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Chapter 1
At night, when gazing
On the gay hearth blazing,
O, still remember me!
—THOMAS MOORE
1854, Texas
In continuing, brilliant zigzags, lightning raced against the dark, stormy sky. Chief Fire Thunder, of the Coahuila Thunder clan of the Kickapoo, held tight to his reins as his white stallion became uneasy over the ominous play of lightning, and the great claps of thunder that rumbled through the ground beneath his hooves.
Fire Thunder leaned low over his stallion and spoke soothingly to him. As Fire Thunder looked nervously at the herd of longhorn steers, he stroked his steed’s thick neck.
When Fire Thunder saw a familiar glow that appeared on the horn tips of one of the steers at the head of the herd, he stiffened. He had seen it before. He braced himself for the worst, when sparks raced along the horns, danced along the steer’s back, then rolled off its tail into the ground.
Fire Thunder straightened his back and sucked in a wild, nervous breath when, deep in the center of the packed mass of steers, the lightning appeared in many other places. As though it were a living thing, it leapt from steer to steer. It bounced off horn tips and tails in a frightening phosphorescent display. The steers snorted and trumpeted as the air crackled and popped around them.
Black Hair, Fire Thunder’s best nekanaki, friend, sidled his horse closer to his. “They are going to stampede!” he shouted above the howling wind and the rain that suddenly fell from the sky in torrents. “Cry to the heavens, Fire Thunder. Tell Grandfather to stop!”
Fire Thunder looked guardedly around him, at his other warriors who were too close to him for him to perform his magic, his special powers that were known only to him and his friend Black Hair.
“This is not the time or the place for me to do that,” Fire Thunder shouted back at Black Hair. He gave his friend a steady gaze. “You know as well as I that my powers are reserved for times when I am alone. We will battle the elements today with the strength bestowed upon us by Kitzihiat, our Great Spirit!”
No sooner was that said than the leaders of the longhorn herd whirled and balked. Dazzled by the play of lightning, the animals churned in confusion.
Suddenly they turned and reversed their direction.
The wet ground was pounded by more than a hundred hooves as the animals began their crazed flight.
“Stampede!” Fire Thunder shouted, grabbing his lariat from his saddle. His eyes blurred from the rain as he rode in a hard gallop toward an old moss-horned bull that was in the lead.
“Let’s head him off together!” Black Hair said as he rode after the same longhorn. “If we can get him stopped, the rest will follow suit.”
Fire Thunder nodded and looked over his shoulder at the rest of his warriors, who were attempting to head off the bulk of the herd, and, lead them back in the direction of the Rio Grande.
Fire Thunder’s gaze turned back to the old bull. Gaining on him, he whirled his lariat in the air over his head.
Black Hair was riding side by side with the bull. He swung his lariat and cut the air in front of the bull’s nose.
Fire Thunder reined his horse off to the side, his animal skidding to a halt and spewing mud. Fire Thunder watched, smiling, as Black Hair brought his coiled rope down over the old bull’s nose.
The rope landed with a whack. The old bull snorted and turned, his horn tips barely missing Black Hair and his feisty mustang.
Fire Thunder swung his rope in the air in a wide circle, then slung it over the old bull’s head and tightened it.
The longhorn yanked and jerked against both ropes, then snorted and stood quiet.
Breathing hard, Fire Thunder watched his warriors round up the rest of the herd, the storm finally floating on past them overhead.
The herd’s panic evaporated, with only a few continuing in wild plunging lopes.
The warriors cut in front of the longhorns, moved them into a mill, then turned the mill into a controlled drive toward the Rio Grande once again.
“I thought we had lost them,” Black Hair said as he rode beside Fire Thunder toward the river.
“Longhorns are a stubborn lot, that is for sure,” Fire Thunder said, smiling at Black Hair. “But not as stubborn as you or I, my friend.”
Black Hair laughed and nodded.
Fire Thunder yanked his wat
er-soaked, red cotton bandanna from around his brow and used it to wipe the rain from his face. He flung his wet, waist-length, coal-black hair back from his shoulders as he stuck the bandanna into the pocket of his buckskin shirt. His fringed buckskin outfit clung to him like a second skin. The leather chaps he wore, to give good protection against rope burns, were now wet, tight, and abrasive.
“We will cross the border with the steers at the Rio Grande under the cover of darkness, go on until we reach the foot of our mountain, then make camp for the night,” Fire Thunder said. He looked upward. The moon was only a tiny sliver in the sky.
“Yes, that is best,” Black Hair said, nodding. “The steers are tired after their run. They would move too slowly tonight to get them safely up the mountain pass.”
“Even I move too slowly,” Fire Thunder said, chuckling. “But it has been a good day for us, my friend. We have retrieved a good portion of the longhorns stolen from us by the Texans many moons ago when we lived in Texas. Now that we live in Mexico, we have enough land to take back the steers that were stolen from us. And we shall, until the number we steal matches that which was stolen from us.”
Reins slack in his hands, Fire Thunder let his steed pick its own way through the darkness. It was now a night of scudding clouds, which intermittently shrouded the moon, making the dark seem blacker in sudden contrast.
The air was motionless, full of the lowing of the longhorns.
