would be tied to the ground and men at will would penetrate their separated legs. There were even tales of after the women were close to death, they would be cut up and fed to the dogs of the invaders.
When finally the packing was done and the tribe formed into a jagged line, then and only then did Flying Bird once again think about her love. Why me? she thought — so close to our wedding date. Surely the gods smile on us, there is no love like ours, no love ever in the world. And as they marched circled by the warriors, Flying Bird could not wail like the other women. Her sadness was beyond pain or sorrow but was a dark emptiness that seemed to sap all the hope from her body. My love is gone, she thought to herself. Gone out into the wilderness. Gone to find the danger that follows now at our heels like some evil wolf following a wounded deer.
With the beginning of the march Flying Bird was oblivious to the sound and movement around her. She walked in desolation. One step in front of the other, hour after hour after hour. She did not feel the weariness creep into her feet and then up her legs. She did not feel the blisters slowly forming on her heels or the weight of the straps from the basket she carried filled with beans. She only felt the heaviness in her thoughts, and thought terrible thoughts about Shining Moon. Deep inside herself she knew she would never see him again.
Mother walked slowly behind her daughter. And although she was tired she carefully watched Flying Bird. Inside herself she knew how the little one ached. But what was one to do over heartbreak? There were no words or helping things. There was nothing but the deep bitterness of it. The sleepless hours and the shallow days. Silently in between her own sorrow, she prayed for Flying Bird, hoping she would find strength and grow strong. She would watch the young girl who every other minute or so would reach up to her ears and touch the turquoise earrings Shining Moon had given her. “He is with you, my child,” Mother spoke to herself, “in all things he is with you. Now you see the bitterness of love, the longing and heartache. The first feeling of separation. Now you see you must learn to accept. Love is all things in happiness and agony.” Mother made a sour face and spit on the ground. Men, she thought, Love … and she let her thoughts trail off into happy thoughts of the past.
She remembered when she was a small girl and how she had longed for a brave named Tall Tree. He was such a handsome, brave young man, so full of life and health. When they were children she had fallen in love with Tall Tree, and as she grew up she would dream of the day he would ask her to marry him. But even as a youth she knew Tall Tree would never desire her. She was far too plain and not beautiful like other girls, and Tall Tree was so handsome he would hever marry a girl like her. But still she held onto her dreams of him. Watching as they grew together, he becoming more and more handsome and she staying plain and in her heart ugly.
It was a cold winter day and she was fifteen years old when the news came. Tall Tree had fallen through the ice of a river far to the north and was never found. Mother had felt as though the same cold river water flooded over her heart. For many suns it seemed she could not sleep, and in all her waking moments the cold of the ice held a tight hand around her heart. But in the spring Sleeping Bear had asked for her hand and her father had taken three good horses for her.
At first when the match was made, Mother hated Sleeping Bear. He was not handsome like Tall Tree. He was a short little man, not a warrior but a grower. A man who worked in the dirt. He was not brave. She told herself she would run away, but she knew in her heart she would never do that.
The day of the marriage she was sad, but Sleeping Bear sat across from her on the elk robes and looked deep within her eyes. For the first time she saw a great gentleness in this man of the earth. After several long moments, Sleeping Bear spoke in a soft deep voice. “I know that your heart rests with the spirit of another and I know I am not the most handsome man of the tribe, but I promise you in all things of my life you will be by my side and in all things I will treat you with truth.”
That night Sleeping Bear did not come to his new wife, but they sat and talked about many things. And in the morning as the sun rose, Mother stood with deep feeling in her heart and she took off her wedding dress and spoke, “Come, my husband, and lay with me with the rising sun.”
And Sleeping Bear entered into his wife with a gentleness of the earth and a touch that was soft and pleasurable. And never again did Mother compare Tall Tree with her husband nor wish for another life. Life had been good with this man whom she loved deeply.
After a day of traveling, Flying Bird was oblivious to the movement around her. Thoughts invaded her mind like bolts of flashing lightning that she could not control. Shining Moon’s face would appear before her, smiling and laughing and then in the next flash his face would be contorted in pain and blood would be running from a large gash in his side. But there was one vision that kept returning to her tired mind. Shining Moon was sitting by a small fire. All around him was black, but in his hands was a large glistening spear point. It was a spear point like none Flying Bird had ever seen. It shone like the stars and seemed to pulse with life and being. She could see the concentration as Shining Moon struck the chips from the living stone and feel the beat of her love’s heart and the sound of his breathing as he worked.
When the tribe reached the box canyon, Flying Bird was not conscious of thought or movement around her. Her body was racked by unfelt pain and her heart was only a dry stone in her chest. There was nothing, no air filtering into the lungs, no fleeting creatures before them, only darkness. She did not remember gathering wood or helping Mother and Grandmother build a small shelter. She did not remember the cool air of night nor laying down on the ground outside the shelter. She did not remember anything until the dawn when she awoke at first not knowing where she was or who she was with. Looking at the rising sun, the memories slowly came to her and with the memories the deep feelings of longing were released by the sun’s rays on the rocks of the canyon and by the small darting birds that greeted the day.
And with this she realized Shining Moon was in all things. He was in the earth and the trees. The sky and the heavens. He was within her, held tight by her spirit and her caring. He was in Mother and Grandmother and Sleeping Bear. There was nothing in the world he was not a part of and she knew he would always be a part of her in all things she did during her life. And in that moment, that small period of time, Flying Bird was no longer a child, but a woman.
Grandmother was the first to notice the change. It was deep in Flying Bird’s eyes. A depth of vision that youth does not have, a vision of time and death. A battle fought in the mind that settles deep within the eyes of men and women. Seeing this, Grandmother walked over to Flying Bird and took her in her arms and held her close to her large sagging bosom. “My child, my child,” she spoke deeply, “now there is only the future.”
During the day while the scouts went out looking for the invaders, the women escorted by braves went out and brought in more wood. They gathered the green pinon nuts and setting snares caught as many chipmunks, rock squirrels and rabbits as they could. Although the canyon was hard to attack, it was also impossible to escape from. There was only one way out and that was the way they had entered. They must have wood and food. Black Bison set up cooking stations and split the food into rations. There would be no full stomachs now, there would only be enough to keep one alive. The warriors would receive the larger rations. Already the older horses had been killed. Their flesh cut from their bodies in long strips drying on the rocks in the sun. Burros and young horses would be next.
Late in the afternoon the scouts returned. One thousand yards to the front the invaders had stopped. The standoff would begin. That night the tribe heard the songs and drums of the invaders. All night the chants went on until with the dawn the warriors, guarding the front of the canyon, looked out and saw the invaders on their horses. A man with nothing but a loin cloth and a lance kicked his horse forward and rode, his back straight and true, towards the canyon. Stopping only feet from the first warriors, he threw the lance into the ground and with motions of his arms and hands, told how his chief, Blue Sky, wished to speak with their chief. The message delivered, Black Bison several minutes
