by Liz D. Marx
Well, this could actually end up being quite amusing, Pamela thought.
Chapter Seven
“Adsila, pay attention! You’ll burn the food again.”
Adsila’s aunt shoved her aside and took over stirring of the stew. Every morning she helped the other women prepare the daily meals for the tribe. She would select the beans for the stew, gather pumpkin seeds, or knead the maize into delicious flatbread. While the men went out hunting, the women took care of farming, cooking and educating the young. It wasn’t an arduous task―far from it, sometimes it was even enjoyable. They sang old songs, chatted about the latest news brought by the trading with neighboring tribes, and discussed good marriage arrangements.
Adsila liked those mundane tasks, but she knew in her heart that such a life was not for her. She wanted more; she wanted something else. The magic of her ancestors coursed through her veins. Images of the past and the future invaded her mind every time she embraced a manual, repetitive task―like stirring the stew, for example. She couldn’t help it. Ever since she was a little girl, she heard voices and saw things no one else would.
Once, when she was only eight years old―eight ganu-gos in her language―the Quapaws requested an assembly to discuss the safe keeping of Mantaka. The day before the set date, Adsila had a horrible vision of fire and blood. Completely distraught, she told the Shaman about it. He took it to heart, to her surprise, and enhanced his entourage of warriors. The meeting was tense, but the Quapaws left without a drop of blood being shed. But a few days later, one of the Shaman’s most trusted men found signs of an ambush nearby. The Quapaws had definitely planned on double-crossing their wealthier neighbor.
Her dream had been a vision.
Adsila often wondered why Dai-mo had presented her with the gift. Perhaps it was because her father was the Grand Chenesi, the tribe’s spiritual leader and medicine man. Or maybe there was more to it; she didn’t know. In one of their rare encounters, she had asked Ami-Tolah, the goddess of Mantaka and protector of her most cherished place, to shed some light but the Lady of the Rainbow just replied, “The gods give you the needle and the thread, but you are the one to sew your mantle of life.”
Her father hadn’t been very helpful, either. Second to the Shaman, he was the most highly regarded member of their tribe. With the exception of special gatherings, he lived a life of seclusion, spending his days communicating with the gods. Adsila missed him; it hadn’t always been like that.
Before the previous Grand Chenesi’s noo-hi faded onto the waters of Sada-noo-hi and her father was awarded the distinguished title of spiritual leader, he had been the best parent of them all. Often he would take Adsila hunting or fishing, despite her mother’s protests. He taught her about herbs and their medicinal qualities, how to pray to the gods to help them cure ugly wounds, and even how to perform a few spells.
Adsila had begged to be taken as his apprentice. She knew in her heart she had been born to follow in his footsteps, but he had simply replied, “Daughter, you are to flourish and have children of your own; that is your destiny.”
Not known for giving up easily, Adsila then asked her mother to intervene on her behalf, only to see her father’s cruel decision reiterated. “When you have children of your own, you will understand why, Sila,” her mother had said, then added almost in the same breath, “Now, go fetch me some white beans.”
The problem was that Adsila didn’t want to understand. Why did her tribe only allow men to be chenesis? It wasn’t fair. The gods had blessed her with the gift―Kan-sa, the wind, answered her every call; Ah-gana, the rain which blessed their crops, seldom ignored her prayers. She was as talented as any other tribesman, so why couldn’t she become their spiritual leader?
“The Chenesi is a very important figure. He is the guardian of the sacred fire and waters of Mantaka, daughter of mine,” her father had explained. “When I die, my nearest male blood kin will succeed me in this honorable task.” While she would be cooking, farming, and making clay pots... By the gods, she would rather have her noo-hi fade than live that life!
Now that her fate had been decided, they were all just waiting for the Shaman to choose her future husband. Adsila’s blood boiled every time she thought about that―she wasn’t even allowed to choose who she was going to spend the rest of her life with! Every passing day, Adsila died a little inside.
The sound of hooves brought her back from those painful thoughts. She stood up and watched a band of five men gallop across the village.
“Uwetsi Kaye!” she called out and ran after them.
Kaye careered proudly on top of his black stallion in front of his fellow men. He was the single reason why Adsila hadn’t succumbed to the darkness yet. He would be the only one she would gladly welcome in her nuptial bed. He was almost ten ganu-gos older than her and had never taken on a wife, despite the several proposals he had received from tribes across the land. There was no woman in the southlands who did not fancy him, and Adsila knew exactly why.
His dark brown eyes were so intense that it felt like he could see through her, all the way to her most intimate desires. His long black hair was usually in a half braid and carried the dark feather of a raven, representative of his noo-hi. He had thick, enticing lips, and the world stopped still when he smiled.
Today, Kaye wore the full official gear. Leather leggings had been added to the usual breechcloths―a sign of lengthy travels. His buffalo-skin robe had been adorned with red and black symbols of strength and power. A large black raven had been carefully painted on the back. As customary, every warrior had their noo-hi portrayed on their official clothing.
Why was he wearing all that? Where had he been?
He came to a halt in the middle of the wide clearing where they usually had their gatherings, descended from his horse and called his father. “I’ve got news!”
Adsila froze. That was not the way to ask for an audience with the great Shaman. A chill went up her spine and she had a brief but striking vision of burning homes and terrifying screams. Oh, dear Ami-Tolah, this would not end well.
“Father!” Adsila heard Kaye shout out outside his father’s tent.
By that time, the whole tribe had gathered around, curious about why the young prince was being so insolent.
Adsila broke into the crowd and tried to talk some sense into her friend, “Kaye, what are you doing? The Shaman would never answer such a dissident call.”
“Yes, he will, Sila,” Kaye replied with a confident yet boyish smile.
Adsila had never liked her nickname, but when spoken by those beautiful, full lips of his, she didn’t mind it at all.
“I’ve just returned from a very important meeting that will seal our future,” Kaye whispered, his eyes were full of pride.
“What do you mean?”
“The white men have spoken and offered a very good deal for our land.”
Adsila’s jaw dropped in shock. What did he mean? They were going to sell their land to the same white people they had fought and hid from for so long?
She didn’t understand it, but before she could ask for an explanation, the Shaman stepped out of his beehive-shaped grass home and spoke the words that were on every tribesperson’s mind.
“What is this disturbance, Uwetsi?” the Shaman asked, addressing Kaye by his official title. “Why do you call upon me without proper decorum?”
Adsila cringed with the Shaman’s harsh tone.
“I have news, Father. Most pressing, yet of good omen,” Kaye replied, apparently oblivious to his father’s austerity.
“I heard you went to the meeting scheduled by the white people with the Cherokees, despite my disapproval,” the Shaman said. He had placed himself a few steps away from his son. His stance was rigid―legs apart, arms folded across the chest, dark eyes seeing everything.
“Yes, Great Shaman. I did go because I am the uwetsi of this tribe and one day I will lead them.”
“And how are you going to lead them, Kaye? By giving t
heir lands away to the white invaders?”
Adsila heard the angry response from the crowd, who had so far been happy to silently watch the exchange between father and son.
“Not give away, Father, no! I made a very good deal. They are going to pay us good gold for our lands,” Kaye spoke above the disapproving outcries.
“White man’s gold,” the Shaman snarled. His heavy tones mirrored the dense air that had settled around them all. “Why would we want their gold? We never needed it before they arrived and imposed their ways on us all. For generations, we did well bartering with the other tribes as we saw fit and just.”
“They have powder guns, Father!” Kaye shouted, losing his composure. His earlier boyish confidence turned into angry desperation. “They will kill us all, like they did the other tribes!”
The mass reacted as if the tribe was being attacked at that precise moment. Adsila heard people crying; a few men dropped to their knees and started praying for mercy. Oh, dear gods, what had Kaye done?
“No one is going to be killed.” The baritone voice of the Grand Chenesi silenced them all.
Too entranced by the argument between the Shaman and her best friend, Adsila hadn’t even seen her father approach. Everyone looked at the bulky man who was on the edge of the human arena that had been formed.
“I have consulted with the gods and they will protect us,” the Chenesi announced as he took a few steps inside the makeshift fighting ring.
“Like they protected the Chickasaw?” Kaye retorted back, referring to the forced removal of their neighbors out of their land a few moon cycles ago.
“The Chickasaw were exposed. We are hidden deep in the forbidden forest; the white men’s army will never find us,” one of the elderly shouted from the crowd. The tribespeople cheered in agreement.
“What about the Cherokees? They are great warriors, almost as powerful as we are, and they have just signed the treaty. They know they would not stand a chance against the white men’s powder gun,” Kaye replied.
“We have the gods on our side,” Adsila’s father said. She could see he was also losing his patience. “Leaving our land is not an option.”
“With the gold they give us, we will be able to procure any other land we desire,” Kaye said, focusing on his father. He seemed to still be hopeful about winning the Shaman’s approval.
“And where are we to go?” a woman standing next to Adsila asked.
“They have offered the land where Dai-mo rests. The Choctaws, the Muscogee-Creeks and even the Seminoles had gone there already. I heard it has plenty of good terrain for crops,” Kaye replied.
The crowd was divided in two: the ones who supported the Shaman and wanted to stay, and the ones who had started to see the white men’s offer as a possibility.
Adsila’s stomach churned―horrible images of burning homes and her loved ones’ bodies sprawled dead on the ground flooded her mind. Please, Dai-mo, don’t let anything happen to my people!
Bile rose up into her mouth. “And who will protect the Valley of Vapors?” Adsila asked. It had been more of a thought, but at her words, everyone stopped talking.
She met Kaye’s gaze. The disappointment in his eyes cut her heart in half. She tried to apologize but her father’s grave voice reverberated across the field.
“If we dishonor our holy pledge to protect Mantaka by leaving it to be ravaged by the white invaders, the gods will punish us. We shall never find peace again.”
“They won’t punish us because this is the way of the future,” Kaye retorted.
“Kaye, stop,” Adsila rushed forward and touched his arm, but he seemed to not want to hear and shoved her aside.
“We cannot protect our children against their magic. You will guide us to death if we stay,” he yelled at his father.
“Enough!” the Shaman’s order put a definite halt on Kaye’s ranting.
After a few moments of tense silence, Kaye’s father, the leader of their people, looked deeply into his son’s eyes and discharged the order that would seal the uwetsi’s fate forever.
“You shamed this tribe by conspiring behind your shaman’s back; you betrayed your people by selling what is rightfully theirs. You leave me no choice, Uwetsi Kaye. You are banished from this tribe.”
Adsila stopped breathing. “No!”
She ran across the clearing and kneeled down by the Shaman’s foot. “Please, Great Leader, be merciful. He is your son.”
“No, he is not my son. He is a traitor to his people.”
Adsila looked up to see the Shaman’s austere gaze, but she also saw through the façade. The father in him, not the leader, was crying inside.
Chloe woke up with a start. It took her a while to realize it had just been another nightmare. She turned on the light on the bedside table and checked her cell phone. Three a.m. She had arranged for the front desk to wake her up at seven, but there was no way she would be able to go back to sleep now. Her covers had fallen on the floor and her pillow was soaking wet.
Why the heck was she dreaming of Mason?
That Native American prince looked exactly like him. In all her previous dreams the prince had just been a presence, like a faceless aura.
“Maybe it’s because my mind is going haywire with all that’s happened lately,” she told herself as her feet hit the carpeted floor.
She went to the mini bar and poured herself a glass of water. Mason had definitely made an impression on her, but she still couldn’t understand why she was so drawn to him. Yes, he was stunningly exotic, but he obviously wasn’t into her and she had never been one to lose her mind over men. She usually didn’t even notice them anymore. It had been so long since her last date that her virginity was probably growing back again.
“Seriously, Chloe, get a grip,” she said to her reflection in the mirror. Her blond curls were all unruly. “You’re about to spend a couple of days with that man, so you’d better get your act together and stop fantasizing.”
After a few more minutes arguing with herself she decided to try to sleep again, but it took her a long time to accomplish that with the images of the handsome Tula prince haunting her mind.
Chapter Eight
She was late. Mason hated having to wait around for anyone, let alone a crazy historian who was making him go on a wild goose chase across Arkansas.
Foster called back last night with a full report about Miss Chloe Doyle. She was a single child from a devoted Christian family, born in a little town called St Joseph in Minnesota, but moved with her mother to Washington D.C. after her father lost all of their money in a failed business venture and committed suicide. Her mother was still alive, and about five years ago she moved back to her hometown where she still worked as a nurse.
The petite blonde tornado, as Mason decided to call Chloe, worked very long hours, didn’t have many friends and seldom took time off to visit her mother. Chloe had worked hard to get her PhD in Native American tribes and was one of the experts at the archive department in the renowned Smithsonian Institute. And that explained how she got her hands in that stone.
Speak of the devil…
Mason saw the object of his thoughts walking down the street carrying a large hard-top purple suitcase and two small matching valises. Her blonde locks were tied back in a short ponytail. The cream dress from the night before was replaced by blue jeans and a forest green T-shirt. Her brown leather jacket hung loose over the bags and kept falling onto the street which meant that every ten feet or so, Chloe had to stop to pick the garment up. She was by far the most clumsy, unselfconscious person Mason had ever met. Why didn’t she just tie the damn thing around her hips?
“You’re late,” he said when she finally arrived where the truck was parked.
Without waiting for a reply, Mason got into the black Ford F-150 he had rented that morning and turned the engine on. Realizing she hadn’t followed suit, he turned around to find the woman still standing on the street. He closed his eyes and counted to ten. Then he got o
ut of the car again and looked at her, the obvious question stamped on his face.
“You cannot expect me to get into a stranger’s car without any explanation as to where we’re going, what the plan is and, most importantly, why we’re going by car,” the blonde tornado replied.
“Stranger? You hired me to be your guide, remember?”
“Yes, I do, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to simply follow you around. I’m the client so you need to brief me properly.” Her green gaze did not waver from his. “And could you help me with these bags, please?”
Mason was stunned. Did she just tell him off?
Not believing his ears but not wanting to delay their departure even more, he gave in. He walked around the truck, opened the bed cover and hurled all three pieces of luggage in without much care. “What part of ‘travel light’ didn’t you understand?”
“I am travelling light. I left the other bag at the hotel,” Chloe replied as she opened a map of Hot Springs National Park and placed it on the hood. “So, I took a look at the map last night and compared it to the description of the area in De Soto’s chronicles. I think that we should start checking out this area over here.”
Mason didn’t even bother to look at the spot she was pointing to. He had a good idea of where his tribe had lived, but may the gods strike him three times if he was going to take her there. “The legend of Mantaka is quite vague. I have a friend who works at the Indian Territory Museum in Caddo who can help us pinpoint where it may have been.”
“Caddo Valley, Arkansas?” Chloe repeated, trying to find the small town on the map.
Mason gently flipped it onto the other side where the map of the United States was. “Caddo City, Oklahoma.”
Her eyes widened in surprise. “Oklahoma? But that’s miles from here.”
“Two hundred and twenty to be exact, but I can make it in four hours,” Mason replied, casually leaning on the side of the car. “Do you really want to find that sacred place or just play around a bit and pretend you do?”