Sky Coyote (20 page)

“Well, sure, but not at a party,” I explained. “Hey, I can’t fool you. You know that savages eat meat sometimes, and you know we Old Ones do too now and then. But, my God, you don’t think we’d do it where anybody else could see! At a
party?
In front of other people? Gosh, even the Chumash would think that was crude. No, seriously, sir, the only animals we’ll be eating will be pretend ones.”

“Oh. Okay.” There was actual comprehension in his eyes. He knew about hiding appetites where nobody could see them. I wondered what the games in his private entertainment console were like. “I guess that would be all right.”

“Thank you for understanding, sir.” Lopez guided his hand to the signature line. “This will help ensure that the mission is a tremendous success. Your superiors in the Company will be very, very pleased with you.”

“That would be nice,” he replied, obediently signing. “But it’s more important to be sure no animals die.”

It dawned on me then that he was actually standing up for a principle here, not just being ignorant and squeamish. I felt bad about lying to him, for a second or two. Lopez caught up the plaquette as soon as it had registered Bugleg’s signature. “Authorization cleared! Let the festivities commence.”

I
T BROUGHT BACK MEMORIES, LET
me tell you, hurrying through the dark canyon to the distant lights, with smoke and excitement on the wind. Party time! Behind me on the trail, they might have been tribal members and not anthropologists, all giggly with anticipation. How often are you invited to go back to the first days of the world, when evening dress consisted of feathers and beads?

The Humashup Municipal Sports Field had been co-opted for the party, neatly swept and fenced around with woven tule screens to keep out the wind. Only the side facing the sacred enclosure was open, framed by a doorway of whale ribs painted red, and a big fire burned there to light the dancing ground. Outside the field were cooking fires where people were lined up for helpings of barbecued venison and abalone-shell bowlfuls of acorn mush. One or two from each family were sent on the line to get as much as they could carry back to the others, who had staked out places with picnic blankets and woven drinking jugs. Everybody stopped what they were doing, though, to stare as we made our entrance: Sky Coyote and his spirits!

I wore my usual fur ensemble, but the rest of the team members hadn’t been able to bring themselves to tough it out in green makeup alone, so they were wrapped in an interesting assortment of capes and cloaks of European design.
Eclectic
wasn’t a strong enough word for the combination of cottonwood fiber G-strings and Florentine velvet brocade.

“Children! Good to see you again.” I held out my forepaws as we swept in. “I hope we’re not late?”

“Not at all, Sky Coyote, not at all.” Sepawit rose from his party blanket, handing off a greasy toddler with a half-chewed rib bone to Mrs. Sepawit. “Please! We’ve saved a place of honor for You, here by the banners.” He stepped through the crowd, escorting us to our seats. People scrunched over to make way for us, and there were several admiring and envious comments on the fashion parade. “We’ve even set out a buffet for You, here in the corner. Plenty of venison and side dishes, courtesy of the ladies of the Eelgrass Gatherers’ Union, and lots of jugs of manzanita punch and chia tea. If there’s anything else we can provide, we’ve got servers ready to fetch it for you immediately.”

What a fabulous view! Imarte rhapsodized. Look at this, look, we’re right in line with the sacred enclosure!

“This place pleases us,” I announced. “Be seated, spirits. Sepawit, have I got time for a whizz before the ceremonies commence?”

“Certainly, Sky Coyote. This way.” Sepawit and I stepped away discreetly through a break in the screen wall to where a latrine trench had been dug, special for the evening’s festivities. We faced out into the dark and addressed the trench.

“Looks like everybody’s in a celebratory mood,” I remarked.

“They’re thrilled,” replied Sepawit. “Nervous, You know, because this isn’t like performing for some other village’s visiting
dignitaries. I’m sure You’ve seen better dancing in the World above This One.”

“You’d be surprised.” I scanned the dark in infrared, spotting our security techs silent and motionless out there in the night. “Some gods don’t care much for fun. My group are all set to enjoy themselves, though!”

“I think they’ll be pleased with what the kantap’s prepared,” Sepawit told me. “They’re really quite talented, our guys, remarkable artists, considering they’re businessmen too. Um … by the way, Coyote. I suppose You’re aware of everything that’s going on in this world … You’d tell me if we were in any danger from, ah, other tribes, wouldn’t You? Like for instance those people we talked about?”

“The Chinigchinix cult? Of course. They can’t hurt you, Sepawit, not with me here. What’s got you worrying?”

“Oh, just that I’m overdue for a report from my Speaker. I sent him south to gather facts … He should have returned by now, that’s all.” Sepawit finished and stepped back from the edge. I felt bad for him. He was looking out into a darkness a lot blacker than the night, from the edge of a pit much deeper and filled with nastier stuff.

“I can’t answer for your Speaker, Sepawit. You know that bad things happen. You’ve got my word for it, though: I’ll keep
you
safe, you and everybody here tonight,” I told him.

“I believe You,” he sighed, rubbing where his ulcer was hurting him.

We went back in, and Sepawit picked his way through the crowd to the fire, where he raised both hands for attention.

“Everybody? We’re just about ready to start”—assorted cheers from the multitude, spirits and villagers alike—”so settle down and get comfortable. Before we begin, I’d like to remind all of
you to thank the Civic Works Committee for the great job they did on fixing up the hoop field at such short notice. And let’s not make their job tomorrow any more difficult by leaving trash around, all right? Wherever you’re sitting, be sure to look around you when you leave and pick up any bones or leaf wrappings or whatever you may have discarded in the course of the evening and make sure you throw them in the latrine where they belong. Agreed?” There were grumbles of assent from various quarters. Somebody far to the back yelled:

“We want a SHOW!”

“Yeah!!” shrieked one of our anthropologists gleefully. I turned around with a stern look. Got to preserve cosmic order, after all. Everybody took the hint and focused attention on the sacred enclosure, except for MacCool, who was solicitously offering Mendoza a bowl of acorn mush. She was declining politely, looking through him.

“All right, all right!” Sepawit looked toward the sacred enclosure for a cue. “Just sit tight, folks, because I think—are we? We are? Here we go!”

He stepped back into the shadows as a drumming cadence began and was picked up by a shrill chorus of whistles. From an unseen place the music grew louder, until it was an alert, a warning, like flashing lights. Someone invisible threw something on the fire, and colored flames leaped up. Out of the darkness came a long low growl, a sound to raise the hackles on an old operative who remembered cave bears. Hold on: where was it coming from? Was it drooling out of the shadows behind us? From over here? Over there?
Had something come down from the hills?
Every member of the audience shivered and crouched down, but nobody could look away from the leaping flames.

There! It was a bear, shambling forward out of the enclosure. It was a grizzly, turning his head this way and that to smell the
air. He shrugged his humping shoulders and muscled up on hind legs, weaving from side to side. You could see the costume feathers and Nutku’s face, you knew it was only him, but there was another dimension here. In cities, in theaters in Europe at this very moment, with carriages drawn up outside and grease-painted players on dusty boards, it would be called suspension of disbelief. Here it was something a lot more profound, and it tugged at my heart painfully.

It was a grizzly, and it was the power in Nutku’s shoulders, and it was the thing you
think
might be a bear when you’re all alone on the trail and you’ve caught a glimpse, maybe, of a profile in the trees. It was that thing in the wild that makes your blood run cold. Though it fascinates, too, because you can’t look away from what might be—what is—Death Himself standing on hind legs.

And here came crouched things, moving slow, shaking rattles of turtle shell in perfect time with the weaving dance of the bear. First one, then another, then a third set up a droning hum, three harmonic tones blending in an eerie wail. It rose in pitch. It became a melody with chanted words.

The words trailed away, but the tune grew louder now and the music stepped up its rattling pace. The audience was frozen in place, even we immortals, because Bear was pacing among us. We could see the glint of his little malignant eyes, and those weren’t costume feathers brushing us but rank fur. The clumsy shuffle wasn’t funny, didn’t make you think of country fairs and fiddlers, oh no; it was scary as hell, because we all knew it wasn’t old Nutku in there, it was a dark god.

The menacing flutes and rattles led him through us, in and out of the rows of people, slowly questing after a scent, turning and turning his head to sniff the wind. Just about at the point where the tension was becoming intolerable, the music changed. Or was it the wind that changed? A whole string of little high notes made Bear lift his head: he’d caught the scent at last. He began to edge his way back out of the crowd, following that shrill refrain, and you could smell the relief in the audience as he shambled with deliberate steps for the arch of whalebone.
Chac chac chac
, the
rattles led him on;
chac chac chac
, he nosed the doorway; he was almost through, the whistles very faint now; then abruptly, the fire blazed up as he whirled to stand, silhouetted black, claws up and threatening, and the flutes screamed out, and there was a thundering roll of the drums.

And blackout!

I gasped, able to breathe at last.

What had happened was that the kantap’s special-effects genius had thrown a cover over the fire, a big woven lid lined with wet moss, and held it there a second in the darkness and confusion while Nutku made his exit. Then it was yanked away, and there was a dim light from the rekindling flames and a lot of smoke and coughing. People were laughing or sobbing with the release of tension. Stiff limbs were stretched. Old grandmothers with apple cheeks and droopy breasts shifted sleepy babies, a bunch of adolescent boys near the front whooped with sudden laughter like honking geese.

When the smoke had cleared and the buzz of talk had died away, a figure was revealed sitting alert and upright in the whalebone doorway. There were a lot of shy giggles and sidelong looks at me, then, because it was Coyote sitting there. It was Kaxiwalic, actually, in an eared hood with a long dog snout tied on over his nose, and in a little fur breechclout with a long tail attached behind and a long stuffed-fur penis attached in front.

I just grinned and laughed. Kaxiwalic waited until the snickers had died down before speaking.

“Eeevening
, neighbors,” he whined. “Got any food?” Which was apparently an old routine, because with delighted yells the audience began to hurl garbage at him. Gnawed bones and mussel shells clattered through the air, and he made a show of scampering about on all fours to retrieve them. He had the dog moves down perfectly: I could have learned a thing or two from him,
especially when he leaped straight up to catch a flying deer rib in his teeth. He got a standing ovation and applause from my fellow immortals for that one.

“Thank you, thank you.” He waved the bombardment to a stop. “You’re all so kind! And what a turnout we have tonight, huh? What a lot of distinguished visitors from the World Above. Or is that a forest of trees?” An unseen drummer struck a double note you’d have sworn was a rim shot. Kaxiwalic peered through the darkness at us, shading his eyes. “No, no—some of them have tits. Definitely not trees. And look! There’s my very own old Grandfather Sky Coyote! Grandpa, how’s it going? Long time no see! Mama says you can come home now, by the way—the girl’s brothers have all died and the baby was born without a tail!”