The Summoning God: Book II of the Anasazi Mysteries by W. Michael Gear, Kathleen O’Neal Gear Read Free Book Online Page B

smallest circle. Frozen because someone had sat there for a long time, the heat from his body wetting the leaves, mashing them down. The moisture had frozen solid when the person rose.
    He recognized the head at the top of the inner circle. Running Elk, War Chief of Aspen village. It took little effort to identify the elderly man. His long, gray-streaked black hair had been feathered into a halo around his wrinkled face. Browser suspected that the four heads around Running Elk belonged to the other members of his war party. They’d been killed days ago, probably right after they’d left the village.
    Browser counted thirty-three heads, but there might be more beneath the piled leaves. Below the heads, five headless bodies lay. Distended hands reached out to the shining night. Legs sprawled hideously.
    “Gods, maybe I should believe in Poor Singer’s prophecy.”
    Poor Singer had been a great prophet. He’d said that if the Katsinas’ People could not find the First People’s kiva and return to the underworlds to speak with the ancestors, they would destroy themselves in a terrible war that would last more than two hundred sun cycles.
    “Catkin?” he called softly. “You may come out. They’re all dead.”
    After a time, he looked up, wondering why she hadn’t answered. Perhaps she’d gone further into the forest to scout the area.
    He’d taken four steps toward the bodies when a whisper warned him: “Don’t move. Get down.”
    Browser’s eyes widened. He dropped and covered himself with leaves.
    Catkin’s voice had come from somewhere close, but higher than his position. Had she climbed a tree to get a better view?
    He forced his breathing to slow and listened intently to the sounds of the forest. Through the thin scatter of leaves he could see branches rocking in the breeze. On the far right of his vision, the glistening wall of Cloud People pushed closer, almost over them now. Leaves twitched and the ground seemed to crawl around him. The scent of rot almost gagged him. Lying here amid the dead might shield him; it might also cost him his life. Decaying bodies spawned evil Spirits. They could sneak into a man and consume his flesh in less than a moon. First the slaughtered in the kiva, now this. When he got home, he would have to undergo a ritual cleansing or …
    “People,” Catkin whispered, and Browser saw her.
    A human-shaped shadow moved in the branches almost over his head. As she stretched out, her body blended with the limb where she lay.
    “How many?” he asked.
    “They’re just dark shapes on the trail. Coming toward us.”
    Browser took the opportunity to scoop more leaves over his legs and face, and Catkin hissed, “Be still!”
    He went limp.
    For twenty heartbeats the leaves sighed and jumped into the air, even more frightening now than earlier. If these were not the warriors who had killed the villagers, the sounds and movement would draw them to look, as they had Catkin and Browser.
    A single leaf twirled above Browser, then spun down and landed on his chest, as if to point him out to his enemies.
    “If you haven’t already loosed your club, do it now,” she hissed. “They’re looking into the canyon.”
    He clutched his club over his belly and willed his heartbeat to slow. He could feel their approach, their steps like snowflakes landing on leaves.
    As they entered the aspen grove, Thunderbirds flashed down from the clouds and seared their images onto Browser’s souls. Ten warriors stood silhouetted against a brilliant white web. They wore white ritual capes and knee-high white moccasins. Strange clothing. They couldn’t be warriors, could they? Would any warrior be foolish enough to wear white on a moonlit night?
    The leader, a tall, heavily muscled man, looked around as though surprised, as if he expected to see someone here. The chert studs on his war club glinted as he cautiously stepped forward to survey the murmuring piles of leaves. He seemed to have no face. Only his