Thomas helped Clara and Abigail up into the bed of the wagon, settling them beside Mrs. Henderson, who was weeping quietly while holding her infant baby.
Thomas made to climb up over the wooden sideboard.
"Thomas!" Clara cried out, grabbing his sleeve. "Aren't you coming?"
Thomas paused. He looked back toward the barn. Barnum and Captain were locked in their stalls, nickering softly, oblivious to the terror unfolding around them. His milk cow, Bessie, was standing in the pasture, chewing her cud near the fence.
"I can't leave the horses locked in the stalls to starve or burn, Clara," Thomas said grimly. "I'll turn them loose into the pasture so they have a chance. I’ll ride Captain and follow right behind you. I won't be three minutes behind!"
"No! Thomas, no! Come with us now!" Clara sobbed, reaching for him.
"Drive, Jacob!" Thomas commanded, slapping the side of the wagon hard with his palm. "Drive! I’ll be right behind you!"
Henderson didn't hesitate. He cracked his whip over the horses' ears. The wagon lurched forward with a violent jolt, its wooden wheels spinning up clouds of brown dust as it thundered down the road toward the south.
"Thomas!" Clara’s voice drifted back to him through the dust, small, frantic, and heartbroken.
Thomas watched them go until the wagon disappeared over the crest of the hill.
Then, he turned and ran toward the barn. His heart was hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. He threw open the stall doors, slapping Barnum hard on the hip to drive him out into the open pasture. He pulled a leather halter onto Captain, threw a folded blanket over the horse's back, and led him out into the yard.
He stepped up to the mounting block, throwing his leg over Captain’s back. He gathered the leather reins in his left hand, his shotgun resting across the pommel of his makeshift riding rig.
He turned Captain’s head toward the south, preparing to dig his heels into the horse's flanks.
Then, he stopped.
A strange, low vibration rattled through the soles of his boots resting in the stirrups. It was not a noise heard through the air; it was a rhythmic, thunderous tremor rising up through the dark earth itself.
Captain reared back slightly, tossing his head and letting out a sharp, frightened whinny.
Thomas looked to the west, toward the long, rolling crest of the prairie ridge that overlooked his valley.
Against the blazing blue sky, a black line appeared over the top of the hill.
At first, it looked like a dark wave of water cresting the ridge. But as it spilled down the slope, the shape resolved into men on horseback.
Dozens of them. Then hundreds.
It was a war party of Lakota warriors.
They rode hard and fast, spread out in a wide, sweeping crescent formation that spanned half a mile across the open prairie. They were mounted on bareback ponies, their faces painted in stark, terrifying patterns of black, vermilion, and yellow clay. Long turkey feathers and eagle plumes fluttered from their braided hair. They carried rifles, trade muskets, bows, and iron-headed war clubs, their voices rising in a high, shrill, rhythmic war cry that echoed off the surrounding hills like the howling of a thousand wolves.
Hi-yah! Hi-yah! Hi-yah!
Thomas’s blood ran cold.
He looked toward the south. The road to Fort Ridgely was completely wide open, but the northern horn of the Lakota war party was already sweeping down toward the valley floor at a dead gallop. They would intercept him long before he could cover a mile on horseback.
He was cut off.
There was no escaping. There was no running.
Thomas looked at the cabin, then at the barn, then down at the double-barreled shotgun resting in his hands. He had two shots. Two charges of buckshot against a wave of five hundred armed warriors.
He swung his leg over Captain’s back and slid down to the ground. He slapped the horse’s flank hard, driving the animal away toward the river bottom so it would not be caught in the crossfire.
Thomas turned slowly, his boots planted firmly in the dirt of his yard, and raised his shotgun to his shoulder. He stood alone in front of his humble log cabin, his back to his home, facing the thunderous wall of death riding down upon him.
The earth shook beneath the weight of five hundred galloping hooves.
The war party did not charge directly into the yard to trample him. As they reached the flat pasture land of Thomas’s farm, the warriors split into two massive wings, swirling around the cabin and barn in a vast, terrifying whirlwind of dust, iron, and flashing color.
They executed the classic prairie encirclement—a seamless, sweeping movement designed to trap their prey in an inescapable ring of fire and steel.
Within thirty seconds, the ring closed.
Five hundred warriors rode in a slow, tight, continuous circle around Thomas Mercer’s yard. The dust kicked up by their ponies rose thirty feet into the air, creating a swirling wall of golden haze that obscured the sun, turning the bright afternoon into a eerie, twilight realm.
Through the shifting curtain of dust, Thomas could see their faces.
Young men, their bare chests painted with lightning bolts and handprints of white clay. Older men, their faces grim and set like carved stone. They rode with incredible skill, leaning low over their horses’ necks, their rifles and muskets aimed directly at his chest.
The air was filled with the sound of snorting ponies, the jingle of brass bells attached to bridles, the sharp clatter of rifle levers, and the deafening, rhythmic chant of hundreds of voices speaking a language he did not know.
Thomas stood frozen in the center of the ring.
His index finger rested lightly against the front trigger of his shotgun. Sweat trickled down his temple, stinging his eye, but he did not dare blink. He knew that if he fired—if he so much as twitched his hand in a aggressive gesture—a hundred lead balls would tear through his body before he could rack the second hammer.
He was a dead man. He knew it with absolute, terrifying clarity. He prayed silently in his heart, asking God to protect Clara and little Abigail, hoping with everything he had that Henderson’s wagon had gained enough of a head start to reach the stone walls of Fort Ridgely.
The circle of riders began to tighten, closing in from fifty yards to thirty, then to twenty.
From the northern edge of the swarming circle, three horsemen broke away from the main body and trotted slowly into the center of the yard.