(Draft) To Sleep, Perchance
The distant thunder of a just-passed storm is melodic and soothing, as it sounds in the little cave where they find themselves. The air carries the freshness of newly fallen rain, and their fire crackles, the flames beginning to die into glowing embers.
Alice lays next to the fire, worn out from it all. She should be able to sleep; and yet, she can't. In truth, she hasn't slept well, if at all, since the cliffs two days ago.
They'd been moving through Huron lands, as fast as they could, finding shelter and taking rest only when Uncas was unable to endure any more.
When Chingachgook stated they'd finally left those lands behind them, the relief of their little party was palpable. Seeing the threat of rain, they'd made camp in this small cave.
They'd immediately set about making Uncas as comfortable as possible. Laid on a bed of quickly gathered, blanket covered pine boughs, he drifts in and out of consciousness, coming to awareness when the pain is too much.
Cora and the men hover over him, doing what they can. They change his dressings, clean his wounds, give him water, try to bring his fever down, give him willow bark tea for pain.
As she had been for much of the journey, Alice has been relegated to the background, unable to help, because they don't seem to feel that she *can help. They know that she has no healing knowledge, no nursing skills. The most she had been allowed to do was hold tight to his unresponsive hand as Cora closed his wounds, stitch after stitch after stitch, back at the cliffs.
She'd followed closely behind as they'd moved through the frontier, hovered anxiously in the background when they'd stop to give Uncas a moment's respite from being carried on the makeshift stretcher over the rough, uneven terrain. Cora would absently tell her to sit and rest, as she would move to check Uncas' wounds.
Now, she lays next to the fire, her place carefully chosen to give her the best view of Uncas' resting spot that she can manage, and she dutifully tries to sleep.
Alice searches for a comfortable position. She pulls her blanket up to her chin, pushes it back down to her waist, tosses and turns for what feels like hours, and then finally gives up with a sigh.
As always, when she can't sleep on their journey, Alice's eyes are drawn to him. She watches his fitful sleep, and wonders if Uncas is getting any decent rest at all.
Chingachgook must be of the same mind. He leaves his position at the entrance to their cave, having taken the first watch, and moves to his son's side. He frowns at Uncas' restless sleep, and reaches for the cup of willow bark tea that is being kept warm by the fire.
Lifting up his son, Chingachgook props him on his shoulder, and rouses him just enough to get him to drink, before carefully laying him down again, hopeful that the remedy for pain will allow Uncas to sleep more deeply. With a sigh, he moves back to the entrance of the cave to continue his watch.
Uncas falls back into uneasy slumber, and Alice falls into watching him again, laying her head in the crook of her arm.
She thinks about when they first met, smiling ruefully to herself when she remembers her outrage at him for driving off their horses. The clasp of his hands on her upper arms had confused her, and watching him walk away from her - all loose-limbed, effortless grace - brought heat to her cheeks.
Uncas was never far away. He'd brought up the rear of their little party, alert, watchful, backtracking at times to assure they weren't being followed.
Her initial askance at being more or less unceremoniously placed into his care, given her slowness on the trail, had quickly turned into appreciation for his ready, thoughtful kindness towards a woefully inexperienced Yengeese girl.
He'd kept watch over her. His assistance was quiet - a quick hand when she'd stumbled, help over barriers of fallen trees or loose rocks. His hands spanning her waist as he swung her easily over ravines, without so much as a by-your-leave, had left her breathless.
He'd held her closely in his arms at the burial grounds. She doesn't remember her fear, she remembers his heat.
He was by her side as he and the rest of men slowly pushed the canoe across the lake to the fort. When he saw her struggling up the ramp to the sally-port, he'd quickly reached for her arm to help. Taking that cue, Alice laid her arm across his, twisting her fingers into the wet sleeve of his shirt.
When she'd had to let go, she'd felt slightly bereft.
The time in the Colonel's quarters was short, before she was hustled off with Cora. It was the first time she'd been without Uncas' presence since their journey began.
The surrender of the fort brought relief, along with new anxiety. Alice knew there should be nothing to fear. It was all over, except for the journey to Fort Edward. But she feared, anyway.
Doubled up with her sister on one of the few horses, she didn't want to be there, with the officers. She wanted to be back with the other denizens of the fort, back where Uncas was; she wanted to be with him. She did *not want to make this journey without him.
"He's too far away," she fretted, and she buried her face in Cora's shoulder, fearful and uneasy.
The first attack by Huron rushing in from the woods, the first volley of shot, the sickly sound of tomahawks cleaving flesh, the screams and moans of the wounded, immediately propelled Alice back to the horrors of the George Road, and she was lost.
At the first killing of a man in front of her horrified eyes, unable to bury her face in her sister's arms this time, she retreated into her mind to hide.
Cora commanded her to run, Chingachgook lifted her up from the ground, and she ran. Chingachgook guided her to the canoe, and she climbed in, then out again. She was led into the cave behind a waterfall, and she followed.
All as if she had become like one of the dolls she played with as a child. No thought, no feeling.