Bonds, Parris Afton

by The Flash of the Firefly

  She went back to scraping the limp hide on the rock, only half listening to the high-pitched giggles and chatter of the women. After three months among them, she could fairly well understand the Comanche language―enough to know she was the subject of their discussion, as usual.

  "It is said Pa-ha-yu-quosh greatly treasures his new slave," came the voice of Eyes That Sing.

  Anne smiled to herself at the young woman's jibe, intended for Morning Sky. Without even looking at Pa-ha-yu-quosh's first wife, Anne could sense the woman's wrathful eyes turned upon her.

  "Perhaps it is because her lovely hair has bewitched him," continued Eyes That Sing.

  An older squaw who had only one good eye snickered, and Morning Sky snapped, "Ma-be-quo-situ-ma dyes her hair with vermilion!"

  Anne sat back on her haunches. "If I had no hair," she told Morning Sky with a thin smile, "Pa-ha-yuquosh would still prefer me over you."

  Just saying the words made Anne feel better, for Morning Sky had taken every opportunity to vent her jealousy on Anne―spitefully poking her with a hot stick from the fire, overturning her bowl of food, jerking at the copper-colored braids. Anne knew that only the presence of Pa-ha-yu-quosh's aunt, Louise Moonflower, saved her from being outright killed by Morning Sky.

  But Louise Moonflower was not there among the women working to protect Anne. Enraged by the truthfulness of the white woman's words, Morning Sky bounded to her feet and ran the short distance separating her from her husband's slave. Anne's eyes caught the flash of metal, and she turned. The knife blade sliced downward along her upper left arm. She looked down at the long, clean gash with incredulity.

  With the first bubbling of brood her senses returned. She sprang to her feet in time to catch Morning Sky's arcing wrist as it plunged downward once more. The two tumbled to roll in the bank's thick turf. Glad for even the momentary diversion in their lives of constant toil, the other women moved into a circle around the two rolling women, shouting words of encouragement to both.

  "I will make your face ugly, Ma-be-quo-si-tu-ma," Morning Sky hissed.

  Anne knew that Morning Sky was larger boned, more muscle-bound, knew that she had not the woman's skill with the knife. If she were to win, she would have to move faster than Morning Sky. With the remaining reserve of her strength, Anne wrapped her legs about those of the Indian woman and twisted quickly to her left so that the two rolled down the embankment into the cool, rushing stream. Anne wrestled free and came up gasping. Her auburn hair hung in plastered strands over her face and shoulders. The water rushed about her hips. For a moment she could not find her antagonist. She whirled, thinking the woman had come up behind her.

  Morning Sky jerked viciously at her hair then, and Anne struggled to regain her balance on the river bottom's slippery stones, but the rushing current made her flounder. Morning Sky held her immobile by grasping Anne's long hair at the nape of the neck.

  "First, pale woman, I will cut off your hair as a gift for my husband."

  Anne felt the sudden sharp prick of the knifepoint in the scalp above her forehead. The gasp of searing pain rose in her throat―to stop short as she found herself abruptly released. She pitched forward into the swirling current. When she surfaced this time, Pa-ha-yu-quosh was thigh deep in the river with the wildly fighting Morning Sky locked in his iron-tight grasp. His usually stone-carved face was as dark and angry as a thunder cloud.

  As Anne staggered to the bank, Pa-ha-yu-quosh silenced the screeching Morning Sky with a sweep of his rocklike fist. The Indian woman spun and fell to a heap on the bank, half in, half out of the water. Pa-ha-yu-quosh advanced then on Anne, and she shrank back, stumbling, sprawling on the grass. The sunlight glistened evilly off the ring in his nose as he knelt and scooped her up in his arms. Caught up against the paint-streaked chest, Anne could smell the bear grease that matted the warrior's long, lanky braids, feel the musky heat the emanated from the coppery skin.

  Her own flesh recoiled at his touch which she had to endure as he carried her back through the camp of tepees to his own. As the son of Chief Iron Eyes, he had the right to live in the privileged inner circle of tepees. When Pa-ha-yu-quosh stooped, pushing aside the beaver pelt at the tepee's entrance, Anne wished she could faint as genteel ladies were supposed to, wished she would will herself into unconsciousness rather than bear the forthcoming violation of her body.

  Pa-ha-yu-quosh dropped her unceremoniously on the soft but flea-ridden buffalo furs. As he raised his breechcloth, she kept her eyes fastened on his, hoping he was possessed of enough intelligence to divine the loathing she felt for him.

  As his slave she was made to get his horse, bring him food, light his pipe, and even bathe his feet and paint his skin on special occasions. These tasks she bore stoically, never giving him cause for complaint, for she knew that rather than beat her himself he would turn her over to the women of the village for punishment―and what they would do to her would be unimaginable, unspeakable. The Comanche woman, Anne had learned, could be a hundred times more vicious than her male counterpart, delighting in the horrors of torture.

  Pa-ha-yu-quosh grinned at the hatred and fear in the pale woman's eyes. It would do her good to know that he could master her in every way, could ride her into submission as he did a wild horse.

  Let his father chide him for wanting the white woman as his wife, passing up the beautiful, bronzed Kwahadi maidens. His father―and the other warriors―their eyes had not seen the golden tones of the woman's soft skin, had not felt the sun-red hair, as soft as a rabbit's pelt, slip through the fingers like falling water. And no man would. Ma-be-quo-si-tu-ma was his. Let his father and the other warriors collect their eagle feathers to parade in their war bonnets their feats of daring. Merely having Ma-be-quo-si-turna to parade as his own was enough.

  "You would be wise, Ma-be-quo-si-tu-ma," he said thickly, "to become my wife. Your life would not be as hard here."

  "I am already married."

  "And if he is dead―if his scalp is one of those that hang on my lance outside the tepee door? What then?"

  Anne shuddered, Several times a day she passed those scalps-blond ones ,brown ones, even gray. But always she kept her eyes averted ...fearing that if she ever let herself finger one of the scalps she would go over the razor-thin edge of sanity. And the horror of Pa-ha-yu-quosh's brutality stabbed at her again. and she raised her eyes to meet his with fresh hatred. "The answer would still be the same!"

  He fell upon her then, savagely shoving her thighs apart. Anne moaned in spite of her determination silently to endure his raping. Pa-ha-yu-quosh thrust harder, enjoying the woman's suffering. The look of hatred he read in her eyes each time she saw him was avenged each time he took her. And yet, this small woman ...so like a fawn ...she never begged, never pleaded that he stop hurting her, as Morning Sky often did, but remained obstinately mute. Strangely, it made him want to hurt the white woman more―to elicit some response from the lips that cursed with such distaste at his approach.

  By the heavy, fast breathing, Anne knew that Pa-ha-yu-quosh was almost finished with her. That with a grunt he would rise from her, clean himself with a swipe of his breechcloth―if he bothered to do even that―and leave the tepee. And to think that she had once thought the lovemaking of Otto to be unbearable. At least Otto had treated her as a human being. To Pa-ha-yu-quosh she was nothing more than a receptacle for his semen, a trophy of war for his valor.

  When he had gone, Anne wiped away the blood that trickled from her forehead and upper arm and the white, sticky, putrid substance that clung to her inner thighs. Yet scrub as she might, she knew she could never scrub away the pain and humiliation that were delineated in her soul. Like a whipped animal, she burrowed in the soft fur to whimper in her sleep.

  Morning Sky treated her better after that day, though Anne knew the day would come when, with neither Pa-ha-yu-quosh nor Louise Moonflower around, an accident would happen, taking Anne's life. But for the moment Morning Sky endured Anne's presence. Even helping,
where she had not before, the white slave take down the tepee lodge when the band moved onward―as it continuously did from week to week, following the herds of buffalo that roamed further and further away to escape the summer's unusual drought.

  By this time Anne had learned to work as hard and efficiently as any of the Indian women. Within five minutes she could reassemble the poles and hides of the tepee. She could skin the jack rabbit as deftly as Morning Sky. And with the scarcity of food due to the drought―the Great Drought of '37, it would one day be called―she had almost overcome her aversion to catching and frying body lice, could almost force her stomach to tolerate the lice gravy which the Indians ate greedily with their fingers.

  In addition to working as hard as any Indian squaw, Anne was certain she looked as Indian as any of them―except for the blazing hair that hung in braids over her shoulders. She wore the simple tunic of deer hide that hung just to her knees, and the knee-high leather moccasins were more comfortable than her kid boots or satin slippers ever had been. The ivory skin of which she had once been so proud was now a dusky gold, accenting even more the large, light gray eyes. Fortunately, with the exception of the calluses on the palms of her hands, her skin still retained its smooth, satiny texture―unequalled anywhere, an admirer had once told her tremulously, holding her hand between his.

  But for all her seeming acceptance of her captivity, Anne dreamed constantly of escape, plotted―planned how she would slip away when Pa-ha-yuquosh was away hunting with the other braves. At times, the yearning for the face of another white person, the clipped speech of the white man, was as painful as a knife thrust. And she would leave the company of the Indian women, who had grown to accept her as their sister, and wander on the prairie or down to the nearest watering place, seeking to be alone ...though she knew she was never alone. There were always eyes watching her.

  Old Moonflower seemed to sense when these tense, anguished moods came upon Anne. "You must put those memories from you, Ma-be-quo-si-tu-ma," she told the young woman more harshly than she wanted. "They only make your life here miserable. Life with us will become easier for you as you adapt to our ways."

  Professor Bern had once told her something similar―about adapting to the ways of the German people. Professor Bern―was he still alive, and Lina? And Matilda? And Johanna? With that thought, Anne gritted her teeth in rage, remembering the sight of the German girl's face as she closed the fortress door on her, closing off her chance for safety that day. Had the others ever realized the girl's treachery?

  Anne knew she would go crazy if she let herself continue in that vein of thinking when there were so many memories she cherished. The memory of Delila holding her on her ample lap when she was a child and telling her tales of herobeah that delighted Anne in spite of her terror ...memories of the suitors at Barbados who had courted her with all the respect due a Duchess of the Royal Court ...of fair Elise―Anne's breath caught, as it always did, at this memory, and her mind would rush on to other remembrances ... Colin's merry green eyes that did not hide his wanting of her ... even Otto, poor Otto, who desired her so feverishly and carried the guilt of his desire with him as if it were a sin of adultery. And old Matilda, and little Fritz, and―what had happened to the people of Adelsolms? Had they escaped the raid―or had they been savagely massacred as had Delila and Elise?

  Anne shrugged her shoulders and rose from her position beneath the honey locust that overlooked the springs, almost dry now from the blistering August heat. She supposed she would never find out what had become of her friends. She felt the tightness in her throat. Moonflower was right, it did no good to look back.

  Her bath finished, Anne knew she had to return to the camp. She started back through the witheredgrass path that led past the ghostly ruins of a Franciscan mission. This afternoon, more than usual, she dreaded returning to the village. During the past eight days she had been living with Louise Moonflower―away from the male sex, as was customary during the time of an Indian woman's menses. And these times were a respite for Anne―a respite from Morning

  Sky's daggering looks ...and Pa-ha-yu-quosh's brutal rapes.

  But Anne could postpone her return no longer .She had been away already three days longer than was necessary. This evening Pa-ha-yu-quosh would be waiting for her, his obsidian eyes never leaving her as she moved about his tepee, helping Morning Sky prepare the evening meal.

  The path zigzagged upward toward the ruins, and Anne paused midway, letting the cooling breeze blow dry her freshly washed hair before she began to plait it.

  It was then, with her head tilted to one side and her fingers entwined in her hair, that she saw the Indian. With the blinding sunlight on her face he was but a shadow standing on one part of the low adobe wall that was still intact. He had been watching her, she was sure. He still did―with a single-minded purposefulness that frightened her.

  Anne paused, the first thought coming to her mind that he was from a raiding tribe, for in spite of the bright sunlight she could see he was not dressed like the Kwahadi men. He wore what looked like a blue military shirt with his breechcloth and knee-high moccasins. His dark hair, not quite shoulder length, was kept from his face by a red band tied around his forehead.

  If she retraced her steps, her escape would be cut off by the high, rocky embankment on the other side of the creek. And she had the feeling that the tall, lean Indian before her would swiftly run her down if she tried to run along the creek. The best option, it seemed, would be to put the mission ruins between her and the man, with every step bringing her that much closer to the village and help.

  Continuing to plait her hair, she moved off the path, her steps going toward the far side of the mission. But through her lashes she saw the Indian lithely jump from the wall and move toward her, placing one foot in front of the other with a sureness in his movements that she had come to recognize as belonging especially to the Indian race, as if each step were planned with deliberation.

  She ceased all pretense then, striking out for the safety of the far walls in a paced run, as she had learned to do by watching the Kwahadis. And at first Anne had the advantage, being closer to the mission's far side. But she looked back once and saw he was gaining on her. She quickened her stride. Her breaths came in gasps now, all sense of breathing control forgotten in her panic. Had she lived this long, endured unspeakable horrors this far, only to be killed and scalped by some renegade Indian?

  The sun had set now behind the hill, leaving the mission in an eerie half-light. It was Anne's only chance. She was still too far away to scream for help, but she might possibly lose her pursuer within the rooms of tumbled stones, delay him by hiding at least long enough until someone came looking for her. Even with the sharp pain in her left side and the cramps in her calves, Anne had enough presence of mind to laugh at the irony of her situation―if she were trying to escape the Kwahadis, they would have been all over her like a swarm of bees ,but where were they now when she wanted them?

  She sped past the adobe compound wall and dodged into the first room she came to, which happened to be the chapel. Christ's cross still hung askew from a portion of the wall. Knowing it might be the first place he would look for her, Anne fled past the stone rubble that had once been an altar and through a side door that swung crazily on its hinges at her touch.

  Quietly she ran across a rock-strewn courtyard to another building. From the musty hay that covered the floor in spots, she realized she was in the granary. She fled to the far corner and waited there, her lungs gasping greedily for air while her eyes and ears strained in the dark silence.

  There had been no warning noise, but his sudden shadow in the doorway blotted out the faint evening light. He moved directly toward her, as if he had known exactly where she would flee all along. Her eyes never left the shadow-masked face, but her legs crumpled beneath her, and she sank to the floor to await her end.

  Powerful, muscle-corded arms enfolded her. "It's all right, Mrs. Maren," the voice said, talking to her as
if she were a child or a person not quite sane. "It's all right, ma'am."

  Brant

  XIII

  Unbelieving, Anne raised her gaze from the tattooed line that boldly streaked the chin to meet the desert brown eyes that watched her so intently. For a long moment she could bring herself to say nothing. Of everything that had happened to her so far, Brant Powers' holding her, comforting her, was the least expected. Neither could she bring herself to move, to stir herself from the arms that held her. It had been so long since she had been held with concern, with tenderness.

  "Brant," she murmured and laid her head against the wide chest. She could hear the steady, hard beat of his heart beneath the coarse wool of the military, shirt. Just for a moment she would let herself succumb to the pleasure of trustingly giving herself over to someone else. No longer to have to be on her guard every moment, both waking and sleeping. To let someone else take the burden of worrying what next to do in order to survive.

  "I've been watching your movements―for the last day and a half―waiting until you were alone."

  Then he had watched her bathing. Anne blushed and was thankful for the darkness of the room. She pulled slightly away so she could see his face. "Why?"

  "I'm taking you with me."

  "There's no way Pa-ha-yu-quosh will let me go, Brant."

  Sitting back on his heels, Brant released her, and Anne at once missed the protection his arms afforded. She could sense he was weighing his words before he spoke. "The Kwahadis would be all over us before we could get five miles. But since I'm a brother of the Tonkawas ...the chief of the Kwahadi might honor my claim to you―that you're my wife."