People of the Nightland (North America's Forgotten Past) (47 page)

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Authors: W. Michael Gear,Kathleen O'Neal Gear

BOOK: People of the Nightland (North America's Forgotten Past)
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A
s he entered the compound Windwolf caught the stench of feces, urine, and human fear. “How did we come to this?”
“Arrogance,” Kakala muttered, “and Nashat’s poison.”
They walked into the enclosure, peering around. A hide-covered hut sat in the back, a low fire burning before it.
Kakala prodded a human form on the ground. “Come on, get up.” Then he bent down, fingering the body. “Dead,” he said. “A young woman. Club wound to the head.”
“Nightland honor?” Windwolf asked.
“Karigi’s sort,” Kakala replied, failing to take the bait.
Several more dead lay here and there; two of them, Windwolf noted, were children. Kakala said nothing as they passed.
The hide-covered hut was a low-domed thing made of willow stems bent over and tied together.
Windwolf stepped up to the fire. In the feeble light it cast, he could see three naked women and a little girl. They sat, backs to the wall, hunched over for warmth.
A warrior lay sleeping opposite them, his body covered with a bearhide robe.
The little girl stared up with horrified eyes, and said, “Not again. Please?”
Kakala asked, “Again?”
Not realizing it was a question, the little girl crawled out onto a filthy hide, settled on her back, and spread her thin legs. Windwolf’s heart sank as he watched the child, no more than eight summers of age, opening herself to the next man who demanded her.
“By Raven Hunter’s balls,” Kakala growled. “Put some clothes on, child.”
The warrior blinked, sat up, and yawned. As he stretched lazily, the women lowered their heads, doing anything to avoid the man’s attention.
“Come for your turn?” the warrior asked muzzily. “I recommend the woman on the right to start with. She’s—”
“My turn?” Kakala asked, stepping forward. “How does this work?”
Windwolf cast a sidelong glance at Kakala, surprised by the deadly calm in his voice.
“We each get a couple of hands’ time.” The warrior rolled his shoulders as he stood up. “Compensation for having to do this stinking duty. Most of us have taken a turn or two already. Sorry for the leftovers.”
“And the child?” Windwolf asked in a mild voice.
“She’s tight. You’ll have to spit on your shaft first.” The man was ducking through the low doorway.
Windwolf sensed Kakala’s bunching muscles, heard the whistle and crack as Kakala’s war club crushed the back of the man’s head.
The warrior dropped with a hollow thud, his limbs twitching. Kakala stood over him, raising the club and bringing it down again and again on the back of the man’s head. The body jerked with each sodden impact.
“Worried he might still get up, War Chief?” Windwolf asked dryly as Kakala raised himself for another blow.
“I just can’t …” The war club hammed the pulped head again. “ … abide …”
Windwolf watched the women flinch at the snapping impact of the club as it continued to hammer at the man’s crushed skull. He reached out and laid a restraining hand on Kakala’s bulging arm, feeling the rage.
“The captives have been freed,” Windwolf told the women. “Find
your clothing, or take what you need from here. The robes will be a comfort during the cold. But go now. Stay silent until you are far away. Head south. Follow the others.”
The little girl still lay on her back, legs spread, her naked body pathetically vulnerable in the flickering light.
“See to her!” Windwolf ordered. “I am making you responsible! And, by the Spirits, if you fail me …”
“Yes, warrior,” one of the women said, and they bundled the little girl up as they stripped the lodge and hurried out into the night.
Kakala sank down beside the fire, his face working. He looked up. “Are you made of wood?”
“It splinters too easily. What do you mean: Am I made of wood?”
“How can you be so calm after seeing this?”
Windwolf sighed. “It is nothing new, Kakala.”
“It is among my warriors. A child.
A little child!
”
“Are you telling me you didn’t hear the stories?”
Kakala spread his hands, looking at the palms. “Somehow, it was different this time.”
“Then perhaps you have finally found your soul. You will have plenty of time to become acquainted with it in the Long Dark.”
Kakala smiled bitterly. “The Long Dark? What right do I have to enter paradise?” Then he slapped his knees and rose. “Come. Let’s see if there are any others, and then you and Keresa can be on your way.”
Passing occasional corpses, Windwolf almost dismissed the huddled forms at the distant end of the enclosure. He walked over, kicking at a foot.
“What?” a man asked, sitting up in the darkness.
“You’re leaving, quietly.”
“Windwolf?” the man asked incredulously.
“Quiet. Just get up and walk. Leave and head south. Make no noise. You have to get as far as you can by morning.”
“Yes.
Yes!”
The man turned the next figure, trying to rouse the sleeping man. “Wake up! Grandfather, let’s go!”
Windwolf pressed on, kicking each corpse, investigating each pile of clothing.
He met Kakala and Keresa at the gate. “I think that’s the last of them. Did the women take the girl with them?”
“They did.” Kakala was still looking downcast, staring at his hands.
“All of our warriors have gone,” Keresa added. “I don’t want to
remind you about Silvertip’s flood. We don’t have much time to get south.”
“No,” Windwolf agreed. He glanced around, noticing that more clouds had moved in, the darkness increasing. “Kakala, I thank you for this.”
“My debt is repaid, Windwolf.”
“What debt is that?” a voice asked from the darkness.
Kakala spun. “Blackta?”
Dark shapes formed in the night. Windwolf eased his war club from his belt. How many? Four? Five?
“So, you’ve captured Windwolf after all?” Blackta walked up, peering in the darkness. “Brought him to the slave compound? Not the Council chambers? Are you insane? He’ll give the slaves hope after we’ve taken so much time to beat it out of them.”
Windwolf gripped the handle of his war club, feeling the familiar smooth grain of the wood. He started forward, only to feel Keresa’s restraining hand grip his forearm.
Kakala stepped breast to breast with Blackta. “You are dismissed, War Chief. Get away from me before I break your neck!”
Blackta seemed to consider it, then cocked his head. “Quiet in there.” He bent, craning, trying to see into the compound.
“Like you said, you beat half the life out of them.” Kakala seemed to swell in the night. “You make me sick.”
“Oh, do I?” Blackta chuckled. “You’ve been in the cages how many times? Twice?” He turned, “Tanga, see to the slaves. Make sure they’re not up to mischief.”
Kakala barked, “Tanga! You, and the war chief will return immediately to your camps. As high war chief,
I
order it.”
“No,” Blackta said crisply. “Check, Tanga. Now.”
“You would disobey me?” Kakala demanded.
Tanga stepped to the side, lifting himself above the wall to say, “I think it’s empty!”
Blackta’s movement was a blur in the night. Kakala snapped back from the impact as Blackta drove a fist into his jaw. Then the man was on him, kicking, beating.
Windwolf whipped his war club up, pivoted, and caught the surprised Tanga on the side of the head, knocking the man back. From the feel of the blow, he could tell it hadn’t connected well, but might be enough to stun.
Blackta’s warriors waded in, each clawing for his war club. Keresa had rushed forward, trading blows with a barely seen assailant.
To fight in such a way was madness, slashing at dark forms, trying to dodge and weave flailing clubs.
Keresa! Spirits, where is Keresa?
Windwolf ducked a hissing war club that would have missed him by a hand’s width anyway.
“Now, Kakala,” Blackta grunted. “I’ve waited too long for this.”
Windwolf ducked down, peering, seeing Blackta hunched atop Kakala’s prostrate body.
He’s only half-recovered from the blow at Headswift Village.
Blackta was choking the life out of him.
Windwolf leapt, slamming his body into Blackta’s. A hot rage burst through him, remembering Bramble’s naked body: the dart jutting from her chest; the bite marks on her skin; the stains between her thighs … and a little eight-summers-old girl lying spread-eagled with tears running down her face.
Windwolf bellowed, raising his war club, smashing it down on the scrambling man beneath him. Time slowed as Windwolf methodically worked his club, hammering away, feeling each satisfying impact as stone crushed flesh, bone, and skin.
He reveled in the droplets of gore spattering his hands and face, and battered away, revisiting each burned camp, each haunted expression. The smell of smoke from burning lodges stung his nose. The shrieks of the dying sounded over and over as he pounded his rage into Blackta’s body.
“Windwolf?” a voice asked.
“Windwolf?”
He turned, ready to lash out, as a hand landed on his shoulder, and pulled him back.
“Windwolf!”
“What?” he gasped.
Kakala, voice hoarse, rasped, “Worried that he might get up again, War Chief?”
Windwolf nodded, panting, staring around at the darkness. “Keresa?”
“Here.” He heard her voice. “The rest have fled.”
“Not all of us.” Tanga’s voice came from the dark gap of the gate. “The first man who moves, dies. I swear, I’ll drive a dart right through him.”
“Put your weapons down, Tanga,” Kakala ordered. “It’s over.”
“Oh, no. The pen’s empty. The slaves are gone. So help me,
Kakala, you’re going to rot your life out in the cages. But first, Windwolf, stand up. Stand where I can see you.”
“Why?” he asked, wondering how much cover Blackta’s body would give him.
“Because I’m killing you. Now. Tonight. Your head is my trophy to carry into the Long Dark.”
Keresa’s calm voice said from the side, “If you hurt him, Tanga, I’ll hand you your balls.”
“You?” he asked. “Side with Windwolf?” He chuckled. “Oh, Nashat has waited for years to have you for his own. And, you, you cold-blooded camp bitch, will be my gift to him … . But then, sharing Nashat’s bed is better than dying in the cages.”
Windwolf caught the faintest movement in the darkness behind Tanga. Then the warrior stiffened and jerked, taking a half stumble. Tanga glanced down, atlatl and darts clattering to the ground. He weaved, coughed. His knees gone weak, Tanga pitched sideways to the ground, kicking, gasping as he fingered a dart point that protruded from his chest.
A dark form rose behind him, saying, “War Chief Windwolf? I think that’s the last one.”
“Who are you?” Windwolf stood slowly.
“Sacred Feathers, War Chief.” The man stepped over Tanga’s body, staring down in the darkness. “I found one of your darts by the gate. Grandfather Drummer is dead.” He straightened. “He was right all along.” He took a deep breath. “My daughter, Elk Leaf … she was in the warriors’ tent … . They …” His voice broke.
“I know,” Windwolf said. “The other women have already taken her. She’s headed south.”
“Which is where we need to go,” Kakala said, rising stiffly.
A man screamed in the darkness. Windwolf turned on his heel, lifting his war club.
“It’s all right, War Chief,” a low voice called. “It’s Kishkat and Tapa. I hope we didn’t get here too late. But there were two warriors out here that were going to stick you like fish as soon as they had a shot.”
“A third one ran,” a second voice called. Forms emerged from the darkness. Windwolf could make out three of them.

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