Pony Soldiers

by James Axler

  The thought of the psychotically sadistic sec boss of Mocsin, up in the Darks, cast a momentary chill over the group. But he was long gone and far away.

  "And besides, the bastard's dead," Krysty said, her fiery hair tied back in a ponytail.

  "Hope so," said Ryan. "Go on, Doc."

  "I was wondering as I looked around here…that precious little has changed since I was here back in 1896. Precious little. It was but six short years after the pitiful and shameful episode of Wounded Knee. I was…but that is another tale, my friends. Crazy Horse was dead those twenty years. Sitting Bull had joined his ancestors six years earlier. Little Billy Bonney asked his last question fifteen years before."

  Ryan was beginning to think that Doc was going to ramble his way through every famous person the old West had ever known. But the warrior stopped him, leaning forward, the massive knife seeming to tug at its sheath on his hip.

  "You talk of being here so long ago. No man lives to be that great age. Why do you tell these lies to us?"

  Doc spit words at him in Apache, making the chieftain sit up, face darkening.

  "Keep it friendly, Doc," Ryan urged. "What did you say to him?"

  The Mescalero answered himself. "He tells me that my father would open his own belly with shame that his son showed such little respect."

  "Doc Tanner here tells the truth. It'd take too long to explain how or why, but if he says he was here­abouts a coupla hundred years ago, then you better believe that he was."

  "He talks of dead names. But not of the Apaches. What of them?"

  "Never knew Cochise. He died when I was only a skinny kid of seven or eight. He wasn't a Mescalero, was he, Chief?"

  "No. Chiricahua."

  "I met Geronimo twice. Mid-nineties, around Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Poor old devil was drunk most days. Surely must have been a devil of a man when he was younger."

  "Mimbreno, not Mescalero," the Indian said, ob­viously fighting to contain his disbelief at this absurd litany of tall tales.

  "I know that, sir," Doc responded. "He told me his real name. I would guess you don't know that. Ge­ronimo was a white man's name. Spanish for Je­rome."

  "What was his name of the people?"

  "His Apache name was Gokliya. He said it meant a man who sleeps a lot."

  "Something like that," the chief replied. "You met… I can…"

  "Shouldn't we go to see how Jak is?" Ryan sug­gested, to break the uneasy tension of the moment.

  "The shaman might not appreciate being inter­rupted," Doc said.

  "It is best to leave him. The painting with sand takes a long hour. And then the Healing Way is not easy for him. It is tiring. We can go at dawn."

  "That's a time off," J.B. observed.

  "We could talk some," Ryan said. "Tell us about General Yellowhair."

  The Apache nodded. "It is well. Listen, then…"

  Chapter Thirteen

  THE LAST SCATTERED PATCHES of light drifted into smaller corners, shrinking, eventually giving in to the encroaching night. The dry wood crackled smokelessly on the cooking fires, filling the canyon with an unforgettable aromatic scent. Ryan was aware of the rancheria settling down all around him, ready for the darkness. A half dozen little children were scolded away from the deep pool where they'd been noisily throwing stones.

  As quiet descended, they could all hear, occasion­ally, the rhythmic chanting of the shaman as he worked over the motionless figure of the boy. Ryan couldn't make out anything that sounded like words. There was a single syllable, stretched, then a pause, followed by two syllables, repeated over and over again.

  Krysty had asked if she could go to see how Jak was recovering. Or not. But the chief firmly refused. "Man Whose Eyes See More will save him. But when he talks to the spirits it is better that he talks alone. If he does not send word by the dawning that your friend is well, then… then he will be at one with the sky and the earth."

  "You got some pretty ways of saying 'dead,' don't you?" J.B. muttered.

  Finally the tall Apache decided that the time had come for them to talk. It was obvious that he would much have preferred that the two women left them, but he fetched up short of actually telling them to leave. More bowls of food were brought, with warm, fresh-baked corn bread.

  And a crock of cooled liquor. That J.B. recognized as pulque, made from the agave plant. Lori sipped at her earthenware beaker, then coughed and spluttered. "I'm tasting on fire," she said, tears streaming down her cheeks. Her distress brought the first smile that any of them had seen to the mouth of the Mescalero war chief.

  Doc wasn't amused. "Let's hear your story," he said.

  "Yes. It is time."

  First came the introductions. As guests, the Anglos introduced themselves.

  "Ryan Cawdor, from the Smokies."

  "Krysty Wroth, from the ville of Harmony."

  "J. B. Dix."

  "Dr. Theophilus Tanner from South Strafford, Vermont. Doctor of Science, Harvard. And Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Oxford, England." He shook his head. "Not that I suspect that any of that is now worth doodlysquat." He stood up, knees crack­ing, and bowed low to the watching Apache chief.

  "Lori Quint. I'm awfully pleased to meet you, sir," she said, the words cautious and hesitant, as if she feared they might spin in her mouth and choke her.

  "I am called Cuchillo Oro. I am the chief of the Mescalero people in this place. A part of the nation of the people, the Apache."

  "Knife of gold," Doc said. "I must confess that I have been admiring that dagger you wear. Sixteenth-century cinqueda, I believe."

  The warrior drew it from the soft leather sheath, offering it, hilt first, to the old man. "My name comes from a great fighter from three thousand moons past. He was called Cuchillo Oro and this knife belonged to him. Now it is mine. The golden knife. And the name of Cuchillo Oro."

  Doc passed it on to Ryan, who whistled at the weight of the knife. The blade was unusually broad at the hilt, tapering down to a needle point. Apart from the golden sheen, dark in the firelight, the steel was without decoration. The hilt was studded with rough, uncut gemstones, polished to a smooth patina by cen­turies of use. Ryan passed it to the Armorer, who ran his thumb along both edges of the blade, hissing at the black line of blood that appeared, etched on his hard skin. "Sharp enough." J.B. tossed it in the air, spin­ning it a couple of times, grinning like a kid as the hilt smacked satisfyingly into the palm of his hand. "Great balance. Man could pay good jack for a blade like this one. Any time you ever decide to pass it on…?"

  Cuchillo Oro took it back before either of the women could touch it. "This is more than a knife. It is a part of the heritage of my people, a heritage that goes back many, many years. When the Anasazi hunted and farmed the tops of the mesas. Before the dry years came and sent us into the canyons. Listen, Anglos, and I shall tell you of the people, and of the affliction of General Yellowhair that has come upon us. Then, you will know...."

  Cuchillo Oro spoke for a long time with scarcely any interruption. In the darkness they heard the monoto­nous sound of the shaman's chanting, but it seemed to fade until it was a part of the background, as natural as the melancholy hooting of a screech owl, circling above the sky-scraping cliffs of Drowned Squaw Canyon. Or the far-off howling of coyotes, crying for the serene, sailing moon. And above it all they heard the ghosts, called the night wind, whispering among the ice-riven boulders that lined the mesas.

  First the war chief told them something of the his­tory of his people.

  Long before the Anglos came to the Americas, thirsty for power and gold, the people were there, controlling the land and guarding it. Cuchillo spoke of the fights against the encroachment of the whites, and the bitter slaughters on both sides. Doc Tanner nodded sagely at this part of the story, listening to the listing of the old names and the old fights.

  "Kit Carson was a hero to your men and young boys, but he ravaged and destroyed all that he could not begin to understand. Canyon de Chelly is clo
se by here, and it was a place of wonder. Of houses old when the sun was young. Animals and rows of trees bearing tender peaches. Carson came, smiling behind his cloak of bloody treachery and… it was done."

  The name of General George Armstrong Custer came into the tale, and the Seventh Cavalry. The chief spoke of the buffalo soldiers, the black regiments of the Ninth and Tenth Cavalry, fighting all across the Indian frontier, long before it became the Deathlands.

  Montana, New Mexico, Arizona, Dakota, Kansas, Nebraska, Texas—where there were Indians, block­ing the progress of the white men, then the cavalry was also there.

  The combination of tribes at the Little Big Horn had given the Indians their biggest single victory, a victory that marked the high point of the waters. It left the handsome and popular General Custer dead among the coulees above the winding river. "Dead forever," Cuchillo Oro said. "But now he stalks the land again."

  For a hundred years the fortunes of the Indians de­clined. Too many of them were herded and guarded on reservations, often on the poorest land. Disease and drink took their dreadful toll, and the old ways al­most vanished.

  "But not quite," Cuchillo said quietly.

  The ghost dances kept going. High above the des­erts the rituals and old magics did not die. Many of the whites thought them so feeble that the freeways had killed them. Down in the southwest the Hopi and Navaho, the Mescalero and San Carlos, the Jicarilla, the White Mountain and Chiricahua… all clung to the vestiges of their ancient cultures, waiting until they could once more become strong.

  "We thought the time had come."

  "When, Cuchillo Oro?" Ryan asked. "When the missiles destroyed all the cities of the Anglos and left them weak and you more powerful?"

  "Ai, such was the time."

  For some minutes the warrior allowed his talk to slip again into the past, prompted by the use of his own name. Doc had mentioned the famous leaders of the people, Cochise and Geronimo. The original bearer of the golden cinqueda, Cuchillo Oro, had been an al­most legendary fighting man, waging bloody war against his particular enemy, Captain Cyrus Pinner, his feud spilling to include virtually any white man. Cuchillo Oro had been, like the shootist known as "Edge," a man who walked alone.

  Like Edge, and Herne the Hunter and other noto­rious Westerners, Cuchillo Oro had eventually van­ished from the pages of history, into the swirling mists of folk legend.

  "But where do you come from, Ryan Cawdor?" the Apache suddenly asked.

  "Round and about. Been north and east lately. I figured it was time to come this way."

  "Horses or wags?"

  "Both. Lost them all. You were telling us about how Yellowhair appeared here."

  Cuchillo Oro went on, the firelight playing off the planes of his face.

  Ryan guessed he was in his early thirties, six feet tall, well muscled. He had dark eyes and high cheekbones, a firm jaw and good teeth that gleamed when he smiled. Which wasn't often. His thick, dark hair was held by a wide headband of emerald-green cloth, knotted at the back. Apart from the golden knife, he wore a Browning Hi-Power 9 mm pistol, double ac­tion.

  A couple of years before the long winters began, in 1998, the United States government embarked on an ambitious project, less than fifty miles from the sa­cred lands of the Canyon de Chelly.

  With state backing from both Arizona and New Mexico, and opposition from many liberal organiza­tions, it was decided to establish and fund a new mu­seum for the United States cavalry. Originally it was to be close to the site of the old Fort Apache, near the San Carlos reservation, but that was aborted by a strong environmental lobby on ecological grounds. The final site, burrowed into the side of an excavated mesa, was opposed mainly by the local Indians.

  Who were overruled.

  The museum was built with an almost indecent haste, opening only twelve months to the day after the first chunk of the sacred mesa had been blasted away. It was filled with all manner of artifacts, both genu­ine and facsimile: uniforms, diaries, weapons, pho­tographs, dioramas, flags, Indian art and videos.

  With a nearby gift shop doing a fine business in scented candles, wind chimes and compact discs of "Songs of the Cavalry," leading off with "Garryowen." There was also an album of inspirational readings by the late and great Duke Wayne. The grand opening, graced by the vice president himself, was boycotted by any representative of the Indian na­tions.

  The speech that got most headlines was made by an aged descendant of Autie Custer himself. It was filled with references to heroism and courage, adversity and the American way of life.

  "It did not speak of the people," Cuchillo Oro said with a grim smile. "But the days were coming closer. The thunderheads gathered to the east and to the west. We waited, as we have always waited."

  College students and some of the growing ranks of the young unemployed were hired to wear the re­created uniforms and ride doped horses, and to carry some of the hundred or more Springfield carbines built especially by a firearms expert.

  They galloped, whooped and fought out some of the most significant battles of the Indian Wars, from 1860 to 1890. A few local Indians took the chance of getting some drinking money by hiring on as Sioux or Apache or whatever the script demanded from them.

  The one fight they avoided showing was, naturally enough, the Little Big Horn. But they did have a long blond wig for someone to wear when they were doing the grand parade of cavalry heroes. You couldn't leave Custer out of that.

  "Then the sky became black. The father of my fa­ther's father saw it. The rocks melted and the desert became as glass. And the dead… Oh, my brothers, there were so many dead."

  "Nobody will ever know the full score of the megacull," Doc said. "But in the late nineties I worked a while with M.I.T. up in…" He saw the question on the faces around him. "Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Experts there calculated that if only one percent of the Russians' missiles got through it would take our economy several decades to get anywhere back to what might be termed normal. If it ever did get back. And they also concluded that— based on the same one percent—millions upon mil­lions would starve in the first few months. Just one percent of the missiles. Nobody could know what happened back then, but it was surely more than one percent."

  The museum hadn't been all that far away from some missile silos, and the area had been nuked with small, low-yield rockets, creating intense local dam­age but not too much spillover. The hot spots cooled fast out in the desert. Shock waves from Armaged­don brought down the wall of the mesa, burying the United States Cavalry Museum. And so it remained for nearly a hundred years.

  "Many of the people survived the first days of the attack. Our homes were often in remote Canyons like this, well shielded from the great waves of power and the burning winds. The cities died. We went back. Back to the ways of the old people. They were changed little, you understand. The long winters were not easy. There were bad times. The cold months of three and four years after the sky blackened. The Navaho caught a sickness and their spirits did not save them."

  "You know why?" Krysty asked.

  "They had been close to the cities and the Anglo dead. Places where spirits of darkness dwelled. They were touched, and they did not try the old ways. They were always in a hurry. They forgot that the cures that bring back the harmony and balance can take many days. They did not take that time. And in those two times of cold, the Navaho were almost destroyed."

  "What about us?"

  The Apache looked at the tall blond girl, brow fur­rowing in bewilderment. "What of you?"

  Lori tried again. "Pink people like us? Is there many around here?"

  "She means, Cuchillo Oro, were there any Anglos in these parts?"

  Doc Tanner's explanation was enough. "Yes. Few and poor. Double poor. But we had no firefights with them. Not for many scores of moons."

  The Apaches, as their neighboring tribes declined, had taken over most of the hunting lands for a couple of hundred miles around. Secure in their healthy mountain fo
rtresses, they had flourished, carrying on living in the old ways, hunting by their own knowl­edge as they always had.

  They had spread their shadow clear across to the Canyon de Chelly. During the span of those Mescalero alive during the brief time of the last world war, all was peace. A peace that lasted, according to Cuch­illo Oro, until recent years.

  "First one and then two. Then a hand and then two hands. Anglos with blasters. Swift and evil men and women. They came from the north and the east, some from Mexland."

  Ryan asked what had happened to these renegade whites when they came straying onto the lands of the Mescalero. Cuchillo Oro slowly drew the great golden knife and mimed drawing it across his own throat. One of the squaws had just brightened the fire with dried wood, and the flames shone off the mirror of the broad blade.

  The war chief talked then of a time when the land had moved. He had only been a young man, barely in his teens. But he recalled the way that the earth had danced beneath his buckskin boots. The seismic dis­turbances had gone on for some months, and were occasionally severe. The Apaches had called it the time when all men walked as if drunk.

  It had been a particularly bad shock that once again moved the earthslide that had covered up the United States Cavalry Museum, opening up the low roof of the single-story building as neatly as if it had just been built.

  But the Apaches hadn't known about this until some weeks later. There had been a group of rene­gade Anglos, traveling together on beat-up wags, moving slowly across the country. There were too many of them for the Apaches to take on in a direct firefight, but they monitored their progress. Cuchillo's father, Pony Rides Far, had ordered the young men of the Mescalero to keep clear of the whites. He did not want a confrontation that might risk anyone leading the armed killers back to Drowned Squaw Canyon.

  The whites had enlarged the museum, building themselves a crude replica of one of the old cavalry forts, near a bend in the river a quarter mile away from the tumbled mesa. For some years there had been a balance between the two groups. The Apaches lacked the firepower to hit the fort and the museum.