Spirit Dances

CHAPTER FIVE

My yelp was drowned beneath the cheering and applause from those around us. Just as well: it sounded suspiciously like a coyote’s cry. I yanked my hand from Morrison’s grip to press it against my throat.

It felt like my hand. It felt perfectly normal, aside from the residual power of the dance still playing my skin. Morrison, wearing the most stricken expression I’d ever seen, shrugged out of his tuxedo jacket and draped it around my shoulders, hiding my entire torso. Hiding my paws. I thrust a foot out to stare at it, but my legs were unaltered. Just ordinary human feet in expensive sandals.

I wasn’t one who typically cared for being manhandled, but I was just as glad when Morrison caught my elbow and levered me to my feet and down the aisle, muttering apologies to the still-applauding patrons upon whose toes we trod.

My shoes, the cause of so much caution earlier, didn’t stymie me at all now that I needed to run for the doors. Here I’d always thought women in the movies who ran in their heels were just managing a lucky take. Turned out it could be done, if necessary.

To my dismay, the ushers held the theater doors open behind us. In terms of fire code that was no doubt the right thing to do, but in terms of getting me away from the roiling energy the dancers had called up, it was no good at all. I whispered, “Out, out, out, get me out of the building, just get me out,” like it was a mantra to keep me safe, and Morrison did so, hustling me ahead of the breaking-up crowd.

The crisp March night air knocked away the sensation of power crawling over my skin. I sagged, willing to stop right there, but Morrison tugged me farther down the street, well away from the smokers who filed out after us. Half a block from the theater he sat me down on a short wall and crouched in front of me, working hard to watch my eyes instead of my hands. “You all right, Walker?”

I shivered my hands out from inside his jacket. They still felt normal, but they were tawny gold and fur-ruffed, pads where my palms belonged and black claws where I was meant to have fingernails. All the times I’d changed shape when scrambling to my garden—into the private center part of me that reflected my soul—I’d known my psychic shape had changed, but it had always felt the same. I’d also known it was only my psychic self changing, not my physical form.

This was definitely physical. And of all the people in the world to lose control in front of, I’d chosen my boss. I had half a dozen friends who would take it in stride, but no, I had to go all magic-freaky on the one guy who was about as enthusiastic about my esoteric skills as I’d once been.

The paws were wavering, my fingers starting to show through as fur faded. It wasn’t me undoing the magic; in fact, given how hard I was focusing on the horrible fact that I was turning into a dog, it was a miracle the magic was letting loose at all. But I was outside the dancers’ sphere of influence, away from the power of their dance and reverting back to normal. There was no pain or discomfort, just a gradual slip back to normality, though when my fingers had returned, I still had the distinct, uncomfortable feeling that it would only take a moment’s concentration to bring the paws back.

My skin didn’t tingle with the dancers’ energy anymore, but the core of magic inside me felt replenished. Or, if not replenished, at least a whole lot more willing to play ball than it had been since that morning. It felt like my reserves had been topped up and were bursting the dam, ready for use and impatient for me to do so.

Morrison’s shoulders dropped about four inches when my ordinary hands peeked out from his jacket. He closed his eyes for a full five seconds, breathing carefully through his nostrils, then looked at me again. “What the hell was that?”

I laughed, a high trill of unhappy sound, and pulled the jacket up around my head to hide in it. It smelled good, like Morrison. Just a hint of old-fashioned cologne, nothing trendy or high-priced. I breathed it in for a few moments, trying to regain my equilibrium and trying not to think about Morrison or his cologne being aspects which could allow me to regain it. After what seemed like forever, but probably wasn’t, I whispered, “Coyote’s been telling me all along that shapeshifting was something I could do in the real world.”

“Sha…” Something about the way Morrison said half a syllable tidily filled in everything that might have followed it. It went something like this: “Shapeshifting? Are you insane, Walker? People don’t shapeshift!” followed hard by except she was just shifting shape in front of me, and I’m not stupid enough to disbelieve that after everything I’ve seen her do the last year, all of which I heard clearly enough that I actually said, “You’re not stupid at all,” in response, and made myself meet his gaze.

For a man who’d just hauled his date out of the theater because she was changing form, he looked remarkably calm. Slightly amused, even, though he said, “Thanks,” with perfect solemnity. “What happened in there?”

“Couldn’t you feel it? The energy they were putting out?”

He shook his head, though his mouth said, “Sure, performers do that. I’ve never seen anybody…”

“Get hairy?” I volunteered weakly. His lips twitched and a tremulous smile of my own shook some of my nerves loose. “It was more than just a performance, boss. They were channeling real power. They were…making magic.” I’d never thought about where the magic came from, not clearly, but I’d experienced similar rushes of power on much smaller scales. My drum could fill me up that way, but never until I overflowed so strongly that it started manifesting in physical changes. The dancers had created something new and strong that hadn’t been there before, something powerful enough to affect me. “You really didn’t feel anything? Nothing like…like your skin was going to come flying apart? You must have. Everybody did. The way the audience came to its feet…”

“I saw a hell of a performance, Walker. The kind that makes you want to cheer, sure, but something bigger happened to you, or we’d all be running around howling by now.”

I blinked at him, then laughed. “You’d make a pretty werewolf, boss. With your silver hair and blue eyes? The girl wolves would be, I don’t know, whatever girl wolves do. Panting after you.” Morrison snorted, and I didn’t want to tell him “panting after you” was a damned sight better than suggesting they’d be sniffing around his hindquarters, which had been the first thing that came to mind.

Somehow, though, his pragmatism made me feel better. I got to my feet and he straightened out of his crouch, looking like he wasn’t sure if he should offer support again. “I’m okay. Boss, somebody in there, the choreographer, one of the dancers, maybe a bunch of them, but somebody in there is like me. That dance, the last one, the shapeshifter’s dance… that had intent in it. I don’t know if it was just the storytelling or if they’ve got something else going on in there, but they were working so much power with so much discipline that it affected me. I’ve got to talk to them.” I’d started walking back to the theater without noticing. Morrison caught up and touched my arm, slowing me enough to notice his expression of concern.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

“Not even slightly.” I wrapped my arms around myself, hugging Morrison’s jacket to me, and stopped where I was, still a good distance from the theater. I watched it, not my boss, while I spoke. “But I can’t stand not knowing what happened, or how or why, and at least when I go back in there I’ll be a little more prepared. And if I go right now, without thinking about any of this too hard, I don’t have to admit that I’m completely horrified and embarrassed that I lost control of my stupid magic and started changing into a dog in front of you.”

Morrison, unexpectedly, said, “Coyotes aren’t dogs,” and I laughed out loud. He said, “What? They’re not!” and I laughed again.

“I know, but Coyote says that all the time. I never expected to hear you say it. I’ll have to tell him you said it.” Coyote was my mentor, another shaman whom I’d thought for years was actually a spirit, because I saw him most often as a golden-eyed coyote. I never tired of referring to him as a dog, mostly because it annoyed him so much. He was also potentially a whole lot more than just a mentor, and it occurred to me he might not like Morrison treading on his I’m-not-a-dog territory.

A frown appeared between Morrison’s eyebrows, making me think maybe he didn’t like being compared to Coyote in any way, either. I wondered if men made everybody’s lives complicated or if I was just unusually incompetent in that field. All he said, though, was, “Just tell me if we need to get out of there, all right, Walker?”

I nodded. “I will, but you might be more likely to notice than I am. I didn’t feel myself changing.”

“I’ll keep an eye on you.” Morrison headed toward the theater, only turning back when he realized I wasn’t following. “Walker?”

“Why aren’t you freaking out?” God, of all the graceful questions I could’ve asked. I put a palm to my forehead, searching for a better way to phrase it, but Morrison chuckled.

“I’ve run out of freak, Walker. When it comes to you and Holliday, there’s no barometer. Every time I think I’ve seen or heard the strangest thing you could possibly come up with, you trump it. Besides, if somebody else in there had noticed what was happening, you’d have been in a world of trouble. I don’t care how weird you get. You’re one of my officers. I’m not going to let you down, not if I can help it.”

In other words, if anybody under his command had suddenly started turning into a coyote, he’d have hustled them out of public view and worried about the details later.

I wasn’t getting preferential treatment. That sort of made me feel better, but only sort of.

Mostly what it did was remind me what a decent person my boss was. He’d gone out of his way for me more than once, even when we were barely on speaking terms. I shouldn’t be surprised that he could handle a little something like me shapeshifting, but I was. I fumbled around for a way to express that, and finally settled on a wholly inadequate, “Thank you.”

Morrison crooked a smile. “Come on, Walker. The show’s about to start again.”

I didn’t enjoy the opening of the second act nearly as much. Not because it wasn’t as good, but because I was concentrating so hard on not getting lost in the power the dancers generated that I couldn’t get lost in the stories they told, either. Morrison leaned over at one point and whispered, “Relax,” but that was easy for him to say. He wasn’t in any danger of sucking up so much magic he would start changing shape. I wondered if I’d have been so vulnerable if it hadn’t already been an emotionally traumatizing day.

Not that it mattered. After a while, it became clear I wasn’t going to slide down that slippery path again. Where the first part had begun with the thunderbird and climaxed with the shapeshifter’s dance, the second opened with a piece that felt more familiar to me. I’d done spirit quests a-plenty over the past year, and the dancers called up the wonder of drifting in darkness as power animals came to examine, consider and eventually to choose. I half expected the audience to start exclaiming over their own spirit guides appearing, and even stole a glance at Morrison to see if he had been granted a vision by the dancers’ skill.

He was watching me, not the stage. I muttered, “I’m fine,” and turned my attention back to the show.

Their second dance tread more territory I recognized. The lights went hard red and yellow, making the stage a rough approximation of the Lower World, a place inhabited by demons and gods. One of the dancers became lost in that world, only to be found by the newly-spirit-guided lead from the previous dance. By the end of the third piece I knew where they were going, because I’d walked the path myself. The first act had followed a shaman’s journey as a shapeshifter, something totally outside my own experience. The second, though, was unquestionably the healer’s path. I was sure the final piece would be the ghost dance, and I knew exactly what to expect of it.

A shaman could, in theory, affect a full-blown healing with the force of his will alone. It required belief on the part of the one being healed, as well, but extraordinary things could happen if both parties were utterly confident in the outcome. I’d only experienced it on a minor level myself, though I knew the power to heal completely lay within me.

I was willing to bet it lay within the dancers, too. Not exactly as I experienced it, maybe, because my magic was largely internal, and they were unquestionably creating something external. My magic wasn’t something that caught others up in it, not the way a dance performance did. I couldn’t imagine a better way to draw people into the necessary mindset for healing to succeed than with a completely captivating dance. It didn’t have to be active belief—fully healing unconscious people was much easier than healing someone who was awake—but the dances could lower defenses, make people susceptible to a healing power they might not even realize existed.

All of a sudden I understood the glowing reviews they’d received all around the country. Everyone, from the man on the street to the most jaded critic, had mentioned feeling lighter, happier, healthier, when they’d left the show. I’d read no reports of miraculous recoveries from terrible illnesses, but that made threefold sense: first, someone that sick might well not be at a dance performance, and second, even if they were, the chances of associating recovery with a theatrical show were slim to none. Third, while I had very little doubt the dancers could affect healing, dissipating it over hundreds of audience members might weaken it enough that no single individual would benefit one hundred percent from the magic.

Never mind that I didn’t believe that last at all. Those who were most captivated would probably benefit the most strongly. It wasn’t impossible that a terminally ill patient caught up in the ghost dance would be healed, while the people around her, too concerned for her health to entirely focus on the dance, would only feel a brief lifting of their worry.

Entranced by the thought, I closed my eyes against the dancers themselves and opened my senses to the audience around me. I’d never tried this before. Generally speaking, the idea of opening myself up to the pain, exhaustion and illness of hundreds of people at once wasn’t high on my list of things that sounded like fun. On the other hand, doing it in the midst of a performance was probably as good a time as any I could try: most people would be thinking about it instead of focusing on their aches and weariness, which had to lighten the burden a little. I hoped.

Viewed through the Sight, the dancers on stage nearly overwhelmed their audience. People generally had two dominant colors to their auras, but at the moment the dancers each blazed with singular hues. That was a mark of focus, of giving everything they had to the moment, and it was wonderful to behold. I’d never seen so much energy focused together, vibrant shades of many colors giving and taking, aware of each other and building to create a whole out of their many pieces. I had, a few times, asked my friends to lend me strength to fight with. Their best efforts looked paltry compared to the dancers’.

I shivered and turned my face away from the stage. Eyes closed or not, I could still See them too clearly to gauge the audience unless I directed my unseeing gaze elsewhere.

Onto Morrison, in this case. I saw a red streak of concern leap in the rich blue and purple that was his usual aura, and put a hand on his arm in reassurance. Surprise spiked through him, then was tamped down so solidly it made me smile. I was glad he was there: he was a gauge to judge everyone else against. I knew what his colors should look like, even when he was intent on something.

He also gave me something familiar to focus on until I could disengage the dancers’ radiating presence from the audience. It was harder than I expected: they wanted to be the center of attention. They were, in fact, giving being the center of attention everything they had, and there was a feedback loop going on: they wanted attention, the audience was providing it, I got sucked into what the audience was watching….

I actually had to open my eyes and blink furiously at Morrison before I could disconnect myself from the loop. His eyebrows wrinkled and I said, “Keep looking at me,” which made his eyebrows convert to question-arches, but he did as I asked. I closed my eyes again, safe in his gaze, and that time was able to slip beyond the dancers’ pull to properly see the audience.

They were, by and large, healthy people. A head cold here, a migraine there, the latter exacerbated by the drums, but the woman was determined to stay for the whole show, someone with a broken arm, a sprained ankle…minor discomforts, in the scheme of things. Only a dozen or so had darker shadows riding their auras. Some of them were grieving and unable to push it away for the space of an evening’s performance. Others were ill: cancers making black spots in auras or chemotherapy leaving irradiated stains. One woman almost certainly wouldn’t know yet that there was a spot in her breast which glowed an unhealthy pink to my Sight, like the awareness campaign had colored my perception of the illness itself. I didn’t care what else happened: I would find her after the show and if I couldn’t heal her myself, I would tell her to go to a doctor. She’d think I was insane, but that didn’t matter as long as she went.

I let the Sight go, not exactly reluctantly. Looking into humanity’s illnesses wasn’t enjoyable, but I’d be able to look at them again when the dancers were done and see if any difference had been made. I was certain that if I caught their power at its apex and directed it, I could make a world of difference to the genuinely sick people in the room. But I had no idea if the dancers had a specific manner of releasing the magic they were creating, assuming they even knew they were doing it. If they did, I couldn’t risk screwing it up by taking over. If they didn’t, there would almost certainly be enough residual power during the curtain call that I could shape it without damaging the dancers.

Morrison was still watching me. I shook my head, whispered, “I’m okay. This one’s about healing, not transformation,” and settled down, much more relaxed, to watch the performance. They moved from one dance to another, until the last piece, their ghost dance, began on a barely backlit stage.

They’d foregone traditional costuming throughout almost the whole program, and the ghost dance was no exception. The men and women who rose up were ethereal, garbed in gray and white. Only the lead dancer wore red and black and yellow, making her lively and vibrant amongst the ghosts. They each told their stories, tales of life and happiness and sorrow and death, and in doing so gave her the strength to live her own life with grace and charity.

More than that, though, viewed with the Sight, they were preparing her, and themselves, for the dance’s final moments. Energy coiled inside each of the dancers, ready to be released. I leaned forward with my breath held, waiting for the climactic finale and the vast outpouring of healing power I anticipated.

It happened so quickly I lost what breath I held. A surge hit the lead dancer, magic so blended it was incandescent white. She spun to face the audience a final time, arms spread in an open embrace so crisp I could see the design behind it, the intention to throw all that strength and beauty out to the audience.

Instead the magic sucked upward out of her body in a bleak whirlpool, and she collapsed on the stage in silence.