Broken Trail (18 page)

When they came upon it, the last shudder was passing from its huge body. Blood lay spattered on the ground and on the broken bushes that the elk had crushed. Joy filled Broken Trail's heart, and he saw the same gladness on Young Bear's face.

Young Bear stood back while Broken Trail spoke to the elk.

“Brother, pardon me for killing you. My people need meat, and I need to earn their good opinion. When your ghost reaches the Land without Trouble, tell the Great Spirit that this is why you died.”

Broken Trail skinned the elk, which was the duty of the
one who made the kill. Then Young Bear helped him to strip off the meat in sheets. They took the heart and liver from the carcass and hacked off the antlers. Finally they pulled the two upper canine teeth so that each of their mothers could have a beautiful elk's tooth pendant. Little more than bones were left for the foxes and crows to share.

With everything heaped upon the green hide, they had a heavy load. Laughing and sweating, they dragged it like a sled. When they reached the village, they hauled it to the longhouse of the Bear Clan, for that was their clan and so the meat was for them.

Catches the Rainbow was smiling and laughing among the women while they set up racks for smoking the elk meat. Every bit would be saved for winter. Standing proudly apart, Broken Trail watched the women work.

Carries a Quiver stood beside him. “The council of warriors will take note of this. Tomorrow I shall speak to them about accepting you as a warrior.”

His words made Broken Trail glow with pride. Soon he would have a scalp lock like Young Bear's, to which he would fasten trophy feathers as soon as he had earned them.

That night, before the families had settled on their sleeping platforms in the longhouse, Broken Trail gave one of the elk teeth to Catches the Rainbow, and she gave him a new pair of moccasins and a set of arm muffs for cold weather.

“I made these while you were away,” she said, “because in my heart I knew you would return.”

The next morning Broken Trail rose early and walked down to the river. It was a blustery day. The wind, blowing from the west, rippled the water and drove ragged clouds across the sky. In the middle of the river a bateau was ploughing its way upstream. It had a mast with a crossbar intended for a square sail, but the mast was empty. He counted twelve men working the oars. The boat was low in the water. It must be on its way from Montreal to Carleton Island, he thought, loaded with winter supplies. Tomorrow it would reach its destination, the landing place below the fort. In an odd way, he felt that the boat's passage brought him nearer to Elijah. A secret link.

He was still watching the bateau creep by when suddenly he sensed that someone had come up beside him. He heard no footsteps. Turning his head, he saw Walks Crooked at his shoulder. How could a man with a twisted foot approach so silently?

Walks Crooked was a lean, sinewy man. He had piercing eyes and a weasel-like face that was made particularly ferocious by four vertical scars on his left cheek, a memento of the cougar whose claws had raked his skin. No one doubted his courage. A man with a crippled foot could have lived his life without shame as a medicine man or a canoe maker. Instead, he had overcome his handicap to become the fiercest
of all the warriors, famous for his ruthlessness. The sorrow of his life was not his maimed foot but the failure of his lazy son Spotted Dog to achieve prowess in anything.

“A war party is planned, a raid against the Mississaugas. Perhaps Broken Trail wishes to be part of it?” There was a taunt in his voice. “There is talk of admitting you to the society of warriors, though some say that you are the sort who runs away when fortune turns against him.”

Broken Trail's heart filled with anger.
“Some say!”
Who would have been the first to spread such a lie about him? None other than the man standing at his shoulder, a sneer on his face.

Broken Trail stiffened his features, not letting his fury show. He was suspicious of Walks Crooked's motives in inviting him along, but what could he do about it? He had long dreamed of the day when he would be old enough to go on the warpath with the men of his band. Now his chance had come.

“Take me with the war party,” he said coldly. “Let me prove what I can do.”

BROKEN TRAIL RAN
his fingers through his scalp lock. It was too soft, too fine. The hair did not stand up in a stiff crest the way it should. It wasn't even the right colour. But at least he looked more like a warrior than before, when his hair had hung nearly to his shoulders, like a boy's. His naked scalp, which still stung from having every excess hair pulled out, had been rubbed with bear grease until it shone.

The war party would leave at dawn the next day. Eight warriors and four youths would take part. The youths were Broken Trail, Young Bear, Spotted Dog and a slightly older boy named Red Crow.

Broken Trail was ready. Carries a Quiver had given him a
new tomahawk. Catches the Rainbow had made him a scalp-lock decoration using elk hair and beads. There was only thing that his scalp lock lacked, and that was a trophy feather. Two trophy feathers would be better. Or three.

Carries a Quiver painted Broken Trail's face in the colours of war, one side black and the other red. He painted with great care to make the pigments smooth. As he worked, he was very quiet. The look on his face was of a man preoccupied with disturbing thoughts. Broken Trail did not pry. He supposed that his uncle was concerned about him, setting forth on his first war party.

Tonight there would be a feast and dancing. By the time Carries a Quiver finished applying Broken Trail's war paint, savoury odours were rising from the cooking pots. As the women set out the food, dogs began to swarm, at first skulking at a safe distance, and then sneaking closer to the fire. Four younger boys with clubs stood guard to keep the dogs from approaching the food.

One year ago it had been Broken Trail's task to keep the dogs away, for these boys were not much younger than he. Until today, he had looked like them. But now he had a scalp lock and face paint like a warrior's. Although he knew the boys, he did not speak to them as he took his place among the men. Young Bear sat on one side of him and Red Crow on the other. This was Red Crow's second war party. For Broken Trail, Young Bear and Spotted Dog, it was their first.

The women brought them dishes heaped with meat and boiled water lily bulbs. Broken Trail was too excited to feel hungry. But he ate everything, just to show that he had a man's appetite. He could hardly wait for the feasting to be over and for the dishes and pots to be cleared away.

At the first warning thumps on the drums, his pulse quickened. He watched while the dancing circle was cleared and fresh wood heaped upon the fire. Then the twelve members of the war party rose from their places. Broken Trail and Young Bear stood up at the same moment. For an instant Broken Trail's eyes locked on Young Bear's, and he saw his own excitement reflected there. This was it. Their first war dance. Silently the dancers stationed themselves in the dark shadows beyond the firelight. Swift Fox, who would lead the dance as well as the war party, carried a spear dressed with bright streamers.

DUM, doom, DUM, doom. War drums began to beat, deep-voiced and strident. The shaking of rattles joined the thumping of the drums. Then the singers began to chant, clacking together the polished sticks they held in their hands. Broken Trail's heart pounded to the beat. Bouncing on his toes, he sensed the rhythm all through his body, faster and faster, until he felt he would explode if he had to wait much longer.

Swift Fox sprang first into the dance circle, brandishing his spear, its streamers flying. After him came Black Elk, then another, and then it was Broken Trail's turn. With a
leap and a yell he joined the dance, lifting his knees high, stamping his feet and fighting with shadow enemies. He held high his new tomahawk and, with the flat side of its head, struck the war post as he danced by. This was what he had dreamed of for so long—to be part of the dance.

Flames swept into the sky. DUM, doom, DUM, doom. Faster and faster the drums beat and the rattles shook and the singers chanted, their clacking sticks adding to the din.

Whooping and leaping, Broken Trail danced in a frenzy. The warrior ahead of him shouted out his history of brave deeds and boasted about the Mississauga scalps he would take. Broken Trail had no past exploits to brag about. But what he lacked in experience he made up for in imagination. Brandishing his tomahawk, he mimed the havoc he would wreak. With wild yells, he smote the war post every time he circled by, and with every blow a phantom enemy fell. By his twentieth circling, twenty foes lay dead.

And then it was over. Swift Fox led the dancers, one after another, out of the circle of light. The chanting, the stick clacking and the rattling stopped. The drums fell silent.

Broken Trail sank exhausted in his place by the fire, completely out of breath. Young Bear, his brow beaded with sweat, leaned toward him. “I wore out my moccasins in that dance.”

“So did I. And they were new this morning.”

“We're real warriors now.”

As the fire died to embers, people straggled back to the
longhouses. On his family's sleeping platform, Broken Trail unrolled his bearskin and lay down, the beat of the drums still throbbing in his head.

In the morning, Carries a Quiver touched up his war paint, adding a red ring around his right eye—the side of his face that was painted black—and a black ring around the other.

“This will help you to see far,” he said. “You must watch out for enemies.”

His face wore the same worried expression that Broken Trail had noticed the day before.

“Do not worry about me. I shall return safely, and with honour.”

“How can I not worry about you? I thought you were dead, and now that you have been restored to us, you are setting out to face danger again.”

“Uncle, you agreed that I should go on the next war party. You told me, ‘Prove your worth.'”

“Those were my words. Yet I fear that this war party is a mistake.”

“A mistake? Why do you think that?”

“In my opinion, it would be better to stay home and use the time for hunting. I said this in council, but those in favour of a war party argued that a raid on the Mississaugas was the fastest way to obtain food for winter. The final decision was not mine.” He sighed. “I should not be talking to you like this, not now. You must not go into battle with
thoughts that weaken your resolve.” He laid his hand on Broken Trail's arm. “Be strong. Keep your eyes about you. Don't rely on your
oki
to keep you safe if you walk upwind of your foe.”

Broken Trail laughed, “No enemy will smell fear upon me.”

“You have never been in battle.”

Swift Fox led the line that jogged westward along the trail. Behind him came Walks Crooked, his lurching gait not slowing him. Spotted Dog, right behind his father, puffed and panted to keep up. Broken Trail was fourth, and then came the rest, with Black Elk at the end.

Half the warriors were armed with rifles; the others had brought their bows, preferring the silence of the arrow to the speed of the bullet. Among the boys, only Spotted Dog owned a rifle, a fine one given to him by his father to celebrate the success of his spirit quest.

The beat of the drums still throbbing in Broken Trail's head drove out most of his troubling thoughts. He set aside his uncle's concerns. For a long time he had wanted to go on a war party. Nothing could spoil it now.

The raid had been carefully planned. A four-day journey westward would bring the war party to the Mississaugas' main village, which stood beside a river that ran south into Lake Ontario. The Mississaugas were a forest-dwelling people, hunters and gatherers. They did not cultivate great
fields of corn, beans and squash as the Haudenosaunee did. Their storehouses held dried meat, fish, berries, nuts, maple sugar and wild rice.

While one group of Oneida warriors took baskets of food from the storehouses, another group would steal all the Mississaugas' canoes. They would load six canoes with food and set the rest set loose to drift downriver. Two to a canoe, the Oneida raiders would paddle the loaded canoes downstream to Lake Ontario, then they would turn east. When they reached the St. Lawrence River, the current would bear them swiftly home.

The warriors jogged on and on. They squelched through bogs where tiny channels of water flowed sluggishly between clumps of bulrushes. Broken Trail's moccasins were soon caked with the mud of swamps. The war party pushed its way through the undergrowth of lowlands that smelled sour with decaying vegetation.

They did not stop to hunt or fish, for they had brought along a good supply of pemmican packed into leather bags. A mixture of dried meat pounded into flakes and then mixed with fat and dried berries, this was food that gave strength, tasted good and would last for a long time.

As they sat around the campfire each night on the trail, the warriors talked about battles they had fought, dangers they had faced and enemies they had slain. Like the other boys, Broken Trail listened and dreamed about the day when he would have his own exploits to brag about. Yet he began to have a feeling, and the feeling grew, that this war
party would not bring honour to those who took part.