he had to
speak he might at least hope his words would be greeted with respect.

Redbird pressed against him, and her nearness warmed him. Flames danced
over the pile of blackened logs in the center of the British Band's
winter camp. Light gray smoke rose from the fire, the same color as the
blanket of cloud that hid the afternoon sun.

Fear twisted its knife in White Bear's stomach. He did not want to tell
this assembly what he knew. Most of them would hate him. The chiefs and
braves and warriors of the British Band, Black Hawk and all the rest,
would never forgive him. Owl Carver would feel betrayed.

_Let them settle this without me._

But he knew it was a forlorn hope. When Owl Carver had asked him what he
learned in his vision, he had answered evasively. And now Owl Carver was
counting on him.

Around the fire sat the council of seven chiefs who governed the Sauk
and Fox tribes, including Jumping Fish, Broth and Little Stabbing Chief.
Beside them sat He Who Moves Alertly, the friend of the long knives, the
war chief who had never made war. Prominent braves like Wolf Paw sat
with them. The older and the younger shamans of the British Band sat
there, Owl Carver and White Bear.

And there was another shaman at the fire as well, Flying Cloud, better
known as the Winnebago Prophet. He was a broad man with a wolfskin
thrown over his shoulders. Unlike nearly all the men of the tribes that
lived along the Great River, he had a thick black mustache that drooped
over the corners of his mouth. A silver nose ring rested on the
mustache. He was head man of a Winnebago village called Prophet's Town,
a day's journey up the Rock River from Saukenuk.

In the quiet that greeted Black Hawk, White Bear heard, over the crackle
of the fire, the rattle of the war chief's bone bracelets as he held out
his hand.

"I only want to go back to the land that belongs to me and dwell there
and raise corn there. I will not be cheated. I will not be driven out."

Black Hawk did not have a pleasing speaking voice; it was hoarse and
grating. But the assembly listened intently, because for over twenty
summers there had been no greater warrior among the Sauk and Fox.

"With this hand I have killed seventy and three of the long knives.
Every Sauk and Fox brave, every Winnebago and Potawatomi and Kickapoo,
can do as much. Yes, we know the long knives outnumber us. But we can
show them that if they want to steal Saukenuk from us, they will hav