Authors: Heather Graham
“They will not hurt you. You wear the blood of our warriors, and that offends them. You will be bathed and cleansed, and that is all.”
“That is all?” she whispered hopefully.
“For now,” he said forebodingly. But she was to get no more from him. He left his house, and the women latched on to her arms. Elizabeth, too, was escorted from the house on the arms of the women.
They were taken past a village center. There was an interesting circle of poles and ashes there, and a large rock. The rock was red, bloodstained. Jassy paled, knowing what the rock was—the “altar” where men’s heads were caved in. The sickening smell of fire and ash was still on the air.
She almost fell, buckling over with such strength that the women had to jerk her back to her feet. They had not been the only prisoners of the Pamunkee the previous night. Some captives had already met their fates upon the rock, and in the tortuous flames.
“Oh, God!” Elizabeth gasped.
“Come on, quickly, move, don’t look!” Jassy urged her. She screwed up her own eyes until they entered into a trail of trees, and from there they came to a brook. Jassy shook herself free from the woman who held her, anxious to reach Elizabeth. She was too late. Elizabeth was violently sick, right into the bushes. Jassy held her up, smoothing back her hair, waiting for the spasm to die.
“It’s all right, it’s all right—” Jassy said.
“No, no, it’s not. It is what they’re going to do to us! I read John Smith’s reports of the murder of John Calvin. They were in your house. I read them … I read about the Indians. They are going to torture and kill us just the same—”
“No, no, they’re not. Powan won’t let them.”
“Powan will light the fires,” Elizabeth said.
“Jamie will come,” Jassy said.
She was wrenched away from Elizabeth. The women set upon them both, tearing and ripping at their clothing until they were both left shivering and naked and panting from the fight they had waged. They were shoved into the water then. The cold was shocking. Jassy rose, gasping for air. They were quickly joined by the women, who did not seem to feel the cold of the brook. Then they were set upon again, and scrubbed thoroughly with handfuls of sand and stones. Jassy hated every touch. Her breasts were in agony that morning, overflowing. No matter how she screamed and fought, they, too, were viciously scrubbed.
Finally, exhausted and panting, she and Elizabeth were left upon rocks to dry beneath the sun. Then they were given short, leather, apronlike dresses to wear, like the other women. They were not given shoes. Jassy thought that they were kept barefoot to hinder escape attempts, since most of the women did wear soft leather moccasins.
They were brought back to Powan’s house then, and given bowls of meat in gravy. Jassy looked at the food suspiciously, but she was ravenous, and when she tasted the stew, it was delicious. Hope came back to them soon and told them that the meal had been rabbit, and that they needn’t fear eating—the Pamunkees did not poison their captives; when they meant to kill them, they did so with a feast and lots of entertainment so that the deaths could be enjoyed.
“What is happening?” Jassy asked Hope.
“They are talking about you again in a council. Pocanough says that he wants you, and that he will have you. Powan says no, that he is the chief, that he will wait and see if your husband lived through the massacre and if he will come for you.”
Elizabeth was poking at her stew. Jassy glanced at her quickly, then looked at Hope again. “Someone will come. They will come from the other hundreds—”
“Maybe. Eventually. But it was not only the Carlyle Hundred that was attacked. We came off very lightly,
they are saying. The Indians managed to kill only twenty or thirty whites in a population of over two hundred. At Martin’s Hundred, half were killed. It is the same at many of the others. Jamestown was spared, for the people were warned. Jamie saved many by being prepared; they say that
you
saved many by sounding the alarm.”
“The entire Virginia colony was attacked?” Elizabeth whispered in horror.
Hope nodded gravely. “Opechancanough ordered it so.”
“Why?” Jassy breathed.
“He wants his land back, I suppose,” Hope said.
Jassy touched her hand suddenly. “Thank you, Hope. Thank you for coming with us. Why—why did you do it? You did not have to.”
Hope shrugged. She lowered her head. “I lied to you. I was jealous. I wanted your husband, and I told you that I knew him to make you mad. He loves you. It was wrong.”
Jassy inhaled softly. “I—I don’t think that he loves me.”
“Yes, yes, he does. He loves you very much.” She smiled. “If he can come, he will. Powan expects him. He says that Jamie will come alone. Pocanough thinks that Jamie should be slain, but Powan says that Jamie is fair, and he will be fair too. If Pocanough wants to fight Jamie for you, that will be all right. Whichever man lives will have you, and if both are killed, you will belong to Powan. That is what I think that they are deciding.”
Jassy shivered, then she looked at Elizabeth again. She couldn’t tell what her sister had heard, and what she had comprehended. Elizabeth had never looked more fragile, or more beautiful. Her soft blond hair curled softly about her face and her flower-blue eyes. The leather apron exposed a great deal of her fair, silky skin, enhancing the fullness of her breasts and the long, shapely length of her legs. Jassy looked at Hope. Hope shook her head and left them quickly.
In the afternoon one of the women came back with a bag of grain and a mortar and pestle, trying to show
them that they must work. Jassy shook her head, and Elizabeth stubbornly followed suit. The young woman looked at them angrily, then returned with one of the matrons with a long reed. The older woman began with Jassy, lashing out at her with hard, stinging blows. Jassy screamed and covered her face and fell to the ground so that the blows could be deflected by the leather upon her back.
Suddenly the blows stopped.
“Stop it! Stop it!” she heard Elizabeth shrieking.
Her sister—her sweet, shy sister—was on top of the Indian woman, wrenching the reed from her hands and wrestling her in a fury. Jassy staggered to her feet, hurrying to Elizabeth’s aid. Just then, Powan came back into the house.
In a fury, he tugged up both her and Elizabeth by the hair. The older woman—with a bleeding lip, thanks to Elizabeth’s tender touch—began to rant and rail and lash out at the white woman again. Powan thundered out in fury and pushed the two of them to the far rear of the house. He sent the woman away.
Jassy held still, watching the tall, muscled Indian pick up the reed. He came over to them and waved it in front of them. “Everyone works. You work too. Next time I will let them beat you until the blood flows from your flesh.”
He dropped the reed and turned and left them. Hope returned with the wheat they were to grind. Looking at Elizabeth’s smudged face, Jassy had to smile. “You
are
a fighter!” She laughed.
Elizabeth flushed. “She was beating you. I could not stand by and watch it.”
Impulsively Jassy hugged her. Hope cleared her throat and told them that they must finish their work. “Everyone works to eat. It is the way that it is done,” she said, looking at them anxiously.
Jassy and Elizabeth looked at each other and shrugged, and then set forth on their task. If it could remain so, if they could grind wheat by day and have Powan’s protection by night, then they could survive until …
Until Jamie came, if he was alive to do so.
And if he could survive Pocanough.
If things could just stay the same …
But things were not to stay the same. That night, when Powan came back to his house, he dragged them both to their feet. He stared at Jassy and pulled on the amulet she wore around her neck so that it hung low over her breasts. His mere touch upon them caused her to wince, and he smiled, slowly and curiously. She gasped, stunned, when he ripped open her garment, baring her to the waist. Her breasts, so heavy and painful now, surged forth. She tried to cover herself, and he grabbed her hands, wrenching them around behind her back and holding her tautly to his chest with just one hand to imprison her. “You tempt me, Cameron’s woman.” She gritted her teeth against the humiliation and pain as he moved his fingers over the full globes of her breasts, pausing to flick the nipples and see them fill with milk. She wanted to lash out at him; she was afraid that she would fall, and she hadn’t the strength to free herself from his powerful hold. “You tempt me, yes … but James Cameron is a man I will give a chance.”
She opened her eyes wide upon his, aware that Powan was taunting her but that she would even be spared rape because of the man her husband was.
She heard a sudden hissing noise, and then fists slammed against Powan’s back. Elizabeth! She was even daring to attack the Indian brave in Jassy’s defense.
“Elizabeth!” she cried, but it was too late. Powan had already shoved her aside and clutched Elizabeth to him. He smiled, looking down at Elizabeth. He had her wrist and pulled her inexorably closer. “No!” Elizabeth murmured, shaking her head.
“Powan! Please—” Jassy began. She raced back to him, trying to swing the solid brave around. “Please don’t. She is Jamie’s sister-in-law! She is afraid of you, she will hate you—”
He started to laugh, and his eyes swept over her, lingering on her naked breasts and slim waist. “She is not his wife, and a captive need not love a captor.”
“You can’t!” Jassy cried, flinging herself against him.
She scratched, she raked, she sobbed, and she fought him very bitterly, but he was quickly on top of her, despite Elizabeth’s harrying him from behind. Powan got Jassy down upon her stomach, and he laced her wrists together with a strip of rawhide, then dragged her to a corner where he tied the rawhide to a stake.
“Leave her alone!” Elizabeth cried, thundering upon his back. “Leave her alone!”
He tied Jassy securely.
“Leave her alone!” Elizabeth cried again. Jassy saw his jaw harden as Elizabeth’s nails raked his bare flesh. He ignored the attack, and his dark eyes found Jassy’s. “Don’t make me forget who you are, Cameron’s woman,” he warned her.
“You can’t—” she said, but he had already spun around and seized Elizabeth.
Jassy strained against her bonds in agony. She heard her sister scrambling away, gasping, sobbing, no longer seeking to attack but trying with all her heart to escape.
Bracing herself, she strained against the pole as she heard the frantic fight that ensued, a fight that was quickly ended.
She heard Elizabeth’s piercing scream.
And she heard the sounds of Powan moving over her sister, breathing raggedly, ramming his body again and again. She heard the Indian’s emission of a pleased grunt. She heard it all, burning inwardly and outwardly, wishing she could scream and scream and scream, just so that she would not have to hear what went on.
But she could hear. She heard Powan fall from Elizabeth, and then she heard her sister sobbing through the night. She could not go to her; she could not even talk to her. Elizabeth slept with the Indian brave. In the dim firelight Jassy could see that her sister was imprisoned by a strong brown arm. Elizabeth had gone silent, still and silent. Jassy wondered if she slept. She did not sleep again herself that night.
In the morning Powan slit the ties that bound Jassy to the pole before he left the house. Jassy stared at him
with hard reproach, but he impassively ignored her. As soon as he had stepped from the doorway, she crawled over to Elizabeth. Elizabeth flinched from her touch and looked, dazed, into her eyes. “Oh, Jassy!” Tears welled within the deep blue pools. “Oh, Jassy, it was awful!”
Jassy held her and rocked her.
Then Elizabeth began to swear. She talked about how she hated the Indian and how she would one day cut his heart out and toss it into a fire while he still lived. Jassy finally encouraged Elizabeth to get up, and she worked on adjusting both of their outfits so that they might decently make it to the brook. People watched them as they walked, but no one tried to stop them. Jassy kept a sharp lookout, desperate now that they might find a way to escape. But although no one impeded their way, there were Indians everywhere, the men and the women, watching them. Escape would be difficult.
“He’ll do it again!” Elizabeth stormed at the brook.
There was nothing that Jassy could say to reassure her. She could not fight and save her. Powan didn’t give a damn about either of them, but in his curious way he did care about Jamie, and if she wanted just to spare Elizabeth, Powan still would not take her in her sister’s stead.
“We’ll escape,” she promised. “We’ll escape.”
But they didn’t escape that day, and by night, Powan seized Jassy and brought her, screaming and thrashing, to be tied to the pole again.
And he seized upon Elizabeth again. The only difference was that Elizabeth no longer cried when it was over.
They
had
to escape.
But two weeks later they had not.
They were coming to know the Pamunkee way of life. Powan was the chief of this tribe, and he spent much of his time in council meetings and debate. He was also a hunter and a warrior, and he expected his woman to serve him. A Pamunkee could take as many wives as he could provide for, so it was natural that he had laid
claim to the women hostages, and that he held them for whatever trade it might take to return them.
After the initial torture by the other women, Jassy and Elizabeth were fairly much left alone. Hope continued to be their friend, and to keep them advised of what was happening.
In the morning they bathed and were set to work, either with grain or mending, or with plucking a wild turkey, or skinning or tanning. Neither of them took easily to the tasks, for although they were accustomed to days of work, preparing skins for clothing was hard and arduous. They were corrected many times by the Indian women when they stretched and scraped and cleaned and dried the skins. Jassy didn’t mind the days. She came to like the mornings and bathing in the cool brook. She didn’t mind the labor because it kept her mind busy.