Little Red War Gods. Patrick PhD Marcus

he’d told Natalia, as he always did before he left, that he loved her, Nastas was surprised to find that he wasn’t thinking of her, even though there was an excellent chance he might not make it back alive. “It is funny what we learn about ourselves when the world has left us to our own devices,” he thought. He could picture his father’s hogan, now his hogan, with all of its charts and lessons and rituals waiting to be unraveled. He knew it was time to make them his life again, to return to the ways of the Navajo. “Earth Mother, forgive me my transgressions. If I die this day, I die as a Navajo.”

      Sitting on a round rock, he licked at his dry lips.

      The rapidly cooling air carried welcome relief.

      Nastas looked up to find several fat rain clouds bobbing in his direction. They looked like the black sheep his father used to tend: BahBah, BahJobe, BahJahova, and BahHumBug. They nourished him then and would nourish him now. He opened his mouth to the first drops, his head moving to catch them like an agitated cobra. “Thank you, Earth Mother. I will not forsake you.”

      The rain continued, and the scattered drops graduated to sheets. The temperature dropped by degrees until Nastas began to shiver. He leapt on the rock and screamed with joy: “Holy Father, you honor me!” He laughed and coughed at the same time as water filled his eyes, nose, and mouth. The storm intensified. Nastas was having trouble keeping his footing against the waterfall streaming from above.

      Forced to close his eyes, Nastas waited.

      The sound was deafening.

      The drops stung his skin.

      Exhausted, he let himself fall backwards. He hoped nothing thorny would cushion his fall. His back made contact with a thin tree trunk. He leaned against it for support until it unexpectedly moved away.

      The rain slacking, Nastas brushed the water from his eyes. What he saw made him marvel. A great black horse stood above him. Wet, huge, and brilliantly spectral, its orange shadow was a creature unto itself.

      It was Musashi.

      Allaying Nastas’ fears that the creature must be a manifestation of evil, Musashi bowed to him like a circus horse and joggled his head up and down until Nastas mounted.

      Ever since then, they’d been kin to the desert.

      They occasionally returned to their family’s government dwelling to ensure all the new arrivals were living well. Nastas’ aunt and uncle and their three children had moved in after he’d left so his mother wouldn’t be alone. Even on these visits, horse and rider stayed only for a day or two. Nastas’ family helped with certain provisions and accompanied him for sweats at the neighbor’s lodge, but usually he kept to himself, praying and studying alone in his hogan. When the sun set, Nastas would often sleep in the desert within earshot of their drunken voices, the banging outhouse door a frequent interruption to the desert still.

      Nastas hunched over even further; his back bowed awkwardly. He wondered why he was still moving. He wondered if movement even mattered. Hours of fleeting consciousness passed, each one closer to complete darkness than the last. Blood from Nastas’ arm dripped from his fingertips onto Musashi’s foreleg, where it fanned out across his black hoof before the desert consumed it. Slowly but surely, Nastas was bleeding to death, his body weakening minute by minute. The branch had done its job well.

      Nastas knew he should dismount and tend to himself if he could, that he should sew his torn flesh together and eat, drink water, and rest in the shade. Maybe even seek help. He was puzzled by the fact he hadn’t already taken these basic survival steps. He questioned what force was interfering with his usual will to live and thrive. He thought of the woman in white. She’d been as poised and magnificent in appearance as a goddess might be, and probably as deadly. The more Nastas explored the detail of her face in his memory, the more he realized she’d been wearing the arraignments of the church elders he’d seen while in attendance with Natalia. He could not place the priestess’ face, but he had no doubt she was one of them. And if she was one of them, was she laying claim to his eternal soul? Was she the one who’d coaxed his soul so far afield, letting his blood continue to flow when help was available? Had she kept his hand from staunching the gush? It horrified Nastas to think he might have committed his soul to them when he’d prayed in their church. Why else could she be there but to collect? He resigned himself to keeping an eye open to further signs of their presence.

      “Earth Mother…Holy Father…Wakan Tankan, receive my blood into your bosom. I wish to walk here for eternity, not flounder in their unnatural clouds and cold halls.”

      The whole time Nastas waged a private war against his body and mind, Musashi continued to move forward at an easy walk toward what he hoped would be salvation. Finally he crested a small, broad hilltop and stopped.

      “What is it, Mush?” Nastas said, before lifting his gaze. When his eyes finally took in the valley below, his jaw dropped in disbelief.

      CHAPTER 4

      “Archer! You’re an identical twin for real then, are’n ya? Begob, there to be two of you and me not even crediting the first one,” said the Irishman to the tall, slim American sitting on the pub stool next to his own. Though they’d just met a few hours earlier, they shared an almost instantaneous connection that gave the two men the look of old friends. If they’d both had less to drink, they might have noticed the beautiful woman several stools down, laughing to herself as she listened to their conversation. The white robes she’d worn in the Arizona desert had been replaced by a simple, periwinkle silk dress that held her tightly on its way past her knees; the outfit was quintessentially alluring.

      “You won’t believe it when I tell you his story,” said Archer, leaning toward Alvin confidentially. “His name is Keane—”

      “Like a knife blade?” interrupted Alvin.

      “That he is. Like a knife blade, Al.”

      Alvin made a stabbing motion with his hand, Archer acting out a death-blow.

      “You’ve struck onto something, Al. I don’t know how he’s done it, but my dad tells me Keane’s transformed into an Indian. Of all the fucking things, my identical twin brother’s become a Navajo Indian. Can you believe that?”

      By his late twenties, Alvin had achieved veteran status in local pubs around Dublin, where he was affectionately known as “Alvo the Great.” During any stint at a variety of oak-paneled bars, Alvo would happily report that he was the best damned lorry driver in all of Dublin, and as far as he knew, the world. And if someone went so far as to buy Alvo a pint, they might hear his carefully crafted philosophy of professional driving: how the right man with the right hands could push the massive power of a lorry in and out of the long, hard streets, as a man might master the sweet curves of the female form. It was the kind of story the locals loved him for, and the tourists remembered long after returning home.

      His friends teased Alvin whenever he embarked on an overly sentimental rant. “If all of Ireland is your home,” they would say, “it’s no wonder there’s nary a bit to eat in my fridge.” And his really good friends – those he saw almost every night at the Boar’s Head for sausages and pints – would tease: “Save your hugs for the girls on holiday, Alvo. We love you, but you’re ugly as a pig licking piss off a nettle.” Then they laughed. Alvin laughed with them.

      Alvin was the kind of person who felt actual love for the place he lived. He loved the cobbled streets slick with bus oil and the simple address numbers on doors. He loved the way Irish girls walked home at four in the morning, sweetly sideways, or the way Dublin’s air made a pint of Guinness taste warm and smooth.

      He loved Dublin in spite of the fact she’d yet to grant his wish and produce a great love for him. Only French Normandy, the town of Rouen, had come close. It was there that Alvin had met, and fallen deeply in love with, Tatiana. Tatiana was a Korean girl who’d been raised in Russia, and whose skin reminded most people of porcelain.

      A year ago, Tatiana and Alvin had spent just a weekend together, but Alvin still thought