~ Watcher Of The Fifth Sun ~

by

Annie Taylor

Black Mesa, Arizona

Wind stirred low and fitful, working at the dry crust of the land, chipping it away until the air was filled with darkness. Gathering strength, the wind pressed against bobbing heads of wild rye, scattering seeds and fraying stalks clinging stubbornly to the parched earth. Onward rushed the wind, tossing pebbles down the hillsides, snapping off tumbleweeds cleanly at the root and whirling their dry skeletons up inside its vortex. Then the wind began to howl, an insatiable need growing within as it pressed ever nearer to the desert sands.

At the edge of civilization, the mighty wind clashed against the leaves of the dying tree, tearing some away, and the tree raised its swaying arms to the pale moon, begging for a mercy. The wind drew the last drop of sustenance from the old tree’s core, sweeping across the high plains, racing ever faster over the desolate land.

Phoebe heard it calling.

She watched as the desert sands drifted and swirled, dancing with the wind, blotting out the stars. Only the eerie light of the moon shone through the desert storm. Fine grains etched the panes of glass and the wind shrieked down the chimney, disturbing Jim’s deep sleep. She listened to his stirrings, waiting.

“Phoebe?”

She came back to his warm bed, sliding between the sheets again, her head in the familiar crook of his arm. She closed her eyes, inhaling his clean, male scent, her sadness forgotten for an instant as Jim ran his fingers through her hair.

“You’re leaving, aren’t you?”

She did not answer, but lay her head against her lover’s pounding heart. Wind rattled at the window panes, as if demanding to come in.

Moonlight illuminated Jim’s face as she turned to look into his wizened eyes. Phoebe traced the curve of his cheekbone, the ridge of his nose with her fingertips, the worries of a struggling nation lining his proud face. She smoothed his furled brow, memorizing his every nuance, unable to answer the question poised on his wanting lips. Phoebe closed her eyes and swallowed. Oh! What she wouldn’t give to spend an eternity with this man! But it could never be.

A sharp rap came upon the bedroom door, and Phoebe reached hastily for her robe, as the woman on the other side flung the door wide open. Maizie, Jim’s mother, scowled as Phoebe grappled with her sleeves.

Jim sat up in the bed they shared. “Is it Grandfather?” he asked.

Maizie nodded, looking first at Phoebe, then at her only son.

“Is he...?” Jim left the thought to finish itself.

“No,” his mother said quickly, “but the time is near. He wants us to be with him.”

~ * ~

Between each numbered beat of his heart, Sage relived every glory, every past regret. All day, he slipped in and out of the clutches of death. Could they know what made this old man want to linger?

Beat.

All was darkness, and he remembered. She appeared beneath the full moon the night Jim was born, but she had come to him once before, when Sage was just a boy...the night of the first vision. Through the years, details and images faded dreamlike at their edges, but Sage Mitka never forgot that first vision. And he never forgot her face.

In the place where the sky meets the earth, old memories came spilling out like water from a broken dam. He remembered the old ones, the Mayans. Sage’s spirit had visited a place he’d never been before: Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent. In his memory, he climbed, and stood at the top of the pyramid, looking down at ninety one steps to the east, the west, the north, and to the south.

On this day, Venus appeared as the morning star, and so arrived, according to the Mayans, the Day of Death. Blood flowed from the slain bodies of sacrificed women and children, cascading over the steps of the pyramid. Rivers of red.

And Sage knew what wise men had forgotten. There was no mystery to the disappearance of his ancient cousins, for he’d seen the sacred writings with his own eyes on that day. Their demise was foretold in the calendars the Mayans themselves had carved into stone. At last, their evil had been snuffed from the earth; they had brought forth their own ruin.

Beside him, she appeared, looking down at the chaos and devastation wrought upon the land, a breeze like a sigh lifting her long black hair. Sage was frightened by this strange, beautiful creature. When she spoke, she touched his hand. Sage felt a powerful current surge through his body.

“Great Knower,” she said, “I will come to you twice more, at the crossroads of your life.”

“Who are you?” he asked, but she only smiled sadly, and she disappeared before his eyes. Sage awoke from this, his first of many knowing dreams.

Beat.

He waited for her promise. Was this not to be his third and final crossroad? Where was she now that Sage needed her strength to slip the bounds of the earth?

Beat.