“Yes, Matron!”
Wampa ran. First she assigned warriors to bring up the arrows, then she trotted to the portion of the catwalk overlooking the gates, where she leaned over and shouted to the men below, “Open the gates! But I want them closed the instant our last warrior is inside. After that, open them only on my order or the order of Matron Jigonsaseh!”
“Yes, War Chief!”
Along the eastern palisade wall of Yellowtail Village, people flooded, carrying armloads of belongings. More supported litters. The wounded and dying moaned each time one of the rushing litter-bearers stumbled.
Tutelo and her young daughters trotted beside the litter carrying her dead husband, Idos. He’d been washed and dressed in his finest war shirt, the one with blue beads down the sleeves. His eyes had sunken, his lips pulled back from his gums.
“Wampa?” she shouted. “Leave the dead outside along the walls. There’s no space for them inside!”
Wampa nodded and leaned over the palisade to relay the latest order.
Tutelo drew her daughters against her sides and watched as her beloved husband’s body was gently lowered onto the pile of dead stacked along the eastern wall.
Blessed Ancestors, there would be no time now to perform the proper rituals to send the dead on their journey to the Land of the Dead. Thousands of afterlife souls would be wandering around the village, crying out to their relatives.
Frightened voices erupted from the plaza. Jigonsaseh turned. A group of elders surrounded High Matron Kittle and the flurry of conversation was growing louder. Matron Daga shook a fist in Kittle’s face. Chief Yellowtail kept speaking to her in a tranquil voice, trying to calm her down.
Jigonsaseh’s thoughts began working out the permutations, trying to decipher her enemy’s strategy. Who was Atotarho’s new War Chief? Did she know him? What were his weaknesses? Not that such knowledge would give her much time. If the Hills army encircled Bur Oak Village and laid siege, eventually they would walk right through the front gates, kill all of the elders, and take the women and children hostage to serve as slaves. After that, they’d burn the villages so that anyone who escaped had nothing to return to.
Her duty was clear. She had to keep her people alive for as long as she could, and make certain that Atotarho knew the valor of the Standing Stone nation. If it took the last breath in her body, she would make sure his losses were staggering.
Jigonsaseh unslung her bow, pulled an arrow from her quiver, and nocked it. As she monitored her retreating lines, she prepared herself for the worst she could imagine.
Twelve
As twilight engulfed the valley, the falling snow resembled wavering sheets of gray silk blowing in the faint wind.
Jigonsaseh stood beside Sindak with her legs braced, staring out at the field of dead to the west. For more than two hands of time, Atotarho’s warriors had been stripping corpses, and mutilating the bodies.
“What’s he doing? Why hasn’t he attacked?”
Sindak wiped snow from the bridge of his hooked nose. “He knows feeding the army comes first. Men with empty bellies desert and flee. As to the mutilation, he’s feeding his warriors’ souls. Condemning your relatives to wander the earth forever will make Atotarho’s army feel better.”
Clan war cries erupted, and she saw several men start dancing, holding severed heads in their fists.
Sindak said, “I’ve tried to get a rough count, but people have been shifting around so much, I haven’t been able to. How many men, women, and children are in this village?”
“Too many,” she answered, seeing no reason to lie to him. “Around two thousand four hundred. Most are elderly or children.”
His gaze bored into hers. Snow had accumulated on his black hair. As though he’d just realized it, he brushed it off, and flipped up his hood. The edges of the tan leather caught the firelight and framed his narrow face with a flickering oval. “You’re in serious trouble, Matron.”
She laughed grimly and turned away.
Sindak asked, “Do you know why Atotarho allowed all of your warriors to return unharmed today? They were fleeing like rabbits. He could have dispatched a few hundred men to chase after them, and they would have killed many. But he didn’t. He let them return to the safety of the village.”
His features had set into hard unyielding lines. The lines of a War Chief ’s face, a man struggling to understand every possible nuance of his enemy’s actions.
While she stared into his eyes, blood surged so loudly in her ears it dimmed the noise in the plaza. “Blessed gods, I’ve been so occupied with the council and the village’s defense—”
“That you haven’t had time to think like Atotarho? Of course not. Besides, I know him better than you do, and I have had the time.”