Somewhere to Dream (Berkley Sensation) (13 page)

CHAPTER
20

Family Reunion

Jesse and Ahtlee headed out with three other warriors the next morning, riding to the powwow. It was the most unlikely of meetings in so many ways. Cherokee and white politicians, all assembled in the August heat under the pretext of bettering their relations, faced each other across a small piece of grass outside the gates of New Windsor. The day was too hot to do any business inside. Everyone had shown up in their finery, the chiefs in their newest clothes: bright, beaded moccasins, a half dozen or so battle feathers hanging in their hair; the politicians wore coats, hats, and matching moustaches. Jesse wore simple trousers and a buckskin shirt, and he had graciously allowed Adelaide to weave a feather into his hair. Normally the feathers were reserved for warriors who had fought in battle, but Soquili had insisted that applied to Jesse, since he had fought bravely that first day, when Soquili had brought him home.

Something told Jesse that any kind of deal making at this powwow might involve his father showing up, and that little voice had been right. Thomas stood back a ways, leaning casually against an oak, arms crossed. Although his father intended to appear disinterested, Jesse could see Thomas’s hungry eyes taking in every man in the area and measuring him. Didn’t matter that Thomas had nothing to do with the men in charge. He had a way of wheedling his way into things, taking what he needed, and using it however he saw the most benefit to himself. Thomas didn’t spot his son right away, so Jesse got to his feet, dusted off his trousers, and made himself visible. He wasn’t surprised that his stomach rolled a bit, queasy with nerves. Now that it was time to talk, he wasn’t sure what he’d say.

Thomas’s eyes popped open at the sight of him, and Jesse watched a variety of expressions cross the old man’s face: confusion, bemusement, then something more calculating. Not once, Jesse noticed, did the gray eyes register anything resembling relief at the knowledge that his son had survived. Jesse nodded shortly, hiding his grin. Felt good to give the old man a shock. Maybe he’d drop dead of it. Thomas’s stunned expression snapped back in place, leaving a smile that hinted at amusement.

Ahtlee said something quick under his breath and Jesse grunted back. “My father’s over there,” Jesse explained. “I should at least tell him I’m alive.”

Ahtlee shook his head slowly, distrust swimming deep in his eyes. “He sees.”

“Well, he’ll come over here if I don’t go over there.”

“He will not.”

Sure enough, Thomas came loping across the square of flat, dry earth they’d designated for the powwow.

“Jesse, boy!” Thomas called cheerfully, waving as if they were the closest of friends.

“I told you,” Jesse told Ahtlee. This time Ahtlee said nothing, only narrowed his eyes speculatively at Jesse.

Jesse grinned. “I’m coming home with you,” he assured the Cherokee. “I just gotta talk to the guy is all.”

Ahtlee nodded, then glanced toward Thomas as he approached. “He call you “boy”? Not “man”? He not know son too good.” Then he turned toward the other Cherokee, leaving Jesse alone. Jesse couldn’t hide the grin that popped out at the unexpected words of praise from his foster father.

“So,” Thomas bellowed as he drew close. “The boy’s alive after all. And would you look at you now? All Injun, you are.” He flicked his fingers at Jesse’s hair. “Even a little feather. Suits you.”

“Yeah, I’m alive, no thanks to you,” Jesse replied, giving nothing away. “And you look the same as ever. Old, dirty, and mean.”

Thomas’s expression resumed his typical sneer. He hooked his thumbs in the waistband of his trousers. “What’s going on, Jesse? Why ain’t you dead?”

Jesse shrugged, looking unconcerned. “Guess I was too pretty to kill. They’d have no trouble with ending you, though.”

His father grunted, then examined Jesse with his piercing gray eyes, hunting for something Jesse had no wish to give. He owed this man nothing, and Jesse held his stare. “And the other fellas they brought in when they caught you?”

“Not pretty enough.”

A couple of seconds passed with nothing said but what passed through their eyes. How many times had Thomas glared at him this way, forced him to look away? Jesse wasn’t budging this time. He wasn’t afraid anymore.

“So what happens next? You gotta stay with ’em?”

Jesse nodded, said nothing. He watched a calculating thought pass through his father’s face, linger in his eyes, then stop on the tight line of his mouth. “You and me stand to do good on this deal, boy, if we play it right.”

Jesse recognized the expression. Thomas had just tossed the dice, and now waited to see which way they rolled. He had no idea what his son was thinking. Jesse loved that. Wanted to keep it that way.

“Yeah? How’s that?”

“I figure you know things we can use, you know? Make the deal even sweeter.”

“Is it a bad deal, then?”

Thomas winked and Jesse’s stomach fell. He knew that wink. The Cherokee were in trouble.

“I tell you what, boy,” Thomas said, coming closer. “I never thought I’d be happy to see you, but I guess I am. Y’all head back and have your little pipe-smoking party, then bring me everything these dogs say. That way I can get it to the men here. Easy pickins. That’s what it’ll be.”

Jesse nodded slowly, remembering so much about his life with Thomas. The beatings he’d been given when he spilled anything, when he left a broom in the wrong place, when he asked a question his father couldn’t answer. The wicked things he’d seen Thomas do that had always haunted his soul, and the way Thomas had told him, over and over, that what he’d seen was how it was supposed to be. All those times when Thomas had bellowed it should have been
him
that died, not his brother. What a waste of time and food Jesse was.

“Is that right? Easy pickin’s?”

“Sure ’nough. Why, you and me can have just about anything we want after that.”

Jesse sniffed and crossed his arms, staring directly at his father. “Ain’t no ‘you and me,’
Thomas
. Never has been.” He got a visceral thrill from calling his father by his first name. It was the first time Jesse had felt strong enough to stand up to him that way, and he figured he had the Cherokee to thank for that. How ironic that the people he’d set out to hate, the people who had captured him and forbidden his escape, had freed him.

Thomas’s eyes hardened to pewter, clashing against the fire in Jesse’s golden eyes. “Is that so? Why the hell did I bother feedin’ you all these years, then?”

“Got me,” Jesse said with a shrug. “Your mistake. You made a lot of mistakes.”

He didn’t give his father a chance to answer.

“I’ll see you in three days, old man. If you want this thing so bad, you’ll have to do it on your own. I ain’t helpin’ you.” He winked, feeling deliciously dangerous. “I gotta go back now, see to my new family. You have yourself a good day, now.”

He turned and headed back to the scrum of Cherokee that no white man would dare enter without an invitation. He ignored the curses his father threw at his back and nodded at Ahtlee when the older man glanced over his shoulder, checking. Jesse couldn’t stop smiling. Never turned to give Thomas any hint of that, though. Didn’t want to give Thomas anything. He owed him nothing.

The speeches began shortly after that, and Jesse sat cross-legged on the mat, glaring across the grass, watching Thomas’s reaction. The old man was listening hard to what everyone was saying, looking for opportunity, and wearing that arrogant grin Jesse knew so well. As if he had the most delicious secret and was just daring someone to ask. Whatever happened to the poker face he always preached about?

Just where Thomas fit into all this, Jesse didn’t know, but wherever it was, it wasn’t good. It made Jesse smile, though, thinking about what Thomas would say if he knew the wickedly narrowed black eyes behind him belonged to a man claiming to be Jesse’s new father. If this meeting wasn’t so damn important, Jesse would have thrown back his head and laughed. After the years of lessons he’d been taught, learning the countless reasons why all Indians were evil savages who deserved nothing better than to die slow deaths, now he regarded his birth father with more suspicion than he did his new family. But Thomas Black didn’t have much of a sense of humour. And Jesse still had to be careful.

Deep inside Jesse there lurked another, deeper concern. Truth was, Jesse was Thomas’s blood son. What was that old saying about the apple falling by the tree? How much truth was in that? Enough that it kept Jesse from entirely trusting himself at times.

Chief Standing Trees, the host, sat tall as his name, towering over the rest of the men despite his advanced years. The day had started out with ceremony, the old chief receiving arrows from the other chiefs, then holding them aloft to signify strength in numbers. Five villages stood before the white men, and pretty soon they’d all be listening to Jesse’s pathetic attempts to interpret. For this meeting, he was mostly supposed to translate English into some sort of Cherokee, which was the biggest challenge. At the next meeting, in a few days time, he would have to pull together the village’s thoughts, put them into English, and declare them to the entire crowd.

Chief Standing Trees’s face, sagging in weary pouches, said nothing. In fact, Jesse wondered if the old man had fallen asleep during one of the drawn-out speeches. He studied the ancient Indian’s eyes, watched them cross momentarily, and figured he was right. Either that or he’d had a long puff on that peace pipe of his.

Beside Standing Trees sat the other four chiefs, all of lesser status and looking exactly that. The smallest, Runs Quickly, didn’t look as if he were going to run anywhere for a long time. His face had been badly scarred by the rampage of smallpox that had decimated the tribes ten years before, and his back seemed to be developing a hunch. His eyes, interestingly enough, reflected the same blurriness as did Trees’s. The other three seemed alert. They also bore ugly smallpox scars, and one had a thick white knife scar running down one cheek. Other than Runs Quickly, the men sat straight, their eyes moving with suspicion over the white men, occasionally glancing off the paper they were expected to sign. Of course, there would be no actual signing, since none of them knew how to write his name. All they were expected to do was make a mark of some kind with the ink they’d be handed. Their names could be nothing but a blotch of ink or an ‘X.’ The white man’s contract didn’t care which, as long as there was a witnessed mark.

Ahtlee stood boulder-like behind Jesse, living up to his name of Does Not Bend, and glaring through ebony eyes at those he trusted least. Jesse figured that of all the powerful men here, Ahtlee was probably the most intelligent. The most . . . vital. He included Ahtlee’s own chief, Standing Trees, in that. Ahtlee had said little about this powwow ahead of time, keeping his thoughts to himself, but Jesse was aware that his adoptive father was there not only to be Trees’s right-hand man and learn about what the white men offered. He was also there to monitor Jesse’s reaction. Soquili had never doubted who he believed Jesse to be; Ahtlee knew better.

Jesse’s role in all this was to sit among the People and tell them what was being said. It was a difficult assignment, since the white men all postured with magnanimous gestures and generous overtures that weren’t exactly translatable into Cherokee. Jesse assumed most of them were lies, and he had yet to hear a Cherokee tell a lie. The gist of it was that the whites were offering a better trade proposal in exchange for a fair parcel of land they could call their own. The Indians would promise to stay off the land and leave the settlers alone, and the whites would do the same for the Indians. There would also be a neutral portion of land along the Keowee that was open to both for hunting and fishing.

It all sounded reasonable, but Jesse was concerned about this neutral land they kept talking about. The moustaches were going on about how everyone would live together in a harmonious, beneficial partnership, sounding to Jesse like they were just talking garbage. That kind of partnership would never happen. Jesse knew it, Ahtlee knew it, probably they all knew it.

Standing Trees had long been an advocate of better trade with the white men. He wanted his people to have everything the white men had, and if it took giving up a little land, which he didn’t believe anyone but the gods owned anyway, that was fine with him. So the big old man stood firm in his backing of this new initiative. He spoke in his tired, croaky voice, raised his gnarled claws to the sky, and intoned to the gods and the ancestors, chanting about the goodness of this plan and how the Cherokee would only be strengthened by signing. Runs Quickly nodded sagely, then joined in with his own little yips and howls.

When the old men were done agreeing and the ones with the hats had thrown out their last highly questionable promise, there would be three days of deliberation in each Cherokee village. Then everyone was expected to return with answers. With a last glance at Thomas, Jesse rose and followed the others out of the meeting area and toward the corral.

CHAPTER
21

Smoke

The moment Jesse and Ahtlee returned to their village, they were ushered toward the council house with some ceremony. There they would be expected to go over the story again and again, slowly and painstakingly inspecting every statement, which Jesse prayed he’d translated right. Before they even stepped through the entryway, the council house had been what Adelaide called “smudged.” The People had burned sage and sweetgrass, letting the smoke clear evil and anger from the room, as well as from the men’s hearts. Jesse was stopped at the door and had to wait while one of the elders held the bowl of smoking herbs before him, then used a feather to fan the stuff over his face, head, and body. He was starting to get used to this kind of thing, though he still found it strange. Adelaide had tried to explain how all of this worked, how the earth and the sky and the spirit world were all connected or something. Jesse had no idea what she was talking about, but he’d given up fighting it.

After the smudging was complete, all the men sat in complete silence, and the head priest came in. He said prayers, turning to the four walls of the council house as he did so: east was first, then south, west, and north, praying to the four symbols of air, water, fire, and earth. When the prayers were done, the sacred pipe was offered around.

Jesse’d heard about this pipe from Adelaide. She’d never smoked it—claimed she never wanted to—but had tried to explain to him what it was all about. A mixture of trumpet flower, sumac, and tobacco was packed into the pipe, along with dried leaves of another plant. After a man inhaled the traditional mix of herbs, he was expected to speak, to share his innermost thoughts. Those thoughts were supposed to come out with brilliant clarity, embracing facts and possibilities with intelligence and intuition. Adelaide had called the stuff Indian Truth Serum, saying a man couldn’t lie at that point. Jesse was very curious.

The building was comfortably quiet, though almost suffocating with the heat and stink of so many bodies sitting close together on this sweltering day. Jesse could only hope the whole thing wouldn’t take too long. Soquili, sitting on his left, jabbed him with his elbow to get his attention. When Jesse lifted an eyebrow in question, Soquili explained how, when the pipe was offered, it would be his turn to speak. Jesse should let the smoke come into him gently, let it mingle with the air in his lungs, then let it drift out. It all sounded pretty easy.

“Little smoke, Jesse.
Little
smoke. No big smoke,” he said, watching Jesse closely to make sure he paid attention.

“Yeah, yeah,” he said, waving Soquili off.

Jesse studied the men as they smoked. They looked relaxed, puffing at the long clay pipe, letting smoke drift out of their mouths and noses. When a man exhaled that sweet smoke, no one looked away, and no one else spoke. Jesse wondered if it was his imagination, but it seemed to him the words seemed to come slower upon the man’s exhalation, his thoughts calm as the ponderous tendrils of rising smoke. When the pipe was handed to him, he reached for it, turned his hand over, as he’d seen the others do, and inhaled, trying to assume the expression of a man who knew what he was doing.

The smoke was harsh in his throat, but he controlled the reflexive coughing. He closed his eyes, filled his lungs, then waited. He’d seen the other men take their time before blowing the curls of gray through their lips, so he forced his lungs to freeze, take in whatever they were supposed to take in, before he slowly exhaled.

Clarity of thoughts. Intelligent insight into possibilities. That’s what the pipe was supposed to bring.

Well, he’d obviously done something wrong. When he opened his mouth, Jesse couldn’t even speak. Just the idea of using his voice seemed impossible. Words? Any words he’d planned before had snuck out and left him completely empty. His gaze floated lazily over the sea of eyes and he noticed there seemed to be more of them all of a sudden. Every dark brown iris was completely focused on him.

Jesse blinked, then marvelled at the simple action, at how his eyes had simply known to do that without any prompting from him. Fascinating. He blinked again, on purpose, noticing for the first time in his life the slick sensation of his lids passing over his eyes. The feeling struck him as funny, and he adopted a wide, blank grin. Soquili was quiet beside him, but when Jesse turned his head, ever so slowly, toward this “brother” of his, Soquili smiled back.

“You’re not so bad,” Jesse managed to say, tripping through the words. His tongue had gained weight. It felt thick and foreign. He frowned, considering. The only other time he’d had so much trouble speaking was when he’d gotten into Thomas’s whisky that time, and how funny—actually, he couldn’t remember what had been funny, but he was sure it had been. He chuckled, and Soquili joined in.

Soquili said something quick to the others and a unanimous snicker simmered through them. It was the kind of sound that might have set Jesse off at other times, but at this particular moment he found the very concept of laughter hilarious. Mirth rolled out of him, turning his muscles to jelly, sending his empty thoughts to float among the smoke. Eventually, he realized he was the only one laughing, and dedicated a lot of effort to keeping his face neutral. He wiped his hands over his eyes, looking around the room and trying to fit himself back into the goings-on. The pipe had moved on. It was three men down now, which meant he’d missed three speeches. Huh. No one had waited to find out what the amazing Jesse Black had to say. He frowned. They couldn’t just keep going, could they? Weren’t there rules?

“Hey,” he said, reaching for the pipe.

Soquili put his hand on Jesse’s arm and gently pressed it down to his side. He shook his head. “You don’t need talk,” he said.

Jesse wanted to object, wanted to contribute something. He pictured the scene at the powwow, the smug look on Thomas’s face. He knew that expression, knew it meant nothing good could be in it for the Cherokee.
He searched his mind for the right way to say these things, but thanks to the pipe, the words got garbled and lost in the thick space between his ears. Truth serum. Ha! Jesse rested his elbows on his knees, let his head slump into his hands, and fell asleep.

He had no idea how long the meeting went on before he was shaken awake and shoved into the cool night. The air felt brisk against his hot skin, and his head suddenly seemed as clear as the starry night. Soquili walked beside him as usual, but he wasn’t speaking. He didn’t look angry, only thoughtful.

“What’d I miss?” Jesse asked.

Soquili looked at him, at a loss.

“Big talk?” Jesse tried, jabbing his thumb back at the council house.

Soquili shrugged and tried to speak English. “We talk more in morning.”

“Did Ahtlee tell them—”

“My father talk, other men think.”

Not much he could do then. Not that there ever had been. “Damn, I’m hungry,” he muttered.

Soquili lifted an eyebrow, inquiring.

“Hungry,” Jesse said, a little louder. Soquili grinned and nodded, then took him home and gave him the most delicious snack of dried venison he’d ever had.

It all started again in the morning: the smudging, the sitting, the prayers . . . and the pipe. Soquili and he headed inside the council house, then went through the routine. As they sat, Soquili glanced at him, his expression giving nothing away.

“What?” Jesse asked, already on the defensive, regardless of Soquili’s frame of mind.

“Smoke not so much today,” Soquili suggested, the corner of his mouth twitching.

Jesse scowled. “Okay.”

The pipe did the rounds, and Jesse watched closely when Ahtlee stretched out his hand for it. Everyone was quiet, waiting. Ahtlee spoke slowly, outlining what had happened at the powwow. His deep voice rumbled, every word heavy with meaning.

One by one, the men took their turns voicing questions and opinions. It was obvious from the start that the elders, for the most part, were going to side with Standing Trees and Runs Quickly, if only for duty’s sake. The younger men, the warriors, argued emphatically, pointing out the weak points that Jesse had shown Ahtlee. Their youthful gestures became more urgent, more frustrated, and the elders grew louder as well, demanding more attention on the basis of their status.

Ahtlee gazed around through narrowed eyes, studying each man and his reaction. He was leaving it up to them, Jesse saw. Why would he do that? Ahtlee was usually so smart. Why wouldn’t Ahtlee step in and show them the answer?

Resisting temptation, Jesse behaved. When it was his turn to accept the pipe, he took a short puff and blew the smoke out almost immediately. By doing that, he was left in relative control of his thoughts, though he rode a pleasant, dizzy wave as it passed through his mind at first. Despite the attention aimed his direction as a result of the pipe, Jesse wasn’t nervous. It frustrated him that Ahtlee wasn’t saying anything constructive. He wanted to be heard. He knew his Cherokee would sound wrong no matter what he said, but he couldn’t stand to keep quiet any longer, to let all this go without at least saying something. Two dozen pairs of eyes stared through the firelit room, waiting for him to say something more intelligent than he’d attempted the night before.

“I say,” he said in stilted Cherokee, “this is bad. I say Tsalagi no go there. These bad words hurt Tsalagi . . .”

He stopped, immensely frustrated when he couldn’t find the right words. How could he explain Thomas’s nefarious character in a room full of honest men?

Soquili took the pipe and did what he could for Jesse, trying to elaborate. Voices rose and fell again, the old men railed against Jesse’s lack of evidence, and Jesse dropped his forehead back into his hands. In the end, he realized, he could do nothing about any of this. He was a translator. A pawn. The whole thing was damn frustrating. He told himself he didn’t care one way or the other.

Now if only he could believe that.