Kimi stopped running. She had reached the end of the path at the foot of the mountain. She had found the well-worn path half-way down and thanked The Great Spirit for his guidance. She was also thankful for the confidence that came with the discovery of the path—confidence not in herself, but in The Great Spirit’s willingness to help her. The exhilaration of following the path through mountain forest, of feeling again a sense of oneness with her surroundings, and of using her legs for the purpose for which they were created energized the rest of her body as well as her mind.
And Kimi had needed to run. She didn’t know where Achak was, or what the Totem was, and she didn’t know how she would find either of them, but she did know this: she had little time to find them. Kimi didn’t know how long The Elders in the Old World would be able to guard The Passage against the Warriors and others who wanted to follow Achak to help him carry out his scheme. She also didn’t know how long The Passage would remain open. It had never stayed open for longer than it took the sun to travel across the sky. Kimi needed to run for her body’s sake and for her spirit’s sake, as well as for the sake of her people.
But now she needed to rest for a moment. It was getting colder, yet her wrist was burning. She had held it close to her chest running down the mountain, but she couldn’t keep favoring it. She needed to set it in a splint so that she could free up every available muscle in her body for when she found Achak. She would need all her available resources when that time came. There were plenty of branches from which she could break off a couple twigs to use for supports, but she had nothing to use to tie them together. No rope, no ties or ribbons hanging from her deerskin covering, nothing. She didn’t dare tear a strip from her covering for fear that would lessen its effectiveness in protecting her against the elements. Looking to the sky, Kimi suspected she was soon going to need all the protection she could get.
Standing twenty feet from where the path opened up to a clearing, Kimi looked back into the forest and up at the small mountain she had descended. She had spent many summer days on that mountain, running with Achak through the forest, climbing the rocky ledges and exploring the hidden caves with him, spending entire days on the mountain. She had come to know the terrain that had been cut by streams and worn by the wind. Mammoth boulders were scattered along the land, giant crumbs deposited by glacial teeth that had eaten their way over and through the mountain eons ago. Trees had grown big and strong enough to hold the soil and rocks and underbrush in place, acting as glue for the entire mountain. The trees. Running amidst them had made her feel like the owl as it hunted at night, the fox as it dashed through the meadows at dawn, the bear as it lumbered through the forest in the cool of dusk. Running through the forest in the days of her youth had made Kimi feel alive and free and safe.
She would not feel those things again until she found the Totem, confronted Achak, and stopped the forces aligned against her.
She turned her attention to the clearing and did not know if what she saw was a blessing or a curse: the wide-open expanse of a frozen, familiar lake. Kimi had always thought it was too small to be called a lake, yet too big to be called a pond. Like the mountain behind her that seemed too small to be considered a mountain, yet too big to be called a hill. That was the strange thing about this land. Everything seemed to be in a constant state of in-between. Its physical features, its place in time, everything. It had always been a strange land to Kimi, as if it was not where it was meant to be. Perhaps one day, if she lived long enough, she would discover the truth about the land she had been born on and had lived on and for which she was now fighting.
In spite of—or maybe because of—its strangeness, this was the land Kimi called home.
Or had called home.
The present. The past. It was all still confusing to Kimi. The reality of it was this: Kimi was here. She was the past brought into the present. Or, maybe it was the past being brought alongside the present. That was a better way of thinking about it. She couldn’t say the past had been brought forward to the present; it had been brought into the present. That was the reality, the only way she could explain it to herself. And it was still confusing to her. All she knew was that in this land the past and the present, what had once been and what now was, the old and the new, had collided.
The forest surrounded the lake with what looked to be an opening directly across from her, a path flanked by two boulders and a huge tree. For the first time since crossing over, Kimi felt a stirring within her, a heightening of her senses. She had to follow that path. She was sure of it. The Great Spirit was guiding her, influencing her inner feelings, and she would follow the guidance she was receiving. She bowed her head and offered thanks before stepping onto the ice. She searched for signs of Achak, but there were none. No tracks in the snow, no movement in her peripheral vision, no muffled sounds. Nothing. She got no more than thirty feet out onto the ice when she froze. In the middle of the lake, a hundred yards farther out, was a circle of small structures. Kimi at first did not recognize what they were. Then she remembered what the Elders had taught her and what she had seen long ago when she first crossed over through The Passage.
Kimi dropped to the ground, looking for movement anywhere. She saw none. She should stay off the ice, instead make her way around the edge of the lake, using the backdrop of the forest as camouflage. She needed to exercise extreme caution. She also needed to get to the other side and follow that path which, she was now sure, would lead her to Achak.
Kimi stood. She turned to her left to start circling the lake when movement across the ice caught her attention. A small red flag was waving in the wind. It was one of the fishing tackle. Kimi thought for a moment. She checked her surroundings again, still no one else in sight. What she was thinking was dangerous. Whoever owned the tackle had to be close by, and even though she couldn’t see them, that didn’t mean they couldn’t see her. That red flag was a signal indicating food on the other end of the fishing line. She was hungry. She had to keep up her strength and endurance, and she might not get another opportunity for food for the rest of the day. But where was the person who had set up the fishing site? It bothered Kimi more that there was no one here than it would have had she stumbled upon someone.
Achak? She whispered the name, fearful of what might be awaiting her.
He could have set this up to trap her, to bait her out into the open. But wait, she corrected herself. He would not have had enough time to find the tackle, cut the holes, and set it all up. Crouching again, this time on one knee, Kimi slowed her breathing and closed her eye, allowing her hearing to take over. She focused first on her immediate surroundings, then farther out. A breeze whispered through the tree tops. A minute passed. Cold branches creaked. Another minute. A low, vibrating hum in the distance. It sounded like one of the engines that the white people used for work. Kimi detected no one else on the ice or in the surrounding forest.
The question Kimi had to answer, the one she always had to answer, was simple. Could she trust her senses? She was more often right than wrong in this matter, which meant there were times when she had been wrong. What about now? If one of the white people came upon her, she could take care of herself if she needed to. If more than one, that clearly would be a problem with her wrist still hurting and her hand unusable. If it was Achak, without the Totem she was powerless against him.
Looking at the red flag waving in the breeze, a thought more certain than any she’d had in a long time struck her. A smile spread across her face. It was simple. She would trust The Great Spirit; she would take the provision of nourishment that was now offered to her. It was hers for the taking, and she would take it.
Offering up thanks once again, Kimi took one last look around the lake and stood. Thankful that the pain in her ankle had subsided, she sprinted toward the red flag, holding her wrist close to her chest. It hurt, but not as much as it had earlier. In seconds she was kneeling at the flag, pulling the line out of the icy water. The cold water bit into her hand, but Kimi did her best to ignore the new pain. It was worth it to get what was on the other end of the line. A fish appeared in the hole, squirming and fighting in a futile attempt at escaping imminent death. She pulled it up and held it in her hand, thankful for—
Kimi dropped the fish. Her head snapped toward the other shoreline, toward the belongings of whoever had been fishing. This time it wasn’t movement that caught her attention. A scent, drifting and swirling in the air, enveloped her. She breathed in deeply, drawing the sweet, thick, dreadful fragrance in through her nostrils, down into her lungs. A dreadful fragrance, heavy with familiarity, paralyzing her with Fear.
Blood. Recently spilled.
Kimi rose to her full height.
Fear. She fought it, tried forcing it back from where it came. As before, when she fought the Fear, it grew stronger. The muscles in her arms and shoulders tightened. Pain in her left hand and wrist shot up her arm. Her lungs constricted. Breath left her body. Her muscles froze, her legs became solid stalagmites, her body unwilling to move. “No,” Kimi said to no one, her voice a hollow whisper. “No, not now, not here. Please, no!” She willed her body to move. It did not respond. She tried breathing, tried expanding her lungs, but could not. She tried making a petition out loud, but her mouth clenched shut as if her lips had been sewn together by invisible, steel thread.
Her eye darted about the lake. Still no one else. She had to go see. Kimi had to fight through the Fear, through the paralysis, and get to the source and confront what she would find. She tried stepping toward it, but her legs still would not move. “No!” she pleaded toward the sky. “This can’t happen. This must not happen. Not now. Please, Great Spirit, please. Help me!” Still nothing. No voice, no sudden strength from within, no deliverance from without.
Instead, in answer to her desperate cry, enormous silence. No wind. No movement. Only the gray clouds above. All was silent. All was still.
Kimi was alone. With the Fear.
She needed to breathe, needed to move. Her lungs and muscles she needed them, why weren’t they working, she needed them she needed help needed someone to help her she couldn’t do this alone she—
No! She interrupted her thoughts. You can do this. You must do this. Alone. You must defeat this Fear. Alone. There is only you and The Great Spirit, no one else.
Kimi fought harder to regain control of her mind. That’s where the true battle was, that she knew. If she could win her mind back, her body would follow. Closing her eye, drawing out all the strength hidden within her, recalling the teachings of her ancestors, pushing beyond the veil of blood and memories, breaking through the barrier of Fear, Kimi fought for peace in her mind. And it came to her. Slowly at first, then like a burst dam releasing a torrent, the peace flooded into her mind and flowed through the rest of her body. She waited. She commanded her lungs to relax. They did, and in came the breath she needed. She commanded her right leg to move. It did. The left leg. It moved. Again. And again. She moved her body toward the shoreline, her arms now moving, her breathing heavy but not panicked. She regained full control of her mind and body.
The Fear was still there, under the surface of everything, but it no longer controlled her.
As she got nearer the shoreline, Kimi noticed droplets on the white snow and blue ice. She turned to look behind her, and they were there too. She hadn’t noticed them as she had been fighting for control, but now she saw them clearly, surrounding her. An innocent sprinkle of red here, a violent gash of crimson there, the pure snow stained. Violated. Her eyes followed the trail of red to the bundle of clothing. Kimi did not want to, but she had no choice. She inched toward the crumpled clothing, knowing what she was about to face, but also knowing she would survive because she had to. That was the only reason—she simply had to.
The clothing was shredded…and stained with various shades of red. Kimi knelt. Tucking her left hand close to her, she extended her other hand, touched a piece of the clothing, and lifted it. Underneath was a white man. His flesh, what she could see of it, was also shredded and stained.
A new frozen wave of Fear crashed over Kimi. This time, she steeled herself against it. She clenched her teeth and curled her fingers into fists. She would never again give up control of her mind to the Fear as she had done for so many years of her life. Never again.
Lowering the piece of clothing and covering the white man, she stood. She turned to the shoreline, to the path bordered by the two boulders and the tree. That was where she needed to go. But first, before heading for that path, Kimi ran back to one of the fishing tackle and yanked it out of the water.