Spirited (26 page)

From his eyes inside himself, Wusamequin knew that the village was aflame. The sweat lodge blazed; Odina’s wigwam was half-consumed. His own wigwam was beginning to smoke.

He saw blood in the snow. He saw death in the sky.

Above the shrieking wind, thunder growled. Its depth and volume shook the ground; its intensity quickened Wusamequin’s heartbeat.

It was Great Bear, bringing his family.

From the burning forest, the twin of the bear the Yangees had slaughtered a moon before strode forward mightily on his back legs. He roared like an avalanche; he shouted like a waterfall. At his beckoning, more huge black bears burst from the fiery trees and bounded toward the village. They bellowed their rage, most on all fours, some rearing up on their hind legs. Cougars raced into the fracas; deer, moose, and mink darted from the flaming forest to join in the battle against the Yangees.

The bears and animals rushed up behind the Yangees and descended upon the last rank of soldiers. The men began to scream, whirling around to shoot at the animals as teeth and claws flashed and attacked.

But it was still not enough.

There were so many soldiers. So many weapons.

I demand more help! Where are my relatives? Where are my ancestors? If you do not come, the People will die!

Mahwah will die!

At that thought, his concentration broke; as he
opened his eyes, he saw evil slaughter—braves lying in their own blood, mothers struck down with their children in their arms.

“Mahwah,” he whispered, searching with his eyes for her.

He turned to Oneko, and in the same moment, a musket ball slammed into the great sachem’s chest. Oneko was thrown backward; blood sprayed from the wound straight up into the sky. Wusamequin dropped to his knees beside him. Oneko’s eyes were open but they did not see. His chest was a ruin.

Wusamequin had no medicine to bring the dead back to life again.

The hatred he felt for the Yangees at that moment was unbridled. The fear for Mahwah’s life, unquenchable. He felt his heart turn to a tomahawk starved for blood.

He threw back his head and let out a war cry that echoed against the mountains.

Through the musket fire and the screaming, Mahwah heard Wusamequin’s voice shouting his rage to the stars themselves. She had been knocked out; now she came to, only to see British soldiers doing unspeakable things. She staggered through the smoke and wind, searching for him. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing—the cruelty, the barbarism. She was screaming, “Stop! Stop!” but no one did. No one listened.

I thought only the French did these things
, she thought,
covering her mouth so that she would not retch.
But it is all of us. We are wrong to be here.

She cried, “Wusamequin!”

“Mahwah!”

He burst from a wall of smoke and flame. His clothes were half burned off; his leggings shredded around his thighs. The fringes on his jerkin dripped with blood. His hair whipped behind him in the wind.

He grabbed her up in his arms and held her, then swept her up and carried her through hell itself. He dodged musket balls, foot soldiers, and a panicked riderless horse; he avoided braves as they raced to slaughter the enemy.

He carried her to a secluded place slightly above the village grounds. There she saw Oneko, dead, and she fell to her knees and sobbed hard, bitter tears.

The locket containing her parents’ miniatures still hung around his neck. She pulled at it; it came free in her hand, and she clasped it under her chin.

Wusamequin took her hand and said, “You must hide, Mahwah. I have strong medicine in me. From you. From Mahwah’s strong spirit. I will kill the Yangees. All the Yangees.” He touched his chest. “Your
tah
has given me a strong spirit.”

As she watched, he closed his eyes and placed both his hands over his heart. Then he drew them slowly away.

A strange energy crackled between his hands. It was like lightning, spitting and exploding in bursts
of brilliant white light. Where it hit the ground, flames erupted.

He drew it up above his head and hurled it at six oncoming English foot soldiers.

It exploded in the center of the row, blowing all six to bits.

“No!” she cried. “Oh, no!”

His eyes were glazed, as if he had gone to another place. He put his hands together again. More energy flowed between them. He lifted his hands above his head again—

—and she saw little Jamie Munsfield trudging forward, a musket at his side. His cheeks were smeared with blood.

“Not Jamie! Wusamequin, please, not the boy!” she cried.

He glared at her. “The People die, Mahwah!”

A brave raced up to Jamie and clubbed him over the head. As the boy fell, the Indian scalped him.

Mahwah screamed, “Oh, God, please don’t!” she cried. “Oh, Jamie, Jamie!”

But it was too late.

As she wept, Sasious raced toward Wusamequin and her. Though his face was sooty and there was a gash across his cheek, he grinned at Wusamequin. He spoke in their language, pointing at the soldiers. The brave who had scalped Jamie waved his hair in the air.

Mahwah hung onto Wusamequin’s left arm, trying to pull his hands apart so that he would make no more death-dealing lightning.

“His death is filled with honor,” Wusamequin said.

“No!” she cried. “He was just a boy! It is not filled with honor. They will retaliate! It will never end!”

Then she jumped up and grabbed his left hand.

It was as if a thunderbolt shot through her. He felt it, too, and shouted, “Mahwah!”

Together their clasped hands formed new energy—a shimmering rainbow, surrounded by stars. It undulated and wobbled; then at the far end, perhaps ten feet behind them, Mahwah saw a meadow shimmering in the moonlight. It was ringed with more of the rainbow, which began to sparkle with starlight.

Sasious shouted and raised his tomahawk. He stared at Mahwah and Wusamequin in utter amazement, and began to back away from them.

“What?” she cried, astonished. “What is this?”

“It is the Land Beyond.”

“What?”

He cocked his head and raised their joined left hands. The rainbow energy poured from them, surging into the ring that surrounded the twinkling meadow.

Then he spoke to Sasious, who looked horrified, as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“Mahwah,” Wusamequin said, his face shining with unearthly light, “The People will go to the Land Beyond. The People will live in the Land Beyond. Safe there. Not hunted there.”

He pointed to the braves, women, and children.
One by one, those who were not battling for their lives saw the gleaming magical meadow.

They began to race toward it.

Wusamequin gestured to the ring and began shouting in his language.

Those nearest hurried forward. Then, once they stood within reach of the magical door, they paused.

Wusamequin spoke to them, urging them to go. He kept hold of Mahwah’s hand and pointed to the meadow.

To the Land Beyond.

An old man stretched out his hands and spoke rapidly to Wusamequin. Wusamequin nodded at him. The old man turned and faced the People, who were assembling.

Then he tentatively stepped through the rainbow ring. It took but a moment, and then he stood in the meadow, surrounded by light.

He turned and waved, indicating that he was all right. Then he tried to step back through, and could not.

It was a door that opened only one way.

Wusamequin held Mahwah’s hand, and called his people to go.

Then Sasious moved into action, planting himself beside the shaman, his tomahawk in his fist.

Wusamequin said to Mahwah, “He says he will stop the People from going to the Land beyond. He says to fight.”

“No, Sasious, please,” she said, moving toward him.
But Wusamequin yanked her back—just as Sasious’s tomahawk swiped the air inches from her face.

Sasious advanced on her. Mahwah screamed; Wusamequin looked from their hands to Sasious, to the doorway, and then back to Mahwah. With his right hand, he yanked the scalping knife from his waist back and hurled it at the war chief. It lodged in his chest.

The People drew back. Sasious gasped, staring down at the wound. He threw his tomahawk at Wusamequin and Mahwah, but it fell far short as he collapsed beside Oneko’s corpse.

“What the bloody ’ell?” someone shouted in English.

“Quickly!” Mahwah implored the People. “Go through!”

Wusamequin spoke rapidly, pointing to the soldiers, who had begun marching toward the cluster in front of the doorway. Alerted, a young mother herded her three children toward the doorway. An old woman guided her doddering old man.

But most of the braves would not come. Isabella knew only a few names—Wematin and Ninigret. The burly Tashtassuck, friend of Wusamequin, waved and raced into the smoke, toward the English.

“He says, take People, and go,” Wusamequin translated for Mahwah. “He says, Tashtassuck is a warrior and will protect the People.”

With the other warriors, Tashtassuck advanced.

A few women—the wives of braves—elected to stay. Many of the old people, as well.

The little boy who had hit Mahwah with a stick tripped across the threshold and ran into the arms of the nearest adult, sobbing for all he was worth.

At Wusamequin’s urging, Afraid-of-Everything leaped through, with Mahwah’s fairy court riding his back.

Keshkecho ran through.

And then the portal began to lose form. The rainbow, to fade.

The doorway was closing.

The people already in the Land Beyond shouted at Wusamequin and gestured at him, begging him to come, come now! Keshkecho reached out and tried to pull him through, but she could not. Then she began to yell for Odina, who had neither come through, nor could be seen on the battleground.

Wusamequin still held Mahwah’s hand. He said to her in English, “We go now.”

His dark eyes called to her; his hand enfolded hers. His heart beat inside her own body. But she was English… and he was leading his people to a strange, magical place that was their version of the afterlife.

“Isabella Stevens! Come here, girl!” It was Colonel Ramsland himself, advancing on an ebony stallion. She had not seen him with the others. “I know you were forced to leave the fort by that Indian squaw,” he continued. “We’ll take you back to your father, and all this will be forgotten.”

She swallowed hard and took one step toward the colonel.

“Mahwah,” Wusamequin said in disbelief.

“My father … I’m British,” she murmured, shaking all over. “I…” She turned to Colonel Ramsland, horribly torn, never dreaming that such a choice would ever be hers to make. “Sir, give me a moment!”

“I am bewildered by your behavior,” the man declared. “Have you… have you
feelings
for this savage?”

She looked at Wusamequin, then back at the colonel. “Sir, I do.”

“I’ll make it easier for you then,” Colonel Ramsland said. He raised his pistol and aimed it straight at Wusamequin.

“No! No!” Mahwah screamed, spreading her arms wide to shield him.

And in that precise instant, Odina appeared, racing out of the smoke and the carnage. She rammed into Wusamequin as if to knock him through the doorway.

Colonel Ramsland’s flintlock discharged, just as Tashtassuck reared up behind him and slammed his leg with his war club. The ball hit Odina in the back, and she crumpled to the ground. Wusamequin bent to pick her up, and in doing so, he let go of Mahwah’s hand.

The portal began to vanish.

“Mahwah!” he pleaded, as he stood before it with Odina in his arms. He turned around and handed Odina through. Keshkecho received the wounded woman, lowering Odina gently to the ground.

Wusamequin turned and faced Mahwah, standing outside the portal, while his people shouted his name and urged him to come through.

Behind him, an apparition took form: it was an enormous bear, and it spoke to Wusamequin, who lowered his head.

Your time has come, Wusamequin.
Wusamequin, We of the Land Beyond decree
That your time has come.

Great Bear, you remind me now that you would show me my path. And that you would help me fulfill the true wishes of my heart.

My heart was sick. I wished for it to be healed.

My spirit had left me. I wanted it back.

These things have been accomplished, for my heart is healed. My spirit is full. I love this English girl, and I will continue to love her whether or not she joins me in the Land Beyond. I cannot speak for her path. I cannot know her truth.

But this
is
my truth: She is my Way, wherever she is.

Isabella’s mind raced. Her heart thundered.

If Colonel Ramsland’s pistol ball had found him…

… if he had died before my eyes …

I love him. What do I care where we go, how we live?

He is my world.

My new world.

He called me from across the sea. He asked me to come to him. I heard his voice before I knew it was his.

He has been calling me, all along.

I will answer.

She turned to Colonel Ramsland, whose horse had reared, thus saving him from a second blow from Tashtassuck’s war club.

She called to him, “Tell my father I will always love him!”

As the astonished man looked on, Mahwah leaped into the shining new world with her one true love.

This is a medicine story.
It tells of a Way.