Wilderness Double Edition 11 Page 8

  Four long strides brought Winona to the pines along the north edge of the clearing. As the night closed around her, a series of piercing yips roused the slavers. Their jumbled voices rose into enraged bellows, and the noisiest of them all was Ricket. His next words were as clear as could be.

  “After her, Chipota! Fetch her back, you hear! I want that bitch!”

  Winona was going as fast as she could. She regretted that the Lipan had showed up before she could reach the horses and untie the mare. It would take her a week or more to reach the Shoshone village on foot, provided that she eluded the slavers.

  The darkness worked in Winona’s favor. It not only hid her, it hid her footprints. The Lipan would not be able to track her. But that did not mean that escaping would be easy. The warrior s senses were bound to be as sharp as a cougars. Giving him the slip would tax her skill to the utmost.

  Suddenly halting, Winona crouched and listened. To her rear rose the patter of moccasins, a patter that died just seconds after she stopped. She held her breath, knowing that the Lipan was no more than thirty feet away and waiting for her to make a sound, any sound.

  Back in the clearing, Ricket was cursing a blue streak. He called Owens every foul name Winona had ever heard white men use, and many she did not know besides. His tantrum was to her benefit. So long as he kept ranting and raving, the Lipan would not be able to hear much. Certainly not the whisper of movement as she lowered herself to the ground and snaked through the undergrowth.

  Ricket didn’t seem to know when to shut up. Winona smiled at the man’s stupidity. She covered a score of yards, then rose and continued on foot, confident that for the moment she had given the warrior the slip. After traveling another twenty yards, she broke into a run.

  Soon the swearing faded away. All Winona heard now were typical night sounds; the rustling of trees by the wind, the cries of animals, both hunters and hunted, and the rasp of her own breath in her lungs. She came to a hill and bore to the right rather than slow herself down by going up and over.

  Winona settled into a steady rhythm. Her sole hope lay in putting a lot of distance behind her before dawn. Once the sun rose, the Lipan would be on her trail like a wolf on the scent of a fleeing doe. She hoped that she would stumble on a stream long before then. Not even an Apache could track someone through running water.

  As time went by and there was no evidence of pursuit, Winona felt the tension drain from her body. She also felt fingers of fatigue pluck at her mind. The blow to her head was having lingering effects. Every now and then a woozy sensation made her want to stop and rest, but she refused to give in to weakness. Not when her life hung in the balance.

  All went well until Winona crossed a meadow and entered another belt of pines. Above her a roosting bird let out with raucous cries of alarm, evidently mistaking her for a predator. It was a jay, and it quieted down a minute later. But the harm had been done.

  At high altitude sound carried much farther than down on the lowlands. This was true in the foothills as well, especially at night when the air was crisp and the wind usually stronger.

  Winona knew that the Lipan had heard. He would suspect the cause and he would come investigate. She had to get out of there, and quickly.

  Although she was winded, Winona steeled her legs and sprinted for hundreds of feet. Obstacles were hard to perceive in the dark, and she nearly collided with a log. Another time a low limb nearly ripped her face. When she could sprint no longer, she slowed to a walk.

  Every so often Winona stopped and cocked her head. No alien sounds fell on her ears, but she knew better than to think the Lipan would make any. Apaches were like ghosts when they wanted to be. Their stamina, their speed, their stealth exceeded that of her own people. Which was understandable given that Apaches lived for war. For untold generations their creed had been to kill without being killed, to steal without being caught.

  It was an hour or so after fleeing the clearing that Winona finally had to rest. The dizziness had returned, and with it a bout of nausea. She shuffled to a flat boulder and sank down, her arms between her legs, facing her back trail.

  Nothing moved out there.

  Yet.

  As would any woman devoted to her family, Winona turned her thoughts to her husband and her precious children. She missed them terribly and wished she was with them at that moment, snug and warm in their tepee.

  Winona knew of other Shoshone women who had taken white men as mates, only to have their husbands go off and leave them once the men tired of trapping. Some of those women had given their husbands children. Seeing them always filled her heart with a secret dread that one day Nate would do the same to her, although deep down she knew that he never would.

  Winona counted herself fortunate that Grizzly Killer was the exception to the rule. He was a man of firm beliefs who held to his commitments as rigidly as iron. He loved her and Zach and Evelyn and would never abandon them, come what may.

  It saddened her to think that she might never see any of them again. They were the joys of her eye, her reasons for living. Without them her life would be an empty shell. If it were not for—

  Winona stiffened, annoyed that she had let her attention wander when she had to stay fully alert. She anxiously scanned the forest, without result. Taking a breath, she shoved upright and went on.

  Soon Winona came to a wide ravine. She stared in frustration at the opposite rim twenty-five feet away. There was no choice but to go around. Turning to the west, she stayed close to the edge so that when she reached the end, she would know it right away.

  A sprawling thicket barred Winona’s path. Rather than work her way around it, she elected to squeeze past on a narrow strip of bare earth bordering the steep drop. Wedging the pistol under her sash to free both hands, she turned so that her back was to the ravine and sidled onto the strip.

  By clasping the ends of thin limbs for balance, Winona briskly skirted over half the thicket. Suddenly the ground under her buckled. She felt it start to give and tried to throw herself to the right, but gravity would not be denied.

  It was a horrible feeling, plummeting into the ravine in the dark with no idea of how far it was to the bottom or what lay below. Winona pictured her body being dashed to broken ruin on jagged boulders or impaled by a tree limb.

  Then Winona hit. Her shoulders slammed onto barren ground and she found herself tumbling down an incline, going faster and faster. In vain she thrust out her hands to arrest her momentum, but all she accomplished was to tear skin from her palms and break several nails.

  Her hip struck a small boulder. Winona nearly cried out. She did a cartwheel and crashed down onto her back. Dust spewed over her face, getting into her eyes and nose as she shot lower.

  As abruptly as the fall had begun, it ended. Winona rammed into something hard, something big, and a black fog engulfed her. Vaguely, she heard pebbles and loose dirt raining down around her. For a while after that the night was still.

  With a start, Winona came to. She was on her left side. Her left leg throbbed almost unbearably. Sitting up, she bit her lower lip to keep from crying out when the agony grew much worse. Fearing that she had broken a bone, she probed the leg and located a spot exquisitely tender to the lightest touch. She was bruised and gashed but nothing had busted.

  Close by was another boulder. Propping herself against it, Winona painfully rose. She stared bleakly at the ravine walls. They were much too steep for her to climb. Unless there was another way out, she was trapped as effectively as if she had placed her foot into the serrated steel jaws of a bear trap.

  But Winona refused to let despair sap her will. Fighting the torment, she limped westward. The floor of the ravine was littered with boulders and dead limbs, which had fallen from above. She rounded a slab of rock, stopping short at the sight of pale bones.

  It was the skeleton of a deer, a buck. Winona figured that the animal had somehow blundered over the rim and fallen to its death. The only other possibility, that the buck had survive
d but had been unable to climb back out and had starved to death, was too unnerving to contemplate.

  A bend loomed ahead. Winona paused to catch her breath. She idly gazed upward – and her heart skipped a beat. Framed against the backdrop of stars was the outline of a stocky human figure.

  It had to be the Lipan.

  Winona clawed at her waist for the pistol, only to learn it was not there. It had undoubtedly slipped loose when she fell. Now she was defenseless as well as boxed in. Her plight was next to hopeless, but still she would not admit defeat. Where there was life, there was hope.

  The figure disappeared. Winona hurried on as best she was able, eager to find a way out of the ravine before the Lipan found a way down. She hustled around the bend and couldn’t believe her eyes.

  To the left the ravine wall ran another dozen yards but to the right the ravine ended, blending seamlessly into the forest. A tangle of brush and trees offered haven from the warrior. Pivoting on a heel, she made off to the north, passing several trees. At the next one she stopped to look back.

  At that exact moment the Lipan emerged from the vegetation flanking the other side of the ravine. Apparently he thought that she was still in there, because he flattened against the wall and stalked in after her.

  Winona dared not linger. The warrior would realize his mistake all too soon. She noticed a long limb lying next to the trunk. It made an ideal crutch.

  Half running, half hopping, Winona fled. Her battered body protested every step. Her left leg would have buckled several times if not for the limb. She broke out in a cold sweat. Sheer willpower kept her going long after others would have collapsed.

  Winona was so intent on simply moving her legs that she was taken unawares when the trees thinned and a bluff barred her path. Veering to the right, she hobbled along until she came to level ground once again.

  It was best to push on, but Winona needed to rest a few moments. Just a few. She leaned on the limb and worked her left leg to keep it from cramping. Suddenly, without having heard a sound, she knew that she had run out of time. She knew that she was no longer alone. Straightening, she turned.

  He stood ten feet away, the war club at his side, studying her intently as if she were a mystery he was trying to make sense of. There was no anger on his face, just curiosity. “You like jaguar. You quiet. You fast.”

  Winona did not know what to say. Compliments were the last thing she had expected.

  “You make good Lipan.” Chipota gestured. “Come now. Go back. Ricket want.”

  “You will not take me without a fight,” Winona declared, planting her feet and holding the limb in front of her as if it were a lance. It made a pitiful weapon but it was all she had. “I will not go back.”

  Chipota sighed. “I not want hurt you. Savvy? Come. I not touch.”

  “It makes no difference. I do what I must.”

  The Lipan was on her before Winona could lift the limb to strike. Almost casually he swatted it aside, shifted, and drove the handle of his war club into her midsection. She doubled over and gasped for breath. The limb was torn from her grasp. Fingers as hard as stone locked in her hair, and her head was jerked upward.

  “You brave woman. But you much foolish.”

  In response, Winona tried to claw his eyes. The Lipan pulled backward. One of her nails raked his left cheek, drawing blood. She coiled for another try, but he was not about to let her. The war club caught her on the tip of the jaw this time. Her legs would no longer support her weight, and the last sight she saw as she toppled was Chipota giving her that strange look of his. Then the hard earth rushed up to meet her face.

  Eight

  A sharp snap brought Simon Ward out of a fitful sleep. He had dozed off seated next to the fire, his arms crossed on his knees, his forehead resting on his right wrist.

  Fearing that the slavers had returned, Simon leaped to his feet and swung from side to side, seeking a target to shoot. There were none. Another snap drew his gaze to the glowing crackling embers beside him, all that remained of the roaring flames he had going at one point. He grinned in relief. There was no cause to fret. The slavers were long gone.

  And so was Felicity.

  That thought erased the grin. Simon sadly lowered his arms and stepped over to where Nate King lay. It had taken every ounce of strength Simon possessed to drag the mountain man out of the grass. Rekindling the camp fire had not taken long since the slavers had left a mound of buffalo chips behind.

  To keep wild beasts at bay, Simon had built the fire as large as he dared without setting the prairie itself on fire. Then he had sat down and tried to stay awake until dawn, a hopeless task given his near total exhaustion.

  The Bostonian had done all he could for the frontiersman, which was not much. Nate King had suffered a shallow stab wound on his left side and a gunshot wound to the head, a furrow dug into his scalp above the right ear. Neither were life threatening.

  Simon couldn’t wait for the mountain man to come around so they could go after his wife. He nudged King’s shoulder. When that brought no result, he shook Nate none too gently. All the trapper did was groan.

  “Nate,” Simon said loudly. “Rise and shine. Every minute we waste, Felicity gets further away.”

  The words echoed in Nate King’s head as they might inside a cave. He struggled up out of a black pit, surprised and glad to be alive. The last thing he remembered was a volley fired by the slavers and an explosion inside his skull. “Simon?” he croaked. “Is that you?”

  “It sure is,” Simon said, laughing out of sheer joy. “You had me worried last night, friend. The slavers claimed that they’d killed you. I was scared to death I was on my own.”

  Nate blinked a few times and felt a chill ripple down his spine.

  “Now we can go get the horses and head out after those butchers. If we push, we can catch them before nightfall, don’t you think?”

  “I’m afraid it won’t be that simple.”

  “Why not?” Simon wanted to know. He was not going to stand for any more delays. This was the day he would rescue his wife or perish in the attempt.

  “I can’t see.

  “What?” Simon said, not sure he had heard correctly.

  Nate swiveled his head to confirm it. All he saw was a gritty gray veil. “I can’t see a thing. The shot I took to the head has done something to my eyes.”

  “No!” Simon exclaimed, more out of concern for his wife than for the man who had befriended him. To his credit, he realized he was not being considerate and placed a hand on the other man’s broad shoulder. “What can I do? We don’t have any water or food, but I’ll go rustle up what I can if you want.”

  Propping both hands under him, Nate sat up. He ran his fingers along the furrow and winced. It was tender but not very deep, and it had not bled much. Bears had done more damage on occasion. Why, then, couldn’t he see?

  Nate recollected hearing of men stricken with head wounds who lost their powers of sight and speech. One man he’d heard tell of had reverted to being a small child and had to be waited on hand and foot or he would have died. Something similar must have happened to him. The big question was: How long would the effect last? Was it permanent, or would his eyesight return to normal sooner or later?

  “Does this mean we can’t go after my wife?” Simon inquired.

  Every syllable was laced with raw anxiety. Nate could not blame the man. If it were his wife, he would feel the same. Closing his eyes, he pressed his fingers over the lids and rubbed lightly. It produced no change. The gray veil seemed there to stay.

  Simon Ward felt the old urge to cry come over him. This new setback, coming on the heels of so many in a row, was almost more than he could bear. He resisted the urge, but only with supreme effort.

  Nate did not waste time bewailing his fate. It had happened; he must make the best of it. To that end, he held out his hand and said, “Help me up. We have to get to the horses.”

  “And what then?” Simon asked, afraid that the mou
ntain man intended to head for the Shoshone village.

  “What else? We save your wife.”

  “But how? With you blind, we don’t stand a prayer. I can’t shoot or fight like you can. If the slavers spot us, we’ll both wind up dead.”

  Nate reached in the direction of the younger man’s voice. His hand fell on Ward’s arm. “Listen to me, pilgrim. You can’t give up. I don’t think those vermin have laid a finger on Felicity yet, but they will before too long. Do you want that to happen?”

  “Of course not. How can you even ask?”

  Nate tucked his legs under him. “Then we leave right away. You’ll have to be my eyes for the time being, until my sight returns.”

  Simon shook his head. The idea was too preposterous for words. Yet he had to admit that everything the trapper said was true. They were the only hope of salvation his wife had. As he assisted the frontiersman to rise, he remarked, “But what if it never does? I can’t spirit her away from them all by my lonesome.”

  “You might have to,” Nate said. Although he would never let on, deep down he was more upset than Ward. There was indeed a very good chance that he would never see again, and it frightened him as few other things could. For how could he hope to survive in the wilderness without his sight? He would be unable to trap. He would be unable to hunt. His wife would have to provide for the family. And while he knew that she would never complain, he could not bring himself to impose so heavy a burden on her.

  “Which direction do I go?” Simon asked. For the life of him, he could not recall if the horses were due north, to the northwest, or to the northeast.

  “Northwest,” Nate said, and felt the other man take his sleeve. “That won’t be necessary,” he stated, refusing to be treated as if he were completely helpless. “I’ll follow the sound of your footsteps.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  And so they headed out, Simon tramping along in the lead, making enough noise to scare off every snake and insect within fifty yards. It was easy for Nate to keep up. But so preoccupied was he with the calamity his family faced that they hiked for minutes before he thought of something he should have thought of sooner.