Jamestown (The Keepers of the Ring) Read Online Free PDF

certainly did not want his hated enemy to know that any had escaped from the slaughter at Ocanahonan. How would Gepanocon explain the children’s fair eyes or his own pale skin and red hair if the Powhatan noticed them?
    Through a crack in the grass covering of the hut, Fallon spied on the traders. “You want copper pots?” Gepanocon was saying, folding his arms as he sat in the center of the camp. “We have only those we gained through trade with the clothed men. Why do you think we have others?”
    One of the visitors pulled a long arrow from the quiver on his painted back. The copper arrowhead gleamed in the sun.
    “The clothed men did not use copper for arrowheads,” the most fiercely painted warrior said, turning the arrow so the copper glimmered in the bright light of afternoon. “How then, did this come to be made?”
    Gepanocon grinned toothlessly. “I may know this answer later, in one or two moons. But I cannot tell you now.”
    “If you know of the clothed men,” the painted warrior continued, purposefully tapping the arrow against his broad palm, “you should speak. Our chief, Powhatan, hates the clothed men. He wants them to leave this land.”
    Gepanocon’s smile did not fade. “If I have news, I will tell you later,” he said, lifting his hands toward the elders who surrounded him. The elders nodded in agreement as if the issue were settled.
    The visiting delegation parted as an aged member of their party stepped forward. The elder’s face seemed to be made of points and edges: a sharp nose and chin, high cheekbones planing down from shrewd ridges of bone. A stark white scar shone vividly upon his cheek. Though the warrior’s long hair was streaked with gray, power flashed from his eyes and rang in his voice as he spoke: “I, Opechancanough, am brother to the mighty Powhatan. And I have a gift for you, Gepanocon of Ritanoe.”
    Gepanocon’s eyes gleamed with interest as Opechancanough gestured to a warrior at his side. The man stepped forward and deposited a buckskin bundle at Opechancanough’s feet. With one smooth gesture, Opechancanough unwrapped the bundle, bringing forth a cloak lined with the luxurious fur of many beaver. An audible murmur of approval and delight rose from the crowd of onlookers, and he tossed it over his shoulder and turned to display it, dark and gleaming against the bronze cast of his skin.
    Inside the hut, Fallon gritted his teeth, pained at Opechancanough’s cleverness. Such a gift demanded an equally extravagant present in return, and what did Gepanocon have to rival such a magnificent cloak? To refuse the gift would be an insult to the brother of the Powhatan chief, and to offer a gift of less value would demean the werowance of the tribe at Ritanoe.
    Opechancanough held the cloak toward the werowance of Ritanoe, and Gepanocon paused only a moment before accepting it. He stepped forward, flung the cloak around his shoulders, then revolved slowly so his people could admire their chief. When he had finished, he bowed his head carefully and stepped inside his hut. The anxious crowd murmured while Fallon waited to see what the chief would do.
    Finally Gepanocon returned, carrying in two hands a gleaming copper pot big enough to cover a man’s head. Fallon recognized it—one of the men from Ocanahonan had fashioned it from fine copper only a week ago and presented it to the werowance. ‘Twas Gepanocon’s most prized possession.
    Opechancanough received the pot with a solemn bow, then handed it to a lesser warrior as the party of traders withdrew from the village. Fallon turned away from the sight and sank in a despairing heap on the floor. Gepanocon had meant to deceive, but he’d been caught in a trap. If Opechancanough had come to trade, this mission had failed, but if he had come to learn whether any of the English still lived, he had of certain accomplished his goal.

     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    FIVE
     
     
    T he Powhatan warriors ran through the forest