Free Shadow Valley by Steven Barnes

a dusky mask. The air had cooled, and the dry, sharp tang of hot sand yielded to the whispered perfume of night-blooming cactus. Quietly, without drawing any attention to herself, Stillshadow hobbled out to the camp’s edge and then beyond. She did not seek to meet or hold the eyes of any that she passed, nor did they seek to meet or hold hers.
    Her people pretended not to see her or to comprehend the risks entailed by such a brittle-bone traveling alone into the night. She did not need their doubts and fears added to the chorus echoing between her own ears.
    Her old hips and knees were slow fires. The bamboo crutch beneath her right armpit carried enough of her weight to walk, but every halting step groaned of flesh’s frailty.
    Certainly, some must have worried. Such an old woman alone? And at night—when human sight failed, and the powers of fang and claw were at their height?
    But she was Stillshadow, and as such could not be questioned. Even to doubt her actions would be wrong. As it would be wrong to add their fears to her own.
    She walked and hummed prayers to the
jowk
as the ground crunched beneath her sandaled feet. For a quarter of the night the old woman walked. Her senses were open, seeking a sign. In the whisper of flowing water or ahyena’s distant call. Or a fruited scent, floating on the wind. There was no way for her waking mind to know where she might find a sign.
    A plant. A berry. A mushroom. A venomous snake or scorpion. Any or all of these could be her doorway into the dream world. All she needed to do was be ready and watchful.
    Before the moon had risen fully, she glimpsed a thing of interest and turned from her path to investigate.
    There, revealed by the cloud-shrouded moonlight, sparkled a spiderweb’s jeweled rungs. She leaned down, close enough for her old eyes to detect the clustered knot of legs and swollen belly crouched in ambush at the web’s upper corner. This brown striped eight-legged was known to her: the black head was unmistakable. “Grass spider,” she whispered, drawing closer. “So long has it been since last we spoke. Within you dwells the spirit of all eight-legged. I ask that spirit to restrain her anger. I must kill this one sister. I need her blood in my veins.”
    She reached down into the web. As she spoke, the brown and black spider crawled over and over her hand. As it crossed her palm she made a fist, then winced with the sharp, sudden pain.
    Stillshadow lowered herself to her knees. She chanted, twitching and wincing.
    A wall of poison fire, the spider venom leapfrogged toward her aged heart.
    Frogs. A wall of fire. What?
    Then conscious thought faded, and she slipped into the place behind her dreams.
    A place of trees and shadows, of game and clouds and plants. An endless stream of human faces capered behind her eyes. She saw …
    Mk*tk leeched of color. Men with the fangs and fur of wolves. Spotted yellow women with long necks. A great green circle …
    Mortal terror hammered at the walls of discipline. She shuddered, trembled. Stillshadow tried to walk and could not. Tried to crawl and toppled onto her side.
    “Great Mother, help me,” Stillshadow whispered. “I have the sight but not the strength. Give me your power. …”
    Her muscles knotted. Her breath contracted to a low rattle in her aged throat. “Help me, Great Mother,” she said softly. “All my days, I have served you. I thought my flesh would follow me, but Small Raven fell. So it seems the foundling was your chosen. Did I somehow fail you?”
    Now the tears flowed without end. All questions vanished, like winter leaves drifting into a pond. The world flew apart, and the emptiness behind it crawled out to engulf her.
    Stillshadow turned to face the dark eastern horizon. For the very last time in her long and honored life, she sang to the sun.
    “Great Mother,” she whispered against the wind. “All my days, I have breathed for no one but you. And yet, we lost our land. The ground wept with