A Flight of Arrows (41 page)

“Thayendanegea has sent the bloody hatchet!”

Alarm was in his brother's voice. William could all but smell it on the damp night air as their father said, “These warriors left the camp before that thing was done, but whether they know of it is no matter. This is a thing I must do. Creator is with me and will see it through as He wills it.”

Bereft of such faith, William asked, “What will you say to them?”

“I will know that when I say it.” Stone Thrower took them each by a shoulder, grip and voice firm. “Listen, my sons. Stay in these woods and do not show yourselves—unless I call for you. Then come out together, straight to me, into the light.”

William couldn't speak. Neither, it seemed, could his brother.

Stone Thrower's fingers pressed hard. “Do my sons hear my words?”

“I hear them,” Two Hawks said with evident reluctance.

Satisfied, the big warrior turned the force of his attention on William, who knew he must say something. The words being shouted in that clearing were incomprehensible, but the roil of violent intent behind them needed no translation.

“Had I the choice to make again,” he said in a rush, “I would stay. I would not go to Quebec.”

A breath deepened Stone Thrower's chest, then William found himself engulfed in his father's embrace, the arms around him strong and sure, like the shielding of eagle's wings.

Stone Thrower uttered a word, muffled by the beating of William's own heart. It sounded like
iyo
. Then he was gone, striding out into the clearing, into the light of the Senecas' fire.

W
ith every sinew strung taut, Two Hawks watched his father cross the clearing. The Senecas had yet to notice him, so focused were they on their prisoner. Beside him, William radiated a matching apprehension. “Will they kill him too, our father?”

“He goes with a shield of faith and a strong heart.” Two Hawks's voice, dry as wood dust, betrayed the fear that lurked behind those words, and so he added, “Be praying, Brother.”

Praying for words to turn aside the warriors' lust for vengeance and blood. Words like a dam skillfully laid across a raging stream. His father did not lack for courage, but the mood of these warriors was ugly. There was no telling which way their hearts would turn. Or their hands. Or what might be the word or deed to turn them.

Two Hawks gripped his rifle, felt the weight of the bow across his shoulder. Should he ready the bow? With it he could shoot in silence from the trees without revealing their position at once. Many arrows in the time it took to reload a rifle. He set by the rifle, slipped the bow from its case, strung it without taking his gaze from his father. Stone Thrower's back was lance straight, his stride unhesitating. Two Hawks's heart swelled with love and pride, pressing up into his throat. He remembered what his brother had said, his father's joy in hearing it.
Let it not be the last words they exchange
.

Stone Thrower was nearly among the Senecas before a warrior gave a shout of warning, alerting the rest. They swung to face him, seeming many in the firelight. Were others out ranging the wood? Two Hawks
glanced into the tangled dark, then whipped his head around to scan the fire-lit clearing as sharp words of surprise fell away to silence. The Senecas had formed a wall, obstructing Two Hawks's view of Aubrey, on the ground behind them. A tall, powerful warrior strode out from their ranks and halted in Stone Thrower's path.

“Who are you, come thus among us? Do you follow from Thayendanegea's camp with news?”

The tension of the warriors eased slightly at this. They had been looking beyond Stone Thrower to the clearing's edge, some with muskets raised, but here was only one man, unafraid in his approach as a friend would be. No threat against their numbers whatever his intentions.

Stone Thrower had wiped the war paint from his face, but thus far it didn't appear any of these Senecas recognized him. Where was the one he claimed to know?

Halted before the chief warrior, Stone Thrower spoke in the tongue of the Senecas. “I have come from that camp, though not with news to share.” It was wisely spoken, Two Hawks thought, for his father did have news. Grim news for the Oneidas. Not news he meant to reveal if he could help it. “I come to speak on a matter of my own concern.”

The words rang out with confidence but were met with silence, in which William hissed in urgent whisper, “What are they saying? Do you understand?”

Two Hawks didn't speak the Senecas' tongue as fluently as did his father, but he knew enough to follow what was said. “I will tell you what they say, only keep your voice down…and your rifle ready.”

Staying hidden no matter what unfolded was a thing he didn't think he could do, now he saw his father alone among the Senecas. Not if they offered violence. Stand and do nothing while these warriors murdered his father and Anna Catherine's father? Already some menaced, edging nearer Stone Thrower. The blood of their fallen cried loudly in their ears. His father would need to balance his words on a knife's edge.

“What concern have you with us?” the chief warrior demanded. “I do not remember you from the camp at the fort.”

“I am Stone Thrower,” his father said. “Born to the Bear Clan of the
Onyota'a:ka
, and my concern with you is for that one you hold captive.”

The warriors standing in front of Anna Catherine's father stepped aside, revealing their prisoner on his knees, hatless, coatless, tattered. His face in the firelight was tensed with pain, one side of it bloodied. Two Hawks could see his surprise at sight of Stone Thrower, but he didn't cry out or plead with his captors.

“What do they say?” William demanded to know.

“Our father makes claim on Aubrey.”

“What mean you? What claim?”

Two Hawks grasped his brother's arm to silence him. “Let me listen, Brother.”

His father's voice reached them. “I would speak for this prisoner before he is harmed. There is a thing I have to say of him.”

As Two Hawks interpreted their father's words, a wave of disapproval swept across the clearing—the Senecas disputing such a claim. The chief warrior's voice rose above the murmurs. “What cause has one of the
Onyota'a:ka
to come among us speaking as a friend, a brother?”

Stone Thrower didn't hesitate. “I am both of those things to you, men of Ganundasaga. Some may remember that once I lived among you, hunted with you—or with your fathers, you younger men. I fought beside my Seneca brothers when you answered Pontiac's call to go against the British at their lake forts. I ask you to remember this and let me speak to you now as a man speaks to his friends. Will you hear me?”

Two Hawks tensed as the chief warrior stepped closer to peer into Stone Thrower's face in silence for a long moment before turning again to address his warriors.

“I do remember this one. I was young in that time of which he speaks,
but I saw my first battle with Pontiac. What he says is true. He fought with us then. And fought well.”

“But now?” Another came forward. “Did he fight for us in the ravine? Or for the Americans?”

The truth was Stone Thrower had fought for neither and against both in attempting to find William, but he was not given time to say so.

“That is a matter we will consider,” the chief said, raising a hand. “He is one man alone, come to us in peace. We will hear him.” He turned again to Stone Thrower, and despite his words, there was hardness in his tone. “Say what you have come to say about this captive, before we decide his fate this night.”

At the edge of the wood, Two Hawks let out a breath and told William what was being said. “Now our father is telling our story. He is telling of our mother, and of us, and why he makes a claim on Aubrey.”

“But why will they care? What difference can it make?” William asked, sounding as bewildered as any white man might be standing there beside him. Two Hawks's mind was a jumble. How could he explain in a few words the ways of a people his brother had never known?

“Our father has some right to vengeance against Aubrey for what he did, taking you from us.”

William's voice held an edge of panic. “But he said he forgave!”

“He did that hard thing, yes. But
these
warriors do not know this.”

While his father spoke of that long ago day at Fort William Henry, Two Hawks's gaze went again to Anna Catherine's father. While on the trail of the Senecas, his father had told them more of the change that had happened in Aubrey's soul. Two Hawks thought he was seeing evidence of that change. There was peace in Aubrey's face as he knelt among those who meant him torment and death. Though Two Hawks did not think Aubrey understood the words being said, he seemed to know he was listening to a tale of a shame no longer his to bear.

“This is the man?” the war chief questioned, gesturing at Aubrey when Stone Thrower finished speaking. “
He
is the one who stole your firstborn and kept him from you all these years?”

“He is,” Stone Thrower said. “Now I ask you to give him over to me, that I may take him from this place to the mother of that lost son, who waits for me.”

At this, a warrior who hadn't yet spoken stepped forward. “I also am one who remembers you and the tale of your sons, of the one twin stolen at his birth. Now you say this is the man who did this thing and you ask us to give him to you, but here is a thing
I
would ask. If we do this, what will heal the grief of
our
women when they hear of the sons and husbands who have died fighting the Americans? We were promised an easy victory and much spoil. Now you see even those things we had were taken by soldiers from the fort. Many warriors lie dead on the ground behind us. What is to cover our sorrow? We have but this one prisoner!”

More than one voice cried out in agreement at this. A warrior made a lunge for Aubrey, club raised to strike him. Two Hawks had an arrow to his bow but checked when the war chief shouted for his men to stop. He stared hard at Aubrey, then motioned to Stone Thrower, giving him the chance to answer the challenge.

Two Hawks lowered the arrow, trembling now, praying from the depths of his soul for his father's next words to be wise ones.

“I understand well your sorrow,” Stone Thrower said. “Your hearts are on the ground, and your grief needs covering. But, my brothers!” he cried, his voice strengthening with conviction. “Do you think killing this one man, or bringing him back for your women to torment, will do this needful thing? I tell you it will be as a drop of rain to one dying of thirst. I know this, for no matter how many enemies I killed in the years I hunted for that man there, no matter how many scalps I took with Pontiac, it was never enough to fill the emptiness in my heart or heal the pain of the mother of my sons. I will tell you what, and who, will cover that grief. His messenger
came to you once. Though many of you spurned his words of peace with Creator, a few began to walk the Jesus path. It is He who—”

“You speak of Kirkland!” one of the older warriors interjected. “We made that missionary flee Ganundasaga like a dog with its tail tucked.”

“Your talk is like his,” said another. “That of a weak man who flees his enemies in the night. I can hear no more of your words!”

The war chief stood with arms crossed and waited to see what Stone Thrower would say to that. Their father's back was to them, but Reginald Aubrey was looking straight at Stone Thrower. He gave the smallest of nods, encouragement to the man he must know was fighting for their lives, even if he could not understand his words.

“I was already a weak man when you first knew me,” Stone Thrower replied. “So weak I forsook my wife and son, forgot how to be a man of the People. So weak all I could think of was killing that man you have bound as your prisoner. But Heavenly Father has made me strong—strong enough to forgive that man.” He flung an arm toward Aubrey. “He was not in that ravine to fight you or those British who enticed you with their false promises. He was there to help me find the son he took. He wished only to restore my son to me. This hard thing he did, risking his life. We together found my firstborn in that battle. That son is with me, he and his brother, and now your eyes will see them, two-born-together united at last.”

Ignoring the murmurs of startled protest rising around him, Stone Thrower turned his back on the Senecas and faced the place where his sons hid, the one furiously whispering to the other of all that had been uttered.

“My sons!” he called out. “Come out to me now. Let these warriors see you together under the eyes of Creator!”