The people; they must save the people. Bear would want that. As soon as he got the people safely away from this area, Raven would return to the bluff to fight. Around him, other warriors were riding to assist the retreat. Behind them, rifle fire and cannon echoed through the hot July afternoon. Bear. Raven didn’t want to think about losing his brother; the brother who had looked after him all these years. He had let Bear deal with the danger again while he fled. He must go back!
But even as he hesitated, reining in his horse, more warriors abandoned the bluff as hopeless, ran into camp. Raven recognized the terror and defeat in their dark faces. The soldiers would be coming after them soon and if the warriors didn’t manage to get the tribe to a safe haven, the soldiers would overtake and kill them all. Strung out along a trail was a vulnerable position for the band. There were wounded in the column as they started out and some of them would not survive the cruel march, Raven knew, but there was no other choice but to keep riding. Behind him, the rifle fire had slacked off and only the soldier’s cannon boomed now. Raven looked up the line toward Willow. She was too busy with the children to realize Bear wasn’t in the march. He could only hope it was awhile before she noticed his absence or she would want to turn around and go back for him.
His friend, Pony, rode up next to him at a gallop. “I left the bluff, I was out of ammunition. There’s a few holding out, they may keep the soldiers occupied for another day or two.”
“Did you see my brother?” Raven demanded.
Pony nodded. “He wasn’t moving; there was blood. I am sorry, friend.”
Raven winced and closed his eyes. “Come with me, friend, we’ll at least retrieve his body for a warrior’s burial.”
Raven and Pony wheeled their horses and even with Ollokot yelling at them, they took off for the top of a hill where they could see the battle scene along the river below.
The other young warrior pointed. “See? There he lies! ”
Raven squinted, heart pounding hard. Was it possible his friend was mistaken? There were bodies sprawled at grotesque angles across the prairie. Bear; that was Bear, all right. There was no mistaking his big body lying so still with blood soaking his buckskins. The sunlight glinted off the brass buttons of the troops moving up along the bluff now. A barrage of rifle fire from the snipers’ weapons drove the soldiers back, but it was only temporary, Raven knew.
“Let us go for Bear’s body!” He urged his Appaloosa forward, but even as he did so, the soldiers turned the Gatling gun toward them in a deadly rain of fire.
“No!” his friend shouted. “It is foolish to waste our lives to bring out the dead! Do you not feel the hattia tinukin sweeping across the grass for their spirits?”
“Then we should at least stay and fight with the other warriors,” Raven argued.
“They are all crack shots,” Pony said, “we will do better to stay with the column until we pick up more weapons and can choose our terrain.”
Again the bluecoats laid down a deadly pattern of fire just ahead of them.
“Come!” Pony demanded. “They almost have our range! Will it help your brother to die here, too?” He galloped away from the scene.
Raven took one more look at his brother, lying so still in the bloody grass. Pony was right. Forgive me, Bear, he whispered, I will not waste my life; I will use it to save the others. He turned and galloped back to the retreating people, and had to blink away the tears that blinded him.
As he blended into the line, Ollokot rode up beside him, his face grim. “You two young fools don’t help us with your brave gestures. It will be dark soon. Maybe the soldiers won’t notice we’ve slipped away into the trees until it’s too late.”
Bear. Bear was dead. Raven had never known such anguish, but he knew Ollokot was right. He rode along beside the war leader, willing himself not to look back where Bear and the others lay, their warrior songs finished forever. “What do we do now?”
Joseph’s brother seemed to consider a long moment. “If we could just get across the Lolo Trail into that place called Montana, we might be safe.”
“That is more than a hundred miles through mountains on narrow, icy ledges.”
Ollokot shrugged. “I know the distance. What else can we do? We cannot let the brave men who died here have died in vain.”
“Not in vain.” Raven fought to control his grief. He must not weep like a woman. He must think of the living; that was what Bear would want. His brother had died an honored warrior to save the people; the warrior I’ll never be. Raven sighed. Reluctantly, he turned his attention to herding the horses along the trail. They would need the horses on this long, long trip. He dreaded telling Willow what had happened. In all the confusion of hundreds of mounted people and with her trying to help everyone, she didn’t seem to have noticed that Bear wasn’t in the line moving away from the Clearwater.
At least she might be carrying Bear’s son; that would cheer her somewhat. Bear had been a very fortunate man to have her love if only for a little while. Raven could have gone to his death with a calm heart if Willow had loved him that way.
Tears came to his eyes and stubbornly, he blinked them back. Once again, Bear had saved his younger brother and this time at the cost of his own life.
Now he saw that Willow was looking around frantically as she rode. He did not want to be the one to tell her, but she was galloping up to him. “Raven,” she looked frantic, “I don’t see Bear! Where is he?”
He must lie to her; Bear would want him to. If she knew the truth, Willow would turn her horse and return to the river, die beside her beloved’s body, attempting to avenge him. Bear would not want her to die; he had loved her as no man ever loved a woman. “He is holding the soldiers back,” Raven forced the lie through his lips. “He said go on; he will catch up with us at dusk when the warriors can slip away from the soldiers.”
Her face furrowed in doubt. “Are you sure? Maybe I should—”
“No, go on. He will be angry if you return there.” Raven didn’t look into those beautiful green eyes. He didn’t want to see her worry and he was afraid she would know he lied. For Bear, he must keep her from returning to the slaughter behind them. If the soldiers caught up with them, would Raven have the courage to fight and die, hold them back as his beloved brother had just done? He didn’t know, but secretly, he doubted it. Deep in his heart, he knew he would never have the courage and the honor of his brother.
“Go back to your place in the line; the children need you,” he ordered.
Willow hesitated, then wheeled and returned to the others. At least, he wouldn’t have to tell her yet. Until he did, he could almost deny it to himself. Raven loved her too much himself to see her hurt. If there was any way he could have done it, he would have traded places with the dead man so that Willow could be happy.
Behind them in the distance, the faint crack of rifle fire echoed as the remaining warriors held the soldiers back. With any luck, in the darkness, they might slip away and follow the column. If the Nez Perce could just reach the Lolo Trail, surely the army wouldn’t follow. Raven kept his mind on herding the horses, keeping the line moving. He must not think about losing his brother right now; he must think about his duty. At least, riding at the end of the line, he wouldn’t have to answer Willow’s questions or look her in the face. Eventually, she would realize that Bear was not coming. Then she would hate Raven even more and curse him because he hadn’t stayed behind and died beside his brother.
It was dark when the band found a sheltered grove of trees and reined in. Willow felt relief as Joseph ordered a halt. The toddler was asleep in her travois and she was so weary herself, all she wanted to do was find a sheltered place and rest, but there was work to be done. Anxiously, she scanned the horizon, wondering when Bear and the others would catch up to the column. She must not even think her deepest fears, she scolded herself as she brushed her hair from her eyes.
She built a tiny fire so the soldiers miles behind them couldn’t smell the smoke an
d filled her bucket from a nearby stream. She had food. Some of the others had escaped with nothing at all and there were wounded to care for. She put the water on to boil and added some dried meat. A rich broth would be good for the wounded. No one had saved their lodges, they would all be sleeping out under the stars until they could replace them. On cold nights, that would make for miserable conditions. She must keep busy so she wouldn’t worry about Bear.
Willow found the old grandmother and together, they dressed wounds and fed children from her kettle of steaming broth. Darkness fell and in the camp, the faint mourning cries of those who knew their men were dead drifted to her ears. Many of the people were discouraged and frightened. There seemed to be disagreement among the leaders about what to do next. From what she could overhear, some of them wanted to surrender to the soldiers, take their chances on the new reservation. Others insisted on making the attempt to cross the Lolo Trail. The Nez Perce had friends in Montana Territory, the Flatheads, and some clans of the Crow tribe.
Willow didn’t care where she went as long as she had her man by her side. Faintly in the distant darkness, she seemed to hear the occasional echo of a rifle and wondered how long the warriors would hold the soldiers at bay before they slipped away to join the survivors.
She saw Raven’s silhouette out by some trees. Looking Glass had sent him to guard the horse herd. He had not eaten, she thought, she had better take him something. She got a gourd of broth and walked out there. He sat under a tree with his rifle across his knees, staring back toward the Clearwater.
Strange, she thought, his shoulders were shaking. Was he cold? Only when she walked up behind him on silent feet, did she realize he was sobbing in a soft, terrible way, the way strong men cry who have never surrendered to grief before.
“Raven? What is it?”
He turned his head, startled; looked up at her. She saw the tears in his eyes and the utter grief on his handsome face, the way his broad shoulders slumped. He was not much older than her, but somehow, tonight, she felt so ancient and he looked so very young and vulnerable. “I-I tried,” he whispered. “I wanted to go back; he insisted I ride to warn the camp.”
She knew the truth then; knew with a terrible agony as if she’d just been stabbed in the heart. The gourd fell from nerveless fingers and she cried out, “He’s dead, isn’t he? You lied to me! You knew he was dead!”
She began to scream and Raven jumped up, put his hand over her mouth, holding her shaking body against his. “Oh, don’t, Willow! I can’t bear to hear you cry! You must not scream and alert the soldier scouts! Believe me, if I could, I would have died in his place so you could be happy! Try to take comfort that he is now in Akunkenekoo, the Land Above.”
She wept then as she had never wept before, cried until she had no tears left. Only then did she notice Raven was shaking like an aspen leaf and she knew that his pain and his loss were even more terrible than hers. She put her arms around him and held him close, comforting him as she would a small boy. “It’s all right, Raven,” she sobbed. “It-it’s all right.”
“Again, I ran. I’m a coward! Always a coward!” He held onto her as if she were a rock he could cling to while terrible reality washed him away. Tonight, in their terrible mutual grief, she felt like the mature one and he was only the shattered younger brother after all. She had never felt such pain; such grief, and yet she found herself comforting him. “I know you are brave; I know you never meant to leave him there.”
“I-I tried to go back,” he said, shaking all over, “but Joseph ordered me to help clear the camp.”
“Maybe he escaped.” She held onto that hope like a life preserver in a stormy sea.
Raven shook his head. “Ask Pony. We did go back, attempting to reclaim his body. A brave warrior should have an honored burial; not be eaten by vultures.”
“You-you saw his body?”
“Yes.” He turned away and she heard him swallow hard several times before he could continue. “We couldn’t get close enough to get it because of the soldiers’ guns.”
In her mind, she saw her beloved sprawled in the grass, vultures tearing his flesh. Her anguish was too terrible for mere tears. “Don’t think about it. We must look after the living now. There are many days ahead when the tribe will need brave men.”
“Then they won’t need me,” Raven said, bitterness in his voice. “I have no honor; no courage.”
She must bring him some ease to his pain or else he might do something terrible in his grief, throw himself off a mountain, ride in a suicide charge against the soldiers so that they gunned him down like a dog. “Don’t say that! Listen to me, Raven,” she whispered, now more concerned about his grief than her own. “Remember Bear thought there was a universal pattern to all things; that nothing happened by chance?”
He nodded, still not looking at her.
“Remember he said that when he was little, his life was saved by a Cheyenne Dog Soldier named Iron Knife? He was certain that it happened so he in turn could save you from that grizzly.”
“Why would it be important to save me?” Raven snorted. “I am worthless; I’ll never do anything worthwhile. Better I should have stayed and died at the River and Bear should have escaped.”
She closed her eyes and remembered Bear’s smile, his tender lovemaking. “I-I must believe that there is a reason, even though we don’t know it yet; otherwise, all life’s tragedies seem cruel and pointless.”
There was a long silence. “Willow, do you really believe that?”
Pain; her whole body, soul, and mind seemed to be one mass of pain. “Yes; I-I have faith in you, Raven; just as Bear did. Now you will have to prove that he didn’t waste his life in saving yours; that you are going to do something noble and honorable with the years he has given you.”
He looked at her and sighed. “It was my turn to die; and he took my place.”
“Maybe not.” She patted his shoulder. “Who knows when his turn comes or why one is saved and another dies? Somehow, it must all fit into God’s giant scheme of things. Think about tomorrow; there’s still so much to do, so much ahead of us to deal with.”
“You are right,” he said softly. “I have to take his place, do the things he would have done. My people need me.”
“Yes, and I need you, too, as does the old grandmother and the children. Now let me get you some food and you rest if you can. Before dawn, I imagine the people will be headed for the mountains.”
He nodded. “Yes, I will need food to keep up my strength.”
“I’ll get it.” She turned and walked back to her kettle. Her own soul was as numb as a stone, and she never expected to feel happiness again. Willow’s grief was so terrible, it felt like physical pain. Bear had meant everything to her and now he was dead. She wasn’t ever going to have his child. All she could do now for the man she loved was take care of his brother. She paused and looked toward the distant hills where Bear now lay for eternity. Not in this life ever again would he embrace her or kiss her lips.
What lay ahead for the Nez Perce with the biggest, most powerful army in the world pursuing them? Maybe the warriors who had died back there had only postponed the inevitable; maybe they were all going to die tomorrow or the next day or next week. How could a handful of people go up against cannons and Gatling guns? She must not think about that tonight. There were wounded to tend to and frightened small children to comfort.
Willow took a deep breath to bolster her sagging courage and carried a steaming bowl of broth back to where Raven sat sentry duty with his rifle. “You’ll feel better with a little food in you.”
“Thank you, Willow, for not blaming me for Bear’s death.” He took the broth, began to eat.
How could she blame him? She knew Bear with all his nobility. No doubt, when he realized that the warriors who stayed behind would die, he had thought of an excuse to send Raven out. Bear, always so brave, so self-sacrificing. She must not cry anymore. If she let herself go, she would not be able to stop, and she co
uld not be selfish in her grief. Her pain was not as important as her people’s safety. In her heart, she was Nez Perce after all. Nez Perce were special people, she remembered, created from a heart’s own blood and at this moment, she felt as if hers had been torn from her chest.
She turned and looked at the distant Bitterroot Mountains to the east, their snowcapped peaks shining in the moonlight. The trail would be narrow and steep. The air would be cold and there wouldn’t be much grass for all these hundreds of horses. One misstep and anyone could fall to his death. Many of the old ones were too frail to make that long trek and the wounded might not survive the ordeal, either. Yet, what choice did they have with the army coming after them?
Somewhere, a night bird called and a wolf howled its loneliness. When she took a deep breath, she smelled the scent of horses and wildflowers. Today, she had lost the most important thing in her universe and she didn’t even have his child to remember him by. She hadn’t know such mental anguish was possible.
“Willow, are you all right?”
She couldn’t speak, but she managed to nod. “We-we’ re going to make it, Raven; for Bear and the others who won’t be going with us. We’ll journey to freedom for them!”
Willow turned and walked away very fast, fighting for control. She had responsibilities, so she must not give way to grief. Grieving was a luxury she had no time for right now. Once her people made it across the mountains, she would have the rest of her life to mourn her loss. Tonight, she would hold up and hold on. Tomorrow would be here too soon and the ordeal of the terrible Lolo Trail lay ahead of her people.
Eighteen
The Nez Perce lingered a little while longer in Idaho Territory, disagreeing on what to do. Joseph, to save his people further death and trouble, appeared to want to surrender. However, the other leaders were convinced that if they surrendered, the leaders would be hanged as had happened four years ago in the Modoc War, and back almost twenty years ago in the earlier Indian outbreaks in the great Northwest. Besides, the leaders reasoned, the people in Montana were a different tribe from the ones in Idaho; they had no quarrel with the Nez Perce and would surely let them come into their land, hunt buffalo, and live in peace.
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