Chapter 104

I gave my promise and began the effort of getting him mounted again while he was still conscious. This time, all we could manage was to lay him on his belly across the saddle. I lashed his hands and boots together. If he fell again, he’d at least be hanging on his horse. If Wind didn’t panic and kick him to death, I’d merely have to get him up over the saddle again.

The sun was halfway over the horizon by the time I saw the line of bluffs Bear had described. It was dusk before I spotted a stone resembling an erect male member. I headed south to the twenty-foot bluff and began calling Blood-Mark-Boy’s name loudly over and over again. The light was going fast. I became disoriented. And then everything literally went black.

I woke sitting erect in my saddle when I sensed someone at my side. In the near darkness, a shadowy figure reached out to me. When I shrank back, a light voice spoke in Lakota.

“Do not worry. You called me. I am Blood-Mark-Boy.”