Chapter One

Land of the People

Summer Solstice 1494 – The New World – Nova Scotia

Crests of white, salty foam crashed against the bow of the birch bark canoe as men, both fore and aft, struck their paddles into the water with arm-wrenching strength.

Jacques DuPrey held on to the gunwale of the small boat wondering, not for the first time, what in heaven’s name he was thinking when he’d agreed to join the hunt. He was a man of the sea, but he was not a fisherman and certainly not a whaler. Lord help him if one of the men were to hand him the harpoon and expect him to throw it.

They were following the wake of a great whale. Three men in a small canoe made from the skin of a tree, sewn together with vines and leather straps.

"How far out do we go?" Jacques yelled to his dark skinned companion sitting beside him.

The Micmac shaman, Bear World Walker, turned without taking his full gaze off the prey ahead. His black hair, adorned with a variety of feathers and shells, flowed out behind him as the wind buffeted the boat. His face was painted with two streaks of weukuju, the red ochre marks that denoted a shaman’s Power. He was seated but held the harpoon at the ready. "As far as the whale takes us, Gray Hair. I have called the great whale, to come and now it is our turn to follow."

What madness! What an adventure!

From a distance the gigantic creature seemed almost docile, swimming with ease, blowing great bursts of water into the air. As though teasing his hunters, the whale leapt out of the water, then disappeared into the darkness below. Without speaking the rowers lifted their paddles and let the boat drift forward.

Jacques looked over his shoulder. They were far from shore and the waves were now only lightly rolling swells. "What is happening?"

"The whale tires of the chase," Bear answered.

White Water, Bear’s nephew, sat at the bow of the boat and slipped his paddle silently into the water, keeping the boat turned into the swells as they slipped near their prey. He was a shaman in training, but he’d been a hunter since childhood. This was not his first fishing expedition.

With quiet grace, Bear stood, steadying the harpoon on his shoulder. Made of wood and antler bone, the harpoon was attached to the front of the boat by a long length of leather rope. When the harpoon found its mark, the air-inflated seal skin bags attached midway up the rope would float and mark the whale’s location. The air bags would also slow down the whale’s escape. Bear had assured Jacques that this form of whale hunting had been used for many generations. Still, Jacques shook his head.

Madness!

"Hold tight to the canoe," Bear whispered.

Jacques firmed his grip on the gunwale as a jet of water erupted beside the boat, drenching all the men in seconds.

The whale was close. Too close.

Jacques glanced over the side of the canoe and saw the gray belly of the whale as it swam away. Only then did he realize its wide tail could crush their frail birch bark boat with one flick and cast them into the endlessly deep sea.

"Why didn’t you strike at him?" Jacques asked. "It was a perfect shot."

"Too perfect. The whale would have taken us down with him. We must wait until he has decided we are no harm to him.

When he presents us his back, we will strike and be successful."

A hard nudge shook the canoe and Jacques was sure it was going to break in two.

Insanity!

"Gray Hair wishes he was back with the women." White Water chuckled.

"Indeed I do," Jacques replied.

White Water touched the Frenchman on the shoulder. "You will earn your hunting name today, Gray Hair. Your first whale hunt tests your manhood."

"My manhood is just fine," Jacques said. There had been more events than he could count when his strength had been tested. He’d crossed uncharted oceans, faced an inquisition and fought the fierce warriors he now called his friends. "I wouldn’t have missed this for the world."

White Water began to paddle with a slow practiced rhythm. Bear braced his feet between the ribs of the canoe. The whale slid swiftly in front of the hunters. It was almost as if the creature sensed their need. Bear threw the weapon and the harpoon sliced through the air, landing in the middle of the whale’s back. A bone-jarring tug shook the canoe and then it sped forward, following in the whale’s wake.

Bear lifted another harpoon from the bottom of the canoe and handed it to Jacques. "You will make the kill.

The significance of the task the shaman had given him filled him with pride and dread. If he missed, the tribe would lose food. If he succeeded, he would become a hunter, a survivor, a warrior equal to his Micmac friends.

Jacques hefted the killing harpoon onto his shoulder, took aim and threw the weapon into the air toward the gray shape in the distance. Unhindered by rope or bags, it landed with accuracy near the back of the whale’s head.

"Now?" Jacques asked after some moments of anxious silence.

"We wait," Bear replied. "Soon the whale will realize we have won the battle and he will honor our hearths with his flesh and light our wigwams with his oil."

It seemed an eternity and many leagues of travel out into open sea before the boat slowed to a crawl. Jacques joined Bear and the other men as they pulled the lines into the boat, each tug bringing the canoe closer and closer to the drifting behemoth. A large eye loomed just under the brow of the boat. The whale was very near death.

Bear took a leather pouch from around his neck and poured a fine mixture of sacred herbs and tobacco into his hand. Sprinkling them over the whale’s back he said, "We give thanks to Putup. May Great Spirit honor him."

"May Great Spirit honor Putup, the great whale," White Water replied.

Caught up in the moment, Jacques leaned forward and made the sign of the cross over the whale. "God bless this abundant bounty."

*****

Shouts of "A’ie! A’ie!" came from the shoreline where women and men waited to gut and clean the catch. The men wore leather loincloths that barely covered their bodies. Like the shaman and White Water, their hair was long and black and fell across broad brown shoulders. The women wore brightly decorated leather tunics that fell below their knees. Many had adorned their hair with feathers and flowers and headbands made of painted leather.

In France they would have been arrested for indecency, but here amid the birch trees and the rugged rocks, these people, the Micmac of the New World, were one with nature.

The air-filled sealskin bags kept the whale afloat as the men rowed to shore. Bear jumped into the icy water, "Great Spirit has smiled on all our people today, Gray Hair."

Jacques silently agreed. Thank God they’d made a great catch. It was enough food to bring his men back from the depression that had surrounded their camp for the last few weeks. He glanced toward the cliff where his men, a mixture of French and Breton sailors, walked down toward the water.

They were men of the sea, without a ship, without a mission and without hope, stranded in an uncharted land and held captive by the power of Jacques’ pledge of honor to the Micmac chief.

Jacques stepped from the small canoe into the water, trusting his feet would find solid footing on the slippery rocks beneath him. Though he’d braided his long silver hair into two plaits and wore a tunic over his leather britches, he still felt like an outsider among the Micmac.

Bear handed him a small knife, a dirk with a silver handle. "It was your kill, you should make the first cut."

Jacques took the knife in his hand and turned it to gleam in the sun. He’d held this knife before, but it had been in another time and what often seemed like a distant dream.

"We will give you a hunting name tonight," Bear said. "You are now a whale hunter, like me."

Though the physical differences were obvious, they were alike in many ways. Both men believed an other-worldly force guided their lives. Both men believed in honor and loyalty.

Jacques made the first cut into the whale then he handed the knife back to Bear. He looked deeply into the dark eyes of his friend. "I could never be your equal in a hunt, mon ami."

"You have learned to call the whale, you have learned to call the caribou. Your men will not be hungry as you travel." Bear smiled, as he sheathed the small knife.

Jacques accepted the compliment with a nod. He’d grown up near the Les Forêt de Brocéliande, the legendary forests of King Arthur in Brittany. Yes, he could hunt but he could not lead the men through the dangerous and unexplored countryside. That was something only a native could do. Bear would be the best guide on the Frenchmen’s long journey to the west. But Bear’s responsibility as shaman would keep him in camp guarding his tribe. Jacques would have to rely on God to protect his men once again.

Though they had started out as adversaries, now, both men trusted each other with their lives and held each other’s pledge of honor above their cultural differences. In another time and place Jacques believed Bear would have been a most noble knight. Perhaps even worthy enough to belong to Jacques’ Order, the Knights of Christ.

Jacques had kept his oath to respect Bear’s people and to honor their ways, and in turn Bear taught him the Micmac way. These dark skinned men and women, whom he’d come to call his friends, were children of the land, living with the seasons and blending with the wild landscape around them. Everything about them was a contrast to the people and customs of his home so very far away. They lived in leather huts, fished the open ocean in small canoes, and hunted game with little more than bows, arrows and spears. They were wild and free, a beautiful race full of life and goodness and simplicity.

A sea bird cut the deep blue, cloudless sky. Jacques thought of the Loire River in springtime and sighed. These past few days nearly everything reminded him of his homeland. The landscape, thick with trees and lush undergrowth, was like the verdant Forests of Amboise where King Charles of France hunted with his falcons.

The weathered shorelines of the New World reminded him of the Western coast of Brittany with its tidal pools and rocky outcroppings. But this was not the time to dwell on the past. There was a whale to render before the ever-present Autumn rains began to fall.

Instinctively Jacques took a deep breath, confirming that the rain would be upon them by nightfall. He’d learned to smell the wind and taste the air for dampness, for fire and for game. Bear taught Jacques to track big game, to shoot a bow and arrow and to make his home in harmony with the forest and the river, with the seasons and the animals. These were talents he would never have developed as a navigator for Order of Saint John and the Knights Templar.

He was amazed how the last two years he’d lived a life not even Marco Polo would have dreamed possible. He’d seen things men could imagine and learned more life lessons from Bear than he ever had from his professors at Navarre.

Though harsh compared to the sea, his life here had been good. But it was long past time to move on.

"My God and the Blessed Virgin! Jacques, you’re turning into one of these savages!"

Jacques lifted his head at the sound of Sebastian Cabotinni’s voice. The Italian stood with one foot propped against a boulder, his dark hair swirling around his head in a mass of tangled curls. Sebastian’s once fine clothing was tattered and patched. He’d refused to trade the cloth tunic for leather like most of the other men.

Sebastian’s manner was hard and cold, his character, as well as his face and hands, was scarred. With Bear’s expert touch as a healer, Sebastian’s skin had healed from the injuries he’d received when their ship had burned to the waterline, but the deep wounds of personal failure still festered. It was hard to believe he’d once been a distinguished swordsman, proud of his station as the Queen of France’s personal bodyguard.

"I work as the People do, without complaint," Jacques said calmly, hoping that Bear would not fully understand Sebastian’s insult. "If you were half the man I am, you’d make yourself useful."

Sebastian grimaced, took off his boots, then waded into the icy water, soaking his britches to the knees. Holding equal status in France allowed the men to be friendly and personal, but here in the wilds of nowhere Jacques held superior rank. Everyone knew that Jacques had pulled Sebastian away from their burning ship and had bartered for all the men’s lives with his own.

Together, the People and the Frenchmen lifted a section of the whale onto a flat rock. Jacques stood between Bear and Sebastian and placed a hand on both men’s shoulders. "Good job."

Sebastian shrugged away Jacques’ familiarity and moved to retrieve his boots.

"A’ie, good job." Bear turned toward Jacques with a broad smile. "Much meat. Enough for your journey."

"Two Arrows has finally given us permission to leave?" Sebastian asked.

"No," Jacques said, "The chief has not yet decided. Gaston has been making noises like a caged dog. I fear he’ll leave with or without the chief’s consent."

"Gaston is ready to lead the men again." Sebastian said. "He is obsessed to discover the white men’s settlement he heard about at the Micmac’s mid-summer gathering. The men will follow him. He has found something to redeem our honor. These legends of the Son of the Great Spirit are too widespread among the tribes not to be true. Even Bear’s step-mother said this spirit, Kluscap, came in a ship like ours."

"What do you think, my friend?" Jacques looked at Bear, waiting for his response. "Are Old Woman’s stories true or are we dreaming to believe there may be some of our own people here in your land?"

"Some dreams are worth believing," Bear said, wringing the water from his long black hair and twisting it into one braid across his shoulder as he’d seen the white men do. "I know of this legend, Gray Hair. I’ve seen evidence of your people, but I’ve never met white men like you. There is much land between my village and the great waters beyond the sunset. Anything is possible."

"Why won’t that bastard Two Arrows let us leave?" Sebastian asked. "The canoes we’ve made have been ready for weeks. We could go at any time."

Bear looked puzzled and Jacques translated Sebastian’s question, omitting the insult. Although Bear had learned French over the past few years, there were still words only a native Frenchmen would understand.

"The way has already been arranged for you," Bear said. "If Two Arrows agrees, in one moon’s time, White Water and his wife Morning Star will travel to his village on the southern coastline. He will take you to the inland trail that leads to the great water beyond the forest."

"You see, Sebastian," Jacques turned to his colleague. "Your prayers may soon be answered."

"More than my humble prayers need to be answered, Jacques," Sebastian replied. "I can’t abide another season in this god-forsaken wilderness."

"The long journey to the west is dangerous," Bear said. "Far more dangerous than your exploration to the North shores last year. But if you insist on seeing the truth with your eyes, then you must go."

"Gaston is still the commander of this expedition. His duty demands that he search for evidence that other white men came here. We’ve found nothing in your land so Gaston must go further west. It is my duty is to follow him."

It had been three years since Jacques had commanded his own men and the ship, La Réale. They’d sailed far westward into the waters fished only by the bravest Breton and Portuguese, following a hundred-year old navigational chart made under the supervision of the Templar, Prince Henry St. Clair.

On the second voyage Gaston Charboneau had been the captain and they’d sailed once again to the edge of the New World, not by chart, but by Jacques’ navigational skills. This time Jacques mission was to find Antoinette, Gaston’s sister.

"You’ve known Gaston since school when you both became Templars," Sebastian said. "I never understood why Gaston left the navigator’s guild to become a mercenary or the reason why he was exiled to Scotland."

"Gaston killed a brother Templar in a dual of honor," Jacques explained. "It cost him his rank and he was too valuable a soldier to be executed."

"And you became a navigator for the Knights of Christ."

Jacques nodded. "Yes, mon ami. I’ve charted coastlines and traveled the world."

"Why aren’t you in charge of this mission?" Sebastian asked.

"I have no skill at giving orders." Jacques replied. "Gaston has been a leader since childhood."

"You’ve known Antoinette for a long time." Bear said. "Was she strong willed as a child?"

"She was far too young for me to notice her. That’s why I didn’t recognize her when she boarded La Réale. It was several weeks before I discovered she was Gaston’s sister, counselor to the duchess Anne de Bretagne, and a priestess of the Sisterhood of the Moon."

"Setting Antoinette adrift in the small boat must have been a difficult decision," Bear said.

"I had no choice. When the first mate commandeered the ship, he proclaimed Antoinette a witch and left her to die in a storm. I put her in the dingy and prayed that calm winds and currents would take her toward your shores."

"It took Anne nearly a year to get you out of Avignon prison," Sebastian said. "Once she became the Queen of France she had enough power and money to send you back to the New World to find Antoinette."

To appease the Templars, Gaston had been appointed the commander of the mission. After weeks of charting endless coastlines they found the Micmac people and Antoinette living among them. She’d become a woman of great power, a healer, a Shamanness. To Jacques’ regret, she was also the wife of Bear World Walker, the noble man who Jacques now called his friend. Even though the shaman had won Antoinette’s heart and become her husband, nothing would stop Jacques from loving her.

"Have you been able to reclaim the navigation chart you gave to Antoinette when you set her adrift?" Sebastian asked. "I imagine she was reluctant to release it. She is stubborn like her brother."

Stubborn yes, but where Gaston was stoic, Antoinette was open and kind-hearted. And God help Jacques, because he loved them both. Each in their own way had molded his life; Gaston in Jacques’ youth and Antoinette in his maturity.

"Yes, Antoinette returned the chart," Jacques said. "She made me promise to keep Gaston from trying to convert Bear’s people to Christianity, but it’s not Gaston that worries me. It’s the priests who will come in the future."

"She needn’t worry about converts," Sebastian answered as he turned to leave. "The only Micmac who have joined our faith have been the women who married Leblanc and Gireau in the spring. They were not from Bear’s village."

"Oui." Jacques touched the crucifix at his neck. "That was the only way to sanctify their union. Conversion by force is quite different."

Without Sebastian to worry them, the men fell silent as they cut up the whale. Bear’s metal knife had been replaced by cutting tools made from sharp edged stones and Jacques wondered how much the white men’s presence had affected the Micmac. They were learning each other’s language and customs quite well. Even though Le Bon Breton sunk in the shallow waters of a protected cove, the flotsam from her belly eventually found its way to the shoreline.

Gaston and his men retrieved what they could from the wreckage and now the Micmac women cooked not only in their leather containers but also in copper pots. Some had metal knives and some of their wig-wams were made from old sailcloth weatherproofed with pine tar.

The People had tasted wine from the Loire Valley and had eaten dried biscuits and beef from the watertight containers that floated to shore. The Frenchmen had eaten whale, seal and bear meat, slept on bough covered floors, under fur blankets and in birch bark huts. The People had clothed and sheltered them throughout the harsh winters. They had traveled together for many seasons, from summer camp to winter camp. Soon, White Water, one of their best warriors, would lead the Frenchmen westward into new lands.

"What makes you believe in Great Spirit?" Jacques had become quite interested with the Micmac’s belief.

"Great Spirit is all around us," Bear replied. "I see him in everything." He waved his hand toward the cliffs. "He is in the trees, in the water, in the whale."

Jacques nodded. "Great Spirit is much like my God."

"Yes, Antoinette has explained this to me. That your God had a son, a man called Jesus who was a great Shaman among his people."

"Something like that," Jacques said. He’d accepted the Micmac’s Great Spirit as another aspect of God. The concept of one deity seemed so strange to the Micmac that Jacques sometimes wondered if the lawful and harsh Jehovah was a true representation of the Divine Being. "Do you believe that you have a definite purpose in life?"

"If you are asking if Great Spirit guides me, then my answer is yes. There is a purpose to my life. I have a destiny. Is that how you say it? It was written in the sky that I should meet Antoinette. It was Great Spirit’s wish that I become the shaman of my people." Bear’s eyebrows furrowed in thought. "But I am always free to change my path. My destiny."

A smile crossed Jacques’ face. He would never have imagined discussing philosophy with a man like Bear.

"We are not so different," Bear said. "Beneath my dark skin is the same tender flesh. My heart beats as does yours. My fears are the same."

"I did not speak of fear."

"Your actions betray you, Gray Hair. You are afraid you will not find what you are looking for. You fear your men will not follow you, you worry that--"

"--is it so obvious?"

"Only to someone who is also afraid." Bear smiled. "I too worry about these things."

After a long silence Bear asked, "What will you do if you do not find your destiny?"

Jacques thought for a moment, pondering what a new goal in his life might be. For so long it had simply been the sea and the quest. Jacques sighed. "Perhaps, brother, my destiny will find me."