Louisiana History Collection - Part 1 by Jennifer Blake

certainty that that way led to death. She did not want to die, though the choice offered to her seemed only marginally better.
    Reynaud moved toward her, ducking under the magnolia limb with a graceful twist of his body and leaning over to offer her his hand. She wanted to refuse it; any other time she would have done so instantly. Instead, she stared at him, noting that he had donned more protective clothing, wearing beaded leggings and a heavier, thigh-length cloak of soft buckskin. His crown of feathers and topknot of hair were gone, replaced by a simple queue tied with a leather thong. She felt an odd constraint, as if she were held by the force of his will, while in her head beat the cadence of the words he had spoken to the merchant and the need to know to what extent they applied to her.
    She reached up to put her hand in his. The touch, the voluntary contact of her palm with that of this man, sent a shudder along her nerves that spread through her body, lodging in the pit of her stomach. The warmth and strength of his grasp brought the dew of perspiration to her upper lip. There was a tremor in her voice that did not hide the bitterness as she inquired, “And will I also be safe?”
    “None will be safer, since none will be closer.”
    He drew her up to stand before him, then reached to steady her as he felt the trembling that shook her. She twitched away from him, turning her back. He stood, staring at her erect head and stiff shoulders, torn between anger and chagrin that she should find him so repulsive and yet more disturbed by the fine edge of panic he had seen in her eyes.
    It took the best part of two hours to reach the river. The night was dark, without a moon. They moved with slow care, cutting straight through the woods by some reckoning Reynaud alone knew and avoiding the road. The half-breed scouted ahead every few hundred yards, ranging back to them to urge them forward, directing them with care over slopes littered with limestone shale or around thickets of wild plums. Their progress was slow but without incident.
    They found the boat where he had left it covered with underbrush, a heavy craft hollowed from a great log. It appeared to be half full of provisions wrapped in strapped bundles to form packs. Elise was doubtful that it would also carry the six of them, but under Reynaud’s direction they were squeezed into it. It sank low in the water, wallowing as he shoved off, then leaped aboard, but once he had settled down and dug in his paddle, setting the beat for St. Amant and Pascal, it bore them well.
    The women and Henri were spaced between the men with paddles, Elise sitting just ahead of Reynaud. She leaned forward to get out of his way as he changed his paddle from one side of the boat to the other. She looked back over her shoulder, glancing at his dark form, which moved with what appeared to be effortless ease to send them skimming over the water, before fastening her gaze on the receding shore. The hills and bluffs glowed with fires in the darkness. Back there was all that she owned now, her land, the only place to which she had any ties. She did not know when she would see it again, or if she ever would. She did not know what she would do when she reached Fort Saint Jean Baptiste, how she would live, where she would stay. None of it seemed to matter. The only important thing was getting away, and the price she must pay for that escape.
    There was a movement on the bank they had left, then another. “I think they have seen—” she began.
    A shout of anger rang across the water, followed by a shot and the whistling passage of a musket ball. Reynaud bent harder into his paddle. The others followed suit, grunting with the effort. Another shot exploded, echoing with a muffled booming over the river, reverberating from the wooded shore opposite, so very far away. The ball skipped away over the water on their right. It was followed by another, and yet another.
    They were a shifting, uncertain