The Legend of Tyoga Weathersby (30 page)

When Seven Arrows reached down to guide himself into her, Sunlei could stand no more. Exploding in violent rage that caught him by surprise, she fought back with everything she had. Thrashing her powerful legs and flailing her arms, she kicked at his abdomen and thighs, elbowed him in the ribs and chest, doing everything she could to push him off of her. Fighting with all of her strength to preserve her dignity and womanhood, she didn’t care if he killed her, or if her refusal to be taken meant the death of her entire tribe, she would not surrender without a fight.

He grabbed her wrists to control her flailing arms, but was unable to restrain her strong kicking legs. “What is wrong, Little One? Don’t be afraid.” Seven Arrows taunted her as if he were enjoying the struggle. “Oh, I know what it is. You are used to mating with a dog. Okay. We’ll do it the way you and your wolf-man used to couple.” Grabbing her around the waist, he flipped Sunlei onto her stomach so that she could no longer kick and push him away.

Exhausted from a nightmarish day of excruciatingly painful events, Sunlei had no more fight in her. As Seven Arrows bent her legs and pushed her knees under her, she was overtaken by the involuntary retching that emptied her stomach onto the buffalo robe.

Sensing that she was no longer going to fight him, he became more gentle. “That is it, Little One. Rise up on your knees and spread your legs. Is this better? Is this how you like it?”

With her face smeared with half-digested fish, and her shoulders pinned down on the buffalo robe, she spread her knees wide, and prepared to receive him.

The splatter of the warm sticky fluid on her back and shoulders sent a wave of relief through her. She expected that the deed was done before he could enter her.

One squirt, then another, and another as powerful and voluminous as the last.

The gurgling sounds coming from behind her and the crimson red liquid now running down both of her arms made her turn around to see what was happening.

Seven Arrows was clutching his neck with both of his hands while the blood squirted through his fingers, down his arm and onto her lower back and thighs. She turned over, sat up, and moved out of the way as Seven Arrows collapsed face first into the buffalo robe now soaking wet with the warmth of his own blood.

Getting to her knees, she saw the blood continue to pour from the gaping wound under his right ear.

She heard the patter of bare feet running from the lodge.

Grabbing her tunic, she threw open the flap covering the entranceway and ran naked after the footsteps she could hear in front of her on the trail.

In ten quick steps, the camp was out of site and she was running for her life.

Chapter 33

You Are Never Alone

S
unlei ran with all her might. It didn’t matter that she hadn’t really slept in nearly forthy-eight hours. It didn’t matter that the gashes on her back from her beating were open and bleeding. It didn’t matter that she had no moccasins on and that the rocks on the path along the riverbank were cutting the soles of her feet.

Sunlei ran.

She ran through the blackness as the branches of the trees and bushes lining the path whipped her face, arms, and shoulders. Breathlessly, she pursued her savior who was running only steps ahead of her. The steps were quick, short, and light. She desperately wanted to cry out, “Stop! Wait for me! I can’t make it alone!”

Whoever was out in front of her was fast, silent, and not at all interested in being discovered.

Someone had ended the scourge of Seven Arrows, but left Sunlei alone and suspect. His throat had been brutally severed, and no one other than herself had been anywhere near him. She would be blamed for the ferocious attack, and there was no talking her way out of the facts.

Her only salvation was escape. And so she ran.

When she heard the war cries from the camp, she knew that Seven Arrows had been found lying face down in a pool of his own blood. Theywould be after her, and she knew that she had no hope of out running the young, strong men.

The gravel and dirt trail followed the contours of the river to her left. The woods to her right became dense with scrub pines and thick with matted briar patches that made veering off the path to elude her pursuers impossible.

Beyond the underbrush that lined the trail, large granite boulders were scattered in disarray like sinful chess pieces banished from a massive board of disapproving squares. They would provide cover, but leave her no way out.

She jumped the rocky bed of a feeder stream emptying into the river when she heard Seven Arrow’s men begin the chase. With only a two-minute head start on them, they would be upon her in no time at all. Breathless, she paused to search the woods around her for a rocky outcropping in which she could conceal herself or even a briar patch under which she could crawl.

The thundering of the warriors’ mocassined feet hitting the ground left her no more time to consider concealment.

She turned and ran as fast as she could.

As her surroundings melted into the confusion of primal panic, her body shifted into the automatic rhythms of preservation that ward off waste, conserve energy, and focus on staying alive. Her legs flew over the rocky ground without registering the pain from her lacerated feet. Her eyes focused on the trail ahead and blurred her surroundings into a hazy distortion of time and place. Her breathing synchronized with the beating of her heart as the blood coursed through her veins with a regulated urgency recorded in rapid pulse and shallow breath. She floated in this magical space for another hundred yards before her body awakened to the pain of her pounding heart, the searing ache of air-starved lungs, and the knotting cramps in calves and thighs that signaled the end of flight.

Sunlei bent at the waist, placed her hands on her knees and whispered to the night, “Help me. Please, help me.” Hearing the braves closing the fifty-yard gap between them, she stood upright to accept the reality of her capture.

She scanned her surroundings one last time to assess any means of concealment or escape. The landscape whirled around her like she was a child spinning in place. A reflective golden sparkle to the south halted the frenzied search and drew her attention down the trail.

Peering into the night, she blinked several times to bring into focus what now appeared to be two amber orbs about waist high, fixed directly upon her. She took several quick steps towards the lights and immediately recognized the glowing eyes of Wahaya-Wacon gleaming in the night twenty-five yards down the trail.

Glancing over her shoulder in the direction of the pursuing braves, she ran with renewed vigor toward the wolf. When she arrived at the spot in the trail where she had seen him, he was gone.

“Wahaya,” she screamed out too loudly. “Wahaya-Wacon,”she called again as loudly as she dare. She turned around and around on the trail while looking into the woods and up and down the trail. In desperation, she cried out, “Do not leave me here. Come back.”

Collapsing to her knees, she placed her head in her hands and bent to the ground in utter despair. Certain that the witnesses to her final prayer were to be only the rocks, water, and wind, she said again into her hands that were covering her tear-stained face, “Don’t leave me.”

When she felt the gentle nudge of his cold wet nose against the back of her neck, she gasped—first in fear, and then in joyous relief. She raised her head to stare into the firey, urging eyes of Wahaya-Wacon.

Her prayer had not been in vain.

The Shawnee braves were getting so close that she could hear their footsteps slapping the trail. “Wahaya, what do I do?” she asked as if she expected him to speak to her.

The Commander took two steps off of the trail toward the dense woods and circled twice to indicate that she was to follow.

Silently nodding, Sunlei got to her feet and followed him into the blackness of the forest. He only ran about twenty yards into the woods before stopping next to a jumble of gigantic boulders that had cleaved from the smooth south face of a granite ridge and tumbled hundreds of feet down to the forest floor. Their landing created a shallow grotto into which the wolf ran.

Sunlei followed. She fell to the ground and pressed back as far as she could into the recesses of the damp refuge. The wolf moved to the front of the alcove, circled once and lay down facing toward Sunlei, who was curled up on the ground. His dark coat blended into the granite surroundings and concealed Sunlei in living camouflage.

Sunlei looked into the eyes of Wahaya. He stared back with a gaze of calm reassurance. The wildness could still be discerned in his eyes.

His ears piqued when the Shawnee stopped at the spot where she had left the trail to follow him into the woods.

“She must be just ahead,” she heard one of the Shawnee say. The same voice ordered, “Sleeping Owl, run to South Fork. Tell Yellow Cloud what has happened. Tell him that we need help to carry Seven Arrows’ body over the mountain. Tell him the Cherokee squaw has murdered his son.” With that the men resumed the chase along the river bank.

If they had been discovered, Wahaya would have torn them apart with the dispassionate savagery that is the hallmark of the apex predator. Yet, the gentleness in his eyes when he looked into Sunlei slowed her breathing, quieted her panic, and calmed her soul.

All things in nature unfold only as they are meant to be. There is but one outcome, one end-point, one resolution, for an alternative ending cannot be. The wolf would see her through this, or he would not. He would allow her pursuers to pass in peace, or, if discovered, tear them apart. She would survive, or she would not. Her light continues to glow, or it is extinguished.

Quietly, the two of them lay facing each other until the wolf stood up, turned his back to Sunlei, and sat down in front of the grotto like a vigilante sentry standing guard.

Sunlei was overcome with fatigue. For the first time in many hours, she felt some measure of safety under the watchful eyes of Wahaya-Wacon. Secured by the pureness of the peaceful beast, she closed her eyes and rested her tired, battered body deep within the recesses of the quiet grotto.

After only minutes, Sunlei was reawakened to the reality of her nightmare by the loud voices of the Shawnee braves. They had figured out that she had left the path and had doubled back to see if they could pick up her trail.

They were very close.

The wolf was gone.

The realization that she was alone sent a frightening shiver up her spine. The respite in the grotto had cleared her mind of the panic that had kept her at a disadvantage. With renewed determination, she bolted from the shelter of the grotto and dove headlong into the woods.

Her first steps on the carpet of dried pine branches and cones alerted the Shawnee to her location. In a flash, they left the trail in hot pursuit of their prey. In the dense underbrush, there was no path for her follow. She felt her feet flying through the briars and over boulders and stones strewn helter skelter about the forest floor.

“Ehya tola si wayho
(Quick. She went this way)
,” she heard the warriors cry out.

Bounding up the jagged face of a boulder, she slid down the moss covered north side into a depression in the forest floor at the base of an ancient oak tree.

“Eh wa ta, eha lo,” she heard another brave call out.

She could hear their footsteps and the crashing of the underbrush and the snapping of branches as they made their way closer and closer to where she lay. She fell to her belly and slithered along the forest floor while clawing through the dirt and rocks, crawling over roots and stones to the far side of the giant oak.

When she paused to listen, she noticed for the first time that she was completely naked. She was clutching her balled up tunic in her left hand. The realization that she was wallowing naked in the muck and rot of the forest floor was a blow to her person-hood more offensive than a slap in the face.

Rising purposefully to her feet, she wiped the sweat from her brow, and brushed the loose dirt and wet leaves from her naked shivering body with the crumpled tunic. Her quaking fingers explored the tunic’s seams until she found its hem, and she gently shook it back into shape and form. Raising the tunic toward the towering tree tops, she extended both arms through the sleeves and felt the safety of its caress warm her as it slid over her battered, bruised, and sweaty body.

If they were going to find her, she was going to maintain some measure of dignity.

Just as her head popped out of the neckline, she felt the calloused hand cover her mouth, and a massive, muscular arm snake around her waist to lift her from the forest floor.

Struggling to free herself from the vice-like grip, she kicked and punched at her abductor with what little strength she had left. She was being carried deeper into the woods and farther away from the river and the trail. After the hijacker had carried her about thirty paces, he put her down, grabbed her by the shoulders, brushed the hair out of her eyes, and said, “Eh ya to, Sunlei. It’s me.”

She looked up into his eyes and collapsed into his arms. Overcome with fatigue, pain, and relief, she passed out in the fortress of his embrace without saying a word.

Chapter 34

Beaten to the Punch

W
hen Sunlie awoke, she was swaddled in warm blankets. Her head rested on a soft, down-filled pillow covered in a linen casing.

She was lying on a thick mattress of buffalo hide suspended off the ground and supported on a wooden frame. It was a white man’s bed. She threw the covers off. Realizing that she was naked, she pulled the soft red cloth blanket up to her chin.

She inspected the delicate weave on a corner of the blanket. She knew this work. She brought the corner to her nose. “Prairie Day.”

Reaching behind her head, she felt that the wall against which the bed abutted was hard packed dirt and rock. Lifting her head, she saw that the other walls were constructed of uncut pine logs and mud daub. The floor was made of broad-cut knotty pine. The rough-cut oaken front door was swung wide open. Fuzzy-edged sunbeams danced through the opening. A gentle breeze caressed her face with its fresh, crisp earthy scent. The shutters of an opening next to the door, not really a window because there was no glass, were open.