As soon as they started to run, Jigonsaseh’s deep voice rang out and the gates of Bur Oak Village were flung open. A flood of warriors sprinted out, chasing after Negano’s forces with their bows singing.
He stumbled over his dead, dying, and wounded warriors as he dashed away from the shower of arrows. Something slammed into his quiver, the impact enough to send him staggering. In shock, his mind refused to believe the number of freshly killed men and women who lay sprawled across the frozen ground. Half? Maybe half the warriors who had followed him just moments ago? Gods, that couldn’t be right.
When he veered around the blazing curve of the Yellowtail palisades, out of the line of fire, he turned to look back. Counting … counting warriors. Maybe forty. Forty out of three hundred. No, no, there must be more. The thick smoke boiling out of Yellowtail probably concealed …
“Don’t stop! They’re still after us!” Nesi shouted. “Blessed gods, how many arrows did Bur Oak Village stockpile?”
Negano shouted back, “The only thing I care about is how many they still have!”
He spun to look through the wide-open gates of Yellowtail Village and into the inferno, and readied himself to lead his remaining warriors inside to get them out of the line of …
Nesi called, “Don’t do it, Negano!”
“Why not?” He swung around to glare at Nesi. “It’s safer inside than outside!”
“Look at it!” He flung out a muscular arm, pointing to the plaza roaring with flames. “You lead a team in there, and Deru will box the village up so that none of us gets out alive! We have to retreat and regroup!”
Negano didn’t even think, he just shouted, “Grab as many of the wounded as you can. Support them back to our camp!”
As warriors scurried to obey, dragging arms over shoulders, hauling another twenty or so men and women to their feet, the Bur Oak archers rounded the curve in the wall and starting letting fly again.
“Run! Hurry!”
All across the battlefield cries erupted, the wounded he’d left behind pleading for him to save them. The screams became more panicked when he charged in the opposite direction.
Twenty terrible heartbeats later, Jigonsaseh yelled another command, and the Bur Oak archers ceased pursuing them, and turned to silencing the cries of the wounded. One by one the begging voices were cut short in mid-scream.
Negano slowed to a trot and stared at the twenty or so shocked warriors who ran behind him, breathing hard. They appeared as dazed as men who’d been struck in the heads with war clubs. Nostrils flared. The sickly sweet scent of burning human flesh and scorched hair filled the night. None of them hauled wounded. Those who had tried must have lagged behind and been cut down. Gods, I should have never given that order.…
Negano rubbed his numb face, struggling to gain a hold on his senses as he led the way through the firelit darkness toward the creek. From his own camp, hundreds of warriors flocked down the hillside, men and women who’d finally understood what was happening and grabbed their weapons to come help.
“Go back!” he ordered. “There’s nothing more we can do tonight!”
Warriors stared wide-eyed as he tramped past. They gaped first at him, then at Yellowtail Village, then at the warriors who followed him as he splashed across the creek. Many called questions:
“What happened?”
“Night attack,” he answered. “The enemy set their own village on fire with our warriors inside.”
A man called, “Gods, who made it out alive? Where’s my brother?”
Someone else yelled, “Where’s my wife? She was assigned to guard the Yellowtail palisade!”
Negano felt physically ill. He should never have used Yellowtail …
“Stop it,” Nesi said as he trotted up beside him.
Negano turned. The square-jawed giant wore a threatening expression. His facial scars twitched.
“Stop what?”
“Stop second-guessing yourself. You did the right thing sending those warriors into Yellowtail Village.”
“But Nesi—”
“Listen to me!” He stabbed his war club at Negano’s chest. “Joondoh was in charge of the Yellowtail Village defense. He missed something. I don’t know what, but this would have never happened if he’d been paying attention. You know it as well as I.”
“Maybe, but—”
“It was Joondoh’s fault. Do you understand?” Nesi’s eyes glanced suggestively up the slope toward the crest of the ridge where Atotarho’s camp nestled.
The chief stood before his fire, propped on his walking stick. Silhouetted in front of the flames, his hunched form was black as coal. Because of the way the mist eddied and shifted, Atotarho appeared to be standing in the midst of the blaze with flames shooting up all around him. Even from here, Negano could sense the old man’s rage: it shivered the air.