Both of them were stunned by this greeting. What could she mean—
The old lady laughed and said something again. The translator covered his mouth, stifling his giggles too.
"She said she was just messing with you, as she likes doing that to first time visitors. It gives her and her coyotes great joy when they see confused looks in your faces like a helpless deer."
"Oh." Harker scratched his head, not seeing how that was funny.
"That's not really funny, more like ominous." Professor Seward spoke her mind without hesitation, still not getting down from Harker's arms.
Lady Ojistah waved her hand. "Come, come. You must be hungry, it is now time for some resting and feeding. I prepared a meal by the fire outside. The coyotes know better than to follow me when I cook or they'd get a beating from my stick."
And she was right. She parted the sea of coyotes like Moses and moved past the confused tourists, still grinning mysteriously just like her pets.
She pointed at the small twigs. "Fruit Bat, pick those up for an old hag, will you?"
"Fruit bat?" Harker was stupefied, but still picked up the wood anyway.
"Good, good. Throw them to the fire. Winter Fly, you stir the pot for me. Just move it clockwise while I look for more herbs to put in there."
"Winter fly?" Professor Seward was even more confused.
The translator explained. "This is just how Lady Ojistah is with visitors, she never asks their names and just gives them new ones."
This soothsayer really was true to those depictions of eccentric, kooky fortune tellers. Harker doesn't know if it was just part of the act to be mysterious, or this was really just the shaman's personality. He's more inclined towards the latter seeing how she lives all alone with nothing but a bunch of coyotes in the middle of the woods.
The Native American soothsayer hummed as she just threw random leaves and objects into the pot. She urged Professor Seward to keep stirring, and for Harker to fan the flames more.
It went on and on until the flames almost lapped up the whole pot itself, and Professor Seward's wrists were too tired to keep stirring.
"Ow, ow, ow…. How much longer should I stir? I'm creating a whirlpool at this rate…." She mumbled.
The Lady sniffed, and looked satisfied. She pushed the poor professor aside, and dipped her own finger on the very hot and steaming soup to lick and taste it.
"Fantastic work, you two! Now it's time to eat."
They awkwardly sat on the logs as the old lady placed soup on strange looking bowls. Were this…. skulls?
Harker thought that the shape was like the cranium of a coyote. The soup had roasted horse meat and fragrant herbs. Lady Ojistah also served some to her furry friends back in the house, though it was more of the horse meat which they bite and chew to the bone.
Harker was not eating much so he would have Absorption Space left to eat Mr. Xi's heart or Ms. Lovette's remains in case something happened.
But it felt impolite to not take a few bites, and so he did and sent his compliments to the chef. "This is a pretty bang-up soup, Ma'am."
The lady giggled just like how her pets would, pretty shrill and grating to the ears. "You may have seconds, Fruit Bat."
"It really is a great soup. But I think it's time that we have our divination, Madam." Professor Seward looked at the coyotes gobbling up the meat, and gulped. "We don't want to take too much of your time now, do we?"
"Oh, they won't bite any more than you would, Winter Fly. You still don't have what I need to find your sister anyway. Let us have a talk about the trees and the creeks instead!"
The two stopped eating at this. She really was the real deal, she knew they were looking for Victoria and that she was Joan's sister without them even saying anything.
"What do you need to find her?" Harker asked.
The old woman giggled. "Why, I need some remnants of her, of course. The ashes of her clothes, or the burnt marks from a place that has an unbreakable tie to her. That way, I could speak to the spirit of the fire that was created by her departure."
Professor Seward frowned. "So we have to go back to the mansion and maybe get a brick from Vicky's bedroom?"
"Yeah, and only you would know where to find that." Harker said. "I don't even know if it's possible with how little was left with your house."
They pondered over this so seriously, until Lady Ojistah picked up the pot from the fire pit. She added even more wood, and wore a mischievous smile, her one good eye gleaming.
"Now, now. Would you lost souls like to see something fun?" The shaman asked, picking up some weird powders from one of the packets hanging from her waist.
Harker and Professor Seward leaned in. "What—"
She threw the powders, and a large puff of smoke appeared. They immediately got soot on their face, and coughed incessantly.
"Cough…. What the hell…. So much for the shower I took this morning." Harker tried to wipe the ash off his face.
But he stopped as he noticed that the smoke began forming into shapes. Lady Ojistah waved her cane around, chanting. The translator couldn't translate it as she spoke so fast and so low. It was over before they could truly register what was happening.
Then, a figure appeared in the smoke. It was almost like a star-shape, with a hand holding trying to catch it.
"Your mind is disturbed by the golden one, your emotions stirring up like the turbulent seas. The farther you travel into the sea, the more you get lost in your own head. You seek out the golden one like you seek out a Northern Star for direction, but the golden one is also the cause of your sense of loss. Not knowing where to go, what path to take."
Then, she turned to Professor Seward. As soon as she did, another star and a hand appeared. The star fell from the hand that tried to grasp it. But it was too late.
"You have lost your star, and it left you in the cold. You have crashed into the icy towers of grief, and seek refuge in the embrace of others that never keep you warm enough. But the ship does not have to stop sailing, oh Sorrowful one. What you lost can be found again, if you do not run away from it."
The two hands in the smoke started to move towards each other, locking fingers tightly.
"The only way for two lost souls to find their path is to walk in the darkness together. It may seem like the blind leading the blind, but with the beats of two hearts as one, you may still find a way out."
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