Season of the Warrior (A Wilderness Giant Edition Western Book 2) Read online

  Presently Shakespeare decided the time was right. What he had in mind was risky—some might say insane—but it would so spook the Piegans they might take it as a bad sign and call off the attack. Slowly he eased backwards, retracing his route until he lay just within the outer margin of the thicket. Girding his legs under him, he sucked air deep into his lungs, held his breath a moment, then threw his head back and did his best imitation of a grizzly’s roar.

  For the span of five seconds the night was totally still. Abruptly, the Piegans leaped to their feet with much yelling and gesturing.

  Shakespeare knew he had to get out of there before they thought to surround the thicket. Grabbing a bush on either side, he shook them vigorously while venting another animalistic roar. In the dancing glow of the fire the effect must have been little less than spectacularly frightening, because the very next instant three of the youngest Piegans were in full flight.

  To cap his performance, Shakespeare suddenly roared a third time and burst out of the thicket with his arms flailing, the play of firelight lending him a spectral aspect. Two more Piegans were frantically retreating while the rest were rooted to where they stood as if mesmerized.

  Whirling, Shakespeare sprinted into the comforting shadows and angled up the steep hill. If he didn’t cover a lot of ground quickly he’d never set his eyes on Blue Water Woman again. He was almost to the boulder when shouts of rage erupted, and looking back he saw the war party in frenzied pursuit. They had figured out he was flesh and blood. Some might even have recognized him as being with the marquis’s bunch. Now his life depended on his being faster and cleverer than they were.

  The mountain man skirted the boulder, dug in his moccasins to gain extra purchase, and jogged to the crest. Once more he glanced behind him to see if the Piegans were gaining, and the next instant he collided with something barring his path and was nearly knocked off his feet. Recovering his balance, he faced forward, and was flabbergasted to behold an equally stunned warrior holding a war club.

  The Piegan gathered his wits swiftly. Sweeping the club up, he sprang.

  Shakespeare dared not become embroiled in a prolonged fight. Since he already had the Hawken at waist height, it was the work of a moment to cock the hammer, level the barrel, and squeeze off a shot. Caught in mid-leap inches from the muzzle, the Piegan was catapulted backwards by the blast.

  Without stopping to gauge whether the shot had proven fatal, Shakespeare ran like the wind down the far side, wincing now and again as branches tore into him. There was quite a commotion at the camp, but it was dwarfed by the uproar made by the enraged Piegans as they reached the top of the hill and discovered their fallen fellow.

  Shakespeare hit the flat valley floor on the run and made for the makeshift barricade. The Piegans behind him weren’t his only problem now. There were others lurking in the tall grass and they might try to intercept him. On top of that, he had little confidence the men in the marquis’s employ wouldn’t shoot if they saw a vague figure running toward them despite being cautioned not to.

  In his younger days Shakespeare had won foot race after foot race in friendly competitions with Flathead, Nez Percé, and Shoshone runners, and the experience served him in good stead in the present as he raced for his life, enabling him to pace himself so he didn’t tire prematurely. He breathed deeply, his arms swinging easily at his side, his legs pumping steadily. The grass swirled around his ankles, and the wind blew through his hair.

  Scores of yards separated him from the barricade when a scarecrow-like form streamed out of nowhere with a lance held aloft.

  Shakespeare swerved as the warrior’s arm flashed down. He glimpsed the lance, then felt a jarring blow to his left shoulder as the tip nicked him, tearing his shirt and his flesh. Unfazed, he closed his right hand on one of the pistols at his waist. The Piegan was elevating a knife when a ball cored his brain.

  On Shakespeare sped, thrusting the flintlock under his belt. Behind him stormed the main body of Piegans. To his right and left arose strident cries as those warriors who had been keeping watch on the camp realized what was happening and joined in the chase. An arrow sailed from out of the dark sky and thudded into the soil a hand’s width from his foot.

  Adding to the clamor were shouts from behind the barricade. Someone—it sounded like the soldier, Jarvis—was telling the rest not to shoot unless he gave the order to do so.

  Then Shakespeare was close enough to see Lady Templar, the marquis, and Eric Nash behind the trunks. The artist spied him and waved him on. Diana cupped a hand to her mouth and urged him to hurry. Looking back, he saw why. A skinny Piegan with the stamina of an antelope was hot on his heels, eight feet away and reducing the distance swiftly. The warrior gripped a knife he would never get to use, as Shakespeare’s other pistol proved quickly.

  Rather than stop to climb over the trunks and thereby give the Piegans a chance to pick him off, Shakespeare, pistol in one hand and rifle in the other, increased his speed, coiled, and leaped, clearing the top with half a foot to spare. Diana, William, and Eric barely got out of the way in time. He hit on his right shoulder, rolled, and swept erect, his features as composed as if he had just taken a stroll in a city park.

  Jarvis suddenly gave the command to fire, and the men on the west side of the barricade opened up on the onrushing Piegans. A single volley was all that was needed to disperse them as, like ghosts, they vanished in the grass.

  In the silence that subsequently enveloped the camp a Piegan could be heard groaning in pain.

  “Dear Lord!” William Templar breathed, his face the pallor of a sheet, his forehead damp with perspiration. The tip of his tongue touched his lower lip and was withdrawn.

  “What on earth did you, do out there?” Eric asked McNair. “It sounded as if you started an Indian uprising single-handed.”

  “I reduced the odds a mite,” Shakespeare said, and replaced the second pistol under his belt to free his hand so he could examine his wound. The lance had gouged half an inch into his shoulder and drawn blood, but already the flow had reduced to a trickle.

  “My word!” Diana exclaimed, moving toward him. “You’ve been hurt.”

  “It’s just a scratch, ma’am,” Shakespeare said.

  “You let me be the judge of that. I’ve had practice bandaging wounded.” Diana glanced at her brother. “Be a dear and bring the bag with the ointments.”

  “I don’t know where it is,” William protested sullenly.

  “It’s with the personal things we kept out of the trunks,” Diana reminded him, adding curtly, “Now be off with you! This man is in pain.”

  Exhibiting as much enthusiasm as if he were being sent to the guillotine, Lord Templar sulked off, his spiteful gaze lingering long and hard on the man he blamed for his sister’s ill manners. William was not one to forgive slights. Forgiveness, in his estimation, was for weaklings, a failing caused by inordinate compassion for those who deserved none. But he was a patient man. Sooner or later an opportunity would arise for him to have his vengeance on the mountain man, and he could hardly wait.

  Watching the marquis leave, Eric Nash remarked absently, “You’re a brave man, Mr. McNair. It’s a pity that in the greater scheme of things our lives are paltry by comparison.”

  “Some lives, maybe,” Shakespeare said, and neither of them had to ask if he had someone special in mind, Diana had peeled back the edge of the torn buckskin and was gently determining the extent of the wound.

  Eric leaned his back on the trunks and folded his arms. “All of us, I’m afraid, live and strive and die in vain. Our petty triumphs, our many defeats, what do they matter? Do they advance the progress of humanity through the gloomy and torturous byways of history one little centimeter? I should say they do not. All is for naught, sir, for naught. Even your wondrous deed we’ve witnessed this night.”

  “I didn’t know you’re such a gloomy cuss,” Shakespeare said.

  “He has his moods,” Diana interjected. “The temperament of an artist
and all that. But sometimes” and she stared at Nash “his moods are bloody inconvenient.”

  “Now, now, Diana,” Eric chided. “Remember you’re a lady.”

  “And you remember that your self-appointed purpose in life is to keep me happy, not depress me. You should be grateful to Mr. McNair for his valiant efforts in our behalf, not lecturing him on your morbid outlook on life.” She glanced out over the barricade. “In any event, of much more interest to me is whether the savages have desisted for the night or whether we should fear an attack before dawn now that they are so stirred up.”

  “Don’t fret in that regard,” Shakespeare said. “They lost three men, so they’ll be busy committing the spirits of their dead to the spirit land. That will keep most of them occupied until morning.”

  “Heathens believe in an afterlife?” Eric exclaimed, and laughed. “Now I truly have heard everything.”

  “Why do you find that so peculiar?” Shakespeare asked. “Sure, Indians believe in a spirit world, and most of them believe in God, only they call Him the Great Mystery or the Great Medicine or the Great Spirit or some other name depending on the tribe.”

  “We were told all Indians are crude and barbaric, brutal primitives who have no religion,” Eric said.

  “Some of them feel the same away about whites,” Shakespeare commented. He had been scouring the valley and felt positive the Piegans were indeed gone. The moaning had ceased, and the only sound now was the sighing of the wind through the grass. “Take the Utes,” he detailed. “To their way of thinking the afterlife is divided up into three levels. The highest is just for them. The middle level is for buffalo and other game. The lowest level is for the few whites who reach the other side.”

  “How marvelous,” Eric said. “Tell us more.”

  “Why are you so curious?” Shakespeare responded. “Do you really give a damn about their beliefs, or are you just like most other whites? Folks in the States generally despise Indians. Think they’re a nuisance and should be killed in the name of progress. The government hasn’t helped matters much by making it official policy to relocate all Indians still living in the States west of the Mississippi.” He frowned. “Why, even a senator came out and said that if every Indian was to disappear tomorrow it would be no great loss to the world.”

  “You sound rather bitter,” Eric said.

  “Bitter, nothing! I’m mad as hell. If the government ever tries to drive off the tribes in these parts, I’ll be the first in line to help the Indians.”

  Diana had been listening in growing puzzlement. “I do not understand you at all, Mr. McNair. By your own admission you slew three Indians several minutes ago, yet now you defend them and their way of life? Isn’t that being inconsistent?”

  “Not at all. Some tribes, such as the Shoshones and the Flatheads, have never harmed a hair on a white man’s head. They’re decent, honorable folks, and when you make a friend of one you have a loyal friend for life. They sure as blazes deserve to be treated better than the Cherokees.”

  “But what about the Indians you just fought?” Diana brought up. “Do they deserve fair treatment?”

  “The Piegans? Of course they do. Part of this land was their territory before the white man ever stepped off the Mayflower. They hate whites with good reason. They’ve seen the beaver trapped off, and the buffalo killed in greater numbers than ever before. They know that white men think they have a God-given right to do as they please with the land and everything in it, and they see us as destroyers of their way of life.”

  “What rubbish! They’re blowing the white presence out of all proportion,” Eric declared.

  “Are they? Already there are hundreds of trappers roaming these mountains, and quite a few settlers like myself who have dug in roots and aim to stay. And more and more are coming every year.”

  “So what would you do if formulating Indian policy was up to you?” Diana asked.

  “I’d keep the whites east of the Mississippi and the Indians west of it.”

  “And where would that leave you?”

  “On this side of the river,” Shakespeare said with a grin. “I’m an adopted Flathead.”

  Eric and Diana laughed merrily, and it was to this scene that William returned bearing a satchel. “Here are our medicines,” he stated, dropping the bag at his sister’s feet. Sniffing loudly, he wheeled and walked off.

  “If you don’t mind my saying so, ma’am,” Shakespeare told Diana, “your brother should give some thought to joining the human race.” Then, almost as an afterthought, he quoted William S.: “Having his ear full of his airy fame, grows dainty of his worth, and in his tent lies mocking our designs.”

  “I say,” Eric chuckled. “You know Shakespeare almost as well as I know Byron.”

  “Who?”

  “George Gordon Lord Byron. The greatest poet of all time. The master weaver of words in rhyme.”

  “Never heard of him,” Shakespeare said. He felt a tug on his sleeve and looking down, found the satchel open and Diana on her knees waiting for him to sit so she could minister to his wound without having to stretch. “You’re making a fuss over nothing,” he grumbled as he eased to the ground.

  Diana’s deft fingers soon had the gash cleaned and bandaged. The pale moonlight, bathing her smooth skin, presented the illusion her face had been sculpted from marble. Eric Nash’s eyes never left it for a moment.

  When she was done, Shakespeare stood, Hawken in hand. “Thank you for your trouble, Lady Templar. Now I’d best cheek on my horse. It gets lonesome without me.” Then he melted into the dark.

  “What an odd, fascinating character,” Eric said. “Did you notice how he lost his mountain twang and stopped using all that slang after he became worked up over the Indian issue?”

  “Yes. I’d like to know what he did before he came to these mountains to live. I’d wager he was a lawyer or a politician perhaps.”

  “McNair a political bloodsucker? I think not.”

  From out of the night came a gravelly voice. “You two had better quit chawing like a pair of chipmunks and get some sleep. Come first light those Piegans are going to pay us a visit and it won’t be no social call.”

  Chapter Five

  Dawn had yet to tinge the eastern horizon when Nate King opened his eyes. Snuggled beside him lay Winona, her rich black hair wreathing her face, her bosom rising and falling as she breathed. For the longest while he simply stared at her, reveling in her beauty. Then he pecked her on the tip of her nose, eased off the bed, and stood.

  Across the room snored Zach, his limbs askew, his mouth gaping wide.

  Nate grinned, went to the table where his clothes, pistols, and rifle had been placed before he retired, and donned his britches. Then he jammed a flintlock under his belt. In bare feet he padded to the door, silently worked the wooden latch, and stepped out into the brisk morning air. Immediately goose flesh covered him and he inadvertently shivered.

  Down at the lake the ducks, geese, and brants floated in idyllic tranquility. Once the sun rose they would rouse to life and create a racket with their quacking and honking.

  Nate softly closed the door, stretched, and yawned. Walking around the corner, he entered the trees and went a short distance before relieving himself. He strolled back, went past the door, and to the far end of the long, low cabin where the horse pen stood. The animals were huddled together in one corner. His stallion, spying him, came over to be greeted, and he accommodated by stroking its neck and rubbing around its ears.

  This was one of Nate’s favorite times, the quiet hour before the advent of the blazing sun heralded another day. Even the air seemed to be stilled with expectation. He gazed at the regal mountains to the south, among them the lofty peak that had earned the name Long’s Peak in honor of the explorations conducted in the region by Major Stephen Long back in 1820. Long, like most Easterners, had no conception of the grandeur of the territory he had surveyed, even going so far as to brand the plains as the “Great American Desert,” and
informing his superiors that the well-nigh limitless prairies were inhospitable to man and beast and of no worth to people depending on agriculture for a living. Thanks to Long, maps now labeled the land between the Mississippi and the Rockies as a desert.

  Nate had to shake his head and grin every time he thought of it. How was it, he mused, that two people could look at the exact same thing and each see something entirely different? When he’d first crossed the plains, instead of comparing them to a desert, he’d been astounded by the teeming varieties of life with which the prairie abounded. Hadn’t Long realized the plains were home to millions upon millions of buffalo, antelope, deer, and other animals? And why hadn’t Long been impressed by the fact that some Indian tribes successfully tilled the soil? Rather than being a desert, the plains were a verdant garden waiting to be claimed by enterprising souls hardy enough to endure the many hardships of frontier life.

  But as much as Nate appreciated the prairie, his appreciation paled in comparison to his passionate devotion to the mountains. For as long as he lived he would never forget his first sight of the towering ramparts with their glistening crowns of snow. He could still recall the shiver of awe that rippled through his soul. And now, as he admired the sweeping vista of monumental crags, sublime rocky palisades, and ivory summits touching the very clouds, he felt the same familiar thrill.

  Nate knew he would spend the remainder of his life right where he was. He would live and die in the mountains, and when he was gone he wanted the Shoshones to accord him a proper burial right there in the land he loved. If he never saw the States again he would not suffer in the least. Back there he had been so dependent on everyone and everything: on his parents for their guidance, on his employer for his livelihood, on merchants for his clothing, food, and other essentials. He’d been forced to rely on society for his very life, much like a bird in a cage was dependent on its owner for its sustenance, and he hadn’t realized the fact until he’d learned the meaning of true freedom by coming to the mountains and making do on his own.