Half-breed
WARNING: Extreme violence, this is a historical tale of a young
woman of two worlds but each of them spurn her. She grows up hard
and fast as a half-breed. There is a lot of gun play and killing.
If torture of humans offends you do not read this story. If the
word Squaw offends you find another story to read. Not much sex
in this one. It dose allude to lesbian loving. It is more of a
western story set in the Oklahoma territory 1860's through
1890's.

Gray Feather had been on her own since the tender age of 12 when
her white father got killed in a crooked game of five card stud
down in Amarillo Texas where he was buying guns for the tribe.
Her mother a slave taken by the Pawnee had died when the girl was
only six of small pox.  The Cherokee woman had contracted the
deadly illness from an intentionally contaminated blanket given
out by the US government as an early form of germ warfare.

The hard life the half-breed had led left her tough skinned and
self-reliant. The sun had darkened her skin and stole it of the
softness the ladies of privilege strove so hard to maintain. Her
teeth were stained a dark brown from the tobacco she was addicted
to and the lack of any real dental hygiene. Her idea of mouthwash
was a shot of rye followed by a beer.

When Gray Feather was a little girl her nose was broken several
times as she had to fight to stay alive in the harsh life on the
edges of the Indian camp. The Pawnee treated her as a non-human
since she was the daughter of a slave. She was to her mother's
people, the Cherokee, white by law and not a true human being.
The whites just called her Indian squaw. The tribe tolerated her
because her father was a rum and gun runner that provided goods
the US Government tried to keep out of the Pawnee's hands.
However once her father was killed she was driven out of the
village, and his lodge was burned.

She snuck back into the village and stole a rifle, an old Colt
.36 CAL cap and ball revolver, and a good strong pony. She slit
the side of a teepee and took a catch of pemmican.  During the
summer the Indians dried Saskatoon berries as well as meat. When
the chokecherries were ripe the band assembled at some convenient
spot to make pemmican.
The women beat strips of dry-meat(a hollow log, up-ended, and
bound with a thong of rawhide to prevent splitting served as a
container) with stone pounding implements until it was almost
like powder. The mass was mixed with melted fat in a bark trough,
then packed very tightly into skin bags, and sewed up so that no
air could enter, folding the skin over until no air remained in
the bag. Saskatoons and chokecherries pounded up, pits and all
added to the flavor, if not the digestibility.

 Some women, as in any society were very clean and careful when
preparing food, and some were not. A well-known good
pemmican-maker commanded a higher price as a bride. "Sweet"
pemmican was made by cracking the big animal bones and boiling
them with water. The melted fat came to the top, and when
congealed, was used for mixing. Also the paunch or stomach of the
animal was used as a container. People who are horrified by this
idea should remember that until a very few years ago sausage
casings were made from the cleaned intestines of pigs or lambs.
If kept dry, pemmican would remain good for years. Even today,
many native people embarking on long trips into remote areas make
a supply, for it is one of the most concentrated foods known to
man. It will sustain life indefinitely and needs no
refrigeration.

She hunted the fat bastard gambler that had shot her father for a
year before she caught up with him in Oklahoma. She whored
herself out to him. She  cut his throat when he took the child to
his bed. She still had his dried and eviscerated  cock in a black
leather pouch tied to her counting token.
  Gray Feather kept alive by selling her body to drunken men in
cow towns that did not have a lot of women to choose from. She
turned 16 and had
enough of spreading her legs for men that would more often than
not give her a beating rather than the two bits she charged for
her services. Now if she bedded anyone it was another whore.

She was laying with a mulatto whore in the dusty town of San
Anglo when a drunken cowboy kicked in the door looking for his
favorite prostitute. He was  enraged seeing the nigger whore with
a half breed Indian. He pulled Gray Feather off the bed and hit
her breaking her nose yet again. She kicked him in the nuts and
when he bent over she bit off his left ear.

The fight moved down the hallway as the two fought and rolled on
the floor. She got ahold of a broken banister and clubbed the
larger man. Gray Feather got away from him and ran nude back to
the room she was in. She retrieved her Colt .36 wheel gun from
her clothes on the floor by the bed.  She turned as saw the
cowpoke rush at her with a drawn knife. She shot him in the head
and he staggered out the door and fell over the railing on to a
poker table below. This disrupted the game and spilled a lot of
good whiskey.

Gray Feather tossed on her cloths and kissed the whore and then
crashed out the window and tumbled on a stack of hay at the rear
of the saloon. She mounted her pony and got the hell out of town
for she was not going to put her trust in the law. The half breed
knew that if she lingered in Texas she would soon dance at the
end of a rope.

She hooked up with a cattle drive that was short handed and
willing to take on the tough young half breed. She rode tail
eating the dust the 3,000 head kicked up. She had to push the
straggles to keep up with  sea of brown that grazed their way
north to the railhead and slaughter houses of Kansas City. It was
dark when she pushed the small herd of old and sickly cattle to
the main herd. She knocked the trail dust off her and went to the
chuck wagon to get a supper of beans and beef with some hard tack
biscuits washed down with bitter hot black coffee.

She smelled as bad as the fucking cattle did and her sour
disposition stove off any amorous advances by the horny cow
punchers. She made the drive to Kansas City and parted ways with
the drovers. She used her pay to purchase a new Remington Model
1875 chambered in 44 Remington Center fire.  It held six rounds
and was a single action which meant the hammer had to cocked and
then the trigger pulled to let it fall on the brass cartage
firing the lead bullet out the barrel. She got a used holster at
a livery stable for a silver dollar. Her Model 1875 had a shorter
 5-3/4 inch barrel. This cut down on the gun's accuracy at
anything over 50 feet, but it came out of the holster faster and
most gunfights were done under 40 feet.
 She shot up the rest of her pay practicing her quick draw and
discharge of the black wheel gun. Gray Feather got as fast as a
rattler and was just as
deadly. She was walking back into Kansas City after a round of
busting bottles with her gun down at the town dump  when three
drunken dudes from back east blocked her path.

"Hay Injun, where did you steal that gun? Fucking redskin whore!
Give us some squaw pussy bitch!" the big dumb Pollack said as he
rushed at her.

Gray Feather's Remington spat lead and in three heartbeats three
men lay dead in the street. She grabbed a Pinto tied to a rail
next to the express office and rode hell bent for leather out of
Missouri. Her counting token now bore seven large knots. She ran
through the badlands and rode with a band of renegade Oglala
under Pawnee Killer as they fought a losing war with the 7th US
Calvary.
  In 1875, the regiment also escorted a railroad survey of the
Yellowstone River valley. This expedition brought the regiment
into constant conflict with Native American raiding parties.
Custer, contrary to popular belief, was a peace-loving man. He
did everything possible to prevent war during his frontier
campaigns. Custer repeatedly requested authorization to share
surplus food and grain with the Native Americans under the
jurisdiction of the Standing Rock Indian Agency, but was denied
permission by the Department of the Interior, which controlled
the Indian agencies. The cavalry, on the other hand, was under
the War Department, and thus, had no recourse.
  Typically, the federal government had broken every treaty it
had made with the Indians.  Food, supplies, and weapons that had
been promised to
Native Americans were instead sold for gold to the settlers. The
government promised these goods to the Native Americans if the
latter would peacefully remain on reserved lands. What few
supplies that actually were sold to the Native Americans were at
unreasonable prices. Flour and grain sent to the agencies were
often mixed with sand; meat was often unfit for human
consumption. Given the Native Americans' traditionally nomadic
lifestyle and the poor living conditions, it was no surprise that
they migrated.

In his conduct of the "Cleaning House Campaign" against the
Indian agents, Custer found one of the worst culprits in
President Ulysses S. Grant's brother Orville. Abuse, cheating,
and dishonesty ran rampant amongst the Indian agents who were
supposed to uphold treaties and act as liaisons among the Native
Americans and the federal government. Indian agents, who were
appointed, often paid bribes to secure their position.

President Grant relieved Custer of his command in April 1876 for
the latter's sin of speaking the uncomfortable truth about
Orville Grant and the Indian agents. Meanwhile, the regiment had
been in combat and had made its name as the finest horse
cavalrymen on the frontier.

Gray Feather escaped with her life and a US Army pony she took
from an Osage scout. Her counting token now sported 19 men
killed. She drifted south to the Oklahoma Territory. The rain
came down in sheets turning the red trail dust into a morass of
mud that tired both horse and rider. She rode into Tulsa and saw
the glided sign for the Lucky Boy Saloon and found a spot for her
horse. The half breed tied her gray gelding to the split rail and
loosened her pistol in its' holster.  She saw a young cow poke
stumble out of the Bar and lean against a cedar post.

    "Hay Half-breed, you kind ain't welcome here. Everyone knows
an Injun squaw can't hold her firewater. White man's whiskey no
good for red devil." dirty saddle tramp said as he leaned against
the post holding up the wooden awning in front of the Lucky Boy
Saloon. His black cotton jacket was unbuttoned and the butt of
his Colt wheel gun rode high in his belt.

Gray Feather looked at the young drifter and saw that he had been
drinking rotgut rye. His eyes were bloodshot and he stank of
stale booze and cheep tobacco. His un-gloved hand shook as he
leered at her.  She stepped away from her unshod pony and onto
the boardwalk facing the drunken bastard 20 feet away.

"Look you stupid Mick either use that big iron or get the fuck
out of my way." the half Cherokee young woman said as she spat
her chewing tobacco into the muddy street.

"Fucken' squaw I will learn you a thing or two!" the drunken
cowhand yelled as he made a play for the pistol in his belt. His
hand had just touched the smooth wood of the gun when Gray
Feather's Remington .44 spat flame and lead. The 350 gr. soft
lead bullet slammed into his chest and threw him back into the
muck of the street.

He looked up into the gray sky as rain fell on his face. He
coughed and dark red blood welled up out of his mouth for his
lungs were filling quickly with his blood. "Fucken' squaw done
killed me." he said in astonishment as his life drained out of
his body and soaked into the red clay mud of the Oklahoma
Territory.

"Anyone else got a problem with me getting a fucking drink?" the
wild young woman said as she spun the heavy Remington in her
right hand and then slammed it home in the worn black leather
holster slung on her wide hips.

"No ma'am, not me. I seen it all. It was a fair fight. That
cowpoke he drew down first. Shit I never seen anyone throw steel
like you did.  Holy shit did you see that?" a sodbuster dressed
in denim pants by  Levi Strauss said as he stood over the now
dead cowpoke.

"Well someone go get Marshall Hill. She has gone and killed
Johnny Kencade. Someone has to ride out to the  Flying K ranch
and tell Sam Kencade that his no count drunken son finally pissed
off the wrong pistolero. Ma'am I will be needing your iron. Just
until the Marshall gets old Judge Butler to hold a hearing on the
shooting. It will be self defense you got six good wittiness that
saw him throw down on you."  Sam Cook the owner of the Lucky Boy
said as he reached out for the heavy Remington.

"No fucking way. I may give my six gun to the law but until then
she says right here on  my hip. Now can I get my fucking whiskey?
It is thirsty work killing a motherfucker." The dark skinned 20
year old woman said as she pulled a plug of chewing tobacco from
her pouch and sliced off a chunk with a long Bowie fighting knife
that she wore on her left hip. She had her long black hair done
into two dirty long braids that hung to her hips. The gun slinger
wore Cherokee deer skin moccasins that came up to her calf. She
had Union field pants cut from wool over her legs and wore a
gingham checked shirt under her horse blanket poncho. Her Bowie
knife lived there on her hip. A battered ill-shaped black Stetson
felt hat sat on her head.

"Just try and not kill anybody else OK?" Sam said as he turned
and swept his arm pointing toward the entrance to his dance hall
saloon. The woman walked past the man she had just killed and
tied another knot on the braided horse hair counting token that
hung from her neck. The new knot marked an even 20 kills.

"So long as they don't rile me." the killer said as she pushed
through the swinging double doors. The Lucky Boy had been built
with dark mahogany imported from the Spanish colony in the
Philippines. A bar 40 feet long ran across the back of the main
room. A brass pipe ran along the bottom of the paneled bar about
a foot off the floor. There was a plate glass mirror on the wall
behind the bar. Above the mirror hung lithograph prints of bawdy
full figured painted ladies bent over to expose their assets.
The center of the bar held a painting of the superstar of her day
Miss Lilly Langtry a former British citizen who had affaires with
English royalty. She was  a society beauty who became the
semi-official mistress to the Prince of Wales, Queen Victoria's
son Albert Edward ("Bertie"), the future king Edward VII. She had
a long career as a stage personality.

Gray Feather walked pass the farmers and store clerks and would
be professional gamblers. They had come to the front at the sound
of gun play to see the show. There was a mummer going through the
crowded bar that the shooter was a woman and a  half breed. Such
talk quickly died off when she walked by them to the bar.

"Whiskey bar keep, two fingers of your good rye, none of that rot
gut shit. Find me a good bottle and leave it." she said as she
dug in her coyote skin tote bag and tossed a gold double eagle on
the bar.   Double eagles were so named because the largest U.S..
coin until the time of the California gold rush was a $10 face
value (about ½ troy ounce) gold Eagle. When Congress in 1849
authorized the large $20 gold piece to coin efficiently the
bonanza of gold coming from the California gold fields, it
naturally came to be called the `double' eagle.

"Hell gal you are going to fucking drink all month?" the
bartender asked as Cowboys made $25-$40 per month plus room &
board in the 1870's. A shot of decent whiskey was 50 cents.

"I'ill be needing a room for a week, a bath, a steak rare, that
bottle of rye, and a whore. But not in that order." the tough
talking, hard drinking, and fast gun said.

"Coming right up. Which one of the whores you fancy ma'am?" the
bar keep said as he pointed to the six well used "dance hall
girls" standing around a black piano player. He reached behind
the bar and pulled a brass key off a hook to room eight on the
second floor and pushed it across the polished dark mahogany
wood.

"I reckon the one with the biggest tits. I like big tits." the
killer said as she knocked back another shot of rye."

"That would be Lilly then. She is a bit long in the tooth but she
is an easy ride." the bartender said as wiped a stain from the
figured wood.

  " Hill! You got to come quick. A half-breed done gone and kelt
Johnny Kencade. She shot him dead quicker than shit. He called
her a fucking squaw and then drew down on her. She was out of
leather and back again before he hit the mud. I ain't never seen
nothing like it. The breed be at the Lucky Boy now marshal. She
be taking a room there." the sodbuster said as he shook his head.

  "You don't say? Well I wondered what damned fool was
discharging
a firearm in the city limits. Round up the witness and see if you
can raise old Judge Butler.  I reckon that he will be dead drunk
and laying up at Red's place. I will go to take a look at Johnny
and pick up this killing squaw. Johnny was a fast gun, that was
when he was not in to the bottle. But then now a days, that
wasn't't often. His daddy is going to be fit to be tied. He'ill
want to hang the cunt for sure." The bent old man said as he spit
a wad of tobacco juice at the brass spittoon in the corner of the
office. He missed as was the norm as was evident by the stained
floorboards.

"Sure thing Marshall, I get old Judge Butler and round up them
what seen her shoot the lad. You what to hold court down a Red's
or at the Lucky Boy?" the farmer asked as the old man strapped on
his Colt Peace Maker. He had not fired a shot in anger since the
Civil War.

"Well might as well use the Lucky Boy since that is where the
deed went down." he said as he put on his vest with his tin star
proclaiming him the law in this part of Oklahoma.

He crossed the muddy street and saw that old Doc Baker had Johnny
 on a flat cart and had his two nigger helpers pushing it down
the his office/funeral parlor.

"Hay Doc, looks like poor old Johnny is having a bad day. What
you make the cause of death, besides stupidity?" the old law man
asked as he spit into the red mud as his feet.

"Hay Ben, I would say it was a single gunshot in the chest.
Bullet went in center of his rib cage and blew a hole in his
heart. The lead came out his back taking a chunk the size of your
fist with it. His gun was part way out but he did get off a shot.
No need to perform an autopsy, save the county two dollars that
way. I'ill put him on ice till his paw comes and fetches him. You
know he will be coming hell bent for leather with his men. If I
was you I would have the trial in the next half hour and send
that killer squaw on her merry way. If not there will be hell to
pay." Doc Baker said as he scratched his balding head.
"You got that right Doc. Just why the hell did I take this
fucking tin star?" Marshall Hill asked as he knocked some of the
sticky red mud off his boots on the boardwalk in front of the
Lucky Boy saloon.

"Hell Hill, it was to get rich off the $47.50 the town shits out
each month. That and to have the privilege of my sterling
company." the old Doc said with a grin as he followed the cart
carrying the dead cowboy.

"That would be true if they did  not charge me $20.00 a month for
rent on that shack the Mayor call a house." the lawman said as he
spit again into the rutted main street.

Hill pushed the swinging door open and stepped into the Lucky
Boy. He saw about a dozen of Tulsa's finest ne'er-do-wells
clustered around a short ugly half-breed at the bar. The lawman
hiked up his belt over his potbelly and squared himself to
confront the young killer.

"Hay, you the one that shot Johnny Kencade?" he said as he pushed
through the small crowd of men at the bar.

"Yea, I shot the fucker. The dumb bastard called me a fucking
squaw and threw down on me. So I killed him, end of story." Gray
Feather said as she took a long swig of the amber liquor from the
bottle.

"That is what I have heard. Look here Ma'am you will have to hand
over your wheel gun so we can have the trial. I got that dumb
Pollock Waslaskie fetching the Judge now. So hand it over and we
can get on with it. You can be on your pony and out of town
before noon.  You will be on your horse and showing its' back
side to the town for you cannot stay here.  Johnny's old man will
come ridding hard and shoot the shit out of my town to get to
you. I can't have that so fucking hand over the iron now please."
he said as he reached out his hand.

"Shit, I was looking to get a fucking bath, a good steak, another
bottle, and some pussy. But my mother did not raise a fucking
fool." she said as she drew her Remington and handed it butt
first to the old lawman.

"It's fucking raining so you can get your bath on the trail,
there ain't no good steaks in this joint, you can take the
fucking bottle with you, and you would just get the clap from
these whores darling." Hill said as he spit at a brass spittoon
and missed.

"Hell, Bar keep give me back my double eagle." she said  as she
tossed two bits on the bar.
"Hay that bottle of rye don't cost no two bits, its two dollars."
the bartender said as he dug her gold coin out of the cash box.

"Shit Charley, let the women have the bottle she has gone and
gotten rid of a pain in our asses so it is the least we can do."
the lawman said  as he grabbed a glass off the bar and led the
woman to an empty table.

"Here sit, and give an old man a shot of courage for I am going
to need it when old Kencade rides into town." he said to the
gunslinger.

"Sure. How long you been a law man?" she asked not really
interested in his answer but felt the need to make some kind of
conversation with the man.

"Let's see, shit it's been 40 fucking years since I pinned on a
star. Fuck it seems like twice that long. Getting old ain't all
it's cracked up to be darling. Here's to better fucking days." he
said as he lifted his glass in a toast to the young ugly killer.

"Fuck yea, to better fucking days" she said as she knocked down
another shot of rye.

Waslaskie came back with the Judge and three men that saw the
shooting. The old man was dressed in a pair of dirty black pants
and a long-john top. He did not look very happy to be out of bed
and in a bar without a drink in his hand.

"Fuck Hill, can't the trial wait till I sober up some? I got a
fucking headache that won't quit." he said as he grabbed the
bottle of rye and took a long pull on it.

"No it can't. You know that Kencade will come to shoot up the
town to get the woman that killed his halfwit son. So fucking
pick a jury of 12 fine Tulsa men and get on with it. She is not
guilty she done shot him in self defense." the lawman said as he
poured another shot for himself.

"Hay you 12 men, there are 12 of them arn't there?  Raise your
right fucking hands and be sworn in as jurist. You all swear to
listen to the fucking evidence in this case and give a fair
judgment here? If so say fucking I do." the old man said as he
pulled the bottle from the lawman's hand and took another pull on
it.

The men mumbled there I do's. and the judge banged the bottle on
the poker table.All right then who saw the deed go down?" he
asked as he looked at the sorry crowd in the saloon.

  "I did Judge. Old Johnny he was in his cups and old Sam here
the
tossed Johnny out for busting up the place. Then the squaw, I
mean this here woman come to get a drink and Johnny he got mean
with her and smart mouthed her some and then the dumb fucker drew
down on her. She shot him dead as shit as fast as you can fart.
Johnny he fell in the mud and said "Fuck she done killed me."
Then he died.That is what happened for sure." Waslaskie said
pointing to Gray Feather.

  OK then, anybody else see something different?  No, good. What
is
your fucking name woman?" he asked as he took another shot of rye
killing the bottle.

"Gray Feather." she said as she shook her head.

"Good, What say the jury? And be quick about it. The fucking
bottle is empty." he said as he held the dead bottle up for the
bartender to see and fetch him another.

"Well hell we all seen it. Not guilty by self fucking defense." a
not too drunk Swede said.

"Not guilty it is then. Case dismissed now get me a fucking
bottle of Jack. Feather Gray you are free to get the hell out
town. If I were you I would do that post haste." the now
inebriated Judge said.

"It is Gray Feather. I will as soon as I get my pistol back." she
said as she took the heavy gun and slid it into the holster
riding on her hip.

"What ever just get going. Ride hard and long for old Kencade is
a stubborn man." the Judge said as he popped the cork on another
bottle of whiskey

"Gray Feather I have to make that official. For the good order
and peace of the town of Tulsa you are hereby given notice to be
out of town in the next five minutes or sooner. Good luck and
ride hard." the old Marshall  said as he joined the Judge in a
shot of whiskey.

"I will need some supplies if I am going to take to the badlands.
Where is the mercantile?" she asked as she went to the bar and
took a bottle of Old Granddad Rye off the shelf.

"Just down Dodge street. The Pollock will  show you. Do not come
back to Oklahoma." he said as he planed to get real fucking
drunk.

" I make my own luck with this." she said as she patted her big
iron on her hip. The half breed left the saloon and followed the
farmer down the street to the dry goods store. She spent most of
the cash she had and left the store with enough goods to see her
through a year of life in the Bad Lands. The woman had enough
gold to buy a pack mule and the tack for the brown beast.  The
colored boy at the stable helped her load her supplies and she
rode out of town.

Gray Feather did not push her pony or the mule as she did not
want to have one of them come up lame. She rode through the low
rolling hills that were covered with stunted Cedar trees and
clumps of woody brush. The sky stayed a lead gray and it felt
like rain.  The wind picked up and the gray skies turned black
and then green as a major storm moved across the Oklahoma hills.
The clouds opened up and a cold rain came down in sheets driven
by a wild wind. Gray Feather rode towards an out cropping of red
sandstone that offered some shelter from the gathering storm.
Lightning ripped the black and boiling skies and she had a hard
time seeing three feet in front of her face. She reckoned that
this qualified as a fucking bath.

She dismounted and walked the animals into a clearing under a
sandstone ledge. The high out cropping of red sandstone blocked
the worst of the wind and rain. She decided to make camp here as
going on in the raging storm was madness.  Gray Feather tied the
pony and the mule to the trunk of a tree and removed the saddle
from her pony. She took off the canvas pack cover that also
doubled as a one man tent from the mule. She unloaded her
supplies and setup the tent and her bedroll.

Gray Feather had a cold camp that night not wanting to start a
fire as it would have been difficult to get one going much less
keep it going in the driving wind and rain. She ate some hard
tack biscuits and beef jerky washed down with a shot of rye. She
tended to the animals and then hit the sack to sleep out the
storm.  The wind stopped blowing around five in the morning and
the rain let up around seven.

The high wind and knocked down a few trees and she had a hard
time getting out of the fallen timber. The sun was high in the
blue sky by the time she had broken camp and worked her way out
of tangled downed trees. She rode on the north side of a ridge
that ran more or less east to west. She could have made better
time on the trail on the south side of the ridge but if there
were anyone following her she would be harder to spot.

The sun was sinking into the west and the sky was a riot of red
and pink clouds. She smiled and recalled on of her father's
favorite saying. "red sky at night hunter's delight, red sky at
morning hunter take warning." The land slowly ran out of hills
and ridges as she rode west. The countryside was now low rolling
rises cut now and then by creeks and dry washes. The trees got
smaller and further apart. The soil was red clay mixed with sand
that supported only hardy scrub brush and tough clumps of dry
yellow grasses. The summer sun quickly burned off the moisture
from yesterday's storm.

Muddy red water rushed through normally dry cuts and ate at the
banks washing more red clay into the stream. She came to a now
swiftly flowing river. The woman saw the bloated carcass of a
small Mule Dear drift down stream.  The mule would have nothing
to do with the rushing water. No matter how much she pulled on
his halter the stubborn animal would not enter the river. She
swore and was forced to follow the river north in hops of finding
a suitable forging point.

"God Damn you Hill!  You just fucking let that squaw ride out of
town after she killed my boy?" Sam Kencade yelled as he grabbed
the old lawman by the collar of his leather vest.

"Sam, I had to. She shot him in self-defense. Hell six men him
draw down on her first. That was after he had made an ass of
himself in the Lucky Boy. Fuck you know how hot headed the boy
was.  He was drunk and spoiling for a fight. He just picked the
wrong bitch to fuck with.  We had a trial and old Judge Butler
and 12 men found her not guilty. Hell man just let it go. There
nothing good out of tracking her down and killing her." the
marshal said trying to reason with the enraged man.

"Fuck that, she killed him and I will have her ass dancing on the
end of a short rope or fucking know the reason why. Give me that
fucking tin star. You are fucking fired, get your shit packed up
and be out of town by sundown or I will so help me blow your
rotten head off." the rancher yelled as he ripped the star off of
Hill's vest and stormed out of the office.

"Well fuck you Sam, I'am tired of taking your shit. I have quit
better jobs than this." the warn-out aged ex-lawman said as he
spit at the back of the enraged cattle baron.

"Mount up men! We are going squaw hunting. There is a hundred in
gold for the man that brings her ass to me." he shouted to his
dozen ranch hands. Most of them were hard men and all were quick
with a gun and had fought in the Civil War, Indian uprisings, and
the range wars that plagued the west in the 1870`s.

"Three Teeth, you take point and track that bitch." Sam Kencade
said to the old Sioux Indian.

"I know of this Gray Feather, she has killed many white eyes. She
has ridden with the Oglala under Pawnee Killer. We call her
"Walks With Ugly Stick" but not to her face. The last brave that
called her that now rides with the Great Spirit and is just a
knot on her counting token. It is not a good day to die. You
should bury your son and drink much whiskey and sing of his life.
To hunt Gray Feather is to hunt death, I am old but I want to see
many more moons before I go to the happy hunting grounds. I am
going home to my squaw." the weathered aged scout said as he
mounted his pony.

"God damn it, she is just another fucking squaw half-breed. I
will make it  150 in gold!" Sam Kencade yelled as he mounted his
Pinto horse.

"And a new Hennery rifle and a horse. For a 150 in gold, a
Hennery, and a horse I will ride her down, but you should bury
your hate with your son. Three Teeth has spoken." Oglala Sioux
warrior said as he headed his pony west out of the white man's
big village.

They made it a few miles out of Tulsa when the sky opened and
sent sheets of cold rain and lighting bolts crashing into the
earth. Kencade drove his men forward in the raging storm. When
the storm clouds blotted out the sun and the land was washed in
darkness they had to stop to ride out the tempest.  They rode to
a Sodbuster's house and Kencade called to the man in his dugout
house.

"Nelson, its me Kencade. I need to use your barn to wait out the
fucking storm." he yelled over the raging wind and rain swept
land.

"What the fuck are you doing out on a night like this?" the
farmer asked as he came to the wood plank door and held up a
lantern.

"I am hunting a fucking red skinned half-breed what killed my
boy. You seen her?" he asked as he got off his mount and walked
it to the front of the dugout.

"No I ani't seen shit, not in this fucking rain. Sure use the
barn I got the cows up on the north fork of the Arkansas River.
You say she killed Johnny? Holy shit he was a fast gun. She
fucking bushwhack him?" the soddbuster  asked as he held the oil
lantern over his head.

"No they say that it was a fair fight, but he had been on a ten
day bender so your grandmother could had out drawn him. I mean to
nail her tits to the wall and watch her die." he said as he
turned and led his men to the barn for the night.

The sun had just started to shine through the breaks in the
clouds when he had his men up and ridding west. They followed the
rutted road for a mile or more when the old Indian called a halt.
"The storm has washed away any sign of her passing. There is no
way to know where she has gone. You should make seven teams of
two men each and have them search the river, the road, the four
cattle trails and the ridge line leading to the bad lands. You
and I Kencade will ride the ridge line for if I were on the run I
would ride on the north side of the hills. We may find her
there." the scout advised as he stood looking at he muddy road.

"Hell's bells, Fuck you are right. When you catch her I do not
care what you do to her but keep her alive and drag the cunt back
to the ranch. Send one man to find me on this ridge. If we leave
the hills we will mark the new trail. Now ride this cunt down."
he said as he paired his men into seven teams. The rancher
followed the Sioux up the slope to ridge. They rode about six
miles when Three Teeth pointed to an out cropping of red rock.

"We are on her trail. She made a cold camp here last night." he
said as he poked around the ground behind the freshly fallen
timber.

"Here is where she slept, and here is where the pony and a mule
were tied for the night. She is not far maybe three or five
miles. Let us ride for we are losing the sun. I do not want to
ride in these hills in the dark.  Too easy to turn a horse's
ankle and it is a long walk back to the ranch. My bones are too
old to do such a thing." he said as he smelled a clump of horse
shit and checked how moist it was. The wetter the shit the
fresher it was.

"There! She is following the river bank north looking for a spot
to ford the river." the old Indian said as he read the sign of
her passing in the mud of the river.

"How far ahead of us is she?" the impatient rancher demanded as
he sat on his Pinto.

"Not far. This is fresh mule shit. See it still steams maybe an
hour not too much longer than that." Three Teeth said as he got
back on his horse and rode slowly looking for more evidence of
her passage.

The two men rode wide around a bend in the river and saw a mule
grassing in the lush green grass growing in the rich soil of the
river bank. They did not see the horse or the half-breed woman
anywhere around.

"This is not good Kencade. She knows that we trail her." the old
red-man said as he held his hand over his eyes shielding them
from the glare of the sun. He saw the white puff of smoke just
before he heard the report of a heavy rifle's shot. The Indian
turned to Kencade and saw him thrown from his saddle as the round
took him in his chest. He wheeled his pony and put his spurs to
its' flank and urged the old horse to flee the killing ground.
Three Teeth left the dying white man to the tender mercy of the
half-breed. He had no wish to meet the ugly woman.

"You fucking asshole! Come back and help me! Shit I am gut shot."
Kencade called out as he lay on the muddy bank of the Arkansas
River.

"I told you to burry your son and drink much whiskey. Now the
crows will dine on your eyes white man." Three Teeth said as he
bent low to the neck of his galloping pony.

Gray Feather moved her long gun and led the old scout's pony and
fired where he would be when the heavy lead slug crossed his
path. The big Hennery bucked again in her shoulder and a puff of
white smoke billowed up in front of the gun. She heard a cry and
when the smoke had cleared the Indian's pony ran on alone its'
rider laying in the weeds of the river bank.

"Sorry old man you should have stayed home. I will send your
spirit on to the last ride." She said as she got up off the
ground and mounted her pony and went to see what she could loot
from the two dead men. Life in the bad lands was hard just about
as hard as the half-breed was.

He lay in the wet weeds and pain stabbed his chest every time he
drew a shallow breath. He coughed and red blood ran down his
chin. His eye sight dimmed and he felt so cold. He was jerked
back to consciousness by cold river water thrown onto his face.

"Wake up mother fucker. I want you to feel this." a woman said as
she bent over his body. He tried to move his hand to draw his six
gun but he found that he was tied to stakes driven into the muddy
ground. He looked down and saw that he was nude and spread eagle.
He saw that a cattail had been shoved into his chest wound to
staunch the flow of blood.

"NO!" he screamed as the half-breed dumped a bark scoop full of
glowing red embers on his penis. The hot coals ate into his soft
flesh and tuned his white flesh red, then black, and then back to
white ash as his genitals were cooked while attached to his body.


She use a bent willow branch as tongs to hold the red hot coal as
he put one on each of his man tits. She plaid his screams like a
fine instrument. She pushed glowing coals into each of his eyes.
They bubbled and then burst the fluid extinguishing the now black
bit of oak wood. She sat on his chest and pissed in his face.
Gray Feather pulled two pointed burning twigs and rammed them in
each of his ears. The fucker thrashed and screamed as she
tortured his body. It was getting dark and his screams were now
not much more than piteous whimpers as he begged for death to
claim him. She used a slab of bark to scoop up the last embers of
her torture fire. She held his mouth open and dumped the hot
coals down his throat.  His death was not the easy one he had
prayed to God for. The burning coals blocked any air from
entering his lungs and they burned holes in his esophagus. The
agony of the burning embers smashed his brain and it only faded
as he died.

She left him there for the creatures of the wild to dine on. Gray
Feather packed his horse and took everything that the rancher had
brought with him including a small bag of gold meant to be the
reward for taking her life.  The old Indian she tied to his pony
and hit its ass sending him on his way home. She led the mule and
Kencade's horse across the river and followed it north to
Wichita. There she headed west to Dodge City. She spent the
winter hold up with a fresh little gal just off the train from
back east.

Spring came and she slipped out one night and rode north to the
bad lands as a wanted poster had been tacked up down at the
express office. Thankfully she had never been photographed so the
drawing could have been any ugly woman. She did not use her
Indian name instead she now called herself Shelly Long.

She had thrown away her men's clothing and now wore a yellow
gingham store bought dress. Her new whore had her taking a bath
once a week and even had her using that new flanged tooth brush
on her brown teeth. She even gave up chaw for the little cunt.
But she still knocked back a shot of rye now and then.

She took a plug of Red Man from a cloth bag and chewed the rich
flavor out of the hard pressed tobacco. Her legs were covered in a
new pair of blue denim pants and a warm red flannel shirt was
tucked into her black leather belt that carried her new Colt .45
Peace Maker.  The butt of a brand new Winchester Model 1876 sat
on her right side as it rode in its' scabbard.  The Winchester
Model 1876 or Centennial Model was a heavier-framed rifle than
the Model 1866 or Model 1873, and was the first to be chambered
for full-powered centerfire rifle cartridges, as opposed to
rimfire cartridges or handgun-sized centerfire rounds.  It was
chambered for the new .45-75 WCF cartridge. It would knock a
buffalo down at 200 yards. It made a hell of a mess of a man.

  She rode away from the soft life and soft body of her teen
lover but the call of the wild and her somewhat image tacked to the
wall of the US Marshal's office had more to do with her leaving
if the truth was to be known. Her familiar counting token now
hung around her throat. Its' bag now held the dried ears of Sam
Kencade along with the nut sack and cock of the man that had
killed her paw so many years ago.  The badlands called her and
she answered that call as she rode west, ever west across the
next divide.

 She roamed the west killing the buffalo for the gold
they brought her. She died alone when at the age of 39 her
horse's hoof got caught in a prairie dog's burrow and broke its
leg and fell crushing her chest as it rolled over her. She lay
undiscovered save by the vultures that circled over her.

This is a work of fiction from my twisted mind. Any connection to
persons living or dead are circumstantial  save for historical
persons.  Feed back at wordweaver69@gmail.com  Arlin