Scalpdancers (19 page)

“Quietly—we stop for no one,” White Buffalo cautioned. He reached down and caught the reins of the packhorse and headed out of the village. Lost Eyes and Sparrow, despite their misgivings, followed his lead. At last they were together, riding east toward the dawn of a new day.

An eagle left the safety of its nest high atop a craggy summit and cast itself upon the wind. The high-country monarch spread its regal plumage and rode the currents sweeping up from a narrow gorge far below, where three riders threaded their way. Dawn had changed the brooding night clouds to airy lavender wisps and brightened the ragged peaks with bronze and radiant gold.

The eagle glided effortlessly down from the cliffs. It dipped and soared, circled and darted, and owned all it surveyed. But the eagle was a hunter and it flew not for the joy of the morning—but to stalk and kill.

Lost Eyes rubbed the small of his back and, looking upward, considered the eagle and the beauty of sunrise. The gorge was a chilled gloomy place hemmed in by towering walls of stone. It was a place carved of violence and gave mute testimony to the forces of nature, the stresses and strains at play deep within the earth.

The eagle seemed to be following them, and Lost Eyes was reminded of another hunter who must track them before this day was done. Lost Eyes had no desire to fight Black Fox. He wanted to put as much distance as possible between them and Sparrow's brother.

White Buffalo turned his stallion to the west as he emerged from the gorge, and the walls fell away to either side. Lost Eyes took comfort in the warmth of the sun. He glanced at Sparrow. She managed a tired smile and from a shoulder pouch brought out a portion of pemmican, a mixture of dried chokecherries, buffalo meat, and meal pounded into fist-sized cakes.

Lost Eyes readily accepted the food and wolfed it down. Sparrow ate and allowed herself to drift a few paces back. She didn't feel like talking, not with the shaman so close.

They had remained with White Buffalo because he knew of a circuitous way west unfamiliar to the Scalpdancers. At least that was his claim. So far Sparrow knew precisely where they were; the course the shaman followed would eventually bring them just north of Singing Woman Ridge on the other side of the falls and the pool of spirits. She thought back on the day the shaman had ridden into their lives and forever changed them. She frowned, unable and, indeed, unwilling to hide her emotions. She had no love for White Buffalo and the sooner rid of him the better.

As if reading her heart and the enmity she held, White Buffalo twisted around and looked at the couple riding in his wake. How fierce he looked in the sacred headdress. His buffalo robe was too heavy to be comfortable here in the sunlight and he had draped it across his horse. Sparrow shivered as his gaze bore into her. Lost Eyes, made uneasy by White Buffalo's strange behavior, angled his gray between the shaman and Sparrow.

“When shall we rest?” Lost Eyes asked, hoping to break the shaman's concentration. The ploy worked. The older warrior gave a start, checked his surroundings for a moment, then answered.

“When the sun sleeps,” White Buffalo replied.

The rattler issued its distinctive warning as it coiled to face the approaching riders. The reptile had been sunning itself amid the rubble surrounding a fallen boulder. The blaze stallion shied at the sound and danced skittishly to one side while White Buffalo strove to bring the animal under control. Lost Eyes took satisfaction in seeing the shaman struggle with the stallion. Sparrow's mare reacted in much the same way, but Lost Eyes' gray held her ground.

Lost Eyes spoke in soothing undertones and nudged his heels against the mare's flanks. The gray moved out of the snake's striking distance. A rifle shot startled Lost Eyes. The rattler's head exploded, and the body twisted and curled in its death throes. The gunshot echoed down the hills—announcing their whereabouts to one and all, Lost Eyes realized.

The shaman made it obvious that he did not care if he were found. He had nothing but contempt for his enemies. White Buffalo immediately began to reload.

“You have done a foolish thing,” Lost Eyes said angrily. Sweat rolled down his cheeks and he hastily searched the hills for signs of pursuit. The sun had passed its zenith, and the few high clouds that remained did nothing to prevent the heat from reaching the earth.

“You worry too much,” White Buffalo chided. He rammed powder and shot down the long barrel of his rifle and primed the weapon with a trace of black powder in the pan. Then he pointed to a line of hills they needed to cross over. “We will find water and a place to rest on the other side.”

Lost Eyes studied the hills and estimated the distance. He turned to Sparrow. “Can you make it?” She nodded but her shoulders sagged. The young woman tried to straighten up. She wasn't fooling anyone.

“I can make it,” she replied.

“Soon we'll be safe,” Lost Eyes told her.

“Do we kill them now?” the Shoshoni brave whispered as he drew a bead on Lost Eyes.

Another Shoshoni standing at his side answered, “No.” His name was Drum. He clapped his companion on the shoulder and retreated deeper into the thicket. An army could hide in these thickly forested gullies and ravines. Drum knew from experience. He had done it.

Drum rode at the head of over eighty Shoshoni braves, all of them painted for war and waiting back in the shadows. Three days' ride from this valley the rest of the Shoshoni village waited, encamped in a box canyon up on the divide. It was hard country, thrust high against the sky, but there they would wait for word that the Blackfeet had been driven out of their valley. No one wanted to consider the possibility of defeat.

“Wait,” Drum said, studying the silhouettes as they materialized out of the woods farther up the valley. It was late in the day and Drum was tired and irritable, but not irritable enough to step into a battle when he didn't fully understand the situation. He was a slim, quick-witted man, who sat loose legged astride his mountain-bred horse. He reached out and forcefully lowered the rifle barrel of the man at his side.

Storm Bear, a squat, well-muscled brave, glared quizzically at his companion. Storm Bear was aptly named. His volatile nature could generally be counted on to stir things up. Unfortunately, he tended to act first and consider the consequences later. Right now, his rifle was cocked and primed and ready to explode, just like its owner. He grudgingly dropped his gunsight from the Blackfoot a hundred yards away.

“He is not alone,” Drum cautioned. A woman-Sparrow-appeared, letting the reins rest easy in her hand. Her horse never swerved from the trail the gray mare ahead blazed through the scrub and thorny thickets.

“She is worth stealing,” Storm Bear exclaimed. “I am glad to have lowered my gun. Let it speak thunder to all but her.”

“You are wise,” Drum answered, appraising the girl and finding her to his liking. What were these two doing alone? Were they lovers, fleeing a combative and vengeful father? It was too bad for the young man. He had ridden a long way just to die.

Movement continued behind a thicket of juniper. Drum held his breath as he caught a flash of white. And as if by magic a blaze-faced stallion poked its head around the thicket and the brief glimpse of a third man became instead a man garbed in the sacred hide of a white buffalo.

“It is he,” Drum gasped. When the shaman had failed to return, Drum took it upon himself to lead his people down from the high country with its bitter winds and scarce game. He led them to war. And yet, without White Buffalo's magic to ensure their success, Drum had been worried. The Scalpdancers would fight for their hunting grounds. Many lives would be lost on both sides.

So Drum watched with elation as White Buffalo rode across the narrow gap in the trees where a rock slide from the ridge above had cleared a path through the forest.

“White Buffalo,” Storm Bear muttered aloud.

Word spread throughout the war party. Eighty braves moved as one and emerged from the brush-choked stand of aspen into the slotted sunlight despite Drum's warning.

When his words of caution proved useless, Drum joined the warriors because he, like them, had given himself over to the shaman's sinister power in defiance of all he had once held sacred. If White Buffalo's magic won for them the land of the Scalpdancers, so much the better.

Lost Eyes reined in his mount and motioned for Sparrow to do the same as she drew abreast of him. White Buffalo continued into the rubble-strewn clearing.

“Do not fear,” White Buffalo told them as he pulled ahead. “Come.” He held up his rifle in a gesture of greeting toward the Shoshoni. “We are among friends.”

“What are you saying?” Lost Eyes pointed toward the Shoshoni. “They are not my friends.” He could see their painted faces in the sunlight and didn't bother to count their number. He saw a menacing group, bristling with war lances and bull hide shields. Some brandished flint-locks like the one White Buffalo carried, others held powerful ash bows, and still others great war hammers capable of crushing a man's skull with a single swipe.

Lost Eyes was filled with misgivings as he watched the Shoshoni slowly work their way up the treacherous incline. At his side Sparrow shared his concern.

“Have they come raiding for horses?” she wondered aloud.

“They have come for war.” Lost Eyes glanced at White Buffalo, who continued to calmly await his adopted people. With sickening realization Lost Eyes began to understand the shaman's duplicity.

White Buffalo had hoped to have time to win Lost Eyes over to his side or to at least be rid of this headstrong young man and his woman. After all, Lost Eyes had saved his life. He turned, sensing the younger man's scrutiny. He didn't like the way Lost Eyes had unslung the elkhorn bow or the way the young warrior walked his gray to within arm's reach of White Buffalo.

“Our enemies draw closer,” Lost Eyes said.

“A man chooses his enemies,” White Buffalo countered.

The hooves of the horses clattered on the loose stone and debris left by the slide. Broken timber and shattered trunks forced the Shoshoni to cut back and forth and follow an indirect route up the slope.

“And his friends,” White Buffalo added.

Lost Eyes judged the distance back to the cover of the forest. He knew what he could expect of the gray, for he had held her back and kept her to an easy pace. Still, the animal's strength had been sapped by the long ride. The gray was nearly winded. But she might have enough to get him over the ridge and down into the hills on the other side.

“And I chose poorly indeed. You are going to attack the village,” Lost Eyes said, his temper rising.

White Buffalo's expression beneath the buffalo head-dress betrayed his disdain. He had been wrong about this brave without a vision.

“I see your thoughts,” the shaman said. “The Scalpdancers have denied you as they denied me. But we are not alike. You cannot even carry your own hate.”

Weak … cannot carry your own hate …
the words echoed in Lost Eyes' skull, a challenge he must answer. It was as if a veil had been pulled from his eyes, permitting him to see at last. Suddenly the power of the shaman to influence him was gone. Lost Eyes tightened his grip on the elkhorn bow in his right hand; his muscles tensed.

White Buffalo never took his eyes off the young brave at his side as he lifted the flintlock rifle and thumbed the hammer back.

Lost Eyes caught the shaman completely off guard. Lost Eyes never reached for an arrow. Instead he swung the bow in a vicious arc that caught the shaman across the bridge of his nose and sent him tumbling off his horse.

Blood spurting from his broken nose, White Buffalo landed on his backside. The jolt caused him to tighten his grip on the trigger and the rifle discharged harmlessly into the air.

Lost Eyes whirled his horse about and almost collided with Sparrow as she fought to bring her own mount under control. She had not heard any of the interchange between the two men—but she knew there was danger from the approaching Shoshoni war party.

Lost Eyes didn't have time to explain. He pointed to a trail that began near the trees and skirted the slide area. The ground looked more solid there for the horses.

“Come with me!” he shouted. Behind him White Buffalo roared in pain and rage.

Sparrow needed no urging. She tugged savagely on the reins and turned her mount completely about, then lunged toward the path Lost Eyes had indicated.

Downslope the war party didn't understand what was happening, but with White Buffalo on the ground and out of the way, Drum, the Shoshoni war chief, gave the order to open fire on the two fugitives. A half-dozen rifles sounded in a ragged volley that peppered the hillside about the fleeing couple.

Lost Eyes ducked low over the neck of his horse. The gray seemed to know just where to run. It leapt a patch of loose gravel and gained the trail just behind Sparrow's surefooted mount. Leaden death ricocheted inches from the Blackfoot brave. He kicked his heels against his horse's flanks and tried to keep his weight forward to help the animal climb.

Down below, White Buffalo struggled to his feet. He looked up the hillside and saw the couple making good their escape, and he snapped his rifle to his shoulder and squeezed the trigger. Nothing happened. “
Saaa-vaa
,” he muttered, remembering he had fired the gun when he landed on his backside. He grunted in disgust and reached for his powder horn. He poured gunpowder down the barrel and tapped it firm with his ramrod. Lost Eyes and Sparrow were in the shadows now—but they'd have to cross sunlit ground near the summit. White Buffalo fit patch and ball to the mouth of the barrel and rammed the load home.

Lost Eyes urged the gray mare to greater effort; only a few yards to go now and they'd be out of range.

The shaman dusted the pan with a trace of black powder. Behind him the Shoshoni guns spoke again, but either the range was too great or their aim too poor. White Buffalo shouldered his rifle, exhaled to steady his aim—