The Valiant Women (24 page)

Shea's eyes helped Socorro. “Yes. We will give him.”

Mangus turned to Juh. He spoke rapidly, lifting a hand when Juh recoiled, swung toward the guests. Mangus's raised voice checked the warrior who listened reluctantly.

When Mangus paused, Juh hurled an angry response, would have spun away, but Mangus called him back, rapped out several questions.

Juh scowled. The muscles in his jaws worked, but at last, with ill grace, he muttered something which Mangus seized upon. After a few minute, Mangus explained to the O'Sheas. “Juh says he has beat his women but they indeed do not like the boy. One nursed him under threat for a time after the mother died, but then claimed she had not enough milk for the white woman's child and her own. The boy would have died, Juh admits, if his sister hadn't fed him ground piñon nuts in water with honey, the way Luz showed her. He knows the boy may die without a mother but that might be better than giving him to whites.”

“He's a strange father,” Shea said levelly, “to prefer a dead baby to a healthy seven-year-old.”

Mangus must have repeated this almost exactly for Juh's eyes blazed. He stared at Shea, hating, measuring. At last he gave a bitter laugh, spoke quickly and watched Shea with malice.

“He says he must know if his son's foster father is a brave man,” said Mangus. “He says, Hair of Flame, that the brand on your cheek is sometimes given to cowards.”

The scar stood out whitely as the muscles in Shea's jaw contracted. “Does Juh want to fight me? I will, any way he chooses.”

Mangus frowned. “You are a fool! If he picked lances—”

“I'll show him in any manner he wants that his son will not grow up with a coward.”

Again, Mangus faced Juh. After a few exchanges, Juh smoothly proposed something that brought angry remonstrance from the other. Juh shrugged stubbornly, repeated some gutturals and waited.

Mangus spread his hands, turning to Shea. “Fighting is easy. He would have another thing. If you will be branded again, bear a brand for his son, you may keep him till he is old enough to join his father.”

“Branded?” Socorro gasped. “No! That's cruel; there's no sense in it!”

Juh smiled stonily at her, enjoying her distress. Mangus stood broodingly, his gigantic presence a force immobilized by his conflicting loyalties. “There has to be another way,” Socorro entreated Mangus.

“It is Juh's price.”

Shea had listened as if stunned, blue-gray eyes dilating. Now they narrowed. He braced himself as if drawing strength from the hard earth. “Where's the iron? Let's get it done.”

Mangus jerked as if his own flesh had been seared. “My friend, don't do this! The cub's not worth it, not to you! Do not forget he'll come back to the Apache. He cannot be your true son.”

“This should not be asked,” cried Socorro. “My love, it's too much! We must just hope Talitha can raise him.”

“It's she who must come with us,” Shea said, glancing toward the little girl who had edged up with her brother and the cradleboard so much too large for her. “And she won't leave him.” He smiled and dropped on one knee, smoothing back the tangled yellow hair. “Get your things together, colleen, and your brother's. We'll leave in the morning.”

Her face crumpled. “They—they'll burn your face!” Hampered by the cradleboard, she turned as quickly as she could to Socorro. “Go without us,” she begged fiercely. “Please, I can take good care of James! We'll stay here!”

“Get your things,” Shea ordered. His big hand clasped her thin shoulder, sent her toward the shelters. He said then to Mangus, “I'm ready.”

XIV

The broken horseshoe glowed dull red in the flames. Socorro's mouth was parched as she watched, unable to look away. There were no branding irons in an Apache camp, of course, and almost no metal.

One man suggested a musket barrel be heated but that idea was scorned because it might ruin the gun. Someone, though, had the old horseshoe and someone else had made primitive tongs from the fork of a willow strong and flexible enough to grip the iron firmly.

Juh held the tongs. Most of the warriors and many of the women and children had gathered. Luz came up to Socorro, gave her some chunks of pulped, peeled agave leaf.

“Use them quickly. I will have ready a tea that will dim the pain and help him sleep.”

Socorro had been too numbed with horror, too full of revolt against this useless torture, to accept that it would be and plan to ease Shea afterward. Luz jolted her back to reality and how to minister to his wound. It was something to hold to.

Brands
did
heal. Shea had survived one along with a flogging; he'd survived the thirst and despair of the desert. This was terrible; she wished she could bear his agony herself, but he'd live.

When Talitha came close beside her, though, she detested the girl and the brown-skinned blue-eyed baby. This was her fault—and hers, for asking Shea to help them. “You shouldn't see this,” she told the child. “Go away!”

But Talitha only hunched her shoulders as if expecting a blow and looked up at Socorro with sorrowful eyes. “He's doing it for us. I—I wouldn't ever have asked to go away if I'd known this would happen.”

Socorro's heart melted. “Poor little one!” she said. Kneeling, she put her arm around Talitha, cradleboard, James and all. “It's not your fault. It's Juh. But my husband's strong, the brand will heal, and in time it'll be only a mark of courage.”

But now,
now
was Juh's gloating face, the rough crescent of glowing red. Mangus strode over to take the tongs from Juh. “I will do this,” he said.

Juh snarled but Mangus's gaze quelled him. That was a mercy, at least. Juh might have purposely bungled, held the iron too long or used it to blind and maim. Mangus would brand, but quickly.

Arms crossed, Shea stood with his head thrown back as Mangus approached. Socorro saw Shea's fingers bite in on his elbows, convulse at the sizzling. The smell of burned flesh made Socorro's stomach twist. She broke into cold sweat and only held on to consciousness by a great effort of will.

Then it was done.

With a shuddering sob, Socorro released the children and hurried to Shea, covering with pulped agave the livid arc that interlaced with the old brand. Sweat stood out on him and his skin looked gray beneath its tan. But he hadn't cried out or retreated from the iron.

“Go to my wickiup and rest,” Mangus told him. “You are brave enough to rear an Apache!”

The tea Luz brought put Shea into a sound sleep. “He may have strange dreams with strange beasts and colors,” said Luz. “Too much of this can kill. But used with care it dulls pain and brings rest. I'll give you enough to get your man through the next bad days. And I'll see that the children are ready in the morning.” She paused at the entrance of the wickiup. “The men will decide about the mines tonight. I think they'll all say yes because your husband is so brave.”

Socorro thanked her, but looking down at Shea who moved in his drugged sleep and moaned, she loathed the thought of the mines because they had led to this.

Except for an old woman who noiselessly kept to one wall like an aged spider content to slumber in its web, Mangus's household yielded the wickiup to their guests. One of his wives brought food, a gruel of corn, seeds and meat, and Luz fetched some honey for Shea, which she helped Socorro feed him, propping him up so that he wouldn't choke. They gave him joint fir tea, also.

“Be sure he drinks a lot,” Luz advised. “It will help keep away fever.” As she was leaving, Mangus entered, squatting down at once because of his height.

His lips curved in a sardonic smile as he glanced from his niece to Socorro. “Well, this is the way of it, men hurt each other and women try to heal the wounds. Though I have known some women who enjoyed the wounding, too! When Hair of Flame wakes, you may tell him we accept his offer. The miners can work without hindrance so long as they don't bring in families and erect forts. We ask for a tenth part of each
conducta
's supplies and agree to take no ball and powder so long as the miners are supplied with only an amount reasonable for hunting.”

“Those are good terms,” Socorro said, though because of Shea's branding she was now feeling revulsion for the whole enterprise. “You must have argued for my husband.”

“Until he took the brand for an Apache child, what I did for him was, in truth, for you.” With a curious lightness, Mangus touched Shea's hair which even in twilight was dusky flame. “Now I will call him friend for his own sake.”

A hard-bought name. Socorro's eyes filled with tears. When she could see again, Mangus was gone.

The long sleep restored Shea as nothing else could have done. “Some dreams I had, though,” he grumbled as Socorro bandaged agave pulp to the burn with a strip of her chemise, finding it difficult to fasten in place without covering one eye. “God's whiskers! Horses with wings, all shades of the rainbow, some with men's faces! And the women!” He grinned, winced as that tugged his cheek. “Lass, you wouldn't believe those women!”

“So that's why you moaned all night!” Socorro scolded. “And I was feeling sorry for you!”

“Skin like velvet,” he teased and the devilish gleam in his eyes reassured her that he would be all right. “And their breasts!” He made an expressive gesture with his hands, chuckled at her look of outrage. “Only trouble was, some had three and others four! Confused me something awful!”

“After such a night, can you ride today?” asked Socorro with a sniff.

“My head feels like it might float away.” Shea touched it with caution. “Mangus gave me the iron as lightly as he could but it still hurts like hell. Rather ride than sit around, though. Guess I'd better find out if we get to work the mines.”

“For a tenth part of the
conductas
and the safeguards you mentioned. You should talk with Mangus, but let me bring you some food first.” She added severely, “I don't think I'll let you have any more of that special tea if it's going to make you dream of beautiful hussies!”

“Let's save it for night,” he agreed wickedly. “Can't enjoy such delights properly on horseback.”

Relieved that he was well enough in body and spirit to joke, Socorro took his face in her hands and kissed him. “Oh, my love! You were brave.” To hold back the tears that threatened to come, she laughed softly, ran her hand over his chest. “Should you moan pleasurably tonight,
mi hombre
, I'll take advantage of your dreams of those so opulent ladies!”

He rested his bright head between her breasts, touching them lightly. “You have just the right number and shape of these,
chiquita
. We'll have to be chaste on the way home because of the children, but wait till I get you in our bed!”

They stayed like that a moment, more a part of each other than they had ever been, and then were lost in a kiss when Luz called from outside that she had brought their breakfast.

Talitha had a worn rag doll her mother had made before their capture, a tattered
Book of Mormon
and a pair of moccasins Luz had given her. For a blanket, she had what looked like an old roan cowhide.

Besides his cattail-down stuffed cradleboard, James had a leather ball and a small gourd rattle that he liked to flourish. Luz had equipped him for the journey with a supply of the soft inner bark of the cottonwood to place between his legs so that he wouldn't foul his cradleboard, and there was a supply of piñon nuts and honey with which to concoct his “milk.”

Absurdly small, Talitha sat behind Shea, clasping his waist as best she could. James was on Socorro's back and the cradleboard was such a convenience, leaving her arms free, that she decided she'd have something like it for her baby.

She'd seen very little of babies but James didn't howl as the others had all seemed to, and he watched what went on with alert interest when he wasn't sleeping. A baby must like this closeness to its mother and being in the middle of things.

With Viejo behind them, they said their farewells and left the Apache camp.

Talitha, during their stops, changed James's linings and fed him. Both children had lice but Socorro was too weary to do much about it even had she known a remedy. When they got home, they'd all have to sleep outside till they got rid of the tiny gray pests. Meanwhile, imagination made her feel that she was crawling with them.

Shea thought the burn might heal faster now without a poultice so she only applied a little mesquite gum softened with water and made his tea from the crumbled white flowers Luz had given her. He drank this after their meal of pinole and jerky. Socorro had been too tired and absorbed in Shea to pay much attention to the children but when she saw that Talitha, cuddling James, was sitting a long way from camp, a lonely little figure in the deepening night, she felt a wave of contrition.

Going up to her, she knelt and put her arm around the thin shoulders. “What's the matter, child? Surely you don't already want to go back to Juh?”

Those blue eyes caught enough of the last light to confound Socorro as the girl put James down on the cowhide to kick in happy nudity. “Do you wish we'd stayed?” she asked bluntly.

“No!” Shamed, Socorro hugged the child against her. “You're our family now!” When Talitha's body stayed rigid, Socorro teased gently, “It's wonderful to get children who're already here. Much less trouble!”

“But we
were
trouble,” Talitha whispered. “You—you must hate us! The way they burned him—”

“Hush!” Socorro stroked the matted hair, letting the child cry. “Shea is now James's father in a very special way.”

“He didn't do it for James.” Misery almost stifled Talitha's voice. “I heard him. He did it for me.”

“He thought you were worth it,” Socorro said, but Talitha clung to her and sobbed as if her heart would break.