by Judd Cole
Then, even those noises blended together, then faded. His eyes appeared glazed over, he sat absolutely motionless, and even his breathing seemed suspended.
Once again Touch the Sky saw images from his powerful vision at Medicine Lake, only they flew past like rapid birds and he glimpsed them only for a heartbeat. But when the words were spoken clearly inside his head, it was not the voices of the dead who had spoken in his vision—it was Arrow Keepers:
Wake to the living world now, little brother, or sing your death song!
An instant later Touch the Sky blinked, and he stared into the war paint of a Comanche!
From the vivid descriptions given by Arrow Keeper and others, he knew immediately it was a Comanche, despite never having seen one close up. A large, cruel mouth was made even more ferocious with streaks of their brilliant green and yellow war paint. His ears were pierced with large brass hoops, and a bear-claw necklace dangled around his neck. His small but lethal skull-cracker was raised at the ready. Two more steps closer, and he would have dashed Touch the Sky’s brains out against the tree.
Touch the Sky raised his rifle off his lap and slid his finger inside the trigger guard.
But when he aimed out into the darkness, the Comanche was gone.
For a long moment the dumbfounded Cheyenne simply sat there, stupidly aiming at nothing. Slowly, the muzzle of his rifle lowered, and he asked himself: Had the Comanche brave disappeared like a thing of smoke because he was a thing of smoke? A fancy coined by Touch the Sky’s tired, overwrought brain?
But no! He had been so real Touch the Sky could count the quills in his moccasins. Their enemy was upon them!
Quickly he slipped the paint’s hackamore back on, then rounded up the ponies and pointed them toward the main camp. It was nearly time to drive them in anyway, as he could see from the position of the Always Star to the north.
Touch the Sky had been filled with his news as he rounded up the ponies. And he had kept a sharp lookout for more Comanches. But now, as he added these ponies to the herd near camp, doubts again assailed him. True, the Comanches were famous for stealth. But how could any Indian simply be there one instant, gone the next?
By the time Touch the Sky returned to camp, few people were interested in his news. Scouts had just returned with news that the buffalo birds had been spotted! These were the parasites that traveled with the buffalo, living off the ticks in their hide. Whenever they were discovered, the herd was close by. Now the camp was buzzing with talk and preparations.
“Tomorrow, brother, we eat hot livers!” Little Horse greeted him triumphantly. “I will kill a huge bull and tie its beard to my pony’s tail!”
Touch the Sky took his news to Spotted Tail of the Bowstrings. He listened closely. Then he said, “Black Elk has taken too many precautions, there could not be a large war party nearby. It was only a lone renegade, hoping to steal ponies. You scared him off.”
Arrow Keeper said little when he told him the story. He only stared long into the fire, his eyes dark, glittering chips of obsidian. After a time, Touch the Sky thought he had fallen asleep. The old medicine man nodded off more and more now, seemed to tire more easily.
But he suddenly reached out and stirred the fire with a green stick. A column of sparks flew up with the smoke. Outside the warmth of the clan fires, another coyote howled.
“It hardly matters, little brother, whether the warrior you saw was real or not. Either way, you saw him. It is a warning. Gray Thunder s tribe is marked for grave danger.”
Chapter Six
“Soon they will attack the herd,” Hairy Wolf said. “So we must strike soon too.”
He and the Comanche leader Iron Eyes sat their ponies where they had stopped their bands at a water hole in the Texas Panhandle. They were still south of the Cheyenne tribe. The land hereabouts was cracked and dried from the sere summer heat. The grass was thin and brittle, and the midday sunshine drew heavy sweat that mixed with the dust coating every Indian, forming a paste.
Their combined bands had ridden north from the Blanco Canyon camp after receiving favorable reports from the scouts Stone Mountain and Kicking Bird.
“Remember,” said Iron Eyes, leader of the Quohada Comanches, “we must stay out of sight of the hunters. There are too many warriors for us to take on, especially now that they are keen for the hunt blood.”
Iron Eyes truly respected the Cheyenne as warriors. But what kind of men permitted themselves only one wife? He himself currently had three, and if any one of them crossed him, he would simply kill her and take another as Comanche law allowed. Women were like horses, there were more to be had.
“Yes,” Hairy Wolf agreed. “Our target is the hunt camp itself. It will be under light guard unless we are spotted.”
The giant Kiowa leader was bigger than every member of his band except Stone Mountain. His rich black mane of hair flew out behind him now as a dust-laden wind kicked up. He was dressed in captured cavalry trousers and high-topped riding boots, and was bare from the waist up except for his sturdy bone breastplate.
“We hit fast,” Iron Eyes said. “We lash the prisoners to the spare ponies; then we count on the superior speed of our horses to stay ahead of the Cheyenne if they come for us. They will never touch us in the Blanco.”
Behind the two leaders, Painted Lips and some of the others towed extra mounts on lead lines. Big Tree, the Comanche who could shoot twenty arrows while an enemy fired and reloaded a rifle twice, had painted his face in vertical and horizontal stripes of black, the color of death.
“No,” agreed Hairy Wolf, “once in the canyon the fight is ours to win. When it is safe, we will then mount an expedition to Santa Fe to meet the Comancheros. We will take no fat or ugly or old women, nor children still sucking at the dug— these are hard to sell.”
“Straight words, Kaitsenko. And these are Cheyennes, so we must remember to get the knives which all the young girls wear around their necks. They will kill themselves if we do not.”
“Then they are more vigilant than their savage lords,” Hairy Wolf said scornfully. “Dog Fat claims he nearly walked up to a herd guard and brained him against a tree where he sat dream-mg.
But despite these brave words, both leaders respected and feared the Cheyenne. This was clear as they set out again. Iron Eyes turned and started the word with Painted Lips: Remember Wolf Creek!
The rallying cry spread quickly through the ranks as the two bands moved north.
~*~
Early the next morning the hunters rode out. The buffalo birds had been spotted near enough by then that the Cheyenne decided against moving the hunt camp. It was necessary to keep the women and children close by for the skinning and butchering should the kill go well.
Black Elk naturally assumed that enemy scouts were in the area. But the reports from his own scouts strongly confirmed his own sense that no large deployment of warriors was in the vicinity. The hunt would be near enough to the camp, which would be safe under the protection of a few junior warriors-in-training.
Touch the Sky’s strong feelings of anticipation affected his pony. It wanted to run, but he held her in. The hunters kept their horses to a walk, planning to unleash them only at the last moment, when the buffalo had sensed them and started their inevitable stampede.
These were the critical moments of the hunt, and the soldier societies were in full force. Despite the Cheyenne brave’s respect for custom and the tribal law-ways, they were a warrior society—the traits needed in a good warrior were not always in harmony with those of a good tribe member. The rash, reckless, fearless bravery of individual effort was what decided Indian battles. The honor of counting first coup went to the warrior who moved first, acting on his own.
This strong tradition of individual effort meant that the hunters naturally got carried away in the competition to kill the first buffalo, a high honor indeed. But a herd warned too early could escape, and thus an entire people go hungry and poorly clothed because of one man’s rashness. So th
e Bowstrings and the Bull Whips rode on either flank. They would not leave their vigilant guard positions, and join the hunt, until the hunt leader signaled the charge.
River of Winds had been selected as hunt leader. Talking would be permitted, in low voices, until he gave the command for silence. Little Horse nudged his pony up beside his friend.
“Brother,” he said, “I have been thinking about Black Elk’s shot into the thickets. Ride close to me during the hunt so no more ‘accidents’ like this happen.”
Touch the Sky nodded, his lips pressed into their determined slit as he glanced to both sides of the wedge-shaped formation. Black Elk rode slightly ahead of him. Wolf Who Hunts Smiling rode directly across from him on the flank, in line with the other Bull Whips. Certainly another accident could happen easily.
“Once the hunt is underway,” Touch the Sky said, “we will move well away from the others.”
Further conversation ceased as River of Winds signaled the command for silence. They were approaching the last long rise before the spot where the scouts had last spotted the herd. And Touch the Sky could see the tiny buffalo birds flitting about, sure proof the buffalo were near.
The wind was favorable for the hunters, blowing hard into their faces. Buffalo were nearly blind, but possessed an extraordinary sense of smell. Touch the Sky could not help thinking about Swift Canoe’s Animal Dance antics, heat rising into his face. Once before he had carelessly frightened off the herd by getting downwind of them.
But former disasters faded from his mind as he cautiously walked his horse up to the crest of the last rise overlooking the herd. He joined the long line of waiting hunters, getting his first glimpse of the beasts.
The sight made belly flies stir in his stomach.
The herd was grazing in a lush valley, bright with thick patches of golden crocuses growing against the deep green of the grass. From the rim of the canyon walls rising above them, giant stands of cactus stood like timeless sentinels.
Touch the Sky couldn’t even estimate how many there were—so many they formed a great, shaggy carpet that seemed to cover the land as far as the eye could see, heaving and rolling like a giant wave.
More luck was with the hunters. Just past the neck of the valley, the herd’s only escape route, was a series of steep-sided sand dunes. When the buffalo were chased into these, their hooves would flounder helplessly.
So far the men had escaped notice. Several ponies wanted to surge forward and were barely restrained by their riders. The desire to draw first hunt blood filled each Cheyenne and made his blood sing. When River of Winds finally dropped his streamered lance, and the line of hunters surged forward, their collective shout rose above the thundering of their ponies’ hooves.
As they had agreed, Touch the Sky and Little Horse angled off from the other hunt groups, avoiding the Whips. Their ponies raced down the slope into the thick of the herd, which was only now coming to life as the dominant bulls bellowed the stampede call.
One moment Touch the Sky saw green grass racing below his feet; the next he was swept up in the stampede, and nothing was visible all around him but shaggy brown fur and dangerously sharp horns. The air was clamorous with the sound of hooves pounding, calves bawling, cows lowing, bulls roaring their angry roar. Sometimes the buffalo pressed in so tight his legs were trapped between them and his pony.
Bulls constantly tried to gore his pony. But the gray was too quick, nimbly lunging to safety each time. He saw Little Horse flashing in and out of the swirling dust, bouncing wildly on top his pony. Touch the Sky’s Sharps was loaded and ready in his hand. But he knew it was suicide to simply shoot at a buffalo in the main part of a stampede like this—as it went down it could cause a choke-point, throwing the hunter to sure death by trampling.
It was the Cheyenne way to hunt buffalo by skillfully moving to isolate one portion of the vast herd. Then, turning it from the main body, they would close in on it tighter and tighter—much as they fought the white man’s circular defense for wagons, attacking in an ever-tightening pattern.
Within a short time he and Little Horse had bunched a group off to the right of the main herd. They were adeptly pointing the stampeding animals toward the sand dunes, whistling, shouting their war cry. Abruptly, several of the biggest bulls veered sharply away from the buffalo they were pointing. Touch the Sky didn’t even need to rein the gray—she leaped after the buffalos with a mind of her own.
A few heartbeats later, Touch the Sky’s eyes widened in shock when the buffalos suddenly disappeared!
He realized why just in time to rein in his pony before she too plunged over the blind cliff which had just sent the buffalo to their death.
He turned to look behind him. Little Horse, intent on driving their bunch into the dunes, had missed all this. But someone else had seen it. And now, as he raced over to join Touch the Sky, the tall young brave stared with dread at the red and black streamers tied to his pony’s tail.
“Woman Face!” Wolf Who Hunts Smiling shouted above the din of the hunt, receding now behind them. “Surrender your weapons! I command this in the name of the Hunt Soldiers!”
“Why?” the warrior demanded. “I have done nothing to violate the Hunt Law.”
“Done nothing?” Wolf Who Hunts Smiling nodded behind him, in the direction of the cliff. “Hunting by yourself, you sent at least a dozen fine bulls over a cliff. The Hunt Law strictly forbids solitary kills—no hunter rode anywhere near you! Now these animals are contaminated and cannot be touched.”
“I did not chase them over the cliff. They escaped in that direction. I did not know about the cliff until they went over.”
“So you say. I saw it differently. Save it for my leader, Lone Bear. I said surrender your weapons!
Wolf Who Hunts Smiling held his Colt rifle, which had belonged to Touch the Sky in the days when he was still called Matthew Hanchon, aimed at the brave. Reluctantly, Touch the Sky obeyed. As much as he despised Wolf Who Hunts Smiling, disobeying a Hunt Soldier was a serious offense.
His enemy’s wily face was triumphant. The swift, furtive eyes mocked him. Clearly, this moment made up for the brief moment of glory when Touch the Sky had ruined Swift Canoe’s Animal Dance mimicry.
“You have done it now, shaman who likes to laugh at his own unmanly mistakes! We shall see if the others laugh with you and roll upon the ground now!”
Wolf Who Hunts Smiling cracked his new, knotted-thong whip hard.
“You’ll soon taste this. We’ll see then how much laughing Woman Face does!”
Chapter Seven
Soon the buffalo had thundered on toward the mountain peaks to the west, yellow-brown dust clouds boiling up behind them.
The kill had gone well and the hunters were exhilarated. They had already made the first cut of the butchering, to reach inside and dig out the still-warm livers. They ate them raw from their cupped hands, savoring the hot, tender mouthfuls.
At first they were busy exchanging excited comments about the hunt and the delicious hump steaks they would feast on later. They were slow to notice that the new Bull Whip soldier, Wolf Who Hunts Smiling, held Touch the Sky prisoner. Curiosity took over once they saw something was afoot—quickly they gathered around the pair.
Little Horse was less curious. He knew full well that his friend’s enemies had managed to stir up some new trouble. The timing could not be worse for Touch the Sky. Arrow Keeper had ridden out to observe the hunt, as had Chief Gray Thunder. But by law the chief could not hunt, and Arrow Keeper had joked that he no longer had any desire to die anywhere but in his sleep. They had ridden back, after tasting warm liver with the hunters, to supervise the moving of camp. The rest of the tribe must be brought up to butcher the first day’s kill.
That meant, Little Horse thought grimly as he joined the others, that by the Hunt Law a soldier troop’s decision was final. Worse, the two military societies were independent of each other. Each must respect the other’s decisions. And this was now a Bull Whip matter.
“What is the meaning of this?” Lone Bear demanded.
“This one,” Wolf Who Hunts Smiling said, “deliberately hunted by himself and used a buffalo jump to kill many bulls! Look, below lies the proof!”
“He lives up to his name,” Touch the Sky said, “by speaking in a wolf bark. I never saw this cliff. I was chasing buffalo that strayed from the group which Little Horse and I were driving toward the dunes.”
“He speaks the straight word,” Little Horse said. “We were hunting together. Nor did I see this cliff. Look here how it—”
“Silence!” Lone Bear commanded. “You jabber on like a squaw.”
Touch the Sky’s glance shifted from Wolf Who Hunts Smiling to Swift Canoe to Black Elk. All were gloating, enjoying it immensely as they anticipated the outcome. As if he couldn’t hold off, Wolf Who Hunts Smiling kept flicking his whip.
Lone Bear stared at Touch the Sky where he stood beside his pony. “The Hunt Law is strict on the number of buffalo a tribe may kill. This is because Maiyun has ordered that we may take from this earth only what we require to live. Thus the buffalo jump may be used only when there are no horses for the chase, no weapons for the kill. Entire herds have gone over cliffs, dying and rotting in numbers too great to imagine. You could have caused it again today.”
Touch the Sky tried to speak up, but Swift Canoe was first.
“This is our greatest complaint against the hair faces. We take only what is needed; they waste all they can. And here before us stands one of them.”
“You swell up with righteousness,” Touch the Sky said. “Why not also tell them, noble warrior, how you hid like a white-livered coward and tried to murder me at Medicine Lake, sullying our tribe’s Sacred Arrows.”
“This is not Medicine Lake,” Lone Bear said, “and Swift Canoe has not been arrested by one of my soldiers—you have, buck! I have ears for Swift Canoe’s words. This”—Lone Bear pointed over the cliff—”is just one more proof that you have little respect for the Cheyenne Way.”