Wild Ecstasy (4 page)

His palate parched from rage, Echohawk felt as though he was suffocating. In a husky low voice he vowed to his father that he would be the kind of chief Gray Elk would expect him to be. He vowed that he would be a strong and loyal leader of his people.

But to himself, alone, Echohawk was wondering how he could follow the road of peace that his father had always taught him. His blood was boiling with anger and humiliation; he could feel it flowing in his veins like molten lava.

Vengeance!

His heart—his very soul—cried out for vengeance.

Echohawk clung to his father and mourned silently for a moment longer, then found himself surrounded by more survivors of the massacre, who had fled into the darker depths of the forest during the attack.

Yellow Wolf and Helping Bear helped Echohawk to his feet. Although he could not see his people, he turned to them and faced them, to give them the confidence they needed in their new leader. They looked to him now for their future. For leadership. For survival. He was their chief, and he knew that for now he must place them and their welfare even before his desire to have revenge.

Helping Bear leaned closer to Echohawk and whispered, “Echohawk, perhaps it is best that you cannot see. Some who stand before you are wounded. Some are carrying their dead children. It is a sight that is most unbearable.”

Echohawk's heart ached, and he could not help but feel the helplessness of this situation, especially now that he could not see well enough to be the leader that his people needed at this time. So much depended on him.

“One by one, come to me, my people,” Echohawk said, reaching his hands out toward them. “Let me embrace each of you. Then I shall tell you what we must do to survive.”

Although his knees were growing weaker by the minute, and his head was throbbing incessantly. Echohawk began embracing his people, himself drawing much comfort from them.

When this was done, he stood before them all, tall and unbending like a tree, his eyes unfocused yet bold and fathomless as he spoke to them. “My people, for the moment my eyesight has been weakened by the blow to the head that I received during the white man's attack,” he said, forcing his voice to sound strong, and most important of all, calm. “But do not fret. We shall endure! We will go to Chief Silver Wing's village and ask for assistance until the wounds of your hearts and flesh are healed, and until my vision clears, to ensure you a chief that can work at full capacity.”

He held his chin high and squared his back. “Busy yourselves at making many travois,” he instructed. “Go and find the dogs and horses that were scattered during the raid. The dead and most seriously injured will travel by travois.”

Soon this was done and the slow journey began to Chief Silver Wing's village. To prove his worth to his people, Echohawk had chosen to travel on foot, only occasionally accepting Yellow Wolf's and Helping Bear's assistance as they walked beside him.

As Echohawk took each step, his weakness worsening, his hate for the raiders deepened inside his heart. Hate was etched inside his heart for all mankind, it seemed. How could he forget that white man who, those many winters ago, raided, killed, and maimed so many of his father's people? How could he forget the cowardly “Yellow Eyes,” who had recently taken so much from Echohawk and his people?

And now there was another white man whose heart was as evil and black, and whose face troubled Echohawk. Although smeared with ash, he had seen something familiar in his features, yet he could not put his finger on just what.

His thoughts went to a white man that stood out from all of the rest, a man who was everyone's friend. If not for the kindness of Colonel Snelling, and of the honest traders that Echohawk had become acquainted with at Fort Snelling, he would believe that all people with the white skin were bad.

But he knew that this was not so. It was just a few that he vowed to kill. In time vengeance
would
be his. One by one the evil men would die. Even if Echohawk had to learn how to fight without his eyesight!

Echohawk's troubled thoughts went to the youngest of the raiders today. There had been something different about the young lad. Strange, how through the smeared ash he had seen such feminine features.

And there had been some hidden mystery in those dark eyes.

An intense bitterness seized Echohawk, and he vowed that this lad, also, must die. No one involved in the raids on his people would be spared his vengeance.

No one!

The sound of the horses' hooves behind him made another cause for sadness enter Echohawk's heart. His beloved horse, Blaze, had been among the missing horses today, and he felt that a man without a horse was only half a man.

This, also, gave him reason to hate—to plan a terrible vengeance.

Chapter 4

—Bobart

 

 

 

As Mariah drove her mustang endlessly onward, feeling as wild as the breeze that blew, she tilted her face toward the dark night sky. She inhaled a quavering breath, so glad that she was finally free of her tyrant father.

Wearily she lowered her eyes, momentarily closing them. Oh, how they burned from lack of sleep! Her head would nod, and then just as quickly she would become alert again as to why she had not taken the time to sleep in her flight from her father. She must get to Fort Snelling. The colonel would send assistance to the Chippewa as soon as he was aware of their needs.

Oh, God, she lamented to herself, she felt as responsible as her father for the Indians' desolation, yet she reminded herself that she had been forced to ride with him and his men.

Knowing that, however, did not lessen her guilt. Perhaps it would lessen once she was able to get assistance for the Indians.

“But is it too late for Echohawk?” she despaired aloud. The instant his chieftain father had died, he had become chief of his people. His people needed him, for if he died, they would have lost two chiefs in one attack.

To think of that possibility, and to know that she had been a part of it, though an unwilling participant, made Mariah thrust her heels into her horse's flanks, urging him faster, into a harder gallop across the land.

Then her spine stiffened as she became aware of the stench that was troubling her nostrils, and soon she caught sight of a black pall of smoke that lay heavily in the air through the break in the trees a short distance away. Clearly she was not far from the ravaged Indian village.

She yanked her reins, causing the mustang to come to a sudden shuddering halt. She studied the low-hanging clouds of smoke, seeing in her mind's eye what was hiding behind it, the scene of the Indian village having been etched onto her consciousness like a leaf fossilized in stone. She knew that she should make a wide swing around it, to avoid the survivors seeing her and possibly killing her.

But some unseen force made her snap her reins and nudge her steed with her knees, sending her mustang into a slow trot, until she was through the smoke and near enough to the village to see that it was deserted.

Her mustang slowly loped into the village, and she was torn by what to do. Even if she did arrive at Fort Snelling as planned, how could the colonel help the Indians if he didn't know where they were?

“He'll know where to look for them,” she whispered to herself.

She urged her horse into a hard gallop away from the burned-out village, knowing that she must get to the fort in haste. The Indians must be found quickly and offered assistance in their time of need and sorrow! And she was anxious to see if Echohawk was among the survivors.

She gazed heavenward. “Oh, God, please let him be alive,” she prayed softly. “Please. . . .”

She rode hard across straight stretches of meadows, then was forced to wind her way through forest land, still fighting the urge to sleep, hunger now joining her miseries, gnawing at the pit of her stomach.

She came to a creek that had to be crossed before going onward. She dismounted and studied the rushing waters, a rude reminder of the storm that had delayed the attack of the Chippewa village. The water in the creek had not yet receded, even now tearing savagely at the banks, leaving them torn and furrowed in its wake.

Mariah caught sight of a black snake as it glittered and slid into a rift in a cottonwood tree near her, reminding her that water moccasins were prominent in this area, should she try to cross the creek, and fail.

Casting fear aside, she looked farther upstream, seeing that it wandered willfully to the right and left, with many a turn.

Then she spied an irregular line of large stepping-stones that the water was rushing across. That seemed to be her only hope of crossing the creek today, or perhaps even tomorrow, unless she traveled farther upstream to see if it was shallower somewhere else.

“I don't have time for that,” she murmured to herself. “The
Indians
don't have that much time for me to waste. . . .”

Wary of her decision, yet knowing that she didn't have much choice, Mariah rode onward until she reached the stones. Gripping hard to the horse's reins, placing her knees solidly against the sides of her mustang, she urged her horse onto the rocks, its hooves unsteady as the rush of the water slapped against them.

Wide-eyed, scarcely breathing, Mariah watched as her horse seemed to brave the savagery of the water well enough, sighing when the opposite shore was almost reached.

But just as she was urging her mustang to solid ground, its hooves slipped. Mariah was thrown forward to the ground as the horse toppled back into the creek, swiftly carried away in the current. When Mariah landed on the ground, her head hit with a thud, momentarily stunning her.

When she regained her full faculties, her eyes became wild as she looked desperately around her. Her heart sank when she recalled her mustang being taken downstream. She hoped it would climb ashore where the current slowed.

But now she would have to travel the rest of the way to Fort Snelling on foot!

“How can I?” she sighed woefully, placing her hand to the small of her back. It seemed that every bone in her body ached from the damnable fall.

A more terrifying thought seized her. “My rifle!” she gasped aloud. “It was on my horse!”

Weaponless, and without a horse, she knew that she was at the mercy of anything and anyone that happened along. She had no choice but to get to her feet and start her long journey to Fort Snelling. Delaying even a moment longer could cost her her life!

“But I'm so tired,” she whispered lethargically. “I'm . . . so . . . hungry.”

She stretched out on the ground, hugging herself to ward off the chill. “I'll sleep for just a little while,
then
go on my way. . . .”

Her eyes closed. Sleep came to her quickly . . . a
deep
sleep.

* * *

Exhausted from the journey, and weak from his injury, Echohawk staggered toward Chief Silver Wing's circle village of skin lodges that were fitted among birch trees, the leaves of the white birch trembling in the breeze. A few children at play on a slight rising of ground were the first to perceive Echohawk and his people. A cry of “Strangers arriving!” sounded the alarm, and mounted braves soon rode out of the village and stopped close to Echohawk, recognizing him.

Yellow Wolf held Echohawk alert as Wise Owl, one of Chief Silver Wing's most valued braves, dismounted beside him.

“Echohawk, what has happened to you and your people?” Wise Owl said, recalling the last time he had been with Echohawk. They had shared in the hunt. They had later shared cooked venison over an outdoor fire before going their separate ways to their own villages. Theirs had become a special friendship.

Echohawk recognized the voice of his friend. “Wise Owl,” he breathed out, his voice barely audible. “My father, Gray Elk, lies dead on a travois behind me. Our people were attacked by white men. Our village . . . It was . . . destroyed.”

With a weak and limp hand Echohawk gestured toward his people, who stood devotedly behind him. “These are but a few of the survivors,” he said sadly. “Others are on the hunt and will soon discover the carnage left at our village.”

He paused, inhaling a quavering breath, then resumed speaking. “We have come to ask Chief Silver Wing for assistance. He was a valued friend of my father's.” He swallowed hard. “And since I have become acquainted with him this past year, he is also a trusted friend of mine.”

“It is with much sorrow that I hear of your misfortunes,” Wise Owl said, taking Echohawk by the arm. “Come. You will ride with me. I will take you to Chief Silver Wing. He will be saddened also by the news you are bringing him. He held Chief Gray Elk in the highest regard.”

Echohawk shrugged himself away from Wise Owl's gentle grip. “I enter your village on foot with my people,” he said, lifting his chin proudly, even though sieges of light-headedness were throwing him off balance. He was not sure how much longer he could stay alert, much less continue walking.

But he must, he thought stubbornly.

For his people, he must!

“As you wish,” Wise Owl said, giving Helping Bear a troubled glance as Echohawk grabbed for Helping Bear to keep himself from tumbling to the ground.

After Wise Owl saw that Echohawk was going to be all right, with Yellow Wolf moving quickly to his other side to offer assistance, he mounted his horse again and rode ahead, escorting Echohawk and his people on toward the village.

As Echohawk entered the village, he felt the presence of many on all sides of him. He did not have to see to know that these were Chief Silver Wing's people coming to gaze and to ask questions about those who were arriving so downtrodden.

But if he
could
see, he knew that he would recognize many of these faces, having joined them in feasting and celebrating on various occasions this past year, his father so proudly sitting at Chief Silver Wing's right side.

But that was in the past, those good times of camaraderie with his beloved father. Now all that he had were memories—wondrous, precious memories.

It was hard for him to accept what his education had taught him—that death is but a change for the better, and that it is unworthy and womanish to shun it.

Oh, but if only his father had been able to shun death this time, as he had in the past.

When Chief Silver Wing's large domed conical lodge of bark and reed mats was reached, Helping Bear and Yellow Wolf stepped away from Echohawk. “We will return now to our journey to Fort Snelling,” Helping Bear said, placing a friendly hand on Echohawk's shoulder. “
Nee-gee
, friend, let hope fill your heart, not despair.”

Yellow Wolf took Helping Bear's place before Echohawk as Helping Bear stepped aside. He embraced Echohawk, then stepped back from him. “May the Great Spirit bless you with sight again soon, my brother,” he said, his voice choked with emotion.

“In time I
will
see again,” Echohawk said firmly. “Pity then those who have gone against my people.”

There were more fond embraces and words of thanks, and then Wise Owl escorted Echohawk, alone, inside Chief Silver Wing's dwelling.

Chief Silver Wing was sitting at the fire in the center of the room, carving a pipe stem. On Echohawk's entrance, he looked up, startled. “
Nee-gee
, friend, what has happened?” he said, stunned to see Echohawk's wound, and also his eyes, which seemed to be blank.

Wise Owl guided Echohawk over to Chief Silver Wing. Echohawk looked down at the chief, seeing only shadows of what he knew was a man of fifty-seven winters, a man of dignity and reserve, with graying hair and lined face.

“It was the
chee-mo-ko-man
, white men,” he said between gritted teeth. “They came and burned and killed. My father. He was one of those who is now entering the Land of the Hereafter.”

Chief Silver Wing shook his head with grave sorrow, then waved his wife over to Echohawk.

Nee-kah knew what he asked of her even though he had not voiced it aloud. She cast a glance of recognition on Echohawk and spread a robe for him to sit on. Wise Owl led him down onto the robe, and Nee-kah then removed Echohawk's moccasins and gave him another pair for present use.

She then went and stood obediently behind her husband, feeling Echohawk's pain as she gazed sadly down at him. He was a man much younger than her husband, and had she not already been wedded to Chief Silver Wing, she would have offered herself to Echohawk to be his wife. She had never seen such a handsome Chippewa as he.

As for her husband, she had been chosen by him, a much younger person than he, to bear him children that his other wives had failed to. She placed a hand on her abdomen, smiling, knowing that even now that child he wanted was growing within her womb.

She prayed that it would be a son. That would please her husband twofold!

“It is with a sorrowful heart that I have heard of the misfortune of your people and of your father's passing,” Chief Silver Wing said. “My village is now your village. Your people will live as one with my people until you see fit to leave.”

“That is kind,” Echohawk said, nodding. Then he spoke with more anguish. “Chief Silver Wing, my father is dead! My eyes are dry and I want something to make the tears come in them!”

“In time, my son, tears will come to you,” Chief Silver Wing said solemnly. “Then all of your sadness will be washed from your heart.” He leaned closer, studying Echohawk's eyes. He waved a hand before them, seeing only a slight sense of reflex on Echohawk's part. “You do not see. Why is that?”

“That is something I am living with,” Echohawk said in a grumble. “When I was wounded, my eyesight was impaired.”

Chief Silver Wing gazed at the head wound, then turned and looked up at his wife. “
Mah-szhon
, go. Take Echohawk to the wigwam that was yours before our marriage,” he said softly. “You will see to his comforts. Tend to his wound. Give him food. Until he is better, my wife, he is yours. Do you understand?”

Nee-kah's dark eyes widened as she glanced over at Echohawk, then down at her husband. “
Ay-uh
, I understand,” she murmured. “I will do this for you, my husband.”

Chief Silver Wing turned his attention back to Echohawk. “I lend you my wife for a while,” he said, smiling. “She is my fourth wife, but can cook better than all other three put together.” He took Nee-kah's hand and urged her to a kneeling position beside him. “And, Echohawk, finally I have a wife who is capable of bearing me a child. She is four months pregnant. She makes me proud. So very proud.”