Forest of Fortune by Jim Ruland

Author:Jim Ruland [Ruland, Jim]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: F+W Media

SUMMER

THEY SPIRITED US AWAY to the mountains, costumed in the skins of animals. They powdered our flesh until we resembled the ghosts we were fated to become. The men were savage, the women cruel. Their ways were not our ways. I understood before Ysabella there was no going back to the life we knew before. The pain we’d endured at the orphanage was nothing compared to this. Each night we prayed for our rescue, and every day our suffering continued. We were captives, trophies of war.

The women hated us. Our skin was fairer than theirs, our features more delicate. They wanted to tear out our hair and batter our bodies. They gave us spoiled food and foul water. They worked us like slaves, punished us for no reason. At the end of a long day’s march, they tied us to trees and left us there for hours. The shadows crept across the ground, devouring sunlight, cloaking us in cold. Hawks circled and the crows watched over us, their cries drowning out our pitiful whimpering. When they released us, we could barely stand much less walk, but I tied strips of lace to the trees for Gamboa to find. The natives kept running, moving us from mountain to mountain, camp to camp. How could one catch what never stopped moving?

Finally, we came to a canyon, a shadowy box at the base of a peak higher than the rest. Water fell from its bald crown and tumbled into a deep pool and began its long voyage to the sea. The canyon was strewn with great rocks. There was one near the falls that rested flat like a strange red table. There were many such rocks, but only one was stained red.

Our first night in the canyon, two savages came for us. They took us to the red rock. A boy who had worked at one of the ranchos conversed with us in our own tongue. He told us it was to be a celebration. The men laughed and offered us food and drink. I accepted the former and refused the latter. Ysabella didn’t show the same restraint. She became raucous and loud, full of musical laughter that carried across the camp. Before long the men were drunk and prodded her into a dance I found grotesque, her shadows rising and falling on the canyon walls.

After the dance, I kept her close to me, told her it was time for sleep. Gamboa will come and right this wrong, I whispered in my sister’s ear. Gamboa will save us! This was my answer to everything. The Indian Killer, my husband-to-be, our savior.

We were returned to the women. The wives and mothers and concubines. They were furious with us. They believed we had slept with their men. There was nothing we could do to persuade them of our innocence. Ysabella’s drunkenness told them everything they needed to know.

They took us into the canyon and tied us to some trees beside the falls, their bark slick with spray.

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