PROLOGUE

Colorado, USA

South of Mesa Verde National Park

February 21 – Sunset

The old shaman woman sat in the front seat, the ancient truck rumbling beneath her, and gasped as she opened her eyes.

The setting sun crouched like a cut coin on the horizon, throwing streaks of red and gold through the dimming sky and across the dung-colored dirt. The air that slid through her open window smelled of heat, earth, and the barely remembered dream of rain.

Of destiny.

"Almost there," Eddie Ironhorse said, and she noted the worry etched across the broad, bronze planes of his face as he guided the truck along the cliff's winding edge.

How nice to have such a handsome young man fuss over me. It has been a while.

And Lord, how I hate to be reminded.

She wrapped her arms around the sudden, terrible ache in her gut, painful enough to make her eyes water, and gave him a half-smile that said she'd try to stay with him, try to hold on.

However, he might want to hurry.

Another vision was upon her.

The air outside her window shimmered under an unexpected February heat, and the borrowed cotton dress she wore clung to her tattooed body like a second skin. Hours earlier, she'd been in the Mexican jungle with its wet and musky scents, where perpetual mist covered everything in a thin, moist veil. Now, she was here in the United States of America, in this desert land called Colorado.

And here is everything.

The Old Shaman Woman felt it coming. Another twist in the pit of her stomach. Another stab of needle pricks along her spine. With each attack, each leak of her visions, the pain grew. Her visions were a gift. But as with all such gifts, they had their price. If she didn't let them come, share them soon, she would die.

The truck reached the top of the mesa just as the sun dropped below the horizon. Eddie put it in park, came around, opened her door, and offered his hand. His daughter, a little girl of six named Courtney, stood beside him, having ridden along in the back seat. The child was all scraped knees and missing her two front teeth. The intensity of her aura crackled like lightning through the desert, and the shaman smiled. She'd known such a child once.

A savior child.

A child of blood.

Shopping bag over her shoulder, she accepted Eddie's hand and let him help her from the cab. She felt some of her strength return as her feet touched the ground. She received her power from the Earth. She couldn't be separated from it for long.

A crowd had gathered around an enormous bonfire, chanting ancient songs pounded on deerskin drums. Bronze, black, brown, yellow, and white, dressed in everything from business suits to sarees, they came from every walk of life, from every corner of the world for this sacred moment.

Dancers in white linen kilts, bells at their wrists and ankles, gyrated around the fire. Mystic symbols covered their bodies, their skin the color of ash, where sweat blurred one symbol into another until they looked like ghosts.

She saw Joe Ironhorse, Eddie's father, standing, feet planted in front of the blaze that burned so intensely hot it made the air around him shimmer. He was a short, stoic, old man dressed in a red plaid shirt and worn jeans. His long, white hair fell straight down to the middle of his chest, framing a face wrinkled and withered with age.

"I remember you being taller," the old shaman woman said as she approached and looked down to meet his gaze.

"And I remember you having blonde hair and freckles to go with those green eyes," Joe said with an ex-lover's grin.

The feel of fire ants as they danced across her skin. Another leak of her visions. She grabbed his hand and held on tight as she collapsed to her knees.

Time to share.

She peers through her mind's eye and sees the comet, enormous as it races near Earth, arriving unannounced and unpredicted as comets like it often do. A fiery ball of iron and ice, its tail spreads out like the wings of an angel. Hidden inside the tail is a circular craft she suspects is a spaceship.

His spaceship.

From inside the ship, a pair of azure-blue eyes blink at her in confusion, almost as if their owner has been asleep for a long time.

Nausea crept up her throat. Her stomach cramped. She lurched forward and threw up on the pristine sand. Joe pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket that smelled of wind and spice and magic. He kneeled in front of her, cupped her chin, and used it to gently wipe her mouth.

"So, the boy comes for his child at last," he said, and she knew through her touch, he too had seen the vision. "He's taken long enough."

The old shaman woman sat back on her heels, reluctant acceptance on her tattooed face. "I suppose it's too late to tell him we've changed our minds. Or we could maybe say we're just not interested anymore. How about I'm late for my mani-pedi?"

"Tempting," Joe smiled, "but not in our best interest. He needs us now, as we will need him in the fight to come."

"Don't you dare say it's a win-win, or I'll puke on you."

Joe grinned, dipped into the fanny pack at his waist, and pulled out a pipe, a pouch of weed, and a lighter. She cocked an eyebrow, reached inside her shopping bag, and retrieved a bottle of very old, very expensive, single-malt scotch.

"You shouldn't have," Joe said.

"I didn't," she said. "I stole it from the priest."

"And how is my old friend?"

"Still hates you."

"He hates you, too."

"I know," she said with a cheeky grin.

She unscrewed the cap, took a drink of scotch to rinse her mouth, then spit it out. After a longer pull, she offered Joe the bottle. He took it and, in return, gave her the pipe, lighter, and weed. They chose a spot on the ground not far from the people and the bonfire and settled cross-legged in the sand, their bodies lithe and limber despite their years.

They drank the scotch, smoked the weed, and enjoyed the comfortable silence that often happens between two old friends.

When the phone alarm went off in Joe's pocket, the old shaman woman sighed, reluctantly took one last hit on the pipe, and then dumped the residue. Turning off the phone's alarm, Joe checked his messages.

"You get cell phone service up here?" She was impressed.

"Yeah," Joe boasted and showed her his phone. "Four bars, see?"

"If we survive this," she said wistfully, "do you think we can take a vacation? Maybe Bali for a week or two? Stay in one of those four-star huts built over the ocean? Eat a bunch of fish and papaya and smoke and drink our minds into oblivion? I've always wanted to do that."

"Sure," Joe shrugged. "If we survive." He stood and held out his hand. "It's time."

The old shaman woman sat for a moment longer, hoping Eddie Ironhorse and his little girl were still nearby. She needed the moral support.

Resigned, she let Joe help her to her feet and then sweep her up in his arms. She was tall and broad-shouldered. He was smaller, made slim, and bent by age. Yet he held her as if she weighed no more than a dried leaf.

"Hurry," she whispered into his shoulder, her fingers digging into the fabric of his shirt as another vision started to consume her. Her heart fluttered so hard in her chest that she thought it would pop.

"This will sting a little," Joe warned as his breath tickled her ear. "Once we're inside, just remember to breathe. Always remember to breathe."

He stepped up to the fire's edge, filled his lungs with air, and held his breath. Accepting her fate, the old shaman did the same.

Joe brushed his lips across her cheek. Then, with the courage and energy of a much younger man, jumped into the flames.