Cate of the Lost Colony - Lisa Klein [75]
She glanced toward Takiwa and Mika, then turned back to me. Her eyes were wet as she pleaded, “Lord Manteo, if Roger Bailey and the others learn of Tameoc’s theft, we will be friends no more, but enemies.”
“Tameoc steals only to provide for his people,” I said.
“I would not go to war over a sword, but I do not make the decisions,” she replied.
This was a wise woman, I could see. The soldier Grem stood beside her, looking displeased. Would he tell Bay-lee that Tameoc was a thief and Manteo his accomplice?
“Who are … you with, Manteo?” Ladi-cate halted over the words, but her meaning was clear.
How could I answer such a question? For I am on two sides. I am the windward shore of the island and the calm one. I am the inside and the outside of the clay pot. Wanchese also demanded I choose. But how can I? There is but one island and one pot.
“I am Manteo of Croatoan, Lord of Roanoke and Dasemunkepeuc and servant of Kwin-lissa-bet.”
Ladi-cate looked relieved. She even smiled. Not even Algon had such good fortune. Was this a dream? I struggled to keep my mind on the serious matter before me: keeping the trust of the English. Keeping Ladi-cate and her people safe. Would Algon have let the wolf devour his Moon Maiden?
“And as Lord of Dasemunkepeuc, I ask you to return to your fort,” I said.
Ladi-cate’s eyes grew wide with surprise to be spoken to in such a way. Then she bowed slightly as the English do before their kwin.
“We will, Lord Manteo,” she said.
“For your own safety, Moon Maiden,” I whispered to myself.
I went to Croatoan to find that Wanchese had threatened my mother if she did not join his alliance. She agreed to be his ally, deceiving him. She sent me to offer the English our best warriors if they would fight Wanchese in her name.
I went back to Fort Raw-lee. I told the assistants that sickness and death had weakened Wanchese and the Roanoke. That the English and the Croatoan together could defeat him. But I admitted this might provoke the Secotan and others to retaliate. In the men’s faces, the desire to defeat Wanchese battled with their mistrust of me. I said I would show Wanchese that I—not he—was lord of the Roanoke by the authority of their Kwin-lissa-bet.
The assistants made me leave John-white’s house while they debated what action to take. I waited by the garden gate. Doubted the truth of what I had said. Was it the kwin and John-white who gave me my power, or was it the gods? Had not my mother’s people—and Wanchese’s—dwelt here and called the land Ossomocomuck for many generations before the English weroance claimed it and called it Virginia? The priests had chosen my name. Manteo, “he who snatches from another.” What did my name mean? How would I live up to it?
I did not realize Ladi-cate was in the garden until I heard her call my name.
“Lord Manteo, will you come in?”
I opened the gate and went to her. The gray mists that were her eyes seemed to enfold me, so I looked away from them.
“You did not go back to Dasemunkepeuc, did you?” I asked.
“You do not rule me,” she replied with a smile.
I hardly knew what to think of a woman who would not heed a man’s will. Even Weyawinga and Ladi-cate’s kwin took advice from their male councilors. Was it my young age? Did Ladi-cate see that although I was tall, I had only lately entered my manhood?
“When I came here I said I would never dig in the dirt,” she was saying. “But Takiwa gave me these seedlings. I will transplant them when we move to Chesapeake. If I did not go to Dasemunkepeuc, I would not have these new plants and Takiwa would not have the medicine that made her sister well.”
She brushed off her hands and went inside, bidding me wait. I stood in the garden like a stone unable to move itself. Ladi-cate was talking to me without any fear. She was no Moon Maiden from a story, but a woman I might