Short Story - A Frozen Heart

(Authors note - The following short story is reasonably graphic and barbaric. Those persons who may be emotionally affected or squeamish should skip this story and go on to the others after it)

The first time I experienced the death of loved ones was when I was a Captain in the US Cavalry stationed in the mid-west.

My troops and I had been given the responsibility of a routing some Blackhawk renegades who had been attacking wagon trains coming from the East during the past few weeks. The savages had also attacked some of the settlements along the way often killing innocent women and children in a most inhumane manner. Often they would shoot pregnant women in the stomach with their arrows and leave both baby and mother to die. Usually the arrows would instantly killed baby or the foetus. The mother however would often live until either she bled to death for the dead infant poisoned her from the inside. They would dispatch of the children by throwing them up in the air and letting the other warriors spear them with their lances. For the ones that missed the lance, their broken bodies would lay writhing in agony after they had returned to earth smashing their bodies as they hit the ground.

When they killed the men they would scalp them. Sometimes the men were not quite dead as the Indians took their rough and semi-blunt stone knives and, grabbing a handful of scalp in one hand and pulling hard, would start sawing away at the man's forehead until his skin started to come away from his skull. The process continued until the savage held the man's hair and scalp in his hand and the man lay bleeding and dying on the ground. The Indians believed the man's spirit was taken away from him when he lost his scalp.

I have seen many people killed by the Blackhawk in most gruesome of ways. I had yet to see just one of them show evidence of having been killed in a humane way. My resolve to rid the world of this scourge was foremost in my mind and my soul. I had felt nothing but a dull ache and a massive black hole in the middle of my body since my wife and child had also fallen victim to these monsters.

Kate and Jessica were coming west with one of the wagon trains to live with me at the fort. Most of the officer's wives and children had moved to the posts over the past months and their passage had always been safe and well guarded by the escorts provided by the soldiers. The route had been much farther south than the area of the Blackhawk attacks so we all felt secure in the belief that our loved ones would be safe.

On this particular day however, the Blackhawk had attacked by surprise and in that area where they had not been seen previously. They attacked the wagon train with the full savagery they were legendary for. The wagon train had pulled into a circle and the soldiers had stayed outside the circle of wagons to flank the Indians. The Indians had been smarter and had some small war parties already hidden amongst the rocks and the trees. The soldiers never stood a chance. They were mown down in a hail of arrows until they were all either dead or critically wounded. The savages had then moved in and scalped them in full view of the civilians in the wagon train. I can just imagine how both horrific and terrifying it would have been for the women and children to watch men dying in such a manner.

The Indians had then rode their horses around the circle of wagons and their archers took their deadly aim and picked off the defenders one by one until only the women and children were left. The savages had then breached the perimeter of the circle of wagons and raped the women in full view of their children. Even though the women were brutalised by these monsters they tried to bargain with their bodies while they begged for the Indians to spare the children. Their pleading had been futile. When the savages had had their way with the women, the riders on horseback snatched up the little children and threw them in the air as high as they could in full view of their mothers who watched their sons and daughters screaming until they screamed no more as they were either lanced or hit the ground. When all of the children were dead and lay mangled on the ground, the savages gutted the women and left them there in the dirt to bleed to death.

One of the women have had the good fortune to be able to crawl behind some barrels that had fallen off a wagon and the Indians had not seen her while they killed all of her companions.

Two days later, when the wagon train had not arrived at the fort, the commanding officer, General Fletcher had summoned me and told me of his concerns. He could have saved his words, as I could tell what he was thinking when I have looked in his eyes upon walking into his office. I had ridden out immediately with a patrol and have found the remains of the convoy shortly before nightfall.

When the woman had seen us approaching she had crawled out from behind some rocks where she was hiding and told us her gruesome story. Shortly after hearing the end of her story, I found my beloved Kate all broken and torn, her arms and legs and strange angles to her body, her skin bloody and ripped, so defiled that I had hardly recognised her. One of her arms was outstretched her fingers seemingly straining into the distance. When I followed the line in which her arm was pointing, I saw my baby Jessica on the ground. At first I thought that I was looking at a crumpled heap of clothing. I soon realised that this was the shape that Jessica's body had taken as it hit the ground and her life was robbed from her.

A messenger was sent back to the fort for help and, with tears in our eyes, we recovered the bodies and escorted them and the remains of the wagon train back to the fort the following day. No sign of a Blackhawk was seen in our journey although we knew their eyes were everywhere watching us. Once back in the safety of our compound, the bodies of the victims who were our loved ones that we would never speak to again, were lovingly attended to and placed in coffins. Church services were held where the great outpouring of grief provided some outlet for the sorrow and anger that was felt by everybody there. Their burial service was a very subdued affair and was restricted to the families and friends of the victims.

As the sun disappeared over the horizon and the day became night, blackness had eaten its way into my soul and taken possession of my whole being. Any fear that I had previously experienced had evaporated and replaced with a quiet determination. I promised that I would rid the land of the animals that taken away my Kate and my Jessica from me. As a soldier trained to set emotions aside and get the job done, they were the only to human beings that I had ever felt any love for. Now they had been stolen from me before their time.

I would make sure that the Blackhawk would come to shake with fear when they heard the name Captain Mason Jordan.