The Legend of Black Wolf - Sully's Journey Home

Chapter One

        As the rifle smoke cleared, Byron Sully watched from his hidden spot on the hill as the camp surrounded the man he'd just killed. A woman, the Major's wife, came flying out of her tent, skirts a blur of color, her screams piercing the countryside. Then, children followed her, and as Sully heard their cries, he began to hear the cries of another, long lost but never forgotten. The family surrounded their patriarch and howled. The Major's wife cradled his freshly shaved face in her hands and kissed his brow. Her wailing drove Sully from his hiding place, up the hill, and back the way he came.

        The orders had never mentioned anything about the confederate, just that this was a target that was sure to turn the tide of the war. Beyond getting his job done, Sully hadn't thought anything of the man's personal life. Now, watching the family surround the man's dead body, his heart started hammering. He'd just killed a family man, someone's father, someone's soul mate.

        Had he really just killed someone in cold blood?

        As he snuck away from the encampment, Sully tried to tell himself he'd just done a good thing. He tried to tell himself he'd just changed the power struggle between the Union and Confederate armies. The man he had killed had needed to die. He hurried to get back to camp and report in that his mission had been accomplished. But something inside Lieutenant Byron Sully felt the exact opposite of honorable. Deep in his heart, he piled the killing on top of other sorrows he would never forgive himself for.

        All is fair in love and in war, Sully had once heard someone say. But he had never known it to be true. He had tried to love, and his deep love had ended, not fairly at all. He had been punished for stealing away a woman who was already promised to another, and he would never stop blaming himself for her death. That regret had driven him to the front lines of battle, searching for the only honorable death he could think of to redeem himself. Now he felt a failure here, too. In trying to run away from his heartbreak, he had only sunk lower, in his mind. In the Army, he was called a sniper, but to him, he'd always feel like a murderer.

        That night, he did not sleep.

        It was four more days of marching before they reached their next point of attack. That night they made camp, and the Colonels of three different regiments joined together in the center of camp for a supper with the men. Everyone was talking about the attack that was being planned in just two short days. Some spoke boldly of how many they'd killed. Some talked of loved ones they waited to see again. All rested and prepared for what could be their last days on Earth. But Sully finished packing his supplies and cleaned his gun in silence, his tent not even pitched.

        He'd been given his orders earlier in the day to set up on a secluded ridge under cover of darkness and be prepare to take out another big target as early in the morning as possible before the rest of the men started their attack. The Colonel wanted to give Sully time to set up a clean shot, which would make the rebel forces weaker and easier to take over. Sully had packed rations to keep him supplied without need of fire, and prepared to leave once everyone was eating.

        As he slipped out of camp, he couldn't resist ducking into the Colonel's tent while nobody was looking. The Major he'd killed haunted his every waking moment, and, now that he was being sent to kill another, he had to find out what he could. If there was any information to be learned, the Colonel would have it stashed in his trunk that had been unloaded earlier.

        As luck would have it, the Colonel had left his trunk unlocked when he left for dinner. Sully hid himself behind the makeshift desk and shuffled through the papers by the light of a single lantern that hung from the corner of the tent. When he laid his hand on the order with his name printed on it, there was little printed there other than what he'd been told. Nothing in the order told of anything about the man or his life. Sully slipped out of the tent, dejected, and began to make his way towards the ridge.

        But with every step, he kept hearing the cries of the Major's wife ringing in his ears. The sounds of his regiment were but faint echoes behind him when his steps halted in the seclusion of the woods. Would this next target also have a wife? Did he have little children who called him 'Daddy'? In the least, this target had a group of rebel soldiers that looked up to him to carry them through the battle, they devoted their lives to the cause and would lay down their lives for their leader. Without him, their strategy would crumble and dozens more would die. Family upon family, torn apart by the bloody battles, dragging on all around him. Yet Sully went on, never seeing the front line, but creeping through the darkness like a thief. He felt others would think him too cowardly to stand up in daylight with the other men. On and on his morbid thoughts reeled until he realized he was way off course in the woods that now surrounded him.

        Sully crouched near a tree in the dim moonlight and tried to quiet his guilty thoughts. But the regret on his heart was too much to ignore. He'd destroyed his own family, now he'd destroyed the family of another man, and he couldn't march another step forward in the order to go execute a third man, destroy a third life, a third family. He couldn't make himself pull the trigger again if his life depended on it. He was heartsick with what he'd become.

        Leaning back against an old oak tree, he rested his head against the barrel of his rifle, and for the first time since the dark night that his wife and baby died, he prayed to the Lord above to help him decide upon the right thing to do.

        'Lord, if You are there, show me the way.'

        Sully prayed, repeating the words over and over for several long minutes.

        Then, in the darkness, he changed his course, covered his tracks, and slipped away.