The Road Home: The Wilderness Road Book 1

By Izzy James

Beti Boatman, pirate's daughter, long dreamed of traveling to a place where no one knew her name. When looters showed up on the day she buried her father her choice was made. Leave her home or allow the only two people in the world she loves to live in constant danger.

When Zeke and what's left of his regiment organized a wagon train west, they did not expect to encounter a woman traveling alone. Beti insists she doesn't need his help, but Zeke knows better and the strong need to protect her runs deep. Things get complicated when looters track Beti down. And emissaries from her mother’s country claim Beti is a real princess. Now Beti must choose: the hardships in Kentucky or a throne.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Izzy James
• Release date: Mar 21, 2024
• ISBN: 9798223444565

Izzy James

Izzy James is the pen name of Elizabeth Chevalier Hull. Elizabeth lives in coastal Virginia with her fabulous husband in a house brimming with books.

Book preview

One

October 1781

Kemp’s Landing, Virginia

Am I dead?

Zeke couldn’t shift the weight of his eyelids. Images of the battlefield crumbled and floated in incoherent, disjointed pieces in his head. Buried? He breathed in through his nose. A gentle hand found his wrist. Not dead was good. Not buried while still alive was even better. Reassured he drifted away in a gray tunnel of slumber. 

Jedidiah Smith, Obadiah Smith. These were great men. Statues in their communities… The misused word felt like a jagged edge as he drifted in the sleepy dream of his Uncle Eleazar pontificating on his favorite subject. It tickled him how his father’s brother polished off the glory of the Smiths every chance he got. How his uncle got from Kemp’s Landing to Yorktown puzzled him, but it would have to wait. Zeke was too tired. Once more he meandered down a peaceful path to sleep.

When he surfaced next his eyes functioned properly, but he wasn’t sure his ears were. He lay in an upstairs room of his uncle’s house in Kemp’s Landing. His four remaining friends from the regiment stood in a semi-circle around old Doc Jones. His uncle swore that somewhere deep in his ancestry Doc Jones must really be a Smith. How else could he be so good at his job?

 Will he walk again, Doc? Moses Woodbridge the youngest of their regiment remained the most outspoken. He was always asking uncomfortable questions like that out loud.

Zeke tensed. Who were they talking about? The mist parted, and he realized it was him. Of course, he would walk again. He remembered the battle, the smell of smoke in the briny air of the York River. The rumbling of the cannon. Shouts of the men. Bayonets grating on metal. Running toward the redoubt when he stopped a ball with his leg. People recovered from balls to the leg. Unless they didn’t and bled out on the battlefield. It was already pretty clear that he was not in the latter category.

He rolled to his right side. The pain from his right knee stabbed the breath right out of his lungs. He fell back to the bed hoping the pain would clear before they knew he was awake.

How’re ye doing, son. Doc Jones appeared at his bedside.

Zeke squinted one eye open.

That’s what I thought. Doc pulled up a chair. No doubt ye heard yer friend’s question. He sighed while bringing his hands to rest on his thighs. The answer is that I don’t know how well ye will walk, but ye should, after a considerable time of healing, be able to walk.

Zeke allowed his lungs to deflate.

How long is considerable?

Always cut to the chase don’t ye, son?

I must attend to my business, such as it is, and I have plans.

Plans is it? Doc smiled. Before Zeke could dispute Doc’s assumption the old man continued. Young woman, I’d wager. Time to get on with things now Cornwallis has surrendered?

Surrendered? Zeke nearly shouted struggling once again to sit up. His compatriots nodded their agreement. It’s over? Hallelujah. He slumped back into the bed.

It will take some time for the formalities. Isaac responded in the cool tone of command. I watched Cornwallis’s aide surrender his sword to General Washington’s aide.

Sent an aide, did he. The men in the room all grunted the same assessment. Coward.

Talk stopped when Doc stood and gathered his bag. Give it while, Zeke. Some of these things take a year or more to heal up. I’ll be back to see ye tomorrow. Eat something.

No trouble there. Zeke’s stomach gnawed on his ribs.

Doc opened the door. Zeke’s mother led his sister, Tirzah, into the room. She carried a tray with a large bowl and biscuits large enough for two men. The smell nearly sent him hopping.

Mama’s eyes filled when she saw him.

I’m gonna be fine, Mama.

 Doc says it will take a good while for ye to heal. His friends shuffled to make room. Mose took the tray from Tirzah and set it on a side table. Tirzah smiled and set her eyes on Zeke.

I know.

But yer here. Mama smoothed the hair away from his forehead.

He took her hand in his and looked directly into eyes rimmed with red. I am going to be all right, Mama.

I know.  Doc says it’s time for ye to eat something, so I brought stew and biscuits. Don’t eat too much this first time. It’ll make ye sick. There’s plenty more in the kitchen.

Yes, ma’am.

We’ll see to him, ma’am. Isaac motioned to Gordon and Mose.

Be careful, Mama exclaimed as his friends took positions on either side of him.

With a quiet signal to each other they slid him up into a sitting position. The stabbing pain eased once they let him go.

I will be all right, Mama.

If yer sure.

I am sure. He smiled at her.

He’ll be just fine, Mama. If the Lord was gonna take him, He’d a done it at Yorktown, Tirzah added as she put her arm around their mother’s shoulders.

She wiped the tears that ran freely down her cheeks. I will check in on ye shortly. She passed her fingers once more across his hair. Then she joined Tirzah and slipped out of the room closing the door behind her. Zeke mouthed a thank ye to his sister.

She will settle down, Isaac offered.

Zeke chuckled. Ye don’t know my Mama.

 Well she sure knows how to cook. Mose smelled the bowl as he passed it off to Zeke.

Zeke took possession of the bowl and the spoon. I’m sure there’s plenty more in the kitchen. Get ye some.

He already had some, Isaac countered.

Mose grinned and bounced his lanky form. Zeke was struck once again at just how young the youngest member of their team really was. He couldn’t be more than one and twenty now, and he’d been with them for at least the last three years. Weariness didn’t seem to sober Mose the way it had the rest of them. A glimmer of light entered the place where Zeke had practiced the grim determination to do what was right. He was glad he’d fought for his new country.

A new country.

Only time would tell what that would mean for all of them. But that was all right. For now, he was glad the fighting was over.

Zeke thanked the Lord for his food and started in on his feast, the first he’d had in a while without the whiz and bangs of muzzle and cannon fire in the distance. His friends filled him in on the battle and how they got him home in Aggie’s wagon.

Mama’s biscuits. The first bite melted in his mouth. Oh yeah, he’d missed these.

He finished half the stew and both biscuits before he rested back against his pillows.

Are we still on? Have ye decided a route? He directed his question to Isaac. They were supposed to be organizing a wagon train to Kentucky. Zeke didn’t want to slow them down.

We will wait until ye are ready. Isaac’s calm scratched at Zeke’s anticipation. He was ready to start his new life now. The dull ache in his leg flared to a lightning strike as he shifted to a straighter position. On the other hand, he could wait a couple of days until he could at least stand properly. Zeke did not want to be carried to Kentucky in the back of wagon. He wanted to ride into the new land of opportunity ready to take on all challenges.

I will be ready. His full belly dragged him to sleepiness.

Yer knee’s tore up. Mose’s wide-eyed declaration caused him to take a longer look at the many-tailed bandage and leather splint holding his leg rigid from his calf to his thigh. 

Doc says he’s not sure the knee will bend. The ball entered just below yer knee, and he is not sure how far up the damage went. Gordon, once a teacher, was sure to supply needed details that otherwise got left out. Zeke turned his gaze to his oldest friend.

What else did he say?

Not much, Gordon said. The ball went clean through yer leg. The reason ye’ve been out so long is because Aggie gave ye something for the pain until we could get ye here. Ye’ve been out for three days.

Zeke looked to Isaac. When the field doc didn’t get to ye in what Aggie thought was a timely manner, she took matters into her own hands and got ye out of there.

Tommy Thornton’s wife, Agatha, known to the unit as Aggie, stood behind the others as she usually did. She’d adopted them all since the beginning. Adding their clothes to her cleaning and mending piles. Cooking for them, bandaging them. When Tommy died at Guilford Courthouse, she’d stayed on to care for them, and they’d vowed to protect her until they could get her home.

Thank ye, Aggie. Zeke allowed himself to slip a little further down into the mattress.

Fierce brown eyes engaged his own. I am glad ye’re feeling better.

Isaac cleared his throat. We have decided that we will wait to go west until ye can make the journey. It will give us all the chance to prepare. He must have seen the grimace Zeke tried to contain as he eased his leg down the bed as he stretched out to sleep.  It’s a long way, Zeke.

I’ll give ye that. But Zeke was itching to get started. His boat building business in Norfolk, torched in 1776, had yet to be rebuilt due to his service in the Continental Army and the subsequent burnings. Norfolk was a great place for a boat building business, but it was too strategically important. Zeke no longer wished to be perched on the edge of a precipice always in danger of tumbling into the water. Nor did he want his livelihood in constant threat of reduction to cinders because somebody somewhere wanted what he had. Nope. He longed for wide open spaces where a man could breathe in the grace that God gave him. That’s where he was bound, and no amount of leg healing was going to hold him back. I am going west as soon as I can. Once again he drifted to sleep.

Good as his word, Doc Jones came the next day and every day after that until Zeke was out of danger. By January, he could get around tolerably well with a cane. By April, Zeke had reconciled himself that his right leg just didn’t bend like it used to and it probably never would. He could live with that, just like he could live with the achy pain that accompanied him every night as he lay down to sleep.

Two

January 1782

Outer Banks, North Carolina

Wiping away more tears from her tear-sore face, Beti Boatman wondered how she could have gotten the entire distance to Doctor Campbell’s before she remembered the treasured memento. It seemed nothing could go right today. And so it should be, her spirit jabbed.  Laying her father in the earth had been the hardest thing she’d done yet. To do it twice? It wasn’t really twice, but going through the motions at the empty, decoy grave had upset her nearly as much as the true burial. Grief swelled her chest so full she could hardly breathe. She secured her father’s dogeared Bible in her saddlebag. Magnus nickered and sidestepped. Beti stilled.

No one should be here now.

The meager three guests had left hours ago. She stepped gingerly toward the open door. Bruised from the events of the day, Beti tucked in as close to the door as she could, barely letting an eye show. She watched with that one eye as two men started to dig in the freshly mounded earth.

Looters.

Shivers wobbled her spine all the way to her fingers. She needed to get out of here before they discovered she was here and alone. Quickly she stepped to her horse. Beti let her hands slide down Magnus’s crest to his withers. Warm and strong, he wouldn’t let her down. She primed the pan of her firelock. She took a deep breath and peered out at the men once more. Only one was fully visible.

Tall and rounded topped by a dark tricorn and covered in a frock coat, he ordered the other man. The other man hunched just out of eyesight.  A growing mound of earth masked their horrible work. The tall one spoke, his voice lost to her in the wind. She had to hurry, only a few minutes would bring their fury to the house. Hot anger took root in her belly and burned the shivers to cinders.

It was people like this that caused her to have to leave the home she loved so dearly. People who came after them year after year looking for a buried treasure that as far a she knew didn’t exist.

Not to mention townspeople who couldn’t accept a pardon whether it came from the King of Heaven or the Kind of England. Her father had both. She slipped the firelock into the saddle sheath. Soon she would be gone, and no one would trouble her again. Beti pulled leather gloves over her wrists careful to tuck her mother’s bracelet under the gauntlet. 

Beti mounted Magnus and turned him to the back entrance of the barn. It would buy her a few seconds. Once she’d gotten down the long drive, the road to town was fairly straight. Doctor Campbell’s house was just on the outskirts. On a good day she could get there in thirty minutes. If Magnus flew, she’d make it in fifteen. If she had to duck into the woods, she wasn’t sure how long it would take. Beti prayed. She didn’t want to shoot anyone, but those men didn’t want to cross her today.

Ready, boy.

Magnus stamped. She squeezed her legs and whispered Get up!

 They bolted out the door. Down the dirt path. A quick look over her shoulder told her the men were just finding out the earthly remains of Ethelred the Black didn’t reside in the mound they’d excavated. The tall man looked up. She couldn’t see his face, but she could feel the menace of him reaching for her. Sharp talons of fear sliced through her belly chilling the angry fire she’d used to nurse her courage. She urged Magnus forward down the familiar road. Her cap hadn’t a chance against the gallop. She swiped it off her head, and her closely pinned hair began to fly. They reached the canopy of the wood. Normally she would feel safe under its covering. Forgotten were the number of times she’d safely hidden from the townsfolk among its welcoming branches.

A blur of white and silver blazed by to her left. What was that? Fear bristled her neck prickling down her spine. It appeared to be man-sized yet it moved without sound . Whatever it was moved through the trees faster than Magnus on the best day. Beti leaned in over the pummel. Come on boy.

 She was halfway to town before her heart stopped racing with Magnus’s hoofbeats. The men hadn’t followed. The blur disappeared, but the feeling that she was being watched had not abated. She kept her pace all the way to Doc Campbell’s. Stopping only when she’d arrived a few paces from the stable.

Rosalee met her in the yard wiping her hands on a snowy apron followed by Beti’s favorite person her sheepdog Nellie. Fear slid off her shoulders as she alighted.

Go in the house, Beti ordered. I shall see to Magnus then tell ye all.

Once inside the stable, where neither of them could be seen, Beti took a deep breath and listened. She motioned to Tim, Doctor Campbell’s man of work, to stay quiet. Nellie sat obediently at her feet. Beti squatted down to give her a welcome scruff all the while listening for the sound of hoofbeats.

Nothing.

Tim reached for the reins. I will see to him, miss.

Beti pulled the loose lines to her side bringing a panting Magnus closer. Thank ye, but I shall take care of Magnus tonight.

Tim headed toward the back of the stable.

Beti smoothed her hand down Magnus’ crest and rested her head against him. His steady strength reminded her she was not alone. She pushed away the peace she knew she should feel at the comforting thought. Ye saved me today. She righted herself to look in his eye. Thank ye.

The stallion nodded. Beti unbuckled the saddle and began to brush him down.

Each stroke of the brush replaced the shaking fear she’d felt as she’d galloped to the Campbells’ with white hot anger. How dare they dig up her father’s grave?

Her father had used his real name when he’d been pardoned by the king and moved to North Carolina. Calling himself Billy Boatman didn’t stop seekers from finding Ethelred the Black. Throughout their time on the Outer Banks, greedy men came to hunt for fabled treasure now and again. Billy always dealt with them with kindness and generosity. He believed God brought the men to North Carolina so Billy