Original Death by Eliot Pattison

three years ago, even how Hickory John sat with the boy for four days and nights without sleep when the pox then struck Ishmael.
    â€œWhen he finally asked me where the boy was, if he was safe, I had to tell him I did not know. When I returned to my house, Ishmael had stripped off most of his clothes. He had leggings over his britches and had untied his long hair. I tried to stop him. Mon Dieu , he’s only a boy. He had used soot and whitewash to paint his body like some savage warrior. He said—” the woman’s voice broke and her hand went to her mouth.
    â€œSaid what?”
    â€œHe wasn’t the boy anymore. The look in his eyes scared me as much as seeing those bodies today. It was like he had been possessed. He had the look of a wild beast.”
    â€œWhat did he say?” Duncan insisted.
    â€œâ€˜Now is the time to shake with fear,’ he declared, then he looked up as if speaking to something in the sky. ‘The world breaker is here!’ he shouted. Then he ran into the forest.”
    â€œWorld breaker!” Sagatchie repeated the word in alarm.
    Duncan looked up at him.
    â€œIt is a monster from the old stories, a demon from the end of time when the world has to be destroyed to save the gods.”
    Madame Pritchard crossed herself. They remained silent for a long moment, the name of the spirit monster seeming to hang in the air. Then the French woman dipped the ladle in the water bucket again. She was lifting it to Duncan’s lips when it was knocked out of her hand from behind.
    â€œWho the hell gave you permission to visit with my prisoner?” Sergeant Hawley roared as he appeared out of the shadows. He spat a curt word in the Mohawk’s tongue and Sagatchie backed away, his eyes remaining on Duncan until he disappeared into the shadows. Madame Pritchard rose from her stool, meekly bowed to the sergeant, and followed the Mohawk.
    â€œIf I didn’t have to account to the colonel for that dead corporal of his I would string you up right now!” Hawley shouted at Duncan. He extended a small metal token on a neck strap toward Duncan, a familiar bronze circle with a tree etched on one side and a large W on the other. “If ye were a ranger on duty ye would have shown this to us! Which means ye’r a damned deserter! We beat deserters with halberds to break their bones before we hang them!”
    Duncan’s mouth went dry as he watched Hawley set the lantern on the stool then pick up a length of rope. “Captain Woolford,” Duncan ventured as Hawley tied a heavy double knot into the end of the rope. “Woolford is my officer.”
    â€œA lie! Woolford and his men are in the North, with the others along the Saint Lawrence.”
    â€œHe does special missions for the general in Albany.”
    â€œThat don’t include cold-blooded murder of the king’s men!”
    â€œI told you. I was trying to help.”
    â€œI believe yer actions, not yer words! We found what else ye had stowed in yer kit. The dead soldier has a name now.” The sergeant flung two items onto the floor beside Duncan. The first was a tattered pasteboard rectangle printed with a large 42, bearing the handwritten name Jock MacLeod above blocks printed with the names of months. It was a pay chit, the record soldiers presented to receive the king’s shillings. Beside it lay the small, finely worked dirk Duncan had taken from the drowned Scot.
    Hawley seemed unable to contain his wrath. He furiously whipped the rope at Duncan. The knot was like a rock against his flesh. It hit hisshoulders, his neck, his belly, then drew blood from his jaw. “You bastard! I’m going to drag you behind a horse all the way to the Highland garrison!” he shouted. “Colonel Cameron can decide whether to hang you as a deserter or just as a murderer!”

Chapter Three
    T his is how we first die . The words gnawed at Duncan. Conawago had never let Duncan hold