The Indians began to return fire. Herron watched from the tower as one of the savages coursed past, his whistler’s color pale against the pale grass, as was the Indian’s own clothing. The warrior rode the whistler, holding no reins, controlling it only with the pressure from his feet and knees. The beast sped, slowed, turned twice back upon its tracks in a figure-eight, while bullets from the men on the walls slashed through the grass where he had been, or where he had been heading. Then he let fly an arrow. With an accuracy that Herron could barely believe, it found its mark and took a man down to his knees, pierced through the arm. Elsewhere around the wall the same dance was performed, but other soldiers were not so lucky.
“Use the wall,” a sergeant shouted at his men. “Use the crenellations. That’s why we built ‘em, lads!”
The soldiers complied, but still, as they stood to track one target for a shot, Indians from the other direction would shoot and soldiers would go down. The exchange of fire went on, and Herron saw no Indians lying in the dust.
“Colonel,” he said. “May I suggest that you concentrate your men along two of the walls and mass your fire into volleys.”
“Do you think that will help?”
Herron looked at his pocket watch. “In the twenty minutes since this raid commenced, I have counted sixteen of your men wounded and two killed outright. At that rate you can last a little over two hours. The sun sets in four. You will not survive with these tactics.”
“General, with all due respect, my men are engineers and carpenters, not regular army.”
“Excuses won’t save their skins, Colonel. Your men are dying. Take my suggestion or not, but do something before it is too late.”
McCormack hesitated. Herron felt for him. The colonel couldn’t relinquish direct command over his men without disgrace, but he was inexperienced in battle. His men fought with precision but without confidence, and it was confidence that made all the difference in a fight.
Two more men fell back with arrow wounds as McCormack struggled with his choice. Herron made it for him.
“Do it, Colonel,” he said in a low voice so his seconds would not hear. “Do it now.”
McCormack seemed almost relieved by Herron’s order. He turned to his battalion commanders. “Please concentrate your men on the east and north walls. You’ll have the sun behind you there. Reserve companies ‘A’ and ‘B’ for the west and south. Put Company ‘C’ in the yard, ready to ride. For the rest, mass your fire into volleys by company. Aim for the whistlers if you must, but drive those savages off.”
“Yes, sir.” The two officers saluted and left to carry out their orders.
Herron peered over the tower wall. The Indians were circling closer now, and their whistlers were varying their colors from dark to light, making it nearly impossible to track them for a shot. The Indians, though, made evil use of almost every arrow, and McCormack’s men continued to fall.
The soldiers hustled into their new positions and crouched behind the walls in groups of twenty. Their sergeants spotting for them, they prepared to loose their salvos upon the enemy.
Storm Arriving pulled another arrow from his first quiver and set it to the bowstring. He pressed with his left foot and leaned in as his whistler rounded the corner of the fort. He saw no shot to take, and held his own fire as he swung around the eastern side. He squinted, saw a bluecoat at the wall, clenched his knees to steady his mount. He raised his bow, and pulled back the string.
A score of bluecoats stood from behind the wall, bristling with guns. Sunlight glinted. Storm Arriving let his arrow fly unaimed, grabbed the first rope and dug in with his left toe. His whistler pulled left toward the wall as a gout of smoke exploded over his head. Whistlers screamed. Men shouted. Ahead, another lone bluecoat was watching, sighting for others hidden behind the wall. Storm Arriving veered right as bluecoats stood to fire. He banked left again to face them, to give them the narrowest target, to cut under their aim. Twenty guns spewed white fire. Bullets zipped and slapped the ground behind him. Agony filled the air. Pungent smoke—metallic and sharp—stung his nostrils, a thick fog of hot haze. Down the line, another volley, more smoke, and men and beasts went down.
Big Nose was wrong about their number, he thought quickly. Wrong by half.
He held on as his whistler hurdled a fallen comrade and heeled in to turn and put some distance between himself and the wall. He halted his whistler and ordered it down into the dried grass. The drake crouched and paled his skin. Storm Arriving readied another arrow, aimed at one of the sighters along the wall, but atop the tower, he spied bluecoats who had no rifles.
Chiefs, he knew: bluecoat chiefs.
He aimed, fired, and was on his mount and riding as bullets began to rip the grass.
Herron only heard the arrow as it sliced through the air and hit with a meaty thunk. Quincy didn’t say a word. He simply collapsed into a twisted heap like a broken toy. Herron stared at his aide for what seemed a long minute, saw the arrow that protruded from his chest, saw the dark brown of Quincy’s irises disappear as his pupils expanded to take in eternity, saw the cabochon bead of a single droplet of bright red blood on the arrow’s raven-black fletching. Then time returned and McCormack was tugging at his sleeve.
“General. You must depart the platform.”
Herron jerked his arm free of the colonel’s grasp. He pointed out beyond the walls. “They’re changing tactics. We’ll have to change ours. God damn it, man, look!”
The dust and gunsmoke dimmed the view of the field but it was clear that the Indians had shifted their methods. Only a few rode back and forth past the walls. Elsewhere, ghostly warriors appeared from nowhere, rode mounts of insubstantial air, and disappeared again. The field was littered with dead and wounded—probably two score of the enemy down—but every time a company stood to volley at a passing rider, a dozen Indians seemed to sprout from the ground itself, loosing deadly shafts and then sinking back down into the earth.
“Send out Company ‘C’,” Herron said.
“Send them out?”
“Yes. Attack.”
“Attack what?”
Herron pointed. “They’re right there. Right in front of us. A hundred yards out from the gate. The men on the ground will see them. Open the gate and attack.”
“General, I—”
Herron glared. “You have your orders, Colonel.”
McCormack hesitated, a moment of defiance, but an emotion Herron understood completely. He nodded once, acknowledging his subordinate’s protest. McCormack saluted and turned to issue commands.
Yes, Herron thought: men will die. But it is not our job to keep them all alive. It is our job to ensure that, if they must die, their deaths are useful.
Company “C” formed up in ranks behind the heavy-timbered gate.
“Ready!” shouted their first sergeant. The men gripped their rifles and leaned forward like foot-racers at a church picnic.
“Open the gate!”
The blocks were pulled, the bolts drawn back, and the single door swung out.
The rifle fire increased. Storm Arriving and a dozen others ducked back down behind their whistlers. He saw Wolf Robe a few yards closer to the wall, nearly flat on the ground. Storm Arriving readied another arrow but did not shoot. He had already emptied his first quiver—others too would be starting to run low—and he could not afford to waste any shots.
Then he heard them, the bluecoats. A throaty, urgent sound that chilled him with the memory of battles fought along the Big Salty.
“Prepare!”
The Kit Foxes were ready and the first bluecoats died at the gate. The next ones through fired their rifles and whistlers cried out in distress as they were hit. Several beasts bolted, leaving their riders exposed. More bluecoats came out of the gate, rifles in hand. Storm Arriving grabbed his mount’s first rope.
“Kit Foxes, fall back. Quickly!”
Wolf Robe was still hiding, frozen by panic as the bluecoats charged the field.
/> “Get up! Wolf Robe! We go!”
Bullets sang through the thick afternoon air. Storm Arriving saw the young Kit Fox grab his first rope, saw him dragged upward as the beast leapt into motion. Storm Arriving turned his own whistler and sped away from the fort with all the others.
They rode until they were out of range of the bluecoats’ rifles and then they drew up and halted. Storm Arriving and Big Nose took stock.
“This is bad,” Storm Arriving said, counting the men that were with them and looking back at the field. The bodies of soldiers and their whistlers lay in the dust outside the wooden walls. Worse than that, the bluecoats, now retreating back inside the gate, had with them three Kit Fox soldiers. Storm Arriving felt his heart ache at the sight of it.
“Wolf Robe,” Big Nose said. “Where is my little brother?”
Storm Arriving pointed.
“What in hell are they doing?” Herron asked.
“General? I ordered them to take prisoners.”
“Prisoners? What in Hell are you going to do with prisoners?”
McCormack was nonplussed. “Why...interrogate them, sir. What else?”
Herron glared at the colonel. He walked to the rail that overlooked the yard. Men, wounded and dead, Quincy among the latter, lay in the shade of an improvised awning outside the infirmary. McCormack’s surgeon major moved quickly among the wounded, ascertaining criticality. In the center of the yard the survivors of Company “C” were assembled in a circle around the three Indians brought in from the field. Other men were joining the circle.
The Indians stood close together: an older man and a youth supporting a wounded man between them. The man in the middle stood on one leg, his other bent at an ugly angle below the knee, useless. The trio eyed the surrounding soldiers, but only the boy’s face evinced any sign of fear, eyes wide and trying to look everywhere at once.
Criminal, Herron thought, to press a boy so young into action.
The soldiers began to taunt the prisoners, jeering and pushing at them from the protection of their circled strength.
“Leave them be,” Herron commanded, and men—soldier and savage alike—looked up to see who had spoken. The soldiers backed off a step. Herron turned to McCormack.
“Well, Colonel? There are your prisoners. What will you do now?”
McCormack colored to his hairline. “Well, General Herron, sir. I certainly don’t intend to interrogate them from here.”
“Why not?” He turned and pointed to the captives. “You there,” he said, his voice filling the yard. “How many in your tribe? No? Then how about: where is your main military force?”
The Indians gave no answer, gave not even the inkling of comprehension.
Herron glanced back at the red-faced McCormack and returned to his questioning.
“Do you speak English?” he said to the Indians.
Nothing.
“Parlez-vous française?”
Again, nothing.
“Sprechen Sie Deutsche? ¿Usted habla español?” Herron turned back to McCormack, unable to hide his loathing of the situation. “There. Your prisoners have been interrogated. Now execute them.”
“Sir!”
“What did you think, Colonel? Were you going to keep them? Send them back to the territories for trial?”
“Sir, I...”
“No, I didn’t think so. Well, now you’ll have to see it through. Execute them.”
“But, General—”
Herron skewered him with a fierce stare. “Colonel, take those insurrectionist bastards outside the gates and have them shot. I will not say it again.”
McCormack’s face was ashen. His hesitation now was not defiance but an inability to execute his orders. Herron gave him a moment to master himself, which he did. The colonel took a backward step, saluted, and walked toward the ladder. Herron turned his attention back to the enemy.
The surviving Indians were gathered a thousand yards to the east—in sight of the gate and the walls, but beyond effective range of their Springfield rifles. He scanned the group through his binoculars.
They rode their beasts without attempt at concealment, though the whistlers still camouflaged themselves with dust-colored flanks. Herron estimated forty, perhaps fifty riders—a little more than half their original strength. He had hurt them, but they had hurt him, too, and badly. He looked back inside the yard and saw only three score of able-bodied men. Half of the fort’s current complement was down or dead. Some would be back, of that he was confident, but he knew, too, that probably a third of the original force was down for good.
It will be different, he assured himself, with regulars out here.
He looked back out at the Indians as the captives were escorted out of the gate.
Storm Arriving and the others watched as the gate opened. The three Kit Foxes were marched out under guard. Little Creek and Wolf Robe held up the limping Rising Moon. Two bluecoats led them to a place a short distance from the gate and stepped back. The other bluecoats raised their rifles and fired. The three Kit Fox fell before anyone knew what was happening.
Big Nose cried out and toed his whistler into motion. Storm Arriving caught the halter rope and stopped him.
“Let me go!”
“No!”
“I will go. I will avenge my brother’s death.”
“You will only kill yourself.”
“Then that is what I will do.”
“No. There is no purpose to it.”
“I do not care.”
“I do. I will not let you do this.”
Big Nose swung with his bow but Storm Arriving caught the other’s foot with his own and toppled Big Nose from his whistler’s back. Other Kit Foxes joined Storm Arriving to hold back the thick-set warrior.
“You cannot tell me what to do,” Big Nose screamed.
“No,” Storm Arriving said. “But I can tell you that you have a wife and a year-old babe at home who will curse your name when I tell them how you died. I can tell you that Wolf Robe came here as a man, of his own choice, and that he killed a bluecoat before he died. And I can tell you that if you attack them now, you will die and you will gain nothing. We have lost this fight, and your death will only mean one more body we must carry home.”
Big Nose stared at Storm Arriving with tear-stung eyes, his breath shuddering through an open frown.
“Let me go,” he said, his voice no more than a whisper. “You cannot tell me what to do.”
Storm Arriving closed his eyes. “Release him,” he told the others, and turned away.
He heard his friend walk to his whistler and mount. He heard the whistler rise, heard its feet stamp and scratch the earth, heard it turn, and heard it walk toward the bluecoat-fort.
Heard it walk.
Storm Arriving turned and looked.
Big Nose was not attacking. He rode his whistler, straight-backed and proud, but only at a walk, not at a running charge. Storm Arriving squinted and saw bluecoats at the walls and on the tower. He saw rifles.
The bluecoats yelled and laughed as Big Nose rode toward them. Storm Arriving saw a puff of smoke from atop the wall, and then heard the report. The lazy bullet landed in the grass like a thrown stone. Big Nose continued to ride forward. More shots were fired, each pop delayed by distance. Bullets began to land closer to Big Nose, and with more force. Finally, one of the bluecoats bellowed a command and the firing ceased.
Big Nose rode without stopping, without turning, up to the place where his brother lay dead. There he halted and in the growing shadow of the bluecoat-fort, with the pale faces of the enemy looking down upon him, calling to him, daring him to act, Big Nose knelt and picked up the body of his mother’s youngest son. He did not glance upward. He did not acknowledge the bluecoats’ insults, the men themselves, or even the existence of the wooden walls that stood unnatural and square in the flowing smoothness of the prairie. He simply turned, mounted, and, as his whistler walked back to where Storm Arriving and the others watched in awe and r
espect, he began to sing the death song to his brother’s fallen spirit.
Nothing survives.
Only the earth
And the mountains.
Storm Arriving joined in the song, as did the rest of the survivors. It was the song every man hoped to sing before his death, or the song he hoped would be sung over him soon after he died.
Big Nose rejoined the group, his face full of grief and wet with tears. Storm Arriving had no words of comfort for his childhood friend, could think of nothing to say at all. Big Nose had risked his life, but not thrown it away; Storm Arriving hoped what he had said played a part in that decision, but did not know and was not going to ask. It was not important to know. It was only important that Big Nose was still alive, and that he had shown the rest of them what truly needed to be done.
Storm Arriving mounted his own whistler and headed it at a walk toward the dark walls of the bluecoat fort. Others came behind him, a solemn procession, all singing the death song for their fallen comrades, all walking into danger’s shadow to bear their bodies home.
“Let them come,” Herron said.
“General,” McCormack said quietly. “With all due respect, sir, I don’t understand you. One moment you have prisoners executed and now, when we could wipe them out in a blink, you let them live.”
Herron gave a slight nod as he stood at the parapet and watched the Indians come forward to gather up their fallen. “We could wipe them out, and lose another twenty men in the doing of it,” he said, “but look at them. They’re beaten. I want them to take that message home, along with their dead.” The Indians picked up the corpses and lay them across the backs of whistlers, one or two per beast. They sang an eerie, warbling song that started high and stepped down to a low mumble.
“They fought well,” Herron said. “They deserve that much respect, at least.” The Indians sang their song, loaded up their dead, and carted them away, like the French at Agincourt.
The Spirit of Thunder Page 17