Lani had taught Gabe that the I’itoi legends in particular were winter-­telling tales and were only to be told between the middle of November and the middle of March. Most of the time Gabe was careful to abide by that rule. Sometimes, when it was July and someone who would not live to see another November wanted to hear the story of Old White-­Haired Woman or the story of the Peace Smoke, Gabe would tell the story anyway. It didn’t seem to him that I’itoi, the Spirit of Goodness, would mind that in the least.

Only when requested to do so did Gabe visit the rooms of individual patients—­the injured, ill, and dying. Even though he had not yet reached cheojthag—­manhood—­and was not yet a fully grown medicine man, the families of patients told Lani that there were times when having Al Siwani—­Baby Medicine Man—­visit their loved one was better than having no medicine man at all.

Lani had marveled at how, sitting in quiet hospital rooms and without even having access to her sacred divining crystals, Gabe had often known long before anyone other than the doctors about who would live and who would die. He talked to Lani about those things sometimes, but even then he had instinctively known to keep from mentioning them to the ­people involved. And when Lani had asked how he knew those things, he could never explain it other than shrugging his shoulders and saying, “I just know.”

Then, for reasons the divining crystals couldn’t or wouldn’t tell her, Gabe had started pulling away. He had stopped coming to the hospital. He had started distancing himself from her. And now, much to Lani’s despair, her connection to Gabe seemed to be severed. He had walked away down the mountain, leaving her behind along with her last-­ditch chance to save him from whatever was pulling at him. It was easy, sitting on the mountain, to ascribe what was happening to the Bad ­People—­PaDaj O’odham—­who had come up out of the South to steal the Tohono O’odham’s crops and eventually to do battle with I’itoi himself.

So was that what this was all about? Lani wondered. Were the four José brothers with all their family troubles—­a dead father and an ailing mother—­the cause of all this? Were they somehow a modern-­day equivalent of the PaDaj O’odham? And, if so, what did Lani have to do to extricate Gabe from their grasp?

Tossing one more piece of wood onto the fire, Lani slipped into her bedroll. Staring up at the stars, she remembered the story Nana Dahd had told her—­the one about the terrible time when Andrew Carlisle, the evil ohb, had captured both Nana Dahd and Lani’s brother, Davy, and held them prisoner in the root cellar. While there, Nana Dahd had summoned I’itoi to help them by singing a chant—­a healing chant—­speaking in the language of the Tohono O’odham. Lani had heard the chant often enough that she remembered every word, the same way one remembers a cherished lullaby. And it made her smile to know that while the song had been totally opaque to Andrew Carlisle, Davy had heard the words, understood them, and acted upon them:

Do not look at me, little Olhoni.

Do not look at me when I sing to you

So this man will not know we are speaking,

So this evil man will think he is winning.

Do not look at me when I sing, little Olhoni,

But listen to what I say. This man is evil.

This man is the enemy. This man is ohb.

Do not let this frighten you.

Whatever happens in the battle,

We must not let him win.

I am singing a war song for you,

Little Olhoni. I am singing

A hunter’s song—­a killer’s song.

I am singing a song to I’itoi,

Asking him to help us and guide us in the battle

So the evil ohb does not win.

Do not look at me, little Olhoni,

Do not look at me when I sing to you.

I must sing this song four times

For all of nature goes in fours.

But when the trouble starts,

You must remember all these things

I have sung to you in this magic song.

You must listen very carefully

And do exactly what I say.

If I tell you to run and hide yourself,

You must run as fast as Wind Man.

Run fast and hide yourself

And do not look back.

Whatever happens, little Olhoni,

You must run and not look back.

Then, as seamlessly as if it were a new track on a much-­loved CD, the next war chant returned to her as well, with every word and every nuance intact. And as Lani recalled the words, she was once again inside Betraying Woman’s hidden cavern beneath Ioligam, trapped there with her own personal evil ohb. Mitch Johnson, deputized by Andrew Carlisle to kill her, had been waiting for Quentin Walker—­the brother who was not her brother—­to return. It was while she and Mitch waited in an ugly, lingering silence that Lani had finally understood what would happen: once Quentin returned, Mitch Johnson would kill them both.

Lani had closed her eyes then, making the darkness of the cavern even darker. And now, sitting outside by the fire, she closed her eyes again. As she did so, all the sensations of that long-­ago time came spooling back to her along with the words to the chant. She could smell the sharp, acrid stink of Mitch Johnson’s sweat; she could feel the calming touch of the damp soil against her skin; she could hear, somewhere in the far distance, the tiny drip of water; then suddenly and overhead, she felt the gentle touch of a bat’s wing, ruffling her hair and telling her what she must do:

Oh, little Nanakumal who lives forever in darkness,

Oh, little Nanakumal who lives forever in I’itoi’s sacred cave,

Give me your strength so I will not be frightened,

So I will stay in a safe place where the evil ohb cannot come.

For years Betraying Woman has been here with you,

For years your Bat Strength has kept her safe,

Waiting until I could come and set her free

By smashing her pottery prison against a rocky wall.

Keep me safe now, too, little Nanakumal,

Keep me safe from this new evil ohb.

Teach me to be juhagi—­resilient—­in the coming battle

So this jiawul—­this devil—­does not win.

Oh, little Nanakumal who lives forever in darkness,

Whose passing wings changed me into a warrior,

Be with me now as I face this danger.

Protect me in the coming battle and keep me safe.

Even as Lani had sung those words long ago, with Mitch Johnson listening and not comprehending, she had realized that the chant had contained words that were hers and not hers, all at the same time. Her ­people believed in singing for power, and her words had come unbidden from some ancient magic place, the same place Rita Antone had tapped into as she sang her warrior chant to Davy Ladd even longer ago. It was no surprise that the words gave Lani comfort now—­the same kind of comfort and strength they had given her in that earlier time. Somehow she knew that in I’itoi’s world, those two other times and this time were all the same.

Realizing she was growing drowsy, Lani looked at the fire and resisted the temptation to add another log. The fire had burned long enough that there would be plenty of coals to last until morning. Then she snuggled into her bedroll. The ground may have been hard beneath her body, but she was too tired to notice.

CHAPTER 13