Book Of Tongues (Hexslinger 1)

Grandma gave a sigh, similarly frustrated, and pressed both palms to her eyes, as though to soothe an aching brain. Then continued, after a moment — “When North and South went to War, Rook, you fought, yes? And that young man of yours, too — not because either of you cared one way or another who owned land, who kept slaves, but because you wanted to die and he wanted to live. Because he knew himself born for killing, and saw a chance to trade that skill for a long ride, far away. And neither of you cared who else might be hurt by it — not least because, unaware of your own true natures, you did not see what would happen when one of you was hurt badly enough to come to power.

“Meanwhile, for we Diné, your War was one more theft in a long string of thieveries. Treaties which signed away the land from under us, leaving our horses no place to graze. Two of our sacred mountains taken — as though that could happen! Your greycoats offered us alliance against the bluecoats, but threatened us with death if we did not accept. After, the government men sent Kit Carson to burn us out, calling us traitors. And then, the Long Walk . . . men, women and children driven to Hwééldi like cattle, three hundred miles in eighteen days, on foot.”

She shook her head, her braids’ double shadow lashing the ground. “Bad blood between us, always. Soon my people will march home once more, and there will be war again — a war we will lose. My dreams have shown me. Like the Steel Hats who drove your Lady and her kind under the ground, you will make it so we are forgotten even by ourselves.

“And I might have stopped it — I, and every other Hataalii. When the tribes sent warriors to ask us for help, we might have banded together, even at the usual cost. When they said, These bilagaana do not think of us as people, given how they treat us, so why should we think of them as people?, we might have answered, You speak the truth. Let us go to war. Let us answer force for force, and make such a slaughter as the land has never seen.

“But I am the true fool, here. I told them no: Bilagaana are only human beings, and to kill human beings by magic is the Witchery Way. We would become skinwalkers, Anaye, were we to do so. Yes, you ‘whites’ think no one as good as yourselves. You think you own everything, and care for nothing. Yet you are not evil spirits, or even dumb beasts — you love your children, at least, enough to cry for their pain. And even if you do not, you still piss and shit as we do, and know to go outside your own camps before doing so, for the most part. This is human enough, for me.”

That’s quite the little philosophical dilemma you got yourself entangled in, Rook thought. His ears burned, and his forehead was clammy — was that his own tongue leeching iron between clenched teeth, or a knife? How could he have possibly cut himself so deeply he could feel it in every pore, without having said a single word?

Why the hell’re you even tryin’ to sell me this cart-load of Indian horse-crap? he wondered, shame and hate struggling venomously inside him, two snakes in the same bag. Just go on and kill me, same’s I would you, if I thought I was capable of it. ’Cause I could face that a sight better than I can the prospect of being damn well talked to death.

“Because I do not want to kill you,” Grandma said, to herself, her voice full of a dull sorrow. “If only I could be sure you were fully a monster! If I killed you, it would upset her plans, I know that much — I do not think she could get another man to serve her quite as willingly, as quickly. And so long as you practise only for your own pleasure — or your lover’s — you both come closer and closer to being something anyone can kill without guilt, without even having to cleanse themselves of the deed, afterward.”

Chess’s voice, now, answering for him — distinct as the Lady’s, though licking hot against his opposite eardrum — Yeah? All right, then. Bring it on, bitch. Let them damn well try.

“Yes. And this, too, is a monster’s answer.”

As though resolved, Grandma got to her feet, flicking back her braids. Rook found himself jouncing upwards as well, knees popping painfully.

“Has your Lady told you the full extent of her plans?” she demanded. “I doubt it. Even an uneducated bilagaana Hataalii would not consent, if so. Remember what I showed you — there are things which must not be done, because their cost is too dear. To bring the dead back to life tears a hole in the world’s fabric. It is a great crime, a sin against Balance. What your Lady wants is to remake the world, to poison everything. It will destroy her, and everyone else.” She glared at him, suddenly furious. “Yet you think nothing of helping her, if it gets you what you want.”

Rook took her contempt, which stung, but at least gave him enough strength to speak again. “Yeah? Well — screw you, you crazy squaw! All I ever wanted was her out of my head, away from me, from Chess . . . and I thought you were gonna help me with that, by the by!”

Rolling her eyes, at the very idea: “Oh yes, of course — because it makes such sense that another Hataalii would offer to solve your problems, free of charge. Or that I would ever wish to help any white man, let alone two.”

Put like that, it did seem foolish — and though he overshot her by a foot at least, when she thrust her face alongside his, it was he who felt dwarfed. That marrow-deep suck turned on full, guttering him ‘til he watched himself fade away by shades, like windowpane breath.

You can still stop this, husband, the silver-bell voice reminded him. If . . . you want to.

“So . . . this was a trap, right from the start. Right from that first time you spoke to me.”

Grandma nodded, a touch sadly. “Always, yes.”

“Was always my power you wanted, the whole time, like any other hex — ”

“Your power? Tchah! You have nothing I need. But when I saw in my dreams that if you were not stopped everything would die, how could I refuse that call? This being the only time at which I could stop you from Becoming — ”

“Becoming what?”

And here . . . he heard what she was thinking, two equally strange ideas laid overtop each other, contradictorily at odds. Grandma’s double voice with Miss Rainbow whispering underneath, translating the unspoken:

A god’s lover,

Husband to

two gods at once,

And your own lover’s

Killer.

Fear spiked down through Rook at those last four words, a shooting metallic pain. He looked down at the ashy remains of the conjured cob, and it was almost a relief to realize how sick he still felt at the thought of Chess hurt, dying. Let alone —

“So.” Grandma reached up, prodding his cheek, and brought it away wet. “If you do still care, this much . . . then there may yet be a way to save you both. A way to live in Balance, without one of you devouring the other — if you are willing to pay the price.”

“What . . . price?”