Original Death (23 page)

Duncan went still. “What do you know of death on the other side?”

The leader of the rebel tribes grew solemn. “I have walked on the other side,” he declared, stirring murmured chants among those who sat behind him. “I know everything about death. My people are the blessed guardians of death.”

“We have the oracles!” a woman in the shadows cried out. “We know we are the true humans because the oracles have come to say so!”

The Revelator paced around the fire, working his pipe, pausing by his guards, who began clearing away the onlookers, then stepped in front of Duncan. “You will carry messages back to the general,” he stated. The spiritual leader seemed to have disappeared. The half-king had become a military tactician.

“The general will not listen to me. I am done with generals,” Duncan replied.

“We are the true humans!” an acolyte cried out, as if the words were part of a liturgy.

The Revelator ignored the woman. “The general will be certain to listen to you. Such a man may not believe what he is given, but he always believes what he takes.”

“I am too weary for riddles.”

“You are going to be taken to Albany as a prisoner. The general will have received an intercepted letter in which it is revealed that the murder committed by the fugitive McCallum was just part of a greater effort to assist the French army. He will interrogate you and discover from you that a large French army is making its way for a surprise attack on Albany along the west side of the mountains.”

“I never wrote such a letter!”

The Revelator shrugged. “Your name is signed to it. I believe that is all that matters. The general so wants to believe you are a traitor. But you must take a beating first, so he believes you.”

“I refuse.”

“Of course you do. But if you do not agree, you will all die. If you agree but don't play your part satisfactorily, your friends will die in exquisite pain,” he said. “I will crush every bone in their bodies like shells under my feet, and the old Nipmuc will be sent to the other side permanently,” the Revelator declared, then he turned away from the fire.

Strong hands seized Duncan, pulling him toward the retreating figure of the half-king.

They arrived at a small lodge on the knoll at the center of the former tribal town, past two dozen fires, each a camp for fifteen or twenty figures. The half-king's force was far larger than Duncan had realized. The structure was set apart, on the highest point of the town, with small smoky fires outside each corner and torches flanking its entrance. Garlands of small skulls reached to the ground from either side of the entry. The Revelator disappeared inside, and his guards shoved Duncan after him.

The long low platform in the center was surrounded by tallow lamps. Women clad in ornate doeskin shifts were on their knees, surrounding the altar, chanting in low tones. As one moved aside to admit the half-king, Duncan froze. The platform held the body of an old man draped in a ceremonial robe of feathers.

“Conawago!” Duncan gasped, springing forward.

As he reached out to touch his friend's face, two warriors leapt from the shadows to seize him but were stopped by the half-king's upraised hand.

“Your friend is not one of us anymore,” the half-king stated. “The oracle roams on the other side but is bound to my people.”

Duncan stared in torment at Conawago's limp body.

A thin smile rose on the half-king's tattooed face. As he gestured Duncan forward, he began shaking a turtle shell rattle.

Though the Nipmuc's cheek was warm, he did not respond to Duncan's touch. Without thinking he pushed the robe aside to take a wrist. One of the women hissed in warning, but another, the oldest of the attendants,
pulled her away. His friend's pulse was weak and slow, but discernible. Conawago was alive, barely.

“What have you done?” he demanded. The women began chanting a prayer he did not recognize.

“Done?” the half-king shot back. “Kept him alive when he was on his last breath! Enabled him to fulfill his glorious destiny!”

Duncan looked at the sentinels and the attendants then at the elegant garment he had pushed away. He had heard of such robes of multicolored feathers, used for special ceremonies. Knots of cedar smoldered in small bowls, scenting the chamber. As he pushed the robe down, he saw his friend's other hand lay on his belly, clutching the hilt of a knife. Not any knife, he knew immediately. It was the ornate knife Madame Pritchard had seen, the weapon that looked like it belonged on an altar. The hilt was carved with elaborate images and inlaid with bright stones. The blade was of flint. It had a look of great antiquity.

As he rearranged the robe over Conawago, the old Nipmuc slightly stirred, and a hoarse, whispered chant rose from his throat. The women instantly stopped and leaned toward him.

“You see now he is my bridge,” the Revelator declared when Conawago fell silent. “He was discovered by my men in a cloud of smoke after we took the Lightning Lodge from those foolish Iroquois. They knew he had just returned from the other side.” The half-king's eyes narrowed, as if he was daring Duncan to challenge him. “Our first oracle declared him our sacred messenger, one of the walkers among the dead. A validation of our holy quest.”

Duncan could see nothing but a frail old man. His friend seemed to have greatly aged since he had last seen him. “Your bridge?” he asked in a faint voice.

It was the nearest of the old women who replied. “To the other side! The oracles, the two who travel between worlds, the ones who speak the pain of the gods.”

Duncan's heart was in his throat. Conawago was wasting away in some kind of coma. “He needs help. Medicine.”

“We watch over him night and day,” the woman said, lowering her voice now. “I drip honey and water onto his lips, but it is not enough. It is unavoidable that he is weak. Part of him is gone over, wandering on the other side, and it has no interest in human nourishment. It is their way.”

“Two oracles, you say?”

“Her life wind is almost gone,” the woman said, and she gestured toward the back of the lodge. Through the thinning smoke Duncan saw now another platform against the wall. “We were wrong to cast her out. The gods have sent her back to help us. The god voice inside her told us this Conawago was a sacred one, told us he would have answers to the questions we will learn to ask. The gods painted their track on her.”

Duncan understood even before he rose and saw the limp form lying on a bed of moss in the shadows. He had seen the track of her gods, under her shirt in Albany. Hetty had been known by the Mingoes, feared but also respected for her ties to the spirits. She had told them Conawago was a sacred one. She had saved him.

“She won't let go of the small one, says he is her only anchor left on earth.” As the woman spoke, another attendant, wrapped in a blanket, turned. Ishmael looked up at Duncan with fearful eyes. His hand was tightly gripped by Hetty.

Duncan took a step toward the boy but was held back by one of the attending women. A low growl came from the shadows, and the woman quickly relented. Hetty had two attendants. The hell dog was there, and he did not object when Duncan put a hand on Ishmael's shoulder. The boy nodded stiffly. He was terrified, but Duncan could do nothing to help him.

Suddenly Conawago began speaking in a rough, hoarse voice, now in the tongue of his boyhood, the Nipmuc tongue Duncan had not learned. Others crowded into the longhouse, speaking in excited whispers. As Duncan was pulled out of the building, the words changed, and they were loud enough for him to hear outside.

“
Arma virumque cano, Troiae qui primus ab oris
,” Conawago called out.

Through Duncan's fog of pain and fear, the words seemed to reach something inside.

“
Italiam, fato profugus, Laviniaque venit!
”

A hollow grin rose on Duncan's face as he was shoved down the hill. The oracle, the near dead old Nipmuc, the pawn of the half-king, was reciting Virgil's
Aeneid
in Latin.

The half-king waited for him outside his tent.

“I told my people the British would break their word when they agreed not to cross the Allegheny mountains.” The Revelator seemed to want to explain himself to Duncan. “The British broke their word. I told them the strong liquor of the Europeans would steal the souls of our warriors. Now drunken Indians litter the settlements. I told them join me, and the settlements along the Ohio would disappear. Now the line of burnt cabins runs for two hundred miles. When I passed through the villages of the Seneca last spring, the women asked me on what day the gods wanted them to plant their squash and maize.”

“There is a long history of prophets arising in times of calamity.”

“Exactly. I prophesize your future, Duncan McCallum. You are going to be taken to Fort Stanwick by some of my men. They will ask for a reward for their capture of a fugitive from British justice, to make it convincing. When you are taken back to the general you will let him learn of the French secrets.”

“The French lies.”

“The British will have to retreat from Canada. They will be denied their victory. The French will see our strength and ally with me. The Iroquois Council will beg to join me. We will seal the frontier with a wall of thorns.”

Duncan returned his steady gaze. The half-king was worried about the Grand Council. He had promised his followers that the Council would embrace their cause. “You mean the Iroquois have refused to treat with you,” Duncan asserted.

The Revelator ignored him. “You will agree tonight, or by this time
tomorrow, Conawago will be sent to live entirely on the other side and you will begin dying just like that Delaware. He took five days to die. I have peeled away the flesh of a living man's face, turned it into a living, screaming skull. My men laughed to see it. Five days is an eternity in such pain. We will take your fingers and nose the first day, then your feet before we take your face, McCallum.” He spoke the words like a vow, then with a click of his tongue a guard appeared and pulled Duncan back toward the torture post.

The half-king followed, and when Duncan was on the ground, tied to the post, he abruptly kicked him in the ribs. “Messages came from the North. Their teacher has taught them well, don't you think?” he spat at Duncan. One by one he dropped five slips of paper onto the ground beside him before kicking the lifeless Delaware and marching away.

A guard lingered with a torch, waiting for him to examine the papers. They were all done in the hands of children. Not just any children, and not, he suspected, of their own free will. The first was a skeleton, over the name Jacob, then a grave with a cross over the name Noah. Next was a skull over Abraham and a coffin over Abigail. The last was an angel over Hannah, who had also penned
Pray for Mr. Bedford, tortured for our lives
.

IT WOULD BE spring on the other side when he searched for Conawago. He would find the old Nipmuc on a mountain trail, watching the warblers that always filled his heart with joy. At the summit they would sit with old bears in the night and watch shooting stars.

Duncan lingered at the edge of sleep, drifting again and again into visions of how he might meet Conawago on the other side. Sometimes they were alone in lush forests, encountering strange animals that no longer existed on earth. Sometimes they sat at a fire with Duncan's father and grandfather, exchanging tales of mortal lives. Sometimes Duncan was walking endlessly in a dense fog, hearing Conawago's voice but never finding him.

He sensed movement beside him and turned to see Sagatchie rubbing the rope that bound him against a rock at the base of his pole. No guard was to be seen.

“I am not leaving,” Duncan warned the Mohawk.

Sagatchie looked at him, confused. “I seek not to escape, Duncan. I seek to free you, to go with you to the oracles.” Duncan had explained to his companions about Hetty and Conawago. “It is a job for a Nipmuc warrior, but you will have to do it.” He kept sawing at his ropes as he spoke. “When you have the flint knife in your hand, you will become a Nipmuc warrior.” A stone flew out of the shadows, grazing Sagatchie's temple, and he stopped.

“I don't understand,” Duncan said.

“It's why he clutches the knife to his chest. A Nipmuc would never be a slave to a man like this half-king. But he would never take his own life. The warrior's duty falls to you.”

“We could never fight our way free.”

“I will fight whomever blocks your way to the lodge. Once you are inside it should be but the work of a moment. Just position the flint blade over his heart and pound the hilt.”

For a long moment Duncan could not speak. “I could never kill him, not Conawago.”

Sagatchie sighed. “Then I will do it, though it is best that he be released by a friend.”

Sagatchie was wrong, Duncan kept telling himself, but the Mohawk's words kept echoing in his mind, mixed with visions of his father calling him to death. He had no choices left, except one. He could let Conawago be slowly killed by the half-king as he himself died at the torture post. Or he could die performing the warrior's duty.