Free The Legend of Tyoga Weathersby by H L Grandin Page A

shards sliced his knees and shins as he slid fifteen feet down the slope while holding the poles of the travois high above his head. The heel of his left foot caught the lip of a small crevasse to stop the slide into the ravine below.
    Tes Qua moaned at the jostling, but remain unconscious.
    It took Tyoga over an hour to maneuver his friend down from the ridge, which, at the best of times, had been a thirty-second romp for the two of them. When they finally arrived at the stream along which the bear trap had been seated, Tyoga stopped, fell to his knees and took a long cool drink of the fresh mountain water.
    Tyoga looked back over his shoulder at his unconscious friend.
    Where is the dread and despair? Shouldn’t I be fearful that I won’t be strong enough to get Tes Qua to safety?

    No where could he find those natural human responses. Before the events of that evening, he would have been a frightened white boy alone in the woods, injured, tired, hungry, cold, and engaged in a seemingly futile battle to save the life of his friend. Courage had taken their place.
    Like a buffalo in a blizzard, or deer in a lightening storm, he was part of the fabric of nature’s course. The realization that whatever should occur will happen and unfold exactly as it is meant to be was an absolute revelation.
    The promise had prepared me to anticipate and read nature’s signs and subtle cues, but did the wolf somehow teach me their meaning and let me know intuitively what to do when the guideposts were revealed?
    A surrendering peace flooded his mind and soul.
    He looked to the heavens and saw the stars peaking through the boughs of the willow trees lining the gurgling stream and remembered his papa’s words to him after his awakening.
    “In all things there are but two outcomes – and each is in keeping with nature’s wondrous plan.”
    He would be successful in getting his friend to the help that he needed—or he would not. In either case, their journey would end exactly as it was meant to be. He did not question whether he had the strength to get Tes Qua home. He did. He no longer questioned his decision to take the valley route. It was the decision that was made. It was right. He would see it through. Or not.
    He looked at his friend and quietly spoke his name,. “Tes ‘a? Tes ‘a? Esginehvis?” (Are you thirsty?)
    Tes Qua did not answer, and Tyoga did not persist. He needed rest now more than water. Unconscious was the best place for him to be.
    He rose from his knees, picked up the travois, and put his back to the task. As he pulled his friend through the night, the rhythmic cadence of his footsteps melded with the sounds of the forest and the ether of the night. Moving beyond fatigue he walked through the darkness. Unwilling to yield to exhaustion’s call, he staggered forward.
    Forging ahead, he stepped back in time and he thought of her.

    He could not recall his life without her.
    Sunlei Awi (Morning Deer) was Tes Qua Ta Wa’s baby sister, and the daughter of Nine Moons and True Moon. Tyoga and Tes Qua were born in 1682, and Sunlei came along about a year and a half later. The three were often entrusted to the care of one of their mothers. Tyoga’s mother, Emma, would leave him in the care of True Moon in the Ani-Unwiya village during planting or harvest time; and Tes Qua and Sunlei would stay with the Weathersbys during hunting season. Oftentimes, when True Moon was engaged in a task, the three were left in the care of Tes Qua’s aunt, Awigadoga (Standing Deer). In the Native American tradition, the three children gained sustenance often from the same breast.
    It was their time together in the Amansoquath village of Tuckareegee that the three grew to cherish the most. In the joy of their nakedness, they ran through the village unfettered by the constraints of the more puritanical mores of the Scotch-Irish traditions practiced by the Weathersby household. They learned about the ways of the forest, and the honored