Warriors of the Night (20 page)

“The hills are steep, but there is a trail down,” Spotted Calf pointed out.

“What do you think?” Ben asked the Ranger. “I’ll come at them right through the front door. Think you and Virge could sneak in the back?”

“Hell, Brass Buttons. This here’s your party. You call the tune and me and the boys will dance to it as best we can.” Gandy clapped Ben on the shoulder, then looked around at the dark mountains surrounding them.

“I won’t be sorry to leave this damn pass behind,” he said. He walked back to his bedroll near the campfire and stretched out. They had made camp in the oak grove, not far from the mound of stones that marked Zavala’s final resting place. Virge Washburn had volunteered the first watch. The grisly discovery he’d made had left him unable to sleep. He was out among the shadows, watching, listening, lest Zavala’s murderer return to kill them all.

Ben nodded to the Comanche. “You’ll ride at my side into the canyon.”

“It is good,” Spotted Calf replied. “But hear these words, my brother. When we reach the canyon, our bond is broken and I will be a tame Comanche no longer.”

“You have said it,” Ben replied. He patted his rifle stock. “And I will be ready.” There was nothing else to be said. The darkness hung gloomy as a shroud. Too restless to sleep, Ben left the brave’s side and wandered off toward the spring. He squatted down and cupped water to his mouth and over his shaggy red mane. He stared down at his reflection as the moon emerged from behind the scudding clouds. He studied his features and marveled at how serious he seemed. His brow was creased with worry lines that aged him beyond his twenty-four years. His eyes looked hard as flint. He opened his shirt and stared at his naked chest where the medal should have been gleaming in the glare of a silvery moon.

Gone. Stolen. The blood heritage of the McQueens. And his fault. His fault. Ben knotted his fist and drove it into his reflection until the image was lost in a blur of black and silver ripples spreading out across the dark pool. He stood and turned away, and his gaze settled on the burial mound. The stones were the color of bleached bones. What the hell was loose in these mountains? Ben McQueen had the uneasy feeling he was about to find out.

F
IRE GIVER STOOD UPON
the table rock atop the rock slide, in full view of the hacienda. He had arrived before dawn so that the men on the wall would see him at first light, the sun rising behind him. He wore his richly colored robes and his jaguar helmet. He brandished the sacrificial knife in his right hand and raised his left hand to the rising sun as if drawing strength from the golden light, or perhaps summoning it into being. And seven men of the eagle clan sat at the base of the rocks and played upon the drum and the shell trumpet and reed flute. From the hills the warriors began to chant, and their voices rolled down from the ridges like distant thunder. A storm was coming, with no way to avoid it, a tempest of wanton killing and destruction. And all to please the Smoking Glass, the god of darkness. With the sun at his back, Fire Giver stood tall and stretched out his arms, pointing the sacrificial knife toward the hacienda. The shaman’s shadow stretched along the canyon floor as if threatening to storm the walls of the hacienda.

Fire Giver saw power in this phenomenon. He imagined fear in the faces of those he had lured into the canyon. Several days ago, he had scattered his warriors across the hills to find other sacrificial victims. The drums were calling them back. While his force swelled in size, the shaman had prevented his enemies from escaping by killing their horses. But he had lost three of his men in the process. The many-times-firing guns puzzled him. The few rifles his people had encountered had all been single-shot, muzzle-loading pistols and rifles. The ferocity of the gunfire from the walls had sent his men scurrying to the safety of the boulder-strewn slope.

Now Fire Giver must be content to wait, to bide his time while his men returned in groups of two and three. In a day or two, he would have a large enough force to storm the walls and destroy his enemies.

Tezcatlipoca was hungry for hearts.

Fire Giver looked down from his place of authority and spied Young Serpent with his men, keeping faithful vigil.
Young Serpent is too impatient, the shaman thought. I long to return to our village as much as he. But I know what must be done. Only after the blood flows like red rain, after hearts like red flowers are offered on altars of stone, will the sacred sign be given.

Far to the south, hidden among mountains as old as time, the People waited. And died. For them, Fire Giver and the eagle clan had begun their quest. They must not fail.

Noon.

A bee landed on the top of the east wall. It crawled along the sun-washed surface until it came to Anabel’s hand, then crawled across her slender brown fingers and took to the air, circling her twice. The bee came and went unnoticed. Her attention was focused on the shaman in the jaguar mask and feathered robes.

The eerie blasts from shell trumpets and the droning drums was wearing on everyone’s nerves. Now and then Anabel and her vaqueros glimpsed masked warriors darting among the rocks on the slope. Like living shadows, there one moment, gone the next.

“Just look at him,” Jorge muttered. “Standing atop that rubble for all of us to see.
Sí
, this hombre has the
cajones
of a bull.”

“Well, if he or his kind come within the range of our Colts…” Miguel said from the corner where the east wall joined the south.

“Now we know what has happened to our families,” Hector muttered. “They must have taken them prisoner.”

“It isn’t a sure thing,” Anabel replied.

“I think it is,” Hector said. “Your father was at peace with the Quahadi and many other tribes.” He reached inside his buckskin shirt and produced a broad beaded belt, a symbol of peace among most tribes of the desert mountains.

“I took it from the mantel,” Hector explained. “Your father used it to make peace whenever a new chief brought his men to the canyon to hold council and trade for guns and horses.”

“These are not Comanche,” Jorge said.

“No matter, they’re all alike. Any Indian will trade,” Hector said. “If you’ve got something he wants.” He held up a brace of single-shot pistols. With the Colt revolvers at his side Hector was confident he could handle any situation that might arise and, as he no longer needed the pistols, they would make an excellent trade gift. He might even be able to buy back his wife and sons. That was worth a little risk, and he said as much to Anabel.

“No,” she replied. “You would go to your death.”

“I do not think so, Señorita Cordero,” Hector replied, glancing toward the lone brave atop the rock slide a little over a hundred yards away. “I will bring them the medicine belt and show that we come as friends.” He turned and started down from the wall. Anabel was torn between permitting him to go and calling him back. Perhaps there was still a possibility that some kind of peace could be made with these mysterious warriors. It might be worth the effort after all.

“Wait. I should go. It is my place,” Anabel said.

“No. Señorita. It is my wife and children who are missing. It is for me to meet with these chiefs.”

Anabel glanced at Jorge, who shrugged and said nothing, though it was obvious he disapproved. Miguel seemed anxious for his brother to go. If there was a chance for an end to the hostilities, he felt it was certainly worth the risk—as long as it wasn’t
his
risk.

“Go then, but be careful.”

“Adiós,”
Hector said. He glanced at his younger brother.

“Vaya con Dios,”
Miguel said. “I will close the gate after you, eh?”

The two brothers hurried down into the courtyard. Hector quickly gathered up a few trade goods, draped a couple of blankets across his shoulder, and then, with the Comanche medicine belt held before him like a shield, nodded to Miguel, who opened the oak door. Hector looked around at the hacienda and spied Chico Raza and the
norteamericano
watching him from the roof. He waved to Chico, who returned the salute. Clapping Miguel on the shoulder, Hector stepped through the gate.

“He’s about there,” Jorge announced, despite the fact that Anabel and Miguel could see just as well as the
segundo
. Even Chico and the captive Matthew Abbot were standing on the wooden walk behind the east wall, attention centered on the distant figure who had just reached the rock slide after making his way unharmed down the canyon.

The stench from the corral was enough to turn the strongest stomach. The carcasses of the dead animals had begun to bloat in the heat. Their flesh was black with flies. Anabel knew something would have to be done but she didn’t want to take any action that might endanger Hector. She watched as Hector raised a hand in greeting and then spread the blankets upon the ground. The bargaining had begun.

“I don’t like this,” Jorge muttered. Half a dozen warriors materialized out of the rocks and slowly advanced on the solitary peacemaker who had bravely left the safety of the hacienda.

“My brother knows what he is doing,” Miguel nervously countered. Hector was indestructible, he thought. Nothing could harm him. Anabel raised a spyglass that had belonged to her father and peered through the eyepiece. She could make out the man in the jaguar mask, who seemed to be the chief. She moved the spyglass and Hector slipped into focus. He was speaking with a good deal of animation, indicating the blanket and the trade guns he had brought. He turned as the other warriors left the protection of the boulders and advanced on him. She had never seen the likes of such men as these, with their eagle masks and feathered armor and their obsidian-studded axes and clubs. One of the braves held a spear set in the notch of a throwing stick, poised to hurl it at Hector if he tried to reach the Colt revolver tucked in his belt. Hector continued to talk, but the warriors surrounding him offered no indication that they understood. Then one of the warriors to Hector’s right suddenly and without warning raised his club and swung it in a short savage arc against the back of Hector’s skull.

“No!” Miguel blurted out from the wall. “No!” He opened fire with his revolver in a hopeless gesture, for the rock slide was well out of range. Hector stumbled forward as the warriors swarmed over the struggling man and pinned his arms and then proceeded to carry him up the mound of boulders until they reached the table rock that served the shaman as a makeshift dais. In a matter of seconds they had stripped away Hector’s shirt and stretched him out across the stone. The warrior in the jaguar mask drew an obsidian knife from his belt and raised it toward the sun, then thrust down.

Hector’s scream reverberated the length of the canyon as the shaman cut his heart from his chest and held it aloft. Anabel dropped the spyglass and sagged against Jorge, who helped her stand aright. No one on the wall made a sound. Miguel had emptied his revolver. Smoke curled from the barrel. He continued to stare with disbelief. Anabel regained her senses and turned away. The screaming had mercifully stopped. She stumbled along the walkway until she came to the corner of the wall overlooking the corral, where the dead horses continued to fill the air with their stench.

“Jorge,” she said. “See that the carcasses are burnt.”

“Señorita?” He had lived a long life and had seen many terrible things, but nothing so awful as what he had just witnessed.

“Burn the damn horses!” Anabel shouted. She swung around, her features flush with anger, her limbs trembling. Tears welled in her eyes. She noticed Matt Abbot standing close at hand. She drew the revolver from her belt. Abbot tensed, uncertain of her intentions. Then, to his surprise, she handed him the gun, butt first. “There is powder and shot in the hacienda,” she said.

“What are you doing?” Miguel blurted out. “You give guns to our prisoner?”

Anabel looked out across the canyon at the boulders and clumps of mesquite and scrub oak, the tall brittle grasses dancing in the wind, all of it foreboding now. How many blood-hungry killers waited for their next victim to venture outside the walls? She stared at Miguel and her eyes were as cold as naked steel.

“Niño—por Dios!
We are all prisoners now.”

I
T WAS THREE HOURS
shy of sunup when a column of six tired men rode their weary horses out of an arroyo that snaked through the cordillera and brought Ben McQueen’s colorful column to within a half mile of Cordero Canyon. Ben called a halt and Snake Eye Gandy trotted up alongside the lieutenant and took a moment to allow his Appaloosa to crop a mouthful of chino grass.

“Bright as a Comanche moon tonight,” the Ranger said, looking up at the stark white hills bristling with cactus and clumps of mesquite clinging tenaciously to the rocky soil. “I’ve told Virge to stay with you. I’m thinking one can ride quieter than two along that ridge.”

“Suit yourself,” Ben replied. He respected the older Ranger’s judgment. McQueen held out his hand. “We’ll give you about a half-hour head start. Good luck.”

Snake Eye shook his hand. “Seems to always boil down to that. Good luck or bad—and a man must take his chances.”

“And keep his powder dry,” Ben added. The Ranger glanced ahead at Spotted Calf and considered warning young McQueen to keep on the lookout for treachery, but he knew his words of wisdom would fall on deaf ears.

“Be seeing you, Brass Buttons,” Snake Eye said as he started his horse up slope. The noise of the hooves striking loose rocks and rubble seemed deafening to the men below. Ben could only hope that the trail that ran along the crest of the ridge made for quieter going.

He signaled to Spotted Calf to continue on, and the Comanche obediently complied. Then the lieutenant trotted up alongside Peter.

“You all right?”

“I may not sit for a week,” Peter grinned. He removed his wire-rimmed spectacles and cleaned the round lenses on the hem of his linen shirt. “Won’t be long now,” he mentioned. “I don’t feel exactly happy about it. More like a toreador standing in the middle of a bullring. I mean, the crowd’s cheering and his heart’s swollen with pride, but then there’s the matter of that damn bull….”