Chapter 6: Dry Bone Valley

(Mastodon)

When Blaire finally falls asleep, dreams drag her away to the desert again. No matter how far or fast she runs, Blaire Naphara always ends up ankle deep in scorching sand and sweltering memories. Desert bareness mirrors her life. Thirty-six years old and no place to lay her exhausted body and comatose soul. Nobody to wipe tears from the face, pain from the heart, or fears from the harassed mind.

No oasis. No green, green grass of home. No peace, or soft place to land. All she has is nightmares. Haunted by voices from the past, and visions of an abrupt vicious end in the near future. It looms above her head like a tornado waiting to erupt. She cannot escape it. Sometimes she turns down the volume, but it’s always there.

In a boiling bed her legs pump madly and feet fly over a million dunes at breakneck speed. Sun bites down on skin and heat rises from the soil to meet her naked feet. Urgent promises of blisters and boils. Once, after such a dream, she woke with aching soles, and in the morning found sand in the bed. And that familiar sound.

The rattle of dry bones stirring her soul.

The desert isn’t what drove her forward with arms flailing like limp noodles beside her. It is something altogether else. Some dark evil birthed in the obscurest recesses of her nightmares. It is coming. A monstrous mountain of flesh hiding an iceberg heart. She fights the urge to turn around. The desire to put a face, a body, a name to the terror burns inside her mind, but her body rules now. Adrenaline pulses in the red rivers of veins, spurring muscles and tendons into ferocious action. Keep running. Carefully place feet. Ignore the spasms in calves, the tight chest fighting painfully for each breath, and a heart thundering to the rhythm of fear.

“I don’t want to die,” she whispers. “Please, Red King, don’t let me die here. I want to see home one last time.”

Hot breath caresses her neck, sending cold shivers down her spine. Blaire stumbles. Falls. Rolls down the dune; head over heels. Down and down she goes deeper into the valley. Blaire gasps, swallowing a mouthful of dusty air. She coughs, tosses her head back and elbows out, trying to stop the mad downward spiral. Her skin burns. A million grains of sand acts like sandpaper, scraping skin off flash.

At last she comes to a stop, face down in the hot sand. She rolls onto her left side, spitting and coughing. With a shaky hand, she wipes at her eyes and mouth, longing for a clean dust-free breath of air, and the ability to see what is coming.

Is this how she’ll die? Will this be her valley of death?

Sand in her mouth. Sand in her eyes. Her head spins. Arms spread wide, hands grabbing sand in fists, looking for a weapon, or an anchor. A rattle of moving bones ringing in her ears, erasing all other sounds. A warning of death. A familiar funeral song.

It has been her song since the terrible day when her child died. His bones weren’t dry, like those of her ancestors. Neither like the bird skeletons, which she gathered with Granddad as a child. In life, the boy’s bones were thin as paper, and light as whispers. In death, they were heavy and cold. They sang to her with sharp tones, like ice clinking in a glass. Short, shrill sounds. His song was something fragile and precious, falling to a stone floor. He shattered like an expensive crystal vase.

She crawls backward, eyes searching the empty dark sky above. There is no help, no hope, and no more time to think about the past or the future. She might not make it to the future, and the past is lost already. Nothing can stop this.

Softly she whispers a spell for rain. Rain to wash away her pain, her fear, her nightmarish pursuer. Her soul longs for the comfort of refreshing water. For that blessing of rejuvenation. For forgiveness from some unknown entity. Something somewhere to give her absolution.

“Please,” she pleads, but still there is no answer.

Blaire tries to rise, but her legs are too weak, too tired. Then it is there. This monstrous thing she feared for ages; this devil from the past. Four feet, black with soot. Fresh scars on the legs. Scrapes running down the length of the forelegs. Blood dripping in fat red splatters onto the hot desert sand. Red on gold. The hot sand soaks the blood as eagerly as any other liquid, be it rain or piss.

She knew the pursuer. Knew his grievance was worthy of her death. Vasiliev Bykov. King of the Bull Tribe. Grandfather to Luka, her departed husband. Great grandfather to her dead son.

He roars above her with the sound of a thousand thunderstorms. Clouds of gray smoke roll from his nostrils. Saliva foam drips from his mouth. Wet blobs fall onto her hot skin, melting with a soft sizzle sound into small puddles. She scrambles backward, the urge to move away springs from a fountain deep within.

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Despite her effort, her feet tangles in snakes. They coil around her legs, anchoring her in front of the angry, snorting Bull like a virgin sacrifice tied to a pole on the edge of a spluttering volcano. But she isn’t a virgin, and too old to be a worthy sacrifice. Her flesh, like her dark, old soul, will be tough to chew and bitter to taste. It won’t satisfy the hunger of this monster.

A terrible pain seizes her useless womb, and she gasps for breath, clutching her torso. Waves of fatigue ride aching bones. Mentally and physically, she has nothing more to give. Blaire Naphara is as empty as heaven, as quiet as a closed church on a weekday. For a moment, the thought of surrender flashes brightly into her mind. Surrender to him. To life’s circumstances. She has nothing to live for, anyway. No one who loves her. No one who will cry when she dies, or even notice her absence from the world.

Except the Bykov Tribe. They will surely celebrate Blaire’s passing. Hell, they might even institute a yearly festival in her honor.

The Bull’s hooves dig into the soil, kicking up dirt behind him. The movement opens deep, long scars in the desert floor at her captured feet. Again, the jangle of bones in her head. A rattlesnake’s lullaby. A macabre child’s pacifier. She glances at the earth beneath him. A shallow grave looms beneath his hooves. Bones peek out at her. So many bones. White and dry. Long dead reminder of loved ones that used to live, breathe, laugh, and love.

The voices of the slain calls to her. Their cries penetrate her heart with the force of a dagger driven by the strongest Bull Tribe warrior. She feels pain for the first time in ages. For too long she closed herself off from emotions. The mental energy required to not feel is beyond her ability. Has been for weeks. Now, she releases all control over the tears that come.

Blaire grabs at the precious bones, fingers closing around two. With shaking hands, she pulls it loose, holds it close to her breast. They vibrate against her, murmuring something she doesn’t understand. Or maybe something she refuses to hear? She doesn’t speak the language of bone, if there is one. If she could, the constant rattling in her head would have stopped years ago. The white bones are warm against her cold flesh. Is she dead and they alive?

The bull snorts fire and smoke, filling the surrounding air with the smell of sulphur. This, then, is what wrath tastes like. She reaches down again, caressing the snakes around her legs with soft fingers. They release her, falling for the charms of her care. Or maybe they finally recognize her as one of their own.

She lays back on the burning bed of sand beneath her, closing eyes against the sun’s rays and the monster’s face. She is ready for death. All she wants for her last rite is to return home once more. After that he can come for his long awaited revenge. Hell, she’ll go to him and he can do whatever he wants to this body. There is only so much turmoil one person can stand.

His breath touches her face. She opens her eyes to find the bull’s head obscuring the entire world from her vision. She sneers, reaches out to pat the wet nose.

“I know,” she whispers. “And you are owed a death. Eye for an Eye, as the Scriptures promise.”

He retreats, but doesn’t leave. Blaire moves slowly toward the place the bull had disturbed with his fierce feet. She drops the two bones into the gaping grave and covers it with the sand he cleaved away earlier. Even as she works, the bones sing to her. She still doesn’t understand the message, but the tone is clear.

Danger. Death. Run.

The large bull doesn’t intervene, just watches her every move. Once the bones are quietly resting again, she stands, wiping her hands on her leather jacket. Around them, the air quivers.

“Death row convicts get a last meal,” she says, looking at him again.

He scoffs at the words, swinging his head away, but still doesn’t speak.

“I want to go home one last time,” she says, trying to sound confident. “One last goodbye to those I love. After that, I’ll come to you.”

“How do I know you’ll do this?” His voice rumbles loudly.

“I’ll make a Blood Oath,” she says.

“As if I can trust you.”

“I am Red King’s granddaughter. You have no reason to not believe me.”

“We’ve been looking for you for years,” he says. “Why would you give up now?”

“Because I’m tired to the bone. This life is too bitter to continue living it. I fear reaching out to speak to my family. I can’t get close to anyone else, since that would place them in danger, too. Constant fear that the police or your spies will recognize me. Even in sleep, I find no comfort. I am ready for whatever happens. I had my vengeance. I won’t deny you yours.”

“You know this is a dream, right?”

“Sure,” she says. “And if it is nothing more than a dream, just humor me. If it is, both of us get what we want.”

“Fine, if you insist.”

“This is my dream, as you say. I can ask whatever I want.”

Blaire retrieves the pocket knife from its hiding place in her boot and flicks it open. She makes a diagonal cut across the fleshy part of her thumb. Blood trickles out. Without another thought, she bends down before the impressive form of the Bull King, and sweeps her thumb across the bleeding wounds on his legs.

“I promise that I’ll come to your compound soon,” she says, “and then you can do whatever you want to me when I arrive.”

“Your death,” he says without remorse. “That is what I want.”

She rolls her eyes, exhales through her nose. “I expected nothing less.”

“Don’t make me wait too long, Blaire,” he says. “I’m running out of patience and nobody can blame me. You should have come to me when it happened, but you ran.”

“Can you at least contemplate that everything I did that night was a response to something that broke me? I truly didn’t take time to think about what I should do at all.”

“Sure,” he says. “But it’s been ten years. You could have made a better choice later. How long do I have to wait for you to come see me?'“

“Ten days at most. Maybe twelve.”

“Ten days. One day for every year I’ve been waiting. Sounds like a ritual. I’ll grant you ten days of grace, nothing more. Please don’t make the wrong decision again. The only reason I’m even agreeing is because of Red King’s memory.”

“Ten days, it is.”

She curtsies to him, and then, without looking back once, walks off into the dusk. A lone ranger. A dead woman walking.