by Jo Ann Wendt
Dove flew, retracing his own trail, charging back through the frozen marsh, back through the forest of pine, back across Collect Pond and up the steep rocky path that led to the wall. He reached the wall first and curtly shouted the situation to the guards and made demands. The guards responded at once. They fired a three-shot musket salvo. The sound of the gunfire cracked the frozen winter air like timbers splitting. Hearing the signal any other day of the year, New Amsterdamers would've come on the run, ready for Indians or wolves or whatever else threatened the colony. But this was Christmas. Musket fire had saluted all day long. A few evening musket shots generated no alarm. Dove paced the guard tower in frustration.
"Have you a drum?" he demanded. "Try your drum!"
A soldier produced one at once and beat a loud tattoo. At last, New Amsterdamers popped out of their cozy cottages, curious. But when another three-shot musket salvo followed the drumming, they grabbed cloaks and guns and came at a run. Dove ran to meet them and tersely shouted Jericho's plight. The word was passed swiftly from house to house, man to man, and soon, every male in the settlement came running, warmly bundled for a night of searching, armed with musket, rum flask, lantern. Dove was ashamed to see the very men he'd openly despised and made fun of: Verplanck, all of the Dutch West India Company directors, even the dame schoolteacher's husband. Governor Stuyvesant came too, hobbling on his wooden peg leg. Every soldier in the barracks turned out.
Dove was further humbled. How often he'd laughed at the Dutch penchant for organizing everything they did. Now he was humbly grateful for it. In less than five minutes the search had been organized and begun. After agreeing on a signal— whoever found her would fire a three-shot musket salvo to call off the search—the men swiftly separated themselves into cadres of ten, divided up the settlement, and marched off to search every inch of it. Other cadres of men marched off toward the frozen Hudson River to the west, to trek into the wilderness and search the land toward the Swedes' colony. Others ran to prepare boats for the East River search. Even braver Dutchmen volunteered to man those boats, knowing the river was full of ice chunks as big as their boats.
With this last group, and with John and Black Bartimaeus and Samuels, Dove swiftly crouched in the snow and drew the outline of the opposite shore, dividing it into search segments. Men spoke up, quickly pinpointing hunting paths and Indian trails that might have been taken, marking the locations of hunter shacks, crude shelters that both Dutchmen and Indians used when caught in bad weather. Then, separating into pairs, they ran to their boats.
Dove was at the river, hauling an overturned rowboat out of a snowbank, struggling to right it, when, suddenly, strong, black cloaked arms reached out to help, and the boat sprang upright.
"I go with you."
Dove swung around and felt immense relief. D'Orias. Blunt, handsome features. Black hair straight as a sword. Trustworthy eyes. He'd liked and trusted Leonardo d'Orias from their first handshake.
4'There's danger," Dove felt compelled to warn. "Ice. When the tide sends it shooting, the ice could poke a hole in the boat. You'd be safer searching on foot."
"I do not ask for safety." Grateful, Dove nodded curtly, unable to speak, a knot in his throat.
D'Orias was no slouch. For when they'd launched the boat into the slushy freezing water, he got in and seized the oars, leaving Dove free to direct and stave off the huge floating ice chunks with his musket butt. Some of the chunks were as big as outhouses.
"Tell me where. I row."
Dove pointed. 4 4Line up the bow with that rocky promontory on the long island. That's my search segment. We'll beach the boat there, search the shore in both directions. If we find nothing, we'll row on to the next point. And to the next. Until we find her."
D'Orias nodded. He stroked like a galley slave, his powerful shoulders sending the boat surging into the hazardous waters. Icy spray flew, and slush sheeted off the oars, freezing on contact, making them grow heavy as iron. But d'Orias didn't slacken. The lantern swung in the stern, and in the bow Dove strained to divert the drifting ice chunks. When they reached the promontory, they leaped to shore and hauled the boat in over the ice and snow. They worked well together as they combed the shore for footprints; d'Orias swiftly tracked north while Dove tracked south.
When the search netted nothing, they met at the boat, launched it, jumped in, and pressed on, rowing to the next point to repeat their search there. This then became their silent, arduous, exhausting pattern as the night deepened and the bitter cold descended. Splashes of slushy river water turned the oar locks to ice, but d'Orias made no complaint. He rowed on, hour after hour. He was as staunch a comrade as Dove could hope for.
They were both chilled half to death. The flagon of rum was small solace. Their breath steamed, their faces grew ruddy with cold. Ice crystals formed on d'Orias's black mustache, and Dove's hands grew stiff. As the boat spurted on, Dove slipped his sword hand out of his fur-lined mittens, slipped it into his cloak, into doublet and shirt, and warmed it on the hot skin of his belly. A swordsman with stiff fingers was no swordsman at all.
"We will find her. Do not despair, de Mont." D'Orias broke the long silence, his breath steaming, his low Italian voice soft with compassion. Dove couldn't speak. He nodded mutely.
"We will find her, de Mont. Do not give in to despair. Despair clouds the mind. A man cannot think when he despairs. So do not despair. Only think. Only search."
Dove's throat thickened. "She's so . . . young. She's only a child. When I imagine what those bastards might be doing to her . . . doing at this very moment ..."
"Do not imagine. Only think, sz? Only search, ji?"
Dove nodded bleakly. By the fourth hour, clouds drifted away and stars came out, twinkling as coldly and starkly as diamonds. A quarter moon rose in the sky, shedding cold light. Moonglow glazed the endless miles of snow. On the river, Dove could see the distant lanterns of other search boats. Pinpoints of light. Glancing across the waters toward New Amsterdam, he could see the outline of Hildegarde's house. For the first time, he glanced at it without interest. In the settlement, moving lanterns flickered everywhere, even out on the rocky shoals at the tip of the island. Everyone was out searching, despite the bitter cold.
"They are good people, the Dutch, si?"
"Yes." Dove was ashamed he'd ever thought otherwise.
The boat scraped bottom once again. Once again, they leaped out, hauled the boat ashore and began the sickeningly familiar pattern, d'Orias trekking north, Dove south. But he was losing heart. There wasn't much more logical shore to search. Desperate that the search not end, he followed the Indian tomahawk hashmarks on tree trunks and trekked up an unlikely Indian hunting trail. The trail lay covered in waist- deep pristine snow, the topmost layer delicately crusted, glittering like iridescent mica. The snow was unbroken. No one had traveled this trail. But he pushed on anyway, forging breathless to the top of a low slope. He stood panting, breath steaming, his eyes desperately searching the empty wilderness in all directions. Except for the pines that stood dark and thickly branched, the leafless ash and elm trees looked like skeletons, and he was filled with despair. Jericho. Would someone stumble upon her skeleton when the snow melted away and spring came again?
He turned to retrace his steps, to charge on with the fruitless. search, when suddenly a scent made his nostrils quiver. Smoke! Just the faintest trace of it. So fleeting that it was gone in an instant. Had he imagined it? Heart thundering, he wheeled and ran, retracing his steps, plunging down the trail he'd broken. He reached the boat. D'Orias wasn't back yet. Abandoning his musket and powder tin, leaving them in the boat—the thirty-pound musket would slow him down—he took only his sword and ran south along the shore, searching for a hunting trail. The smoke had to have come from a hut.
He nearly missed it. The trail was well-hidden. The rogues had been clever, chinking the hashmarks on the trees with packed snow, hiding them. They'd also used a broom to sweep away their footprints. Dove intensely studied the shor
e. He saw an unnatural snow mound between two bushes. He ran to it, drew his sword and tentatively inserted it, testing. Steel clicked against wood. He frantically brushed the snow away.
Their boat!
Common sense told him to wait for d'Orias. But, Jericho. At the mercy of brutes, perhaps suffering—at this very moment—what no child should ever suffer.
He made his decision.
Plunging into the waist-deep snow, he leaped forward and followed the disguised trail. D'Orias was smart. He would put two and two together, follow Dove's tracks. He plunged along a trail that led deep into the wilderness, past thickets of leafless hickory trees, past tall, dark stands of pine, over frozen creek beds, past frozen springs. A dozen times he lost the trail and retraced his steps in a frenzy of frustration. Overhead, in the dark sky, the stars twinkled with cold indifference. The quarter moon rose higher, the snow grew brighter. Once, a white rabbit leaped across his path, startling the hell out of him, leaving a delicate trail of cloven prints in the snow's slight shimmering crust. Now and then, a wolf bayed distantly or a tree limb cracked in the deepening cold. But mainly, there was stillness and silence, only the labored sound of his own breathing, only the dogged trudging of his boots, the sound of his scared heart beating. Jericho. Would he be in time? He was her master. He ought to have taken better care of her.
At a distance he judged to be a hundred yards from the river, the rogues had confidently abandoned all attempts to conceal their trail. Three separate sets of boot prints emerged in the snow. In one spot, where they'd set her down for a moment, he found a smaller set of moccasin prints. She was alive!
Elated, he leaped into a steady trot, following the trail through a windswept trough of broken snow. The smell of woodsmoke came again. Grew distinct. Then, suddenly, forging breathlessly to the top of a low rise, he looked down through the pines and saw the hut just below. He was almost on top of it. His heart hammered in his throat. Sheltered by snow-covered granite outcroppings, the crude hunter's hut had no window, no chimney—only a door and a smoke hole in the center of the thatched roof. A pine branch had cleverly been laid over the smoke hole to disseminate the rising smoke from the warming fire inside.
His blood surging, he shucked his cloak. He wrenched his glove off with his teeth and thrust his sword hand under his doublet, under his shirt. His hand was so cold, his belly ached from the touch of it. He warmed his hand until his fingers grew supple. At the same time, he warmed the icy silver sword hilt in his arm pit. He made his plan. Three men. It would have to be a lightning attack. Give them no chance to get to their weapons. Catch them unaware. Make every thrust a death blow. Kill or be killed.
His heart hammered. He wished he could wait for d'Orias.
But Jericho! What was happening to her? He drew a long, scared breath of cold air, then gripped the sword hilt in his warmed hand and ran full speed down the rise, snow flying from his boots. He flew at the hut, kicked the door in and sprang into the room. The flimsy door crashed into the wall. In less than a heartbeat, the scene before him burned into his brain. The room was smoky. A crude fire crackled on the dirt floor. Thrown upon a blanket on the floor, stripped naked, bound and gagged, lay Jericho. The two men squatting there wheeled, startled. He saw the terror in her eyes, and then he saw red. He exploded like a volcano.
"Get 'im—'tis her master—get—"
Dove sprang. The shout was still coming forth when the rogue's head nodded at an unnatural angle, like a limp ribbon. A single slash all but decapitated him. Jugular blood spurted to the rafters, spraying the smoky room with a fine, slick spray that glistened in the firelight. Dove whirled and lunged for the second rogue, who'd gone springing for a pistol that lay upon a stool. The rogue grabbed for it. Dove slashed. Hand and pistol remained on the stool. With a scream of shock, the rogue backed away, blood pumping from his stump. Hot with anger, Dove advanced on him.
"Nay! Nay! Mercy—I beg—"
Dove thrust. Anger carried the belly thrust into the soft pine-log wall behind. Blood surged out of the man's mouth like vomit, and for a moment the wretch hung impaled to the wall, still alive. Gagging in disgust, Dove wrenched the sword free. Dying, the rogue melted to the floor. Panting, revulsed, Dove threw the bloody sword aside and leaped for the bed. The dirt floor was slick, slippery.
"Jericho?" He was just kneeling, swiftly covering her shaking body with a man's cloak when a voice cracked from the open doorway.
"Nicely done, milord. You've saved me two purses o' gold. Now I shan't need to split wi' them two."
He swung his head. He looked straight into a brass-bound pistol barrel. God. Three, not two. He'd forgotten.
"Stand up, milord."
Heart hammering, he covered Jericho, hiding her face so she wouldn't see. He stood slowly, unsteadily. He swallowed and eased away from the bed. If the pistol went off, he at least was determined that Jericho not be hit.
"Easy, milord, easy. None o' your tricks." Dove's eyes swept the man. A thick-necked, brutish man. Built like a bull. Cold, indifferent eyes.
"Let the child go," Dove demanded.
"Nay. Indeed, milord, this exceeds me fondest expectations. Two at a blow, so to speak. I don't wonder but this'll earn me a extra purse o' gold."
"If it's money you want . . ."
The rogue laughed softly, and Dove jettisoned all thought of bribery, negotiation. This was a madman. He was not to be reasoned with. His thoughts flew to escape. Were it not for Jericho, he would risk a rash move, take his chances on the pistol misfiring. Pistols rarely fired straight. They were chancy, unreliable weapons. And he could leap like lightning. But what if the lead shot hit Jericho?
Taking care not to move and anger the rogue, he swept the room with furtive darting glances, calculating. The door stood open, framing the snowy wilderness and cold sky. The quarter moon hung low in it. The air stealing into the room was bitter cold, freezing the spilled blood into pale ruby crystals of ice. The dirt floor would be as slippery as Collect Pond. If he could somehow anger the madman, induce him to come close, induce him to lash out with a fist . . .
He gazed at him with cool contempt.
"What sort of cur kidnaps and rapes a child? Only the sort who cannot succeed with a real woman."
The pistol's aim grew deadlier, shifting from Dove's head to his heart. At least its sweep did not now take in Jericho.
"Careful, milord. Your life is measured in minutes."
"And your manhood could be measured in a thimble."
"Be silent," he growled. "Be silent!"
Just then, Dove saw a shadow steal across the snow. D'Orias? It had to be! He prayed it was. To cover the sound that even d'Orias's stealthy step would make in snow, he burst into an inane, loud, blustery tirade. Heart pounding, he ranted at the man.
"You lamebrain! You imbecile. You think you can get away with killing me? Fool. I am a de Mont. My brothers would hunt you down to the ends of the earth. And when they found you, would they kill you immediately? Oh, no, you dark cull. You would not be so fortunate in the hands of my brothers. What they would do to you, you miscreant, would not be pretty. There would not be enough of you to feed to carrion!"
The pistol came closer as the rogue extended his arm.
"Bid the world farewell, milord." The brute took pleasure in torture, Dove noted. Smiling an ugly smile, the brute took his time squeezing the trigger. He watched Dove sweat. D'Orias, for God's sake!
A dagger flew through the air, flashing past the low-hanging moon. Hurled powerfully, it struck with the speed of a musket ball. The rogue screamed and Dove dived to the floor, avoiding the discharge as the pistol dropped and fired wild. The shack rang, the loud reverberation caromming off the walls. The rogue fell heavily to his knees, clutching his bleeding shoulder.
Leonardo d'Orias leaped into the doorway, black cloak, black hair, black eyes glittering, assessing the situation at a glance.
"What took you so long?" Dove demanded crossly.
D'Orias smiled gently. "Mi s
cuza, de Mont." The smile faded as worry replaced it. "The little one? She?"
44 Alive,'' he snapped. 44On the blanket. But first—'' Dove > crawled to his feet and gestured at the rogue. Retrieving his sword, groping for it, his hand shook. The room swayed. Blood. So much blood. His father's blood spurting. The smell ... the sweet sickening smell . . .
He swayed for a moment. D'Orias leaped forward. Dove stopped him with an angry head shake.
"This—is my duty, d'Orias. Remove your dagger."
44As you wish." Without mercy, d'Orias went to the moaning man and ruthlessly wrenched out his dagger. The rogue screamed in pain and fell forward. Unmoved, d'Orias wiped the dagger clean on the wretch's clothes, then sheathed it. 4'He is yours."
Dove stepped forward to finish him. Jericho. Jericho stripped naked, bound and helpless. With the toe of his boot he flipped the heavy, moaning man to his back and held his sword tip to the man's frantically thudding throat.
The small, crafty eyes opened wide, terror-struck.
"Nay! Nay! Mercy! I beg! Mercy! Mercy, milord, mercy!"
Dove felt dizzy. His sword hand shook. Gently, d'Orias's hand closed over his and took the sword. Dove backed away, grateful. The rogue's screams rose to shrieks.
"Mercy! Mercy!"
"Si. I grant mercy. The same mercy you granted the child."
D'Orias thrust.
Dove fought dizziness as blood gushed again, as the dying creature on the floor writhed and emptied his bowels. He staggered to the open door, drew in a breath of cold air, then went to Jericho.
"Jericho?" He gathered her up and carried her to the fire. He clawed the cloak from her face. Beneath her red freckles she was white. She shook like a terrified animal. Blinded by fear, the pupils of her eyes had constricted to pinpoints. For an instant, she didn't know him. She tried to lunge away. A pitiful testimony to the treatment she'd had. His anger boiled. He wanted to kill them all over again.
He shot an angry look at d'Orias, who grabbed blankets and a flask of rum, then squatted beside them.