by E.B. Brown
Now the Great Weroance sat beside her husband, dressed in his finest attire, watching the Englishman pledge a truce to the Powhatan people. She could feel the tension roll off them in waves, from the sly glances they shared and the grunts of disapproval from the Weroance as the Englishman spoke.
Maggie looked over Winn’s shoulder to where Kwetii lay in the arms of a Powhatan woman. It made her nervous to see her daughter out of her immediate reach, but Opechancanough had insisted one of his wives hold the child. She suspected it was just another ploy to keep both her and Winn in line throughout the ceremony, and a successful one at that.
“We share this meal as we meet as friends. All who take of this food today make this promise!” Opechancanough called out, raising his hands in the air. The Powhatans hooted and hollered, and the sounds of joyful noise filled the air. The Englishmen, few as they were, and none that she recognized, joined in by clapping and nodding in agreement. She fleetingly wondered why no English women were present, but then she recalled the subservient role they played in Jamestown society and realized they would not be included in such activities.
“Business has no place fer women,” Charles said. Benjamin waved the man off.
“Then you know not my wife, Charles. She is quite clever.” Benjamin replied.
Maggie shuddered at the unwelcome memory. Its shadow persisted, however, nipping at her ankles like hungry fleas wanting her blood, begging for acknowledgement. Was Benjamin safely returned to his own time? She knew she might never know the answer, and it was best left in the past. She glanced sideways at Winn.
He watched the English as he ate, taking the offered bowl of food from the Taster. Winn only gave her bits from his bowl, and stopped her hand when she reached for his untouched mug of rum.
“Wait.”
He handed the mug to the thin man seated behind them, who took a gulp. Winn watched the Taster for a few moments, shrugged, and then handed it to Maggie. She noticed the Weroance did the same.
Doctor Potts began passing around jugs of ale, which the Indians gladly filled their mugs with. He was another little man, yet dressed in the fine clothes of an aristocrat with a starched stand up collar and shiny new shoes with his brown hair tied neatly with a blue ribbon at his nape. His eyes followed the jugs as he watched the Indians pour out their share.
“’Tis the best we have, for our loyal friends!” Potts shouted, his arm outstretched, pointing to the clay jugs.
The Taster was given an overflowing mug, which he topped off with a gulp before handing it to the Weroance. Opechancanough grinned and raised it in salute.
Maggie looked around the gathering at the Indians seated in a circle, her mug sitting still full in front of her. Men, women, and children were present, nearly three hundred total, a token of trust to show the English they were sincere in desire for a treaty. A young brave teetered across the fire, and the women around him snickered and laughed.
Then another young brave fell to his knees.
Maggie turned to Winn, who had also seen the men fall, and then she saw Opechancanough lifting his mug to his lips. She lurched over Winn and knocked the mug from the hand of the Weroance in one quick motion, falling into Winn’s arms as a flurry of activity erupted around them.
“Red Woman!” the Weroance shouted. Maggie felt hands trying to pry her from Winn, but her husband held fast and shielded her from her would-be captors.
“I – I think it’s poisoned!” she told Winn. Both Winn and Opechancanough stared at her and then turned their attention to the Taster, who hiccupped and promptly fell to the ground in a heap of twitching limbs. Thick foaming bubbles of saliva began to drain from his opened mouth into the dirt.
“Liars! We will kill you all for this!” Opechancanough shouted.
Bedlam exploded around them. Warriors pulled the Weroance to his feet and shuttled him to the dugout boats waiting at the river. He barked out commands and the Indians began to mill toward the canoes, some stumbling and falling into the mud amidst screaming and crying. Maggie frantically searched for Kwetii and nearly keeled over with relief when Winn handed her the babe.
Shots rang out, and Maggie saw the Weroance stumble before he was pulled into a canoe. As the crowd surged toward the shoreline, many men fell, never to rise, all foaming at the mouth as the Taster had done. Women screamed and cried as they ran, dragging children behind them.
The English fired into the crowd, taking down more than the poison could finish off, pecking off the Indians blow by blow. She let Winn push her into a canoe, then reached up for his hand to guide him in, panicked when he kissed her roughly then thrust her away. As the bellow of gunfire roared around them, he pushed the canoe into the current instead of getting in.
“No! Winn! No, no!” she screamed.
“Go! Be safe with my daughter!” he shouted.
She clutched the side of the canoe, tears clouding her vision. He stood still for what seemed like ages, his tall warrior’s body primed to fight, his chest rising only slightly with each breath, looking like some ancient pagan devil as he watched them leave. Smoke from the fires rose behind him, the flames cracking and hissing to smother the screams. He glanced up at the sky, and then she lost sight of him as he turned back to the chaos to join the other warriors.
*****
As she took a deep breath to steady herself, the thick smoke stung her throat and her lungs rejected the influx, leading to a spasm of coughing that served to agitate Kwetii more. The babe lay nestled against her breast inside a soft doeskin sling, but even the infant knew how precarious their lives were at that moment and she voiced her dismay loudly. Sitting wedged next to two sobbing women in the canoe, Maggie stared at the riverbank, hoping for something, anything to indicate the men would return.
Her arms ached as she paddled, the muscles in her shoulders screaming in protest at the unaccustomed labor. She closed her eyes to the pain and continued to push the oar through the murky water, grimacing when it caught on a bushel of Tuckahoe roots and she had to yank it free. Kwetii continued to wail.
“Here, I will row,” the woman beside her said. “Feed the babe.” Crusted with mud down her back, her one arm bloodied but intact, the woman took the paddle from Maggie and resumed the chore. Maggie glanced down at her daughter, somewhat stunned at her own inability to recognize the child’s cry for milk. Her body, however, was much more attuned, and she felt a rush of milk let down as the babe latched onto her swollen nipple.
“The men will follow us. Your warrior will return.”
Maggie looked up at the soft spoken voice. It was Sesapatae, and it was she who had taken the paddle from her hands. Maggie could only nod in return, not trusting her voice for fear of wavering. If she spoke her fears aloud, would it make her unworthy? Should she hold her own hopelessness inside the empty chamber where her beating heart should rest? She felt beaten and bruised, unable to raise the spirit within to battle the hopelessness, the sight of Winn walking back toward the battle etched into her mind. She could not strike it away, neither by closing her eyes nor by screaming, the hated image burning bright and clenching off all glimmers of hope.
She felt unworthy of his love, unworthy of his trust, when it would take but a gentle push to send her over the edge of madness. She could easily run screaming from the destruction, and if not for the tugging of the tiny babe at her breast, she would have done so.
The dugout canoe bumped bottom and slid onto loose sand, and they all helped pull it up onto the bank. There were three other canoes with the occupants doing the same, their backs illuminated in the moonlight as they worked wordlessly across the shimmering sand. Up ahead, she saw four men carry Opechancanough from the lead canoe and take him immediately to the Long House.
She felt a thin hand slip around her own. Sesapatae led her away from the riverbank.
“Come with me, Red Woman.”
Maggie looked back toward the river. The water was calm, lapping the beach with a gentle slappin
g sound as it gleamed in the light of the full moon. They had left to meet the English with more than two dozen canoes. Only four returned.
She let Sesapatae guide her up the riverbank to the village. Only a few remained behind, and those who were able rushed down to help the wounded and sick. A woman walking ahead, supported by two other women, vomited up a blood-tinged froth. Several children, crying but otherwise unharmed, ran ahead, luckily among those too young to share the gift of the English rum. They were fortunate, because it seemed those smaller and weaker fell first, like the young braves who first teetered and collapsed, and the wiry young Taster. The Taster who had saved her life, and the lives of all those she loved.
She did not know she cried until the hot tears stung her splintered lip. She reached up and brushed them away with her filthy fingers, ashamed of her weakness in the face of so much stoicism among the women. With the pain of the truth hammering into her, she suddenly realized that the life she had led in the future was truly meaningless. In her own time she had been independent and resourceful, never doubting she could take care of herself. Nothing in the future could have ever prepared her for a life in the past.
Before they reached the Long House, a warrior came striding toward them, his face etched with despair. Her stomach flipped over as she realized he was coming straight for her, and she grasped her daughter convulsively to her chest to protect her from what was to come.
“Come with me. My Weroance will speak to you,” he said. Sesapatae held out her arms for the baby, but Maggie shook her head. She knew the offer was sincere and that she could trust the woman, but she also knew she could not be parted from her child. If there was nothing within her power to do, she at least was sure she could protect her flesh and blood.
She followed the warrior into the Long House. There were no women sitting regally at his side this time, no warrior standing ready to pounce. He lay alone on his raised dais, his only comfort his oldest wife who tended his wound. Opechancanough bled from a wound to his stomach, and although it appeared to be more lateral to his flank, it could very well be fatal. When he turned his head and opened his round brown eyes, she could see he was well aware of that fact.
“Leave us,” he commanded. His voice held a tremor, yet even in his weakness, he would not be opposed. The wife finished bandaging the wound and quickly obeyed. The Long House emptied on his command. Maggie recalled the last time she had been alone with Winn’s uncle. It was a different Long House and a different village, yet the legendary man lying wounded in front of her was one and the same.
“Come closer, Red Woman. Let me see the child.”
She did as he asked, although her hands trembled as she pulled back the sling and released her sleeping daughter. The child often slept like the dead when her belly was milk full, and she hoped the babe remained quiet throughout their exchange.
“I will hold her,” he said gruffly. Maggie was shocked when he pulled himself into a sitting position, so much so that she rushed forward to help him when he let out a moan and clutched his side. He grunted and shrugged off her ministrations, instead holding his arms out for Kwetii.
“Not too tight,” she whispered. Seeing her lifeblood held in his arms weakened her, and the only motion left in her power was to sit down next to the Weroance on his dais. He raised an eyebrow at her and chuckled, but quickly returned his gaze to Kwetii, appearing enamored with her.
“You think I do not know how? I am a Great Warrior, as well as your husband is,” he said. “This life means much to me.”
He ran one crooked finger along her cheek, and she opened her blue eyes to stare at him. Usually the child made her presence known by screaming upon waking, but laying there in the arms of the elder Weroance she merely studied his weathered face. Maggie let out a sigh.
“Why did you save me?” he asked, keeping his gaze steady on the babe. Maggie swallowed hard and cleared her throat before she spoke.
“I don’t know,” she said softly. She had no urge to lie to him, only the desire to serve him the truth as she knew it, as scattered as it was from her slivered memory of childhood history lessons. “I didn’t think of it as saving you. I just realized too late that it was all poisoned. I didn’t want to see anyone die.”
He nodded, more to himself than to her, and patted the babe as he rocked her.
“Was this my time, Red Woman? Did you chase death from me today?”
“No,” she replied hoarsely. “You won’t die just yet. I know you live to be a very old man.”
He smiled.
“I have ordered the death of all the Time Walkers, and all my warriors obey my command. Yet my own nephew, my favorite, son of my sister, he defies me … for you. For one red-haired Time Walker, he defied me. And now here in my arms, is this blood of my blood, this blood of a Time Walker.” He bent down and pressed his lips gently to Kwetii’s forehead, and the babe continued to stare peacefully at the warrior. “I see you there, you know. You are the one who will send me to death. You are the Time Walker who will bring death to me.”
Maggie put a hand on his arm. Her touch was light, yet she needed to connect to him, to show him somehow that she was no enemy.
“It will not be by my hand, and it will not be today. I can promise you that.”
He winced once more, seeming in pain, and gently turned to place the babe back in her arms. She helped him lay back down, yet as he stretched back onto the furs he reached up with one hand to cup her cheek.
“Keep safe my blood, Red Woman.”
She nodded. The old warrior closed his eyes, and she tucked a fur around him, placing Kwetii next to him as they both gave in to slumber. She would sit with him until his wife returned.
A shadow crossed the doorway. It was Winn, and Maggie threw herself into his waiting arms. Bruised and bleeding with the scent of smoke searing his skin but blessedly intact, he held her tight as his body shuddered.
“Don’t ever leave me again!” she cried, not caring that she was smeared with blood and sweat, nor that he shook his head furiously and clutched her harder.
“Shh, ntehem,” he whispered.
Only a few warriors returned from the peace treaty dinner. Winn was back, and he was safe. It was all she could ask for.
*****
They spoke each night in quiet whispers as they embraced beneath the furs, seeking answers to the question of where to take their small family. Although Chulensak Asuwak decided to return to the remains of the Paspahegh village, Teyas insisted on staying with their band of misfits. Ahi Kekeleksu refused to leave, and although Maggie thought it merely an excuse for Chetan to stay, she was surprised Makedewa opted to join them as well.
Rebecca, however, was another matter entirely. She grew stronger while she lived amongst them, eventually coming to the point where she could tolerate interaction with the men without flying into a panic. Luckily her mind was sharp and she found comfort in the daily labors of living with them, and she knew the people who saved her from the Massacre meant her no harm.
For all his faults, Makedewa was still a brooding male, yet they all noticed the change in him since that fateful day. Formerly rash and loud, he became more thoughtful in his actions and made effort to speak in a neutral manner instead of round-the-clock angry. Clearly, he held more interest in Rebecca then just friendship, and Maggie found it amusing to watch him around the girl. She would have never expected him to fall for an Englishwoman, but as she watched him follow the girl around the camp like a lovesick puppy, she knew he was smitten. He knew how she had been damaged, and for all the desire in his eyes, there also burned a temperate patience he never showed before. Maggie was sure he would never do anything to harm her.
The decision on where to live, however, fell only on Winn, and for that matter, Winn demanded answers of Maggie that she could not give him. It frustrated her that she had not been a better student of history, but hindsight was a luxury she no longer dwelled on. He wanted to go south to live among the Nansemonds,
where he knew they would be welcomed, but Maggie had doubts living among any Indian tribe would be safe for very long. She was fearful of relying on what she knew of history, yet Winn banked their lives on the few facts she was certain of. It was an impasse, for sure, but one that had to be rapidly resolved. Winter would overcome them soon, and to be settled well before the first frost would see much to ensure their survival.
The decision was made, however, and they believed it to be the right one. Maggie could offer no guarantee, and Winn had only his knowledge to guide them. Their destiny lay ahead, a future in the past. South, it would be.
They left on one of those lingering days of summer where the sun still scorched their skin as they worked, but the night brought enough chill to chase them beneath layers of furs. The horses stood waiting, Blaze tied to Maggie’s fat older mare, the yearling nipping at her flanks and causing her to squeal and stomp.
“Ready, Maggie?” Teyas called. Maggie finished tightening the rawhide strap that held her traveling sacks around the barrel of her pony, and Teyas peered over her shoulder.
“If Winn is ready, I’m good.”
“Find him, then, sister, I think he lingers too long at the waterfall.”
“All right. You go on, we’ll catch up. I think Kwetii will sleep some more,” Maggie replied. Teyas shrugged and mounted up, Kwetii carried in front of her in a makeshift pouch. Maggie crafted it after the babe outgrew the swaddling board, and Teyas liked to use it when they rode. The child was nearing too big to use the contraption any longer, but it would serve well for the ride, at least when she slept.
He was not difficult to find. Winn stood looking out over the waterfall when she approached, his countenance sculpted in thought, his warrior’s body softened in a forgiving stance as he gazed at the crashing water. When she moved to his side and slipped her arm through his, she was surprised to see her bloodstone suspended from a rawhide cord, hanging from his hand.
“You still have that,” she said softly.
“It belongs to you,” he replied. He placed it in her hand, closing his fist over it for a moment before he let go.
“I belong to you.”