Trail of Hope

Chapter 2

2Fort Wool, New Echota, Georgia, October 1838

Hunger pains gnawed at the inside of Sophia’s shrunken stomach. She moved and smelled her own sweaty body. She stank…plus her dirt wore dirt, which made it worse. She gazed across the crowded courtyard. Bleakness and loss surrounded her in her prison. Having grown up in a beautiful plantation home surrounded by the finest things money could buy, she’d never really given much thought to her surroundings. She’d always been more concerned about the people inside her home and how they were living. This place, though? This place she hated.

She stared into the blank faces of the starving and abused Cherokee families as they inched their way around the too-small enclosure. So many whys pushed through her mind until she thought she would go crazy. She still couldn’t quite fathom the reasons behind Major Todd’s actions of placing her there. After fainting the horrible night of her a*******n, Sophia didn’t remember how she got here. She woke up to find herself in the fort surrounded by Cherokee Indians.

Her thoughts turned back to the major and asked herself the same questions for the thousandth time. Why would a decorated soldier care what she thought about him? And why lock her up with the Cherokee? None of it made any sense to her.

Her gaze scanned the prisoners inside the fort’s interior, their worn clothing and emaciated bodies. These kind and loving people treated her better than her own kind had. Even during this terrible time, their numbers diminishing daily as more and more died from the deplorable conditions and lack of food, they continued to care for her, in spite of the fact that she was white. Especially Martin. He’d taken care of her almost from the moment she’d opened her eyes and found she was a prisoner. Over the last few weeks, the elderly Indian had taken a special interest in her, acting more like a grandfather than a friend…at least how she imagined a grandfather would be if she’d ever known one. Everything she now knew about the Cherokee was so very wrong from what she’d been taught.

Sophia turned away from the gruesome sight of the growing mound of bodies in the corner of the fort. It was a constant reminder of just how dire their situation was. As she did several times each day, she rose on her tiptoes and searched through the crowd of listless bodies until she found Martin sitting against the far wall.

Carefully making her way across the courtyard, she pushed through the last line of people and stood in front of Martin. With no care for the tiny ants scurrying through the loose sand—or how unladylike she’d become—Sophia dropped down beside him and crossed her legs as the Indians did, which was a surprisingly comfortable position.

“Martin? Why are we still here? Why are we held here like prisoners?” Her words came out clipped, but Martin didn’t seem to notice.

“One of the more friendly guards told me our departure was changed to avoid the hot weather,” he answered in his usual calm manner. “I did not want you to worry more, so I said nothing.”

Sophia sighed. “I was afraid of that. You’ve been too cheerful.” She tucked her arm through his and wrapped her fingers around his balled fist. “I’m not a little child. I can handle more than you think.” A smile tugged at one side of her mouth, and she bumped him gently with her shoulder. “I just wish I could understand why this is happening to your people.”

Martin’s lip curled in disgust, and his eyes narrowed into small slits on his weathered face. “The white man is not interested in the care of our land but in its riches—specifically, gold.” Sophia’s eyebrows furrowed together as several more questions popped into her head, but she pressed her lips together, biting her tongue in order to keep silent. “Our homeland is fertile, and we were able to grow many kinds of crops. Over the years, white men crossed our lands. They found gems, gold, and silver and wanted it for themselves. The Choctaw and several other tribes have already resettled out west, including my best friend, Strong Eagle, and his family. I miss them.”

She watched his gaze shift from hers to the empty space over her shoulder, and squeezed his hand. She didn’t want to press him for more, but she needed to have answers. “So, everyone here will be moved west as well? How far west will they take us?”

He didn’t answer. Several minutes passed in silence. His gaze was empty as he continued to stare over her shoulder.

“My wife and I were brought here with everyone else.”

She frowned in confusion. “Your wife?” At times since her arrival, he’d worn his sorrow like a cloak, but she hadn’t known him well enough to ask at first. Then as time passed, she’d never found a good time to ask him what weighed so heavy on his heart. Turning her head slightly, she followed the direction of his gaze, which was focused on the mound of bodies in the corner behind her. She closed her eyes for a moment, wishing she could take back the question. His sadness was palpable. She threaded her fingers through his. “Martin, I am so very sorry.”

He shrugged, his gaze dropping to their clasped hands. “She was sick for a while. We knew it was only a matter of time. I just wish it hadn’t been here.”

She wanted to comfort him, to at least say something to ease his obvious heartache, but she couldn’t find the words. She’d never faced so much loss before and wasn’t sure how to help herself much less help Martin. The only real family she’d ever known was her mother and father, but it had been her old nanny and her nanny’s two children who’d taught her what the bond of family should be.

Martin sadly patted her knee. She wasn’t sure whether he was trying to comfort her or himself. “The Ani’Yun’wiya have lived and cared for these lands many lifetimes—it is with heavy hearts that we leave our homes.

From her first day in the godforsaken fort, she had witnessed the Cherokees’ a***e at the hands of the soldiers. The generous people had been starved and beaten. She gazed at the fort’s inhabitants, clumped together in family groups. Her chest tightened at the pathetic sight. She tamped down an intense, unfamiliar flood of anger. “Surely the government doesn’t want the Cherokee treated like this?” she whispered.

Martin smiled. If the tiny lift of his lips could be called a smile. “No, little one. General Scott is a good man. I was there when he gave the orders for all of us to receive food and blankets. Because so many here have died, he also commanded that the soldiers treat us better…but these orders are not obeyed.”

“And the other? What was the word you used…ani-something.”

His smile widened. “Ani’Yun’wiya. That is who we are.” He raised his free hand with a quick motion toward the people surrounding them. “It is what we call ourselves. The name was given to us by the ancient Cherokee who passed before. Ani’Yun’wiya means the Principal People.”

“Why do you talk differently than the other Cherokee? Did you go to school? And why don’t you go by your Indian name?”

“You have many questions,” he grunted, but Sophia caught the approval glistening in his clear eyes. “Martin is my only name. As more white families settled these lands, my grandfather believed we would need white names, so trading between our people would be easier and we wouldn’t seem too different. My father had two names, Cherokee and white. By the time I was born, he never used his Cherokee name, and I was only Martin.”

Sophia’s admiration for the old Indian grew as she listened. In spite of everything his people had been through, the Cherokee spirit remained strong. Even as death hovered, waiting for its next victim, Sophia observed their loving regard for one another—and not just the individual families. They seemed more like one huge family.

“I attended William and Mary, the white man’s college in Virginia,” Martin said, pushing out his thin chest with pride. “My father insisted. He was a smart man, my father. He watched as the white settlements grew larger. He told me I must become an important person—that the Cherokee would need important people to survive.” Sophia watched his bony shoulders wilt. “I don’t feel so important now.”

“I know it isn’t much, but you are very important to me.” She placed her small hand over Martin’s skeletal arm and squeezed. Her tentative smile disappeared as his bushy gray brows drew together and his gaze hardened.

“Martin?”

He gently patted her arm and forced his stiff old body into a stand. “I will return shortly.”

Sophia turned and watched as he made his way toward the front of the fort. He stopped beside one of the fort’s tall log doors and crossed his arms over his thin chest. She leaned to one side to see what Martin was doing and saw him talking to a very handsome man. Her eyebrows rose as she peered closer. The younger man’s face could have been chiseled from stone. He had high cheekbones and a perfect nose, and his skin was dark like the Cherokees. Even though she was too far away to be certain, his eyes looked black.

As if he knew he was being studied, his dark gaze quickly moved around the enclosure, finally landing on her. Even with the distance between them, her stomach knotted, and a small kernel of fear balled in her stomach. His gaze seemed to pierce her soul. The hairs on her arms and neck rose the longer he stared…his piercing gaze made her feel as if she were being stalked by a predator. Forcing herself to look away, she decided she wasn’t that curious about who he was after all. She couldn’t help herself, however—two seconds later, she was studying him again. He wore dark gray wool trousers and a light gray shirt covered by a soft-looking brown leather coat. The clothing almost fooled her, but she knew he was an Indian. If so, how was he able to ride around the countryside without being locked up?

A sharp yell pulled her attention away from his handsome face to a group of boys who were hitting a small rock back and forth between them with a stick. The hair on her arms and back of her neck rose, and she had the eerie sensation of being watched. She slowly scanned the stockade, trying to find whoever was staring at her. She finally noticed a uniformed soldier standing under the shaded overhang of a small shed several feet away, but she couldn’t see his face until he stepped out into the early morning sunshine. She sucked in a breath, holding it until her lungs burned. It was Major Todd. His hooded gaze followed her every move.

Uncomfortable and not wanting to talk to the major or draw any attention to herself, Sophia stood, her palms nervously trying to smooth the tattered material of her skirt. It had been a gift from one of the women who’d taken pity on her the night she’d arrived wearing her dirty nightgown. She despised the ill-fitting and scratchy garment, but refused to complain. It was much more proper than the nightgown.

She turned to walk toward Martin and the handsome stranger, but before she could finish the forward motion of her step, a hand wrapped around her upper arm and squeezed. She fell backward and hit something hard enough to knock the air from her lungs.

“You try my patience, dear Sophia.” Major Todd said in a low growl. She tried to pull away, but his grip was too tight. All she could do was try to keep upright as he shoved her through several small groups of Indians who backed away from them, their eyes wide with fear.

“Did you think I wouldn’t notice?” he asked then pushed her into the small shed where he’d watched her from a few moments earlier. Frantically, her gaze darted around the room, trying to find some way to protect herself…so she wasn’t prepared when he wrapped his hand tightly around her throat and shoved her against the hard wooden logs of the room’s wall. Something jabbed into her back, but the sharp pain was nothing compared to the constricted burn spreading through her chest as she tried to breathe.

Clawing at his short, stubby fingers, she gasped in minute amounts of air. After several seconds, she wheezed, “What…what…did I…do?” The major ignored her struggle. Dark spots floated in her dimming field of vision as her air-deprived lungs burned.

“You are spending too much time with that Indian,” he spat. “Have you slept with him yet?” The back of his other hand slammed across her face. “w***e,” he spit out, then slapped her again, whipping her head in the other direction sideways. His grip around her throat loosened, and she gulped air in.

The stench of his foul breath as it blasted across her face made her want to retch. She swallowed furiously, trying to control the upward flow of bile in the back of her throat. Tears of pain and frustration filled her eyes, but she refused to let a single one fall. His eyes narrowed, and a strangled sob caught in her tight throat as fear raced through her battered body. “Martin is like a grandfather to me. Nothing more.” She choked out the words. Her body felt like it was on fire, but strangely, her face felt numb.

A small tic began in his right eye and he took one slow step back, his hand dropping to his side. She pulled herself upright and eased away from whatever had been digging into her shoulder blades. With each deep, calming breath, the tremors faded from her exhausted muscles, and her body stilled. No matter how much this man tormented her, she refused to appear weak, or let him know how much his actions and words affected her.

“He might have lived in a regular house and worn our clothing, but he’s still a filthy Indian. Your mother worked too hard to make you into a lady—a white lady, I might add. Do not disappoint me again. Next time, I will not be as forgiving, and you will be treated like the rest of these savages.”

She let her gaze follow him as he clomped across the room. He might as well have been speaking in a foreign language, because she hadn’t understood what he’d just said. She gently massaged her tender neck, her thoughts chaotic as she tried to figure out the major’s insinuation—both about the ‘white lady’ as well as her treatment. She wasn’t treated any differently than the Cherokee, and the other remark made no sense to her at all.

The slight squeak of the hinges as the major opened the door pulled her out of her thoughts, and her breath caught in her chest when he stopped. Thankfully, he didn’t turn but simply pinned her with his dark gaze as he glared at her over his shoulder. The slimy smirk on his face made her empty stomach roil. “You will learn to do as you’re told. I was promised your cooperation.”

After the door slammed shut behind him, her shaking returned, now more with anger than fear. “How dare he?” she whispered. “He is delusional if he thinks I will ever be his wife.” She might be young and alone, but she wasn’t without her own gifts. A lifetime of dodging her mother’s foul temper and underhanded slights had given her strength. From somewhere deep inside her, she drew on that power. Without a doubt, she knew she would be able to handle whatever the major threw at her.

Edging around the door, she hung her head and picked her way through the crowd, trying to remain invisible to curious gazes. Gingerly, she lowered her sore body to the ground at the base of the far wall, one side of her frame pressed against the rough wood, and tucked her feet underneath her. With her head against the wall, she closed her eyes. The voices around her faded into the background as exhaustion claimed her.

“Oh, Lord. What happened to you?”

The young male voice startled her awake. Her eyes flew open and she glanced up, instinctively scooting away from the young man despite the soreness in her muscles. When her sluggish mind realized it wasn’t Major Todd, but another young soldier she’d occasionally seen standing guard, she relaxed. His wide-eyed, sky blue gaze and open mouth steadied the choking panic writhing in her gut. He had the appearance of a gangly youth, more arms and legs than bulk. He was very cute, though, and in about ten years would mature into a handsome man.

“I ran into a small problem.” She grimaced. Her slender fingers hovered over her cheek, then dropped into her lap. “Is it very noticeable?”

The young soldier stared down at her swollen face. He shook his head, the sunlight catching pale red highlights in his brown hair, but she could see the uncertainty in his gaze. “Not too much.” He squatted and handed her a bundle loosely held in his grip. When she took the wad of material from him, he sat back on his heels. “Who did this?” He jerked his head toward the large group at his back, his gaze locked with hers. “The Cherokee are good people. They wouldn’t have done this.” Realization dawned and his eyes widened. “It was a soldier, wasn’t it?”

Sophia didn’t answer. Carefully, she unwrapped the dirty blanket and stared into the age-cracked porcelain face of the antique doll her father had given her as a child. Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath. She hadn’t told anyone about her problems with the major, or how she’d ended up at the fort; for whatever reason, she surprised herself and told the young soldier everything.

After a short silence, another voice joined their quiet conversation. “Child, why did you not tell me?” Martin leaned forward and tipped her face up with the tips of his fingers. Sadness filled his eyes as he stared at her swollen cheek. “We take care of each other. That is what family does. You are a part of the Cherokee family now. Of my family.”

So many feelings flooded through her, filling her heart until her chest ached. She clutched the doll to her chest, drawing strength from her father’s gift. Her heart felt shredded. She wanted nothing more than for her father to show up at the gate to take her home—but now that she had Martin, she knew she couldn’t leave him either.

Looking up, she met the older Indian’s worried gaze. “I’m all right. At least I will be.” She nestled the doll in her lap and willed her jittery stomach to calm down. “My old nanny’s daughter, Sally, told me the major was a bad man. She used to say, ‘He has devil eyes, Miss Sophia. I seen the fires a-burnin’ in them. Devil eyes.’” She blinked back the threatening rush of tears. “Sally was right, you know,” she whispered.

“Excuse me. Sir?” The young soldier motioned for Martin to follow him a few feet away.

Sophia watched Martin quickly glance at the doll draped across her lap, but he didn’t ask about it, and she was simply too tired to explain. Crossing his arms over his chest, he turned to face the young man.

“Name’s Bryan, sir. Bryan MacConnell.” His voice lowered, and she had to focus to hear his words over the background noises filtering in. “I haven’t been here long, but I’ve seen how you take care of her, sir. Major Todd ordered me to give her the doll, but when I saw what he’d done to her, I couldn’t give her his message.”

“What’s the message? I will tell Sophia when she’s feeling better.”

Bryan shuffled from one foot to the other. “I don’t rightly understand it, but he wanted her to know her father wouldn’t be comin’ for her. Said he was restin’ with her mother.”

Sophia heard a cry filled with so much pain it brought tears to her eyes, and was startled to realize the cry had come from her. Unaware of the stream of tears staining her face as she gasped for air, she felt arms wrap around her trembling shoulders. She cried until she couldn’t cry anymore, then gently pulled away from Martin with a loud hiccup. She wiped her face with the backs of her hands. “Thank you,” she whispered. “When I heard what Bryan said…” She clenched her jaws together, willing away the overwhelming grief threatening to erupt all over again.

“Miss Sophia, I don’t understand. Your parents are together. That’s good, isn’t it?” Bryan’s face pulled into a lopsided frown.

She moved her head slowly from side to side as more tears again trickled down her face. She drew in a shaky breath. “No, that’s not good. My mother’s dead.” She turned her soggy gaze to Martin. “The major killed my father.” Sorrow consumed her body, squeezing and crushing her chest. She bit the tender flesh on the inside of her cheeks, the momentary sting of pain giving her a brief reprieve.

From somewhere deep inside her, a small spark stuttered, then roared to life. She pushed her shoulders back and sat up straighter. Crying and feeling sorry for herself would do her no good. She let loose the strong will and determination that had cost her a close relationship with a mother. Sophia was going to use the very thing that had made her life miserable as a weapon against the major.

Martin’s joints popped and creaked as he lowered himself to sit beside her. Finally, after a few grunts and moans while crossing his legs, he managed to get comfortable. Not wanting any more questions, she changed the subject. “Martin, who were you talking to earlier?”

His eyes sparkled. “He is the son of my best friend, Strong Eagle. They were relocated several years ago with the rest of their tribe to the lands promised by President Jackson. Strong Eagle’s son is named Clay.”

“Only Clay?” she prodded.

“When he joined the Lighthorse, Clay took the last name of Jefferson after the third president. He believed taking a last name like everyone else would allow the White law to respect him more if he seemed more like them.

“Clay asked me questions about the relocation—and our treatment here. The Cherokee Council wants to try to stop the move.”

“What is the Lighthorse?” Sophia asked, trying to convince herself she was more interested in the Indian history than Martin’s handsome friend.

“It is a group of appointed warriors who uphold Choctaw laws—an honorable profession among the tribe.”

“Does Clay also have an Indian name?”

Martin nodded. “Nighthawk.”

“Nighthawk,” she quietly repeated. She knew nothing about Indian names, but his sounded strong. Clay’s handsome face shadowed her thoughts as her tired mind replayed the day’s events. She wanted to know more about Clay. How did he know Martin was here, and why would the council have sent him? Clay was also an Indian, so how was he able to avoid recapture? A small kernel of hope began to form. She wanted to see Clay Jefferson again. Maybe she would even muster enough nerve to talk to him, too.