Blood of the Devil

by W. Michael Farmer

  She was quiet so long I thought she had gone to the world of dreams, but then she said, “Delgadito’s return is a good thing. He’s a hardened warrior and can help protect the camp and train its boys. Deer Woman sees Delgadito with different eyes now and knows Kah is the better man for her, knows Delgadito would only betray her, knows Ussen has given her another chance. She won’t betray Kah.” She shifted again and settled with her head resting on my shoulder. I felt myself drifting toward sleep when she murmured, “I saw a large bird take wing this morning when I was bathing, and thought for a moment it was a great owl, but that’s impossible, isn’t it? That type of owl wouldn’t show itself by day.”

  “No, it wouldn’t,” I said gently, and I said nothing more, but her words troubled me. I wondered if the witch could see us or work some evil on us through the eyes of the owl I had freed at his hacienda. Soon I heard her steady, deep breathing. My heart was glad Ussen had granted me Power to kill witches and given me a woman that filled my life with many good things.

  I felt Juanita get up in the cold air to find the bushes. Far down the cliffs, I heard coyotes yip. It had become such a common thing for her to do in the past moon that I didn’t even open my eyes when I felt her move. I waited to feel her chilled body return next to mine, but she didn’t come.

  I sat up. When my palm pushed against her side of the blankets, it landed on a soaked wet place. From the tipi entrance, I saw a fire growing in the pit outside the cloth-covered wickiup the women had made Juanita to birth our son, and there was a low glow through the canvas from a smaller fire pit inside. I saw shadows move inside the wickiup and heard a song from a birthing ceremony. Old Sleepy, mother of the widow Falling Water, was singing. She had been the midwife for the delivery of all but the adopted children in the camp. I knew all the women in the camp were there to help Juanita in her hard, happy time. It was my place to wait.

  I looked at the stars and their turning around the one always pointing north. It was not long past the night’s middle. I made a fire and propped the blanket up against the heat so the wet spot would dry faster. I used a twig from the fire to light my cigarro, blew smoke to the four directions, and asked Ussen to give Juanita a safe passage to our new life-way.

  Memories came to me of my witch dream at Rufus Pike’s rancho and the long, hard ride I made back to the Guadalupes only to find most of my People killed and scalped. I thought of Juanita and her sling and how she had helped me take horses from a vaquero camp for those who had escaped in that raid and how angry she was, thinking I had lain with Deer Woman, when the truth was I had not done such a thing. That memory made me smile. I thought of our first night together and how much pleasure she brought me in the blankets and in keeping our tipi strong and solid. I thought of all the things she did, all the things a woman of our People had to do to live, and thanked Ussen for the gift of a good woman.

  The evil face of Sangre del Diablo floated before my eyes. I thought of his power and how he had almost killed me. I felt stirrings of fear as I thought how he might attack us from far away through the birth of our child. Had Juanita really seen an owl? Owls tell my People death soon comes. I wondered if the witch could somehow make our child die in the struggle to be born, or take Juanita by making her lose too much blood. Or if he might send a sickness and make the child sick so that it would die a few days after it was born. I knew of women who had died giving birth in Cha’s camp and at Mescalero and of healthy children who had died early. I didn’t have the power to fight a witch from far away. I could only pray that Ussen might give Juanita and the child Power to fight off any attack.

  I shook my head to make Sangre del Diablo’s face leave my mind. How could he know where I was or that Juanita was my wife? I thought, Maybe I’m just making things up to worry about. Then hurrying feet passed, and I looked out my tipi to see Sleepy’s daughter, Falling Water, running to her mother’s tipi. Soon she returned running with a basket filled with moss like women use at their moon time and a few bundles of dried herbs on top.

  My mother, Sons-ee-ah-ray, came out of the birthing wickiup, kneeled to face the east, and raised her arms to sing a prayer.

  “Come, child of Yellow Boy.

  “Come, child of Juanita

  “Ussen, give us this child.

  “Give us the life of this mother.

  “Give us this good woman and her child.”

  Sons-ee-ah-ray sang this prayer to the four directions, put wood on the outside fire, and went back in the wickiup. I wanted to run there and learn what was happening, but for our People, it was not a place for a man. I knew I must wait and be patient, but I wished many times that I had killed the witch. From the Happy Land, he could not possibly attack my wife and child. At some point, I drifted into an unquiet dream in which women were wailing and Sangre del Diablo laughed and howled like a wolf before roaring out a promise that he would take my wife and child. I jerked in my sleep, reached for my rifle, and Moon on the Water gasped. She had just entered our tipi, as if suddenly appearing out of the cold air, and stood before me.

  I snapped awake from that evil vision in a cold sweat, looked through the tipi door, and saw liquid gold poured from a big round pot out on the far horizon.

  Moon smiled with glittering eyes. “Sleepy says come. Your child awaits its father.”

  I wiped my eyes and felt my heart beat even faster. “Juanita?”

  “She bled much, but she’s strong. Your mother prayed. Sleepy used her medicine, and Juanita is still with us. She rests for a while. She has no pain. Your child is a fighter. It fought hard to leave its mother, but all is well. Come.”

  So witch, I thought, your power is weak against my woman. She’s a strong fighter.

  At the birthing wickiup, Maria, Sons-ee-ah-ray, and the other women, all except Sleepy, had already left to give us some privacy. Sleepy held our beautiful, dark-eyed child, its hair already thick and black, in a soft blanket. She had rubbed a thin layer of grease colored with red ocher on it to protect its skin. The baby didn’t cry in the cold air but relaxed, waved its arms, and enjoyed kicking with the freedom of new life.

  I dropped to my knees and looked into my wife’s eyes. Juanita’s face sagged with weariness, but her eyes sparkled, and she smiled when she said, “I lied to you, husband. Your first child is a daughter.”

  I laughed aloud. “Enjuh! Sons will come soon enough. You have no worries from the birth of our child?”

  “I have none. The first sound our baby made was like that of a wren chirping in the trees. As much as it kicked to get out of me, Sleepy says we should call her Kicking Wren.”

  We both laughed. “It is a good name, a fitting one until we give her another.” I nodded toward Sleepy. “We thank you, Grandmother, for all you have given us this night.”

  Sleepy, rhythmically rocking Kicking Wren in her arms, smiled and said, “This child is strong in her body and she has willpower. Raise her well, my son.”

  Juanita said, “I’ll come back to our tipi before the sun hides again. Deer Woman says you’re welcome at her fire for your meals. Go now. Kicking Wren is ready for her first meal.”

  With a nod to the two women and my first child, I left the wickiup to offer my morning prayer to Ussen and to thank him for the safe passage of Kicking Wren to her new life. In the morning light, my dreams of Sangre del Diablo seemed distant, unimportant.

  Juanita had asked Sons-ee-ah-ray to be the di-yen (medicine woman) who made the baby’s tsach (cradleboard). Sons-ee-ahray gladly accepted the honor. She started work completing the tsach the morning Kicking Wren was born and worked steadily for the next two days to complete it, singing many prayers and performing ceremonies for each part as it was finished. She had many of its pieces ready before Kicking Wren was born and spent moons finding just the right materials. She sent me down to an arroyo near the stronghold entrance to collect black locust for the frame. She knew exactly how long the pieces needed to be by measuring the length from Juanita’s elbow to her fist for the middle wi
dth and using ancient rules only women knew for the frame length based on how fast babies grew before they were set free from the tsach. She also had me find a piece of red cedar up on the mountain and split it into pieces for her to form the footboard, which she shaped with her knife, smoothed with sharp, black flint, and glued together to be laced into the slats.

  I also had to provide her with a deerskin, and she worked for many days to make it softer than Indah cloth. Not knowing if Kicking Wren were a girl or boy she had collected both the narrow leaf yucca for a girl and sotol for a boy for the back slats and, with a piece of the soft buckskin, covered them with wild rice grass and mustard padding. On top of the buckskin, she laced fox fur to keep Kicking Wren warm in the Ghost Face Season. She cut the buckskin’s outer wrap to hold the baby in place so that it laced from the right side, which was the custom if the tsach was for a girl.

  The rainbow, the curved protective frame over the top of the child’s head, she made by steaming arrow wood into semicircles and layering each as a rib on top of the other to the width of a hand so together they looked like a piece taken from a rough basket.

  Before she finished the rainbow, she called me to her tipi and showed me four pieces of arrow wood she had planned to use that had unusual cracks in the grain. While she could probably still steam them into shape for the rainbow, they would have been weak and endangered Kicking Wren if the rainbow ever took a blow. Sons-ee-ah-ray asked that I find her more arrow wood without cracks so she could make the best and strongest of rainbows. I quickly found what she needed in my supply. But as Sons-ee-ah-ray put the cradleboard together and Juanita and I enjoyed our baby, deep in my mind, I worried that the cracked arrow wood showed that the witch, defeated now, was still working to take my child and curse my little family and me.

  With the new arrow wood replacing that which was cracked, Sons-ee-ah-ray covered the rainbow with perfectly tanned buckskin and stitched it in place with deer sinew for additional strength and to hold feathers, strings of beads, and little colored stones and carved animals to bring Kicking Wren luck and to keep her entertained while Juanita did her chores. The rainbow protected Kicking Wren’s head should the tsach fall. I have heard of this happening even when the tsach fell from a galloping pony. The frame reinforced with leather lacings, sturdy slats, footboard, and the well-made padding was strong enough to hang from a saddle when we traveled for fast escapes or to hang on a tree where Juanita could keep an eye on it while she worked.

  Sons-ee-ah-ray had the tsach nearly completed by the end of the second day and was painting a half-moon and other symbolic decorations on the rainbow as she chanted and sang her songs for a long and productive life for her granddaughter.

  Juanita had given Sons-ee-ah-ray two of her finest baskets for the tsach, and I, a fine new knife in a decorated sheath. Mother would have made the tsach for nothing, but custom said the tsach maker must not go unrewarded. We saw the beauty and strength of our baby’s tsach and knew that Sons-ee-ah-ray had given us much in return.

  On the fourth day after Kicking Wren was born, the whole camp gathered in the early morning light for Sons-ee-ah-ray’s ceremony to bless and put Kicking Wren on her new tsach. As the sun floated above the far mountains, Sons-ee-ah-ray held the tsach toward the light and then, slowly turning south, pausing, then west, pausing, then north, pausing, finally to return to the sun. All the while, she sang a tsach ceremony song sung by my People for generations:

  “Good like long life it moves back and forth.

  “By means of White Water in a circle underneath, it is made.

  “By means of White Water spread on it, it is made.

  “By means of White Shell curved over it, it is made.

  “Lightning dances alongside it, they say.

  “By means of Lightning, it is fastened across.

  “Its strings are made of rainbows, they say.

  “Black Water Blanket is underneath to rest on:

  “White Water Blanket is underneath to rest on.

  “God, like long life the cradle is made.

  “Sun, his chief rumbles inside they say . . .”

  Sons-ee-ah-ray gently took Kicking Wren, sleeping in Juanita’s arms, lifted her to face the sun, and sang to her softly as she again turned to the south and lifted her, turned to the west and lifted her, turned to the north and lifted her, and finally came back to the sun. Singing prayers to Ussen that sounded like those she had taught me when I was barely off a tsach, she unwrapped Kicking Wren from her blanket. The sudden exposure to the cold air made her tense, cringe, and wave her arms, but she made no sound. Sons-ee-ah-ray rubbed her with warm water and three times gently lifted her toward the tsach. The fourth time, she laid Kicking Wren within the tsach, covered her with her blanket on the warm fox fur, and laced her in, safe and sound.

  Sons-ee-ah-ray motioned Juanita to her and, praying again to Ussen for a long life and safety for Juanita and Kicking Wren, touched them with the sacred yellow pollen on their foreheads and lips. She sang another prayer and then handed Kicking Wren in her tsach to her mother as they turned once more around the great circle.

  When Sons-ee-ah-ray finished her ceremony, we had a great feast and ate good things, roasted mescal, bread from acorns and mesquite beans, honey, dried fruits, and roasted haunches of deer. It was a good day to be alive, but the threat of the witch stood like a shadow in my mind. I knew I had to find and send him to the Happy Land before he brought evil to us all, especially my family.

  CHAPTER 14

  BLAZER’S ADVICE

  A hard Ghost Face Season filled with good times and bad dreams came after the birth of Kicking Wren. We didn’t move down from the stronghold mountaintop to the llano where the cold, snow, and wind were much less furious. We stayed on top of the flat mountain in Juh’s stronghold because none of us had any idea when the witch might come back. If we went down on the llano and camped near water, and he found us, we would be only five warriors defending fifteen women and children against two or three times our number. He would have a good chance of killing us all and taking our scalps. It was better to be a little cold than dead. Even if he returned with a hundred Comanches, he couldn’t take us in Juh’s stronghold. Still, I dreamed often he had somehow found us and moved among us unseen, bringing sickness and evil. I was in the sweat lodge often trying to learn what he might be doing or planning, but no visions came.

  Our camp, deep in tall pine trees, had some shelter from the wind and snow, but high up on the flat mountain it was colder than our camp in Mescalero. To keep warm, we had to wrap in good, heavy Nakai-yi blankets and sit close to small, hot fires sifting down to red, glowing coals. The good times came watching Juanita nurse and care for Kicking Wren, sleeping close to them under the blankets, and knowing the satisfaction of successful hunts to keep bellies full in the camp. The younger children, tromping down packed snow paths from their lodges, came often to see and play with Kicking Wren, and they laughed with delight when she made faces back at theirs, laughed with them, or squirmed and chirped to be free of her tsach.

  Beela-chezzi asked me to help teach and train his little adopted son, Shiyé (My Son), who did not yet have an adult name. The witch had been ready to sell Carmen Rosario, a Nakai-yi woman, Beela-chezzi’s new wife and Shiyé’s mother, to a place of whores in the City of Mules (Chihuahua City) before we burned his hacienda and set the slaves free. The child had the light of understanding behind his eyes and soon spoke our words better than Carmen Rosario, who was slow with her tongue, but quick with her hands. She’d learned to make baskets from Juanita. I made Shiyé a child’s bow from tsélkani (mulberry) wood and blunt arrows from cane stems that grew along the water running through the camp.

  On clear days when the wind wasn’t bad, Shiyé and the other children developed quickness and accuracy in the snow playing the shooting games all Apache children have played since the time of the grandfathers. Many arrows were lost, but a child who learns to track the path of an arrow in the snow will soon learn to follo
w the tracks of animals and men on hard ground in the Season of Large Leaves (midsummer). The Season of Little Eagles, when the snow began melting, gave them another chance to find arrows escaping them in the snow and to fix ruined feathers so the shafts flew straight.

  As the Ghost Face Season slipped away, I decided that with Victorio wiped out, the Blue Coats might leave the reservation. I spoke of this with Juanita one night by the fire as she nursed Kicking Wren and I cleaned the Henry rifle as Rufus Pike had taught me.

  “Maybe Blue Coats on the reservation land have gone and taken the weak agent, Russell, with them. If we stay here, Kicking Wren will not know the mountains of her People, and the Nakai-yes might come to kill us as they did Victorio. I believe the witch knows we’re here, and he might come with his Comanches and Nakai-yes before I can find and kill him.”

  Juanita held her hand up for me to pause. Kicking Wren, full of milk, had stopped nursing and slept. Even with a hot fire, the night air in the tipi was cold. Juanita laid Kicking Wren close by the warm, slow-burning, orange and blue flames still coming from the fire pit coals. She covered the cradleboard with a blanket and then pulled a blanket over her shoulders and sat down next to me.

  “Speak, husband. I think I already know the path of your words.”

  “Maybe the Season of Little Eagles will be a good time to return to the reservation. I would speak with Blazer to learn what the Blue Coats and Russell do. You’re wise. What do you think we ought to do?”

  She wrapped her arms around her knees and stared at the flames doing their slow dance in the fire pit. I finished cleaning the Henry, put it back in its scabbard, and put away the things I used in a parfleche she had made for them.

  She looked at me from the corners of her eyes and slowly nodded. “I think of these things also. The reservation isn’t the best of places, but it’s much safer than this camp. Moon on the Water is afraid to return to the reservation because of what the Blue Coats did to us before you took us away. But she’ll be strong, and Maria, our mother, will make her come with us. If the Nednhis decide to leave San Carlos and return here, the Blue Coats and Nakai-yes are sure to follow. Bullets will fly. Blood will flow. I think you should see Blazer when the warm winds come. If Blazer says it’s good to return, then I say we ought to go back.”