The Wolf and The Blossom

Chapter 2

Waya

Children laugh in the distance. Too close.... too close to the white man's village. I say as much to my brother, Sequoyah. He grins, a mad mans grin.

"Tohiyusdv, brother Waya," he claps me on the shoulder, teasing me to calm. "If we are quiet they will never know we were here."

My skin tightens over my bones in anticipation. White men never need a reason.

We continue our hunt. Two hares so far, next we are going for a deer. The men around us laugh and joke, talking about fun nights, sports games, the environment since the white men arrived.

Sequoyah, with his head half shaved, interjects adding outlandish details and laughing like he has no care in the world. "You'll be on my stick ball team right, young Waya?" he asks, punching my arm.

"Uh uh, brother of course!" I punch his right back, chuckling. "Someone has to teach these boys how to play correctly."

Protests go up about my joke when Onacona halts us all. "Tracks. Set up the trap and get into the trees, quickly."

As a unit we set up the elaborate trap to circle the deer towards us and hide in the trees and bushes. Sequoyah hides in the bush beneath my tree, getting a high from being closer to the action, and when silence is supposed to fall, it doesn't. Heavy foot falls, loud talking, the rustle of clothing, crunch of leaves... too much noise.

Sequoyah looks up at me, eyes worried. The movement causes the bush to rustle and the white men go on alert. We all look towards Onacona and he puts a finger to his lips. Be quiet, be still, wait it out.

The white men stare at my brother's bush, weapons raised. My blood stills. Don't move Sequoyah. I silently plead. Don't do anything stupid. They speak but I don't understand their tongue. It's unlike anything I have heard before. But from the looks on their faces, they're angry.

Sweat slides down my arms, my back. Tension crackles in the air, my heart racing.

Sequoyah readies his bow and the movement rustles the bush again causing one white man to fire...

Onacona makes the motion for us to descend upon them and more shots ring out.

I rush to my brother, pressing a hand to his wound, foreign and deadly. "Brother, how could you do something so stupid!"

"Gvgeyuhi, young brother," his words are garbled with blood, his hand gripping my arm.

I love you too, brother... I send the silent words along with his spirit, resting my forehead against his, running my hand over his head.

The fighting stops and Onacona tells the other men to fall back and we leave, carrying my brother with us.

-~-

Ahyoka, Sequoyah's wife, falls to her knees as we walk through the village with her lifeless husband, sobbing. I keep my head down with shame as I walk towards the tent of the deceased.

Anger courses through my veins.

They come onto our land, kill our people...

I stand over my brother's still body. Staring at the face that spew so many jokes. The lips that could coax any woman into bed before he married or make anyone in the tribe smile, including me. The brothers knot inked on his chest above his heart, twin to the one on mine. Callouses decorating his palms, from teaching me to whittle figures, to playing stick ball, to shooting a bow and arrow. Arms that held me when our parents were killed when I was eleven, ten years ago. This day never should have come.

The chief of our clan breaks my thoughts as he call us to the meeting tent. I send my brother a last parting look and head to the meeting tent.

"Men, we strike at sundown. We will not let the white savages kill our brother and get away with it," he says with no before thought. We are doing this. Enough is enough.

Revenge will be sweet.

It will be the best feeling to return to what the white men wrought upon us.

"Be ready. Now disperse."

Without another thought, I go to my wattle, painting red woad on my chest and over my arms. Memories of Sequoyah flash in my mind. Us making canoes, winning every game of stickball, the bright look in his dark eyes when he told me he'd be a father, the way he hit my shoulder right before he was killed.

I slide my quiver over my back and strengthen my bow, slinging a holster over my hips to hold my ax. Before today I never participated in a raid, but today?

Ahyoka enters my tent, eyes red and face puffy. I turn my back to her, closing my eyes. "I should have done something more."

"Do not go down that road, Waya. It's not your fault. Avenge my love."

I nod, walking past her and out of the wattle.

It is time.

-~-

The village is small and one by one the lights go off. Onacona has targeted the houses with the men who killed Sequoyah and the rest will fall after.

The moon permits limited light but I am ready. The hum of battle roars through my body as I await the order. My eyes fall on the last man out, going into a log house. The man who killed my brother.

He is mine.

Once the man is inside we wait...an hour...two then Onacona sounds the order.

I stand on surprisingly steady legs and head into the village, aiming straight for the killer's lodgings.

Hell has arrived upon this village.