The Other Side of Free by Krista Russell

Author:Krista Russell [Russell, Krista]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: JUVENILE FICTION / Historical / United States / Colonial & Revolutionary Periods
Publisher: Holiday House
Published: 2013-10-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty

April 21, 1740

What in creation?” Phaedra shot out of her bed, waking Jem from a deep sleep.

Sitting up, he became aware of the overpowering stench that had roused Phaedra. He rushed outside to find that the very charm he’d wished for had fallen to earth as though a gift from the Sky God himself.

It was a rather small, quite dead, and extremely smelly skunk. And it hadn’t exactly fallen out of the sky. Omen held it tightly in his talons.

Phaedra was at his heels. “Get rid of that thing before we all expire.”

But Omen didn’t want to let it go, so Jem waited for him to finish his meal. Owls must not have much of a sense of smell, he figured.

Tildy came over to see what the fuss was about. She took one look at the owl’s feast and exclaimed that she had lost her appetite.

“Good,” Phaedra said. “The pot’s empty anyway.”

Finally, Omen dropped what was left of the carcass. Jem wrapped it in a wide palm leaf and stashed it under a pile of rocks. After a sparse breakfast of thin gruel, he fetched the packet and headed to the Indian village. He’d ask Domingo to show him how to tan the skunk’s hide.

The streets were even more empty than usual. He finally found Domingo sitting on a rock by the creek that ran between the village and St. Augustine. He was whittling a thin plank of wood about as long as his arm and as wide as his wrist.

“Where is everyone?” Jem asked. “Over at the Castillo?”

“Mostly.” Domingo shrugged. “Some have gone.”

“Gone where?”

“West . . . or south.” Domingo said.

“Why’d they do that?”

“To get ahead of the English. Last time they came, they took prisoners from here and sold them as slaves. Time before that, they burned the village to the ground.”

“Why’d they do that?” Jem asked. “What have your people ever done to them?”

Domingo shrugged. “Friend to England’s enemy. When the English attack us, they weaken the Spanish hold on these lands.”

“But these are the lands of your ancestors!” Jem said, his voice rising with indignation. “By rights, you’re the ones who should hold them.”

“No one owns the land,” Domingo said quietly. “People are of the land, not over it.”

“Were you here when they burned the village?” Jem asked.

Domingo nodded, his jaw muscles tightening the way Big Sunday’s did when he was angry. “I was small,” he said, “but I remember. We hid in the woods until they left. My parents made plans to leave after that, but we never did.”

“Why not?”

“My father decided he must stay to fight the English. He started the militia with other maroons. Led them to Carolina to help others escape. He told my mother he owed it to those still enslaved.”

This was a story Jem hadn’t heard. “What did your mother say?”

“I do not know. During Father’s first trip back north, yellow fever took half the village. My mother was first to die.”

“I’m sorry.” Jem didn’t know what else to say.

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