Don Ruy stared incredulously into the eyes of the Indian, and a flush crept over his own pale face as he remembered many things.
“Doña Bradamante!” he murmured, and nodded to Tahn-té, who leaped on the horse and rode where the yells of the victors sounded in the piñons towards the hills. Beyond all the other horsemen he rode, and saw far above in the scrubby growth, the enemy seeking footholds where the four-footed animals could not follow. Then, when Ka-yemo had called the names of the trailers who were to follow the enemy beyond the summit, Tahn-té the Po-Athun-ho turned back and chanted the prayer of a prophet to whom the god had sent true dreams.
The Castilians watched him as he came; so proudly did he carry himself that the men swore an army of such horsemen would win half the battle by merely showing themselves, and the old men of Te-hua knew as they looked on him, and as they counted the slain and wounded, that Tahn-té had indeed been given the 270 gift of the god-sight to save the women of the valley.
Juan Gonzalvo swore ugly oaths at sight of the horse of Don Ruy. Since the pagan had taken it as his own, it was plain to be seen that some woeful thing had chanced to his excellency.
But to their many questions Tahn-té led them to the arroyo where Don Ruy was indeed wounded, and where a pale secretary was carrying water in his hat to bathe his excellency’s head, and his excellency let it be done, and exchanged a long look of silence with Tahn-té, who understood.
The ankle of Don Ruy had a twist making it of no use to stand upon. The Po-Ahtun-ho made a gesture to Chico to hold the horse while he, with a soldier to help, put it straight with a dextrous wrench, and the secretary several paces away, turned white at the pain of it.
Then was his excellency helped again to his saddle, and the men from Mexico marvelled at the surgery of the pagan priest who killed and flayed one man to mend another with.