The Warrior (Perry County, Pennsylvania Frontier Series) Read online

  "Eight thieves dishonored their nation, their tribe, their clan, and their lodge.

  "Eight traded their honor for beads." He touched his pouch where the wampum lay.

  "To the eight came the warrior Friend Seeker, offering a return of honor.

  "One of the eight slew the peace-bringer with a coward's blow, for this he died slowly. Of the others, only one lives." The Tuscarora feared he would foul himself.

  "Hear now the judgment of The Warrior, oh honorless thief.

  "From this place, you will return to the north. At every fire you will tell the story as I have told it. Until the Cold Father comes and freezes the land you will tell the story. Then you will speak the words no more.

  "Does the thief understand the words of The Warrior?" Heart pounding, voiceless with relief, the Tuscarora nodded vigorous acknowledgment.

  The Warrior continued, "When hunters sneer and women turn their faces from your dishonor, you may forget that the hatchet of The Warrior waits hungrily for your failure. This will remind you!" A razored tomahawk blade sliced along the Tuscarora's hand, and the small finger fell away. The thief howled, clutching the bleeding hand with terror renewed in his breast.

  Again The Warrior jerked the man upright and fixed him with an eye of death. "For now you live, but if your story is not widely told it will not long be so. Each night, be grateful for life and hope that you have spoken well enough to see the sun." He spun the man away with a contemptuous shove. "Go, and never again come this way."

  The Tuscarora crashed down the mountain and The Warrior could hear his progress almost to the low ground.

  He buried Friend Seeker facing the valleys he had loved. He took only the great bow, for that was his teacher's wish. He disguised the burial place so that only careful searching would find it. Then he dared to begin the grieving he had held so long.

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  Chapter 14: Age 21

  For Late Star, the world had become bitter. The loss of his friend had emptied his heart, and he lacked the interest to refill it. Now the fire circle was unsatisfying, and the goings and comings appeared pointless. For all of his days Friend Seeker had been there. When they were youths, the Seeker had saved him from the Pistecataway, and each had grown in the reflection of the other's abilities. If he had been asked, he would have scoffed at such closeness, but the empathy had existed, and without it the spirit of Late Star dimmed.

  He had gone to his special place and positioned medicine arrows to help his thoughts and voice reach Friend Seeker, newly started along the final path. He had smoked to the old ones and greeted courteously the wind, water, and forest fathers who might be present. To The Great Spirit, he blew smoke and asked that he allow Friend Seeker to know the words of Late Star, not yet on his own journey to the Hunting Grounds. To the Seeker, he spoke openly, allowing his heart to bleed and tears to run. Without others to hear, he could do this. He asked that the Seeker remember their times together and hold a place for him in The Sky Father's mighty fire circle.

  He promised that he would not be long in coming, and when he gathered his totems to return to his lodge, he measured the pain of body and ache of limb and believed that he and Friend Seeker might meet sooner than others would expect.

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  His teachers had said that all things must change, and the weight of that thought now became plain to The Warrior. Truly, all had changed. No longer did he sit as a student, and no longer was his path chosen. He stood now as protector of his village and guardian of Iroquois lands.

  The name of The Warrior swept like brush fire across the nations. Killer of Cherokee, avenger of Friend Seeker, reclaimant of the sacred wampum, The Warrior's presence rose like a mountain storm, black with turmoil, looming ever higher, promising thunder and lightning to all in its way.

  Among a hundred fires and through hands of villages, Blue Moccasin spread the name of the new fighter. Skillfully, he embellished the tales, using enough facts to support the fabrications. How the people loved it and how quickly they created new and better stories, until Blue Moccasin found himself repeating adventures told by those who knew nothing of the true Warrior. Squaws lulled children with stories of The Warrior's vigilance, and the children slept secure in the knowledge that their people's mightiest fighter scouted between them and unseen enemies. Fathers inspired sons with tales of The Warrior's skill and courage and those claiming to know The Warrior multiplied a thousand times.

  It was a phenomenon and the laughing spirit of Blue Moccasin reveled in it. Someone had heard that The Warrior did not feel cold or heat. Blue told how The Warrior traveled shirtless in winter, and those from Aughwick remembered and improved the story. With a straight face Blue spoke of The Warrior seizing glowing coals and rolling them in his palms. Sure enough, others had seen him do that very thing. Blue Moccasin was not surprised.

  There were new duties for The Warrior and many that he chose were different from those of Friend Seeker. Once he had, without invitation, entered the lodge of a notorious wife beater. He had loosened the beater's teeth, flattened an ear, and broken his already crooked nose. He had warned the beater to never again abuse his squaws. In leaving, he had cracked a pair of the abuser's ribs to help him remember. It was said that in many other lodges the women's lot became easier.

  Yet there was lingering blackness about The Warrior. An aura of coldness hung about him, and most sensed lurking danger. Dogs felt it, and at his appearance barks stilled and tails fell low. Only puppies and their nursing mothers seemed immune as they wriggled and wagged for attention.

  Hunters who were uncomfortable near The Warrior and felt diminished by his awesome size were bemused by his willingness to pat a puppy or scratch behind the ears of a drag-teated dog. It was also so with children. If The Warrior sat at the fire, others were uncomfortable; his eyes gleamed too wildly and no amount of heat lessened the chill surrounding him. Yet chubby babies invariably crept to him and accepted the curve of his massive arm as their due. Surely there was magic of the spirit world in it, and many made protective signs and smoked to the cardinal directions with more serious intent. As honored as they were by The Warrior's presence, all felt better when he had gone. The Warrior was better appreciated from a distance. Up close, he was overpoweringly larger than life and more than a few accepted that, indeed, he might be a son of The Great Spirit.

  For the first time, dreams of enemies rose to haunt The Warrior's sleep. Others had spoken of this, but until the death of Friend Seeker he had been spared. Within his lodge the soft hand of Pond Lily would waken and soothe him, but on a trail he often started awake, sweat bathed and muscle tensed.

  In the dreams, unknown faces leaped at him from unsuspected ambushes. Often smiles turned to snarling attacks or harmless squaws became hate twisted figures with whom he struggled ponderous and ineffectual until they fell away unresolved or replaced by another.

  The dreams came from the attack on Friend Seeker. He was sure of that. Where the Seeker had acted with honor, the coward had plotted. Who could guard against such acts? From The Warrior, such cowards would receive no mercy and if he fought clumsily in his dreams, in real combat he acted as the lightning.

  For Turned Ankle and the aged Oak Neck, the Shamokin leaders, The Warrior appeared like a spear from The Great Spirit. Poised against the Iroquois border, he needed only a word to strike like a den of panthers against any who caused them concern.

  A trio of outcasts had upon occasion harassed Iroquois lodges and Turned Ankle pointed The Warrior at them. Others might have waited the trio's next appearance, but The Warrior went to them. To the south he traveled and past villages of small tribes that lived where the lands were flatter. He knew his destination, for Blue Moccasin had told it.

  He traveled now in war paint fearful to behold. Completely painted except for the stiff Huron roach, one side of his head was black as a crow's wing and the other white as winter snow. Each movement changed the hard featured face as light or shadow struck differently the contrasting pai
nt. The result was a death mask with burning coals for eyes that gave pause to the hardiest.

  At the village of the outcasts he strode into the central place and announced his arrival with the mounting shriek of rage he had discovered at the death of Friend Seeker. He willed loathing into his mind and allowed hatred for those he sought to boil within him.

  From lodge entrances burst hunters heavy with sleep, peering into the morning mists to recoil in awe before the giant killer crouched like a panther within their village.

  Terrible was the voice of The Warrior and great was the fear it struck into the listeners. Did it roar like the bear, snarl like the cat, or hiss like a snake? Few could agree, but none wished to hear it again.

  "I am The Warrior. Three of this place have defiled the lands of the noble Iroquois. Bring them forth or fall beside them, for this is their last sun and they have eaten their final meal."

  He called the names that Blue Moccasin had given, and all others experienced vast relief and fell away to leave the three standing alone before their lodge.

  They might have run, but they had instinctively seized weapons and one of them hurriedly strung his bow. His quickness encouraged the other two, who flourished tomahawks and knives and shouted challenges to give themselves courage.

  The Warrior controlled the hungers until he was sure they were the three he hunted. When their words convinced him, the silence of his concentration struck the hearts of those watching as strongly as had his cries. If any had thought to aid the three, the thoughts crumbled as dust with The Warrior's attack.

  Like a spear, he drove at his enemies. The archer released his arrow with confidence, but somehow the giant Iroquois moved enough that the arrow sliced past and he was upon them in the same instant. Savagely, the outcasts fought. Like cornered woods rats they flailed with desperate strength, but they were overwhelmed, and if there had been time, their minds would have known disbelief.

  One continued swinging wildly, unaware that the hand that had held the tomahawk was severed and that his life was gouting redly away. Another died with a hatchet embedded in his chest, almost as the archer felt his ribs crushing and death swallowing him within The Warrior's terrible arms.

  Like dried sticks, the archer's bones cracked and The Warrior hurled the dying body into the handless one who still staggered about. Their heads struck like colliding pumpkins and The Warrior turned from them.

  The village waited, their senses numb with the savagery of the vengeance.

  "I am The Warrior. Remember what you have seen, and pass warning to those who would challenge our nations." He strode from the village, only a small gash along a shoulder marking the efforts of three desperate enemies. Later they again heard his cry echoing through the forest as though daring any to stand against him.

  So great was the fear that few dared approach the dead with whom they had dwelt. Those who did dragged the bodies to their stream and launched them in the current.

  That which had visited was too terrible to risk. If it had not bled it could not have been real, for they had believed only demons were of such savagery. Now they wondered if the Iroquois Nations had others like The Warrior to send against those who offended them. The possibility increased their fears and added grist for the story spreading.

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  In utter mortification, Blue Moccasin left the mountains to live among the people of his white father. He slipped away in the night, unprepared to face his betrayal of the trusts given him.

  Only he recognized the betrayal and no others would know. The words had slipped out unnoticed even by himself until they were spoken. Then it was too late. The Warrior had uncoiled from his cross-legged seat, and without speaking strode to his lodge. Pond Lily's soft voice intruded on Blue's shocked silence, and then The Warrior had reappeared, armed, with his mind set on the hunt. Stop him? Easier to halt the Susquehanna. The mighty figure melted silently into the forest.

  Arrogance had caused it. Pride in knowing something others did not caused him to speak. Childish, childish pride and men would die because of it.

  Yet it was not the deaths of those who raided the Iroquois that tortured the soul of Blue Moccasin; certainly it was not a fear for The Warrior. It was betrayal of the trust given to the message carrier. Knower of many things, welcome within all camps, hearer of a thousand confidences, he was bound by honor to repeat with care, that none would suffer because of him. The carrier of messages did not judge those who sent or received. He chose few sides and favored fewer viewpoints. He reflected the feelings of those whose messages he carried and disguised his own thoughts beyond revealing. Therefore, he could be trusted, even by those in hiding.

  When he had thoughtlessly mentioned the village of the outcasts that too often harassed the Iroquois borders he had not fully considered to whom he spoke. To any other, the information would have meant little, for no other fighter or leader would have traveled far for so piddling a problem. But The Warrior? Like a clam he had closed on the careless words. Like an arrow he would speed to his targets, and there he would, without mercy, kill the enemies of his people.

  For his tongue's looseness, Blue Moccasin chose severe penance. He would return to his white half and live among the stinks of his father's people. In Philadelphia he would wear clothes, study dead languages, and labor at difficult mathematics. Secretly, the studies could please him, but at this time he chose to dwell on the strictures of dress and unceasing demands of white ways.

  Great would be his suffering, but well he deserved it. The lesson would be learned, for never again must a wagging tongue disgrace him. Few were the positions of honor, and message carriers stood high among those few. Like a whipped pup. Blue Moccasin slunk away to serve his self-imposed exile and regain his right to honorably carry the forked stick of a carrier.

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  Chapter 15: Age 26

  Erect as the pines he sat among, The Warrior rested his hands palms up on crossed knees and opened his mind to the will of The Sky Father.

  His place was beside the grave of Friend Seeker, though five winters had obscured all traces of it. Before him, the mountains fell away into the wooded valleys of the creeks he preferred, and if his eyes had searched he could have seen even the distant stretch of the Kittatinny. Here, where the land stood high and where the spirit of his teacher seemed closest, he might find the will of The Sky Father, who ever more often let his voice be heard.

  He had come to this brightest of places because the need for guidance scratched him as never before. The thoughts of Late Star too often wandered for his counsel to have meaning, and there was no other. Here The Great Spirit had spoken within his mind and perhaps he would again, for indeed the problem was strange.

  How many times had he taken the war trail for his people? As many as the feathers on a pigeon? More than any could remember, at least.

  How often had he killed? How many were the coups? As many as the scars of battle that traced patterns on his body? More, many more.

  And who were the tribes, the clans, the villages and families that had felt the wrath of The Warrior? Too many to count, of that he was sure.

  Many had come against him and many he had searched out. For each a punishment had been inflicted and warning given. Rarely was the message ignored. Yet, two seasons past a strangeness had begun among the distant Chippewa, and that strangeness had become a river of challenges that disturbed the peace of the Iroquois nations.

  Announced by a carrier of the forked stick, a champion of the Chippewa had strode across the lands of the Iroquois to meet the Iroquois fighter in open combat. It was a proud thing and The Warrior had met the Chippewa spear to spear.

  Clever was the Chippewa and strong was his heart, but when he had tired, The Warrior had counted coup by touching his point to the champion's breast. Word had been carried for all could be proud of it, and the Chippewa nation was honored by the spirit of its fighter. Their champion had returned to his people with chin high and eyes clear.

  Then the
strangeness had begun. To the land of the Iroquois came a stream of challengers. Some were warriors of note who met eye to eye, but others were only hunters who practiced no warrior codes. Some were even youths with few skills who leaped from hiding or appeared without announcement or preparation. All were Chippewa and each, in his way, sought honor in defeating The Warrior.

  The chiefs and sachems of the Six Nations had become annoyed by the ceaseless attacking of their fighter. Chippewa had been impolitely turned back, some with physical abuse. Those who had appeared, The Warrior had dealt with summarily. The deserving had lived to rejoin their lodges. The survivors were few, but the challenges continued. Iroquois warrior societies rumbled and fingered their weapons, and councils spoke of war with the arrogant Chippewa. Although pipes of peace were smoked, tensions seethed and the paint pots were uncovered and ready.

  On the mountain Tuscarora, The Warrior sought understanding. To The Great Spirit he opened his mind and to The Great Spirit he told all that had happened and his wish to soothe the war hungers that chewed at his people.

  That powerful warriors would seek honor by defeating another known for his strengths was an ancient tradition accepted by all. That hands of youths should turn from their tasks, to travel great marches, to die without real chance of victory spoke of sickness or. . . of magic.

  Of magic! The thought blossomed within the mind of The Warrior. He felt the physical tingles that often accompanied discovery, and he accepted them as part of The Sky Father's presence.

  Behind his eyes, visions whirled and focused on a figure whose gestures spoke in violence and before whom men were poised breathing his words of fire. Was this a man of medicine who launched fanatical fighters as one might fly arrows one after another? Abruptly the vision dissolved and he was left without certain answer.