COMING SOON!
YOU CAN BUY
KACHINA ROULETTE
IN SOFT BACK COVER
OR
ON KINDLE
AT AMAZON BOOKS
CHAPTER 1
It was the fourth day of the new moon ... the Hawk
Moon. A tiny sliver of crescent moon
rose over the Kaibab Plateau like a shining scimitar under black glass and Albert
Numkena obediently followed the glowing star light through the forest.
Albert adjusted the small leather pack on his back and
looked up into the neon November night sky. There were no clouds and the heavens glistened
like water. He took a deep breath and
smelled the aroma of sage, a smell that made him feel much older than his 67
years, and he wondered how many more pilgrimages he would be making to Pota Ve Taka. Albert shook his head and tried to ignore
such melancholy thoughts.
Looking down at the rocky terrain he could see the faint trace
of a trail through the darkness. After
so many trips to this place he knew the way by heart but he never remembered
there being a path. Perhaps the local
elk and deer had been forced by the new uranium mine to move further into the forest.
Albert frowned and continued walking
slowly toward his goal. He must not let
anger cloud his mind. Tonight required
clean thoughts.
A coyote called out in the distance, perhaps a mile to the
north, and a chorus of yips and howls filled the silent night with song.
Albert was a Hopi spiritual leader and he answered his
brothers' call with the song of the First World .
His voice was hoarse but the words
sounded sweet and sad. It was the
timeless legend of paradise lost.
The coyotes stopped their singing to listen and Albert
quickened his step as he walked amongst the bushy pinyon pine trees that dotted
the landscape. He sang of the Sun God Taiowa who created the first fire of
life and how Spider Woman and the Hero Twins crafted the earth, the people, and
all the animals, using dirt and their own spit and the magical Song of
Creation. The story filled Albert’s
spirit with great joy and wonder.
Albert carefully climbed a small hill, almost losing his
balance as he neared the top. His heart
raced and the legend was stopped short for lack of breath. Cresting the hill Albert bent over and fought
for air, his heart pounding inside his chest like a loud drum. He was getting too old for this. Soon, maybe next year, some younger member of
his clan would have to claim these lands for his people, but for now the heavy responsibility
was his.
Albert felt a great exhilaration as he faced north. Black Butte rose like a dark sentinel, a lone
mountain of basalt, the remnant of a long extinct volcano that had once turned
the land around it into a fiery cauldron, only to be swallowed over millennia by
a vast inland sea. According to Hopi
mythology, Black Butte was the navel of the earth and the northwestern boundary
of Hopiland. And beneath its near-vertical
stone walls lay the secret shrine.
There were eight major Hopi shrines marking the boundaries of traditional Hopi country. One was to the east at Tokonave, or
Albert resumed his journey, following the ridge line that
ran toward the solitary peak. The old
man's thoughts rambled from his childhood, to his fields of short-eared corn
that lined the terraces above Oraibi
Wash
This last thought was troubling. It was the trap of false pride, like bragging
or pretending you were something special when you really were not, and it was
not the way to peace and salvation. Over
the course of long time, such thoughts had nearly destroyed the Hopi people and
the first three worlds they had once inhabited. Wisdom, harmony, and respect for the Guardians
were all that really mattered in this, the Fourth World . Everything else merely clouded the Kachina
Way
The Kachinas
guided the spiritual journey of life for the Ancestral Puebloans of the
American Southwest, which included the Hopi, Zuni, Tewa
Village , Acoma Pueblo, Laguna Pueblo
and Isleta, covering a big chunk of northern Arizona
and New Mexico
The Hopi personified the Kachinas in two very interesting ways. First, there were the ceremonial dances where the participants dressed ornately like particular Kachinas and danced in reverent obedience to theKachina Way
The Hopi personified the Kachinas in two very interesting ways. First, there were the ceremonial dances where the participants dressed ornately like particular Kachinas and danced in reverent obedience to the
Albert reached into a small deerskin pouch that hung from
his belt and pulled out a pinch of yellow corn meal. As he walked through the chilly Arizona
To his right, Albert could just make out the faint outline
of the crumbling walls of an Anasazi pit house. He smiled.
The Hopi road of life had passed this way many, many years in the past,
when Albert's ancestors had first arrived in this world. The Ancient Ones had lived atop this ridge
around 900AD, overlooking the place of their emergence, and they had practiced
spiritual harmony together. And today
their children, the Hopi, followed the same weathered course on their three
mesas to the southeast. For the past
thirteen hundred years his people had been retracing their migration path to Pota Ve Taka. At this exact time every year, on the fourth
day of the Hawk Moon, the ceremonial leader of the Fire Clan brought the humble
offerings of a thankful people.
How would the gods receive him tonight?
Every year Albert wondered this same thought as he neared
the shrine. For the past thirteen years
he had waited anxiously for a sign that the Guardians took notice of his
people's allegiance to the creator's plan. But they never answered his call.
“Why should they?” Albert chided himself.
Was not faith the whole point of this endeavor? Was not the need for proof yet another example
of Albert's unworthiness?
Albert sprinkled his corn meal on the ground in front of
where he was walking and spit again in disgust. The evil in each man ran so
deep it was hard to separate the good from the bad.
The terrain became rockier as he neared the looming
mountain.
Albert focused intently on the ground and prayed he did
not fall. Faith was the key. He would not stumble because he knew the right
path.
Nearing a grove of wind-bent juniper trees, Albert stopped
and surveyed the scene. Junipers
symbolized the holiest plant of this, the Fourth World .
Albert approached a misshapen old tree that reminded him
of himself. The tree had stood atop this
mesa for several hundred years. Lightning had recently grazed its side,
leaving a sap-filled scar. Albert
caressed the wound and tried to soothe his brother's pain.
“You are old like me, my friend. Our time is short. Soon we will return to the dirt where we
belong. But tonight I need your help. I need a small piece of your arm to give to
old Masaw, so that he will know we
still love him like a father and are following the true ways.”
A gust of wind came from the west and rustled the branches
of the junipers. The sound was musical,
like water trickling over pebbles in a stream.
The smell of cedar filled the air like incense.
As was the Hopi custom, Albert would never take an
offering from the first tree he asked. That
would have been disrespectful. After all,
the juniper was being asked to give up a part of itself, and one did not make
such a request without truly feeling the pain that would come from such a noble
sacrifice.
Albert moved on to a younger and healthier tree that was sheltered
from the direct force of the wind.
Again, Albert asked permission of the tree before cutting a
small branch with his pocket knife. A
tear ran down his leathery cheek as he gathered the offering and placed it in
his weathered old pack.
“Thank you, little one. You are generous beyond your
years. And your sacrifice will light the
fires for another long year.”
At the edge of the juniper forest the flat ridge ended and
there was a gentle drop-off to a dry wash below. Albert traversed the gravel slope like he was
skiing down a hill and when he reached the bottom of the rocky hill his
momentum sent him crashing through the underbrush and up the other side of the
wash. He felt childlike and out of
control.
He did not see the stick until he had already tripped over
it. It sent him tumbling to the ground
like a bag of old bones. Albert struggled
to his knees and glared at his mystery assailant.
“What is this thing?” he muttered out loud.
Albert reached out to touch the odd wooden object.
“Bahana!”
growled Albert as he yanked the survey stake out of the ground and angrily
flung it into the bushes.
Bahana was a
derogatory Hopi word for the white man, and Albert's wrath was directed at the
uranium miners who had recently desecrated this hallowed ground with their
greedy land claims.
Albert stood up and brushed himself off. His legs were wobbly and his left side felt
like it had been stuck with a hot knife.
The nighttime silence was suddenly broken by the piercing
snarl of a mountain lion. Albert's eyes
widened with alarm and wonder. The
mountain lion was one of the guardian spirits of the Fourth
World and to hear its call was a sign of great significance. The hunter was afoot and something was about
to die.
Would the lion come for him?
The thought brought laughter. He would not make much of a meal but it would
be an honor to perish at the claws and teeth of Toho, the great cat.
Five minutes passed and nothing happened, so Albert
continued his solemn midnight trek. The
first moon was now higher in the eastern sky but it seemed like it was darker
than it had been when he first began his walk.
The pinyon pine trees that covered the hill seemed to close in on him
and drown out all of the light. Albert
squinted as he wound his way through the towering trees.
Pota Ve Taka was
one of the most important shrines in all of Hopi culture, but in comparison to
the important places of worship in the Western World it was hardly noticeable,
nothing more than a circular pile of rocks with a small opening facing to the
east and the rising sun.
Albert laid his pack on the ground and went to work. He reached into the leather satchel and retrieved
four Pahos. These consisted of the feathers from a golden eagle,
wild turkey, and mountain bluebird that had been bound into individual bundles,
using yarn spun from native Hopi cotton.
Albert walked up to the nearest pinyon tree and hung one
of the Pahos from a low branch. As he did this he softly sang the Song of
Emergence, the story of the Hopis escape by raft from the Third
World during the great flood. Albert's head bobbed rhythmically up and down
as he went about his task of tying the prayer feathers to the branches of the
surrounding trees. His bony, arthritic
fingers were stiff from the cold but Albert felt no discomfort. His heart swelled with great joy as his frail
voice rose into the night with all of the power and the glory he could summon.
When he had finished this task he turned to face the
shrine. Inside the circle of stones
there lay three round balls of black obsidian representing the first three
worlds which the Hopis had once inhabited.
Albert embraced the juniper branch and stiffly dropped to
his knees. He grimaced in pain as he
planted the shaggy green branch in the center of the circle and then sprinkled
some corn meal over the offering.
He had now come to the part of the song where the Hopis
made landfall and encountered Masaw. Masaw
had been the God of Death in the Third World ,
and he greeted them with the news that he was the caretaker of this wonderful world
of light and fresh air they had just discovered. He told them that they were free to live
above ground in the Fourth World as long as
they treated their new home with respect.
And then he warned them that they would meet an ugly fate if they
resumed their old ways. Before departing
for the Underworld, Masaw promised
his wayward children that he would always be watching their every move to make
sure they lived up to their end of the bargain.
From the darkness to Albert’s left there came the sudden sound
of a branch breaking underfoot. Albert
turned to face what was approaching, half-expecting to see a mountain lion come
bounding out of the trees. What greeted
him was not animal, but rather, something from an ancient dream.
Vaguely human, the creature approached with great care. It glanced from left to right, its eyes
bulging in their sockets as if they might explode. Its head and face were colored an ashen gray
and crowned with a headdress of black vulture feathers. The mouth formed a large circle, the bright
red lips covering three sharp teeth – two on the top and one on the bottom. From deep in its throat there came a low
growl. The body of the beast resembled a
man, the upper part adorned with bands of exotic seashells and the skulls of
small animals like chipmunks and field mice.
“MASAW!” cried Albert as he pointed a
trembling finger at the fearsome Kachina.
The monster's teeth clicked together as it lurched
forward. From behind its back Masaw produced a long, black obsidian
blade that seemed to shine in the faint moonlight. A sound like hollow laughter filled the air.
“I knew that you would come one day,” said Albert as he
kissed the ground in divine worship.
Masaw towered
over the prostrate medicine man and slowly raised the blade to the sky. It hung there for a brief instant before
slashing down with deadly accuracy.
The blow was aimed perfectly at the Hopis' wrinkled neck
and the results were almost surgical, severing head from shoulders in one clean
cut.
Albert's head landed inside Pota Ve Taka's ancient ring of rocks and came to rest with his
black eyes staring up at the stars. A
small trickle of blood ran down his chin and his mouth was framed with a tired smile.
COMING SOON!
YOU CAN BUY
KACHINA ROULETTE
IN SOFT BACK COVER
OR
ON KINDLE
AT AMAZON BOOKS
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