She dashes into Nest’s arms, draws her close, and holds her tight. Nest recoils, then stares in shock. She knows this woman. She recognizes her face. She has seen her face, just as it is now, in a collection of framed photographs that sits upon the mantel over the fireplace in the living room. It is Caitlin Anne Freemark. It is her mother.
And yet it isn ‘t. Not quite. Something is amiss. It is almost her mother, but it is someone else, too. Nest gasps in shock, not quite certain what she is seeing. The woman breaks free, her face suddenly filled with regret and despair. Behind her, barely visible in the darkness, a man appears. He materializes suddenly, and the feeders, who are clustered all about the woman, give way instantly at his approach. Nest tries to see his face, but cannot. The woman sees him and hisses in anger and frustration. Then she flees into the night, racing away shadow-quick with the feeders bounding in pursuit, and is gone.
Nest blinked anew against the darkness and the sudden bright pain that stabbed her eyes. Images whirled and faded, and her vision cleared. She was sitting once more on the grass, cross-legged in the darkness, her hands clasped before her as if in prayer. Two Bears was seated next to her, his eyes closed, his chiseled body still. In the distance, the burial mounds rose silent and empty of life. No lights moved across the grassy slopes; no warriors danced on the air above. The ghosts of the Sinnissippi had gone.
Two Bears opened his eyes and stared out into the darkness, calm and distanced. Nest seized his arm.
“Did you see her?” she asked, unable to keep the anguish from her voice.
The big man shook his head. His painted copper face was bathed in sweat, and his brow was furrowed. “I did not share your vision, little bird’s Nest. Can you tell me of it?”
She tried to speak, to say the words, and found she could not. She shook her head slowly, feeling paralyzed, her skin hot and prickly, her face flushed with shame and confusion.
He nodded. “Sometimes it is better not to speak of what we see in our dreams.” He took her hand in his own and held it. “Sometimes our dreams belong only to us.”
“Did it really happen?” she asked softly. “Did the Sinnissippi come? Did we dance with them?”
He smiled faintly. “Ask your little friend when you find him again.”
Pick. Nest had forgotten him. She glanced down at her shoulder, but the sylvan was gone.
“I learned many things tonight, little bird’s Nest,” Two Bears told her quietly, regaining her attention. “I was told of the fate of the Sinnissippi, my people. I was shown their story.” He shook his head. “But it is much more complicated than I thought, and I cannot yet find the words to explain it, even to myself. I have the images safely stored”-he touched his forehead-“but they are jumbled and vague, and they need time to reveal themselves.” His brow furrowed. “This much I know. The destruction of a people does not come easily or directly, but from a complex scheme of events and circumstances, and that, in part, is why it can happen. Because we lack the foresight to prevent it. Because we do not guard sufficiently against it. Because we do not truly understand it. Because we are, in some part, at least, the enemy we fear.”
She squeezed his hand. “I don’t think I learned anything. Nothing of what might destroy us. Nothing of what threatens. Nothing of Hopewell or anywhere else. Just …” She shook her head.
Two Bears rose, pulling her up with him, lifting her from the ground as if she were as light as a feather. The black paint gleamed on his face. “Maybe you were shown more than you realize. Maybe you need to give it more time, like me.”
She nodded. “Maybe.”
They stood facing each other in awkward silence, contemplating what they knew and what they didn’t. Finally, Nest said, “Will you come back tomorrow night and summon the spirits of the Sinnissippi again?”