Seducing Jennifer Pt. 36

The following is fiction. No sexual acts occur between humans under the age of 18.

If you haven't been reading this series, don't bother with this. It explains why things happened the way they did.

And there's no sex, so don't hold your breath waiting for it.

*****

I stood up as the couple approached. Vholes was clad in a ragged breechclout and Anna was wearing a short doeskin tunic. She carried a pack on her back, but it wasn't an ordinary burden-basket. It looked more like a cradle-board.

I ducked into the guest house. "You need to get out here now, Jennifer—"

My lovely wife was sitting on the edge of our bed with her legs spread wide. Mary Louise was squatting in front of her, apparently examining her pussy.

"Get out, Jack!" Jennifer squealed.

"No, really. There's someone coming, and...I'm pretty sure it's your mother."

I ducked back out and stood up. Anna recognized me and ran into my outstretched arms.

"Oh, Jacky! You really made it!"

She lifted her radiantly beautiful face to me and I kissed her lips tenderly.

She shrugged out of her backpack and held it up to me. It was a cradle-board. And there was a baby laced into it.

Jennifer came out of the guest house with Mary Louise close behind her. They were both dressed in pretty doeskin tunics.

"Mom?" Jennifer gasped. "Oh my God, Mom!"

She ran to Anna and embraced her. Anna handed the cradle-board to me and took Jennifer in her arms. "I've missed you, Sweetie. But everything is OK now. Don't cry."

"But I was so worried! And you missed my wedding..." Jennifer sobbed into Anna's blond hair.

I looked at the baby in the cradle basket I was holding. Little brown child with blue-ringed black irises. Kind of cute, if you liked that sort of thing.

Tommy stooped to look into the baby's face and offered it his finger. It pursed its lips and looked back at him solemnly. "Kind of looks like you, Dude. Strange-looking eyes on the little toad, though."

The women were involved in a group hug, sobbing and babbling all at the same time. Vholes slithered over and stood next to Tommy and me.

"A little addition to the family, what?" Vholes grinned. "Children are always a benefit to the clan."

"How did you find Anna so quickly?" I asked. "And where did the baby come from?"

Vholes waived his bony hand. "I'd rather answer all your questions at once. Perhaps we should go inside while the women become reacquainted? I shall require a pot of hot water...I fear that I am rather fatigued."

We crawled into the hut and sat cross-legged around the fire pit. Vholes quickly assembled a small pyramid of sticks over a wad of dry tinder and struck sparks into it. He soon had it glowing brightly.

He warmed his hands over the tiny fire and carefully added more sticks. "Would that it did not take so long to heat water here," he said. "Some of the conveniences of other worlds are sorely missed."

"I could probably bum some water from the cook shack in town," Tommy offered.

"That would be most welcome, Master Thomas," Vholes said gratefully. "We will await your return before going into specifics."

After Tommy had left Vholes said to me, "Did the initial marital exchange go well for you, Master Jack? Any problems?"

"It was spectacular," I grinned.

"I would imagine so. When souls have merged, the subsequent joinder of bodies tends to be...well, as you say, spectacular." His bony face softened in the firelight, and I thought I saw a thin smile of fond remembrance cross his lips.

"Pardon me if I rest my eyes, and my souls, for a few moments, Jack. Perhaps you wish to do the same. I expect you had a rather...active...night."

I rested my hands on my knees and stared into the fire. Secrets seemed to hide within its glowing core, and the leaping tongues of flame sought to provide clues to the mystery, but I could not decipher them. I closed my eyes and let my mind open to the faint voices of my souls.

Tommy came back in with a large gourd full of hot water. "I came as quickly as I could," he explained, "but nobody had anything really hot so I had to wait—"

The women crowded in behind him, joyous smiles on their tear-stained faces. Mary Louise carried the baby, crooning to it, and making it grizzle happily. Anna took the cradle-board and hung it on a post where it could see her before sitting down next to Vholes and leaning her head on his shoulder.

Tommy and Mary Louise sat down close together and Jennifer sat close to me, hugging my arm.

Vholes added herbs to the pot of water and tossed a pinch onto the fire as well. "So where to begin," he said wearily. "It is difficult to know, when there is no true beginning. All life is a circle, as is our world, and the paths of the sun and moon. They rise, they fall, we live, we die, and then it all starts again. Matter and energy are conserved, as are souls and consciousness. The plant and animal people know this well, and accept it without question. We humans, perhaps, are not so wise."

He stirred the pot with a twig. "Philosophers have debated the meaning and mechanism of this since the earliest appearance of humans on this planet. And it has been the same on many others. In the world where we all once lived, physicists search for a single unified theory of the universe, but perhaps Descartes had already found it when he succinctly stated, 'cogito ergo sum;' 'I think, therefore I am.'"

"I know one of you is going to ask me, did we all die and perhaps go to heaven?" He sighed. "I wish you wouldn't, because I don't know. Any explanation I could manufacture would be woefully inadequate. So I will ask you, do you think? Do you feel? Do you have memories?"

We all looked at each other, nodding.

"Then you exist. In this time and place. And that is what is most important."

My mind seethed with unanswered questions. "But...we once existed in two different places. In the dream world, and in what we thought of as the 'real' world...but now it seems that we exist only in this world, wherever or whatever it is. But I seem to have memories of both existences. Did one version of me...die?"

Vholes shook his head. "Our cases are special and unique to us, as far as I know. You and I, Jack, have long lived a bifurcated existence in two worlds simultaneously, and we have full memories of both. You attempted to block your abilities from your mind, dismissing your ancient memories as mere dreams. I did not."

"Let us drink tea. It may help promote understanding, or if not that, acceptance."

He ladled out tea in a gourd dipper and passed it around the circle. We each took seven small sips.

"Perhaps I was fortunate, perhaps cursed. I was abandoned by my mother but was fortunate enough to be raised by my grandmother, who was a Cherokee and who lived as traditional a life as was possible at that time. We observed the ancient traditions, the dances and the songs, and we lived close to the earth." He cleared his throat and dipped up more tea for himself.

"My dreams were never dismissed as fantasy by my grandmother. We discussed them as if they were any other natural events, and with the help of her Dreamwalker tea we often traveled other worlds together. We both learned many things in our travels, but one persistent legend shaped both my lives."

"In ancient, ancient times it was said that the first people, the a-ni Ketuwah, came to this world from somewhere up there." He waved toward the smoke-hole. "Far above the sky-dome, from a place near the center of the constellation we now call 'Orion's Belt.'"

"This was during the times when, as other legends have it, 'the world was new, and all the plants and animals could talk the same as people.' These explorers, if that's what they were, came in the form of four beautiful young people. They were represented by the colors bronze, black, red, and gold. And the spot where they arrived was here, where the sacred mound now lies."

He looked at each of us in turn, his yellow eyes glowing in the firelight. "They travelled throughout this world the Creator had made and they found it good. They made certain arrangements and left two new humans behind, people you will recognize from the story you know so well—Se-lu and Ka-na-ti, Corn Woman and Lucky Hunter."

'After the explorers had left, toward what destination no one knows, unpleasant things came into this world. We've all heard the story." He took another dipper of cooling tea. "Anyone?" He offered it around.

Anna took the dipper and drank, then got up and went to the baby, moistening its lips with the tea before returning to her spot next to Vholes. She refilled the dipper and passed it to Tommy.

"Now we know that the stories are not perfectly recorded throughout the millennia, at least not in a form we can easily recognize. No Tsa-la-gi can hear the story of Se-lu and Ka-na-ti without feeling the thrum of a sympathetic chord deep within him. So apparently something is still there, perhaps recorded in our DNA."

"But the details...these are soon forgotten. Few remember, but some of the Ancient Ones said that the four explorers told Se-lu before they left that they would return, when the ani Kituwah needed them most."

"When I made my vision quest at the age of twelve winters, with my grandmother's help, I fasted and prayed until a misty form appeared to me and told me many things. Some I cannot share with you, but one I can—my mission in both my existences was to help the explorers return to Kituwah."

He looked at each of us with owlish eyes. "I think I have done that. I have worked long and hard, and my time in these bodies is nearly at an end. So you may believe me when I say I am proud to see before me Tsa-k'-yi; he nodded to me, A-de-la da-lo-ni-ge, Guh-hna-ge, and Gi-ga-ge." He pointed to Jennifer, Tommy and Mary Louise in turn. "The bronze, the gold, the black, and the red."

"Tsa-k'-yi," I murmured. "Almost like 'Jacky.'" The sound of my true name, the one to be kept secret, set my souls to humming joyfully.

"Quite," Vholes nodded. "I don't suppose I need to tell you that this information must be kept only among the six of us. Others may suspect, but they must not be told. Indeed one wise woman already believes." He smiled. "The Blue Clan mother is a valuable ally. Keep her close to you."

He stretched his long legs and massaged his knees. "Now I'm sure there are specific details you would like, and I'll try to answer a few questions, if I can. But I would like you to be brief." He put his hand on Anna's knee. "Anna and I have some things we need to discuss privately."

"Mother of Pearl," Tommy said. "The whole thing is just wildly implausible. I mean, the four of us somehow wound up in the same town at the same crappy private school? By coincidence?"

"Oh no, Thomas." Vholes smiled hideously, and I saw the War Chief in his face. "No coincidence, although I cannot be certain that events would not have managed to occur without my help. How did your mother come to live in that house, Thomas?"

"I don't really know. I guess she came from California, but my Dad...I don't even know who he was. Mom inherited the house; I'm not sure who from, but she always said it was all she had and we were going to live there until I was on my own."

"Perhaps she inherited it from a distant relative she never knew," Vholes said. "She was most fortunate when an attorney tracked her down and told her about it. And how is it, Thomas, that you attended a private school, when your mother is a destitute alcoholic surviving on the public dole?"

"I got a scholarship," Tommy said defensively. "For under-privileged minorities."

"Funded by the school?"

"No, some anonymous rich guy. Oh." He looked at Vholes and grinned. "Thank you for that. But the school sucked, by the way."

"What about me?" I demanded. "I was stolen from my real mother and sold to white people. Did you arrange that too?"

Vholes shook his head. "You drew the others to you, Jack. You were the first one I found, when I was the attorney assigned to assist with an investigation into the trade in Cherokee infants. My souls recognized you in your crib, and I knew what had to be done."

"Then why didn't you—"

Vholes held up a bony hand. "I tried, Jack. But no one particularly cared outside of the Cherokee Nation. The US Government certainly did not. Their official policy was still 'Kill the Indian, Save the Man.' They thought putting you in a white home was the best thing that could happen to you." He sighed. "And perhaps, in your case, they were right. Your mother did not live long, Jack. She was troubled in her souls and did not wish to suffer any more. Her only concern was that you would survive."

"My father?"

Vholes shrugged.

"Only rumor," he grinned.

"And I'm guessing you had something to do with my dad getting that fantastic job offer that moved us all the way from Boston when I was three," Mary Louise broke in.

Vholes nodded. "Buying, selling, trading favors. I lived in that world and am sick unto death with it. But my efforts speak for themselves, I think. Anyone have any problems with my meddling? Berate me now or forever hold your peace."

"What about Mom?" Jennifer asked. "Surely you didn't arrange for her to...be controlled by that awful little man."

"Not exactly—" Vholes began.

"I'll cover this, Simon, if you don't mind," Anna said. She stood and went to the baby, unlacing the cradle-board and returning to her seat with the infant in her arms.

She dropped one shoulder of her tunic, exposed her breast, and began feeding the baby. She combed his fine black hair with her fingers as she spoke.

"I guess Jack knows more about this than Jennifer does, and I'm sorry. I meant to tell you, Sweetie, but it just never seemed like the right time." She nodded at Jennifer and briefly repeated what she had previously told me of her early history.

"Simon didn't get me into that mess, but he did try to get me out of it. I was too stubborn to listen to him when he tried to make me understand how important you were going to be to the ani Kituwah."

"Not to take credit from Simon, because he has done a lot, but other forces were at work when I ended up being 'adopted' by Hyman Hershkowitz. I got there on my own—but coincidence? Hard to believe. My chances of dying on the street were far greater than anything else. And then came Hyman, looking for a girl he could completely control."

"Guess he kind of miscalculated that time," Tommy grinned.

"Quite," Vholes said.

"And then came Simon," Anna smiled. "At one of Hymie's parties. He was handling some case, I can't remember the details, and Hymie was desperately trying to influence the judge. He offered me to the judge but that backfired because it turned out the judge preferred boys."

"He was running out of time so then he thought maybe he could get his opponent's attorney, Simon, to throw the case. So he got Simon out to the lake house and assigned me to him for the night." She bumped her shoulder against Vholes affectionately.

"Simon was horrified, of course. But I begged him to take me so I wouldn't get assigned to someone else. That's the first time he gave me Dreamwalker tea. And we came here, together." She switched the baby to her other breast.

"I was somewhat more attractive in those days," Vholes added wryly.

"Before anyone asks," Anna continued, "yes, we were lovers. Both in this world and in the other. From time to time. And Simon was more than "somewhat more attractive." Before he got sick he was every bit as fine a specimen of Cherokee manhood as Jack, here.

He asked me to leave Hyman many times, and I know he would have seen that Jennifer and I were taken care of, but I was determined to make Hymie pay for what he'd done.

I didn't really believe in the dreams, you see, even after having been here so many times. And I knew Simon was convinced that Jennifer was one of the chosen, but I wasn't. Still, I let her spend time with Jack, and really hoped that they would end up together, because they seemed to be perfect together."

"But—" Jennifer chewed at her lower lip, "where have you been lately? On your vision quest? And in the other world?"

"I left that other world before you did, dear," Anna said, putting the baby on her shoulder and patting its back. "Simon did the ceremony for me...and the story about my 'dream quest' was not exactly true. I knew I was going to have a baby before Simon merged my souls. And I didn't want that to interfere with the journey the four of you were about to take..."

My mouth went dry and I held Jennifer close against me. "So who was the father?" I asked quietly.

Anna and Vholes looked at each other.

"Only rumor, " they said in unison.

The baby burped loudly and Anna laid him in her lap. He gurgled at her, his tiny fists waiving in the air. "Oh, he's such a little fighter!" Anna cooed, batting at his little fists with a finger. "Maybe we should call him I-na-ge u-ta-su-ni."

I shivered and my skin broke out in goose-pimples. "Wild Boy," I whispered.

Vholes fixed me with his cat-like stare. "The old stories need not play out the same way in every cycle, Jack. Indeed, the stories are not necessarily accurate after millennia of oral repetition. And they are never to be taken dogmatically. They hold truth, but not all truth. This Wild Boy's mother did not throw him away."

"I'm just wondering," Tommy said, "not that I particularly care, but what happened to all Hymie's money?"

"Oh, that," Anna said airily, playing with the baby's toes. "I took care of that before I left that defiled world. Some of it went to the Cherokee Heritage Center, some to the tribal medical center, some to the Kituwah Night Hawk Society, some to Simon's office to be used for certain charitable things...this and that. I made sure none of it went anywhere that Hymie would have approved of, though. Told you I was stubborn."

"Who was the woman that got burned up in Mr. Hershkowitz's limo?" Mary Louise asked. "I was so afraid it was you."

"She got really unlucky, poor thing," Anna said sadly. "I have no idea who she was and I doubt that anyone else did either. When I dumped Hymie, he decided he would just replace me, and he knew that strip club was full of teenage runaways, because he owned a big chunk of it.

So I'm guessing he picked one, probably one that looked a lot like me, and was about to take her to his place when one of his nasty little friends decided he'd had enough of Hymie's double-dealing and black-mailing, and...boom. End of Hymie, his driver, and some pitiful little girl."

"But it could have been you, Mom!" Jennifer squeaked, tears starting in her eyes. "If you had waited just a few more days to do what you did—"

"Oh, I had some advice on that," Anna smiled, looking up at Simon. "And I had enough sense to follow it this time."

Vholes cleared his throat.

"I have no wish to take credit where it is not due," he said. "Did my meager efforts have some effect on bringing you all together here? I suppose they did. But if I had not lent a hand here and there, I believe things would have worked out anyway.

The cycle of existence is eternal. As what begins must end, so what ends must begin again, as night follows day and death follows life. Is this the work of the Creator? Perhaps. Or perhaps it's just the way things are. Everything must be balanced by its opposite."

"It's just really strange that this is happening to me, one out of 7 billion people on this...or that...planet. Why me? Why not someone prettier, or skinnier, or smarter?" Mary Louise said. "It's just so insanely unlikely!"

"People have been asking that question for millennia, dear. Why did my souls decide to enter this particular body, when the odds were so high of them choosing another? It's the lottery of life.