Chapters (41)
- PART ONE
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- PART TWO
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- PART THREE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- THIRTY-FOUR
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
He said, “It shouldn’t take more than half a day to get up to Chaco.” Arlen had suggested they try it and Calliope immediately agreed. It was a spiritual center for the people she’d been studying her whole life. Bisabuela had taken her to the sun dagger. And she’d been hearing her voice since the worlds branched apart, that light on the bridge, merging in her mind with Bisabuela’s voice on the mesa. Arlen had confirmed her suspicion. Equinox, the middle of time. And Chaco Canyon had been the Middle Place for the Ancients. Calliope had found her path. The bridge seemed to have split open in the fall equinox. Best they could figure, the spring equinox was coming March 20—three days away, give or take. Time was strange here; it didn’t work the way it worked in the previous world. It wasn’t faster or slower, didn’t evince any perceptible difference just felt different, thinner, maybe, stringier. Chance continued, “Even so we need to get moving. We can’t account for weather or other … events.”
“You don’t think there’s anything else like the Suuke out there?”
“This is Zuni land now. Could be. You saw how many ko’ko there are.”
“They aren’t all demons though.”
“No, they’re almost all benevolent, in their own ways. But we still should be careful. It’s not just ko’ko I’m worried about …” He sighed deeply, buried his face into her neck. He stroked the indent of her waist, ran his hand along the curve of her hip and thigh. She coiled herself tighter against him, and he groaned into her ear. “We need to pack. Yet all I want is to get back inside you.” He spread her legs with his knees, burrowed his hand in the wetness there, opened her mouth with his.
She was breathing shallowly, digging her fingers into his arms as she rocked against him, swaying against the rhythm he created for her body, on the brink of finishing, when a quick tapping on the door snapped her back, and standing in the open doorway was Mara, red-faced, wide-eyed. She stammered an apology and shut the door.
Calliope and Chance looked at each other and burst out laughing. After a few seconds Chance said, “She’s right though. We should get a move on.”
“Is that what she said?” Calliope was still laughing.
“I don’t know, I couldn’t understand her, she was so embarrassed.”
“I’m not embarrassed.”
“Me neither, Hom:il’ona.” And it was true.
THIRTY-TWO
THIRTY-TWO
RIPPED AWAY
