Firebrand's Woman

by Vanessa Royall

  By now Hawk’s men had learned not to count on victory, and their earlier cheers, boastful and high-spirited, had become mean. They snarled and urged their champion to blaze away.

  “Get him in the belly!” they called. “Get him! Use your elbow on his biceps! Paralyze him, Hawk!”

  Torch was exhausted; Hawk was not much better off. Unable to rise, they fought on their knees. Every movement came slowly, as if they were fighting underwater. Torch was dazed, groping forward, when Hawk struck him a mighty blow on the side of his head. No one could tell for certain, because it was beginning to grow dark, but many were sure the blow had been done with a balled fist—just as many were certain that the opposite was true. There was much angry shouting as Torch fell backward onto the earth, blinking dully.

  Hawk crawled forward for the kill.

  Barely moving, he groped toward the fallen Torch; but there was joy in his eyes. His hand reached Torch’s shoulder, but from some last reserve—perhaps a buried vein of rage so great it was not even born of earth—Gyva’s champion twisted aside. Hawk looked up, stunned. He saw his rival up on his knees. He saw Torch rise, sway, stand up. He saw Torch motion him: Come up, come up. He blinked. How could this be?

  But when Hawk proved unable to rise, Torch reached down, put his arms beneath the other man’s armpits, and hauled him to his feet. Hawk stood, but barely, too exhausted to lift his arms. No one who watched ever forgot what came next. Hawk’s earlier blow must have been delivered by fist. That was the only explanation anyone could contrive to account for Torch’s rage. With a flat, open hand, he slammed Hawk halfway across the circle, caught him before he fell, and slammed him again. On the sidelines the hotheads went silent, strangling on their own bile. Again, again, and again, driven to the end of all effort, Torch blasted the luckless Hawk, not letting him escape, not letting him fall. Finally, with a last mighty blow, Hawk was knocked out of the circle itself, and came to rest flat on his back in the dust among the spectators. Torch lurched forward and dragged his unconscious opponent back into the circle for the last pin. Then he, too, collapsed.

  The two men were carried to their tents and later were given their ration of water. Then they slept,-unaware of the cool night, unaware of the quiet that had stolen peacefully into the mountains.

  Brittle Serpent’s tent had been removed, and only five remained when Gyva took her place at the midnight vigil. According to tradition every member of the tribe was given the opportunity to watch over the tents at least once during the course of the manhood ritual. In that way all might be assured that the prohibitions against food or excess water had been observed; but more importantly, each member of the tribe would become an actual participant in the event. There were in the village old men and older women who, if permitted, would ramble on about sitting in vigil one dim night in the trackless past over the tent of Tall Heron, the chief preceding Four Bears. And that was a long, long time ago.

  The low-slung tents were pitched in a row, separated from one another by several yards of open space. Not a sound emerged from any of them; the warriors were seeking in sleep whatever sustenance there was. Eight men and three women had held vigil from sundown to midnight, seated in a quiet little group not far from the tents, and they rose a little stiffly from the damp earth when Gyva, with the other members of the midnight vigil, approached. There were six men and four women, one of whom was little Swallow, who had brought a blanket with her.

  “They are all very quiet,” observed a brave who left now to enjoy his own sleep.

  “They have reason to be,” answered a man joining Gyva’s group. “And I surmise they will sleep even more deeply another night from now.”

  Everyone stood for a time, looking at the tents and deciding just how much personal meaning lay in the potential power they symbolized. Then the men sat down and lit a pipe to pass among themselves, talking in low voices and smoking, and then just smoking. The women, two squaws whose interest lay in bead stringing, sank to the earth next to Gyva and Swallow, some small distance from the men. Swallow had not yet unwrapped her blanket; and because the ground was damp and cold at night, Gyva wished that she had brought her own. But even if she were to stay here forever, still she would not ask to share anything belonging to the wicked Swallow!

  Time passed. The women muttered about the advantages of shell beads as opposed to the wonders of stone beads, and the problems of stringing both. Swallow had not unrolled her blanket at all, but instead rested against it as she sat on the ground. Now and then she would glance at Gyva and smirk a little, but when she saw that the only response was a contemptuous glare, even her smirks abated. At length boredom and the cold ground got the better of her. She stood up and stretched.

  “The earth seems harder at night,” she pronounced.

  “It is a thing of which I am sure you have much knowledge,” Gyva observed, her voice like the edge of a knife.

  Swallow realized she had erred in giving Gyva a chance to remark upon her tryst with Hawk in the river grass. “And your soft back has known a bed of grass and ground as well,” she shot back. “Indeed, perhaps the traces are still pressed upon the flesh of your underside.”

  Gyva glanced toward the other women. Fortunately they were not listening.

  “Anyway, it matters not,” Swallow was saying, “I shall be wife of whoever becomes chief.”

  Gyva’s temper flared. This arrogance she could not bear. “Let us hope you are more certain of him whom you claim for husband than you are of those you claim for lover.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Let us have it out, Gyva thought. “I mean that you have not enjoyed the manhood of Torch.”

  There was a pause, brief but telling. “You are pathetic in your jealousy,” Swallow accused. “If you cannot hold a man, you need not attempt to attack a woman who can.” Her tone, as always, was haughty, self-certain. Gyva was positive that Swallow had not been possessed by Torch. Positive. Almost positive.

  “He told me that after the manhood ritual was concluded, I would be his choice,” Swallow said.

  Gyva considered this. Did it mean that Torch had not made love to Little Swallow only because he had wanted to “shepherd his strength,” as he had phrased it? And did it mean that once the ritual was over he would call for her? No, that could not be true.

  Swallow struck again, a bitter blow that she administered with relish. “A man will always choose a woman who knows her place in the tribe,” she said. “You ought to have considered that before sneaking around the council meeting.”

  “I was only gathering firewood,” Gyva maintained, knowing all the while how lame was her excuse. It was absurd. She was disgusted with herself. Why did she have to make such excuses, to feel ashamed? What was the point of it? “No, you might as well hear the truth,” she heard her voice telling Swallow, “I did go to the place of the council with the intention of listening to the deliberations of the men.”

  Little Swallow, startled by this frank acknowledgment of guilt, and a bit stunned by the heedless audacity of the act itself, glanced toward Gyva with a look of curiosity. “Why?” she asked.

  “Because I wished to know what the braves are planning.”

  “They would have told you. They always do.”

  “Yes. They always do. But after everything has been decided. It is too late to do anything about it then. There is nothing one can say.”

  Swallow’s lovely mouth curled scornfully. “Ah! I recall the time you spoke up at the Meeting of Nations. Asking the Sac warrior how long it would be before the white men come into our homeland! Would that you had the power to stand outside yourself and observe your pretentious conceit! What do you know of affairs?”

  Gyva was enraged, and tried to keep her voice even. She was not entirely successful “I know more than you, and that is certain!”

  Swallow just laughed. “So you think. Anyway, it matters not. The knowledge necessary to the wife of a chieftain lies in how to move her body, and when to caress, and ho
w long, and where. The skill necessary to the wife of a chieftain encompasses the giving of a thousand kisses, each one different and each one in a different place. You will be gathering firewood as an old crone of ninety circlings of the sun, dried and withered as—”

  “I know the things of which you speak so crudely!” Gyva retorted. “And better than you do I bestow them!”

  The two maidens had grown quite heated in their exchange, and their voices had risen accordingly.

  “You there,” grunted one of the older braves. “Both of you. We are here to watch over a new chief, not to decide who is to bed him!”

  Embarrassed, both girls fell silent. Gyva could feel her fine skin burning with humiliation. How fortunate that it was night. Swallow, to put the brave’s remark out of her mind, busied herself by unrolling the blanket. In spite of the darkness Gyva saw that the other girl had something wrapped within it, which she quickly slipped in back of her as she sat down.

  “You may not sit here,” she told Gyva.

  “I would not, even if you asked me.”

  “There will come a time when you do all I say,” Swallow hissed. They were both whispering now, but too angry with each other to cease speaking entirely.

  “Hah!” Gyva spat. “There are not that many days even in the mind of the Great Spirit. There will come a time when you shall follow me.”

  “Do you know how the white jackals take black men as slaves? I believe, when I become wife of the chieftain, that I should like a slave of mixed blood, to fetch and carry for me. Yes, I think such a slave would suit me well”

  “True chieftains do not hold slaves.”

  “Hawk has nothing against the practice. He told me. You see, I do have plans for you.”

  “Hawk will not become chief. Did you see today at the wrestling, how badly he was beaten?”

  “It is but the first day. There is time.” Having said this, Swallow smiled in a manner Gyva did not like at all. It reminded her of the expression on her face when Gyva had realized that Swallow was conspiring with Hawk, a secret grimace promising malicious delight. “Perhaps we shall simply send you forth from the nation, and you can go be slave of the white chieftain, Chula Harjo.”

  “It is as I thought. You are ignorant. The white chieftain is Moon-Row. Chula Harjo wishes to be chief—Four Bears told me so. But he is not chief now.”

  Uncomfortable that Gyva knew something she did not, Swallow returned to the personal level. “He has also killed one white woman, I have heard.”

  Gyva’s mother. Gyva did not care for Swallow’s tone. “And my mother fought him with a pitchfork. To this day Jacksa bears the scars.”

  “Hah! I do not believe that. Many of us do not believe that tale at all. Why, it may have been invented by Four Bears just for your sake, to make your blood appear richer than it is.”

  “It is rich enough!”

  “We shall see.”

  The two girls were glaring at one another, and the rest of the vigil party was all but somnolent, when a moccasined brave raced silently down from the village. Gyva recognized him as one of Hawk’s hotheads, and immediately her suspicions were aroused. But the brave was troubled. He brought an urgent message.

  “There may be an attack party approaching,” he whispered, as they rose and gathered around him. As they did, Gyva noticed Swallow pushing whatever it was she had been concealing under the edge of her blanket. It was a flask, for water or honeyed milk.

  “What do you wish us to do?” the messenger was being asked. “We are charged with standing vigil here until the great dipper has spun halfway toward the horizon.”

  “Your responsibility to the new chief is indeed a sacred one, but so is duty toward your village. I have already spoken to Teva, and it is her advice that the contestants not be awakened, since we are not certain a raid is coming. One of the outlying sentinels has heard something, that is all. So what I propose is this: Just come up with me to the edge of the village, so you will be ready to help if needed. In that way, you can also look down here where the tents are, and fulfill your vigil, too.”

  It seemed a reasonable solution, and everyone rushed up to the edge of the village, to be ready to fight if necessary. The nefarious Choctaw raid was still on the minds of all, and the possibility of another attack was not to be discounted. Even the Harrisville white men might attack! In moments the sentinels passed along a comforting message. No intruders had been spotted; no attack was forthcoming. While waiting, however, Gyva and the others noted that, in the dark, it was very difficult to observe the tents, crouching back there on the grass.

  All told, they had not been away from the vigil for more than ten minutes. Almost a fool’s errand, and yet…and yet Gyva was upset. She had not lost her strong suspicion that, somehow, the manhood ritual was being sabotaged. And she believed it for certain when they came back to the place of the tents. Not caring what Swallow might think, Gyva drew back the corner of the blanket under which she had seen Swallow hide the flask. But the flask was gone. There was only one answer in Gyva’s mind. The container—which had undoubtedly contained broth, or soup, or strong, invigorating drink—was in the tent of whichever brave had stolen out to take it.

  Silence would mean dishonor now. The proof would be there for all to see in Hawk’s tent Gyva saw it clearly. Everything had been planned. The hothead brave rushing down to warn of a phony attack! Passing along Teva’s “advice,” too! The witch-woman had probably been asleep the whole time! And those assigned to the vigil had behaved predictably, had gone back up to the village, ready to defend the tribe.

  “Where is the flask?” demanded Gyva of the other maiden.

  “Swallow turned and blinked, as if puzzled, asking: “What? What flask?”

  A cold silence fell upon the vigil party. Trouble.

  Gyva explained what she had seen, every detail from the wrapped blanket to Swallow’s hiding of the flask before they’d gone to defend the village against mythical attack.

  “You are as the loon is!” Swallow jeered.

  “Enough of this!” commanded the oldest brave present. “It is a fierce accusation. We must send for Teva immediately.”

  It was done, and within minutes the seeress came wavering down to the place of the tents. She had already been informed of the trouble by the messenger; she looked at Gyva with a gloomy eye. Yes, she had been told that an attack might be forthcoming. Yes, she had advised precisely the course of action taken by the hothead. But this matter of the flask was most serious.

  “I swear it was there, and now it is gone,” said Gyva.

  “There was never a flask, nothing but my blanket,” countered Swallow, with a most unsettling smile.

  When she saw that smile, Gyva ought to have known. Somehow her enemies were far ahead of her. They had more ruses, knew more tricks. And with vicious skill they not only managed to use against Gyva her growing reputation for bizarre behavior—the killing of the Choctaw notwithstanding—but simultaneously augmented that reputation.

  “What is this? She has done something else? She has truly implied that a future chief has dishonored the manhood ritual? Well, if she is wrong, that is one thing! But if she seeks to distract us from her folly at the council meeting by an accusation as serious as this one—well, that is quite another.”

  But this time Gyva was ready for them.

  “We have but to look in the tents,” she said. “I am sure one of the warriors has the flask.”

  An air of great foreboding settled upon the vigil, and upon Teva, too. The old woman drew Gyva to one side. “You are sure of this?” she asked, with a tone of extreme doubt.

  “There was a flask and now it is gone. What else could have become of it?”

  “If there was a flask,” said Teva after a moment, “then I am in agreement with you.” In the light of the stars the mark upon her face seemed to glow. “But if not…if not, you have made the most serious of all accusations. I hope for your sake that your words are true.”

  “What s
hall we do?”

  “We shall wait until morning, and then inspect the tents of all, with everyone of the tribe in attendance.”

  The suggestion could not have given Gyva more satisfaction. At last everyone could see what manner of man Hawk was. She imagined him now, coming out of his tent, all the bluster gone, the tail of his arrogance tucked up between his legs, while at the same time the proud staff of manhood sought to curl into his flesh.

  Gyva did not return to her sleeping place when the predawn vigil party arrived, nor did the witch-woman, nor did any of the others. In fact, word spread, and when dawn came over the blue mountains, most of the tribe had gathered around the tents.

  Teva said not one word to Gyva during all the waiting.

  Wise, Gyva thought. She does not wish to show favoritism.

  Fleet Cloud was the first to appear, but he only pushed himself slightly out of his tent. “Help me,” he pleaded. He could stand and he could hobble slightly, but he could not walk. Fleet Cloud would not be chief.

  Only four candidates remained in competition, and they awoke now and emerged from their tents as Gyva reconsidered her accusation. She had believed that the flask contained some nutritious, sustaining substance, and that one of the braves—Hawk, almost certainly-had stolen out to acquire it, taking it back to his tent for consumption. But had it been a more complicated ploy? Perhaps Fleet Cloud had believed the contents of the flask to be good, while in fact a certain subtle poison was administered thereby?