Prologue

Republic of Texas

December 1840

Two Days Before Christmas

“Ninety-Eight, Ninety-Nine, One hundred! Ready or not, here, I come!” Eight-year-old Brody Richards jumped from the front porch of the family’s ramshackle cabin. Frost-coated grass crunched beneath his bare feet. He shivered and hollered, “Y’all b-b-better h-hide!”

Face red from the rare cold snap, he raced across the packed-dirt yard. A lock of dark hair looped over one eye as he headed for his younger sister’s favorite hiding spot beneath a haystack.

Six-year-old Betsie never ventured far; she thought that if she couldn’t see him, he couldn’t find her. Like always, her dirty feet stuck out of the hay along with an edge of blue calico dress, though her face was hidden in the mound of sweet-scented hay.

“Now, where can Betsie be?” he asked, chuckling as the hay shook from her laughter. He grabbed her feet and dragged her out, “Here she is!”

“Aw, Bo-bee,” she lisped, “how you find me?” Wisps of hay clung to her face, and one strand had become twisted in her dark braids.

“’Cause you always hide there.” Brody poked her tummy.

Dressed in a thin sweater and threadbare dress, the little girl shivered, pouting. “It was warm in there.”

He took her chilled hand. “Help me find everyone.”

Ben, his best friend, would be the hardest to find. He could squeeze his tall, skinny body into the smallest of hiding spots.

Tugging Betsie along, Brody raced through the small barn, home to the family’s two plow horses and one swaybacked milk cow. They found five-year-old Evan hiding inside a stall, and seven-year-old Mike in the hay loft.

“Let’s find Ben,” Brody told his siblings.

The children scrambled around the barn, then out into the pasture and into a small wood. The thin layer of frost crackled beneath their bare feet; none of them had shoes that fit. Betsie had wished for Santa to bring them each a new pair.

Brody knew the truth but let his sister keep her impossible wishes. Even Santa is too poor to buy shoes.

A sparkling creek ran through a grove of scrub oak where the boys fished on summer afternoons. Today, with the freeze, the water would be too frigid to wade in, even though it moved too fast for ice to form on its surface.

Ben was nowhere to be found.

“Brody!”

“Double darn, that’s Ma; we ain’t found Ben yet.”

“I’m telling Ma you swore, Brody,” Evan said.

Brody grabbed the back of his brother’s overalls as Evan struggled to run. “You better not, or I’ll tell about that snake under your bed!”

Evan jerked away, a scowl on his face, but Brody knew he wouldn’t tattle. He let go of Evan, and they headed back home.

“Brody! Ben!” Ma called from the sagging steps of the porch, “It’s time you headed to the Rivers’ to bring in those cows. You step lively now; Mr. Rivers will be waiting.”

“Ben,” Brody hollered, “Come out!”

Laughter came from the shriveled, brown leaves of an oak. Ben, lively blue eyes dancing with mirth, dropped from a branch overhead. “Ha, ha, I win—you couldn’t find me.”

Gamboling like a couple of sheep, the boys wrestled as they ran toward the porch. Ma smiled. “You hurry home after you finish, Brody. Don’t be late for supper.”

The boys turned and headed down the dusty road toward Ben’s home. Earlier in the day, Ben had walked the five miles with his older sister, Abilene. She’d come to visit Brody’s older sister, Ruth, and sew.

Having Ben spend part of the day was a real treat for Brody and his siblings. The rare sprinkling of snow added to their pleasure, despite the bone-chattering cold.

Brody wasn’t allowed much play time; chores came first. It took every hand to keep their family fed and clothed, and a roof over their head; Pa struggled to make a profit.

“Ain’t nothin’ but a hardscrabble farmer, and that’s all I’ll ever be,” Pa lamented often. “Sure hope one day we’ll be as thriving as Rivers.”

Ben’s family had been in Nacogdoches longer than Brody’s family and were more prosperous. Brody often helped Ben bring their cows in from pasture; it was a chore both boys enjoyed. They chased the cows with long swatches of reeds, pretending they were cowboys on a roundup. They always had fun making sure the cows were secure in the barn each night.

“Two days until Christmas!” Ben rejoiced as they walked along, crunching over icy spots on the hard-packed trail. Ben wore warm leather boots as he jumped into frozen puddles, cracking the icy coatings.

Tagging behind his friend, Brody admired Ben’s sturdy boots. Jealousy prickled his thoughts.

Probably don’t pinch his toes, neither. Brody’s bare feet burned with the cold, but he didn’t complain. Sure wish I believed Santa would bring us shoes like Betsie.

“You getting any presents for Christmas?” Ben asked. “Pa said he might buy me a knife of my own. I showed him one at the Mercantile with a pearl handle.”

Brody shook his head. Presents were for rich folks.

“Doing anything special?”

“Ma said maybe we’d have ham, from old Bacon we slaughtered last fall.”

Ham! It was a rare treat, but not like having leather boots.

“Well, that’s good,” Ben agreed. As if sensing it was time to change the subject, Ben asked, “Hey, Brody, did you hear what happened in San Antone this spring? Papa read about it in an old newspaper he got from Mr. Sims at the store.”

Newspapers didn’t come often to the small villages nearby, so any news from the outside world was shared among them.

“What?” Brody brushed hair from his chilly brow and lifted a blade of grass to his mouth, the icy coating melting as he chewed.

“A bunch of Comanche and rangers got into a fight—some got killed. The paper said the Comanche were going on the warpath and kill every white man they come across.”

A shiver passed over Brody as the wintry sun went behind a cloud. “Aw, that’s a long way from here. I ain’t seen any Indians in months. Why’d they care what we do way out here?”

“Pa says the Comanches are awful mad—say the white man’s taking over their homeland—the Comancheria—and they plan to wipe us all out. The leader’s named ‘Buffalo Hump.’ Papa said the world’s in a sorry state if a man can’t live in peace.”

“You’re just trying to scare me.”

“Ain’t neither, just telling fact. Race you to the big scrub oak!”

Ben took off like a cougar and Brody’s feet ached as he pounded after his friend. San Antone is miles away, he told himself. It’s too fine a day for trouble.

It took a good hour and a half to round up all fifteen of the Rivers’ cows and herd them to the barn. Brody tried not to be jealous of the fine, store-bought lumber barn and all those stalls. They could easily house twenty-five cows or horses. Not like our place. But Pa says one day we’ll have more, too, if we work hard.

“I best get home,” Brody said when they’d gotten the cows inside, fed and watered them. “See you Christmas?”

“Sure.”

Brody headed back down the well-worn path between his family’s homestead and the Rivers’ ranch. It was a long walk, but he was used to it. As he neared home, he stepped faster.

Usually, Betsie and Evan were waiting for him as he came over the last rise. They’d race back to the cabin, laughing and joking, faces flushed, smiles wide.

Strangely, they weren’t there today.

Brody crested the rise and his eyes fixed on black, rolling curls of smoke. Smoke—the barn!

***

“The barn’s on fire!” Brody yelled as he raced across the yard, then was startled to see several sleek horses—cavalry horses—tied to the hitching post in front of the cabin.

The cabin.

Brody’s eyes refused to believe what he saw as he approached. A tan-coated soldier stared at him. Another soldier, tall and lean, came toward him, speaking gently.

“Son, do you live here?”

“Ma? Pa?” Brody asked, pushing past the soldier. Brody stared at the cabin, smoke wafting from the parlor window as a soldier tossed in a bucket of water. The acrid scent of burning wood pinched Brody’s nose and the smoke caused his eyes to water.

“Think it’s out, Sergeant,” the tan-coated soldier said. “We can’t save the barn, but we got the animals out.”

“Do you live here?” the lean soldier asked again, taking Brody’s arm. “Son? Was this your home?”

Brody’s lips moved, but he couldn’t form words. His brown eyes widened as he stared in disbelief. This morning, the hard packed dirt around the cabin had held a rare dusting of white, untainted snow. Now, the snow had melted, dirtied into a muddy brown pigsty, littered with . . .

It can’t be!

Someone had made an unholy mess around the cabin. Ripped clothes dotted the yard, wet and trampled. Ruth’s best bloomers. Pa’s blue-striped Sunday shirt. Little Betsie’s cherished red dress with real pearl buttons. Brody stared at the ruin, his mouth open.

That’s mine and Evan’s patchwork quilt; why’s it all torn like that? And Ma’s Dutch oven? Why’s it thrown down the steps with applesauce spilling out? We never waste food. Where is everyone? What happened?

A soldier in a dark blue cavalry uniform knelt on the porch near . . .

Ma?

Brody hurried to Ma, sprawled on the steps above her Dutch oven. A feathered arrow stuck from her chest, and a small bloody circle spread slowly on the bodice of her dress. Her hazel eyes stared lifelessly at the gray sky.

“Ma!” he screamed as the soldier grabbed him by the arms, jerking him away from Ma’s body.

Another soldier picked up a stained dish towel from the porch and covered Ma’s face.

“I’m sorry,” the man said as he turned Brody’s face away, pressing it against his warm woolen jacket. “It was an Indian attack. We were giving chase but didn’t arrive in time. Is this your family, son? What’s your name?”

“Pa? Where’s Pa? And Ruth an’ Betsie? Where’s my brothers?” Brody shouted, tears filling his eyes as he struggled to pull himself out of the soldier’s strong arms. He wanted to look, to find his family.

The soldiers glanced at the far side of the house. Brody noticed a row of lumps lined up underneath the tattered remains of Ma’s patchwork quilts. Three large mounds and three small.

A little arm in blue calico had fallen out from under the green and white nine-patch quilt. Dead? All dead?

“Betsie?” He could only scream in anguish, falling to his knees and wailing.

Later, Brody found himself on a horse in front of one of the soldiers. They rode down the main street of the village. His mind knew they passed stores, the jail, a church, but his mind was numb as his feet, refusing to accept the devastation.

Mr. Sims’ store had been ransacked, the goods scattered and smashed in the dirty street. The front window held jagged shards of glass, and several Indian arrows had plunged into the wooden porch railings. Blood was pooled on the steps.

The houses had been pillaged. Chickens darted here and there, squawking. Women and children walked around aimlessly. Several lumps lay in the street, covered with blankets, just like the ones back home. Fires smoldered at the bank and Livery, and soldiers had formed a bucket brigade, using water from a horse trough as they worked to save the Widow Miller’s boarding house. One lone puppy sat on a porch, its snout raised in a mournful howl.

Brody barely registered any of it.

The soldiers took Brody to the church. Inside, people sat on the wooden benches, many of them crying, others staring ahead in shock. Mr. Aloysious, the banker, was standing near the door, handing out blankets to newcomers and speaking to a few other men in a low voice. He looked shaken, but determined, as though he was doing his best to be strong for those who weren’t able.

“Boy lost his family,” the soldier told Mr. Aloysious quietly as he guided Brody through the double doors. “We’ve got a detail burying them. Do you know if he has anyone to take him in?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know.” Mr. Aloysious shook his head. “Why? Why did this happen?”

“Maybe the Lord’s will,” the soldier answered. “I’ve got men searching for wounded or . . .” He left the rest unsaid.

Where were you, God? Why didn’t you save my family? Ma read the Bible every night, and we prayed. Even little Betsie could lisp her prayers.

He didn’t know how long he sat in the white, clapboard church. People brought him food he couldn’t eat. Someone covered him with another blanket when it grew dark. Brody sat in a huddle on the floor, not caring. Christmas Eve. Christmas Day, someone said.

Did you get shoes in Heaven, Betsie?

A day later, Ben hurried in, hollering, “He’s here Ma! He’s alive.”

“Brody, we’ve looked everywhere for you!” Mrs. Rivers’ eyes were res and swollen, the rest of her pale as a ghost.

Huge tears formed in Brody’s eyes. He grabbed Ben’s arms and sobbed, “My f-family’s dead, Ben. They’re dead!”

Mrs. Rivers knelt and gathered him in her arms. Pressing her tear-streaked face against his head, she murmured, “It’s all right. It’s a Christmas miracle. You’re my son now. You and Ben are brothers. I lost my beautiful Abilene, but I’ve gained a son. The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away.”

Brody wept, inconsolable.

“Shush, now.”

Someday, somehow, I will find those murdering savages and make them pay. Someday.

Chapter One

Little Sugar Creek

Pea Ridge, Arkansas

Twenty-Two Years Later

“Brody, Get down!”

A Minie ball whistled over his head as thirty-year-old Brody Richards ducked behind a hickory tree. Another of the hollow-based bullets whizzed past, close to his ear, and severed a piece of tree bark behind him. “Where are they?” He could barely hear himself over the noise of battle.

“There’s four Rebs on that ridge,” Ben hollered.

A cannon boomed and the air filled with gun smoke, along with the metallic scents of blood and death. Screams of terrified horses and men pounded at Brody’s ears. Horses panted up the grassy bluffs and threw out clods of dirt from their hooves. The familiar whine of another Minie ball whizzed through the air, hitting its target with a thud. A soldier, body pierced by a rifle blast, screamed out a curse. The sound stabbed Brody’s soul.

His heart lurched in fear. Is that how my family met death?

Brody fought to breathe, his short, lean body straining against his sweat-soaked Union blues. His hazel eyes scanned the area, searching for a way to retreat from the Confederate soldiers pinning him and his best friend to this ridge.

Will today be the day we die?

Even though years had passed since he’d lost his home and family during the Indian raid, the heat of battle made Brody feel as if it were yesterday. If Ben’s family hadn’t taken him in, he didn’t know where he’d be now. I sure enough wouldn’t be defending the Union because Ben egged me into joining up. Over the past twenty-two years, Brody had often followed Ben’s lead.

“Let’s make a run for it!” Ben shouted. They had some protection behind a massive oak tree, but the gray-uniformed soldiers were persistent. Brody and Ben had been hunkered down most of the day, exchanging fire with a regiment of Johnny Rebs who wanted them all dead and buried.

Brody wiped the sweat from his eyes and thought of Lynda, his wife. She hadn’t wanted him to join up, but he’d felt it was the patriotic thing to do. Or that’s what I told Lynda.

Truth was, since Ben’s family had adopted Brody, they’d been as close as brothers. As he’d later written to Lynda, I can’t let Ben go alone. Ben, with his cheeky grin and slap dash ways, always darting into danger when others fled.

Who will save him if I don’t?

Somehow Brody saw his role in life to protect Ben. He often wondered if he took to the role because he hadn’t been able to protect his own family and Ben’s sister from Indian arrows and tomahawks. In the years since, he’d saved Ben countless times—everything from a charging bull to a pit of quicksand.

Another round of musket fire shattered the air. Brody leaned out to see where the Rebels were positioned, and a Minie ball ripped through the sleeve of his blue jacket and sliced a hunk of skin from his shoulder. Darn Reb! That burns like fire!

“Brody!” Ben’s voice held horror as he scurried to Brody’s side. “How bad?”

Brody shook his head, trying to keep down the hardtack he’d swallowed earlier as bile rose in his throat. He bent, retching. Blood oozed through his fingers as he placed a hand over the gaping hole in his jacket. “It’s not bad; the bullet sliced through. Just a flesh wound.”

“That’s good,” Ben’s slate-blue eyes looked him over and he cracked a weak smile. “I sure wouldn’t want to lose my best friend.”

Ben searched his haversack for something to staunch the blood. Ripping a clean handkerchief in two, he tied it around Brody’s arm. “Let’s find a medic.”

Gunfire snagged the bark of the tree over Ben’s head. He turned and fired back, downing a stocky man in gray with one well-aimed shot. A second later, Brody spied another Rebel sneaking from behind a rock. In the split second he spied the man, before his lips could form a warning, the soldier took aim and fired.

At Ben.

The bullet pierced the front of Ben’s blue coat. A circle of blood spread, a widening crimson stain on his chest. Eyes wide, Ben fell forward into the new spring grass.

Brody had no time to fear, only to react. Stepping out into the Confederate’s path, past caring if he died, Brody raised his carbine and shot. The soldier managed a return shot that went wild, shooting into the sky before his twisted body hit the ground with a thud.

“Ben,” Brody whispered, as he knelt and turned his friend over. “Ben?”

He doubled over, his face twisted in agony.

The Confederate’s shot had been too accurate. In the space of a split second, Ben had given his life for the Union on a grassy bluff of an Arkansas battlefield. A cold fist closed over Brody’s heart. Grief, dark as midnight, threw gloom over the world.

Ben, dead? Brody slumped down. How can I go on without Ben? Why, God, why?

The sounds of cannon fire receded, and Brody knew he must return to his unit. Ben was past help.

How can I tell Mama Rivers I let Ben die?

A fellow soldier crawled up and urged, “Let’s go, we’ve got a clear path this way.”

“Ben?”

“Leave him! You’re hit, and I’ve got shrapnel in my leg; we need to get back to camp or we’re both dead.”

There was nothing to do but follow. Brody had a wife at home. I have to live for Lynda. I’m sorry, Ben.

***

A few days later, Brody sat on a camp stool, a lap desk across his knees. He’d borrowed a few sheets of paper and made ink from wild blackberries. Although his shoulder still pained him, it hadn’t been serious.

I should have died, not Ben.

They’d waited for the Confederates to abandon the area before they went back for his body. Brody saw his friend buried with other Union soldiers they’d lost in the battle. It was time to write and relate the terrible news.

Dear Lynda, I am writing from camp to let you know I am healing from a shoulder wound. Doc says it should be fine. Me and Ben were ambushed by some Rebs. Ben died saving my life. Can you go by and tell Gloria? It’s going to be hard news, but I know you’ll find a way. He’s buried in Fayetteville, Arkansas with other men from the battle.

I was sorry to get your letter last week and hear you lost the baby. It surely seems like I’ve been gone from you longer than six months. I was hopeful to get furlough in time for the little one’s birth. You take care of yourself, and, God willing, we will have more babies.

Your loving husband, Brody

He put the letter in an envelope and sealed it with a drop of wax. Staring into the fire, he let his mind wander. Sometimes, lying on his pallet in whatever godforsaken place he’d ended up, Brody questioned God. His main question was always “Why?”

Why is my life so hard? Even before the attack, we struggled.

Pa had just about sweat blood to make a go of farming. He worked hard from sunup to sundown, but never got ahead. One year, their cow found a chokecherry bush, ate the poisonous plant, and died. Another winter, two of Ma’s babies died of the croup. The one summer they had a good wheat crop, the cook stove set part of their cabin on fire. The money from the wheat went to repairs and the supplies they needed to survive another winter, and Pa’s dream of buying a new plow went up in smoke.

Little Betsie only got one pair of shoes her whole life.

After surviving those hardships, the Indian attack killed them all. It didn’t seem fair. Mama Rivers often said God had a plan for his life or he wouldn’t have been spared. It seemed to Brody that God’s plan was Lynda.

She’d come along, shy, sweet, and trusting. He’d never known love could be so tender or fill his heart with such joy. As he and Lynda planned for the birth of a little one, Brody had almost felt life had a purpose, a plan.

Now, their baby had died, too.

Brody sighed. He pulled out the small leather notebook where he often wrote his thoughts. Dipping his pen nib into the blackberry ink, he wrote:

Guess I reckon you know best, God, and you got a plan somehow. Even if I can’t see it. Losing Ben and our baby. It’s hard. I can’t just walk away from this war. Ben thought enough of being here to fight and give his life. I got to preserve the Union for people I love— Lynda, Gloria, maybe another baby. I reckon I got some faith in you, or I wouldn’t stay. I’d just walk into a river somewhere and let the water close over my head. But I got people back home counting on me. God, if you could send a sign you’re still working in my life? I sure would like to know things will get better.

Brody closed the book and stared into the crackling flames of the campfire. As memories of Ben came to haunt him, tears coursed down his gaunt cheeks.