Tworivers
Copyright© 2025 by Harry Carton
Chapter 13: Inoculations
The predawn cold bit through Dawson’s shirt as he stepped outside Baya’s tipi, the scent of juniper smoke clinging to his skin. Across the campsite, shadows moved – warriors already checking on the inoculated volunteers camped beyond the perimeter. Apparently, the warriors were not worried about pox.
A low whistle cut through the darkness. Thomas emerged from between two wickiups, his face half-lit by a guttering torch. “Nantan’s fever spiked,” he murmured in English. “Not unexpected, but...”
Dawson rubbed sleep from his eyes, fingers unconsciously checking his watch—still counting. “How high?”
“One-oh-two last check.” Thomas checked the thermometer from the med kit. His breath fogged in the chill air. “Gouyen’s with him. Says the fever’s breaking.”
Dawson exhaled sharply, watching the vapor curl between them. Across the camp, muffled coughing signaled another volunteer stirring. Nantan wouldn’t be the last to suffer through the night.
The first streaks of dawn revealed Bent Bow crouched beside the central fire, methodically shredding willow bark into a boiling pot. Dark circles shadowed his eyes, but his hands moved with precision. Dawson knelt beside him, catching the acrid-sweet scent of the brewing remedy. “How many fevered?”
“Three,” Bent Bow grunted, stirring the mixture with a charred stick. “Nantan worst. Others...” He gestured vaguely northwest where the isolation tents stood. The unspoken truth hung between them – if this failed, they’d be burning bodies by sunset.
Dawson’s watch beeped softly – 72 hours since inoculation. He rose just as Winona burst from Nantan’s tent, her hands streaked with something dark and glistening. Dawson’s gut clenched until he recognized the paste’s herbal reek, not blood. Dawson pushed through to Nantan’s pallet.
“Blisters ruptured clean,” Winona announced to the gathering crowd. She held up Nantan’s arm, showing angry red dots fading to pink. “No new sores. Fever broke before dawn.” A murmur rippled through the assembled warriors and elders.
Nantan sat upright, sipping bitter tea with steady hands despite the sweat-damp hair clinging to his forehead. His eyes locked onto Dawson’s – clear, alert. “Your poison works, Yellow Hair,” he rasped, flexing his scabbed forearm. “Hurts less than my first spear wound, many moons ago.
Laughter erupted from the warriors crowding the tent flap, tension bleeding away like pus from a lanced boil. Thomas materialized beside Dawson, pressing a canteen into Nantan’s hands. “Drink. Salt and honey.” His fingers lingered on Nantan’s wrist – checking pulse, Dawson realized. Old medic habits died hard, even across centuries.
Beyond the tent, Bent Bow was already rolling up his sleeve for Gouyen’s knife. “No waiting,” he growled when Dawson raised an eyebrow. “If it works for Nantan, it works for all.” The blade flashed, drawing a thin red line. Gouyen worked quickly, transferring infection with a practiced hand while Winona administered the pitcher plant chaser.
“I’m next,” Winona said, rolling her vest aside. “If my father can stand that awful taste, I can also.”
Thomas hesitated – she looked barely sixteen, but he remembered Nantan’s comments earlier — twenty-two winters, and she was a full woman, her activity confirmed in the nights of their shared tipi, he remembered – Dawson caught his minute nod. Gouyen pressed the blade to Winona’s inner arm, quick and clinical. The girl didn’t flinch, though her nostrils flared at the pitcher plant tincture’s bitterness. “Tastes like cougar piss,” she muttered, sparking laughter.
By midday, the inoculation line stretched beyond the wickiups. Elders who’d scoffed yesterday now shuffled forward, their grandchildren clinging to their leggings. Dawson lost count of sterilized blades – boiling water steamed ceaselessly over the central fire, the scent of juniper mingling with the metallic tang of fresh blood.
Yellow Hair mumbled to himself, “We’re out of warriors for three days. Hope it’s quiet time on the lone prairie.”
The wind shifted, carrying the scent of roasting venison – and something acrid beneath it. Helmut’s forge. Dawson pivoted toward the smoke rising beyond the wickiups, where the German knelt beside a makeshift anvil, hammering what looked like a rifle barrel into shape, and quenching it in oil. The Huey’s rotor blade lay in pieces nearby, its alloy glinting unnaturally bright in the sunlight, the crate of Toledo springs open nearby. Winona strode over, her arm bandaged from the inoculation, but was too interested in Helmut’s work to let a scratch make her stop.
Helmut looked up, taking the pellets from the arquebus. “Lead,” he showed them to Winona. “We need this for the rifle I’m crafting. This comes from a mine. Do you have it?”
Winona frowned at the rough lead ball resting in Helmut’s palm. “There’s a cave two days’ ride west,” she said slowly, tracing the air with her finger. “Old women say the walls weep metal. But—” She hesitated, glancing at Thomas across the fire pit. “Spirits guard it.”
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