“How do we beat it?” Leeze asked, pulling on her pendant so hard it was a miracle the leather strap didn’t snap.

  “First, by surviving,” Syl said. “Once we get back to the village, I’m sure Velena will have thought of something.”

  “Unless she still thinks it’s a Lake-Wolf,” Reylo pointed out. “If they haven’t realized we’re dealing with an Anihazi, they won’t have the right kind of plan.”

  “So that means it’s up to us to figure it out?” Leeze asked, still not quite succeeding at keeping the nervousness from creeping into her voice.

  “No,” Syl answered. “Not just us. But what we’ve learned out here will be invaluable. We’ll bring our information to Velena and the Anavilla, and they’ll decide how to hunt this thing.”

  “Anihazi?” Milia asked from the stretcher. “Those spirit things Jurik is always talking about?”

  “Yes,” Edar said. “That’s what took you last night.”

  “You can’t be serious,” she said and looked to each of the group standing around her. When none of them cracked a smile, she sighed dramatically. “You’re all crazy. Spirits aren’t real.”

  “Got a better explanation for what broke your leg?” Edar asked flatly.

  Milia didn’t have an answer for that and wisely kept her mouth shut.

  The group continued in silence until Edar finally spoke up. “Jurik’s home isn’t far now. Just a few more minutes.”

  “Does Jurik live alone?” Syl asked.

  “Wife and three kids,” Milia answered before Edar could. “His oldest is only four. I don’t know what they’ll do without him. Maybe Teb will take them in? Or maybe somebody at Lake Cashin. They have a lot of friends there.”

  Nobody corrected her about the prospects of the family being taken in at Lake Cashin. Milia had been through enough for one day. She’d learn the truth soon enough.

  “Was Jurik… a coward?” Syl asked the question hesitantly.

  “What?” Milia asked, acid in her voice. “Never. I once saw him face down a wild boar that got too close to one of Teb’s daughters. Didn’t even have his Sho-Val with him!”

  Syl shook her head. “Then I don’t think we have to worry about finding somebody to take care of his children,” she said softly. That got a raised eyebrow from just about everybody in the group.

  “He ran away from his home,” Syl pointed down the road where they’d come from. “Away from his family. If what Milia says is true, and I believe it to be,” she added quickly before the woman could speak up, “then there has to be a reason. If he thought his family needed him, wouldn’t he have run back to his home instead of a forbidden cave?”

  “Wait,” Kule said seriously. “There’s something I don’t understand.”

  “There’s a lot you don’t understand,” Leeze said.

  “Very funny, but no, really,” he said.

  “What is it, Kule?” Syl asked.

  “If he was so happily married, what’s with the hookup spot?”

  “That’s your big question?” Leeze asked, annoyed.

  “It’s a valid one,” Kule defended.

  “Did you say something about a cave?” Milia asked. “That wasn’t a… what did you call it? A hookup spot? Not if it’s what I think it is.”

  “You know something about the cave?” Edar pressed.

  “I’ve never been there,” Milia said. “But Jurik told me about it, if it’s the same one. He didn’t talk about it a lot, and when he did, it was always in very hushed tones, like he didn’t want anybody to hear. Even when it was just the two of us out in the middle of the field,” she chuckled fondly.

  “What did he tell you?” Syl asked. There was something special about that cave. Something that prevented the Anihazi from finding them. If she could just figure out what that was…

  “That he wasn’t supposed to be there,” Milia chuckled. When nobody else found it funny, she coughed and turned more serious. “Well, first off, it wasn’t a hookup spot. Jurik may have been a farmer by day, but he fancied himself something more like a scholar. Or a historian.

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  “Ever since he was young, he wanted to go exploring. He dreamed of finding buried cities. Or maybe treasure.”

  “So…?” Syl prompted when Milia drifted off in thought.

  “He found some of that in the cave,” she said.

  “He found a buried city in the cave?” Kule asked. “Yeah, I’m thinking he just told you that so he could have a safe hook-up spot.”

  “Not a city,” Milia corrected. “A history. Our history.”

  “The Anavillas already know our history,” Edar said defensively. “We’ve been passing it on from generation to generation. Even if people don’t listen when they’re taught,” Edar looked at the others when he spoke, “the history is still there. What could he possibly find in a cave that we didn’t already know?”

  “Our history before we came to this valley,” Milia said in a hushed whisper.

  “What are you talking about?” Edar asked, flustered. “The tradition of the Anavillas goes back generations. Centuries even. There’s no mention about a ‘before the valley,’ because we’ve always been here.”

  “Edar,” Syl interrupted. “How far back exactly does our history go?”

  “I just told you. Centuries,” he said, as if that was the end of it.

  “You know our history better than anybody, Edar. Better than your father. Better even than the Anavilla. You have a knack for it. For understanding it. If you did the math, how far back does our history go?” Syl pushed.

  Edar looked away from her, but he was doing the calculations in his head.

  “About seven hundred years,” he finally said.

  “And how do they start?” she pressed.

  “With the founding of the twelve villages. A testament to the twelve forms of the Ka-Sho,” he answered.

  “That’s the beginning?” Leeze asked. “I thought that was in the middle somewhere.”

  Edar hesitated, the disconnect becoming apparent. “Yes,” he said thoughtfully.

  “So, either we magically appeared, with the knowledge of the Ka-Sho,” Syl proposed, “or there’s a possibility that something of our history exists beyond these mountains.”

  “How come we didn’t notice this?” Reylo asked. “How come you didn’t notice this?” he asked Edar specifically.

  “Because we have very few written records,” Syl said. “The role the Anavilla plays is an oral one.”

  “And we rarely tell the stories from beginning to end in one sitting,” Edar further explained. “We tell it a bit at a time. Beginning and ending where time allows. And not necessarily in order.”

  “But you know all the stories,” Rogar pointed out. “How come you didn’t see it?”

  “Because I’m still learning,” Edar admitted. “My grandmother is constantly filling in blanks I didn’t know were there before. I don’t know what I don’t know…”

  “So there could be more history beyond the seven hundred years you know about?” Syl asked.

  “Yes,” Edar said slowly. “Or there could be something written on the walls of that cave.”

  “I didn’t see anything while we were there,” Dena said.

  “Jurik said there was a cave-in about a week ago,” Milia filled in. “Destroyed everything.”

  “Did he tell you anything about the history? Or anything else that was in the cave?” Syl asked.

  “Not much,” Milia admitted. “The writing in the cave wasn’t in any sort of language he could understand. He said he was just starting to piece it together when the cave-in happened.

  “His biggest regret was that he’d never taken any of the relics out of the cave,” she finished.

  “Relics? What kind?” Syl asked. Was that it? Did one of those ‘relics’ hide them from the Anihazi?

  “Nothing special,” Milia said. “Sho-Vals, old bows. Some arrows. That kind of thing. Nothing we don’t already have. Just really old versions.”

  “That’s it?” Syl said, her shoulders dropping. They’d already proven weapons didn’t work on the Anihazi.

  “Oh! No, he did mention one other thing, but I didn’t really believe him,” Milia continued. “It was too ridiculous. I thought he was just making things up at that point.”

  “Making what up?” Syl asked.

  “Well,” she said, soaking up the attention as everybody had gathered closer. “He talked about this beam of light in the back of the cave. He said there was this blue sphere floating in the light. Something about chains too, but I wasn’t really listening.”

  “You didn’t think to start with the magically-floating blue stone?” Kule asked flatly.

  “I didn’t think he was being serious,” Milia defended herself.

  “He didn’t try to take the stone?” Syl asked, ignoring the glares between the two.

  “Uh…” Milia said, trying to remember. “Yeah, I think he did. Said he couldn’t get it out of the light. Since he didn’t have any proof, I stopped listening to him when he started talking about the stone after that.”

  “Maybe that stone is why the cave was safe,” Dena said. “And why he went back there. Must’ve been buried. Too bad.”

  “Hey,” Reylo started, something on his mind. “If what Jurik told her is true, and that stuff written on the cave walls really is our history, and more than seven hundred years old, does that mean the stone is too?”

  “That would make sense… I guess,” Dena said.

  “Okay. If that’s true and the stone somehow hid us from the Anihazi, does that mean the Anihazi is more than seven hundred years old as well?” Reylo went on.

  “No,” Syl answered. “What if we’ve misunderstood it the entire time?” she asked, the puzzle starting to come together in her head.

  “Misunderstood what?” Edar asked.

  “The stories tell us our Ancestors protect us from the Anihazi, right?” she asked him.

  “That’s right.”

  “What if it’s not our Ancestors in the stars that protect us? What if it’s more literal? What if they protected us by bringing us to this valley? By putting that stone there to hide us from the Anihazi?

  “What if,” she went on, “the Anihazi are very real. Not spirits, I mean. Some kind of creature. Or maybe more people. I don’t know. But somebody or something on the other side of the mountains that wants us dead?”

  “So, this is some kind of… war?” Dena asked.

  “I don’t know,” Syl admitted. “But if that’s the case, maybe there is more to the history we’re misunderstanding. Maybe there’s something else there that can help us fight back.

  “Edar, can you think of anything?” Syl asked eagerly.

  “Now’s not the time,” Rogar interrupted.

  “Why?” Syl asked without looking at him.

  “Jurik’s house,” Rogar answered. “It’s just ahead.”

  Syl clenched her teeth. They were on to something, or at least close to it. If she could figure it out, maybe she’d finally understand what her connection was to the Anihazi.

  “Think about it,” she said softly to Edar. “Let’s check for survivors,” she told the others as they approached the building.

  “I don’t think we’ll find any,” Rogar said and gestured at something by his feet.

  As the others gathered around, they couldn’t disagree.

  There on the ground was a bloody paw-print.

  A paw-print over twelve inches wide.

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