“I’m from Sanford. I lived there up until about three weeks ago with my little sister, Lily.” He paused a moment to let that fact sink in.

Naturally, everyone was wondering where Lily was.

“One day we were outside our house, and a gang of kids was walking down the street. They came after us and we tried to escape, but Lily fell down and hurt herself. She couldn’t run anymore.”

The faces around us showed fear. Some of them probably either thought they knew what was coming next in the story or they suspected it was pretty bad.

Peter’s voice was quaking now. “They caught us and took her away. They left me behind and wouldn’t let me go with them.”

“Where is she now?” asked someone.

Peter’s voice cracked and became almost a screech. “She’s dead!” He dropped his face into his hands and sobbed.

I put my arm across his back and continued the story. “I wasn’t there, but Peter told me the whole thing. I’m going to tell you … not to shock you, but to make you see that this is serious. More serious than you can imagine.” I looked around to make sure I had everyone’s attention. No one was even eating anymore.

“After they caught his sister, he followed them at a distance so they wouldn’t see him. He saw them take her to someone’s house, so he ran back home to get his gun; but by the time he got back, it was too late. They had killed her … and they were dismembering her and cooking her body parts to eat her.” My stomach rolled queasily. I saw three girls and one guy get up from their seats and run into the woods. The sounds of their retching echoed across the silent space.

Then the only sound to be heard in the swamp was Peter’s sobbing. Bodo came up and put his arms around him, patting him on the back, his own eyes wet with tears. “I’m so, so sorry for you, Peter. Dat’s a terrible thing … terrible.” He cleared his throat a couple times and looked up at the ceiling of the hut, trying to manage his emotions.

“So you see,” I continued, “we have a really big problem out there and we need to do whatever we can to plan for these … monsters who will eventually be coming this way.”

“But you said they’re up north of here,” said one girl, weakly. “Sorry, I don’t mean any disrespect, Peter.”

He shook his head but said nothing, still hiding his face.

“They’re spreading out. Kids I used to know were ganging together, abandoning their houses. You know that once these few maniacs who are leading these groups start letting people think cannibalism is okay, the idea that it’s not will start to fade for the weak. And there are plenty of weak-minded people out there.”

“She’s talking sense, people,” said Paci. “Our own history shows the same kind of thing happening to our ancestors.”

“No one ate our ancestors, idiot,” said Jeremy sarcastically.

“No. But they murdered them didn’t they? In cold blood. People do strange things, bad things, when they’re fighting for resources like land and food. You may have been all busy with your football and your nice shiny SUV and off-res parties, Jeremy, but you have to remember the basics we all learned when we were little kids in school.”

“Even we learned those stories,” I said.

Jeremy had nothing to say in response.

Trip stood up and said, “Maybe we all agree that together we’re better off - stronger - as a nation rather than individual tribes. But that doesn’t solve our biggest problem. Who’s gonna be chief?”

Everyone looked from Kowi to Trip, the tension growing with every second.

I watched the two of them. They were both big, proud, teens - almost men. And maybe this virus that killed our parents was dead now and wouldn’t kill us when we turned twenty, so they would grow to lead these people as they got married and had families. It didn’t make sense to sacrifice all of that for silly things like pride and egos.

“I think you should both be chief.”

“There can’t be two chiefs,” said Trip.

“Why not?”

“Because someone has to make the final decision; someone has to have the final say,” said Kowi.

“Fine. Have a council, and majority rules.”

“They’ll just do what they did before we split,” said Coli. “They’ll each have their people side with them and it’ll just be a split decision all the time.”

“Have a fifth member,” I suggested, at the end of my list of brilliant ideas. “That way there will always be one tie-breaker.”

“Who’s it going to be?” asked Jeremy. If it’s Creek, they’ll vote Creek. If it’s Miccosukee, they’ll vote Miccosukee.

I threw up my hands. “I don’t know! Geez, can’t you guys just come up with a solution?”

“I have one,” said Coli, standing now, her brightly-colored dress blazing with its designs. “Why don’t we let one of the white kids be the tie breaker if we need one?”

You could have knocked me over with a feather when those words came out of her mouth. I waited for the arguments and yelling, but they never came.

“Fine with me,” said Trip. “She already proved to me she’s capable of fighting.”

“Fine with me, too,” said Kowi. “We need her skills. If we tie her to us more permanently, she’ll have no choice but to help.”

“Hello … I’m standing right here.” I shook my head. “And I already told you I’d train you. You don’t need to appoint me as a tie breaker.” I wasn’t even sure I wanted that kind of responsibility or permanent connection to these people. I was happy just being a three-person tribe.

Voices rose as everyone discussed the pros and cons of having a white girl, namely me, involved in their day-to-day decision-making. I couldn’t blame the people who had negative opinions on the matter - our American history classes had made it abundantly clear that the white man had been viciously unfair to the Native Americans in years past. They probably figured the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.

I wasn’t sure which way the decision was going at that point, but I knew exactly when it changed in favor of bringing me and my friends on board.

A sound broke through the many voices buzzing with discussion, and filtered into our collective consciousness. First it registered in my mind as a moaning or a crying. I thought it was the wind and then maybe an animal. But then the weeping took on a very human tone, and Buster’s barking made it obvious that whatever it was, it was nearby and he didn’t like it. He took off, racing towards the water, howling his butt off.

Several people followed, using the sounds of Buster’s hysteria as their guide. I stood back with Peter and Bodo, waiting to get news from those by the water of what was happening.

We heard screams a few seconds later, not just from one person but several. Some were crying hysterically. Guys were shouting, and those who had remained with us, ran towards the others.

Peter grabbed my arm. “Canners!” he said in a choked voice.

“Shhhh, it’s not canners. They don’t take boats into the Everglades moaning and crying.” My own reasoning sounded hollow to my ears. The truth was, canners were the first thing that had jumped into my mind too. They were like our boogie men, but real and alive and looking for us.

A group of indians came up the pathway from the direction of the water. At first, all we could see was a crowd, but then as they got closer to the hut we could see that in the middle of all of them was Trip, carrying someone like a baby.

A small person.

A girl.

He brought her into the hut, and laid her down on the floor. Her face was white.

I’d heard that expression before, that someone’s face had gone white, but I’d never actually seen it before. Now I knew that it was no exaggeration; it was like all her color was totally gone.

I moved closer because she looked familiar to me.

Trip was furious, his face a stone mask of anger. His jaw was bulging out so far it made his face look deformed.

Her facial features clicked in my mind, reminding me of the girl with the baseball bat who’d nearly taken my head off not that long ago.

“Celia?” I asked as I moved closer.

Trip’s head whipped up. “How do you know my sister?” he demanded, accusatorially.

My mouth dropped open. “I … I met her. before we came here. She gave me a map …”

Her arm, or what was left of it, dropped down and thumped on the wood floor. A weak moan escaped her lips.

“Oh, my god,” whisper-shrieked Peter, “they took her arm!”

Bodo grabbed Peter as he lost consciousness.

All I could do was stand there and stare.

Celia was lying near death on the floor of this ceremonial hut with only half an arm left on the right side of her body. It had been taken off at the elbow and the stump was wrapped in scraps of ripped up t-shirt, the end covered in blood.

***

The crying and occasional shrieking of the girls continued, while Bodo and I knelt down next to Coli and tried to help.

“She’s lost too much blood. She’s too pale. I know she’s going into shock, but I don’t know what to do about it!” Coli was crying, the words tumbling out of her mouth.

I rubbed her back. “Just make her comfortable.” I pulled the cape off my head and rolled it up, putting it under Celia’s head.

Trip clenched and unclenched his fists, alternately pacing behind us and coming back to stare at his sister who lay unresponsive on the ground. Every once in a while her eyelids would flutter and she’d mumble something, but then she’d disappear into unconsciousness again.

“How’d she get here?” I asked Kowi.

“She got in a boat somewhere, probably back near her parent’s old vacation cabin. It’s not that far from here. She must have paddled with one arm.”

“Was she alone?”

“Yeah. And there’s blood in the boat. I don’t know how long it took her to get here.”

I looked at the wrapping on her arm. “Some of that is older blood, I think.”

“I’m afraid to take it off,” said Coli. “What if she starts bleeding more?”

“Just leave it,” I said, putting my hand on Coli’s arm to let her know she wasn’t alone in questioning what was right and what was wrong.

Peter was sitting off to the side, his legs pulled up to his chest, rocking himself rhythmically while he cried silently. I saw two of the girls go and sit with him. Buster laid down as close to him as he could, resting his chin on Peter’s hip. Peter was oblivious to all of it.

“We needt to try and talk to her - to see if she can tell us who didt this to her,” said Bodo.

Coli leaned over and tapped Celia on the cheek gently. “Celia! Celia, wake up! We need to talk to you.”

Celia’s head moved a little, turning to the side. Then her eyes opened and she blinked a couple times. I watched as recognition dawned.

“Bryn?”

“Yeah. It’s me. You’re in the Miccosukee camp. What happened?”

She turned her head and looked at the others. “Coli?”

“Yeah, babe. It’s me.”

“Where’s Trip?”

He came striding over. “Right here, Cee. What the hell happened to you … to your arm?” His voice broke.

“Kids. They came to the shop. They broke in … and smashed all mom’s stuff.” A tear trickled out of her eye.

I felt myself start to cry too. I knew how much those stupid shell things meant to her.

“They took me and kept me at this house. It’s a big one, near the water. They have lots of kids there - they use them like a … like a … pantry.” She cried harder.

“Did she say like a pantry?” whispered Bodo. “What does dat mean?”