Jerimiah's Gold

Chapter 5

I awoke to a familiar chanting. It was the next day. A fire had been set in the fire pit that sat in the center of the teepee. Dazed, I rose to a seating position. My eyes refused to open completely, so I spent a good few minutes just trying to regain my vision. I pinched the bridge of my nose, for I had accumulated a migraine due to last night's events. I was still in the cage. Locked up like a bad dog who's been scolded.

Once my vision cleared, I rattled the cage door. It didn't even so much as budge, no matter how hard I shook it. I pounded on the door, bending the flimsy steel. It was then when I noticed the door was wired shut at both ends. Defeated, I sat back and just tried to regain any sort of awareness.

The same woman from last night walked in the teepee, and waltzed directly to me. She crouched to meet my eyes. Through squinted vision, I could see her incredibly long hair that swayed and drifted in the faint breeze. I was breathing through my mouth, so my throat and tongue were completely dried. She noticed this and walked outside for a moment to retrieve a wooden bowl of water.

"Please. Drink." She said monosyllabicaly.

"Why, why are you keeping me?" The words were acid on my sore throat.

I couldn't bare the dehydration any longer, and I allowed her to put the bowl of water in the cage. I swiped the bowl and nearly drank all the contents in a single gulp.

"We are no good with outsiders. White man." She said cautiously.

I raised an eyebrow. "But I'm not white, nor a man."

"You share this civilisation, no?"

"Sometimes." My voice was gravelled.

She was bemused by that statement and wore a skeptical look. "You will not harm us?" She asked.

"No, please, let me out." I peered into her eyes and pierced her empathy.

She chewed her lip for a moment before removing the wires. The wiring screeched as it was cut apart from the chain link cage. She slowly opened the door and offered her hand to me. I took it; she helped me out of the cage and onto my feet. My legs shook and my knees buckled. It felt like my legs were soft pasta noodles, or brittle ones on the verge of snapping. Noticing this, she threw my arm over her shoulder and guided my out of the teepee.

The sun stung my eyes and burnt my skin as it blinded me through the clouds and the tree branches. The tribe stood attentively as each member noticed the woman carrying me out of the teepee. One of the men approached and asked something quizzically in a strange, foreign language. The woman hissed something at him and he rushed away.

My feet dragged as she tried to keep me standing. I wobbled and hopped, desperate to gain my balance. The woman sat me down on a fallen tree that had some kind of hide drapped over it, and was seated in front of a fire pit. A single tree trunk stood on the opposite side of the fire; this is where she'd take her seat.

"What is this place?" I asked, my voice hoarse.

She looked at me blankly as if she was trying to understand what I said.

"Where am I?" I asked slowly.

"This is my home. My people." She responded shortly.

"Are you the leader?" I rest my elbows on my knees and sat hunched over. Allowing my hair to fall carelessly in front of my face.

"No, Eagle Eye is captain." She responded proudly.

"May I speak to him?" I tried to keep my questions simple so she'd understand me.

"I do not know. I will ask now. Wait." She rushed to her feet and jogged to a much larger teepee than the one I had previously been held captive in.

I heard heavy footsteps that broke my stare from the ground. A large, no, huge man emerged from behind a sheet of deer hide that worked as a door for his teepee. The man had the head of a buck skinned and cleaned to wear as a hood, as the rest of the bucks skin draped gracefully on his back, on his shoulders were large leather pads that were strung together by some wiring done by thick foliage and malleable twigs. He had nothing covering the lower half of his body besides another thick strip of animal hide to cover his genitalia and buttocks.