Revenant's Storm (The Wicked West series)

"Saint Niçjo was not recognized for his act of service until after his untimely death. When the faith of the righteous Messiah faltered in the wastelands during the final hour of the Blackest Night, the soft green glow of Niçjo's bones signaled the path towards shelter and salvation." Scriptorium of Mojave Saints, 143:78

Jozefo was having the time of his life. He found, at once, that he loved to travel. He had a good sense of direction and he was resourceful. But, most importantly, Jozefo discovered within himself the soul of an explorer.

Jozefo pitched himself a camp that first night and tucked himself into his sleeping bag in such a way that the scorpions could not crawl in. (Though, just in case one did, Jozefo unpacked a tin mug to safely scoop out the errant visitor.) He stared upward into the maw of the universe and felt that, with the earth as his bed and the stars as his guide, he had everything he could ever need. Despite the complete upheaval of his life as he once knew it, Jozefo was content.

It would take time before Jozefo could consider home as the bones of his skeleton and the kiss of the desert sun. Jozefo still felt his military routine like a shadow beneath him. At certain hours, he found himself with the sudden urge to cook or organize his possessions; as though part of himself had never left Colonel Wilson’s Bootcamp at all.

In the beginning, Jozefo thought constantly of his friends. He missed them dearly. He hoped that the gang would be well. That they would not miss him too much. That they would take care. He wished he could have explained to them why he could not stay, but he knew instinctively that he would never have been able to leave at all if he had wavered in that critical moment. He hoped, in some near future, that their paths might cross one day again, very soon.

Jozefo had not been able to sleep, that historic first night.

His homesickness was swept astray by the wash of his exhilaration. Jozefo was too excited, absolutely elated with the adrenaline of his undisputed escape. His future expanded outwards around him and beyond him, and suddenly Jozefo wasn’t the nameless soldier he had fretted over during his mission, but a very young hero on the cusp of a grand adventure. And so, even through the initial hesitation and uncertainty, Jozefo embraced the discomfort of his expanding horizons and learned to love the challenge.

For the first time, laying in the dirt and staring wide-eyed up into the stars, Jozefo asked himself the selfish questions he had never permitted; questions like, “What do I want to do?” and “What might I like to try?” He had no idea where even to start, and he created long lists in his head of activities that he could imagine himself doing and possibly enjoying.

When the lists were too big to fit in his memory, he drew them out in the sand around his sleeping bag with his fingertip. When he woke in the rosy caress of dawn, he was surrounded by his own fantastic and heartfelt promises, like Make a friend wherever you go and Help those in need without delay and Fall in love one day.

When Jozefo had wandered for naught two days with the foolhardy struggle of an unseasoned traveler, he crossed paths with a small group of four. It was sunset, and they were just setting camp for the evening. The travelers warmly welcomed him in their pigeon-tongue Esperanto, and Jozefo recognized that their dialect slightly differed from what he had used, once, long ago, in Tombstone.

The language came back to Jozefo like a warm friend, and he eased into the familiar shapes of its parlance. In its vowels and consonants lay the ancient legacy of paramount tribes who had roamed the basin and revered its majesty. It was this legacy which made the strangers embrace one another as brothers instead.

Jozefo did not recognize the words from his vantage point in history, but the ghosts riding the wind on occasion whispered powerful names to him: Cochise and Hohokam and Navajo and Yuman and Puebloan, amongst others. Tall and ancient and mystic and powerful sentinels hidden between the shadows of the purple mountains.

In his dreams, Jozefo perceived these cultures as the crowned scions of this panorama landscape, and in the depths of lucidity, he saw himself standing proud amongst their stoic ranks. Jozefo knew, in the way that one knows all in dreams, that he belonged there; that he had somehow been displaced from them during the confused and tragic tangle of his life. He had returned, unknowingly, like a seasonal bird guided by the earth's magnetic pulse and an instinct to migrate.

Jozefo wondered at the miracle of shared language and grinned wide at his new companions. The travelers were a family: a kind man named Mikelo and his three children. The family propped up their buckskin wikiup and Jozefo laid out his sleeping bag for the night. Mikelo’s pack of three domesticated dogs sniffed curiously at the campsite and pawed at lizards.

When the camp was set and the fire pit was crackling that evening, they each shared and exchanged what food they had. Jozefo, new to this tradition yet determined to impress the party, eagerly unwrapped the remaining tin of food that he had prepared in the canteen the night he fled. It was the last food that he had on his person, but he offered it freely and happily. Jozefo urged the family to try and anticipated their response.

They smiled and thanked him and each took a bite. The daughters, Safira and Vespera, looked at one another askance. Mikelo coughed politely.

“What is it?” Jozefo asked nervously. He had tied his shell jacket around his head during the heat of the day and had forgotten about it; the tangle of sleeves and fistfulls of hair shot out in random directions. He was always anxious to receive criticism on his cooking.

“It is prepared well,” Petro, the son, explained, not unkindly. “It’s just missing a little flavor.” Petro spooned some of his homemade hominy into Jozefo’s mouth. The soft texture of the corn kernels and the acidity of the lime water danced on his tongue. “Here, try this.”

Jozefo added Recreate Petro’s dish to his growing list of personal goals. After the happy buzz of the potluck conversation, Petro had waved his closed fist over Jozefo’s tin of food like a magician and sprinkled some flakes over it. Jozefo tested it and would never be able to see food the same way again.

Jozefo would meet many new flavors in the coming weeks. Roasted agave heart. Honey sweetened by the fruit of the Catclaw Acacia. Flat breads made from corn and bean flour. Stews thickened with ground acorns. The chef inside of him was in utter paradise.

In that eternal tapestry of life, people like Jozefo strengthened the bonds between threads and could even mend frayed strands. Travelers were naturally drawn towards Jozefo, who never denied the pleasures of friendly conversation and a shared fire.

The further he wandered, the more travelers taught Jozefo how to thrive in the desert: where to dig for water, how to hunt for food, which herbs to season stews with, and which plants could soothe a sunburn or cool the fiery sting of an ant bite. He would eventually trade his fatigues for hand-embroidered linen; his tactical military tools for handmade tokens gifted by kindhearted companions. He made friends everywhere he went. Jozefo foraged as he traveled, never tarrying in one place for long, pockets filled with Arizona walnuts and the berries of the netleaf hackberry. He smiled often and almost forgot of Ralph’s violence in that town so very far away from where he was now.

When the sun was high and merciless in the sky, Jozefo stopped walking to wipe the sweat from his brow and drink from his canteen. It was the only thing he had left to remind him of Colonel’s Bootcamp. Despite his insisted justifications of its practicality, the reason he could not part with it was purely sentimental.

The heat of the day boiled the horizon around him, and the mountains glimmered further in the distance, as though being washed away by a gauzy dream. It was beautiful in all of its treacherous glory.

Jozefo capped his canteen and squinted. He saw something glittering blue and green and orange in the distance, and birds of prey loitering patiently overhead. He found himself walking closer, straining to see, his feet kicking up dust below him until he was sprinting, gasping for breath as he collapsed into the dirt next to the little girl.

She was so small, and when he turned her over, he saw the heat sickness in her flushed cheeks. The glass beads of her traditional garb twinkled and refracted the sunlight into colorful patches around her. She did not respond to his touch.

Colonel had always told Jozefo that, in a dire situation, a brave man would rise to the occasion. This was, historically and logically, untrue. It does not matter if a man is brave or tall or wealthy or left-handed in a dire situation; the only thing that takes precedence is that he is afraid. Fear erases all intentions, and a man is left only with his own devices.

Jozefo did not rise to the occasion, for such a concept is simply not how the real world worked. Jozefo had the most statistically probable reaction he could: he responded with what he remembered from his military training.

Fortunately, Jozefo had been a diligent soldier, and with his new medicinal knowledge, he managed to mangle together a solution. It took hours, so he set up camp for the night right then and there at noon, mixing herbs and rehydrating the unfortunate child. It would not be until well into the night that the little girl would open her eyes and blink up at his worried face, as though waking from a dream.

She tried to speak, and when her voice came out dry, the teenager hurried to find the canteen. The girl tried again. “Mothball?”

Jozefo did not understand. She said it again, and once more, each repetition with rising distress. He tried in Esperanto. “How are you feeling? Where are you from?”

The little girl looked around her, searching the floor, and panicked. She began to cry.

“No!” Jozefo gasped, and fumbled for the canteen again. “Don’t cry! It’s dehydrating!”

Jozefo was at a complete loss until he remembered the little toy and nearly dropped the canteen. “Sorry! One second, please!” He reached into his pack and retrieved the dusty white toy. The girl, who could not see through her mirage of tears, only calmed after the familiar wool was pushed safely once more in her small hands.

Jozefo crouched and anxiously examined her face. He helplessly asked things like, “Are you alright?” and “Can you understand me?”

The child nodded, and Jozefo relaxed a fraction of an inch. “What is your name?”

“Maritza.” She looked down and did not meet his eyes.

She’s shy, Jozefo realized, and smiled reassuringly at her. She smiled a tiny smile back. “My name is Jozefo, but my friends call me Kettle. Do you know what a tea kettle is?”

Maritza shook her head. Jozefo scrunched up his face as he considered, and Maritza wondered in awe if he knew he was making such a silly face. “It’s metal and it heats up water, but most importantly, it whistles.” He whistled loud and she gasped and he grinned. “I’ve been told I do that too, when I sleep.”

“That loud?” Maritza asked, and seemed a little frightened by the idea. “How do you sleep?”

He only shrugged. “When we travel we’ll keep an eye out for a kettle, so that you can see for yourself. We should get you home, though. You’re a far ways out to be all by yourself. How did you get here? Where is your family?”

Maritza instantly became sullen and withdrawn. She would not respond to Jozefo’s questions for the rest of that night. He sighed, worried for the vagrant girl, and extinguished the campfire.

* * * * *

Maritza would not share any details about herself the following day, either, no matter how kindly Jozefo asked.

When he saw that she would not budge, he relented and instead regaled her of the marvels he had seen and the fascinating people he had met and of the things that he had learned.

As the walked Jozefo told Maritza about the legends he had heard in his travels. How the First Man and the First Woman had looked up into the black sky that was far too dark to travel by night, especially when the moon did not shine. How the Man gathered bits of rock-star mica and set about laboriously setting them in the sky as the stars, and of the wily trickster god Coyote who came and snatched some of the rock shards up.

“I will take these for my very own stars,” Coyote said, “and I shall place them where I please.”

The First Man continued his arduous task at his painstaking pace until Coyote exclaimed, “Never mind doing it that way! Why must I wait for this long for your work to be done? Let the stars sit wherever they will!” And Coyote threw the rock-star mica up into the air and blew a strong breath at them until they flew and stuck helter-skelter to the sky in random bunches.

“This,” Jozefo sagely explained, “is why some constellations are carefully fixed and the stars are otherwise scattered in uneven clusters.”

Maritza was enchanted. Her favorite tale was that of the kind-hearted Spider Grandmother, who took the shape of either a timeless woman or a common spider. In her spider shape she lived in her Kiva, the hole with the cool stones deep underground. When she was called upon, she would help by teaching humans how to make and dye and cut yarn and with her medicinal cures. The Spider Grandmother was a wise leader and a good omen, and Maritza liked to imagine that it was she who had led Kettle to find her in her hour of need.

The wonderful stories filled Maritza’s mind, who had a habit of daydreaming, and the fantastical imagery crowded out the worry and fatigue. Maritza did not notice how many steps they had taken that day, or the heat of the sun, but instead lost herself in the whimsy of wandering wherever she fancied.

Maritza decided that wanted to trust Kettle, and secretly asked Mothball what he thought about adding the teenager to their sacred friendship. Mothball agreed, and in a frightened voice, Martiza abruptly told Kettle of the witch, of the saints’ prophecy, of her banishment, and of her mother. Jozefo seemed angered by her story, but he patiently listened and did not interrupt her, even once.

Martiza began to sniffle when she reached the part about Nikolao.

Jozefo had scoffed. “Crying? Over a man with such little honor?”

The two decided to travel together from then onwards. Although Martiza was standoffish at first, they soon they become friends. And then, slowly and as if the most natural thing in the world, they become like family. He carried her on his shoulders when she was too tired to walk and she fed him pieces of pickled prickly pear and enjoyed her newfound height. Ritz and Kettle: two lost ghosts haunting the sands of the graveyard desert.

One night, they broke camp with a large caravan. The caravan consisted of three nuclear families; the makeshift site accommodated nearly twenty and five people. Children ran and played and mothers chided them.

Maritza and Jozefo gathered with the others around the smoke of the bonfires with food in their bellies and laughter in their hearts. The two oathsworn siblings listened with interest as the conversation slipped into the theatrical hush of storytelling.

There would be no stories of the benevolent Spider Grandmother or the silly escapades of the omnipotent prankster Coyote. That night would be a night of ghost stories and demons. Of the kachina, spirits of the tangible world manifested, both good and neutral, some wickedly evil.

The inky night darkened around them as the orator turned to tales of the Skin Walkers; a Navajo war party which had hunted down and slaughtered men and women who had split from an ancient tribe to form a group called The Witchery Way.

“The Witchery Way, you see,” smiled the storyteller, bathed in the menacing hellfire of the cooking spit, “was believed to be a secret cabal of Skin Walkers. The only way to stop them was to behead them and set them aflame.”

Maritza gulped loudly. Her eyes were saucer-wide as she shot a worried look at Jozefo. Her fingers were sticky with the candied sap sweetened by the Catclaw Acacia. The wooden Kachina doll, gifted by a generous elder, sat menacingly on her lap beside Mothball.

“Some say,” the orator eyed each member of the party soberly, “that the Skin Walkers have returned to rob the caskets of the townspeople. There are whispers on the wind of missing bodies and empty graves. If you listen, carefully, the wind whispers of the tombejo de fantomoj,” the orator raked out the words in a slow hiss and even Jozefo found himself anxiously leaning forward to hear the quiet threat, “and it is a warning. For those who seek out the emaciated forms of the Skin Walkers do not return from the black of night.”

For the first time since leaving the Bootcamp, Jozefo knew where his next destination would be. Amidst the fright of the campfire, and with Maritza whimpering at this side, Jozefo could only think that small, precious church in Tombstone.