"Kill them. Kill them all now." Victorio huddled near the guttering fire, his dark eyes fixed on the flames. What he saw were not the dancing sparks rising from the burning, popping fragrant green piñon log but vague, distant movement, encroachment on Apacheria, his homeland. He poked savagely at the fire with a smoldering stick. New sparks twisted into the cold New Mexico night air, turning and blazing like the hatred already within him for the Indah--the White Eyes--and their never-stopping slow theft of holy land. He straightened, his hand repositioning the emblem of the Warm Springs Apache, the buckskin band looped over his right shoulder and fastened at his left hip. The sacred hoddentin pollen from the tule cattails stained the leather a dull yellow, his badge of manhood, leadership, belonging. He had earned all this on the Sacred Mountain, Salinas Peak, and had proven himself both a warrior and chief repeatedly ever after.

"Enough of such talk! That is too dangerous a path to ride," Mangas Coloradas said quickly, contradicting his friend and ally. All sitting in council around the fire waited for the Eastern Chiricahua chief to continue his thought. Of those here, perhaps only Cuchillo Negro seated at Mangas Coloradas' right hand, was as respected. "The White Eyes can be dealt with. Their distant war weakens them. We need not risk the death of our women and children when there are other ways to bring about peace."

"They fight themselves and still there are enough of them to dig our ground to steal away the yellow metal, pesh-klitso, and the white iron, pesh-lickoyee," Victorio said hotly. "All along the Mogollón Rim they sneak like thieves and dig their tunnels into the body of the world, angering the Mountain Gods. They take away the pesh-klitso they find, and it brings more rushing in. They take the forbidden metal!" Victorio's breath came in heaving gusts now. His anger grew. "They might fight among themselves beyond the rising sun but they fill our land with their greed. You, of all here, ought to know their treachery!"

Before the Civil War Mangas Coloradas had dealt with the Mexicans intruding on his land to mine copper. In the guise of friendship the Mexicans had invited Mangas Coloradas and his people to a feast of corn and other food. A hidden howitzer fired into the group, killing many and scattering the survivors. Two of Mangas' wives had been killed and only after the massacre did the chief realize the infant he had rescued from the chaos, clutched tightly to his breast and swaddled in a heavy blanket, was his own son, Mangus.

Treachery walked the land, and Victorio wondered why Mangas Coloradas did not recognize it. Even the fiercest storm lost its force if it blew too long. He snorted, thin plumes of exhalation freezing in feathery patterns before being swept away by the north wind. At times, Mangas was too trusting for his own good. Or the good of the Apache.

"There are honorable men among them. We can parley," insisted Mangas Coloradas. His frail form took on strength and dignity, and Victorio knew he could never deny the head chief, no matter how wrong he might be. Looking left and right, Victorio saw others shared his concern. He might challenge Mangas Coloradas now and win support from Cochise and Geronimo and Loco and Nana and even Cuchillo Negro. But he could not do it. He respected Mangas Coloradas too much.

"You are an old fool," Geronimo said, in his usual rude fashion. "They seek our death, both sides of their war. Did not General Baylor try to kill us all?"

"The Great Father Davis removed him," Mangas Coloradas said softly.

"And we deal now with Carleton, who wears blue and not gray. What will the Great Nantan of the bluecoats do with him?" Geronimo spat into the fire. Victorio joined him, as did Cochise to show their contempt for James Carleton. The old chief remained unmoved by this show of unity against his wish for a peaceable solution.

"We fought Carleton," said Cochise, "and you were gravely wounded. He used his cannon all too well against us at Apache Pass. Have your wounds healed so quickly?" Cochise tilted his head to the side, as if examining Mangas Coloradas. For months the old chief had recuperated at Ojo Caliente--and still he sought peace with Carleton.

Victorio looked around the circle at the other headmen, seeing how few believed in Mangas Coloradas' solution for their trouble with the Indah. He returned to poking the fire, stirring it to greater life until the heat burned at his face and arms. Only Mangas Coloradas thought the White Eyes could change their colors and become honorable. Cochise, Nana, who was older even than Mangas Coloradas, Geronimo, Loco, Delgadito, not one of those fierce and honorable warriors agreed. Victorio saw it in their eyes, the set of their shoulders, the way their hands moved restlessly on bone-handled knifes and fingered rifles resting in the crooks of their arms.

But Mangas Coloradas was a decent, intelligent, cunning man. Victorio respected him.

Victorio rose to his full five-foot-ten-inch height and looked down at the older man.

"Do what you will. The others are right. The White Eyes think only to steal from us, to move us from our hereditary lands. Talk to them, if there is any hope of peace. May Ussen give you strength and a clever tongue, but I will not be still long." Without waiting for a reply, Victorio vanished into the darkness, wrapped in his blanket and an icy cold that chilled more than his flesh.

Life was difficult, but Victorio knew it might be worse. His band of Warm Springs Mimbreño Apache ranged far and wide, successfully finding game in the Black Range. Twice he had even gone to the San Mateo Mountains on successful raids. His wife and their four children were content and well cared for. But the rumors always whispering in his ear from those travelling from the north told of bitter fighting between General Carleton's bluecoats and the Mescalero. Kit Carson, known as Red Clothes to the Navajo, knew Apache ways too well and tracked down even the wiliest of the Apache from his base at Fort Stanton.

Victorio sighted down the barrel of his rifle, flicking away a nonexistent speck of dirt. Coming suddenly into his iron sights was his sister, Lozen. He lowered the rifle.

"You are worried," he said. "Did you not steal enough horses from the White Eyes?" He tried to make a joke. His sister was the equal of most warriors in his band and prided herself on always returning from a raid with at least one horse, usually the finest. This day, his bantering brought no smile to her grim face. Her clothing, a warrior's rather than that of a woman, was torn and filthy from her long ride. She wore a simple cloth headband holding her long hair from her dark eyes, a calico shirt, a breech clout supported by a belt with two sheathed knives and buckskin leggings. Her moccasins showed holes from lack of time to repair them, another testament to her desperate travel. Unlike her brother and the others, she did not wear the symbol of fertility, the hoddentin stained strip over her shoulder.

"I bring only sorrow, my brother," Lozen said. She hunkered down near him. He smelled gunpowder and blood on her, but she seemed unharmed. As was her habit, she had scouted alone, preferring to let the other, slower men blunder about by themselves. Victorio had often said--with no joke intended--the Apache would have nothing to fear if he had a dozen warriors as able as his sister. Even Nana, called Broken Foot, who had seen more summers than any of them, preferred her company to that of the young braves in his band in battle.

Victorio laid down his rifle and stood, face turned toward the brilliant blue cold afternoon sky. Above him, ice clouds like the skeletons of delicate birds fluttered across the sky. Victorio saw a huge crow wheeling high above their camp. A bad omen. From the black bird he turned slowly, hunting for other omens. None came, but the crow alone was enough. His heart knotted like a rope as he faced his sister.

"What word do you have of Mangas Coloradas?" he asked, instinctively knowing the source of her grief.

"Dead," she said, the word a burning bullet aimed for his heart. "He was tortured and murdered by the White Eyes."

"Who? Which ones?" Victorio wanted to scream and rant and tear at the heavens. He forced himself to calmness. Only after he learned who had killed his friend would the blood rage come upon him.

"A scout for Colonel West captured him. Joseph Walker, by name. Walker and those with him killed the three accompanying Mangas Coloradas, then took him to old Fort MacLane. Carleton ordered the death, calling Mangas Coloradas a robber and thief. But it was West who tortured him."

"They tortured him?" Victorio's heart threatened to explode from his chest.

"He tried to escape them three times, the soldiers said. They approached him at Pinos Altos under a white truce flag and they violated it!" Lozen's hands clenched and unclenched in fury as she spoke. She made no effort to hold back her anger, as did Victorio.

"What became of his body?"

"Buried by West. I know where it is. Conner told me everything, and he has no reason to lie. He did not know Joseph Walker. Conner volunteered everything I have told you, Brother. He is as outraged as any blooded warrior!"

Victorio knew Daniel Conner as an honest man and friend to both the Mescalero and Warm Springs Apache. Some, like the Indian agents, might stir up trouble with their greed and perfidy, but other Indah never gave reason to be doubted.

"You and I, Lozen. We will go to where they buried Mangas Coloradas. We owe him a decent burial so he can wander the Happy Place forever."

Lozen nodded once, spun and lightly ran to her horse. She caught up reins and vaulted onto its back and headed north even as Victorio chose a suitable mount and galloped after her. They rode all night and into the next day to reach the deserted fort, slowing only to rest and water their horses.

Victorio reined back and cocked his head to one side. As they rode, he had been especially watchful. If Colonel West had killed a warrior of Mangas Coloradas' stature, he would be boasting about it--and others would be seeking to give themselves names as heroes. Any who caught and killed Victorio would be equally honored, by the slaughtering bluecoat commander.

Snow drifts in the shade of tall pine and blue spruce reminded Victorio of the recent storm, but the sight of a mound of fresh earth told of a different tempest. He circled the clearing in front of the deserted fort, noting an abandoned iron kettle beside ashes from a recent fire, perhaps three days old. Had the bluecoats warmed themselves on this fire as they tortured Mangas Coloradas?

Victorio never tortured his prisoners. The Apache showed no mercy but few warriors would bear up well under the sight of a helpless man dying by inches. He had noticed among the White Eyes the streak of cruelty that brought only suffering to the innocent.

Mangas Coloradas should have died as a warrior, with knife drawn and fighting.

"No one is near," Lozen said, and Victorio believed her. She had an uncanny knack for scouting, although this was not her real enemies-against Power. Whenever he wished to know where the enemy hid, Lozen would stand with arms outstretched, palms up to the sky, and pray to Ussen. Following the path of the sun, she would turn slowly until her palms tingled and her flesh changed color, sometimes changing to a deep purple. The intensity of the sensation told how far the enemy was, the closer the foe the more obvious the tingling.

Victorio slid from horseback and walked to the grave. Kneeling, he began digging, slowly at first and then faster and faster as bile rose in his throat. Using hands and knife blade, he tore at the soft dirt until the body of his friend lay revealed to the open sky and Ussen's gaze.

Victorio recoiled, rocking back and coming to his feet. Tears came to his eyes and rage unlike any he had ever felt seized him.

"They cut off his head!" Victorio cried.

"I think they must have boiled off the flesh in the iron kettle," Lozen said, her own voice choked with fury. Her moccasined foot kicked hard at the kettle, sending it spinning away. "He will wander the Happy Place without a head, lost and shunned forever!"

Victorio's back arched as he turned his face to the sky. A wordless cry of rage ripped from his throat. He slashed at the world with his knife and knew there could never be peace with monsters who committed such vile acts.

Copyright © 1998 Robert E. Vardeman