Prologue

1868

 

The Governor of New Mexico decreed that all Indian children over six to be educated in the ways of the white man.

Indian Commissioner, Thomas Morgan, said: It was cheaper to educate the Indians than to kill them.

1880, Apacheria, Season of Ripened Berries

Isolated bands of colored clay on white limestone remained where the sagebrush was stripped from Mother Earth by sudden storms and surface waters. Desolate. Bleak. A land made of barren rocks and twisted paths that reached out into the silence.

A world of hunger and hardship. This is my world. I am Tanayia. I was born thirteen winters ago. My people and I call ourselves “Nde” this means “The People”. The white man calls us Apache.