Forty-seven
A fire crackled. Yellow light illuminated the camp the warriors had chosen. Thick scrub oak, sumac, and wild rose was interlaced with nightshade vines, the latter rich in black berries. Overhead, smoke from the distant fire damped most of the stars. From this ridge, distant flames could be seen as they sparkled on the high-country slopes.
Crow Woman swallowed hard and fought the urge to tremble. They had tied her feet, waist, hands, and neck to a slim pine pole. She couldn’t bend without tightening the thong at her neck. She could barely shift her feet and wiggle her arms. Trussed like a hunter’s carcass she could only stand, her back to a sandstone boulder, and hope she didn’t fall over.
The four warriors watched her from the fire, eyes like ferrets’ in the hot yellow light. They were muscular men, wearing new war shirts. One, a narrow-framed man, kept giving her an oily smile. After they had stopped for the night, he had donned a pair of spotless white moccasins. Something about him, the way he looked at her, scared the breath right out of her.
She had watched as they fixed a stew of corn, yampa root, chokecherries, and goosefoot seeds. Two had emptied their canteens into a small corrugated pot after the ingredients had been added. They had watched her in silence while it boiled. One by one they dipped from the steaming pot using spoons crafted from mountain sheep bones.
Silence. They just ate, savoring each bite, their eyes fixed on her. She wanted to squirm, to hiss and spit, to curse their mothers as camp bitches, but fear had a stranglehold on her voice.
It would have been so much better if they’d cursed, leered, tormented, and threatened. They just watched, jaws chewing, eyes eating into her courage.
Silence. It left her trembling. She couldn’t stop the sudden shiver that racked her. It was as if they weren’t men, but some kind of feral predators, wolves gone into men’s bodies. Or worse, mute evil that watched from those gleaming eyes.
The narrow-framed man scraped the bottom of the jar, tilted it, and scooped the last of the stew. He lifted the polished bone spoon, letting it slip past his lips as he sucked the last of the liquid from the hollow.
In silence they replaced their spoons in their packs, retied their canteens, and wiped out the stew bowl with grass before packing it away.
Why don’t they speak? She swallowed hard to keep her breath from catching in her throat. Her mouth had gone dry, her knees weak.
They stood, stepping around the fire, each inspecting her with eager stares. The narrow-framed man was smiling. Not a leer, just a lilt to the lips. A hint of expectation in his expression. He knew how terrified she was.
“What do you want from me?” Her voice came out as a croak.
They might not have heard.
The narrow-framed man raised his hand, and she was surprised to see a long, hafted obsidian blade. She winced, almost toppled, and caught herself as he slipped the sharp blade across the skin of her cheek. He didn’t press hard enough to cut, just to tickle.
“Get it over with, maggot!” she cried. “Kill me, and have done with it!”
Silence, but the men smiled, two showing missing teeth. Another laughed with silent mirth.
The only sound was the crackling of the fire.
“If you want me, take me,” she said between pants of fear.
The narrow-framed man leaned close. She could smell his sweat, the smoky tinge to his hair. His breath carried the faint scent of stew. Lips to her ear, he whispered, “Where’s Ironwood?”
She jerked back, teetering, falling. But one of the men caught her, holding the pole she was bound to upright.
“I—I don’t know.” Her voice was catching. They could see her shivering now. Blood and spit, if they’d only beat her, give her the pain to cling to! Anything but this slow silent promise. She leaned her head back, throat straining at the thong, and screamed her terror into the smoky night.
It echoed in the quiet air.
With slow deliberation the narrow-framed man inserted his obsidian blade beneath the neck of her war shirt and carefully severed the fabric. He worked his way out, over her shoulder, and down her arm until the cloth fell away, exposing her arm and right breast.
“What are you going to do?”
“Shhh!” He placed a finger to his lips, leaning forward to add in a whisper, “We follow Leather Hand. He has sent us to find Ironwood.”
“I don’t know where he is!” she insisted doggedly.
“Oh, yes,” he whispered. “You do. But we have time.”
She had trouble taking a full breath. “I said, if you are going to take me, get it over with. Come on. Untie me. You’re men, aren’t you? Your staffs aren’t made of wet clay, are they?”