Apache Lament by Patrick Dearen

Author:Patrick Dearen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Gale, Cengage Learning
Published: 2019-05-05T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 13

The roar was like thunder.

Stooped over sotol hearts roasting in the coals, a startled Nejeunee looked up into the brilliance of Sháa, the sun, as quick groans came from the teepee behind her. Wheeling to the flap, she heard a second roar and more groans, and then there was bedlam.

“Indaa!” came a shout.

Blanket-draped and bleeding warriors burst from the teepee, simultaneous with a chorus of yells from the ridge across the fire. From the cradleboard at Nejeunee’s back, Little Squint Eyes began to cry as she spun from the teepee and looked up through the rising smoke. Down the snowy mountainside charged Indaa, maintaining a battle cry that echoed across the hollow.

Confused and shaken, Nejeunee turned one way and then another, not knowing what to do. Suddenly Quick Talker and One Who Frowns were with the wounded Ndé milling beside Nejeunee. The older woman seemed too stricken with fear to utter a sound, but Quick Talker repeatedly called out for the husband she believed awaited her on the other side of death.

More gunfire erupted, individual shots rather than a volley, and Ndé began to fall. Nah-kay-yen the gutaaln went down at Nejeunee’s feet, the first to validate his own concerns about the fate of a People already dead. Two other men dropped almost as quickly, one of them sprawling lifelessly across the roasting sotol hearts. A fourth warrior managed to reach the horses and leap astride a paint, only to collapse across the animal’s neck and slide headfirst to the hoofs.

For a moment more, stunned Ndé huddled about Nejeunee, and then a warrior broke for the arroyo and rising slope behind the teepees. Others fled in his wake, leaving Quick Talker standing in the line of fire, incapable of doing anything but wail. One Who Frowns brushed past Quick Talker and rushed after the men but made only a few steps before an unseen force twisted her half-around. Nejeunee didn’t know how One Who Frowns stayed on her feet, but she did, a pitiful figure clutching her side and hobbling on, laying a blood trail in the snow.

One warrior alone stood his ground. From beside the staked horses, Gian-nah-tah shouldered his Winchester and fired three quick shots at the Indaa. Evidently out of ammunition, he too fled. He momentarily disappeared in the arroyo behind the teepees before reappearing beyond, enemy gunfire chasing him up the agave-studded rise. Bullets shook cholla stalks and scrub juniper and sprayed snow against his heels, but somehow he eluded even the slugs that ricocheted off outcrops and whizzed back through camp.

To Nejeunee, the sequence of events came rapid-fire, images and sounds playing out almost simultaneously as the smoke from campfires and rifle muzzles hung in her throat. It was too much to process, but Nejeunee acted instinctively.

“Run, my sister!” she shouted, taking Quick Talker’s arm.

The two of them bolted after the others to the crying of Little Squint Eyes. Ahead, One Who Frowns sank to the ground and began to squirm, painting the snow a stark red.

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