The Legend of Tyoga Weathersby (4 page)

He placed both his feet on a single spring to concentrate all of his weight on one side of the trap. The long spring surrendered a bit to the new approach. If he could apply equal weight to the long spring on the other side of the trap, he might have a chance to free his friend.

Surveying the area around them, Tyoga saw a granite boulder that appeared to be heavy enough to compress the long spring into submission. It was the perfect size and shape. Rolling it over to the alter rock, he lifted it up onto the raised flat surface, and carefully slid its smooth flat surface onto the long spring. The spring collapsed under its formidable weight, but the jaws did not budge as the tremendous force of the remaining long spring was more than sufficient to keep the trap clamped in place.

Snatching a long straight hickory stick from the ground, Tyoga steadied himself and carefully placed his left foot onto the flat iron face of the opposite long spring. Supporting himself with the hickory stick, his right foot left the ground, and his entire body weight came to bear on the long spring. Slowly, the jaws began to release their grip.

Muscles straining in his legs, arms, shoulder and back while he supported himself with the hickory stick, he quaked from the force of his effort. He felt the jaws continue to loosen their vice-like grip while the sweat poured from his brow, into his eyes, and dripped off of his nose. When he flung the sweat from his eyes with a shake of his head, he caught a glimpse of a horrible sight.

As the jaws were opening, the teeth imbedded into Tes Qua’s ankle were not releasing their hold on the bone. The more Tyoga opened the trap, the more Tes Qua’s foot was being torn from his lower leg.

Beholding the gruesome sight, Tyoga realized the odd transformation that had taken place in the macabre device. Designed to entrap, maim and ultimately kill; the trap had become an instrument of a new, merciful purpose acting as a splint, holding foot to leg.

The cruel jagged teeth that ravaged and sliced were now protective and conservatory. The trap hadn’t changed, and neither had its purpose, really. But the utility of its charge had been completely revoked.

Tyoga couldn’t bear the thought nor the act of re-imprisonment,but with the strength draining from his now numb arms and violently shaking legs, he closed his eyes with the realization that the only course was to relinquish the progress so costly gained. He tightened his grip on the hickory stick while transferring his weight from the spring to his arms, and listened helplessly to the sickening sound as the teeth of the devilish jaws once again sank their teeth deep into his friend’s flesh and bone.

When Tes Qua woke up, it was late afternoon.

Tyoga had gone to the pond several hundred yards downstream to retrieve some supplies that they had hidden along the banks from their last fishing trip. There was a black obsidian tomahawk that Tes Qua’s uncle had given to him, a steel bladed knife that the boys had taken from the body of a trapper who had frozen to death on the summit of old Mount Rag several years ago, and a water gourd. Tyoga had filled the gourd with fresh water, placed the fishing weirs in the stream, and had built a fire in hopes of attracting some help.

“A’tey a Ho?”
(How are you doing?)
Tyoga asked his friend when he saw him stir.

“Ney da do, Ty.”
(Not well.)

“I know. Hurt much?”

“No,” Tes Qua answered. “I can’t feel anything.”

“Tsadulis tsaldati? I caught some fish.”

“Tla. I’m not hungry.”

“Thirsty?”

“Hey ya. Esginehvsi.” Tes Qua took several long gulps of the cool mountain water from the gourd Tyoga handed to him. “What are we going to do, Ty?”

“Gotta go fer help, Tes’a. Gonna be dark soon. Cain’t be here in the dark. Bad spot. Lotta sign.”

“Can you make it back before dark, Ty?” Tes Qua looked around their campsite. “It’s a pretty long way back to Tuckareegee.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. Won’t be too long after tho’,” Tyoga replied. “An’ I’ll be back dark or no. Would’a lef sooner, but I couldn’t leave ya sleepin’. Best get along now tho’.” He turned to spring toward the woods before stopping and pulling the obsidian tomahawk that he had secured in his belt and handing it to Tes Qua.

“Here’s the tomahawk, Tes—just in case. Tes’a, yer gonna have ta tend th’ fire. Lotsa wood piled up here for ya, but cain’t leave the fire go out—or ev’n git low—ya unnerstan?”

Tes Qua opened his eyes and looked at Tyoga for a brief instant. He saw the words that Tyoga did not want to say expressed in his face.

Tyoga gently shook his friend to convey his stern and meaningful message. “Ya cain’t leave it go out, Tes’a.—Cain’t let it git low ev’n.”

He stood, and with several leaps, he was gone from sight.

He hadn’t gone twenty paces before they both heard the murderous howl of the first wolf.

Chapter 3

The Primal Decree

T
yoga stopped in his tracks at the haunting fugue. He didn’t breathe. He only listened. The birds were still lively overhead. The crows raucously cawed their angry chastisements, and the squirrels scurried through the underbrush.

Restless, he hesitated another instant, cocked his head, and turned back towards the spot he had left Tes Qua. He waited to hear if there would be a response to the wolf’s lonely plea. When none came, he relaxed a bit.

“Nothin’ ta do ‘cept keep goin’. Jest a lone wolf lookin’ for some company,” he said out loud.

He continued on his mission with more urgency in his pace. He had traveled about twenty minutes when he heard the plaintive wail again. This time the hair on his arms responded to the cry as if its tone had electrified the air with its woeful plea.

The wolf’s macabre wail echoed from the canyon wall on the other side of the ridge. The scream pierced the dusk with its primal decree and shrouded the forest with its promise of death. He was close.

Tyoga froze in place, ears piqued towards the ridge, eyes hard, and his senses alive. He heard the rustle of leaves as rabbits disappeared into briar patches. He noticed the nearly imperceptible raindrop crunch of bark as the squirrels scurried up the towering pines. Their tiny needle claws secured them to the trees as if they had been stitched to the trunks. The delicate trill of the songbirds ceased, cut short in mid-measure by the maestro’s baton.

Only the crows continued their dissonant scolds.

Tyoga didn’t have to wait long to hear the response to the wolf’s call. It came from across the valley. One. Two. Three. Distinct cries. Separate at first, and then in concert. All came from the same direction. Each chorus was closer than the last. They were moving fast—directly toward Tyoga.

While searching his surroundings for concealment, Tyoga fought to control the terror that threatened to cloud his thinking. There was no time to hesitate and even less to choose.

He realized instinctively that the pack of wolves converging on the ridge was the Runion pack. This rogue wolf pack filled the bravest hearts with the paralyzing terror understood only by the hunted. These wolves had tasted human flesh. With disregard for the abundance of natural prey, they would with wanton abandon target the lone mountain man’s riverside camp or an Indian hunting party on the trail of game.

The ruthless alpha male had wielded his dominion over man and beast since the late 1600s. The Runion family’s campsite had been invaded by the pack of murderous killers on the night of May 22, 1678. No one was spared. The half-eaten carcasses of mother, father, and two children were enough to make the blood run cold in even the most hardened mountain men. It was the uneaten body of the two-month-old baby girl who had been disemboweled—seemingly for the shear pleasure of the kill—that had placed the price upon the Commander’s head.

When the news of the savage slaughter of the Runion family made its way east to the tiny town of Brunswick, even the hardiest frontiersman stayed clear of the valley.

The Native Americans feared the pack as much as the new settlers. The bounty placed upon the leader of the pack by the white men was too much for the valiant warriors of the tribes of the Chesapeake and Appalachans to resist. Many tried to kill the commander. A fortunate few returned empty handed. Most never returned at all.

Tyoga raced towards a tangle of downed cedar trees and crouched down behind them. Grabbing handfuls of mossy loam, he began rubbing the masking scent over his chest, arms and shoulders. When the pack crashed over the rise and broke into view, Tyoga gasped as if he had plunged into the icy waters of the Susquehanna. He held his breath and dared not move while the cold yellow eyes of the killer clan scanned the ravine and the slopes beyond where Tyoga lay hidden and camoflauged.

The Cherokee shaman had taught him that no living thing can secret itself completely. Hiding is but an illusion designed to deceive the hidden. While the hand is the instrument of shadow and concealment, it is also the betrayer that leads to detection and discovery.

Tucking each hand into the opposite armpit, Tyoga held his elbows close to his sides. While watching the pack drift on the crest of the rise, he pressed his body hard into the protective scent of the rotting earth and stamped his form into the moist dirt blanketing the decaying cedar trunk..

They were magnificent creatures. Their dominant mastery over all that they surveyed filled the air with a coercive sorcery that was at once charismatic and numbing. His brain screamed at him to close his eyes, shut them out, or look away, but he was mesmerized by their beauty and grace. Like balls of iron drawn to the magnetism of their allure, he could not take his eyes off of them.

The wolves rode high on the pads of their saucer-sized paws, hinged to the ends of long legs that seemed fragile and delicate from wrist to knee. Above the knee of the forepaws, fleshy knots of massive muscles attached to barrel chests that housed an enormous heart and lungs. The sinewy sheets that anchored haunch muscles to tendon and bone gave their hindquarters a deceptively sleek appearance.

The power, speed, and stamina generated by the sublime architecture were unrivaled in the natural world.

The wolves seemed to possess the facial dexterity to convey the emotion and sentiment usually reserved for human kind. Joy, trepidation, anticipation, fear, and something akin to the self-awareness expressed in gratified contentment percolated from the tempered masks of the mighty warriors.

A sudden change in posture, the lightening quick rationing of dilated pupil, and the metallic numbness of identity lost signaled a dramatic alteration of the pack’s focus and resolve.

Tyoga dare not breathe.

As if mustered by a commander’s call, the restless troops circled each other with their snouts pecking at the air in search for the scent of the crier. The pack froze in reverent deference when he appeared in the clearing, a hundred yards away.

The statuesque beasts stared toward, but away from the master with their heads bowed in submissive display while never making eye contact, yet never losing sight of their lord.

He was twenty yards from Tyoga.

He could hear the demon breathe, smell his pungent musk, and discern the low gutteral threat emitting from his huge silver breast. Tyoga didn’t move.

With a chirp-like bark the directive was passed. Across time and generations, as distinctively expressed as eye color, gait, height, and scent; the coded communique was understood. With a knowledge requisite upon species and kind, the effect was immediate and palpable. The changes were subtle and nearly imperceptible.

Tyoga felt it happening. He had felt it before. The transformation would change the pack of seemingly carefree romping dogs into a blood-thirsty killing machine. So organized, so focussed, and so lethal that the prey—be it rabbit, buffalo, or deer—was already dead as it quietly grazed.

Their huge heads lowered as their necks retracted ever so slightly into massively muscled shoulders. Their taut bodies elongated as their spines swayed to lower them to the ground. Blood engorged their thickening legs and expanding chests to support the chase. Their pupils dilated. The yellow of their iris ignited into flaming amber/orange.

Horrified, Tyoga understood.

Prey down. Food.

Tes Qua.

The pack was off before the thought was finished.

Tyoga was right behind them.

Chapter 4

The Siege

T
he sun was setting when Tyoga arrived at the scene.

The remaining glow from the western sky cast a demonic pall upon the forest floor. It was the pivotal time of day when predator became prey, and those that were neither melted into the lengthening shadows to be secreted away until dawn. Details are lost in this shadow-world. The second tier senses of scent and sound become the arbiters separating life and death.

Tes Qua’s attempts to keep the fire burning had failed, and the few remaining glowing embers were fast on the threshold of becoming barren ash. Tyoga could make out the silhouette of his friend leaning with his back against a massive chestnut tree. Clutched in Tes Qua’s hand was a once flaming pine bough that he brandished in defense against the circling pack of snarling wolves. As if writing his final prayers in the wind, the glowing end of the branch etched random patterns in the air like desperate fireflies signaling for the attention of a disinterested mate. Lying on the ground was the gleaming black blade of the obsidian tomahawk that was just out of his reach.

With fearless abandon, Tyoga leaped from the surrounding bushes to place himself between his friend and the marauding wolves.

His arrival startled the pack and confused the Commander. They had been only moments away from the kill. The intrusion broke the ancient pact between predator and prey, and now their growling bellies would have to endure additional insult.

Tyoga recognized the Commander immediately. His eyes glowed hot amber with the fire of unquestioned dominance and superiority. Their eyes locked in primal embrace.

Unaccustomed to challenge of any sort, the wolf was uneasy with the boldness of this unknown adversary. He trembled with restraint and curled his frothing black lips to reveal two-inch long incisors that had made easy work of buffalo, deer, and bear. Those adversaries, he would have attacked and dispatched without malice or hesitation.