Jamie nodded his head and tried to rest. His bound hands and feet hurt so bad he had to clench his teeth to keep from crying out from the pain. But he made not a sound. He was cold, but tried not to shiver. He had to be brave. He had to be. He knew his life depended on it.
The boy tried hard not to think of his parents, and his baby sister. He fought hard to put them out of his mind. Young, he was. But he was born on the frontier, and was a realist for his age. He knew he was alone now. If he was to survive, he had to depend on his wits. The young Indian had seemed friendly enough, but his pa had always said that Indians were notional folks. They didn’t think like white people. So Jamie — seven years old today — lying on the cold ground in a part of the country he had never seen before, made up his mind. Where his captors were concerned, he would be like a leaf: whichever way the wind blew, that’s how he’d go.
He just couldn’t see any other way. At least for the moment. But one thing he did know for a certainty. If the savages didn’t kill him, he would escape. He didn’t know how, he just knew he would. Someday. Or his name wasn’t Jamie Ian MacCallister.
Part One
The Way West
’Tis grand! ’Tis solemn!
’Tis an education of itself to look upon!
— James Fenimore Cooper
One
They traveled for three days and nights, first on foot, then in canoes on a big river. When they finally paddled their canoes toward shore, the boy was so lost and so tired and so sore he couldn’t tell up from down.
His hands and feet were untied, but his feet were so numb he could not walk. The Shawnee who had taken him picked him up and threw him onto the bank. Then the whole band turned their backs to him and walked into the village amid shouts of greeting from the others.
The Indian boy knelt down beside Jamie. “I am called Little Wolf,” he said in broken English. “You must rub your ankles and wrists to get the blood flowing. And you must not try to run away. This is a test. The first of many. If you cause trouble, Tall Bull will kill you.”
“Why are you helping me?”
Little Wolf smiled. “Don’t be fooled. I am not helping you. But you are a boy and if you live, you will be a warrior. I heard Tall Bull say this from his own mouth.”
Jamie thought about that for a second or two. Then fierce pain hit him hard as the feeling began returning to his feet and hands. He did not make a sound. Little Wolf watched this and was pleased. Jamie rubbed his ankles harder and more pain nearly put him out.
“You see!” the Indian said, as others gathered around. “You have pain, yet you do not cry out. You will be a warrior someday. Now get on your feet and walk to the village. Stay to one side and behind me.”
“Where are we going?”
Little Wolf struck him across the face with a stick. Jamie felt the warm trickle of blood on his skin.
“Do not ask questions,” Little Wolf said, a mean look in his eyes. “Not yet. Learn this now. Do as you are told when you are told to do it. You will endure many beatings before the testing is over. Now do as I told you!”
As they walked from the river, Jamie limping badly on his swollen feet, he looked at the twin lines of Indians up ahead of him, mostly women and young boys and girls. They all had sticks in their hands and were waving them, shouting at Jamie. Jamie did not have to understand the Shawnee language to know the shouts were strong insults upon him. He also knew from listening to adults talk what was about to happen to him. The Shawnees made captives run through a long and cruel gauntlet. And sometimes people did not live through the double line of tormentors. Jamie was determined that he would. He began stamping his feet on the ground and rubbing his wrists harder to hasten the flow of blood to his feet and hands.
Little Wolf turned and his smile was hard. “Now we will see how brave you are, White Hair.”
“Braver than you think.” Jamie met the older and taller boy’s eyes. “I bet I knock some of them to the ground.”
“Oh?” Little Wolf said. “And when, or if, you are able to do that, you might die.”
“I’ll take that chance.” Jamie looked deep into the Indian’s eyes, and with a start realized Little Wolfs eyes were green!
“What are you staring at, White Hair?”
“Your eyes.”
“What about my eyes?”
“They’re green. And your hair is brown. You’re white!”
Little Wolf knocked him down with his club. “I am Shawnee.”
Jamie got up with blood running down from the gash on his forehead and mad enough to spit. He tackled the bigger boy and they rolled on the ground. The older men of the village ran to the kicking and punching boys and pointed and laughed. But they made no move to separate them. If the boy with white hair bested Little Wolf, so be it.
Jamie took a wild swing and his hard little fist landed solidly on Little Wolf’s nose. The blood spurted and Little Wolf jumped back, astonishment and pain mirrored on his face. He raised his club to strike Jamie, and Tall Bull jerked it from his hand.
“No!” Tall Bull ordered. “Wrestle him. Tell him if he can best you, he is spared the gauntlet.”
Little Wolf didn’t like it, but he told Jamie his father’s orders, adding, “I think I will kill you this day, White Hair.”
“I don’t think so,” Jamie told him, and then hit Little Wolf as hard as he could, right on the mouth.
Jamie didn’t know anything about Indian wrestling, but he did know a little something about fistfighting, for his father had seen to that.
Little Wolf went down hard, landing on his butt. His lips were red with blood. He became furious when some of the young girls giggled at him. He sprang to his feet and tried to grab Jamie. But the seven-year-old twisted away and kicked out with one shoe, the hard leather catching Little Wolf on the knee. The Indian boy gasped with pain and Jamie set himself and swung. The blow struck Little Wolf on the side of his neck and dropped him like a stone. Jamie had lucked out and quite by accident struck the Indian boy in just the right spot. Little Wolf was unable to get up.
“Enough!” Tall Bull said, holding up his hand. He knelt down beside his adopted son just as Little Wolf was beginning to come around from the nerve-numbing blow. Tall Bull was a brave warrior and a respected subchief of this particular band of Shawnees, but he was also very superstitious. He cut his eyes to the white-haired boy. He knew he should kill the captive immediately. There was open defiance in the boy’s eyes. But still he held back. It was rare that Little Wolf ever lost in any contest. He had never lost to a person of Jamie’s age and size. He was confused.
A woman stepped out from the crowd and walked to Jamie’s side and put a hand on his shoulder. Tall Bull’s mind was made up for him. The woman was his wife.
Jamie looked up at the woman and met her eyes. He was not expecting to see compassion or tenderness, and he was not disappointed. Jamie would find out soon enough that he had been spared because the woman needed a slave to work, and work he would, brutally hard work, with daily beatings for many weeks. But he was alive. And for now, that was all that mattered.
Tall Bull stood up, Little Wolf beside him. There was blood on the boy’s face and wild, open hate in his eyes. Jamie met the Indian boy’s gaze and knew he had made a bitter enemy. He knew, too, that he would have to be very careful, for he sensed, correctly so, that Little Wolf would plot to do him harm, even to kill him, if Jamie ever let down his guard.