PART ONE: Elisa's Story
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May 9, 1997
Arizona
The nearest airport to Flagstaff was in Phoenix, which meant Elisa and her parents had to rent a car and drive two hours north in addition to the five hours they already spent on a plane. Beth had the misfortune of having two finals scheduled for the very last day before graduation, and she was unable to meet them at the airport, but they had plans to meet up with her that evening for dinner.
While they had a few hours to kill before they could check into their hotel rooms and meet with Beth, they went to the cemetery on the Hopi Reservation to pay Carlos, Peter's father, their respects.
"Are you sure you don't want us to come with?" Diane asked as Peter shut off the engine to their rental car.
"Yeah...I have a few things I want to say alone...just some things I need to get off my chest," Peter said.
Diane put her hand over his.
"You don't need to be embarrassed of your emotions, Peter. Not with us," she said.
"I know," Peter said, and he squeezed her hand gently. "But some things need to be admitted aloud in private before they can be spoken of to others."
Diane nodded reluctantly.
"We'll wait here for you," Elisa said from the back seat.
"Thank you," Peter said, then he got out of the car and walked across the parking lot to the cemetery.
Carlos Maza's headstone was beneath a tree on a hill on the farthest side of the cemetery from the parking lot. It was a warm spring day, the sky was clear with high fluffy white clouds and plenty of bright sunshine, and it made the walk through the cemetery and the hike up the hill pleasant, even if it was a little hard on his knees.
He crouched down next to the grave marker and pulled away some of the weeds that had grown up around his father's headstone before standing back up.
"Hey, Pop," he said, his voice melancholy and regretful but affectionate. "Thought I'd come by and say hi. It's been a while, but at least it hasn't been a few decades, like last time."
He felt kind of silly standing there, talking to a stone slab. He'd been agnostic his whole adult life, but he had to admit he'd had to face a few things lately that had him questioning everything he thought he knew. Kachinas and fae. Gargoyles and mad scientists. Magic. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair.
"Beth is graduating tomorrow. You'd be really proud of her. Native American studies, if you can believe that. I wanted nothing to do with my heritage, but she's making up for it, I guess. I only wish you were here to see her. To see us."
He paused as some of the grief he had held back for so long welled up within him.
"I miss you," he said, his voice breaking. "and Mom, though I hate to admit that. I only wish I knew—"
A gust of wind picked up suddenly that was so strong it nearly knocked him over, and he had to brace himself.
"Peter," the wind whispered.
He looked up at the sound, wondering if he was imagining things, and then he heard the same voice again.
"The barn."
An icy chill ran down his spine and made the hairs on the back of his arms and neck stand up.
He glanced around the cemetery to see if anyone else was there, perhaps he had mistakenly heard someone else speak, but he was alone.
He heard a flapping and fluttering sound and looked up at the tree above his father's grave and found it full of crows.
Dozens of them.
So many, the tree nearly looked black.
They hadn't been there before when he showed up, and he hadn't seen or heard any birds up until that point, it was as if they had just suddenly appeared. They didn't make their familiar hoarse caws or coos. They didn't make a sound. They all just stared at him with beady obsidian eyes.
Then they opened their beaks as one, and made a sound in a harsh croak that sounded like, "Joseph."
He flinched at the sound, and for half a heartbeat he stared back, awed and confused, and a little frightened if he was honest with himself. Then as one they took off and there was a flutter and flurry of dark wings so loud it was nearly deafening, and he covered his ears to ward it off.
Then they were gone.
Peter stood there for several minutes breathing hard like he had exerted himself.
"Mind playing tricks," he muttered as he attempted to shake off the odd encounter.
But he had heard the wind call his name.
Hadn't he?
He had heard his uncle's name, too.
Someone he hadn't thought about in a very long time.
If he recalled correctly, Joseph was a rather aloof man, distant and cold, even with his own brother. Their relationship had been strained in a way that made him grateful he had been an only child. He couldn't cast too many stones, though. His relationship with Carlos had been pretty dysfunctional as well. The Mazas were really good at broken relationships, it seemed.
He gazed down at the little silver rental car in the parking lot where his wife and daughter were waiting.
His relationship with Elisa had been strained as he struggled to accept her relationship with a being whose species he had not realized even existed until a year ago, and as he compared and contrasted his relationships past and present, he realized there was a common issue.
Stubbornness and rigidity, the inability to look past one's own point of view, and he made a vow then and there to make sure his relationship with his family, his children, particularly his relationship with Elisa, did not suffer the way his had with his own parents.
He walked back to the car and climbed into the driver's seat. He sat there quietly for a few minutes contemplating.
"Are you alright, Dad?" Elisa asked, observing his silence.
"I've been thinking...while we're here on the res...I'd like to check in with my Uncle Joseph." he said, his voice a little hesitant as if he wasn't sure it was something he actually wanted to do or not.
"I didn't know you even had an uncle," Elisa said carefully.
Diane glanced back at her and gave her a sympathetic look, knowing very well Peter didn't reveal much about his family. Then she reached over to her husband and put a hand over his reassuringly.
"Of course we can, if that's what you want to do," she said.
Peter looked gratefully at her.
She never pushed him when it came to his family. She always respected his reluctance to talk about it, even though he knew it drove her mad at times that he was so cagey about his life before he moved to New York.
"I haven't been in touch with him or seen him in years. He's my dad's older brother and my only known living blood relative. He never married or had children of his own, so when he's gone, we will be the last of the Maza family line, and there won't be any direct link left to the tribe here," Peter said regretfully.
Elisa felt a slight pang of guilt. No wonder it upset her parents that her relationship with Goliath guaranteed she wouldn't have children.
"I'd love to meet your uncle, Dad, " Elisa said supportively.
Peter nodded gratefully, then he put the car into reverse and began pulling out of the parking space when Elisa noticed a dark shadow on his shoulder.
"Hey, you've got something…" Elisa leaned forward in the car and plucked a long black feather off the back of his shirt.
"Strange," Peter said, as he viewed the object from the rearview mirror, and he tried to push away the memory of the odd encounter with the crows and the disembodied voice.
Elisa twirled the feather thoughtfully between her fingers for a few minutes, feeling the soft but rigid fibers of its structure and admired the way it gleamed iridescently in the light as her father drove them towards the town.
She gazed out the window at the blue sky above and the clouds as they passed overhead. There was so much sky out here in the west. It stretched on for miles without any tall buildings to obscure it. If it weren't for the tall peaks of the San Francisco Mountains around the area to break up the skyline, she would almost feel a little agoraphobic.
She looked back down at the feather in her hands, only to realize it was gone. She looked around for a few minutes for it, but it had completely disappeared.
Odd, she thought, but thought nothing more of it other than a mild feeling of unease as she gazed thoughtfully back out the window.
...
...
Joseph Maza lived in an adobe style home on a small sheep ranch that was no longer operational on the outside of Kykotsmovi Village. Peter didn't have a phone number for his uncle, nor did he know whether or not he still lived at the ranch or even if he was still alive for that matter, so their visit was rather unexpected.
The man who opened the door was a wrinkled, weathered, and leathery old man. He was arthritic and had a slight hunch to his posture that made him seem shorter than he was, and his short brush of hair had gone nearly white, but there was something still recognizable in his features that reminded Peter of his father, Carlos.
"What do you want?" he huffed suspiciously, his voice gravely with age. Elisa figured he had to at least be pushing 80.
"Uncle Joseph," Peter said kindly, and somewhat timidly. "It's me…Peter."
Joseph squinted at him. His eyes were a little rheumy, and he wasn't wearing any kind of corrective lenses, so it took him a moment to recognize him. The decades that had passed since they last saw each other didn't help either.
"Peter! It is you! My god, you've—"
"Aged?" Peter laughed.
"It's good to see you, boy!" Joseph Maza said as he grasped his shoulder, his gnarled hands dug into his arm with deceptive strength.
"Boy?" Peter laughed. "I'm pretty sure my gray hair would argue with that statement."
"No matter how old you get, you're still the nephew who used to chase my sheep!" Joseph said as he shook his hand scoldingly at him.
Peter rubbed the back of his neck.
"Ah, yeah…I kept trying to ride them, but they'd never let me."
Joseph realized then that Peter wasn't alone and he looked past him to Diane and Elisa. His eyes narrowed disapprovingly at Diane momentarily before they opened wide with surprise when they landed on Elisa.
"Carmen?" Joseph said in an awed whisper.
"Uhm…no," Elisa said awkwardly.
"This is my eldest daughter, Elisa," Peter said, introducing her to Joseph. "But...she does resemble my mom quite a bit."
Elisa looked at him in surprise. Her dad rarely spoke of his mother, and he had never mentioned before that she resembled her. She'd never seen photos. Anytime she had asked her dad about his mother, he would change the subject. One time when he'd had a little too much to drink on Christmas a few years ago, she had weaseled a little information out of him, and he finally admitted to her that she had left when he was young, but he refused to say anymore about it.
Joseph barely seemed to acknowledge what her father had said and just continued to stare at Elisa in a way that made her feel rather uncomfortable.
"And this is my wife, Diane," Peter said proudly, indicating his spouse.
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Joseph," Diane said warmly.
"Uh, why don't you all come in then," Joseph said, and gestured for them to step inside.
It did not go unnoticed by either of the Maza women that Joseph had completely dismissed Diane, and they shared a knowing look before they followed Peter into the house.
Joseph's home was small and sparse in its furnishings, and it was quite obvious that the home had never seen a woman's touch.
"I don't have much to offer you, but I can get you all a glass of water if you're thirsty," Joseph said as he shuffled deeper into his house.
"No, I think we're all fine," Peter said.
He knew from experience that the water on the reservation wasn't always reliable in not only its availability but also its potability, especially in the older more rural parts like the ranch.
Elisa looked around, assessing the place quickly as she did anytime she was in a new situation. The main room consisted of a small sitting area and a kitchen. There were two rooms and a bathroom down a hall off to the left. A door in the back led to the ranch out past the house, and through a window Elisa could see an old barn about a quarter mile away from the house.
Joseph took a seat in one of the chairs in the sitting room and her parents took a seat on the small sofa. The only other available seating was at the small dinette table, but there was a shotgun lying in plain sight on top of it. Joseph likely used it back when the ranch still had sheep and he needed to fend off coyotes during lambing season.
Elisa chose to stand and look at the few photos that were on the wall instead.
In one it looked like a native couple on their wedding day, dressed in traditional Hopi clothing. It had likely been taken somewhere around the first world war, based on the aging of the photo itself. There was another photo with the couple, older now, posed with two young boys. In another, there were just the two boys as young men, an older brother, Joseph, and a younger one, Carlos. There were no other photos. None of Peter or his family.
"What brings you here after all these years, Peter?" Joseph said, his tone slightly bitter and disapproving.
"My youngest daughter, Beth, is graduating from Flagstaff University tomorrow."
Joseph raised his wiry white brows.
"A university educated daughter, eh?"
"Native American studies, too," Diane added.
"Native American studies," Joseph spat in a mocking tone. "She wouldn't need a degree in it if she had grown up on the reservation with her people."
"Anyway," Peter said uncomfortably, trying to change the subject. "Since we were here, I thought I'd visit. It's been...a very long time."
"You didn't even come to your father's funeral," Joseph said pointedly.
"I know…" Peter said ashamed. "I'm sorry. It's taken me a long time to come to terms with my past."
Joseph pursed his lips.
"You have just the two girls?"
"We have a son as well, but he's back in New York, he...couldn't make it out for the graduation, unfortunately."
Joseph nodded approvingly at that, like having one son made up for the failure of having two daughters, and Elisa decided she didn't like him much.
"I heard through the town gossip you followed in your father's footsteps and became a cop?"
"Yeah, I'm a desk sergeant these days with the NYPD. Elisa's actually a detective with the force, too," Peter said proudly, practically ignoring all of Joseph's none-too-subtle jabs.
"You're what…30? Unmarried? One of those 'career' women?" he said it like he thought that was a joke.
Elisa folded her arms across her chest defensively.
"Something like that," she replied coolly.
She caught movement out of the corner of her eye and her glance darted towards the window just behind where Joseph sat. She gazed out of it and towards the ranch beyond the house.
In the field near the barn, stood a woman of young but indeterminate age in native Hopi clothing. Her hair was long and black, and it moved gently in the breeze. She wore a midnight blue manta dress that fell to mid calf and was belted about the waist with a red sash. It had only one wide sleeve on the right shoulder that went down nearly to the elbow.
Although she could not clearly see the woman's eyes or her gaze from this distance, she knew she was looking directly at her as she lifted a hand and beckoned to her.
"There's a woman out by the barn," Elisa said, her tone somewhat distant.
"What?" Joseph said with disbelief. "There's no one around here for miles."
"You can look for yourself," Elisa said to him, pulling her eyes temporarily away from the window and the strange woman.
Everyone stood and looked out the window that Elisa was pointing at.
"There's no one there, Elisa," Peter said.
"You're seeing things, girl," Joseph said dismissively, and she caught the words, "detective" said mockingly under his breath.
She scowled.
"I could have sworn...I know I saw someone," Elisa said defensively.
"Perhaps...someone was just passing through?" Peter suggested.
"Not likely. People typically steer clear of here," Joseph said.
"Why?" Elisa asked.
He shrugged.
"It could be it's just off the beaten path, but people around these parts also don't seem to like me much."
"Gee I wonder why," Elisa said sarcastically under her breath.
They all brushed off the incident, but Joseph seemed suspicious of her the rest of their visit and kept a close eye on her. Thankfully, they didn't stay long past that, and by then, Elisa was quite relieved to leave.