Now Guzman tried to ignore his twisted ankle and hurried after de Santiago before he was too far gone. They took time to bury the dead fighters in rough, shallow graves, to bandage the wounds of the other two who had managed to dodge most of the wrath of the Apache’s guns. They began to make their way back up the trail.
The progress was slow, the two injured fighters lagging far behind. They climbed back up the mountain, beyond the tree line, scrambling over rocks and scree until finally they came again to the pass over the mountain ridge.
De Santiago paused there for only a moment. He deliberately glanced over his shoulder, to the west, and a strange calm seemed to come over him. He knew that from up here, if it weren’t for the clouds, they could see the ocean over two hundred miles away. Then a realization struck him that was so obvious that he was disgusted with himself for not having seen it before. As much as he loved his mountains, the leader knew at that instant that the key to all that he must accomplish rested out there, with the sea.
He walked on, deep in thought.
They finally stopped for a short rest in the saddle of the pass. The two troops finally caught up, falling in their tracks, exhausted from the brisk climb and gasping for breath in the thin air. As they checked their crude bandages, Guzman loosened the laces on his boot so the swollen ankle would have more room.
Juan de Santiago never sat. He paced back and forth, an odd look on his mud-smeared face, muttering crazily all the while. The other men tried not to look at him. They had never seen their leader in such a state.
Mountains on either side of this narrow pass soared to over eighteen thousand feet. The wind whistled through the cut and it was bitter cold at this altitude, driving snow and bits of sleet at them. Before them, the rough trail clung to the side of a near vertical rock face. It would take very sure steps and nerves of steel to descend without falling a thousand feet to sure death.
De Santiago turned and set off down the trail even faster than before, as if he had heard a call the others had missed. Guzman groaned and followed after him, still favoring the ankle. The other two men looked at each other, then stood and obediently straggled along behind as best they could.
Headquarters was another twenty miles away. Worse, sunset would come, even at this altitude, in less than an hour. Trying to traverse this trail in the dark would be suicide. Still, de Santiago charged on, seemingly unaware of the danger or of the misery of his men.
Guzman finally yelled at his leader’s quickly disappearing back.
“Wait! Slow down. We can’t keep up. It’s not safe.” His words echoed off the cliff faces.
The rebel leader seemed not to hear him. Still, Guzman struggled mightily to keep pace. The others had apparently given up. They lagged several hundred yards farther back up the trail, shuffling slowly down the narrow path. Guzman could no longer hear their ragged breathing or the scuffling of their feet on the scrabble rock of the path.
De Santiago finally stopped and turned, the frustration clear in his voice.
“Keep up the best you can. Tell the other children behind you to camp at the pass tonight and hike in tomorrow. Join them if you must.”
He turned and continued his determined pell-mell downhill dash. Still, Guzman trudged on. It was his duty, after all, to stay with his commander, to protect him. And that was difficult to do if he was almost out of sight on a narrow sliver of mountain trail.
Then they were crossing the face of the mountain, clinging to a path that was barely a foot wide. Below them, the mountain dropped away, nearly vertical for a thousand or more feet. Above them, it was straight up to a summit that was completely lost in the cloudy mist.
It was almost totally dark when the pair finally crossed a shoulder of the mountain and the path thankfully became a little wider, the drop below them not nearly so plumb. Still, the loose rock and talus made the footing treacherous.