Jamestown (The Keepers of the Ring) (10 page)

“I love you, Fallon.” Her voice brimmed with trust.

He ran his hand over her glossy dark hair and pressed his lips to her ear. “I love you too, Gilda.”

Ten miles north of Ritanoe, a hunting party of Powhatan Indians pursued a wounded deer. They had come across a trail of blood and followed the wandering track until they found the beast, a majestic buck. An arrow protruded from the animal’s side; whoever had fired the missile had missed the heart and lodged the arrowhead in the buck’s shoulder bone.

Opechancanough, chief of the hunting party, motioned for his braves to circle the animal. At his signal the warriors swept in for the kill, and the weary buck had neither the strength nor the opportunity to flee. Within a moment he lay dead on the forest floor.

As the Powhatan warriors whooped in celebration, Opechancanough idly walked forward and pulled the offending arrow from the carcass. The copper arrowhead gleamed in the late afternoon sun, and his eyes narrowed in suspicion. No Indian tribe had learned the secrets of shaping copper in this way. Could it be that clothed people still walked the land? If his brother, Powhatan, had not finished the work Opechancanough had given him to do, the war club must be wielded again. The clothed people had no place in the land, and they would have to die.

The first maize crop was ready for harvesting when a group of Powhatan traders arrived at Ritanoe. Gepanocon’s scouts had sent word of their coming, and before their arrival the chief sent the four Englishmen away from the camp to hide in a series of sacred caves in the woods. He did not consider it a sacrilege to hide men in the sacred caves, for the Englishmen were his special treasure, the key to making weapons and utensils and good magic. The presence of the English, Gepanocon warned his people, must be kept secret.

Upon entering the village the traders announced that Powhatan himself, the great chief of the united Powhatan tribes, had sent them to trade furs for copper. The name “Powhatan” sent Fallon’s blood sliding through his veins like cold needles, and he kept Noshi and Gilda by his side and hid in his hut as the traders bargained. He certainly did not want his hated enemy to know that any had escaped from the slaughter at Ocanahonan. How would Gepanocon explain the children’s fair eyes or his own pale skin and red hair if the Powhatan noticed them?

Through a crack in the grass covering of the hut, Fallon spied on the traders. “You want copper pots?” Gepanocon was saying, folding his arms as he sat in the center of the camp. “We have only those we gained through trade with the clothed men. Why do you think we have others?”

One of the visitors pulled a long arrow from the quiver on his painted back. The copper arrowhead gleamed in the sun.

“The clothed men did not use copper for arrowheads,” the most fiercely painted warrior said, turning the arrow so the copper glimmered in the bright light of afternoon. “How then, did this come to be made?”

Gepanocon grinned toothlessly. “I may know this answer
later, in one or two moons. But I cannot tell you now.”

“If you know of the clothed men,” the painted warrior continued, purposefully tapping the arrow against his broad palm, “you should speak. Our chief, Powhatan, hates the clothed men. He wants them to leave this land.”

Gepanocon’s smile did not fade. “If I have news, I will tell you later,” he said, lifting his hands toward the elders who surrounded him. The elders nodded in agreement as if the issue were settled.

The visiting delegation parted as an aged member of their party stepped forward. The elder’s face seemed to be made of points and edges: a sharp nose and chin, high cheekbones planing down from shrewd ridges of bone. A stark white scar shone vividly upon his cheek. Though the warrior’s long hair was streaked with gray, power flashed from his eyes and rang in his voice as he spoke: “I, Opechancanough, am brother to the mighty Powhatan. And I have a gift for you, Gepanocon of Ritanoe.”

Gepanocon’s eyes gleamed with interest as Opechancanough gestured to a warrior at his side. The man stepped forward and deposited a buckskin bundle at Opechancanough’s feet. With one smooth gesture, Opechancanough unwrapped the bundle, bringing forth a cloak lined with the luxurious fur of many beaver. An audible murmur of approval and delight rose from the crowd of onlookers, and he tossed it over his shoulder and turned to display it, dark and gleaming against the bronze cast of his skin.

Inside the hut, Fallon gritted his teeth, pained at Opechancanough’s cleverness. Such a gift demanded an equally extravagant present in return, and what did Gepanocon have to rival such a magnificent cloak? To refuse the gift would be an insult to the brother of the Powhatan chief, and to offer a gift of less value would demean the werowance of the tribe at Ritanoe.

Opechancanough held the cloak toward the werowance of Ritanoe, and Gepanocon paused only a moment before accepting it. He stepped forward, flung the cloak around his shoulders, then revolved slowly so his people could admire their chief. When he had finished, he bowed his head carefully and stepped inside his hut. The anxious crowd murmured while Fallon waited to see what the chief would do.

Finally Gepanocon returned, carrying in two hands a gleaming copper pot big enough to cover a man’s head. Fallon
recognized it—one of the men from Ocanahonan had fashioned it from fine copper only a week ago and presented it to the werowance. ‘Twas Gepanocon’s most prized possession.

Opechancanough received the pot with a solemn bow, then handed it to a lesser warrior as the party of traders withdrew from the village. Fallon turned away from the sight and sank in a despairing heap on the floor. Gepanocon had meant to deceive, but he’d been caught in a trap. If Opechancanough had come to trade, this mission had failed, but if he had come to learn whether any of the English still lived, he had of certain accomplished his goal.

The Powhatan warriors ran through the forest like deer, hurrying northward toward the great chief’s village of Weromacomico. When they arrived, five days after their visit to Ritanoe, Opechancanough told his brother and the elders that the attack upon the clothed men had failed; the English still walked the land and worked the iron. Worse yet, the Englishmen at Ritanoe made copper arrowheads and pots for Gepanocon, who would surely rise up against the Powhatan when the time was right.

“No!” Powhatan thundered, rising from his blanket on the floor of his hut. “We will destroy Ritanoe and all in it, including the clothed Englishmen!

“We should not kill them,” Opechancanough said, taking a seat in the circle of elders around the chief. He looked around to make certain that every elder listened, then he spoke with calculated concern. “It is said that Wowinchopunk hath seen more boats with big guns in the land of the Paspahegh. The clothed people continue to come; we cannot fight them all. But if you take these clothed men at Ritanoe and hold them in your village, the others will listen to you.”

“We will fight them one city at a time,” Powhatan said, his face flushing as his hand closed around his war club. The dark line of roached hair that ran from his hairline to his neck vibrated softly in his anger. “First, Ritanoe, then Paspahegh.” He gestured to one of his braves. “Run from village to village and let the drums call for a war party. Any man who wishes to strike the war post with me shall be rewarded, and Ritanoe will be no more!”

Pressing his lips together to smother a smile, Opechancanough said nothing as the runner hurried to gather men for Powhatan’s war party. He would let his brother strike uselessly at the Indian villages. The Englishmen would continue to come in the winged ships.

And he would wait for his vengeance. The hate within him was a living thing, demanding to feed, but he had learned how to discipline his appetite. Unlike his brothers, Opechancanough had learned that patience was an invaluable element of strategy.

“What are you doing, Fallon?”

They were on the bank of the river, and Fallon gave her a brief smile before returning his attention to his knife. “I’m marking this tree with an ‘F’ for Fallon,” he said, running his sharpened blade through the wounded bark of an oak. “And under it, I’ll mark a ‘G’ for Gilda. And then an ‘N’ for Noshi—”

“Why?” Gilda asked, thrusting her hands behind her back. Fallon shrugged. “So people will know we’ve been here. So if anyone should happen to come here from up river—”

“Mama and Papa?” Her blue eyes lit with hope, and Fallon felt a stab of guilt pierce his heart. ‘Twasn’t fair to encourage her to yearn for what could never be, but how were they to go on without dreams? In his deepest heart, Fallon prayed that Rowtag had survived, mayhap he was recovering his strength somewhere, and soon he would come down river to find them.

“I don’t know who might come,” he said, sheathing his knife in his belt. He knelt beside Gilda and took her hand. “I don’t really know why I’m doing this. But if an Englishman sees our marks, he’ll recognize the alphabet and know that we were here. They’ll look for us, Gilda, and take us back where we belong.”

She stared at him, uncomprehending, and Fallon sighed. Where did they belong? They weren’t English, in fact Fallon had never even seen an English ship, nor were they savages like the Indians of Ritanoe. But of all the towns and cities in the world, surely there was another like Ocanahonan, where men cared for each other and worshipped God.

“Why don’t you help me?” Fallon said, searching for a stone. He found one and put it in Gilda’s hand. “We’ll carve a cross on this oak tree, you see, and anyone who sees it will know that we believe in the Christ, and that we’re not heathen savages.”

“What’s a savage?” Gilda said, energetically marking the tree.

Fallon shook his head and began another carving.

To the villagers of Ritanoe, the heat of early summer signaled the beginning of the harvest. The first sowing of maize had yielded a bountiful crop. The corn was gathered and carried in parfleches to the village where it was roasted over a slow-burning fire, then stored in clay pots buried in the earth.

Noshi and Gilda joined in the harvest, too, gathering herbs
and berries. When their small baskets were full, Fallon sent them ahead to the village while he walked behind in the trail. With every day that passed he became more and more convinced that they could not stay in this place; the difference between civilized Ocanahonan and primitive, heathen Ritanoe was simply too great. His parents had charged him with the care of the children, and as a godparent of sorts he was to watch over their souls. But how could he do so when Noshi yearned to join in the heathen dances and Gilda was fascinated by the ritual chants and charms of the conjurors?

He did not dare hope that the English would come again. Throughout his entire life he had heard stories of the great man called Walter Raleigh who had sent John White to establish a colony on the island of Roanoke. John White had left for England, promising to return with supplies and additional colonists, and the remaining settlers had migrated to a safer location upon the river Chowan. A lookout had been posted on Croatoan Island, but the months of waiting stretched into two decades with nary a sign of John White or an English return. As the years passed, the English led their Indian neighbors to believe in the one true God, and eventually the City of Raleigh became the village of Ocanahonan.

Could the English come again? Fallon let Gilda and Noshi scamper ahead while he sat in the shade of an oak to ponder the question. Mayhap if he took the children and traveled to the sea, he could find an answer. He had heard stories of the Spaniards, another people from across the great ocean, and though the people of Ocanahonan seemed to hold the Spanish in fear and contempt, still, mayhap their society would be better for the children than an Indian village—

A sudden flurry of feathers distracted Fallon’s thinking. A flock of crows that had roosted in the trees above him took flight, and Fallon turned his head and concentrated upon listening. Someone moved in the woods. A great many people, judging by the disturbance of the birds.

He leaned forward upon his hands and knees and crept behind a fallen log as he peered into the woods. Under the mushrooming canopy of trees a group of warriors advanced. They carried brightly decorated war axes and shields. Even from here, Fallon recognized the bright red designs of Powhatan warriors.

Fallon turned and sprinted toward the village.

Breathless, he raced into Gepanocon’s hut with the news. The werowance listened with the smiling, patient attention adults give children, then gestured abruptly and told his elders to send warriors to hide the four Englishmen.

“What of the others?” Fallon demanded, ignoring the protocol that directed that he be silent until the chief addressed him. “You must leave your warriors here to protect the women and children.”

“My men will return when the English are safe,” Gepanocon answered, rising to his feet. Moving with unusual quickness, he grabbed his war axe and pushed past Fallon.

Fallon watched in disbelief as the chief and his warriors hustled the four Englishmen from their hut and hurried them through a secret door in the palisade walls. “That’s right,” Fallon remarked critically as the chief and his men fled. “Make a palisade too strong for the enemy to come in, and you cannot get out. Run, chief, and may your greed and cowardice preserve you.”