The Dawn Country(100)

A flush of revelation sent heat surging through Koracoo. “This journey had nothing to do with rescuing his children, did it?”

Towa gestured weakly. “The only thing I can say for certain is that the story convinced you to help him. You’d have never helped him if it hadn’t been for Zateri, would you?”

She laughed softly. “No.” It didn’t matter now. She had more important things to worry about. “Did Gannajero tell you where she’d hidden Odion and the other children?”

“Somewhere in the forest, that’s all I know, but they can’t be far away.”

Koracoo closed her extended hands to fists. “What are your plans, Towa? You going to kill me to keep me from killing her … even knowing she’s destined to die shortly after you get her home?”

He braced his legs. In an agonized voice, he replied, “From the first instant that Chief Atotarho pulled me into his longhouse and gave me these orders, I’ve been sick to my stomach. I hate this, Koracoo. But please don’t force me to make that choice. I can’t—”

“No, you can’t, good friend,” Sindak called from the darkness. “I won’t let you do something you’ll regret for the rest of your very short life.”

Towa spun to look at Sindak. Though Koracoo couldn’t see him, apparently Towa could. He stared directly into the darkness near the tangled wall of deadfall and said, “What do you mean ‘very short life’?”

“I mean, if you make any move to kill Koracoo, I’ll have to kill you. And doing so will destroy my life, Towa. I love you like a brother.”

“Sindak, what am I supposed to do? Disobey the orders of our chief? How can I ever go home and face my family—?”

“Atotarho isn’t worthy of your loyalty. Don’t you know that by now? All of this has been an exquisitely well-planned ruse to elevate his status. It wouldn’t surprise me if Akio was an unwitting part of it, just like we were.”

Towa’s head cocked. “Are you saying he wasn’t a traitor?”

“Of course he wasn’t. Zateri was the bait to draw Gannajero in. If the chief had called Akio into his longhouse and given him special secret orders to make sure his daughter was captured, Akio would have been just as goggle-eyed with loyalty as you are tonight.”

“You mean … that’s why the chief went out on that Trading mission? It was the setup to make sure his daughter was captured?”

“Makes sense, doesn’t it? You always wondered why he picked the two worst warriors in the village—you and me—to undertake the mission of rescuing his beloved daughter. The only thing that makes it worse is that he actually picked the three worst warriors: you, me, and Akio. He must have thought we were idiots. Of course we’ve proven that, haven’t we? Especially you.”

As Towa’s aim began to quake and dip toward the ground, Koracoo said, “Towa, we need to know where Odion and the other children are. Where did you stash the old woman? We have to ask her.”

Sindak called, “Stop being an idiot. Tell her, Towa.”

Towa let out a shaky breath and closed his eyes. He gestured to the right with his bow. “She’s over there, hidden in that copse of dogwoods.”

Koracoo’s eyes narrowed. The copse was only twenty paces away, close enough that the old woman could have heard every word they’d—

Koracoo grabbed CorpseEye and lunged for the dogwoods, running with the club out in front of her to help her keep her balance in the slick snow. When she veered around the dogwoods, she saw the place the old woman had stood, listening and watching. The snow had been tamped down from constantly shifting feet.

Koracoo shouted, “She’s gone!”





Forty-six

As Gannajero waded through the snow, headed south to where they’d stowed their canoes on the riverbank, she burned with rage. Most, maybe all, of her men were dead. She could always hire more—that wasn’t the problem. In the past twenty summers, she’d hidden stashes of wealth in ten different places—enough to pay an army if necessary. One of her stashes was less than two days north of here. In four or five days, she’d be back to Trading as vigorously as before. But she had to make it to a canoe before dawn. Her trail through the ankle-deep snow was impossible to hide. The instant War Chief Koracoo had enough light to track, she would come, hunting like a starving wolf following a hapless rabbit.

Gannajero grasped the upthrust branch of a fallen maple and studied the moonlit forest. The gleaming silver patina that covered the trees seemed dull in contrast to the brilliant snow. Ahead, a small clearing created an irregular oval on the low hillside. A deer trail threaded across the snow and through a thicket of brush, then wound through the middle of the clearing. She stepped onto the deer trail and plodded forward. If she were lucky, several deer would run this trail throughout the night, obliterating her tracks. But that would only slow Koracoo down.