“Apache,” Diego muttered as he stumbled forward in the early light to greet them. “Damn Apache.”
“Apache,” I repeated the strange word, more to myself. I didn’t want to forget it.
The Apache may have saved our lives.
The Apache crept to the edge of our campsite, each step as light as a bird’s feather. It was as if they walked and breathed as one man instead of ten.
When they got close, they surrounded us in a half-circle. More light crept into the sky and through the trees. Their bows quickly lowered when they saw us, cold, bleeding, and dirty. We were hardly a threat. Their eyes, unfortunately, rested mostly on me while mine spoke to theirs, pleading for their help.
Despite the early chill, they were bare-chested. They wore grey deerskin pants and skins around their feet that reached their knees and laced near the top. A dark, wide skin wrapped around their foreheads. Three of the men wore brownish yellow feathers against their foreheads. Their hair was black and hung loose past their shoulders; their skin was brown, although their faces were flatter, less oval, and their noses longer.
The Apache who stood in the center of the men recognized Diego. He had two feathers tucked inside his headband while the others only had one. Diego mumbled a greeting and the Apache repeated the same words back to him. I did not understand their words as easily as I understood Diego. Their words were nothing like mine.
“Isdzán,”
the Apache said, nodding at me from the center of their semicircle. His eyes traveled down my body. Instinctively, I wrapped my arms across my chest, mostly to keep my dress closed.
Diego turned, looked at me once before turning “Yes,” Diego said. “A woman.” He paused and then extended his arms. “A gift.”
My eyes widened.
My surprise did not go unnoticed by the man with two feathers. Even so, I sucked back a breath and watched for Honovi in my periphery. He tried to stand by my side but his knees wobbled. I reached out to steady him but he shook his head. Finally, his knees buckled and he sank to the ground.
Carefully, the Apache with the two feathers stepped away from the circle and approached me. He was just as tall as Diego but even broader across the shoulders. Long scars sliced across his chest. On my other side, Lobo started to growl as the man approached. The Apache stopped, eying Lobo warily. I was afraid he’d draw back his bow and kill him.
My voice shook. “Quiet,” I whispered to Lobo. I patted the top of his head with my free hand, clutching my deerskin with the other, eyes still locked on the Apache.
The Apache tilted his head curiously and looked from Lobo and then back to me. He turned to the other men standing behind him and said something that made the whole line chuckle, including Diego, but Diego’s laugh sounded forced.
Another step and the Apache stood directly in front of me. My nostrils flared as I raised my eyes but not my head. He studied me strangely, his dark eyes narrowing, his brow furrowing, like he’d never seen a girl before.
The Apache’s eyes were as black as Honovi’s but there were more crinkles in the corners. I could see my reflection in his eyes and I looked terrified. Finally he stepped closer so that our noses almost touched.
My neck pulled back. The Apache was so close that I could feel his warm breath on my face.
His eyes widened; his head tilted with curiosity. He pointed to my eyes.
I blinked, confused. What did he want?
“Ya’ài,”
he said.
“Ya’ài.”
I turned to Diego, pleading for a translation.
Diego was on the ground, cross-legged, his hand pressed against his neck. He was still glaring at Honovi. I wondered if he’d help me.
He surprised me.
“The sun,” Diego said, pausing a moment to turn his attention away from Honovi. His voice was flat. “He believes your eyes hold the sun.”
I turned back to the Apache and shook my head, confused. I wanted to tell them that they were simply green, like my grandmother’s and the grandmother before her. Nothing more, nothing less.
But then Diego said, “He’s never seen anyone with green eyes before, Aiyana.”
The man continued to ask Diego questions in his strange language and Diego answered. He pointed disgustedly to Honovi. I hated to think what lies Diego would tell the Apache about him.
“Please,” I said, stepping forward. I crossed the distance between Diego and the Apache and went to sit beside Honovi. His skin had lost most of his color; his eyelids could barely stay open. “He needs help. Please help us,” I said. My throat thickened. “Please. Please help us,” I pleaded again as my voice cracked. Tears began to stream down my face.
The Apache seemed to understand. He knelt beside me on one knee and offered me the water pouch from his belt. I took it from him. “Thank you,” I said. I tilted the pouch to Honovi’s lips. He barely managed a few sips.
Diego sighed next to us but I ignored him. He said something to the Apache that I couldn’t understand, but by his tone I presumed it had something to do with Honovi. I suspected we both had become gifts.
Carefully, I let more water dribble onto Honovi’s cracked lips. His lips moved but barely. My hair hid his face. “Please, Honovi. Please don’t leave me,” I whispered. I lightly stroked his cheek as he drank the water. His skin had turned greyer, colder.
In his delirium, Honovi managed a tiny smile and I bent over to kiss his cheek as his head lay in my hands. “Please stay with me,” I whispered in his ear. “Never leave me. Please.”
He raised his hand to the one I had on his cheek. And then his eyes closed and before I could stop myself, I started to cry.
I was alone. For the first time since leaving my village, I felt truly alone.
Beside me, the Apache said something quickly to the men who gathered around us, closer than before. Two men came forward and took Honovi from my arms and, at first, I wouldn’t let go of his hand. They slumped his body over one of the horses. Two more men untied the horses that were grazing next to Diego’s deerskin sacks. Another man gathered the sacks while the man beside me extended his hand. I put my hand in his and stood beside him. I didn’t need to understand his strange language to know that he wanted Diego and me to follow him.
And so I did, numbly, wondering whether Honovi was dead or alive. But I figured that if Honovi died, I was dead, too.
***
Diego and I followed the Apache.
The two men carrying Diego’s deerskin sacks over their shoulders walked behind us. Diego carried the small sack, the one that held his map.
Barely moving, Honovi was laid on his stomach over Diego’s horse while another Apache led the horse by its rope. We walked until the sun reached the center of the sky but it was the longest walk in my life. I watched Honovi lying helpless on the horse, sometimes his arms and hands would twitch, like he was trying to slide off. I regarded any movement as encouraging and prayed to Hunab Ku that he would survive until we reached the Apache village. Surely they would help him. Wouldn’t they?
The Apaches, including the man with two feathers, didn’t say a single word during the walk to their village. Only Diego prattled, nervously.
“His name is Manaba,” Diego told me. He nodded ahead to the Apache with two feathers. “He’s their chief.”
“How do you know these people?”
“I trade with them.”
My eyes pulled back. “You’ve been here before?”
Diego nodded. He patted the deerskin sack over his shoulder, the one with the map.
“Why?” Why would anyone travel high into a cold mountain that practically touched the clouds?
But Diego just smiled smugly and ignored my question.
His smile, though, made me shiver even more, even when we finally stepped out of the forest and into a clearing. The tall grasses glistened in the sun.
“We’re here,” Diego said. He nodded ahead to a wide cliff that towered over the clearing. It had crevices and jagged edges of reds and browns and reminded me of the mountains that surrounded my village. Two men—Apache men—stood on either side of the top of the cliff. When they saw us, they raised their bows in greeting.
I followed Diego’s gaze to the base of the cliff. In its shadow, strange dwellings shaped like arrowheads dotted the furthest edges of the clearing. I put my hand over my forehead to eliminate the glare. Instead of pit houses, the Apache lived in small dwellings that were round at the bottom and narrow at the top. Smoke billowed from the tops of most of them. They were made with long sticks and animal skins. A woman lifted an animal skin and emerged from one carrying a baby on her back. Seeing us in the distance, she lifted her hand to wave and trilled a high-pitched greeting.
That started a flood of children running toward us. They seemed to come from everywhere—the strange looking dwellings, the cliffs, a small patch of leafy trees next to base of the cliffs where I expected there was a river or a creek. They trilled and yelled excitedly to their fathers and brothers as if they’d been gone a long time. The happy tones in their greetings lifted the tightness in my chest. But then my mind wandered back to Honovi.
Two men lifted him off the horse and he gasped from the pain.
I began to run to him but Diego pulled me back. Under his breath, he warned, “No, Aiyana. Leave him. The Apache will know what to do.”
I looked up at Diego, anxious. Why should I believe him? Why should I believe the man who tried to kill him?
But Diego seemed to be able to read the fear behind my eyes. “Don’t worry,” he said between clenched teeth. He paused and then released my arm as the men carried Honovi to the closest dwelling, one with grey smoke billowing out of the top. The men lifted the flap and then all three disappeared inside.
My voice cracked from thirst. “Why?” I said to him. “Why would you care whether he lives?”
Diego chuckled. “The Apache always need more warriors.” He paused. “I knew Honovi would be worth more alive than dead.” He grinned. “Just like I knew you’d be.”
His answer chilled me, more than the thin cold air on Apache Mountain. Diego’s very presence sickened me. I loathed him. And I couldn’t say what I really thought or how I really felt especially since I needed him. Again. He was my only guide in this strange new world.
It pained me to admit but I needed Diego more than he needed me.
***
I followed Diego and Lobo into the center of the Apache village.
Lobo’s tailed wagged the entire time, as if he was greeting old friends. He wasn’t even bothered when some of the smaller children tugged his ears or tried to ride on his back like a horse. He was a strange wolf, indeed.
The Apache houses that looked no bigger than my palm from across the clearing were larger than I thought. As tall as saguaros and three deep, they lined the base of the cliff near a stream. I couldn’t see the stream from their houses but I could hear it.
I watched as two, three, and sometimes four people, mostly women, emerged from the houses. I wondered how they could live inside houses with no windows, no sunlight. Inside they were dark except for fires that burned in the center.
The Apache women wore dresses like mine only theirs were made from thicker skins. Their feet and legs were wrapped in furs like the men’s, and their straight black hair hung loose. Many had babies strapped in baskets on their backs. The younger girls wore braids.
As soon as the children finished welcoming their fathers and brothers, they turned their attention on me, as did their curious mothers, who waited their turn to touch my hair, finger the mostly torn tassels on the edges of my dress, and even touch the blue stone that still hung in the center of my necklace. I rubbed my shoulders nervously. It was impossible to ignore the attention. Especially when they gasped and pointed at my eyes.
I lowered my chin and kept walking but the crowd had grown thick. It was like walking along a muddy river bottom. My feet felt heavy and I was surrounded on all sides. They asked me questions in their language that I couldn’t answer and giggled when I didn’t reply. I shook my head to let them know I didn’t understand but they kept talking anyway. And touching me—my hair, my dress, even my skin. Desperate, I looked for Diego but he had already disappeared, along with Lobo.
Followed by the crowd of Apache, I walked aimlessly in a circle around the houses till I reached the one where the men carried Honovi. The animal skin flap across the front was closed. Smoke billowed from the top; it smelled like sage. I reached for the flap; it was soft like deerskin, but darker. I opened it. My eyes squinted against the darkness. I got one foot inside. Just as I was about to take another step, rough hands yanked me back by the shoulders.
I froze.
Disapproving gasps and whispers filled the air.
I didn’t understand.
Why wouldn’t they let me inside? Why couldn’t I see Honovi?
“Wait!” I said, still struggling to see inside as hands tugged me backwards. “Please, may I—”
A deep voice from inside the house bellowed something loud, something angry. My mouth snapped shut. The hands around my waist dropped immediately and the crowd behind me backed away. For the first time since arriving in the Apache village, I stood alone.
And that’s when I caught a glimpse of Honovi. He lay on a bed of furs next to the fire in the center, his eyes closed. The air inside the house felt warm and thick, so different from outside. Breathing became difficult.
The two men who carried Honovi inside knelt on either side of his head. They looked up at me, eyes narrowed. Irritated. A third man, a shorter man with narrow shoulders, crouched at his feet, shaking a stick over his body that rattled like rain. The small man turned and flew across the floor at me like a bee. He wore a necklace heavy with teeth and bones and an animal skull that covered the top of his face.
A healer?
My heartbeat quickened.
His eyes glared at me through the mask. The color of the mask matched the whites of his eyes. He yelled and shook his stick at me, furious.
I shook my head. I didn’t understand. “Why can’t I stay? Why can’t I see him?” I pointed past the man at Honovi.
Behind me another voice yelled.
I turned to find Manaba. He was yelling something at me, too. His eyes held fire. Everyone was angry and I didn’t understand why. I only wanted to touch Honovi.