Temple of the Winds

Zedd chuckled softly as he moved on, searching for a place ahead where he could take them up and out of the ravine. He finally found a cut through the bank. Roots of gnarled bushes hung down like hair, providing handholds. The moon slid behind a thick cloud. In the inky darkness, they climbed slowly, blindly, feeling their way with their hands.

Zedd could hear a few bugs buzzing about and, in the distance, the mournful call of a coyote. Other than that, the night was still and silent. Hopefully, the Nangtong would be busy picking through Zedd and Ann's things back with the horses.

Zedd reached the top and turned to help pull Ann up. "Stay on your hands and knees. We'll crawl or at least crouch as we go."

Ann whispered her agreement. She made her way atop the bank with him. They struck out, away from the gully. The bright moon came out from behind the cloud. In a semicircle right in front of them, blocking their way, stood the Nangtong. There were perhaps twenty of them. Zedd reasoned that there were more about nearby; Nangtong hunting parties were larger.

They were not tall, and were nearly naked, wearing only a thong and a pouch of sorts that held their manhood. Necklaces made of human finger bones hung around their necks. Heads were shaved bald. They all had sinewy arms and legs and pronounced bellies.

The Nangtong had all smeared white ash over their entire body. The area around their eyes was painted black, giving them the appearance of living skulls.

Zedd and Ann peered up at spears, their barbed, steel points glinting in the moonlight. One of the men chattered an order. Zedd didn't understand the words, but he had a good idea of what it meant.

"Don't use the dacra," he whispered over to Ann. "There's too many. They'll kill us on the spot. Our only chance is if we can stay alive and think of something." He saw her slip the weapon back up her sleeve.

Zedd grinned up at the wall of grim faces. "Would any of you men happen to know where we could find the Jocopo?"

A spear jabbed at him, then signaled them to stand. He and Ann reluctantly complied. The men, not up to Zedd's shoulders, but about as tall as Ann, crowded in around them, suddenly jabbering all at once. Men pushed and poked at them. Their arms were pulled back and their wrists tightly bound. "Remind me again," Ann said to him, "about the wisdom of leaving these heathens to their unenlightened practices."

"Well, I heard from a Confessor, once, that they are quite good cooks. Perhaps we will sample something new and delightful."

Ann stumbled but caught herself as she was pushed on ahead. "I'm too old," she muttered to the sky, "to be mucking about with a crazy man."

An hour of brisk marching brought them to the Nangtong village. Broad, round tents, perhaps thirty of them, made up the mobile community. The low tents hunkered close to the ground, presenting the least possible purchase to the wind. Enclosures made of tall stick fences held a variety of livestock.

Chattering people, wrapped head to toe in unadorned cloth to hide their identities from the sacrificial offerings about to take their prayers to the spirit world, turned out to watch Zedd and Ann being prodded at spearpoint through the village. Their captors, covered in the white ash and with their eyes painted black, were hunters in the guise of the dead. so there would be no danger of their being recognized as one of the still living.

Zedd was jerked to a halt before a pen while men undid the rope tie at the gate. The gate swung open in the moonlight. It seemed that the whole Nangtong village had followed behind. They hooted and hollered as the two prisoners were hustled through the gate, apparently wanting to give messages to the two spirits about to go speak on the Nangtongs' behalf to their ancestors.

Zedd and Ann. their wrists still bound behind their backs, both fell when they were forcefully shoved into the pen. It was a muddy landing. Snorting shapes loped away. The pen was occupied by pigs. The way they had churned the ground into a quagmire, the village must have occupied this place for at least the past few months. It smelled like what it was.

The spirit hunting party, nearly fifty, as Zedd had guessed, split up. Some went back to tents, surrounded by gleeful children and stoic women. Others of the hunters encircled the pen to stand guard. Most of the people who stood around watching were calling out to the prisoners, giving their messages for the spirit world.

"Why are you doing this?" Zedd called to their guards. He nodded his head and inclined it toward Ann. "Why?" He shrugged.

One of the guards seemed to understand. He made a cutting gesture across his throat, and then indicated the imaginary blood running from the pretend wound. With his spear, he pointed at the moon. "Blood moon?" Ann asked under her breath.