A cheer broke out from the mountain behind him and Jem saw the three boys sitting on their destriers, watching him. Bug had his hands raised in the air and Ichabod was clapping. Squawk barked at the both of them, and Ichabod said something back, then pointed at Jem and made circular motions with his finger. Squawk sneered and bunched up his destrier’s mane in his hand and kicked it in the sides.
Squawk’s destrier bolted down the path toward Jem and trotted around him in a circle, both rider and animal prancing with their heads held high in defiant arrogance. Jem folded both of his hands on the saddle horn and said, “You gonna do something beside try and make me dizzy?”
Squawk slapped the rear end of his mount and gave a command that sent it rearing up on its hind legs with both front legs sticking straight in the air. Squawk let go of the mane with one hand and leaned back, keeping that pose until the animal finally came back down. Jem stuck his fingers in his mouth and whistled loudly. When Squawk turned around to join the others, Jem noted a small smile on the boy’s face.
Jem waved to the other two and said, “Come on, now. Let me see what you’ve got.”
Ichabod rode into the meadow. His brow was furrowed in concentration as he brought the destrier’s speed up, reaching a full gallop before gently pressing himself out of the saddle. He stood to his feet, grasping the mane with both hands and shifting hesitantly from one foot to the other. He suddenly let go of the mane and clapped both hands over his head, then dropped back down onto the animal and hugged it for dear life. Jem whooped and hollered as Ichabod rode past.
He looked over at Bug and pointed. “What about you, squirt? Got any tricks?”
Bug kicked his small mount into motion and took off running with an excited shout. He passed Jem at full speed and jumped to his feet, surfing on her back with one hand high in the air. The boy stood straight legged as the animal whipped around Jem, and he let go of the mane and spun in the air, landing backwards on the beast with his arms folded in a relaxed pose. The animal seemed to steer itself while the boy smiled and patted his mouth, pretending to yawn.
Jem’s mouth fell open and he said, “Holy shit.” As Bug spun back around to ride back to the others, Jem grabbed his hat and stood up in saddle, waving it and cheering.
The sun retreated from the mountains and Jem gathered the collar of his coat under his chin to keep out the cold wind. He gathered sticks in a pile and built a ring of stones around them then lit a match and flicked it into the kindling. He rubbed his hands over the blaze and sat down.
The boys were watching him from a safe distance. Only Squawk refused to cross his arms over his bare chest and shiver. The other two looked pitiful. Jem waved for them to join him and said, “Come on. Don’t be stupid.”
Squawk gave a command and the other two boys nodded and ran into the darkness. Squawk bent low in the grass and moved into the shadows. “Have it your way,” Jem said. He uncapped his whiskey flask and took a sip and tended to his fire.
That Beothuk boy I shot wasn’t much older than Squawk, he thought. He took down a full grown deputy in the darkness and scalped him. Jem took a second, longer sip of whiskey. He was gonna come kill me and Claire, too. Screw that. I’m glad I shot him.
Jem thought about the story Walt Junger, Billy Jack Elliot and Old Man Willow told about finding Sam’s body. A Beothuk massacre. So bad they couldn’t bring the body home. Jem took his knife out of its sheath and twirled it in his fingers, watching the firelight reflect off its blade. He drank again. “Sheriff Walt Junger,” he said.
A fat conejo landed dead on the dirt in front of him.
Jem looked up to see a triumphant Bug raise his hands in the air and cheer.
“Let me guess. It was a contest and you just won,” Jem said. He grabbed the conjeo by its ears and slit it open with his knife. Bug bent next to him, watching in fascination at how he prepared it.
Branches cracked and something heavy was sliding across the dirt toward them. Squawk came into the light, dragging a doe by her legs. He deposited the animal at Jem’s side with a grunt and looked down at the conejo in Jem’s hands. In the flicker of the firelight, for the briefest moment, the brave warrior was just a disappointed little boy.
Jem looked over the doe and said, “That has got to be the biggest female leaper I ever seen. I’m impressed.” He patted the animal on the side and nodded approvingly at Squawk. Squawk plopped down cross-legged in front of the fire and sulked as he waited for Jem to finish gutting Bug’s catch.
Jem got the meat roasting in minutes and showed Bug how to work the spit. He watched the boy try it himself and then said to Squawk, “All right. Stop pouting, we’ll do yours now.”
Squawk’s head shot up and he held his hand up to tell the other to stop talking. All of the muscles in his body coiled like springs.
Bug whispered something, but Squawk hissed at him to be silent. Jem searched the darkness but saw nothing, heard nothing, until a high-pitched cry rang out like an animal being torn apart at the joints. Squawk leapt to his feet and ran in that direction.
“Lakhpia-sha,” Bug gasped. The child’s eyes went so wide that Jem could see white on nearly all sides of them. “Lakhpia-sha!”
“What the hell is a Lakhpia-sha?”
There was a second scream and Jem realized Lakhpia-sha was Ichabod. He scrambled to his feet and ran until he could make out Ichabod’s flailing hands and feet pinned under the form of a massive, silver-furred beast.
The creature was shaking Ichabod by his left arm, its drooling fangs sunk deep in his flesh. Squawk leapt onto the beast’s back and wrapped his arm around its throat, trying to wrench it off of Ichabod enough to free his arm.
Jem raised a pistol and shouted, “Get out of the way!” but Squawk could not let go. Jem yelled as loudly as he could, trying to scare the thing off but Ichabod’s arm was clenched in its mouth, shredded to a tangle of bone sinews.
Jem grabbed Squawk by the shoulder and ripped him off of the animal’s back. He grabbed a tuft of the creature’s thick hide and jammed his knife into its throat. He pumped the knife back and forth like he was trying to get water out of the beast’s neck, and finally, a jet of hot black blood spurted onto his hand.
The beast let of Ichabod and ran off, taking Jem’s knife with it.
Jem raised his pistol and fired twice into the darkness but heard nothing. Ichabod moaned, lifting his ruined arm and staring at it in disbelief.
“What the hell was that? Son of a bitch.” Jem looked up and saw Bug riding for them on his destrier, coming across the meadow at full gallop. Two small flames appeared in the darkness near Bug and Jem realized it was the shining yellow eyes of a second creature. Bug’s destrier screeched as the beast leapt and bit its neck, splashing Bug with her blood.
Jem grabbed the boy by the ankle to pull him free of the thrashing mount. He fired at both animals rapidly, shooting Bug’s destrier and its killer until both of them were writhing on the ground in a mewling mix of bloody fur.
“Werja,” Bug shouted, spinning around and around, pointing into the shadows. “Werja!”
A third beast had been creeping up behind them and had its jaws open for the back of Squawk’s head when Jem turned and fired a bullet past Squawk’s ear that cleaved the animal’s skull in two.
Squawk did not flinch. He tore pieces of his loincloth into small strips with his teeth, hurrying to get them around Ichabod’s arm. He chattered to Ichabod, smacking him on the cheek and shaking him, but the boy had stopped moving.