The Orenda Joseph Boyden (56 page)

He stands and runs to me. I think he’s going to help me up but instead snatches the arrow and pulls it out of my leg. I roar with the pain.

“There,” he says. “Now we’re even.”

THIS IS MY BODY, WHICH IS FOR YOU

It is with a happy heart, dear Lord, that I tell You that each day I have tried to live by Your word, and each day I have always sung Your praises. I am blessed to find myself in a foreign land surrounded by a people in need of Your guidance, and I am closer to becoming the man I’ve long wanted to be. Please accept me into Your kingdom with open arms, for, after treading so close many times in the past, I now understand that Your kingdom is near.

A horrible battle rages outside the mission palisades, and I’ve tried to comfort not just the dying but also those who fear what comes. We huddle now, hoping the enemy won’t get in. The damaged roof of the chapel offers scant comfort from the screams of the wounded. The afternoon wanes, and I myself fear the coming darkness worst of all.

I look around at the small group who still holds faith in this place. One of my oldest converts, Delilah, hardened into a shell in recent weeks, sits glumly alongside a handful of Huron and a couple of Algonquin fur people. And then there is sweet but damaged young Snow Falls, her newborn wrapped in rabbit skins and sleeping now in a covered basket beneath the table upon which the tabernacle sits. It was my suggestion to put the baby there when Snow Falls wandered in just as the fighting grew hot again. It seems the safest place in the event more arrows fall upon us.

I try to maintain a hopeful countenance, but any words I speak are punctuated by men shouting or dying or killing. Instead, I bow my head and pray, hoping the others might follow me and find a little solace. As the afternoon wears on, people come and leave, always rushing. To where, I have no idea.

Gabriel has been out tending to the wounded and finally returns with Isaac at his arm. Gabriel looks at me.

“There were many close calls,” he says, “but our brother managed to escape unscathed.” Gabriel shakes his head and sits.

“I helped the Huron prevent one breach of the palisades,” Isaac says breathlessly. “And it worked. But the wall at the far end of the village has fallen to a second attack.” He stares at me, his eyes bloodshot. “The time has come, Père Christophe. The enemy is inside the gates.”

I’m at once drawn to and repelled by his crazed eyes, this fever that’s overcome him. I hear the distant shouting of men fighting within the walls of the mission. “What is it time for, dear Brother?” I ask.

He looks at me as if I’m stupid. He wants to say something but bites his lip as he scratches his head with the stump of his hand. “We still have time for Communion,” he says.

He’s right. “Please, Isaac,” I say, “prepare the Eucharist.”

I take my place and ask that we all join hands in prayer. We gather in a circle, all except for Snow Falls, who seems hesitant. “You partook of the body of the Great Voice this morning,” I say. “You are ready to partake of it again.”

Everyone flinches as a musket fires nearby. I offer my hand to her. She stands and comes to me.

Isaac returns, clasping a dish between his arm and body. “Thank you, Brother,” I say, reaching for it.

He pulls away. “Père Christophe,” he says, “will you please allow me to serve the Eucharist?”

Another musket fires close by. I nod.

Isaac bows his head, and the rest of us follow. He whispers what I recognize as one of his favourite Gospel passages, rooting around in the dish until he’s able to grab a Host in the fold where his thumb once met his palm. “For I received from the Lord, that which I also delivered to you,” he whispers, “that the Lord Jesus, in the night in which he was delivered up, took bread, and having given thanks, broke it, and said, This is my body, which is for you: this do in remembrance of me.”

Isaac places the thickness of it into his mouth and chews, struggling to swallow. He moves then to Delilah, who gazes blankly back at him as he again fumbles to grasp a Host. She opens her mouth obediently when he finally manages.

And then he turns to Snow Falls, managing to grasp a large Host more quickly now. The bleat of her baby echoes from under the tabernacle and she turns to it, but Isaac whispers and she turns back to him to accept the Host in her mouth.

When it’s my turn, I see that Isaac shakes and sweats, and I fear for the commotion he’s about to cause. Almost dropping the dish he pinches between his chest and arm, he manages once more to grasp a Host and raises it to my mouth. I accept the offering, but a bitterness explodes, making my mouth salivate and my throat close.

I gag and spit it up into my hand. “What’s wrong with this sagamité?” I ask.

Isaac looks at me. “We are dying for them, Père Christophe.” He shudders and then spits up onto himself. “The village falls soon, and it’s best to die for them now.” He looks at me with a sudden clarity I’ve not seen in him before. “To allow us to be tortured before death is a brutality I can’t allow.”

I look in horror at Snow Falls and Delilah. Both sit on their haunches, holding their bellies.

“What did you put into the Eucharist?” I ask Isaac.

“Ingredients that will act quickly,” he says. “Death-cap mushroom and water hemlock. I tried it on a dog, and he passed within minutes.”

I slap him. “Are you insane?” I shout.

Delilah begins to cry and moan, and the others in the circle have stepped back, all but Gabriel, who throws himself between us. “What’s happened?” he asks, confused.

As the sound of nearby fighting erupts outside, a group of frightened women and children rushes into the chapel, Sleeps Long and Gosling among them.

“Isaac has killed them,” I say, pushing him out of the way and grasping for Snow Falls, who’s collapsed onto her back and begins to convulse.

DID I DO THIS TO YOU?

I know something’s wrong as soon as I enter, even before I see the crow Isaac and Dawning of Day lying dead on the floor. What has happened? Have the Haudenosaunee already attacked?

Christophe Crow rushes to me. “Quick,” he says. “Your daughter.” He’s crying. No.

I shove through the throng of women and children who’ve come here as the fighting begins to spread throughout the village. Sleeps Long crouches beside my daughter, holding both of their babies as Gosling furiously tries to push charcoal into Snow Falls’ mouth.

“What is this?” I roar.

“Isaac went mad,” the Crow tells me. “He ate poison and fed it to Delilah and your daughter.” I kneel down and Gosling looks at me. Her eyes, they’ve always told me the truth.

But this can’t be true. My hands begin shaking and I see sharp colours. “Save her,” I whisper.

My daughter’s body quakes. Her eyes are open but don’t look like they can see anything. Blood drips from the side of her mouth, and her lips are black from the charcoal. She looks like she shivers to death.

“I’m sorry, my love,” Gosling says.

I stare down into my daughter’s face, wondering how it rains in here but not outside until I realize that I am washing her in my tears. My daughter. Oh, my daughter. Did I do this to you?

Sleeps Long takes my shoulder. “Here, hold her,” she says. She
hands me my tiny granddaughter. Her eyes are open, too, and see nothing either, not yet. I cradle her as my daughter begins to convulse more strongly. I lie down beside her, the baby between us. She reaches a hand out and touches her mother’s lips, cuddles her face into Snow Falls’ cheek. My daughter. Did I do this to you? Did I cause such pain to all of us? What if we’d never come across your family on that winter day? What if I’d never killed your parents and taken you for my own? Would all this bad blood between your people and mine have turned so poisonous?

I take my daughter’s hand in my own. “I’m sorry,” I whisper in her ear. Her hand squeezes mine, as if she can hear me.

DRUMMING INTO THE OTHER WORLD

As Christophe Crow gathers those in the room into a circle, I watch as Isaac Crow walks toward the shining box, my baby sleeping in her birch basket underneath the table. But instead of going into the shining box for the round ottet, he reaches into a secret pocket in his black robe that he sewed for when he did tricks for the children. He pulls out a dish and some other ottet and sets them on the table. He then rips the bread into chunks and places the pieces in the dish.

He comes back to the circle and whispers words in his tongue before eating a piece from his dish. He then offers it to Delilah, who chews, her eyes blank, and then he offers it to me.

My baby wakes and begins to cry just as Isaac is about to feed me. He tells me it’ll only take a moment. The large piece that he stuffs into my mouth with his damaged hand tastes horrible. I want to spit it out and look at Delilah. But she chews without complaint. I don’t want to be rude to the crows so I chew as fast as I can and try to swallow the bitter-tasting food quickly. Immediately I feel pain in my stomach and wish I’d let myself cough it out.

Christophe Crow’s face shows that he doesn’t like the taste, either. He spits out his ottet, and that’s when I kneel beside Delilah, who’s already on the ground, and try to make myself throw it up. Nothing but spit comes out. The inside of my stomach feels like it’s been sliced in half and begins to burn. Christophe Crow slaps Isaac and rushes to me. Isaac collapses to the ground.

Christophe Crow sticks his fingers in my mouth, and I gag so hard that I spit out red. “You must throw it up,” I hear him say as I fall over onto my side when the pain gets too great.

I stick my own fingers down my throat, but the ottet seems to have lodged itself deep inside me. I can hear my baby screaming under the table now, and I struggle to crawl up and to her. The fire that shoots through me drops me flat.

My baby. My child. Help her. I don’t know if the words are in my head or coming out of my mouth. Help her. She’s screaming. I see Delilah on her back, her body doing little jumps. Her legs kick the floor. Christophe Crow leans over me, and the sparkling necklace I’ve known for so long hovers in front of my eyes. I want to grasp it. I want to touch my father. Delilah’s legs drum out on the floor. I remember my mother now, my brother, drumming their legs into the other world. My legs begin to drum now, too.

My father dangles above me, one arm pointed to where the sun rises and one arm pointed to where the sun sets, his legs crossed comfortably over one another, the halo of blood around his head. My baby still cries but not as hard now. The sound of her gets closer. Gabriel Crow stands over me with my baby in his arms. A burning knife cuts through my guts. I can taste blood in my mouth. My body vibrates. Gabriel Crow hesitates, then leans down to me. I reach up when my body stills and take her in my arms.

I’m not sure what I’m seeing anymore when my eyes open, the pain now a great rush of boiling water through my body. I can’t feel my arms or know if my daughter’s in them. I want my husband here beside me. Faces hover, all of them crying. But none is my husband’s. My body kicks then stills again. When my eyes are closed, I see Carries an Axe walking with me through a field of new corn, hand in hand. Our baby isn’t with us but I know she’s somewhere safe. When I open my eyes again, Christophe leans over me, touching my forehead, my chest, both of my shoulders. I see Gabriel, and Sleeps Long stands above me weeping, her baby in one arm, mine now in her other. I see
Gosling, who forces my mouth open and stuffs charcoal into it. I can tell from her eyes that she knows it’s too late. I see Fox, who leans to me and touches my forehead. I see my father, Bird, his face blackened and the paint of war on his cheeks nearly smudged off. I’ve never seen him cry. His tears splash on my face. Please don’t cry, Father. It means I’m dying. He has my daughter in his arms now, and he lies down beside me. My daughter’s tiny hand tickles my lips and, as I close my eyes, I feel my child’s warm breath upon my cheek.

THAT PLACE DANCING WITH FIRE

I pull myself up from my lifeless daughter. Fox speaks to Sleeps Long. I know what he tells her. Her body acts as if it wants to collapse, but her face remains a mask. She comes to me.

“They died bravely,” I tell her.

She nods, and when my granddaughter begins to cry, Sleeps Long passes her own child to Gosling and takes the baby from my arms. “She’s hungry,” Sleeps Long says as she removes her breast from her loose top. Snow Falls’ daughter sucks hungrily.

The fighting outside gets closer. By now a few dozen women and children have made their way to us. Fox approaches. “We have to get them out,” he says.

Gosling gently rocks Sleeps Long’s baby, cooing to her. “I recently dreamed,” she says, looking at me, “that one day, years after our child is born, you will take him to the same rocks where you had your own dreaming.”

I’m about to say we can speak of this later, that we must get out of this place.

“You know those rocks,” Gosling says. “The ones with the ancient paintings of men in canoes being escorted by Mishipishu.”

I can suddenly see them as vividly as if I stand in front of them. I’d always thought the men in canoes were being pursued by the water lynx, not guarded by him.

A few men shout outside. “Fox,” I say. “Come with me. I have a plan.”