Author's Note: These should be the last flashbacks; from now on the main narrative will continue (1757.)

1756

Upstairs, on the second floor of the family's country home, the dressing room was a flurry of activity, with several maids gathered around the older daughter of the house making last-minute adjustments to her ball gown. It was of malachite satin, the vivid color bringing out the darkness of her elaborately curled and piled hair, with huge hoops and a long trailing sack train in back. Cora examined herself from several angles in the small burnished mirror. She was not now nor had she ever been especially vain, and indeed had little patience for those young women of her acquaintance who were, but tonight was an important occasion. Her father was giving this private ball essentially in her honor, and it was to be the opportunity for her to meet and dance with the soldier he had personally groomed to be her future husband.

"You look beautiful, Cora," Alice said, no envy but honest admiration in her voice. She was in undress, and was not to be attending the party tonight, but would have to hear about it later once the guests had gone home. Reaching out, she touched one of the cascading ribbons that were sewn into the bodice of the gown and fell from there almost to the floor. "How much do you think this gown cost?"

"Too much," Cora said, a little ruefully, thinking of the imported materials and the hours that must have been spent sewing it. "But Father said it was important to look my best tonight, and I will only have my own dance once. I hope I don't step on this train." She gathered some of the fabric up behind her and tried to determine how she was going to move about gracefully with such a thing trailing behind her. But the sack dress was the very latest fashion and society dictated that she, as the oldest daughter of a man whose position in that society was firmly established, follow the fashions, even if she personally preferred simpler styles of dresses.

"I wish I could come down and see you."

Cora glanced at her young sister's wistful face and spared her a smile, thinking it was quite possible that Alice did not yet realize that this was the beginning of their separation, that once she was engaged to Duncan Hayward it would only be a matter of time, perhaps another year, until they would have to learn to live apart. "Soon you will have your own such party."

"Not for three more years." Alice sighed at the magnitude of the wait she must endure. "You will tell me what the others were wearing, won't you?"

"I will tell you absolutely everything." Cora grinned at the younger girl and cast one last glance back in the mirror to ensure everything looked just right. The maids stepped away, admiring. One handed her her fan and gloves, which she put on, and then she blew a quick kiss in Alice's direction and stepped out of the room.

Their father met her on the landing and escorted her down the rest of the stairs, then through the passageway and down the hall in the direction of the ballroom. The brightly lit ballroom, after the comparative dimness of her dressing room, almost hurt her eyes with its brilliance. And such a feast of colors and fabrics! Cora hesitated, self-consciously, but began to make her greetings to the people nearest her. Her friends, and their mothers. Once the dancing began, she sat out the first few dances, not wanting to seem to appear too proud.

Her father sought her out again after the first hour. "Cora," he gestured. "It's time to meet Duncan."

She followed him over to the soldier to whom she was all but engaged. He was tall, splendidly outfitted in his soldier's red uniform with its elaborate braiding and trimming. Instantly she was thankful that, if he was not necessarily handsome, he was not bad-looking, either, and then chastised herself silently for this bit of irreverence. What mattered a husband's face and figure, if he were a God-fearing man who would work hard to keep his family fed and happy?

Munro made the necessary formal introductions and Cora curtsied, hiding behind her fan before she realized that he might mistake genuine shyness for coquetry. When Munro, discreetly, left the two of them standing there, off to the side in the middle of the huge room, she turned to Hayward and took as deep a breath as her stays would allow. "Good evening, sir."

"It's my pleasure to finally meet you, Miss Munro." He bowed, again, and smiled. She suddenly realized he was nervous too, and felt much better. "Might I bring you some..." he looked around, realized they were quite near the tables of refreshments and indicated the pitchers of sweet wine and punch.

"Please." She dipped into a curtsy again, hoping she looked elegant. It was very warm in the room, or seemed that way, but perhaps it was only her many layers of clothing. She fanned herself and tried not to shift. The shoes she was wearing were new, had a curved heel and were wickedly uncomfortable.

Duncan was back almost immediately with a tiny cup of punch, which Cora took and drank in one gulp before realizing that she knew perfectly well she was supposed to sip demurely at. But she had been thirsty. Duncan didn't looked shocked, just amused.

"I hear you have a younger sister," he said, politely. "Is she not to be here this evening?"

"Yes. Father thought it best if she rested tonight."

"I see. Miss Munro...."

"Yes, Major General."

"I think you are overheated. Perhaps we might take a stroll around the terrace? "

"That," Cora said, with a small inner sigh of relief, "would be perfect."

***

1740

The child lay with his face flat against the wooden floorboards, the sound of his breathing rasping in his ears. Acrid smoke was starting to creep across the floor; he could see it when he squinted out past the bedframe he was under. It stung in his nostrils, but he was terrified to move. He whimpered, sensing he was alone, but also sensing that he could not remain where he was for much longer. The crackling was increasing. Soon it would be roaring. He was already very familiar with fire, had been taught not to get too close to it, had seen the huge flames that his daddy sometimes built up when they had a bonfire outside...but this was in the house. There shouldn't be huge flames in the house, that was dangerous.

He inched forwards on his belly, trying to make it out from underneath the low bed frame. He was not stuck, but he couldn't seem to make his limbs move any faster than a bit at a time. A piece of wood splintered off from the floor and grazed his cheek. He chewed down on his lip against the pain.

The crackling was growing still louder, and the smoke weaving its way across to him. Nathaniel peered out, seeing the front door of the cabin wide open, banging in the wind. There was a fierce wind. It howled outdoors.

He heard a shout, but it had no meaning. He meant to squirm backwards then, but he was frozen in place. Just as the sound of falling timber crashed in his ears, he saw two moccasins appear in his sight and a tall copper-skinned figure hauled him out and up from under the bed. There was a moment while they stared at each other, the dirty white child just out of toddlerhood and the young Indian man. Then he was being carried, in a most undignified way, tucked under an arm that felt like warm iron as if he were a log of wood, bouncing as the man ran with him, out of the collapsing cabin and into the darkening woods. Nathaniel tried to look back, to catch one last glimpse of his home before it disappeared but he could not twist his head that far around, and the Indian carrying him had no intentions of pausing. He ducked his head to avoid being slapped by branches as they passed and swallowed against the terror in his throat.

Much later, when the Indian's pace had slowed to a gentle walk and the boy had long since passed out in exhaustion against his rescuer's shoulder, his hands slackened and the Indian noticed something shiny fall to the ground. Stooping, still carrying the boy, he stopped to examine it. A grooming implement of some kind, a palm-sized square with teeth on either side. Turning the boy's limp palm over, Chingachgook saw the imprint the article had made in the boy's flesh, so tightly he had been gripping it. The Indian picked up the comb and put it back into the child's hand, pressing the cold fingers around it and holding them there, for the rest of the journey.

***

1757

Uncas set a rough trencher--really just a flat and slightly hollowed piece of wood--down on the table in front of Alice and added a mug of more tea. He, like the rest of his people, never drank tea except for medicinal purposes on the rare occasions when they were sick, but Nathaniel had explained to him how crazy the English were about their tea as a daily drink. Apparently, it was unaffordably expensive for the majority of British and it was even common for people to dry and re-use tea leaves more than once. He found this hard to believe, since sources of tea were everywhere here. Perhaps the English simply weren't aware of all the varied plants that could be used for tea making.

Alice bobbed her head in a gesture of shy thanks. She had such big eyes when she looked at him, like a child, he thought, amused. There was something sweet about her, just like there was something hard about Cora. Not that a woman who had just lost her mate did not have the right to be hard. It was in clear contrast to his own people's women, many of whom had seen loss, but they did not direct their emotions internally. Grief was a public emotion, something which was to be shared with those close to you.

Nathaniel was leaning by the fireplace sharpening a piece of flint. "Come and eat," Uncas said, passing by him as he stooped to retrieve some of last year's maize from its pot in the coals where it had been cooking. When Nathaniel didn't move, Uncas added in Mohegan, standing up, "And go tell the girl to come in and eat, too."

His brother gave him a sharp look. "Why--"

"My hands are full, Brother." Uncas raised an eyebrow at him and headed back to the table.

Nathaniel uttered an expletive but, after a minute, laid his work on top of the mantel and pushed himself away from the stonework, going out the front door.

Uncas sat down opposite Alice. He, Nathaniel and Chingachgook usually crouched by the fireplace to eat, as mealtimes were more a business of giving nutrition to one's body for energy than they were a social affair, but he had realized that as long as these women were with them they were going to have to at least attempt some of the customs they were used to. But cut wood made quick and fine stools and he had placed a plank over two of them on Alice's side to make a bench for her and her sister.

Cora came in, her eyes hooded and cheeks flushed, followed by Nathaniel, who was wearing an expression of reluctant forbearance. She sat down beside Alice and folded her hands in her lap, but did not look interested at the prospect of food. Alice touched her sister's elbow, timidly, which earned her a brief, strained smile.

For a moment all four of them sat there, each one suddenly acutely aware of their differences in background and upbringing, yet sitting around the same small table, in the middle of the woods, in a country that was in an ongoing war.

Then Uncas, who was hungry and was slightly baffled as to what the rest of them were just sitting there for, reached out for a handful of maize kernels from the bowl, which he had just assumed was communal. He paused the motion of his hand when he saw the shocked look on Alice's face, and the only slightly disapproving one on Cora's.

"Younger brother," Nathaniel said in Mohegan, "you may be le cerf agile--" the French said slightly mockingly in imitation of their enemy's nickname for Uncas, who was known throughout the woods for his speed and strength-- "but you have the table manners of a drunken bison."

Uncas hesitated, then decided that eating what was already in his hand would still be preferable to putting it back into the bowl. He gave Nathaniel a nonchalant stare as he did so.

"Do you not say grace?" Cora asked. Her dull tone suggested she had already decided that she was not intending to be shocked by anything else that could happen today.

"Certainly we do." Nathaniel took this opportunity to elbow his brother and, clearing his throat, stood up at the head of the table. He rattled through a very proper if mechanically delivered blessing for the food, then reseated himself and looked expectantly at Cora and Alice. "Now you may eat."

There was corn, and yams, and a little jerky, though their supply of that was rapidly dwindling hence the reason Uncas knew Chingachgook would not come back empty-handed. Neither of the girls seemed to have much appetite.

By the time the meal was almost over, darkness had fallen outside. The firelight provided just enough light to see by, but Uncas lit their one lantern anyway to banish the shadows from the corners of the cabin. Cora and Alice retired to the fireside to sit and digest what little they had eaten. Uncas turned to Nathaniel, asking in an undertone, "Where are they going to sleep?"

"On the floor, where else?"

Uncas gazed doubtfully at the girls. Even more so taken together, rather than separately, they seemed incredibly out of place in the small frontier cabin. Everything about them. Their odd clothes, pale skin, way of moving...

"They slept in the forest last night, didn't they? You watched them sleep, didn't you?" Nathaniel challenged. But he followed Uncas to the rack of furs and pelts, and selected several of the finest ones: last winter's bear, a couple of golden-tipped wolf pelts that had been sewn together. He approached the girls, and busied himself, as they moved out of the way, with preparing a bed on the ground near the fire and against the wall. While Uncas banked the coals for the night, Nathaniel disappeared into the storage room for a few moments and came back out, slowly, approaching Cora with some folded material in his hands. "Here."

She took the bundle. As it unwrapped in her lap, they could see it was a colorful handmade quilt, and though the colors had faded where certain parts of the blanket had been exposed, it looked to have been virtually unused. Alice scooted in next to the wall on the furs, and Cora carefully laid the blanket over her. She looked up at Nathaniel. "Thank you."

"You're welcome." His mouth softened when he looked at Alice curling up like a puppy under the blanket. "One more thing."

He put something else into her hands. Cora looked down to see a small decorative tortoiseshell comb.

Her face registering surprise, she looked up once more.

"It was my mother's," Nathaniel said. "It might as well be used again." He turned before she could thank him again and, heading over to the rack of furs, began to make his own bed, on the other side of the cabin. Uncas, after a few more minutes, extinguished the lamp, and soon the only illumination in the room was the glowing coals in the fireplace, and the only sounds, the occasional crackle they made.