The Outcast

Chapter Thirteen

A small herd of mountain buffalo called King Valley home. Shaggier than their flatland cousins, they stayed deep in the woods most of each day, coming out at dawn and late afternoon to drink and graze. They posed no threat so long as they were not disturbed. Many a time Shakespeare had watched them from his window and been reminded of the days when he hunted their cousins with his Indian friends. He didn’t hunt these. Nate had suggested they leave the herd be. As Nate put it, “We’ll hunt them only if we’re starving. That way, we’ll always have a pantry on the hoof we can fall back on.”

Shakespeare got a chuckle out of pantry on the hoof.

But now, with his wife helpless on the travois, Shakespeare worried their decision would cost him dearly.

The bull snorted and shook its shaggy head, its horns glinting in the sunlight.

Blue Water Woman heard the snort and craned her neck to see over the top of the travois. A tongue of fear licked at her and she swallowed it down. As she always did in a crisis, she willed herself to stay calm, to focus and not give sway to fright. “Husband?” she said softly.

Shakespeare didn’t take his eyes off the buffalo. He was holding his Hawken across his legs, but he made no attempt to raise it. “Not now, chipmunk. We have a problem.”

“I see him. You should cut the travois loose and ride off before he charges.”

Shakespeare almost gave a snort of his own. “And abandon you? That’s the silliest thing you’ve ever said in all the years I’ve known you.”

The bull stamped and tossed its head and came several steps nearer. Over six feet high at the shoulders, with a bulging hump and broad head, it was a living, breathing monster.

Shakespeare fingered his rifle. It would take a lucky shot to bring the brute down. It must weigh between fifteen hundred and two thousand pounds, a lot of it muscle.

Blue Water Woman rose on an elbow. The bull looked at her and rumbled in its chest.

“For God’s sake, don’t move,” Shakespeare cautioned. “If it charges I might not be able to protect you.”

“If it charges I want you to save yourself.”

Shakespeare did what he had just told her not to do; he moved. Turning in the saddle, he declared, “I can hardly forbear hurling things at you.”

“I cannot help it if I love you and do not want you hurt.”

“Grant me the same courtesy.” Shakespeare had never told her, but he secretly hoped he died before she did. He would be so lonely without her, he didn’t know if he would want to go on living.

Blue Water Woman was watching the buffalo. She was taken aback when other dark shapes appeared. Six, seven, eight, she counted, all as shaggy but none as big as the huge bull. “Carcajou!”

Shakespeare’s pulse quickened. One buffalo was bad enough. Nine was a nightmare. All those horns, on creatures as unpredictable as the weather. He eased the Hawken from his lap. He couldn’t get all of them, but he would bring the big bull down.

“Do not shoot,” Blue Water Woman cautioned. She worried that he might drop the bull in the hope the rest would run off.

“What do you take me for?” Shakespeare wedged the hardwood stock to his shoulder and took aim.

“What are you doing then?”

“Just in case.” Shakespeare intended to fire and throw himself in front of the travois, if it came to that.

“You are not to shoot no matter what,” Blue Water Woman insisted. She was all too aware of how stubborn he could be once he set his mind to something.

“That will be for me to decide.”

A cow started toward them, but stopped at a bellow from the bull.

“That was nice of him,” Blue Water Woman said. Her gratitude was short-lived.

Head bobbing, blowing noisily, its hooves ringing on rocks, the big bull advanced.

Shakespeare took a bead on the buffalo’s right eye. The skull was so thick that a brain shot rarely penetrated, and facing it head-on, he didn’t have a lung shot. His best bet was the eye, but with the head bobbing as it was, it was like hitting a bobbing dark pea.

Blue Water Woman gripped the travois. She had seen for herself how savage buffalo could be when they were provoked. Once, after a surround, she had gone with the other women to skin and carve the many buffalo the warriors killed. She had been slicing a belly open when she heard cries and shouts. A bull everyone thought was dead wasn’t. It had regained its feet, and before any of the warriors could loose more shafts, it had been among them, ramming with its broad forehead and ripping with its great horns. Four horses had gone down, one with its insides spilling out. A warrior had rode up and buried a lance in the buffalo’s side, and the buffalo whirled and gored his horse. As the horse fell, the man was pitched onto an upcurved horn. For as long as she lived, Blue Water Woman would never forget his death shriek.

Shakespeare’s impulse was to fire before the bull reached them. His finger curled around the trigger.

“Please, Carcajou.”

Against his better judgment, Shakespeare took his cheek from the Hawken. His nerves jangled as the bull came ever closer. The mare nickered and tried to shy but couldn’t because of the travois. “There, there,” he said quietly, and stroked the mare’s neck.

Blue Water Woman held her breath.

A swarm of flies buzzing around it, the big bull reached the mare. It looked at her, grunted, and walked on by.

Now it was beside the travois. Blue Water Woman could have reached out and touched it. She saw its nostrils flare, and suddenly it stopped. The great head swung toward her. For a few heartbeats she feared the worst. The bull sniffed the buffalo robe she was bundled in, then nuzzled it and rubbed against the travois so hard that the entire travois shook and threatened to shatter.

Shakespeare put his cheek to the rifle.

The bull ambled on. After it came the bull’s harem, none of them so much as giving the mare or the travois a glance. They crossed to the lake and dipped their muzzles to drink.

“I’ll be switched,” Shakespeare said in relief, and gigged the mare to get out of there.

Blue Water Woman sank onto her back. Tension drained like water from a sieve. “Are you glad you listened to me?”

“I always listen to you, heart of my heart.”

“Oh my,” Blue Water Woman said.

“What?”

“All this time I thought you were deaf.”

A ringing in Zach’s ears was his first sensation. He clawed up out of a dark well and floated in a pool of pain. Where he was and why he was in pain eluded him until he tried to move and discovered his arms and legs were pinned. Then it all came back in a rush: the talus, Lou, the Blood warrior, everything. He opened his eyes and brown specks fell into them, making them water. Blinking, he raised his head. He was on his back. Dirt and rocks formed a cocoon around him. Only his face was exposed.

That he was alive was a quirk of fate. If he had wound up facedown, he’d have suffocated. He thought of Lou—and sought to break free. Dust got into his nose, making him cough. He cut his fingers, but he didn’t care. After hard effort he was able to sit up. He looked around. The talus had swept him into the pines.

A lot of tugging and digging freed his legs. He slowly rose, half dreading a leg was broken. He was bruised and sore but otherwise fine

His rifle was missing. He’d also lost one of his pistols. A glint of metal drew him to the Hawken’s barrel, which poked from a bush. He picked it up and was relieved to find it undamaged except for scrapes and nicks. He looked around again but did not see the pistol.

Zach moved out of the pines. The talus slope was much as it had been. He scoured it from bottom to top, but there was no sign of Louisa. He cupped his mouth to shout her name and hesitated. If the Blood was alive, the warrior would hear and come after him. Zach shouted anyway.

The silence was a stab to his gut.

Zach moved along the edge of the talus, seeking some sign. A whinny brought more relief as the bay came out of the trees. It was covered with dust and the parfleche he had tied on was missing, but otherwise the horse was unhurt. He climbed on and called Lou’s name again.

Worry clawed his insides. He imagined her buried alive. It would be an awful way to go. He debated whether to scale the slope on foot and search every square inch. Instead he swung wide and rode to the top. Dismounting, he checked for sign. In the dirt were tracks—a lot of tracks. They told a story that sent a thrill of joy and then a chill of horror down his spine.

Lou was alive! But other warriors had her. Her footprints led to where a horse had been tied. From there, hoofprints led up the mountain, with the tracks of warriors on either side.

Zach knew of the tribe on the other side of the divide; he had fought and killed one of its warriors. His pa and Shakespeare had used a keg of black powder to blow the pass—the only way over, they thought. Apparently there was another, and a war party had come into the valley. Those warriors now had Lou and were taking her back to their village.

That was how Zach read the sign. Lou faced a worse end than if she had been entombed in the talus.

Zach swallowed and gigged the bay. He figured they weren’t far ahead, no more than an hour, but they would move fast and it would take some doing to overtake them before they got over the range.

A grim fury seized him. All Zach wanted was to live in peace with his wife and the others. All he asked was to be left alone by the outside world. His days of living to count coup were over. But enemies kept putting them in peril. Danger kept rearing its unwanted head. Life was a constant struggle for survival, and he was tired of it.

The idea surprised him. He had never thought like this before. And now was hardly the time to start.

The Heart Eaters had his wife.

So be it.

He would have to save her and take their lives, or perish in the attempt.

From the woods below the talus, the Outcast watched the breed head up the mountain. Limping into the open, he started after him. His left knee throbbed and his head pounded. He’d lost his bow and his quiver, but he still had his knife and tomahawk. They would have to do.

The Outcast had not lost consciousness. For a while he had lain in a daze but finally he recovered enough to stand on wobbly legs. He almost gave himself away when he had moved through the trees, but fortunately he saw the seven warriors before they saw him.

They were strange, these warriors. The Outcast had never beheld their like. Their scarred faces were hideous. He imagined they did it to strike fear into their enemies, but he could have been wrong. He saw them uncover the white woman, saw their hand talk although they were too far away for him to tell what they were signing. Then the warrior had made the woman climb onto his pinto and they went off up the mountain.

The Outcast had two reasons to go after them—they had taken his horse and his captive. A third reason gnawed at him like a beaver at a tree, but he refused to let it take root. He cared for no one but himself. He had lost all feelings for others the day she died.

Or, rather, the day he killed her and their baby.

He relived it in his mind, that terrible event, seared into his memory forever. The day he came back to his lodge to find Mad Wolf there. She had the baby to her bosom and was pleading with Mad Wolf to leave.

For half a dozen moons Mad Wolf tried to win her away. Mad Wolf had more horses and his father was high in the council, and he thought he had the right to any woman he wanted. Mad Wolf wanted Yellow Fox. Mad Wolf didn’t care that she was spoken for. Mad Wolf didn’t care that she had told him over and over that she would never come to live with him.

Mad Wolf kept after her. One fateful day he had dared to enter their lodge and press his suit.

The Outcast had never been so mad. Even now, it made his blood grow hot in his veins. They had heated words, Mad Wolf and he. One angry word led to another, and Mad Wolf reached for his knife.

Without thinking, the Outcast reacted. He drove his lance into Mad Wolf’s body with all the strength in his sinews.

The Outcast hadn’t realized that Yellow Fox had come up behind Mad Wolf. He hadn’t realized his lance went all the way through Mad Wolf and through the baby and into her until she cried out.

It wasn’t one body that fell.

It was three.

It was the day the Outcast died inside. When the elders called him before them, he listened with an empty heart. No Kainai had ever done such a thing. Kainai were never to kill Kainai. To kill a woman and an infant—it was unthinkable. It was bad medicine. With deep regret the council acted for the good of all.

They banished him.

No one came to see him off the day he rode from the village. Those he passed turned their backs to him.

The Outcast wandered. An empty vessel that refused to be filled, he traveled where whim took him. In his sorrow and grief he thought he would never feel again.

He hadn’t, until now.

In grim anger, the Outcast started after the scarred warriors.

They had taken his horse and his captive.

He would have their lives—or they would have his.