Daughter of the Eagle Page 11

  He arranged his position so he could watch the distant prairie. If he had planned correctly, today would be the time. And his plan was working well.

  Black Fox had been preoccupied all summer with thoughts of the warrior woman. Crazy though she might be, she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.

  He devised and then rejected several plans to capture her. None were quite satisfactory, or they involved too much risk, or they would reveal too much about his own feelings for this woman of the enemy.

  He had decided that it must be a capture. Never had he wanted to possess a woman as much as he did this one. To kill her would be a waste. He could take her to his lodge, and if she became a docile wife, so be it. If not, if it appeared dangerous to keep her alive, she could easily be killed at any time.

  Meanwhile the warrior woman was dangerous to his tribe. Every few sleeps, it seemed, there was news of another raid by Crazy Woman. She struck mostly at night, it was said, when the danger to the spirit of a dying warrior was at its greatest. An arrow precisely aimed at a sentry, a few horses stolen, harassment at every turn.

  And always the stories were the same. There were but two attackers, Crazy Woman and her ever-present companion, the tall warrior. Black Fox wondered about the relationship of these two. Was this the girl’s husband?

  It was no matter, Black Fox decided. After he captured the girl, she would become his wife. The other man, whatever his status, could be disposed of in any one of a number of ways. It might be interesting to keep the man alive for a while, to try to see what attracted his beautiful companion.

  But for now, any plan to capture the two was unquestionably dangerous. Black Fox had seen these two in action and respected their skill with weapons. In addition, the woman apparently had no fear. That alone would make her unpredictable and dangerous.

  Finally Black Fox began to develop a plan. The more he considered, the more it seemed workable. If it were successful, it would serve several desirable purposes. It would rid the plains of the dangerous pair, and the hunters could again search for buffalo in safety.

  Success would bring him fame and prestige as a rising young subchief. The impact of this prestige could not be overlooked as it related to his political career.

  Most important of all, however, was the motive he would share with no one. Black Fox admitted only to himself the driving force behind his need to resolve the matter of Crazy Woman. It was the all-absorbing need to possess this girl. He thought again and again of the brief time he had seen her. He could picture in his mind’s eye her spectacular charge, the supple curves of her body as she fought, and her graceful balance on the horse. The burning message of hate as their eyes met for a moment had only served to fix his attention further. Black Fox admired a horse or a woman with spirit. It became only a greater challenge to find a way to break that spirit.

  His immediate plan for the defeat and capture of Crazy Woman was based around one single fact. It had become more apparent as time passed that her entire motive was vengeance. Revenge for the loss of a brother, it was said.

  Now, reasoned Black Fox, if her thoughts revolved around revenge, let it be used against her. If some incident could be created that Crazy Woman would see as a personal affront, it might affect her judgment.

  It must be a bold attack against her tribe. Not against her own band, Black Fox thought, but one of the others. That would draw her out, make her fight in unfamiliar territory. After long thought, he had decided on the Northern band.

  It was no problem to recruit young men for a prolonged war party into enemy territory. His main difficulty was to select only the best and most reliable warriors. In a short while Black Fox had assembled a group of his tribe’s finest, ready to follow this popular leader.

  Now it became a matter of quietly observing the Northern band while Black Fox and his followers familiarized themselves with the features of the terrain. One of the critical elements of the plan was that the presence of an invading war party not be suspected until the proper moment.

  Eventually that moment had come. When a large number of the men of the Northern band had gone on a hunt, Black Fox and his raiders swooped down on the village. Even so, it was difficult for a time. The few warriors left in camp defended fiercely, and the attackers had been hurt.

  They had carried off two boys, carefully instructed them by means of sign language, and released them to tell the purpose of the raid. Then the raiding party had openly headed southwest toward its own territory. As Black Fox had expected, a messenger soon set forth to the south. All members of the war party had been cautioned not to stop him, not to even show themselves.

  The messenger took exactly the route expected. Straight to the south, following a buffalo trail as old as the earth itself, the messenger rode. The plan was working well. Black Fox and all his raiders followed, well behind, still taking care not to be seen.

  He had already selected the spot for the ambush. A cleft in a range of the rolling hills narrowed the buffalo trail, as a stream narrows through the rocks. At this point Crazy Woman would have no room to maneuver, to use her skill with the horse. Warriors would strike from hiding, and their quarry could be taken quickly.

  Black Fox stirred from his pleasant reverie as he saw an approaching rider hurrying from the south. Impatiently he rose and waited while the scout crossed the valley. At times horse and rider were lost from sight in the tall, waving expanse of real-grass. Finally the scout ascended the ridge and stood before him.

  “They come! There are about thirty. They will be here,” he paused to point upward, “when the sun is there.”

  Thirty. More than he had expected. But no matter. They would be forced to spread out in a long line, to make their way through the pass. The warriors of Black Fox could strike the unsuspecting party in the middle, cut them in two, and separate them from their leaders.

  “It is good,” he told the scout. “Come.”

  The two made their way back to where the rest of the war party waited in concealment. Young men rose to their feet, picking up their weapons in eagerness.

  “They come,” announced Black Fox. “There are thirty, so we must do well.”

  A murmur rippled around the group, but Black Fox signaled for silence again.

  “Let the leaders come well through the pass before we show ourselves. They will not expect us to be in this area. We are only one sleep from their own camp.”

  Black Fox paused a moment, then added a last reminder. “Remember, the Crazy Woman and her man are not to be harmed. Shoot their horses if necessary, but I want those two alive!”

  27

  Running Eagle had a bad feeling as they approached the narrow cleft in the hills. She wished that Owl had been able to give them a better prediction. Apparently the medicine man had not been able to see a clear vision for the journey.

  “Only be very careful, Running Eagle. This is a dangerous mission,” Owl had said.

  She had nodded and moved on to other things in preparation for leaving, but now his remarks took on new importance.

  It could be seen that this was dangerous country. The broken slopes, the vast expanses of real-grass, and the thick, nodding meadows of plume grass furnished endless places of concealment for warriors. At this time of the season, both of these grasses grew taller than a man’s head. To remain still almost anywhere was to be hidden.

  It was good, she reflected, that the Head Splitters were not in this immediate area. The range of hills ahead would afford an ideal ambush. But, following the raid, the attackers had been observed to ride rapidly southwest. An effort, no doubt, to escape the certain retaliation of the People. It would be necessary to track the retreating enemy and overtake them.

  But for now, the enemy was far away. It would be perhaps two more sleeps before they located the trail. And that was good. The exuberant young men were somewhat better behaved today, due to the efforts of Flying Squirrel and the others.

  Still, Running Eagle had misgivings. She would have m
uch preferred to travel alone with Long Walker, harassing the enemy and striking the sentries by night. Again she felt the frustration of having been forced against her will into a pattern of events which she could not control. She did not like the way the pattern was developing. Ahead seemed ever more of the wrong direction, and she was powerless to stop it. She wished to break free of the relentlessly threatening series of events, to shout stop, and to ride away in carefree companionship with Long Walker.

  She had reveled in their friendship, their time together, but not enough, she now realized. She should have treasured it so highly that she could never have let it go, no matter what the cost.

  Now she sometimes thought of herself as a person in a tale of long ago, retold around the story fires. The outcome was already certain, and there was no way to change it. She was living out the story as it unfolded but still had no knowledge of its outcome. She wondered if Long Walker felt this frustration as she did. She thought so.

  “Walker,” she spoke casually, avoiding her real concern, “will these men be ready when we fight?”

  “I think so. They are new at battle but they are brave.” He was quiet a moment and then spoke again.

  “Just now I am thinking about the ridge ahead.”

  “You, too? Why?”

  “It is a perfect place for ambush.”

  The girl nodded. “True. But the Head Splitters are far away to the west.”

  “But if they were not, Running Eagle?”

  She nodded again. “It would be the place.”

  She halted and raised her hand. “We go through the pass with care. Stay close together. Walker and I go first. Watch the hillside.”

  Briskly the two rode forward to pass the danger area rapidly. There was nothing. Not a seed stalk moved among the tall grasses, and there was complete silence.

  Running Eagle was well past the danger spot before she realized that the silence was wrong. There should have been the sounds of the prairie everywhere. The song of a meadowlark, the scream of a hawk overhead, the rustle of a deer feeding on the hillside, perhaps.

  She drew rein and signaled Long Walker to silence. “Walker! It is too quiet”

  At that moment came a muffled sound from behind the shoulder of the hill. It was an odd, unnatural sound, and it could have resulted from only one source. It was a partly choked snort, the sound a horse can still make when its muzzle has been tied with a thong to prevent its calling out.

  Running Eagle turned to shout the warning, but she was too late. With the terrifying falsetto war cry of the Head Splitters, warriors rose from hiding all along the sides of the pass, from behind every rock, from the ground itself, it seemed. They fought on foot, ducking and dodging among the horses.

  “Straight ahead!” the girl shouted. “The stream.”

  She jammed heels into the ribs of the startled Owl Dung, and he sprang into a dead run. The scattered timber ahead would allow them to organize a stand for defense.

  There were pounding hooves behind her, and she risked a glance. Two of her young warriors followed closely, but there was no sign of Long Walker.

  Without a moment’s thought, the girl pulled the gelding to a sliding stop, pivoted, and charged back toward the pass. There was a moment to assess the situation while she raced back. Her party had been cut in two, with several dead or injured lying in the mouth of the pass. The fight still raged beyond, but she could see nothing.

  Long Walker’s horse was down, and he was scrambling free to stand ready to fight. Except for the two now riding with her, no others had come through the pass alive.

  “Walker!” she yelled, not knowing whether he heard or not.

  Enemy warriors were running toward him as she thundered toward the spot. The horse made a quick, catlike turn around the lone figure, and as the animal dropped his hips to pivot, Long Walker swung up behind the girl.

  One of the young men with Running Eagle gave a triumphant yell and an obscene gesture as he turned. He was met by a shower of arrows and dropped from the saddle like a stone. The horse ran loose, confused, reins trailing. There was no time to catch the animal for Long Walker.

  Another flight of arrows whistled past, and Owl Dung screamed with pain and rage and ran faster. They had reached the trees before mounted enemy warriors began to stream across the meadow in pursuit.

  Escape now appeared impossible. The three fugitives could in no way defend themselves against the entire war party of Head Splitters. But they could not run with one horse forced to carry double.

  There was a low cough at her elbow, and Running Eagle glanced aside. The young warrior who had stayed by her side was breathing heavily, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. The feathered end of an arrow shaft protruded from near the center of his chest. His eyes were glazing as Long Walker sprang to help him from his horse.

  By the time Walker had deposited the dying youth as gently as possible on the grass, his breath was coming in bubbling, irregular gasps. Running Eagle caught the rein of the horse. The young warrior would have no further use for it now. She handed the rein to Long Walker, and the two stepped into the partial shelter of the streambed, leading the horses. One last chance had opened to them. With two horses they would have at least a chance to evade the enemy pursuit.

  If only the enemy would delay a charge at the strip of woods for a short while, they might have a chance to escape down the streambed.

  Running Eagle thought sadly of the youth who had provided their chance at escape, however slim. He had done so at the cost of his own life.

  She was embarrassed and depressed that she could not even remember the young man’s name.

  28

  The two fugitives huddled together in the twilight, waiting for full darkness to come. There was little chance of the enemy’s risking a fight in the darkness. They would use the hours of darkness to travel.

  There was no doubt that they would be followed, and among the Head Splitters were excellent trackers. The goal would be to put enough distance between themselves and the trackers to make their escape.

  Running Eagle and Long Walker had left the stream the moment that the shouts behind indicated the discovery of the disappearance. They rode as rapidly as possible for a time, finally pausing in a rough and rocky canyon to hide and rest. They concealed the horses in a brushy draw, then hid themselves in another, where the tall plume grass offered concealment. Owl Dung’s wound proved to be a minor one—a long gash across the rump, probably made by a sharp flint arrowhead.

  Evening was near, and they had only to hide until dark, when the Head Splitters would stop the search until morning. Three times they had heard the sounds of searching warriors. Each time they huddled against the stone wall of the canyon while the rider searched on the rim above them, looking down into their hiding place. Only the slight overhang of the ledge kept them from sight of the searchers. Several times shouts in the distance caused momentary uneasiness.

  During the intervals between threatened discovery, they talked quietly or watched the day lengthen toward night. Both were more optimistic now; time was on their side. As if in good omen, a large flock of honking geese moved high over their hiding place in a long line. The birds were migrating, heading due south for the coming winter. The fugitives watched and listened in silence, until the birds were long out of sight and only the faint resonance of their cries was heard.

  Just before dark a thin cloud bank moved across the prairie, and a scatter of light rain began to fall.

  “It is good,” observed Walker. “It will help to cover our trail.”

  Good though it might be, the cold rain chilled to the bone. The two huddled together for warmth, only partially sheltered by the overhanging rock.

  “We could build a fire,” Long Walker joked.

  Both chuckled. Then their eyes met in amazement.

  “We could, Walker! Light it just before we leave. It would be morning before they discover it was a trick.”

  Both moved quietly to collect fu
el in the gathering darkness. They laid out a long and narrow pile of wood along the base of the rock. At one end a pack rat’s nest of dry twigs would make a hot, smokeless blaze. After burning for some time, the flames would encounter larger, greener fuel to produce a big smoky fire. The Head Splitters would suspect a trick, of course, but it would take time to prove it. Meanwhile the fugitives would be on their way. They settled back down to wait. Darkness came slowly under the cloud cover, the light robe of Rain Maker.

  “Walker, I have wondered. Why do you think this has happened?”

  “Why has what happened?”

  “That we are alive. They could have killed us both, easily. Those beside us were killed.”

  Long Walker had wondered this, also. After his horse was struck there was a time when he lay there helpless, a leg pinned under the dying stallion. It should have been easy to kill him then, either by arrows or with the deadly stone clubs. Yet he had been spared. He shook his head.

  “I do not know. But do you remember the young chief who rode away, after the fight on your first war party? I saw him today.”

  “Young chief? The handsome one?”

  Long Walker gave her a quick, resentful look “I do not know of that, Eagle, but he is the same one.”

  “But who is he? What does he want?”

  Running Eagle had some idea, already. She remembered the last, intense look as Black Fox rode away, the look of a man who wishes to kill but is prevented. Yet there was something else. There had been, intermingled, the admiring look of a man who covets a woman.

  Even at the time, in the heat of the fight, there had been the momentary recognition, a feel of excitement mixed with revulsion. She had thought of it since, from time to time.

  “I can only think,” Long Walker was answering, “that he wants us alive for some purpose.”

  The two looked at each other in partial understanding that made their bewilderment even more frustrating. Neither voiced the gnawing suspicions, ones they were scarcely able to admit to themselves.

  Both were thinking, of course, of the long-recognized desire of the enemy for girls of the People. “Our women are prettier than theirs” was not an idle saying. Raiders from the Head Splitters liked to carry off girls and young women whenever possible. Women of the People were traditionally tall, long-legged, and willowy in build, with facial features of outstanding beauty.