Killer of Witches: The Life and Times of Yellow Boy Mescalero Apache

by W. Michael Farmer

  “It doesn’t matter that you’re silent. I, Sangre del Diablo, Chief of Ghosts, know why you’re here. You come for revenge. You murder my fierce ones. You murder my slave women. Murder them out of revenge. Are you from burning villages filled with hairless dead east of the great river? Are you from the ones I took in the Blue Mountains to the west? Are you from the smoking ruins of villages to the north or south? It makes no difference. Now you hang before me. Revenge makes you blind to my true power; you’re too blind from revenge to serve me. Blind you are, and blind and hairless you shall be in the land of the grandfathers.”

  Sangre del Diablo held out his right hand, and the right side skull man handed over a skull, placing it upside down in his palm. Sangre del Diablo in a smooth, graceful motion lifted the jaw like lifting the top of a box and the skull came apart, the top of the skull in his right palm and jaw in his left. I saw that the skull top was filled with a powder so black it had a purple sheen in the flickering firelight.

  The Witch hurled the powder on to He Watches, who coughed and wheezed as its cloud swirled about him and settled on his head and shoulders, leaving them splotched and streaked in large purple-black patches. He coughed again, a ragged gagging kind of cough as he squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. He clenched his teeth, gagging and then wheezing and coughing again. Blood ran from his nose and his lips and he began twisting his head in agony.

  Sangre del Diablo replaced the jaw back on the skull, handed it back to the left skull man, and slowly, deliberately sliding a heavy leather glove over his hand and wrist, lifted his right wrist to his shoulder touching the owl’s talons. The owl turned and took hold of the glove and was brought face-to-face with the Witch who removed its hood. It was a great horned owl, its feathers a dark gray, its talons immense, its eyes yellow. The owl immediately turned its head toward the sounds of He Watches’ distress. The Witch in his loud, raspy whisper said, “Death comes for you, old man.” The Witch unsnapped the leash to the owl’s feather-covered leg, and swinging his arm up shouted, “Ataque!” (Attack!) The owl flew off his gloved arm in great beating flaps of its wings and swooped out into the darkness.

  The warriors and women waited as if a single beast holding its breath. I strained, helpless against my bonds. In a few seconds, the outstretched talons of the great owl swooped out of the night and stabbed into the eyes and face of He Watches. He jerked his head from side to side trying to throw off the owl as the raptor tore at his face and eyes and made sharp thrusts with its beak at the back of his neck near the base of his skull, ripping and tearing flesh. He Watches made no sound as he jerked his head from side to side, attempting to throw off the thing tearing at his face and head. His struggles grew weak. Watching death come to my grandfather, I strained in cold fury against the rawhide holding me, vowing the Witch’s death and asking Ussen for his promised power.

  He Watches blinded, blood streaming from many rips in his face and eyes, bowed his head and struggled no more. The owl with its great beak tearing at the base of his skull had finally broken his neck and released him to the land of the grandfathers. The owl hopped to He Watches’ shoulder and facing Sangre del Diablo screeched his kill with outspread wings.

  Sangre del Diablo raised his gloved arm and shouted, “Vengan!” (Come!) With a single flap, the owl jumped from the crosspiece and glided to his arm. Sangre del Diablo gave it a piece of bloody meat, which it tore apart and gobbled down. When it finished, Sangre del Diablo returned its hood. The drum began again its booming tattoo, and warriors and women resumed their howls and screams. With the owl still on his arm, Sangre del Diablo began again, with the skull men at his side, a whirling dance around the fire until they faced me and stopped.

  CHAPTER 42

  ESCAPE

  * * *

  Sangre del Diablo and I locked eyes, mine filled with roaring flames of anger and hatred, Sangre del Diablo’s filled with smug pride and satisfaction. He said, “The old one goes to the land of the grandfathers blind and with a crooked leg, but he did not suffer long. He couldn’t resist death when it flew to him. You, too, must suffer before you follow him. You haven’t lived long enough to know true suffering. Hanging there through the night and day to come, you’ll lose the use of your arms, and then before all my people, I’ll tear your legs apart and geld you and make you eat your man parts. Then I’ll put out your eyes before I leave you hanging there for death to come. Warrior, do you think you will enjoy the Happy Land blind and without arms and your man parts? I’ll take them from you. I’m stronger and better than you. I’m the Chief of Ghosts.” He turned to his skull men and yelled, “Bring water!”

  The skull men stepped on benches brought for them and poured water over the rawhide ties. By the time the sun reached its zenith in the coming day, the green rawhide, shrinking as it dried, would have closed into ever tighter loops slowly separating my joints, causing excruciating pain in my shoulders, arms, and wrists and making them useless and dead.

  After they poured the water and took away the benches, Sangre del Diablo said to his skull men, “Take the stools from their feet, and let the dead and the living walk on air. How does revenge against me taste now, you stupid, foolish Apache?”

  The stool was yanked out from under me. My feet dropped a few inches and left me dangling by the rawhide ties that cut into my flesh, especially at my shoulder joints where most of my weight was supported, cut into the muscle under my arms, and my weight, pulling against my arm joints, made them slice at my flesh and joints like dull knives. I knew the pain would only grow to something much worse, but I made no sound as my mind formed a plea to Ussen for strength and courage to face the evil that stood before me.

  The Witch turned to the crowd and said, “Children, I, Sangre del Diablo, the Chief of Ghosts, will return again. Tomorrow night this warrior will pass to the Happy Land without arms, without eyes, and without his flesh to enjoy women. You’ll see me take them from him. Warriors enjoy this night with any woman you choose. Take your pleasure, for when the sun rises, you’ll go to find the two who escaped us. I’ll have all these miserable Apaches who wanted revenge against us, and they’ll go to the grandfathers screaming like the women we take on our raids. Now go! Take your pleasure before I call my ghosts against you.”

  The crowd yelled with one voice, “Ho! Ho! Hi-Yah!” The warriors and vaqueros took their women, some even taking two or three, and headed for the dark, black shadows under the groves of trees just beyond the circle of light made by the torches.

  Sangre del Diablo turned to Segundo and said, “You’re my strong right arm. You’ll lead the men at first light to find the other two, so go and rest. We’ll return to the hacienda, and I’ll take my body back. Do not disturb me. Before the sun rises, this Apache will be groaning in pain. By noon, he will be screaming. Let the skulls watch them and make sure the old one has left for the land of the grandfathers.” With the owl relaxed and still riding on his arm and Segundo following, he turned and walked back through the compound gates toward the hacienda. The skull men squatted by the fire, their eyes focused on me and on He Watches’ body.

  I felt the rawhide ties growing tighter, my fingers feeling like thousands of needles were being stuck in them. I bent my knees and placing my feet flat against the pole raised myself enough to take the pressure off my arms. The watching skull man said, “Enjoy the little extra time your legs give you, Apache. Soon even your feet and legs will grow too weak to rest you from the rawhide chewing you apart.”

  The night wore on. The rawhide drew tighter. Sounds from under the trees trickled to nothing, and the two skulls squatting by the dying fire appeared to be fighting to stay awake. I raised my eyes to the stars and saw the top of the night was past.

  Then the skull facing He Watches stood and said to the other, “I make water,” before disappearing into the shadows.

  The other nodded and said, “Hmmph. I’ll go when you return.”

  Five minutes passed. Ten. The skull watching me grew impatient, and mut
tering how the first one must have found an unused woman, picked up a small piece of burning firewood and walked the path the other skull took.

  I closed my eyes and used my feet to push up once more against my own weight. Then, in a dream-like state, I thought I heard the voice of Klo-sen whispering in my ear. “When I cut these ties, can you keep from falling?” I shook my head, my arms too numb to hold anything. I dreamed. Ussen saves me. Klo-sen has Power.

  Klo-sen, on a ladder against the back of the pole, slashed my wrists free, cut the rawhide at my elbows, and my arms, numb, flopped down by my sides. Klo-sen slid his arm around me, clamping me against the pole, and cut the rawhide holding my shoulders. He whispered, “Now I’ll drop you. You won’t fall much.”

  No longer dreaming, I said, “I know. Drop me. My arms will return soon.” I hit the ground like a sack of corn and dropped to my knees before I fell over on my side. Klo-sen jumped off the ladder and gave me water and washed the blood from my face while Beela-chezzi carried the ladder to the cross of He Watches and cut him down.

  I whispered, “The skulls?”

  Klo-sen’s black marble eyes glittered in the dying light, and he said, “They are no more. Many in the bushes are no more. They believed they’d chase us in dawn’s light. Fools! Now let’s go!”

  I shook my head. “No. The Witch must die. His helper Segundo is also a witch. He too must die.”

  Beela-chezzi grimaced with impatience. “Some sleep inside the walls. We must be far away before they are ready to ride, or they will take us all. Klo-sen and I are lucky to live. We go!”

  “No. I know a place to hide in the compound. Bring He Watches. I’ll show you. When my arms return, I’ll kill the witches. Those left in this band will scatter without them, and then we’ll return to Juh’s camp. Help me stand.”

  Klo-sen stared at me, shook his head in disbelief, helped me up, and motioned to Beela-chezzi to bring the body of He Watches and follow them.

  The torches on the spear butts were burning low when I led them through the compound gates and back to the windowless room where Segundo had kept me prisoner the day before.

  Klo-sen and Beela-chezzi laid the body of He Watches against a wall and squatted close together with me in a corner where we could whisper our plans. Though the rawhide had begun to cut into the muscle under my arms, and though my joints were burning, they had not yet separated. Streamers of blood from the cuts made by the rawhide ran toward my fingertips where I felt its sticky warmth and the tingle of circulation beginning to return.

  Beela-chezzi said, “Tell us what we should do in this place of witches and their evil.”

  I said, “I watched the Witch come and go with the Shináá Cho. He sleeps in the back corner room of the hacienda. The Comanches prefer to sleep outside the walls and not be closed in. The vaqueros stay near the Comanches, but they don’t trust them. Comanches learning witchcraft stay in the hacienda. You’ll know them because they have no hair. When they are not doing witchcraft, they wear hats that look like hair. The Witch does this too.

  “The Witch calls the second chief, ‘Segundo.’ He sleeps somewhere here in the hacienda. He took me prisoner and has much skill. I never heard him coming. I must have my rifle back to kill the Witch. Segundo said he plans to sell it in Casas Grandes. Perhaps he keeps it in the place near the corral outside the wall gates where they keep supplies and load wagons for Casas Grandes. Will you go and look while my arms return and gain strength?”

  Beela-chezzi nodded. “I’ll go.”

  “When you return, close and lock the gates to keep any others out while we make things right with the witches.”

  Like morning mist on the wind, Beela-chezzi disappeared out the door.

  The door to the room where Klo-sen and I hid creaked open enough for Beela-chezzi to slide inside. Klo-sen pulled his rifle to full cock.

  “It is you Beela-chezzi?”

  “I come. I cannot find the rifle. It is not in the place of supplies or where the men sleep. I have brought us pistolas and a rifle and bullets.”

  Making fists and flexing my arms, I sighed. “Then either the witches have it or know where it is. I am grateful you looked and brought me another. Feeling returns to my hands and arms.” I held out my hand, and Beela-chezzi gave me the rifle and a bag with cartridges. In the dark gloom, my hands caressed the weapon and smelled the fresh gun oil. “You chose well. It feels and smells well cared for. Have you tried the bullets? Do they fit?”

  Beela-chezzi shook his head. “Dawn comes, so I hurried.”

  I took a cartridge from the saddlebag and slid one into the loading gate. I cycled the lever twice, and the bullet flew off the loading elevator and tinkled against the floor. “They fit. Enjuh!” I loaded the rifle, and we buckled on the holstered pistols Beelachezzi had found.

  “I’ll find the witches and kill them. You go to the top of the compound walls by the gates and kill any warrior you see moving inside or out. We’ll let the slaves go when we’re done. I want the story of what we did here to go among the Nakai-yi and other Indians. When they hear it, they will fear us more than the Witch. Agreed?”

  Klo-sen and Beela-chezzi nodded. “Agreed.”

  CHAPTER 43

  BATTLE OF THE HACIENDA

  * * *

  We were in the courtyard when Segundo stepped into the cold night air. He surveyed the courtyard and its shadows and paused to stare at the big double gate to the compound. He must have known it had been open the night before. He must have seem the dim outline of Beela-chezzi kneeling on top of the wall next to the gate because, silent as a snake, Segundo glided forward, keeping in the wall shadows. He snapped my Yellow Boy to his shoulder and fired, the shot sounding like a huge explosion as it echoed off the compound walls. Our friend disappeared over the far side of the compound wall.

  Segundo ran for the gates, but Klo-sen separated from a black hall entranceway and swung his rifle like a club into the back of his head. He sprawled forward, landing hard, face down on the walkway leading to the gates, the Yellow Boy flying from his hands.

  Klo-sen drove his knee down between Segundo’s shoulder blades, drew his knife, and grabbed his hair to yank his head back, but the hair came off with a weak tearing sound, braids and all. Klo-sen stuffed the hair in his belt as I ran to the Yellow Boy, picked it up, sighed with relief, and whispered, “My rifle! Quick, let’s open the gate and help Beela-chezzi.”

  Outside the gate, we found Beela-chezzi sitting by a water barrel in dark shadows against the wall. Segundo’s bullet had grazed him just below his ribs on the right side.

  He said, “I’m slow moving, but I’ve had worse in arrow games we played before my first raid. I was crawling to the barrel for some water to splash on the wound when I saw movement in the trees.” He pointed at two brushy spots under the trees north of the gate. “Our knives missed them.”

  I checked the Henry. It had a round in the chamber, and the loading tube showed six cartridges. Kneeling in the shadows by the gate, I sighted down the barrel and used it to scan the courtyard but saw nothing. “Segundo’s shot must have awakened the Witch. I’ll watch for him here. Be ready. He comes. Watch the trees for others.”

  Klo-sen and Beela-chezzi stretched out in the dust by the water barrel and sighted their rifles toward the trees.

  The sound of many feet running and the crying of babies and small children echoed down the hacienda hallways leading to the courtyard. Above them, the bellows of Sangre del Diablo, “Ejecútese! Maldígale! Ejecútese! (Run! Damn you! Run!).” Women, some with babies or small children in their arms and slightly older children running beside them and crying in fear, poured out of two courtyard entrances and ran for the open gate.

  I dashed through the gate to the shadows around another water barrel against the northern wall and again dropped to one knee, my attention on the courtyard entrances. The women and children strung out across the courtyard as the faster ones in front ran through the gate and headed for the stream. Two hunched-over Coma
nches, rifles at the ready in one hand and whips in the other to hurry stragglers, ran behind them.

  I stood, snapped off two quick, booming shots, and dashed to my left back toward the gate. The first Comanche, already a quarter of the way across the courtyard toward the gate, took two more steps and collapsed; the second, to the left of the first, dropped in midstride like a poleaxed ox.

  Three brilliant flashes with loud, sharp, rolling thunder from a single rifle on the top of the back courtyard wall sent bullets smashing into the hacienda walls behind the water barrel where I had stood only seconds before. I snapped off a shot toward the flashes and moved again to the other side of the gate, charging up the steps to sprawl flat on top of the compound wall. There was no return fire. I saw nothing on the back wall before raising my head to look over the wall and see Klo-sen, rifle in hand, running toward the spots Beela-chezzi had pointed to in the trees. A running hairless figure he did not see closed in behind him. Beela-chezzi fired three times and missed the juking, ducking figure. I glanced into the courtyard. Segundo was gone. I whipped the Henry in the direction of the hairless figure, but it had disappeared into the trees with Klo-sen.

  Dawn’s light came fast, and shadows following shifted and changed. The two Comanches who had chased the women and children lay in the middle of the courtyard, one face down, the backside of his left shoulder blown away, and the other lay on his back, one eye socket black, the other open, staring at the fading stars. No sounds at all came from inside the hacienda.

  I waited on top of the wall for the coming light, straining to see anything move in the changing shadows on either side of the wall. A brilliant, yellow ball rose above the mountains sending golden beams like stage lights thrusting through the brush, tall cottonwoods, and drooping willows.