to the surface of my thoughts. He’s waiting for me at Sarah’s home. A friend in need of solace, a child in need of comfort.
This time when I head out, the Jeep has a much easier time of it. The ground no longer feels the need to trap it but cooperates with the crunch of grit under tires that gradually lose their casing of mud.
Sani’s work?
Wind still sputters, raising dust devils that whip ahead then fall behind. This afternoon there are many sounds. Birds screeching, fluttering overhead. Predator and prey scurrying behind rocks. The lone bay of a dog.
But there is something missing.
I no longer hear the distant heartbeat of the mountain.
CHAPTER 32
 
A
S DIFFICULT AS IT IS TO GET SANI’S WORDS OUT of my head, his face out of my mind, I focus on Frey as I near the house. I park a quarter of a mile away, beside scrub brush that hides the Jeep from prying eyes. Then I jog closer.
No cars. Not the one I passed with the elderly couple, not Kayani’s police SUV. I don’t see the van George was driving yesterday, either, so it looks everyone has gone.
Still, I approach cautiously, intending to peek into the window just to be sure the coast is clear.
“I wondered when you’d come back.”
Frey’s voice from the corner of the porch. In the dusk, I didn’t see him shrouded in shadow sitting on the chair Mary occupied when we had our talk. Seems a long time ago now.
I take a seat beside him. His face is drawn, eyes downcast. I detect a whiff of sage and smoke emanating from his clothes. There’s a smudge of something dark—ashes maybe—on his right cheek.
For a few moments neither of us speaks. The grief is his and I won’t intrude. Nothing I have to say will do anything more than add to the ache he must be feeling.
When at last he breaks the silence, his voice is thick, as if sadness has swelled his throat making speech difficult.
“Kayani said he saw you at the lodge.”
I nod.
“He left to find you after—
it
was over. He called a while ago to say you were gone.”
Should I tell him of meeting Sani? No. It is Frey’s time to talk. I smother the spark of anxiety that flares when I think of what Kayani wished to speak—or confront—me about. Letting only curiosity come through, I ask, “Did he say what he wanted?”
Frey’s eyes flash, anger surfacing, the cat close. “Why would you tell him to watch me? To watch George? Why did you go to the lodge in the first place? Who were you looking for?”
I close my eyes, breathe in, search for the strength to tell Frey what I suspect.
When I start to speak, I feel Frey go still and quiet. His eyes bore into me, the concentration of a feline deciding whether the creature he’s studying is predator or prey.
It makes the vampire, too, spring to alert. Still, I manage to keep my voice steady, human, and I tell him all. Who I suspect is responsible for the deaths of the sisters, why I believe it, that Chael is here in Monument Valley.
I finish with my suspicions about George, the things he said to me this morning, his anger because I caused Sarah’s death. “He thinks she died because of what happened at the council. He wants you to
put an end to me
. His words. I believe he’s the one who shot me. He thinks I stand between you and staying here with John-John on the reservation.”
Frey stands, moves abruptly to the porch railing; his hands grip the banister. “You told Kayani all this?”
“Of course not. Seeing how Sarah and George reacted to my being vampire, do you think I’d risk it? If he and George talked, though, George may have.”
Frey shakes his head. “I don’t think they were alone together.” He turns to face me, crosses his arms across his chest. “Chael is here? You’re sure of it?”
“Yes. Though no longer at the lodge. My mistake.” I fill in the details. “I underestimated him. Stupid. I thought maybe you’d know where they might go. Another hotel or lodge in the vicinity?”
“There are a couple of possibilities. I’ll check them out tomorrow.”
“
You’ll
check them out? You don’t even know what he looks like.”
“But I do know what Judith Williams looks like.”
“No, Frey.” I jump to his side. “She might recognize you. It’s too dangerous.”
The pulse in Frey’s neck throbs as he clenches his jaw. “No. She won’t see me. I’ll make sure of that.”
“At least let me go with you.”
“No. You have to stay with John-John. He likes you. He needs to have a woman near him. It’s what he’s used to.”
That’s not the reason he wants me to stay. At least not all of it. “I know what you’re thinking but you can’t take him on by yourself. He’s too old and too powerful. And with Judith on his side, it’s two to one. John-John can’t lose a father, too.”
Frey’s anger explodes with a sound half animal, half human. A primal snarl from the panther. “He is responsible for Sarah’s death.”
I grit my teeth, match his anger with my own. “
I’m
responsible for Sarah’s death.” The words linger on the quiet night air, a release of guilt and acknowledgment that’s been building inside since we first heard of the
accident
. “Me. I brought this nightmare to you. I won’t let you risk your life. I’ll stop you. You know I can.”

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