Mountain Magic

by Simmons, Trana Mae

  She might have surprised him, had she been alone. But she couldn't leave Little Sun. Before Tall Man had untied her outside the cave, he had removed the knife from her belt and searched her, even feeling inside her moccasins for a hidden weapon. He went through her saddlebags, tossing the pemmican she carried there into a snow bank and slipping her hatchet into his own belt.

  All too soon, Tall Man stood and ordered Caitlyn to untie Little Sun. She reached for the knot at the boy's neck.

  "Untie it at the other end," Tall Man barked.

  Little Sun whimpered, and Caitlyn worriedly shushed him again. Using both hands, she loosened the other knot and pulled the rope free, then stood with Little Sun in her arms.

  "He rides with me," Tall Man told her in an icy voice. "You will ride alone. I have no fear that you will run from me as long as I have him."

  "Oh, God," Caitlyn pleaded. "At least let me give you my saddle blanket to wrap around him. And some pemmican for him to chew on. Otherwise, he'll be crying from hunger and cold."

  "He could cry all he wants if I left him here," Tall Man mused with narrowed eyes.

  "I'll fight you every damned step of the way if you leave him behind," Caitlyn warned. "You'll have to kill me, before I find some way to kill you!"

  A growl of menacing laughter left Tall Man's throat, but he shrugged his shoulders. "I have no time to waste beating you and no wish to listen to a bawling child. Give him to me and go outside to get your blanket from your horse."

  Caitlyn clutched Little Sun tighter. "I'll take him with me."

  "I am not ready to kill him yet," Tall Man said as he took a threatening step toward her, reaching for Little Sun. "He will bring my enemy to me, then Spirit Eagle will watch this one die before him."

  Caitlyn bit back a sob of terror and looked down at Little Sun to see if he understood Tall Man's words. He stared back at her with fear on his small face, his hand clenched in her buckskin blouse.

  "It'll be all right, Little Sun." She lied the promise with all the fervency she could get into her voice, but Little Sun buried his face against her neck.

  Tall Man laid his hand on the hilt of his knife. "He will do just as well for me only half alive."

  Slowly, reluctantly, Caitlyn allowed him to take Little Sun from her arms. She didn't have a choice. The tiny boy, wide-eyed with panic, glanced briefly at the Indian's face, and wisely didn't struggle. As Caitlyn walked toward the cave's entrance, she glanced over her shoulder at Tall Man, who followed her. Little Sun's eyes were closed now, his figure rigid with fright and the rope dangling from his neck.

  Caitlyn first ran over to the snow bank and dug out her bag of pemmican. She handed it up to Tall Man, already on his horse, and quickly unsaddled her pinto. Leaving the saddle on the ground, she carried her blanket over and reached up to wrap it around Little Sun.

  The Indian sat stoically, gazing out through the falling snow with his face dead of emotion. She took a breath and removed the pemmican bag from Tall Man's grasp, reaching inside for a piece. Pushing the pemmican into Little Sun's unresponsive hand, she caressed his cheek briefly before she turned to mount her horse.

  They rode for hours, even after darkness fell. Caitlyn shivered violently as the night deepened. Her long-sleeved buckskin dress and knee-high moccasins protected her somewhat at first, since even though snow fell, the temperatures remained mild until after the sun set. Then the cold pierced her clothing, penetrating her skin, icing her fingers blue. She wrapped her hair around her and kept working her fingers to try to bring some warmth back into them.

  Tall Man stopped briefly once, pulled the blanket he rode upon free, and tossed it around his shoulders. He ignored the pitifully shivering figure on the pinto and rode on. Caitlyn finally laid down on the pinto's neck, burrowing into its warmth, trusting the pinto to follow Tall Man's horse on its own.

  The cold seeped into her mind, almost dulling the pain of her thoughts.

  Jon. He must be back at the cabin — warm. She started to slide from the into and grabbed its neck. No, Jon was... what? Hurt? Dead? Tall Man refused to tell her.

  And Silas. Little Sun being with Tall Man told that tale. The old mountain man would have protected Little Sun with the last breath in his body.

  At the moment she could care less who waited at the end of their ride for Tall Man to deliver her to. She only wanted to be warm again. The snow mounded on her hair and back, and Caitlyn suddenly felt warmer. She could go to sleep now — someone had built a fire.

  Little Sun! No one remained now to care for him but her. Tall Man intended to kill the boy, as well as Spirit Eagle.

  Caitlyn struggled against the lethargy and drowsiness drawing her toward unconsciousness. With a groan of misery, she pushed herself upright, shaking her head to dislodge the snow. Some of it slid down her back, and sodden tresses of hair hung around her face. She shoved them back with frozen fingers.

  The pinto halted abruptly, and Caitlyn made a grab for its mane. Her unresponsive fingers refused to cling to the harsh strands of hair and she tried to grip the neck again, but her body slipped from the horse. She lay on the ground, trying to will herself to her feet, and blinked suddenly in a circle of lantern light.

  "That her?" an unfamiliar voice snarled.

  "She is the one the Blackfeet missed in their raid," Tall Man said. "You will have to decide if she is who you seek."

  "Get her inside. Shit, man, what the hell are ye doing with a baby?"

  "That is for me know. I have brought you what you wanted — what we agreed on. He will go with me tomorrow, while you go wherever it is you want to go now."

  Caitlyn struggled again to rise as Tall Man walked away. The lantern light blinded her as it came closer and she turned her head aside. A rough hand reached out and gripped her chin, turning her face back into the light.

  "Jesus," that voice said. "You're her, all right. Ye look just like Mauvreen. I tried to get close enough to make sure last summer, but ye had too many damned men protecting you — Indians and whites both."

  Caitlyn mewed in protest as he dropped her chin and grabbed her arm to try to pull her to her feet.

  "Goddamn it, get up and into the cabin, or I'll leave ye out here to die. Guess one ways just as good as another, long as I take back proof that ye're dead."

  Little Sun. The boy's name in her mind did what the man's cruel grasp couldn't, and Caitlyn rose shakily to her feet. She had to go to the little boy. And, oh God, the man had said something about a cabin, where it would be warm.

  Stumbling awkwardly in the direction the man shoved her, Caitlyn lifted her head and saw the dark shape of a cabin in front of her. No light beckoned from the windowless front wall, but the door was partially open. She half-walked, half-crawled forward, and tripped over her numb feet as she reached it.

  She sprawled across the doorway, and heard the man behind her give a muffled snort of anger. He stepped over her and grabbed her by an arm to drag her on into the cabin, slamming the door behind them.

  Caitlyn lay on the dirt floor for a long moment before the sounds of a crackling fire penetrated her dazed senses. Opening her eyes, she saw welcome flames flickering in the fireplace against the back wall. Little Sun sat huddled on her saddle blanket in front of the fire, and Caitlyn forced her arms to stiffen and raise her a few inches from the floor.

  She got to her hands and knees and began to crawl toward the fire. The cabin was tiny — barely a fourth the size of her own. But she could only move a foot or so at a time, willing a hand forward, a leg to follow. She heard a low voice mutter, a guffaw of menacing laughter, but she concentrated too hard on her movements to make any attempt to understand the words spoken with the laughter.

  At last she collapsed by the fire. Little Sun whimpered, but she couldn't move her arms to reach for him. He scooted closer to her and patted her cheek.

  "Cat? Cat a'right?"

  "I'm...I'll be all right in a minute, Little Sun," she managed to whisper. "Just let me get warm."


  He stood and picked up the blanket, then laid it over Caitlyn's shoulders. As soon as she realized what he had done, a sob escaped her lips. Still a month or so shy of two years old, Little Sun had tried to care for her. But, oh, God, she was supposed to be taking care of him.

  Ever so slowly the warmth chased the icy depth of chill from her body. And, though her senses were slowly clearing, Caitlyn laid as though unresponsive in front of the fire, straining now to listen to what Tall Man and the other man were saying.

  "Listen, goddamn it," the stranger said. He must be white from his speech, Caitlyn thought. "I need a guide back out of these damned mountains. If ye want paid, ye'll wait until we get back to where I can find my own way."

  Suddenly Caitlyn heard the man gasp in fear. "All right," he said in a hurried voice. "Put that damned knife away. I'll give ye what I owe ye now. And I'll double that if ye take me to wherever rendezvous will be held this summer. I can wait there and go back with the pack trains."

  "I have no need of more coins than what you owe me now," Tall Man said in a deadly voice, surprising Caitlyn when he spoke in English. "They will buy me all I desire from the traders. I have no woman to carry what I own and my sister has what I do not wish to burden myself with."

  Caitlyn heard coins jingle. "There," the man said. "Look, I'll give ye two more or...or my extra rifle, if ye'll at least draw me a map. Or give me directions."

  "It is a poor man who cannot find his way to where he wants to go," Tall Man muttered, this time in Nez Perce.

  "I can't understand ye," the other man said. "Ye learned English faster than I did yer language while we waited out that damned long winter."

  Returning sensation crawled through Caitlyn's veins with prickles of pain, and she couldn't hold back a groan. Knowing she had drawn the men's attention, she sat up, but kept her back to them while she gathered Little Sun into her lap.

  "What will you do with that one?" Tall Man asked.

  "Not that it's any of yer business, just like ye told me the boy wasn't none of mine, but I've gotta figure out how I can take proof of her death back to Ireland. Her cousin will only pay me if he's damned sure she's dead. Her grandfather will want proof, too."

  Caitlyn bent her head over Little Sun's. Oh, God, Jon had been right. Her past — the past she declined to discuss with him — had followed her, even down through all these years. The freedom of her life with Mick had lulled her into a false sense that whatever her mother had run from would never effect her — that she could ignore any ties to a family she didn't even remember.

  And now her refusal to face what could happen and take proper precautions would cost her — had already cost her. Jon, Silas and even her dog littered the trail of her blithe stupidity. She even had a hand in the danger that faced Little Sun.

  Her shoulders bowed under the weight of her guilt and grief, but Little Sun shifted in her arms and she took a deep breath against the threatening tears. She still had a chance to protect him, though at the moment she had to admit that it was about as much of a chance as the snow had of melting from the mountains in one short day. In the morning, Tall Man and the stranger would separate — Tall Man to wreak his vengeance on Spirit Eagle through the tiny boy.

  And her? She still had no clear idea why her family wanted her dead — why they sent a man across the ocean and over half-way across this country to kill her. No wonder her mother had run from a man as vicious as her grandfather must be.

  Caitlyn tried to remember if there had been any clue in her mother's journal as to why even her children would be in danger from their grandfather, but failed. Instead, she recalled a passage or two where her mother had written yearningly of her home.

  "Here, Miss Keefe."

  Caitlyn looked up at the stranger's face, not at all surprised to recognize the man who had followed her and Jon around at rendezvous. William Hogan, she remembered Jon and Silas telling her that Reach for the Moon had said the man's name was.

  "My name's O'Neal," she said, sorry at once that she had confirmed her identity. The twist of the man's lips told her that his supposed mistake of her name had been a trick.

  "Oh, yeah, I guess it would be," he said with a smirk. "Yer mother married that James O'Neal, all right. I found the record at that parish where they stopped to do it. Here." He pushed a plate at her again. "The boy's probably hungry."

  Caitlyn took the plate and glanced over her shoulder at Tall Man. His stony face gave her no indication as to whether she would be allowed to feed Little Sun or not. Drawing in a breath of courage, she turned her back again and picked up the wooden spoon on the plate.

  The stew meat — venison as best she could tell — was half raw, but she and Little Sun ate it anyway. She waited until he pushed the spoon away from his mouth before she finished the small portion left.

  As she set the plate on the floor, Little Sun said with a whimper, "Pot, Cat. Me, pot."

  Caitlyn rose to her feet and took his hand. "He has to got to the pot," she said, eying Tall Man warily.

  "Send him here," the Indian ordered.

  "No," Little Sun cried, tugging on Caitlyn's hand. "Jon. Jon me pot, Cat."

  Caitlyn knelt and cupped his small face. "Listen to me, Little Sun. Jon isn't here. You have to go with him."

  "Cat. Cat me pot," he replied with a mutinous pout.

  "Take him the hell over in the corner," Hogan snarled. "We're leaving here in the morning anyway."

  "No," Tall Man growled. "He will go outside. I do not plan to sleep in here with the stink of piss in my nose."

  "Please, Little Sun," Caitlyn pleaded. When he shook his small head, she stood and faced Tall Man. "Look, I have to go too...."

  Tall Man crossed the room in two strides and grabbed the rope still around Little Sun's neck. He pulled him behind him as he walked to the door and opened it, the rope choking off Little Sun's cries. Caitlyn started after them, but Hogan grabbed her hair and threw her to the floor.

  "Ye can go next," he said with a rude laugh.

  Tall Man picked Little Sun up by the back of his shirt and shoved him through the door. Caitlyn's nails bit into her palms until she felt her skin split, and she shot daggers of hatred at him. The Indian held the end of the rope and met her glare with icy disregard.

  A moment later, Little Sun came back into the cabin, fumbling with his small britches to pull them up and sobs shaking his shoulders. Caitlyn scrambled to her feet as he started to run to her, but Tall Man jerked the rope, sending the tiny boy sprawling.

  "You son of a bitch!" Caitlyn arched her nails and took a step. She halted instantly when Tall Man drew his knife.

  Hogan grabbed her arm and shoved her forward. "Come on, if ye gotta go," he said. "I'll keep an eye on ye."

  "I can go by myself," she spat at him.

  Hogan backhanded her across the face and Caitlyn's head snapped back. Swallowing her cry of pain, she lifted a hand to wipe at a trickle of blood from her nose as she glared at him with blue fury.

  "Just because I fed ye," he warned, "don't start thinking that I'm gonna go easy on ye. Your being dead's the only way I'll get what's owed me."

  "Why do you wait?" Tall Man asked with a shrug.

  "I told ye," Hogan said. "I've gotta figure out what kind of proof I can take back with me. The man who hired me said something about her mother keeping journals all her life." He looked back at Caitlyn. "If ye've got something like that, my getting it might keep ye alive a little longer."

  "Why should I...."

  Hogan raised his hand again, and Caitlyn couldn't keep from flinching. Hogan gave a sardonic chuckle and dropped his arm.

  "Reckon that tells me what I want to know. And before I'm done with ye, ye'll tell me just where my proof is. Maybe not willingly, but ye'll tell me."

  He shoved her toward the door again and Caitlyn stumbled outside. She turned to see him leaning against the door, a rifle he must have picked up before he followed her in his arms. She'd noticed three rifles against the wall, one of them Jon
's long rifle, but Tall Man had always remained between them and her.

  "Don't try to run," Hogan snarled. "Or I'll put a bullet in one of yer kneecaps. That Indian may be sure ye won't leave the boy until ye have to, but I won't take that chance."

  He kept his eyes on her and Caitlyn thought briefly of asking him to turn his back. But she wouldn't give him the satisfaction of breaking her pride — making her beg. She lifted her dress and squatted, then wiped herself with a handful of snow. She rose and, head high, walked back into the cabin.

  ****

  Chapter 30

  Caitlyn's pride did her no good the next morning when Tall Man rode away from the cabin with Little Sun. She screamed the little boy's name over and over, fighting with all her strength to wrest free from Hogan's hold. Hogan finally landed a vicious blow on her jaw, and she crumbled into the snow.

  "Ye damned bitch! What the hell...?"

  Caitlyn managed to lift her head just as Spirit Eagle landed behind Tall Man on his horse and pulled his son's kidnapper to the ground. The horse neighed in terror and whirled, sending Little Sun flying from its back. Caitlyn shoved herself upward with a sob, but Hogan kicked her in the stomach, and she rolled a few feet away, gasping for breath.

  A second later, she heard a crunching thud, and Hogan's dead weight landed on her. Frantically, she shoved at his body, and an instant later it was jerked from her and thrown aside. Jon reached down and pulled her into his arms.

  She sobbed and cried for only a second, then twisted in Jon's arms. "Little Sun! Jon, we have to...."

  Jon grabbed her and shook her shoulders. "Stay here, Caitlyn," he ordered. "That horse is going crazy over there!"

  He shoved her behind him and lifted the rifle. Caitlyn stared wildly at the two struggling figures in the snow, Tall Man's horse dancing around them in terror. Why didn't the horse run? Then she caught a quick glimpse of the horse's lead rope, caught between two branches.