Billy Buckhorn and the War of Worlds, page 30
As he pulled up in front of Grandpa Wesley’s house, he heard laughter coming from the backyard and smelled the aroma of meat cooking on a grill. With new energy, he bounded up onto the porch and stepped into the living room.
There he found Lisa chatting with Raelynn on the sofa. Seeing her boyfriend and sensing his newly found upbeat attitude, she jumped up and sprang into his embrace.
“Well, well, well,” she said jokingly. “Look who decided to grace us with his royal presence. If it isn’t the celebrated Thunder Child himself!”
The broad smile on her face told Billy she was only kidding, and they kissed. And to Billy it felt very normal, so they kept kissing.
“Yoo-hoo,” Raelynn said finally. “There are other people present, and they’re feeling rather ignored.”
The couple finally broke it off with one last lingering look into each other’s eyes.
“By the way, I’m no longer Thunder Child. I’m just Billy.”
“Hello, just Billy,” Lisa said. “I’m just Lisa, your long-lost girlfriend.”
“Okay, you two,” Raelynn interjected. “Enough! Why don’t we go out back where everyone’s enjoying themselves?”
As the couple followed the investigator toward the back, Billy said, “I’m sorry I’ve been distant the past two weeks. I had to sort out a few things in my mind.”
“No problem. I figured you needed time to process everything that happened.”
Raelynn announced Billy’s arrival to everyone gathered around card tables and folding chairs in the backyard. Chigger was the first to welcome his friend with some news he couldn’t wait to share.
“Billy, I’ve been dying to tell you about the comic book I’ve started writing!” he said, not waiting for anyone else to speak.
“Oh, yeah, what’s it called?” Billy asked.
“Nathan Nighthawk and the Tale of the Banished Beasts,” he said. “It’s filled with all those nightmarish creatures I dreamed about.”
“Sounds fantastic, my friend,” Billy said. “Too bad no one will believe it.”
“I believe it,” Jerry Swimmer said. “Every word. In fact, I’ll tell everyone I know to buy a copy. I had a front-row seat to the most unbelievable series of events anyone on earth has ever witnessed. So I tried to tell everyone I encountered all about it.”
“And what was their response?” Raelynn asked.
“They all think I’m crazy.”
She gave him a little peck on the cheek. “I told you he’d come around,” she said and grabbed her FBI boyfriend’s arm.
After everyone had their chance to greet Billy, Cecil announced, “Time to eat the roast beast,” playing off Chigger’s comic book theme.
The gathering provided Billy with the perfect occasion to share his new idea and answer the questions the UTP Team had been asking. After devouring a classic summertime plate of sliced barbecue beef, baked beans, potato salad, and coleslaw—followed by a slice of ripe watermelon—Billy was ready to converse.
“The first question I’ll answer came from Cecil back at Cahokia when the Sun Chief appeared.”
“That’s right,” the elder said. “After all our failed attempts to find his bones so we could free him from the Snake Cult’s curse, how did you make that happen?”
“I simply followed the advice of someone who was a little older and wiser than I was at the time,” Billy answered.
That reply puzzled everyone there.
“One of the things I learned from Morningstar was how to do out-of-body time travel,” he said.
“Wow!” Chigger interrupted. “I think I just found the storyline for my next comic book!”
“Anyway,” Billy continued, “before the Showdown at Cahokia, my future self paid me a very timely visit.”
He paused to let that sink in.
Using his hand, Chigger made the gesture of something flying over his head. “You’re blowing my mind here, buddy,” he said.
“You’re blowing all our minds,” Lisa echoed.
“After telling me to rely on myself, he briefed me on a few important upcoming events,” Billy continued. “Then he suggested I use the time travel trick to go back and follow Coyotl’s timeline, starting the day he got Shakuru’s bones, to see where the Aztec took them.”
Billy paused again to make sure his listeners were keeping up.
“That allowed me to see the code to the combination lock on the Cliffside Cave’s gate and then listen to the Nahuatl words Coyotl used to reestablish the concealment and imprisonment spells. The day before the Showdown, I physically visited the cave and used a Nahuatl spell I found in the back of Blacksnake’s book to undo Coyotl’s spells.”
“Sounds like basic procedures from the spy’s international handbook,” Chigger commented.
“But what about the Uktenas?” Cecil asked. “What happened to them?”
“Your granddaughter can fill us in on those details,” Billy replied.
“By the time we got the US Marshals’ helicopter refueled, it was already dark,” Lisa’s account began. “We flew north over the Mississippi River, but it was too dark to see much of anything below. That is until I saw a very curious sight about the time we passed by Memphis.”
“What, what, what?” Chigger effused.
“There were seven small, odd glowing objects moving northward in the river,” Lisa continued. “I asked our pilot to get us closer so I could take a better look. When we were directly above the objects, he aimed a spotlight down on them, and I was shocked to see seven Horned Serpents merrily swimming along. The spotlight also revealed a trail of dead fish floating in the water behind the serpents, and withered and dying plants along the shoreline.”
“Why only seven serpents?” Lisa’s grandfather asked. “I thought there were eight.”
“There were eight, but only seven of them still had their glowing Fire Crystals in the middle of their foreheads,” Lisa answered. “The eighth one, the one without the crystal, was out in front, apparently leading the pack.”
“Oh, that explains a lot,” Chigger said. “I wondered when and how you started putting things together.”
“You’re right. That’s when I began wondering about what happened to that missing Fire Crystal. And I remembered the story Billy told me about how Chigger kept the purple tail crystal belonging to the Uktena in the bat cave.”
“Smart girl,” Billy said.
“I called Billy and told him my suspicions about where that crystal might be,” Lisa concluded.
The crowd at this backyard cookout waited quietly and patiently for more details to unfold. You could hear a pin drop in the silence.
“Then I called my oldest, bestest friend, who was riding in the van toward Cahokia at the time, and asked a very vague question,” Billy said. “Is there something you’re not telling me?”
“Man, you got me good,” Chigger replied with a chuckle. “I thought you already knew for sure I had the crystal. I spilled my guts immediately, didn’t I?”
“I’m glad you did,” Billy said. “Think about what might’ve happened if you didn’t.”
Chigger picked up the story from there. “I realized the lead Uktena was paying attention to me and seemed to want to follow me because I had his Fire Crystal,” he explained. “I still wanted to do something to help the Underworld Takeover Prevention Team, so I came up with the idea of trying to slow them down.”
“I have to say that was good thinking,” Lisa responded.
“I appreciate that, Lisa. I tried communicating this idea through the crystal, and my Uktena—I called him my Uktena because he seemed to like me—understood me.”
“I think your superpower was still at work,” Billy commented.
“No doubt. I checked in on them as we kept driving toward Cahokia. They stopped at that Cliffside Cave south of St. Louis, waiting for further instructions. I’m pretty sure they’d already been programmed by the Serpent Society to do that. But now they were waiting for me to tell them what to do next.”
“Good deductive reasoning, Sherlock,” Billy said. “When the Snake Priest killed the remaining Serpent Society members at Cahokia, the Uktenas they controlled bit the dust at the same time.” “This is all incredible, but I have one more question,” Cecil said.
“What happened to the Night Seers and their collection of cryptid creatures?” Billy said. “That’s what you want to know, right?”
Cecil nodded.
“We have Amos Yonaguska to thank for helping us with that problem,” Billy said.
The Eastern Cherokee medicine man, sitting quietly in the back, had joined them for the barbecue at Billy’s invitation.
“Amos, where are you?” Billy called out.
A tall, thin man with a craggy face rose from his folding chair. “Hello, everyone,” he said. “I feel blessed because Billy chose to forgive me for my past transgressions and welcome me into this community. I hope you all can do the same.”
“Not only did he transfer control of the Tlanuwa to me,” Billy explained. “As a former member of the Owl Clan, he was also able to block the attack of their beasts at Cahokia. Once that happened, the Night Seers scattered and escaped as quick as they could, because they’d already witnessed the execution of the serpent sorcerers who failed Monkata.”
“I only wish I’d acted sooner, before any of the banished beasts had been released from the Underworld,” Yonaguska said. “Now, every last one of them has been sent back where they belong.”
“Except for one,” Billy corrected. “Our Tlanuwa still remains, living in a remote mountain area far away from humans. Amos and I will keep an eye on him.”
“We’ve become quite attached,” Amos added.
“To you, Amos, I say Wado—thank you—for what you did,” Billy replied. “And to everyone here, please welcome Amos as our new ally and friend.”
Cecil was the first of many to approach Amos and shake his hand.
“But will the Night Seers just get away without being punished for what they did?” Billy’s dad asked.
“Not if we can help it,” Jerry Swimmer replied. “Amos gave us the names and addresses of all the Night Seers, and we expect to arrest every last one of them for the murders of your parents, Wesley and Awinita Buckhorn. They’ll also be charged with acts of domestic terrorism for their role in releasing dangerous, life-threatening beasts onto several Indian reservations.”
Spontaneous shouts of “Aho” and “Amen” and “Hoka hey” and “Hallelujah” came from various members of the assembled partyers as the celebration kicked into high gear.
Billy decided announcements about his own future plans could wait until another time. In fact, the delay allowed him the opportunity to huddle up with his parents and the Lookout family to make those plans more concrete.
Then, on the night of June 21, the summer solstice and his seventeenth birthday, Billy made the announcement to the hundred or so invitees who’d gathered at the Cherokee Nation Cultural Grounds. The medicine lodge, site of the shaking tent ceremony earlier in the year, still stood on those grounds, thanks to permission given by the tribe’s principal chief.
“Thanks to a very generous donation from an anonymous donor,” Billy said as he stood before the assembled crowd, “I’m proud to announce the creation of the Awinita and Wesley Buckhorn Center for Healing and Cultural Education, which will be located in the renovated house that once belonged to my grandparents.”
Vigorous applause flowed from the audience, which included everyone who’d recently attended the gathering at the abandoned amphitheater.
“I’ve consulted with my parents, my grandparents—who send their regards from the Afterworld—and the Lookout family, and we’ve decided to make it a place where traditional Cherokee medicine merges with modern medical treatments in a holistic approach. And now my partner in this project will give you some more details. Lisa?”
Billy gave his girlfriend a quick peck on the cheek as she stepped forward, immensely embarrassing the girl. It showed on her face. Smiling, she gave him a little swat on the shoulder as he stepped aside.
“My partner, the sometimes-annoying Billy Buckhorn, will serve as the primary provider of traditional healing services, carrying on the practice of his grandparents,” Lisa said. “But he’s inviting other members of the Cherokee Nation Medicine Keepers to also treat patients here, if they want to.”
“I really like the sound of that,” Wilma Wohali replied from where she stood in the crowd. “Spoken in the true spirit of Awinita and Wesley.”
“Billy plans on continuing the even older tradition of connecting Native people with the spirits of their deceased loved ones,” Lisa continued. “A scene etched into the wall of the crystal cave provided a glimpse of this ancient practice.”
That announcement was received with mixed reactions. Not everyone at the event approved of such activities.
“Excuse me,” a woman standing in the back of the audience said. “I’d like to say something, if I may.”
Billy recognized Mattie Acorn, a Cherokee woman who’d come to him seeking consolation after her son’s death. She came forward and stood beside Lisa.
“First, I need to apologize to you, young man,” she said, looking at Billy. “When my son died, I came to you seeking a comforting message, but what you gave me was the truth. When you saw a vision of him dying by suicide, I pretended it wasn’t true and called you a liar.”
There were gasps from a few in the audience.
“You weren’t lying,” she went on, “and I’m sorry for accusing you of that. When you open your new healing center, I want to be the first in line, and maybe we can connect with my son.”
Billy stepped closer to the woman, and he reached out to her, grasping her hand. “I’d be honored to help you, but why wait?” he said. “Let’s find a quiet, private place and see if we can talk to him now.”
As they retreated to an out-of-the-way corner of the cultural grounds, Lisa invited guests to enjoy refreshments available inside the lodge, and everyone mixed and mingled in a subdued mood.
A few evenings later, Lisa and Chigger joined Billy for a little night fishing on Lake Tenkiller. The skiff, which had been neglected the past few weeks, drifted on the water as the three dropped their fishing lines overboard. A dark velvet sky filled with a brilliant field of stars floated overhead.
“I had hoped for a little alone time with my boyfriend,” Lisa complained as she sat in the soft glow of the camping lantern.
“Ah, but Lisa,” Chigger replied, “this is the new reality. You, me, and Billy are truly the Three Muskrateers!”
“My dad said you, he, and Augustus were the Three Muskrateers back when you were searching for the hidden cave.”
“I was just trying out the name then, but I now realize that name was meant for us,” Chigger said. “One for all, and all for one.”
“And I was hoping for a quiet night of fishing with no talking!” Billy said a little too loudly.
“Shhhh!” Chigger admonished. “You’ll scare the fish or wake those Underworld shadow spirits.”
That gave all three of them the shivers.
“I for one don’t want to get any of that started again,” Billy said, and no one said anything after that.
Looking up, Billy thought he saw the campfires of the ancestors burn more brightly for a few seconds and then fade back to their usual appearance. The muggy June air clung to his skin like a familiar wet blanket, and he felt that things were almost normal once again.
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Kilpatrick, Alan. The Night Has a Naked Soul: Witchcraft and Sorcery Among the Western Cherokee. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1997.
Kilpatrick, Jack F. and Anna G. Kilpatrick. Friends of Thunder: Folktales of the Oklahoma Cherokees. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1995.
Little, Gregory L. The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Indian Mounds and Earthworks. Memphis, TN: Eagle Wing Books, 2016.
Little, Gregory. Path of Souls: The Native American Death Journey. Memphis, TN: ATA Archetype Books, 2014.
Mooney, James. “The Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees.” Seventh Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1886, 301-397, Bureau of American Ethnology.
Monroe, Robert A. Ultimate Journey. New York: Doubleday, 1994.
Pauketat, Timothy R. Cahokia: Ancient America’s Great City on the Mississippi. New York: Penguin Books, 2009.
Zimmerman, Fritz. The Native American Book of the Dead. Self-published, 2020.
ary Robinson, a writer and filmmaker of Cherokee and Choctaw Indian descent, has spent more than thirty years collaborating with American Indian communities to tell the historical and contemporary stories of Native people in all forms of media.
His most recent books include Native Actors and Filmmakers: Visual Storytellers and Be Your Own Best Friend Forever, both published by 7th Generation in 2021.
His historical novel series, Lands of Our Ancestors, portrays California history from a Native American perspective. It is used in many classrooms in the state, and has been praised by teachers and students alike.
He has also written several other teen novels, including Billy Buckhorn and the Book of Spells, Billy Buckhorn and the Rise of the Night Seers, Standing Strong, Thunder on the Plains, Tribal Journey, Little Brother of War, and Son Who Returns. His two children’s books share aspects of Native American culture through popular holiday themes: Native American Night Before Christmas and Native American Twelve Days of Christmas.
He lives in rural central California.
