59 Bright Sword folded the letter back up, and
put it in his pouch. "Let us pick up our Dead," he ordered, "Clean up
the field. We will bury the enemy as is their custom, and put up a
marker for them. Someday, we will return here, and put up a statue to
mark the place...a statue of a Drummer Boy."
60 Many men there, swore an oath that when the fighting ended, they
would find the boy's mother and see to her needs. Ten of them did so,
bought land in her village, and treated her like their own mother, even
giving their second sons her boy's name, so that in a way, he would
have descendants.
61 Bright Sword gathered replacements, pushed south, and began to make
headway against the enemy. Now, they were not so bold, when they could
not out range their foe, and they, too, had repeating rifles. The
direction of the wind was beginning to change!
62 As Little Blossom Crow recovered from her wounds in Mi, her fighting
people dug in, for a final defense of the city. But the enemy did not
seem to be in much of a hurry. They advanced slowly, preferring to
take the villages to the west, first, though it was profiting them
little.
63 The only thing in the villages was fighting people. The village's
people, grain, and stock were long gone!
64 As Little Blossom Crow rested, she received two visitors. She
recognized one, immediately. He was the famous Fireworks Maker, Flaming
Serpent. The other man was a well-known Witch/Healer by the name of Singing Dove.
65 "Proud I am to meet you both," greeted the Warlock.