Chapter 1

The bugle blast interrupts the tranquil morning just before the thunder of galloping hooves is heard throughout the valley. Captain Uriah Monroe surveys his surroundings looking for what will inevitably be the Union Army pursuing him.

Just last evening he saw the snow white steed and its agile rider just outside their encampment. He's seen that horse numerous times and now he's sure that this rider is the reason that he has again been located by the Union Army and has to order his band of sharpshooters and warriors to scatter. He has vowed to find and capture this elusive ghostly steed and the scoundrel that has been the bane of his existence.

For weeks now the enormous beast and its rider have been spotted just before the onslaught of Union reinforcements reach his band of misfit soldiers. Captain Monroe's brigade is the most feared unit in the Confederacy. Up until now, he has been able to elude the Union and cause havoc throughout Virginia. His soldiers are made up of Virginian farmers and countrymen who are familiar with the Virginia countryside. They know this land. It's every hiding place, hill, and valley. They know how to use the terrain to their advantage to take the Union by surprise. But this rider, he also knows the countryside. There's no doubt that this rider was once a son of the south.

Monroe mounts his charcoal gray steed, one that is almost as large and daunting as that of the elusive Union scout, and trudges off into the woods to try to pick up the trail of his adversary. There is little or no chance that he will find this rider, but he still has to try.

He leads his steed through the brush as quietly as the agile beast can muster. If he knows his opponent as well as he thinks he does, he knows that he's already found his way onto one of the many deer paths leading through the woods and is on his way to the security of the Union lines.

He nears the edge of the forest that leads into a grassy meadow free of obstructions. He keeps himself hidden in the trees, using the waning late spring sunlight to keep hidden in the shadows.

Just beyond the edge of the forest he spies a majestic white steed grazing. He's sure this is the horse that belongs to his elusive foe, as he has never seen the match of such an incredible animal among either the Yankees or Rebels.

Monroe watches at the creature walks through the meadow to a darkened area just beyond his sight. He could follow, but that would expose him to whoever is currently sheltered out of sight. He decides it would be best to stay hidden until the rider shows himself, allowing for a clear shot that the scout will never see coming.

Once dusk has totally taken hold of the Virginian terrain, the ghostly steed comes out of hiding, his rider perched high on his back. Monroe removes his revolver from its holster and takes aim at the unwitting soldier. He cocks the hammer of the pistol back and steadies his arm. Just as he's ready to fire and finally take out this man who has destroyed several of his supposed surprise attacks, his horse rears at the sight of a large copperhead snake.

Monroe tries to settle his steed, pulling on his reigns trying to right the frightened animal. The panicked stricken animal struggles against its fear and its rider, backing up and away from the feared snake slithering along the ground. Even though the horse is still frightened, Monroe refuses to miss his chance at taking out his target. He aims his pistol and just as he's ready to fire, the horse rears and bucks, sending him flying off of his mount and landing with a skull cracking sound on the rocks and tree roots littering the ground.

Beatrice Prior sits out of sight at the edge of the meadow watching her beautiful snow white steed graze. She rode him hard today and had to offer him some sustenance before she returns to the Union brigade that is resting just a mile and a half north of this location. As the sun sets on this tremendously eventful day, she thinks about what she's doing here. She looks down at what she's wearing; she used to be seen in nothing but the finest dresses in the south. Now she finds herself wearing the clothes of a Union soldier.

She never agreed with the fact that her father had slaves on his plantation. She felt it was wrong to expect people to do things for her and to wait on her hand and foot without ever receiving any compensation. As a child she frequently got in to trouble for playing with the sons and daughters of the slaves that worked in the fields and in the house. When she got older, she was chastised for helping one of the slaves to leave the grounds to go to the hospital to see his wife and their new born child. He wasn't trying to escape, he just desperately wanted to be part of the birth of the child.

When the war broke out two years ago, she watched as the lives of the enslaved men, women, and children around her became worse. Soon after the war began, she started to try to help the slaves living on her family's plantation. Not long after she found herself helping runaways to reach the Underground Railroad. But this was never good enough for her. She was only helping a handful of people. It was then that she decided that she needed to do more.

After helping her best friend Christina, a young slave on her family's plantation, and her family to make it safely to the Underground Railroad, she made one final rebellion against her father. She stole his prized white steed and galloped north to Maryland to her cousin's home on the Union side of the State. When she arrived, tattered and exhausted, her cousin Shauna and her husband Ezekiel, a colonel in the Union Army, welcomed her with open arms.

Soon after her arrival Zeke had to leave his wife and Beatrice to resume his position with the Union Army. Beatrice found that just being in the North did not provide her opportunity to help with the war effort. She felt even more ineffective now than she did in the south. At least down there she had the chance to help runaway slaves to make it to the Underground Railroad. Here she had no way to help anyone.

At the beginning of spring in 1862, just after Zeke arrived at home for a short leave, she talked to him about joining his regiment. As a woman, it was illegal for her to even consider fighting. But she planned to disguise herself as a young male courier and join the ranks of the Union regulars. After a barrage of complaints and begging from his wife and Beatrice, Zeke finally agreed to allow her to disguise herself as a courier to carry letters back and forth between himself and his beloved wife Shauna. At first this seemed harmless, he enjoyed being able to have communication with his wife and Beatrice felt like she as doing something to help the war effort. Soon after he made this fateful decision, it became evident that this war was not going to concluded as quickly as many believed.

After some time Beatrice was asked to deliver a message to an outpost that was not far from their encampment near Fairfax, Virginia. Against Zeke's better judgment, he sent her out. She made the trip in record time. She and her steed were not to be matched. Soon after, Zeke began to send her farther out with more correspondence regarding the war efforts. In spite of his best efforts to keep her safe and away from the fighting, she became the fastest courier and found herself completely entrenched in the war.

Now she sits in a cave in the shadows at the edge of a meadow watching her steed graze his fill of the grasses. She wonders if she's really making any difference in the war or in her life. Has the risks that she's taken helped anyone really? She can't be sure, but she was also never sure if the people she helped to escape the south ever made it to freedom.

She often thinks of Christina at times like this. She and Christina were the same age. Her mother was a house servant and her father worked the stables. Those were very precious titles for slaves in the south. It was far better to work among the owners than it was to kill yourself in the fields. The house servants were better cared for and treated with more respect than the other slaves. This is how Beatrice was able to become friends with Christina. They often played together as children while Christina's mother watched over the Prior children.

When she helped Christina to escape, they agreed to meet in Philadelphia after the conclusion of the war. At this point, no one really knows when that will be. The fighting has been going on for many months now. It is the spring of 1863 and there is no end in sight.

When the sun has set and darkness has settled on the meadow, Beatrice lets out a clicking sound that alerts her horse, Abraxas, to go to her. She always felt that Abraxas was a perfect name for this horse. His perfect white coat looks ghostly in the morning sun, just like she imagines the Sun God Helios' steeds to look as they gallop across the morning sky.

Abraxas hears the clicking and meanders his way to Beatrice's hiding spot in the evening shadows. She mounts the beautiful creature and she guides him into the meadow. As she finds herself completely exposed, she hears the tale tell sound of a pistol's hammer being pulled back. She knows that she could be in trouble.

She hears a horse whinny in fear and a shot fire across the meadow. When she turns toward the sound, she sees a soldier thrown from his mount and knocked unconscious on the ground. Against her better judgment, she steers Abraxas toward where she saw the soldier fall to the ground.

When she gets to the edge of the forest she finds the unconscious body of Captain Uriah Monroe, the brother of her beloved colonel and friend Colonel Ezekiel Monroe. She doesn't personally know Uriah, but she knows who he is and what he looks like from pictures and the fact that he and Zeke resemble one another a great deal. Uriah is a man large in stature. Approximately six feet tall with a narrow build, just like Zeke. He has Zeke's brown hair and warm complexion.

She knows she should just leave him where he lies. He's an enemy of the Union and the favored brother of the Monroe family. When Zeke left the Carolinas for the north, he was immediately disowned by his family. Uriah promised him that if they ever met on the field of battle that he would not hold back because they are brothers.

She dismounts and slowly creeps over to Uriah to check to see if his wound is mortal or if he is just knocked out. As she crouches to check on him, he opens his eyes slightly at the sound of someone approaching. He looks up at her confused and disoriented.

She sees him open his eyes and it's enough to make her want to run, jump on Abraxas and speed away from this place. Zeke has brown eyes that covey tenderness and warmth when he looks at you. Uriah's eyes are cold and unyielding, even in his compromised state. She can't manage to run, all of the blood surrounding his head and his twisted limbs cause her to have concern. She reaches for his head to check the gash that is causing him to lose so much blood, and when she gets near him he seizes her arm and glares up at her. But in his weakened state, she is easily able to wriggle away from him his grasp and back away.

"I will get you, you scoundrel. I almost had you." Captain Monroe declares.

Before she can retort, she hears shouting from within the woods, coming nearer. She shakes her fear away, and she runs for Abraxas. Together, horse and rider gallop off into the darkness.

Beatrice knows that had his horse not been spooked by whatever scared it, she would be dead right now. He had her in his sights and he would have shot her before she even ever realized he was there.

She quickly rides back to the Union encampment where Zeke will be awaiting his courier, James Prior.

"Who goes there?" a voice resounds into the darkness.

"A soldier. A courier seeking Colonel Ezekiel Monroe," Beatrice declares.

"Dismount and proceed."

As she does as instructed, the owner of the voice comes into view. "Junior, is that you?" Beatrice asks.

"Prior, where've you been? Monroe's furious, you were expected back last night," Junior declares.

"Had to take a detour is all," she explains.

"Well, colonel said to wake him the moment you arrived back at camp."

"Do we have to wake him?" she asks exasperated. "We can just let him know I'm back in the morning."

"No, it has to be tonight or he'll have my head."

"Damn it, Junior," she growls.

Junior just laughs at her and leads her to the colonel's tent.

"Colonel, Prior's returned."

"Send him in," Monroe bellows from the tent.

Junior looks to his fellow soldier, "Good luck."

"Yeah," Beatrice says, "take care of Abraxas for me, okay?"

He nods and is off. Beatrice turns and enters the tent and looks upon her cousin and friend, Zeke. As soon as the flaps of the tent close out the outside world, Zeke wraps his arms around her and hugs her tight to him. "Thank God you are okay. Where have you been? Are you alright?"

"I'm fine. Better than Uriah's feeling right about now I wager."

He looks gravely at the young girl standing in front of him, "Uriah? You squabbled with Uriah? You are lucky to be alive, girl."

Zeke's soft brown eyes look upon her with concern. He runs his fingers through his unruly brown hair and sighs, "This is enough, Beatrice. I can't have you placing yourself into so much trouble all of the time. I agreed to have you here only as a courier. You are not a scout for the Union Army."

"I know that, but it's because of me that you've been able to upset most of Uriah's plans against the Union in the past few months, is it not?"

Zeke looks downtrodden as he nods toward the soldier, the young girl sitting in front of him. She could be beautiful, she could be the wife of some high ranking Union officer. Instead she's here, with her wavy blond locks hidden beneath a soldier's hat, wearing a baggy navy blue uniform, with dirt all over her face to hide her exhausted looking feminine features. He's sorry that he ever agreed to allow this to happen. He should have fought harder against his wife and cousin. But instead he decided to use her for his personal selfish reasons.

"What happened with Uriah?" he asks.

"I don't know Zeke, I'm too tired to talk about this now," she complains.

"You look famished and exhausted. You should lie down and sleep," he tells her.

"I'll go back to my…" she stops when he cuts her off.

"You will sleep here tonight. I'll go sleep in your tent for the night."

"I can't let you do that," she argues.

"That is an order, Prior," Zeke growls. "We will talk again in the morning." He kisses her on the cheek and takes leave of the tent.

Beatrice lies down on the cot, and immediately feels herself drifting off. It's been a long time since she's slept on anything other than her sleeping bag lying on the ground. The cot is a welcome change for her worn and torn body.

Uriah wakes to bright sunlight shining in his face. He looks around cautiously taking in his surroundings. He's in a tent, a medical tent to be specific. When he tries to move he can feel every beat of his heart through his body, especially in his head. He reaches up to find a bandage wrapped around his head and what is probably a large lump that has formed at the back of his skull.

"Captain, don't touch your head. You had a pretty bad gash and you lost some blood, but you will be fine," a pretty nurse explains.

"How did I get here?" he asks.

"A couple soldiers brought you in last night," she explains.

"Do you know what soldiers?"

"I'm sorry sir, I don't. I wasn't here last night when you were brought in. They only called me in after you arrived."

He smiles at the nurse, "Could you go out and find Sergeant Hunter or Corporal Andrews?"

"Absolutely sir, be right back," she says as she takes leave of the tent.

He lies there and tries to remember what happened last night. He had been in the forest on his horse trying to find something or someone. But what exactly that was is eluding him right now.

The nurse enters the tent with both Hunter and Richardsin tow. "They were together sir, so I brought both of them."

"Thank you Marlene. Could we have some privacy?"

She nods and leaves the tent again.

"What happened to me last night?"

Both Hunter and Richardslook bewildered at their captain.

"I'm not sure sir," Peter Hunter speaks first. "We heard a shot and followed to sound to the edge of the forest. There we found you unconscious on the ground, Phobos was nearby grazing."

"Was there any sign that someone else was there?"

"It was obvious that there was another horse grazing there at some point, but we couldn't pinpoint where the horse and rider had gone after leaving the meadow," Drew Richards explains.

Uriah struggles to think back to last evening's events. He was pursuing someone that was around the meadow. Then he suddenly remembers the ghostly white steed and its agile and dauntless rider. They are the reason that he's here today. This realization is enough to infuriate him. It isn't enough that the scout has spoiled some of his best plans over the past months, now he's responsible for his being injured.

"We need to set a trap for that scout and his ghost steed," Uriah declares. "We will put an end to the Union's good luck."

Thanks to NYCgirl166 for checking out my story before I published it!