The day is spent erecting wickiups and staking out territory. We are the first, but we are not the only. Another band comes in from the north midday. Another from the west not long after. Each stakes out a position in the valley, and by the end of the day there are easily a thousand lodges and twice that many horses and dogs. And they keep coming.
At nightfall, the celebrations begin. It is like the shrieking from the night I carried Wolfe into camp, but this is not mourning, and it goes on for hours. The leaders of each band make up the inner ring around their scalps, which are strung from small poles. The warriors dance around the leaders, and the women and children take the outside. Around and around, dancing and singing songs I have never heard and hope to never hear again. Beeya does not dance, but she enjoys herself, swaying and yelping softly, sitting at my side in the grass beyond the wide circle where all the activities take place.
There are far more horses than people, and when the morning comes, the races begin. The men race all day long, betting on the outcomes and bartering when they lose. Beeya and I watch as Magwich loses five of his horses and wins five more from someone else, only to lose them again. His mood is black, and Beeya keeps me away from the wickiup much of the day. She has dressed me like a doll. Feathers hang from my braids, and beads hang from my ears. When Beeya came to me with a rock, a fishhook, and a chunk of wood the size of a cork, tugging at my ears, I let her have her way. I have no fight in me. The pain was sharp, but it didn’t last. I almost missed it when it fled.
The women move among the camps and congregate around the clearing, visiting and displaying their wares: beaded clothes and moccasins, painted pots and feathered headpieces, armbands, belts, and cuffs. Some women cluster and string beads onto long strands of what appears to be hair from a horse’s mane, keeping their hands busy as they chatter. No language barrier exists among them; they are the same nation, if not the same tribe.
Some of the women wear cloth instead of skins, simple tunics and long skirts sashed at the waists and decorated in the style of their people, but I do not blend in. I am stared at with wide eyes and open mouths, but Beeya likes the attention. She tugs at my arm and makes me sit, spreading a skin in front of me along with little pots of paint. She pats the skin and says my name, “Nayohmee,” and pats it again. Then she pulls a woman forward through the crowd, pointing from the woman’s face to the skin in front of me.
The woman is someone of importance or esteem, because the other women part immediately. The woman stares down at me, hostile but curious, and Beeya motions for me to begin. I paint obediently, long black hair parted down the center, scowling eyes, bangled ears, simple lines. I have made her more beautiful than she is. I am not a fool. When I am finished, the women watching murmur and shift, and the haughty woman stoops to study it closer.
“Att,” she says to Beeya, ignoring me. The woman takes off several strands of beads from around her neck and puts them over Beeya’s head before she picks up her portrait, holding it gingerly to protect the wet paint. The women murmur again, and Beeya beams.
I am a novelty, and I draw for hours, making pictures on hides with the paints Beeya brings me. My fingers are stained from knuckle to tip, but I do not mind. It is easier to draw than to drown, and I am drowning. I paint one skin, one face, and then another. Beeya collects her pay and basks in the warmth of attention. After a while, the haughty woman comes back with a man. A thick scar runs from his forehead to his ear, but it only enhances his face. He wears a neck plate of bones, and his long hair is drawn back from his face. Red and yellow tassels hang from each temple and brush his prominent cheekbones.
I paint his image on a white skin that his wife lays down before me. I accentuate his scar and the harsh lines of his face, creating a portrait both startling and severe, and he is pleased. He says something to Beeya, something about Magwich, and Beeya doesn’t like what he says. She shakes her head, adamant, and begins gathering the paints and her prizes in a rush, shoving them into my arms to help her carry them. She is suddenly ready to leave, though others still await their turns around us and complain loudly. I follow her obediently, relieved to be done, but the man calls after her, insistent. She doesn’t answer this time but hurries away. We return to Magwich’s wickiup and dump Beeya’s treasures by the door. She pushes me down on the buffalo robes and barks a command—stay?—before she rushes out again.
I am stunned by the silence, by my sudden, unexpected freedom. And I do not stay. I have not been left alone once since I was taken, not even to relieve myself, and I don’t hesitate. I know where Weda and Biagwi’s wickiup is, and I stride toward it, not looking right or left. I do not care what happens to me; I only want to see Wolfe again.
No one stops me. No one seems to see me at all. I duck into the wickiup, heart pounding and stomach clenched. It is shadowed within, like Magwich’s was, and for a moment I stand, chest heaving, eyes adjusting to the different light.
He is here, asleep on a pile of skins, his small arms stretched over his head, his little legs tucked like a frog’s. His lips move up and down as though he suckles in his dreams. He has grown. In two weeks he has grown, and I sink down beside him. I do not touch him; I’m afraid if I do he will wake and I will be discovered. There is a quaking deep within me, beneath the denial in my chest and the ice in my belly, and I moan in dread, pressing my hands to my lips, trying to contain it.
The skin over the door shifts, and light spills into the wickiup as someone enters. A heartbeat, a gasp, and Weda begins to scream in bloodcurdling alarm. “Biagwi, Biagwi, Biaaaaagwiiiii,” she yells, staggering back, the skin hanging over the doorway still clutched in her hand.
“No, no, please,” I beg, but she can’t understand me. I step away from Wolfe, my hands held aloft, but her screams have awakened him. His lower lip protrudes and trembles, and he releases a long, sad wail. Then Biagwi is there, Magwich too, pushing into the wickiup, and Beeya stumbles behind.
Magwich grabs my hair as Weda scoops Wolfe into her arms. Biagwi is shouting at Magwich, and Magwich shouts back, dragging me from the enclosure. Beeya pounds her fists on his back, and for a moment he releases me to push her away. She steps past him and runs her hands along my braids and fingers my earrings before patting my breasts and my hips, her tone full of desperate cajoling, and I know what she is trying to do.
She is trying to convince him that I am pretty. That I am desirable. That he wants me, like John does with his jacks. I heard Wyatt telling Warren all about it, his mouth full of cake, after John and I said our vows.
“You gotta convince the jack he wants the mare, while distracting the mare with what she wants most.”
John scolded Wyatt, but I made him explain when we were alone. He did so in a very delicate way, whispering into my ear and nipping at my neck, his hands splayed on my hips, and I did not need any convincing.
I shove at Beeya’s hands. She scolds me, shaking her head like she is trying to help me. Magwich grunts and grabs my hair again, snapping my head to the side and hissing when Beeya tries to get in his way, but he does not slow. I wrap my hands around his wrist, trying to relieve the pressure on my braids, and stagger along at his side. I don’t know where we are going. We do not stop at his wickiup or at the edge of the camp. Minutes later, we enter the clearing where the men are gathered to race and the women display their wares. People gape at Magwich and me, but Beeya has disappeared.