Only it isn't a circle of dancing people this time, but a ring of spiky plants that surround her. Red stones lie between each of the plants and the medicine woman waters each one from a large gourd. "Where's my mom?" Jacob yells. "Where is this place that is no place? Tell me, so that I can help her." The medicine woman holds a finger to her lips. "Chuh, chuh," she says. Under the starlight, the earth around the stones begins to move: to pull together into an increasingly large pile. The earth twists upward, building itself into two legs, an abdomen, chest and arms. When it stops its dusty ascent, an old dwarf woman stands before him, hunched and barely as tall as his waist. The dwarf woman holds out her hand like she is the queen of England rather than the corporeal formation of a swell of dirt. The medicine woman motions for Jacob to kiss the dwarf woman's hand. "Yumi aishmag- jangke," she demands. Jacob has no idea what the words mean. The dwarf woman is ugly and dirty but he understands that it would be an insult not to obey.
