People of the Silence (88 page)

“The…” Ironwood swallowed. He had heard of it from warriors who’d been forced to watch their comrades do it. The Mogollon formed two parallel lines. Each person lifted an obsidian-tipped lance and held it poised to strike as the enemy captive was shoved down the corridor. The game was to see who could blind the prisoner first.

“Let’s get it over with,” Ironwood said, and struggled to rise, but he couldn’t seem to get his feet under him.

The guards dragged him up. Ironwood saw people moving across the plaza, getting into position. His legs trembled badly. A pang of fear went through him, fear that he might not be able to meet this last challenge. The Fire Dogs would roar with laughter if he failed, and then they would treat him as a coward. So far he had been accorded the torture worthy of a great warrior, but if he weakened, they would stuff his mouth with dry dung, force it down his throat, then heap it around him and set it afire.

It will be said that War Chief Ironwood died screaming like a frightened child. The Traders will carry the story everywhere. The men and women who fought at my side will hate me for humiliating them and all Straight Path warriors.

Ironwood fixed his blurry eyes on Night Sun, locked his knees, and lifted his head.
I can do this. Just a little longer. If I stay on my feet for another hand of time, they will reward me with death.

The guards cut Ironwood’s bonds and he spread his shaking legs to brace himself up. Jay Bird turned and marched away, going to the head of the two lines of warriors.

“Walk!”
one of the guards ordered, and shoved Ironwood into a shambling trot.

As he entered the gauntlet, he heard Night Sun let out a small cry, and glimpsed the lance from the corner of his left eye. Ironwood instinctively flung up his arm to deflect the blow, and the onlookers exploded with shouts and cheers. The crowd surged forward, laughing and stamping their feet. The acrid odor of their sweat filled the air. Ironwood stumbled on down the line, desperately trying to pick out lances in the gyrating multicolored smear …

The
game
had begun.

*   *   *

Poor Singer stopped on the winding mountain trail, panting, his legs rubbery. Exhaustion weighted his limbs. What should have been a three-day trip had taken them only a day and a half—and he felt it in every strained muscle. Propping his hands on his hips, he gazed out across the basin. It looked almost flat, like a smooth green blanket rumpled around the edges. Jagged blue peaks hovered above the ground in the east, but the Thlatsina Mountains in the west had vanished. Poor Singer frowned. A hazy band of smoke stretched across the northern sky. It had grown darker and even more ominous since yesterday.

Cornsilk came up beside him, her pretty face stained with perspiration. “Do you think it’s a forest fire?”

“Maybe. But it’s early for a fire so large. The grass is still green. Snow covers the mountains. What could be burning?”

Wind Baby sighed through the trees around them, carrying the scents of juniper and sage buttercup. A small herd of deer trotted through a meadow below, white tails up, signaling danger.

“They must have seen us,” Cornsilk whispered.

“Or scented us. Wind Baby is blowing right down our backs.”

Poor Singer watched the deer lope into the forest and disappear without a sound, then he turned his gaze back to the thick black smoke. “Perhaps the thlatsinas are trying to tell us something, Cornsilk.”

She exhaled tiredly. “Probably that we need to push ourselves even harder. Come on. The village can’t be more than a finger of time away. It’s just down there at the base of the mountain.”

“You go ahead. I need a little longer to catch my breath.”

She squeezed his shoulder, said, “I’ll wait for you at the bottom of the meadow,” and headed on down the slope.

Poor Singer stared out across the basin. An odd sensation tingled his stomach. As if … as if somewhere deep inside he knew the ground was getting ready to split wide open and swallow everyone and everything that meant anything to him, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

“You’re being foolish,” he whispered. “The Keeper told you that if you talked with your grandfather, told him what happened in the Dream, that he would—”

He cocked his head when he heard a voice. It seemed to ride the wind like a falcon, soaring and diving over the slope—a low voice, the words indistinct.

“Cornsilk?” he called, and gazed down the trail she’d taken, squinting through the weave of sunlight and shadow that made up the juniper grove. “Did you say something?”

A sharp cry rang out …

And was suddenly silenced.

Poor Singer’s heart thundered.
“Cornsilk?”

He ran with all his might, swerving around the twists in the trail, rushing headlong through the trees, his arms up to protect his face from the overhanging branches.
“Cornsilk? Cornsilk, where are you?”

*   *   *

Swallowtail kept his left hand clamped over Cornsilk’s mouth as he shoved her before him into a dense growth of currant bushes that clustered between four tall junipers. The branches scratched his arms and her face as he forced her to the ground. He knelt behind her with the tip of his knife pressed to her silken throat. He could feel her heartbeat pounding against his wrist, and his distended manhood strained at the fabric of his shirt. The excitement of the chase, the thrill of catching her completely by surprise, all of it had stoked an insane
need
to hurt her.

Poor Singer thrashed through the forest no more than twenty hands away. Swallowtail fought to still his breathing.

Poor Singer cried, “Cornsilk? Cornsilk, answer me? Where are you? Are you hurt? Cornsilk!”

She squirmed, and Swallowtail hissed,
“Don’t!”

As a warning, he pricked her throat with his blade. Cornsilk jerked to look at him, her dark eyes terrified, and he smiled as her blood ran warmly over his fingers.

“Cornsilk? What happened? Where are you!”
Poor Singer shouted and flailed his way down the trail, out of sight.

Swallowtail could follow his path from the loud cracking of branches and the snapping of deadfall. When Poor Singer had run far enough, Swallowtail lowered his knife and wiped the bloody blade on the shoulder of Cornsilk’s dress. “If I remove my hand from your mouth, will you promise not to cry out? I just want to be inside you, Cornsilk. You are one of the First People, and I
need
to be inside you.”

He could feel her jaw tighten as understanding dawned.

She hesitated, and Swallowtail ran his hand down her arm, caressing it. “I will do it anyway. The only difference is this: if you cry out and Poor Singer comes running, I’ll shoot him dead before he can get near you. Do you understand? I will kill him. And then,” he added with a smile, and kissed her hair, “I will have to kill you to keep you from telling Jay Bird that I murdered his grandson.”

Cornsilk started shaking and it made Swallowtail chuckle. She nodded against his hand.

“You promise?” he said. “You will not cry out?”

She nodded again.

Cautiously, Swallowtail removed his hand. Cornsilk turned to face him. Red spots, left by his fingers, marked her face. They were exciting.

“Swallowtail,” she whispered. “Why are you doing this? I have never hurt you! Why—”

“Lie down and get ready for me!” he ordered. “And remember—” he slipped his bow and quiver of arrows from his back and laid them on the forest duff, within easy reach “—if you make a sound—”

“I—I won’t. I won’t, Swallowtail. Just don’t hurt Poor Singer. Please, I—”

“Do as I say!”

Cornsilk lay back on the soft cedar-scented ground and pulled up the hem of her green dress, revealing long brown legs.

Swallowtail pulled up his hunting shirt, eagerly crawled forward and shoved her knees apart. She was dry, and tight, when he forced himself inside. The only other woman he’d been with had been Cloud Playing, and she’d been so close to death that all of her muscles had been slack. Cornsilk’s body held him like a firm hand. He stretched out on top of her and placed his knife against her throat again.

Hatred burned in her eyes, and he smiled. He would wait. Savor each moment of this. Then, just before ecstasy overtook him, he would kill her and watch the life drain from her eyes while the semen drained from his body—just as he’d done with Cloud Playing.

“Move,” he ordered in a hoarse whisper. “Move!”

Cornsilk made a feeble attempt, and he thrust violently against her hips.

“Blessed gods,” he whispered, “keep moving. Move faster!”

He felt the first prickling in the root of his penis—more quickly than last time, the sensation overpowering him, as if he were a hawk swooping through fire, soaring, ablaze! He pressed the knife against Cornsilk’s throat and gazed directly into her horrified eyes. The thrill nearly made him laugh out loud. Just a moment longer, not long now, and he’d slash through that thin veneer of skin …

Something struck the side of his head, the force strong enough to blast lights through his eyes and knock him sideways, off of Cornsilk. Swallowtail scrambled to his knees.
“Who—”

He heard as well as felt the sickening
thunk
as a rock slammed into the back of his skull. Dazed, in shock, he knew he had to get to his feet to fight. He dragged himself up, staggering, and looked into the horrified face of Poor Singer. The youth stood in front of him with tears streaming down his narrow face and a huge round rock gripped in both hands. Swallowtail roared in angry defiance and lunged for Poor Singer …

Cornsilk kicked his legs out from under him. Swallowtail toppled to the ground, rolled, and grabbed for Cornsilk, but Poor Singer fell upon him, screaming,
“Don’t you hurt her! Don’t you ever hurt Cornsilk!”

Swallowtail heard, more than felt, the next blow. His skull cracked, and lights, like a thousand splintered stars seared his vision. Lights … fading into the grayness …

*   *   *

Powered by terror and rage, Poor Singer barely realized it when Swallowtail slumped to the ground like a clubbed dog, his limbs twitching. Poor Singer kept beating, lifting the rock and bringing it down hard, screaming,
“I won’t let you hurt her!”

Swallowtail’s body had grown flaccid, but the rock came down again, and again. With each blow, the boy’s rubbery limbs shook and flopped.

“Poor Singer?
Poor Singer!
”

Poor Singer blinked. He vaguely heard Cornsilk, but he kept grabbing up the bloody rock and bashing it down. Killing Swallowtail for what he’d done! He—

“Poor Singer!”

Cornsilk tugged the rock out of his hands and threw it into the forest, where it rolled and thumped against a tree trunk. Poor Singer sat with his fists suspended in midair, trembling, crying like a child. He looked up into Cornsilk’s face and saw the blood trickling from her throat.

“I—I had to make him s-stop.” Then he glanced at Swallowtail. Only red pulp and bone fragments marked the place his nose had been. The boy’s shirt was still pulled up, twisted around his torso to expose the wet penis, like a dead slug across his thigh. “Cornsilk, I … oh, gods…” He squeezed his eyes closed, trying to blot the sight from his soul. “I can’t believe I—”

Cornsilk knelt and embraced him, drawing Poor Singer against her as if she would never let go. “He was going to kill me, Poor Singer,” she said in a shaking voice. “I could see it in his eyes. He wanted to kill me.”

“But why! Why would he attack you? He had no reason! You hardly even knew him!”

Cornsilk pushed back and gazed into his blurry eyes. “I don’t know why. But he wanted me dead. The…” She swallowed. “The rape … I think that was just an afterthought.”

“You mean, you think he came up here to kill you?”

Her shaking was getting worse, as if now that it was over, the truth had begun to sink in. Cornsilk released Poor Singer to rub her arms. She clamped her jaw to still her chattering teeth.

“Oh, Cornsilk.” Poor Singer stroked her hair. “It’s all right, Cornsilk. You’re safe now. Everything’s going to be all right. Do you hear me? I won’t let anybody hurt you.
Not ever.
”

“If you hadn’t c-come when you did, I—”

“But I did come,” he said, and thought about how he’d almost missed Swallowtail’s trail. The boy had been very careful. His moccasins had barely scuffed the dust. When Poor Singer saw the faint prints, he’d immediately whirled and started back up the trail. That’s when he’d heard Swallowtail’s voice … and panicked.

“Are you all right, Cornsilk?”

She wiped the tears from her face and smeared the drops of blood. They streaked her cheeks in ghoulish patterns. “Let’s hurry,” she said as she scanned the forest. “I won’t feel really safe until we’re out in the open—away f-from here.”

Poor Singer went to pick up Swallowtail’s bow and quiver of arrows. As he slipped the quiver over his left shoulder, he looked again at the dead boy. Poor Singer had never killed a human being before. He had killed animals for food and hides, but this … Flies crawled hungrily over Swallowtail’s crushed face. What should have sickened him left only a hollow sensation in the pit of his gut.

Clutching the bow in his right hand, he walked back, placed his left arm around Cornsilk, and hugged her as they headed downhill.

*   *   *

Night Sun forced herself to watch, her heartbeat sickeningly loud in her ears.
Watch! So you can tell the story … someone must tell the story.

Ironwood stumbled, and fell to his knees. The crowd went wild. They rushed forward, jeering and throwing stones at him. He futilely lifted his arms to protect himself, but the rocks battered his bloody flesh. Soft grunts escaped his lips as he groped about, seemingly in a daze. Then his hand curled around a stone, and with a quick pitch, he lobbed it back at his tormentors.

An agile warrior ducked, but the stone thumped hollowly against an old woman’s breast, toppling her backward amidst shrieks of pain.

Some of the Mogollon roared, relatives of the old woman, no doubt. Others hooted in approbation of a warrior who still fought back.