River Marked (Mercy Thompson #6)(56)
Author: Patricia Briggs

The Inuit woman shrugged. "There will always be fools, and the river devil can be persuasive to the minds of men."

The sharp-featured woman.

"Cherokee," I said, suddenly certain I had it right. She smiled a small secret smile, the kind that always makes me want to smack Bran. "If you like." She tilted her head, and said, "River Devil is Hunger because living between worlds for those without a hold in either is costly. She must consume food for both her aspects: meat for the flesh and for the spirit."

The Hopi woman continued, "All life is rife with possibilities. Seeds have possibilities, but all their tomorrows are caught by the patterning of their life cycle. Animals have possibilities that are greater than that of a fir tree or a blade of grass. Still, though, for most animals, the pattern of instinct, the patterns of their lives, are very strong. Humanity has a far greater range of possibilities, especially the very young. Who will children grow up to be? Who will they marry, what will they believe, what will they create? Creation is a very powerful seed of possibility."

The Plains woman who was not Lakota, Crow, or Blackfeet said, "River Devil feeds on possibilities."

Inuit Woman reached up to place her hand on her sister’s shoulder. "She feeds on the death of those possibilities. For this reason, she must feed upon people rather than animals, animals rather than plants. But best of all, she loves to feed upon children."

"She feeds on the end of possibilities," corrected the Plains woman–Shoshone, I decided. She looked Shoshone to me. She smiled as if she’d heard me think it aloud. It was a big smile, like her brother’s. "The greater the possibilities, the better her hunger is sated. When she is full, she must digest her prey both here in the world of spirits and also there in the world of flesh. While she is doing that, she is vulnerable."

"Coyote and his kind–Hawk, Bear, Salmon, Wolf, Thunderbird, and others–they have more possibilities than even a newborn child." The Cherokee woman turned in a graceful circle as if to encompass all that Coyote and those like him were. "If Coyote can persuade enough of them to allow River Devil to consume them, they may be enough to force the river devil to overeat. And she will be helpless until she digests them all."

"While she is helpless, someone needs to kill her." The Inuit sister looked at me with her big dark eyes, and I knew, with a sinking feeling, who they were talking about.

"What about Fred or Hank?" I asked. Adam couldn’t do it. His strength might make him a better candidate, but werewolves don’t swim. I wouldn’t risk Adam to the river.

"They are vulnerable to the river devil’s mark," she said. Then she paused and addressed my unvoiced thought. "I do not know about the werewolf. Alone, he would be like the others, but his pack might keep him safe . . ."

"Or she might gain the whole pack." The Hopi woman shook her head. "No. That would not be wise. Nor is water the werewolf’s element for all that it is an element of change."

Shoshone Woman said, "She must die, then. As she eats, she grows in power. If she does not die before she digests such a meal as our brother will provide, she will be much, much more destructive than she is now."

"What about an airstrike," I said. "Or nuclear weapons. I know people who might be able to get the military in on this." Bran could. He might not be out–but he knew how to get things done when he wanted to.

Hopi Woman shook her head. "No. Modern weapons will not harm her. Only the most simple thing, a symbol of the earth that opposes her water: a stone knife."

"Our time is short now," Cherokee Woman said. "You must go back."

Shoshone Woman touched my cheek. "Tell our brother he is wise, that we have no further words of wisdom to add to his."

"He says that you are not speaking to him," I said.

She laughed, but it was a sad laugh. "Coyote doesn’t usually lie, but sometimes he forgets. It is he who is angry with us. We gave him advice he did not like, and he got mad."

Cherokee Woman narrowed her eyes at me. "We told him nothing good could come of letting Joe Old Coyote take the Anglo woman to his bed."

Inuit Woman smiled and touched my leg. "Obviously, we were wrong."

"Coyote is like the river devil," I said. "Right? He walks in both places. So why doesn’t he eat everything in sight?"

"Coyote walks in one world at a time," Cherokee Woman told me. "He can do this without being trapped because we wait for him here, and you and his other descendants anchor him there."

"Coyote understands that the Universe is all one." Shoshone Woman’s voice was indulgent.

"Coyote," said Hopi Woman dryly, "doesn’t much worry about understanding anything, which is why he understands so much."

"What happens when the river devil eats them? Coyote and the others." In the stories, Coyote died and was reborn the next day, but there was an air of resignation that clung to these women that hinted at something more dire this time.

They exchanged looks that I could not read.

"We don’t know." Inuit Woman stared out into the fog that surrounded us. "As I told you, it is not given to us to know the future. We are merely wise advisors."

"It may be that this is the last time for Coyote to walk your world," said Cherokee Woman in a low voice. "So much has changed, it is impossible to know what those changes mean."

"There are some who do not walk either world any longer." Shoshone Woman’s eyes glistened with tears. "River Devil is of both worlds and so could send them back scattered into the universe."

"Do not worry about that which cannot be changed." Hopi Woman sat on the ground and patted my tennis shoes. "Even if Coyote is not reborn with the morning sun, there is always hope of a new dawn. Come now, sisters, it is time to send her back."

"I think she looks like me," said Shoshone Woman. "What do you think?"

AND HER WORDS STILL RANG IN MY EARS WHEN I found myself back where I had started. Time had passed–I could tell because Jim was kneeling on the rug feeding tobacco leaves into the fire. He sang, the words unintelligible to my ears, but not foreign. Adam licked my nose, then nipped it–he’d noticed I was gone, then. I’d ask him later if my body had disappeared with me or if it had just waited there for me. I nuzzled him to let him know I was fine.

One of the hawks–Fred and Hank were hard to tell apart when they were human; as hawks I figured I might have a fifty-fifty chance–fluttered his wings and cried out softly. We were apparently bothering him.