CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Climbing up to the highest peak in these, the Bears Paw Mountains, Strikes Fast looked out upon the night and its brilliance of stars. The moon had already set, its absence causing the sky overhead to be littered with the radiating glow of starlight. Indeed, the brilliance of these tiny lights versus the black sky seemed unusually profound this night. Even the snow over the ground seemed to have a personality, appearing to accentuate his thoughts, which were cold and barren. Though it was frosty and bitter in this white world of snow, he didn't bother to place his blanket around him. Instead, he set his blanket on the ground and made a fire with the embers he had carried here from the lodge fire; then, placing a spark from the fire in his pipe, he lit the tobacco, and, as he drew in a whiff of the smoke, he silently said a vow to speak only truth.
Standing, he carefully raised his sacred pipe overhead and blew four breaths of the smoke upward to the Creator, then, inhaling again, he exhaled four puffs to the Wind Maker, then to the Thunder and lastly to the Lightning. Only then did he sing a little of his beaver medicine song before beginning his prayer:
"Akbaatatdía, daásitchee kuxshé bíasshee,Creator, please help my wife.
"Akbaatatdía,Creator, I come before You now even knowing why we have not spoken in many years. I am here before You asking for Your help to heal my woman's injuries and her illness. I have done the best I can for her, but my medicine is failing me. Since the last time we spoke many years ago, I have learned it's true that only You have the power to restore life. A medicine man may heal, but it is done only through Your guidance.
"Akbaatatdía,Creator, I open my heart to You, and what I say to You is the truth: I no longer wish to walk the path of revenge.
"Akbaatatdía,as You are aware, I abandoned the good road for what I thought were good reasons, because a man must avenge his loved ones. But, good though I thought it was to seek vengeance, I began to lust after killing, and I lost who I was in doing this. Further, I speak with a straight tongue when I say it was not because of my own actions that I ceased to thirst after killing, but rather it was because of the influence of the two Pikuni medicine men who came into my life. But, in my defense, even though I knew I had lost myself by taking up the warpath, I never used my power to curse others. And yet, once I had started down the path of killing, I could not stop what I was doing, even when there was no need to continue.
"Akbaatatdía,I am here, praying to You now, not for myself, but for my wife; she did not commit the same acts as I, and she deserves to live.
"Akbaatatdía,if someone must die, let it be me. I will gladly give my life for hers. Please hear me. Let her live. To show You my heart is in the right place, I gladly give You my sacred pipe filled with sacred tobacco if You will only listen to my plea and guide my hand so I might help my woman. Before You now, I pledge my sacred honor that, if I live, I shall seek the straight medicine path if You might again favor me with the gift of healing. I say this to You, also: if You choose to help me, I will use this power to help my wife and others yet to come.
"Akbaatatdía,Creator, this is now the end of my prayer."
Patiently, Strikes Fast waited and he waited. Yet, there came no answer.
And, though a single tear fell down his cheek, he did not move. But, when the eastern sky began to turn silver with the light of day, Strikes Fast knew Sun had not heard him.
Nevertheless, as he had promised he would do, Strikes Fast placed his pipe and tobacco upon the rock beside the fire. Slowly, with both his mind and body filled with the pain of remorse, he prepared to leave.
As he slowly came up to his feet, he heard a rumble above him; however, looking up, he saw nothing, and he heard nothing more. Despair consumed him, and he turned away. But, at the same moment when he stepped a foot forward to go, words came issuing down from the sky:
"I have heard you, young medicine man. A helper will come to visit you this very morning. Do as your helper says. She will share her healing song with you and will lead you to the right herbal needed to heal your woman. She will tell you how to use this plant so your woman will recover."
Strikes Fast stopped perfectly still. Had he heard these words correctly? Had the Creator said He would help him to bring his wife back to health? Also, had he imagined it, or had the Creator truly addressed him as a medicine man?
So overcome was Strikes Fast with happiness, the tears—which had been accumulating throughout the night but were as yet unshed—began to flow freely down his face. And, as Strikes Fast prepared to leave to do as the Creator instructed, he heard the Creator say:"Welcome back, young medicine man."
****
In the early hours of the morning, Strikes Fast was greeted by a skunk. At first, he stepped aside, avoiding the animal altogether, but then the skunk spoke to him and said, "It is I, your helper."
Strikes Fast, however, didn't answer at once. Truly, he was confused, and, after a moment, he said, "But, my medicine helper is a beaver."
"I fear," replied the skunk, "your beaver medicine failed you when you needed it most. Sun has instructed me to give you my healing songs because all creatures, big and small, fear me above all others. Learn these songs well because they contain great medicine; they will bring your wife back to life, yes, but they will help you to heal others, also. But first, I must lead you to the medicine plant needed to allow your wife to breathe again with ease. Follow me."
Strikes Fast did as the skunk instructed and followed the little animal to a plant he recognized at once as one of the most sacred of all plants. He said, "But, my wife is gravely ill, and it takes many days of work to cause this plant to be used without it having an ill effect."
"Ah, yes," replied the skunk. "So it is said. And yet, in the long ago past, your people used this wild plant to heal without the need to do more than pick it. It has healed my own children, and it will do so for you, too. This is what Sun has instructed me to show you. Talk to the plant as you pick it and tell it what you wish it to do. Honor it. Let it know you will not uproot all of its children so many other plants may grow. When you return to your home, cut it up and wet it, make a paste of it and place it on your woman's head wound. Then smear it over her lungs. This you must do four times each day. Lastly, make a tea of it and let her inhale its fragrance four times each day. When she is able, let her sip the tea, but she must take only a little of it.
"Now I will instruct you how to make a rattle so you may coax the evil spirits to leave your wife's body and mind. She erred when she did not also paint herself against these evil spirits, unaware they would turn against her. But, she was not then thinking of herself. However, using the rattle is not enough. Each day you must paint her as she did to you. Sing the medicine song I will teach you and use the rattle four times each day. Do all this and she will become well again.
"Come, I will take you to the place where you may find the stones to place into your rattle. Make the rattle of whatever hide you have with you. After I show you where to collect the stones, I must leave. I have my own family to attend to. If you need me again, call me out by my name,Xuáhchee."
The skunk led him to the stream outside Strikes Fast's mountain lodge and indicated where he would find the shiny stones he was to use in the rattle, and then the skunk sat down beside him and taught Strikes Fast the Skunk Medicine Song. Over and over they sang it together until Strikes Fast knew he could sing it on his own.
Then, when it was all done, Strikes Fast and the skunk said their farewells, and Strikes Fast watched the skunk half trot, half walk away.
Silently, he said, "Thank you, Xuáhchee, my new animal helper. And, thank you, Creator."
****
For three days and three nights, Strikes Fast did exactly as the skunk had instructed. He prepared the plant and used it as he had been taught. He sang the skunk's healing song, accompanying it with a steady rhythm—the heartbeat of all livings things—on his medicine drum. And, with his rattle, he encouraged the evil ones to leave his wife's body. Day by day, he watched each evil spirit depart, one by one.
