The day was overcast, as if a blanket of gray had been draped across the sky. Later there would be the misery of rain, but for now Father Juan de Villalva welcomed the relief from the beating sun. He lay on the jolting litter, his head turned to one side as he listlessly watched his people in their flight. Two men carried him, two Spaniards from San Luís who could have been put to better use carrying precious food that all these people would need when they reached San Augustín. That city was already starving even without this new burden of refugees. Perhaps it was a blessing that most of the Indians at San Luís—as many as 800—had gone west to join the French at Pensacola and Mobile.
The priest would have understood if he had been left behind. It would have been reasonable, a man so ill as he, with no hope of recovery, especially after the horses and cattle were driven away. That had been the final blow for them at San Luís, the sabotage of Manuel Solana’s plan for an orderly evacuation. There were to have been horses to carry food and belongings and the sick and the old. And cattle were to be driven along to provide meat, both for the journey and for later at San Augustín. But then the loyal Indians, the ones with whom they had shared the walls of Fort San Luís, the ones who were supposed to be pious Christians and loyal servants, those very ones absconded in the night with horses and cattle that they themselves had been sent out to round up. That betrayal was the final blow. When Juan heard in the morning that the horses were gone, he had given up all hope of ever leaving that place. He would die at San Luís, left behind to be murdered by the pagans. Although it frightened him, he had accepted it.
Then Solana had come to the little room where the priest had lain ill for more than a month on a hard bed in a corner among a store of empty barrels. Those barrels would remain empty now and never again be filled with wheat and carried to the port to be shipped to San Augustín and— illegally, but more profitably—to Cuba. Solana had come there, to that dark little hole where the priest was contemplating his death, and had stood beside his bed and told him that two men would carry him on a litter. Juan had tried to refuse. He would die no matter what, he explained, and it would make little difference whether it were in San Luís or San Augustín. But Solana was firm, and the priest had given in at last with thankfulness in his heart.
And now he was here in the train of Spanish and Indian refugees, his suffering almost as great on the litter as it would have been at the hands of the pagans. His face was painfully burned by the sun, his lips cracked and swollen. Every part of him hurt from the sag of the cane mat litter, the sides of it pulled up tight against him by the poles on which it hung. But he would see Ana again. That, at least, was a comfort.
He watched the country go by, empty and desolate, and thought of how it had been in the beginning when they had arrived here as young men, he and Solana, to make their lives in this well-populated, fertile land. Who would have thought then that it would end this way? Solana had expected his sons, and the sons of his sons, and their sons, to always be here. They would be hidalgos, gentlemen of Apalachee into a future without end. And he himself, what had he expected? That the fruits of his mission would reseed and bear more fruit and that this would be a Christian land forever. But very soon now they would be at Ivitachuco, and when the people there had come out to join the flight, it was Solana’s plan to burn the mission to the ground.
Juan felt a hand on his arm. Turning his head he saw Solana walking beside him.
“How goes it?” asked Solana.
The priest licked his lips to loosen them enough to speak. “Better,” he said. “Better without the sun.” His mind was clear, unlike yesterday when he had swooned in the heat.
“Even the rain will feel good,” said Solana.
“At first, yes.” The priest touched his fingers to his lips and then looked to see if there was blood. There was, but only a little. “Can you see Ivitachuco?”
“Not yet. Perhaps from the next hill.” Solana walked in silence for a time. Then he said, “Some friends of yours have joined us.”
“Who is that?” the priest asked without much interest. Ana was the only one he wanted to see now. All others he had known in his life were no longer of any concern.
“Carlos,” said Solana. “And that woman who is related to Ana. The young one.”
At first the priest made no response. He stared away into the gray of the sky and tried to remember things from the past. What was it that had happened to Carlos? He had become strange, left the church, and taken up work in the fields. Then there was the battle at Patale. He thought Carlos had deserted and had put him out of his mind, too ill to wrestle anymore with such things. So he was back again. But Lucia? Why would she be with him? “Let me speak to them,” he said.
“I will send them to you.” For a moment longer Solana walked beside the litter, and then he turned back along the line of marchers.
It was some time before Carlos and Lucia appeared. The bearers had already told the priest that they could see Ivitachuco ahead, and now he was watching familiar places go past, feeling joy at his return, even though it was not to stay. He would have Ana with him again, and wherever she was would be home to him. He began to feel expectant, as if at any moment she might appear at his side. He had almost forgotten about Carlos, and when it was he who was suddenly there beside the litter, it startled him.
“I have come,” Carlos said quietly in Apalachee.
The priest licked his lips, stretching them a little. Then he said, “Do you not speak Spanish anymore?”
“Yes, Father,” Carlos replied in Spanish. “I hope you are well.”
“I am not well.”
“But in spirit I hope that you are.”
The priest was gratified to hear kindness in his voice. “My spirit is well,” said Juan. “How is it you have come here? Solana tells me Lucia is with you.”
“She is here,” said Carlos. He slowed his step a little so that Juan could see her walking on the other side of him. Her distant smile reminded the priest that he had never really known her nor been able to speak to her beyond formalities.
“Are you together now?” he asked Carlos.
“Yes. She is my wife.”
“Wife?” he murmured and thought to object, to point out the absence of Christian sacrament. But what did it matter anymore? And who was he to speak? He, too, had a wife he had never married. “That is good,” he said. “God’s blessing be on you both.”
“Thank you, Father.”
“She has been away from Ivitachuco with you?”
“We were with Salvador.” Carlos spoke bluntly, without apology. “He is dead now. His camp was raided, everyone killed or enslaved. We were not there when it happened.”
“Then God spared you.”
“Yes.”
“And so you have turned back to God again?”
“We have come back, yes. It is our wish to go to San Augustín.”
“Good. That heartens me, my son. Stay by me and I will see that you go with me as my servants to the convento in San Augustín. Otherwise, life could be very hard for you. They say there is hunger there.”
“Thank you, Father.”
“Are we home yet?” Juan craned his head, but he could not see past the bearer in front of him.
“Almost,” Carlos answered.
“Tell me what you see.”
“A few people are standing out on the edge of town watching us come. They have packbaskets and bundles ready. There are two horses and some cattle.”
“Do you see Ana?”
“No, I cannot see her. If you wish, I will go find her and bring her to you.”
“Yes,” said the priest. “Do that.” Lowering his head back into the litter, he closed his eyes to wait.
When Lucia and Carlos reached the edge of town, they learned that Don Patricio had already departed with most of the people, heading eastward for Timucua. He planned to stay in that neighboring province, near one of the destroyed missions. The slave-catchers had already done their work there, he reasoned, and perhaps they would not return. Don Patricio and those who followed him were more willing to take that risk than to risk a life even more unknown in the far-away world of San Augustín.
The few remaining people from Ivitachuco had already begun to mingle with the people from San Luís. Lucia moved slowly among them, searching for Ana and Isabel. But it was Isabel who found her first, coming up from behind and clasping her arm with her bony fingers.
Lucia turned to her, smiling. “My grandmother, I have come.”
Isabel held her arm, squeezing it very tightly. There were tears in her eyes. “We heard what happened to Salvador,” the old woman said. She shook her head, pressing her lips together with emotion. “Just this morning we heard it. We thought you were there.”
“No,” Lucia said quietly. “We were away when it happened. We are here, Carlos and I both.” She looked around for him, but he was not in sight.
“So he finally talked seriously to you?” said Isabel.
“Yes,” she said, smiling.
“And you have lain together?”
“Yes.
“And you will stay with him now?”
“Yes. He is my husband.”
“Good.” She patted Lucia’s arm. “That is what you have been needing, a man like that. Ever since he moved out of the convento he has been a man worth having.”
Lucia was happy to be with her again. “You are not angry at me for leaving you?”
“No. When I heard you went with Carlos, I was not angry. But I was worried about you at Salvador’s camp.”
Lucia was silent for a moment, remembering the carnage. But she pulled her thoughts away from it. “We are going to San Augustín,” she said. “We will all be together.”
“Except for me,” said Isabel. “I am not going.”
“But what will you do?” Lucia remembered the old woman of the Usuanca clan who had fed them and guarded their sleep.
“I am going back to our homestead.”
“There is nothing there. I saw it. The house is gone.”
“Then I will build another. A small one. One old woman does not need very much.”
Lucia looked away, knowing there was nothing she could say. The crowd had thinned now, many people having joined the line of refugees. And there was Ana coming toward them, walking quickly. As she drew near, she held out her hands to Lucia, who clasped them and held them tightly.
“I have come, my mother’s sister,” said Lucia.
“You have come,” said Ana, tears in her eyes. “Holy Mary be praised, you have come.”
“We were not with Salvador when the slave-catchers came,” said Lucia.
“I know,” said Ana, nodding with relief. “I have spoken to Carlos.”
“Did he take you to Father Juan?”
“Yes.” Ana turned and looked back toward the priest’s litter. “He is dying,” she said quietly.
“We are all dying,” Isabel said impatiently.
Ana gave her a sharp look.
Lucia was surprised at the acrimony between them. She said to Ana, “My grandmother says she is not coming with us.”
“What can I do?” Ana said in exasperation. “For two days we have argued about this. She is as stubborn as a tree stump.”
“I am if I need to be,” Isabel said sharply. “We all do what we must.” But then she reached out and put a hand on Ana’s shoulder. “Go on now, my daughter.” Her voice was gentler. “Go be with your man.”
Ana looked at her sadly, all her impatience gone. “It is a hard thing you ask me to do, my mother.”
“Yes, but you must do it. Go on.” Isabel reached with her other hand for Lucia. “You, too, my granddaughter. Go to your man.” She pushed them both away from her.
Lucia looked at her, thinking of arguments to make. But she could see that it was hopeless. “When we come back,” she said, “we will look for you where you said.”
“I will be there.”
“I will still sing the song to the Sun every morning,” said Lucia.
“Good. We will both be singing it. Go on now. Your men are waiting.” She turned away from them and began walking back into the town.
“There is nothing we can do,” said Ana.
Lucia nodded, and they stood in silence and watched her until she disappeared among the houses.
There was no time lost at the stopover at Ivitachuco. Manuel Solana requisitioned one of the two horses for himself, and the caravan moved on, Spaniards and Indians together, all of them homeless, fleeing toward the east. As the people descended the long slope to the river, Spanish soldiers put Ivitachuco to the torch. The refugees, glancing over their shoulders, saw the flames come up, and some of the people turned around to watch. First the fire engulfed the pitch-laden pine posts of the stockade. Then, as it burned hotter, sparks were blown to thatched roofs close by and the fire spread quickly across the town, waves of smoke and heat rising up into the gray, heavy sky. Lucia stood beside Carlos and watched it without sadness, feeling only a detached fascination with the magnitude of the fire.
Then Carlos touched her arm and pointed past the fire to a solitary figure walking away along the ridge of a hill, almost out of sight. There was no question who it was—a small woman, white-haired, wearing a skirt of deerskin, her chest bare in the summer heat. She had a pack basket on her back, and from her hand a copper kettle swung along with her steady stride. After a moment she disappeared over the hill.
“The White Sun Woman remains,” Lucia said softly. She glanced once more at the burning town and then turned with her husband and resumed the journey down the long slope to the river that marked the eastern border of Apalachee.