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  He set up camp without a word or a command. Finally, he had nothing to say. He had given up trying to talk to me.

  The empty victory did not last.

  As soon as a fire burned brightly, he turned to me, “I will tell a story as I have every night since we left our valley if you will but ask.”

  My determination would not be broken for want of a story. I lay down with my back to him and the fire. No matter how many times he asked, I was not going to speak.

  The next day began without words from either of us. His first steps turned down the mountainside, but the pace soon slowed. The closer we came to the valley floor, the more often my guide stopped to listen. At the bottom, he crouched and studied the empty flat land in front of us, certainly not a grand valley with nine rivers.

  Without warning, he grabbed my arm and pulled me across the meadow. In the distance, water churned like the Buffalo River. We hurried toward the sound, but it was not a river, only a flooded stream tumbling down slabs of black rock into a swollen pool.

  “Bear Creek,” he said, wading slowly across just above the waterfall. I took off my moccasins and stomped in. Two steps onto the smooth rock bottom and I slipped, falling half onto the bank and the other in the creek.

  He turned and, without any expression, offered help. The outstretched hand only angered me. I pushed myself up and rinsed off my hands. Head high and my skirt wet, I scooted to the other side.

  He kept the creek to our right as we hurried across the valley. A smaller stream joined our race. At a sharp bend in the creek, we came upon a standing stone. My guide walked straight to it. I followed him around it once. Three-sided, its sharp edges came to a point high above my reach.

  He walked around a second time, as I searched for a way out of Bear Creek Valley. Quietly chanting, my guide danced another circle about the stone.

  In every direction, a cliff or steep mountainsides loomed.

  How will we get out of here? I asked myself.

  He centered his back on the edge, which had once been painted red. “Our path is there,” he pointed straight in front of him, “to Little Red Creek.”

  After a long, steady climb up out of the valley, we reached a wide plateau. On every side, mountains shouldered dark clouds. We stood at the highest point around. Over the distance, only three ridges stood as tall, and I still could not see an end to the mountains.

  The wind turned cold as we started down the other side into an open forest with little underbrush. He kept a quick pace. The wind steadily blew harder.

  Night approached when he pointed and said, “Little Red Creek.”

  I shrugged my shoulders. Not red, but it is little, I thought.

  “The water running here,” he said, “will twist, turn and swell until it becomes a river that will flow down into Nine-Rivers Valley and past the villages of your people.”

  I wanted to ask how many days that would take.

  He waited. I did not ask. He walked away. “We will camp there below the bluff,” he said over his shoulder.

  It felt good to be sheltered from the wind and warmed by a fire.

  As with the night before, he said, “I will tell a story if you will but ask.”

  It had not been an easy day to remain silent. My resolve had waned at times, and youthful curiosity almost tricked me more than once. I had not faltered. I felt that was the only thing I had control of.

  The next morning, we broke camp in our new routine of silence. We left Little Red Creek behind, climbing most of the morning. The steep hike wound about chunks of rock that lay strewn on top of the earth as if thrown there by giant hands. Few trees grew on the slope and even fewer on the mountaintop, which opened onto wide grassy fields.

  I saw the old path before my guide said anything.

  “Once many traveled this trail, but even I have not passed this way for many seasons.” He marched off.

  As I studied the eastern horizon in front of us, I wondered. Are there really towns beyond the mountains as marvelous as he describes?

  We turned downhill, and the mountaintops disappeared. The last light of a cloudy day faded. Soon, the trail slipped away, lost among moss-covered boulders.

  He stumbled across a stream and topped a small mound on the other side. “We will camp here,” he said.

  “Nanza clear a circle. I will gather some wood.” He walked down the other side, muttering to himself.

  I hurried to clear a pit near the center of the mound. It felt colder than the night before, and we had no shelter to break the wind. I surrounded the pit with rocks that I carried up from the stream. When he still had not returned, I gathered some wood on my own.

  He came back with only a few limbs under his arm. I started to ask why, but stopped. With the wood I had gathered and his skill, we soon had a fire. The flames warmed my feet and burned away the last of my commitment. We stared hard at each other across the flames, a determined old man and a stubborn young girl.

  I wanted to learn about people and about my homeland. He lowered his eyes and leaned forward. Before he had the chance to ask his nightly question, I stood and looked up into the darkness between the stars. He waited. I was still angry, but I chose to speak for my reasons.

  “Taninto, the Wanderer, tell me a story.”

  He waited for me to sit then nodded slightly.

  Chapter 14: Men of Metal

  Taninto’s Journey

  Their arrival - June 22, 1541

  As a boy-just-turned-man, I could not wait for my first day to wear Uncle Tecco’s feza. In the light haze between dark and dawn, I bathed with thoughts of strutting about the plaza in my hat of manhood, for everyone to see, most of all Saswanna.

  I raced back to my uncle’s lodge, but he had already left. The feza could not be worn without his permission. The town bustled with people in their finest cloaks and headdresses, and I had nothing on my head.

  My uncle was not on the crowded streets or the plaza. He had already climbed the Mound and disappeared into the Lodge of the High Council. The guards at the top of the stairs indicated as much, but without Uncle Tecco at my side, they would not allow me up the steps.

  A confusion of voices churned the air. Drums rumbled on all sides as I ran back to my uncle’s lodge. Aunt Miluka and the two daughters were resting in the summer patio as if nothing were happening. Neither daughter looked up from their hair braiding. It was their place to wait, but I could not. I quickly stepped inside the empty lodge.

  “Did you talk to your uncle?” Aunt Miluka asked from outside the door.

  “No,” I answered.

  She bent slightly and looked in. “He is on the Temple Mound,” I added.

  Her shadow remained in the door while I took down a jar of bear grease and rubbed the oil over my chest and arms. I slipped on my deerskin shirt. She grumbled when I picked up the feza. I put it on and pulled it down in the back, snug like every other young warrior wore his.

  The daughters giggled as I stepped out of the lodge. I spread my arms wide and spun around. They giggled louder. Before my aunt could speak, I let go with my best war cry.

  Two steps toward finding Saswanna, Aunt Miluka called out, “Your uncle will not be pleased to find you gone.”

  I stopped and mumbled, “I will wait for him in the lodge.”

  I sat where I had the night before. What meager skill I had in patience, I learned from my father. A quiet man of intricate moves each action considered and precise. In the two days since my uncle had summoned me to Casqui, I had little time for thoughts about my family or friends.

  “Taninto,” my uncle called from outside.

  “I am here, Uncle Tecco,” I said as I stepped out.

  He wore the ceremonial mantle of a Tassitti, a wise-one. The cloak of white bird feathers reached from his knees to his neck, leaving only his head and left arm exposed. I stretched tall and looked him in the eyes. The white feathers in his topknot fluttered in the breeze as he studied me. I noticed he had replaced both of his silver ear-s
pools with wooden plugs.

  “Son of my first sister,” he said, “today, you shine. I am proud of you, Taninto.” He put his hand on my shoulder. “Never let that light fade. Walk with pride, but always step with respect.”

  As he spoke, the daughters came from the patio. Both wore flowing blue cloaks hung over the right shoulder and a single braid over the left with a blue feather tied at the end.

  Uncle Tecco shook my attention away from the daughters. “Listen, Taninto,” he said. “Keep what you have learned up to this day above all that you will see in the days that follow.”

  I nodded.

  “It is time,” he said.

  As he must, Tecco Tassitti led the way. I followed two paces back with Aunt Miluka and her daughters close behind. All along our path, people stepped aside in honor of a wise-one. Pride gleamed in every face. Uncle Tecco seemed proud of me, my aunt of her daughters the people of their nation and me of my new status.

  The crowd around the south gate parted as Uncle Tecco approached. He led us through the gate without hesitation. As soon as the daughters stepped from the other side, the opening filled back in.

  Many things had happened in the days since I had returned to Casqui, but nothing compared to the sights around me. More people than I could see gathered outside the walls on both sides of the canal. A formation of warriors and elders from every village of the Casqui Nation stood before me. Together, they completed four squares, each one inside another.

  Twenty stout warriors with one captain formed each wall of the outside square. All faced away from the center square, each one gripping a long-handled war club in one hand, and a buffalo hide shield in the other. Behind every warrior with a war club stood a man pointing an antler-tipped lance to the sky. Bowmen completed the third square, with every bow taut. The most feared warriors, skilled in the use of the war axe and the long blade, protected the open square inside all the others. Scattered about the inner square, village elders and the other wise-ones waited.

  Three warrior chiefs stood in front of the formation. To the left, the Warrior Chief of Upper Towns wore a breastplate of woven buffalo hide and a headdress of hawk feathers. He held a war club of white flint, rubbed to a high shine. Like the other warrior chiefs, his weapon was for ceremony, not fighting.

  In the center, the Warrior Chief of Casqui carried a white bow. Thirteen red feathers circled the rim of his hat. Two large copper discs hung around his neck, polished but pitted with the marks of many battles. A quill bag with one red arrow hung at his left side.

  To his right the Warrior Chief of Lower Towns held a white lance, tipped with the horn of an elk. A round breastplate of copper protected his heart. He wore the orange-brown skin of a mountain lion over his head and down his back. Spread around the formation of warriors and elders, eight scouts carrying copper-tipped spears waited, ready to race out in every direction.

  Uncle Tecco walked toward the wall of warriors. I hesitated. He said, “Remember, step with respect.”

  He marched through the layers to the inner square where three other Tassettis, all wearing white, greeted Uncle Tecco. They looked past me as I followed my uncle to his position on the south side. A circle outlined on the ground in purple paint and covered in skins lay at the center of all those squares.

  I hoped Saswanna could see me inside with my feza. I searched the crowd for her face. My heart jumped. Saswanna was there. She looked up. Through and above it all, our eyes met. I smiled, but felt uneasy. I lowered my head and looked away.

  “Uncle Tecco, what does it mean to see a face and grow weak?”

  “This is not the time for such questions,” he said without regard for my pain.

  A rhythm of deep drones began to grow. The crowd grew silent. The ranks on the north end opened. Wise-ones, elders, warriors and all who had gathered bowed their heads and eyes, except for one.

  Uncle Tecco pushed my head down but not before my vision filled with all the honor and wealth surrounding the eighteenth mico, King of all Upper and Lower Towns of the Casqui Nation. I had admired and watched him speak from the summit of the Temple Mound during many ceremonies, but I had never been in the close presences of King Issqui.

  On four strong shoulders, King Issqui floated above the mass of bent heads. He sat perched on a carved throne under a canopy of fine woven red cloth floating in the breeze of two large fans of white birch bark. The deep, rich tones from a pearl-wrapped cypress flute led the royal procession. Three warriors painted white and clutching shiny copper-tipped lances marched on each side of the throne. At the center of the assembled circle the flute playing stopped. The royal bearers steadied the throne on stout poles forked at the top.

  King Issqui stood and spoke. “Hear me, the honorable, the wise and the brave joined here as one. I come to walk with you as just another man following the same path of duty. Together, let us meet the Strangers.”

  The bearers lowered the throne. King Issqui stepped to the ground as Uncle Tecco spun me around. Everyone turned toward the east. Out front, the three commanders called the formation of warriors and peacemakers forward. And so began the grand procession of the Casqui Nation to meet the one Saswanna called the “Son of the Sun.”

  The scouts ran to the front as the bearers struggled at the rear with baskets and litters overflowing with gifts. The march moved slowly. Many feet pounded the dry earth to a choking dust. In the hot months, I normally wore very little. The hat and shirt I had put on earlier with great pride had become an irritation that I wished I could remove.

  We passed the edge of Casqui territory where it dropped off into the swamplands, farther than I had ever gone. Trees with trunks thicker than the reach of six men blocked most of the sunlight, except where it shimmered off the dark swamp waters in the distance. The lowlands and its swamps were a natural defense that separated Casqui from its neighbors and enemies.

  Two scouts ran in from the southeast. The warrior chiefs signaled and the grand march stopped. A bellowing cloud of dust raced toward us.

  “Men of Casqui,” King Issqui shouted from the center of the formation, “do not betray your people. Stand proud, stand strong, but stand in peace.”

  The formation opened to allow King Issqui through the ranks. He walked past the three warrior chiefs with the four wise-ones following. I stayed close to Tecco Tassetti. On orders, bearers hurried to the front and began laying out the many fine gifts on either side of the king.

  Odd shapes led the rolling dust. Thirty or forty of these figures galloped toward us like a stampede of buffalo, but not buffalo or any known animal. Each moved with such grace and certainty that from afar it appeared as one creature.

  At a point where no arrows could reach, they stopped. When the dust settled, I could make out men—strange men—sitting atop beasts the size of a bull elk, but with a long neck and a noble head without horns. Each man and beast sparkled as their shiny cloaks rippled.

  One of the beasts reared and danced on two legs. Its rider shouted commands, and two raced back to where they had come from. Those that remained fell into a single line across the road. Each one pulled a gleaming sword of silver from a sheath at his side and held it across his chest as they marched forward.

  King Issqui turned and shouted, “Men of Casqui, regard the unknown, but do not fear it.”

  I straightened my back and squared my shoulders like those around me. The strangers halted. Stance to stance, men of different worlds waited with hardly a movement as an odd sound of rumbling, pounding, screeching, and clanging grew ever louder.

  Where the road enters the forest, four flags of three colors, black, white and blue, appeared against the trees. More men of metal carried the flags, followed by another hundred beast-riders, and two hundred or more men on foot carrying weapons known and weapons never seen before. Three or four hundred gaunt and bound slaves trudged at the rear. Out front, three giant fierce dogs circled a great prancing black beast carrying the greatest of all the riders.

  The King of Casqui
called for his throne. He mounted it as the strangers moved closer. The one on the black beast waved his hand, and the advance stopped. Their dust washed over Issqui.

  The strangers had thick beards, wore hats of metal, and too many garments for the heat. But the beasts on which some rode held my greatest wonder. Beautiful and frightening, yet they carried their master where and whenever commanded.

  King Issqui ordered his throne bearers forward. Between the line of beast-riders and the Casqui procession, he dismounted alone. The king of all Casqui faced the direction of the rising sun and made a long, slow bow, kneeling in silent prayer. When he stood, he turned in the direction of the setting sun and made another long bow, but remained humbled on the ground only a short time. Turning to the strangers, he made a sweeping bow, but bent only his back, not his knees.

  He returned to his throne. His bearers raised him above all others, even the strangers on their great beasts. From behind the front ranks of the pale strangers, three red men stepped out. All three bowed to our king. One announced that they were interpreters in the service of their great lord, Hernando de Soto.

  Issqui studied the interpreters, then looked up at the strangers and shouted loud enough for all to hear, “Very high, powerful, and renowned Master, I greet your coming. Soon as I had notice of you, your power, and your perfection, I determined to conform my wishes to your command.”

  One of the interpreters ran back to the strangers. Issqui waited while his greeting was translated to an insignificant man on a smaller brown beast.

  “Is that their leader?” someone behind me asked.

  The man rose up, turned to the strangers, and shouted in a language like nothing ever heard by my people. When the translator returned, the king continued his speech.

  “Although you entered my land, capturing and killing the people who dwell upon it, who are my brothers, I will hold as right all that you might do, believing that it should be so and for a good reason that to you is perceivable, but from me is concealed. Since it is known that an evil may well be permitted to avoid a greater evil, I trust that this will be so. For from so excellent a prince, no bad motive is to be suspected.”