Proud Wolf's Woman

by Karen Kay

  She glanced at him now where he sat only a short distance from her.

  “Are we close to the Pawnee now?” she asked.

  Neeheeowee placed his right hand before him, the back out. He swung it to the right, palm out and thumb out, and then back. Julia frowned, having learned that this was the sign for “no.”

  “Will we be there soon?”

  He lifted his shoulders and said, “Within five or six days.”

  “How will you locate the specific men that you want?”

  He held back speaking for a while as though giving his answer much thought. After a short time, he said, “I have spent these last five years determining just who it was that attacked our camp that day. I have made inquiries into many camp circles, some who are friendly with the Pawnee. I know now the men that I seek. I also learned that these men usually hunt or war together. So it should be easy to set a trap and snare them all. It is what I intend to do.”

  “I see,” Julia said. “But, you are only one person; how many of them are there?”

  “Three,” he said. “It will be a fair fight.”

  “Ah,” she said. “I know it will be a fair fight, for you are a warrior to contend with, but do you not think you should teach me some skill with a weapon in case I am needed?”

  “You will not go near the fight. You will stay way back, guarding the ponies as we agreed.”

  “Neeheeowee,” she said, “I still think you should teach me to be of some use.”

  He cast her a sulky glance, then he frowned. “Do you know nothing about fighting?”

  “No,” she said. “Nothing at all.”

  “Eaaa. I see. You are right,” he said. “You must know something about fighting, for by following me, you may need some skill. I will teach you a little each night and you must practice. But realize that by carrying a weapon, if you do not use it well, that weapon can be turned against you. It is the first thing you must know.”

  Julia smiled. “I will remember. I will look forward to our lessons. Is there any other way I can help you to overcome this enemy?”

  He smiled. “Yes,” he said, looking meaningfully at her breasts. “Do not tempt me with your body.”

  “I do no such thing!”

  He chuckled. “You do not have to do a thing, just your being here is enough.” He looked down at himself, his breechcloth already straining against his need. “Do you see?”

  Julia caught her lip between her teeth. “There is very little I can do about that.”

  Neeheeowee laughed outright. “No, my love,” he said. “There is a great deal you could do about it, it is only that we cannot allow such things to happen between us right now.”

  “Neeheeowee,” she began, “could we go to sleep tonight with you holding me? No lovemaking, just holding? Is that not allowed?”

  He shook his head. “It could be done, I would say, if you looked like a bear and smelled like a rotting buffalo. As it is, though, I would never sleep.”

  She chuckled, not missing the backhanded compliment. “But Neeheeowee,” she said, “I wake up each morning with you holding me. I am only asking to go to sleep that way, as well.”

  He moaned. “I am afraid it would be painful for me: to have you in my arms, to want you and not be able to take you… I do not know if I am man enough.”

  Julia didn’t know what to say to that and Neeheeowee, after putting out the fire, chuckled, lying down to sleep, and, despite what he said, he invited Julia into his arms and into his bed, putting his arms around her and holding her the whole night through.

  Evidently, she thought, he was man enough.

  She awoke to the sound of Neeheeowee flipping through the parfleches. And though it was dark outside, she could see that once again, a mess lay strewn out all over their camp.

  She came up onto one elbow. “What is it you are looking for?”

  He glanced over to her, then back toward the bags. “I thought that I had packed more food than this. I do not wish to spend the time this morning hunting for our morning meal. I had hoped to snack on some wasna and be on the trail before the sun rises. But if I cannot find this food, it will mean I have to hunt.”

  Julia sat up, letting her sleeping robe fall to her waist. “I know where it is.”

  He gulped, his attention suddenly diverted to her chest and the parfleche bag he’d been holding fell to the ground.

  Julia came up onto her feet, shoving her dress over her head at the same time, and paced over toward Neeheeowee, who, now that she was dressed, seemed to have recovered himself…somewhat.

  “I know where the food is,” she said, again. “I’m surprised you do not remember it for it was in a special spot—it looked to me as though you’d hidden it. When I had to repack our things several days ago, I found the food wrapped up within your clothing. I put it back the same way I found it, thinking you had reason to pack it that way. Ah,” she said, “here it is now.” She pulled the food out from underneath clothing.

  Neeheeowee stared at it blankly. “I did not pack it this way,” he said.

  Julia merely shrugged, but Neeheeowee thrust out his chin. “It is most strange,” he said. “That first day I left camp odd things happened to me. First all my supplies fell off my pack pony and then I became tired, so tired that I took down a blanket from my horse and threw it out on the ground. That is all I remember, except awakening the next morning to find you there and me with a severe headache.”

  Julia tilted her head to the side. “Perhaps your water was laced with whiskey?”

  “Maybe,” he said. He narrowed his brow and looked at her. “No, I think someone put a medicine into my water or perhaps gave it to me in a drink I had before I left the camp. I think someone cut my rope and someone pierced a hole in my water bag. Julia,” he said, “I believe I have been tricked. Someone went to much trouble to slow me down.” All at once he chuckled. “And whoever it was, did a good job of it.”

  Julia gazed over to him. “Why do you laugh if you think this?”

  “Because,” he said, “it was done so well and because it means that whoever did it protected you. Someone wanted you to find me. It means someone in the Minneconjou camp cares for you. I am pleased with it. Did you find anything else like this?”

  “Yes,” she said, “I found your moccasins hidden beneath your paint. I thought at the time that it was odd, but I didn’t want to question the way that you arrange your things.”

  Again, Neeheeowee grinned. “Show me,” he said, and when she did, she had the pleasure of hearing the deep, resonant beauty of his voice, for Neeheeowee laughed, and Julia after a while, joined in his with a chuckle of her own, their joy in one another’s company extending well into the night.

  And when they fell asleep that night, he held her in his arms, Julia deciding there was nothing quite so wonderful as the feeling of his embrace around her. Contented now, she fell asleep.

  It came without warning. Just when Neeheeowee thought he couldn’t be happier, it came to him: the dream. He saw his wife and baby again, alive, then dead. He heard their screams, he heard their pleas for pity, he listened to their voices now, demanding retribution.

  He moaned in his sleep, he tossed, and cold sweat began to cover his body. He tried to call out to the ghost, he tried to explain about Julia, about the change in his life, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t talk, and she wouldn’t listen.

  “Avenge my death,” she said. “Avenge the death of my child.”

  It was all she said. It was all she would say. And she would not listen to his thoughts, or to his pleas, silent though they were. She wanted revenge; he was her instrument. She would not let him rest until it happened.

  He tried to cry out his frustration, but nothing would come, and, at last, he had no choice, he awoke.

  Julia awakened to the feel of Neeheeowee stirring beside her. He groaned in his sleep, his body twisting out of his sleeping robe. She sat up and leaned over, taking him in her arms, but he shrugged her off, reminding Julia t
hat in an Indian culture, a man wanted no sympathy when he showed any sign of weakness. To do such was considered the ultimate of insults.

  So she lay back down, listening to the sound of his breathing as it became more and more normal. At last he took a deep breath and shuddered.

  “The enemy is close,” he murmured to her after a while. “We will have to be on guard at all times from now on during the day, most of our movements being done at night when there is a moon to guide us.”

  “I see,” she said. “How do you know this?”

  “I know,” was all he replied.

  “Ma,” Julia let go the Lakota expression. “How far away do you think the enemy is?”

  “I am not certain of that. I will scout ahead tomorrow while you stay here well hidden. I will find out where the enemy is so that we can make plans to overtake him.”

  Julia nodded in agreement, yet listening to him, envisioning what was to come, she felt her stomach wrench, fear sweeping over her. When she lay back down to rest, she was not at all surprised to find that the sleep which she needed eluded her.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Neeheeowee returned to camp the next day when the sun was at its highest peak. He looked weary, even a little downtrodden.

  “They are less than a day’s ride from here,” he said in answer to her unspoken question. “We can intersect with them tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?” she repeated. “So soon?”

  “Haahe, yes,” he said. “We will make our plans tonight, for we must take them by surprise. Because they are in their own country, they have become lax and I can use that to my advantage. They will not expect an attack so close to home. And Julia,” he said, looking at her closely, “I will show them no mercy. Expect none.”

  Julia looked at him, understanding in her eyes, yet within her heart, she wished it could be different.

  As it turned out, there were five of them, not three, and Julia grimaced, shutting her eyes when she discovered it. They were big men, all well armed with lances and bows and arrows, but all right now were asleep. The sun had not yet made its appearance in the sky, and Julia realized she was witnessing the darkness before dawn.

  The enemy had pitched their camp high upon a flat-topped mesa, and Neeheeowee and Julia had last night climbed to a spot above where the enemy slept. Both Julia and Neeheeowee lay flat on their stomachs, overlooking the Pawnee camp. Neeheeowee had painted himself for war, the black paint stretching across his face, the look of him fierce enough to cause Julia to cringe.

  He motioned her back down to a ledge on the mesa. Using hand signals he told her to wait there, unless he ran into trouble down there, at which time she was to mount the swiftest of the ponies and flee. She nodded, although she had already told him that if he died, she would ride right into the camp and perish, too. She had no wish to live her life without Neeheeowee.

  They had argued about this point more than any other of their plans, and Julia kept her intentions silent for the moment, not wishing to cause further argument with the enemy so dose at hand. Her glance, however, told Neeheeowee she had not budged on her decision at all.

  He scowled at her before sending a helpless look toward the heavens, but he said nothing, only communicating by sign what he expected her to do. Julia nodded, agreeing to all of it, with the exception of the one.

  He nodded and, again, scooting to the top of the ledge, peered down into the enemy camp, Julia following him up onto the ledge. And then, all at once, it started. Neeheeowee shrieked out his war cry and dropped down into the camp, cutting the throat of one of the villains at once.

  The Pawnee responded as they had been taught all their lives, up and starting battle even before they rubbed the sleep from their eyes. One attacked Neeheeowee with a knife, Neeheeowee pulling him down toward him and stabbing the attacker with that knife.

  Two down, Julia counted.

  Two of the Pawnee, seeing the strength and cunning of their enemy, fled the scene, disappearing down the mesa and into the night. It left Neeheeowee with one left to fight. Julia gulped and barely dared to look.

  “You,” she heard Neeheeowee say in Lakota, himself cornering his prey. “You are the one who killed my wife and my baby. You are the one I have sought all these long years. You do not deserve to live, you do not deserve to walk this earth, you will not walk the path to the spirit world, either. I will ensure it.”

  The two men circled one another, Julia noticing with an odd sense of detachment that the sun had just begun to rise on the eastern horizon. A breeze blew straight into her face and then quit. She shook her head.

  Had it spoken to her?

  It couldn’t be. She must be going mad.

  Again, wind rushed into her face. “Stop the fight.”

  She caught her breath.

  She had heard of what the Indians called the spirit wind, she had been out west long enough to know of these beliefs. But she had never thought it to be true.

  “He follows the wrong path. Do not let him do it.” The wind again rushed into her face, ruffling her hair this time and seeming to speak to her yet again. “It will sour his heart forever.”

  She gazed back down at Neeheeowee and the Pawnee. Perhaps the whining of the wind, the desolation of the plains had, at last, made her crazy. Or perhaps the men had spoken. But as the two men circled one another, grunting, screeching, screaming, she knew with certainty that neither of them had spoken.

  The Pawnee howled, and Neeheeowee, not even flinching, pulled the Pawnee down, pushing his knife to the other man’s throat so fast, the Pawnee barely seemed to know it before it was done.

  “I will kill you now as you killed my wife,” Neeheeowee said, Julia listening. “I will make you suffer as she did, and never fear, you will never see the spirit world.”

  Wind rushed up behind her, seeming to push her down into the camp.

  Neeheeowee raised his knife and in that moment, there in the breeze, Julia saw the future before her, a future with a sullen Neeheeowee, a Neeheeowee without heart, without passion, and she understood all at once why she was here: this murder would take Neeheeowee’s heart just as surely as his wife had taken his spirit.

  She looked around her for help, but knew that if anyone were going to do something about this, it would have to be her.

  He screamed, and Julia jumped to her feet.

  “Hiya! No!” Julia yelled it out as loud as she could, running forward and stumbling over the rocky landscape to twist her way down into the camp.

  At the interruption, the Pawnee howled, snapping about to try to regain control, but Neeheeowee held him fast, not letting him move even a little bit.

  “Hiya! No!” Julia shrieked again. “You must not do this.”

  “Eaaa!” Neeheeowee roared. “You are not to interfere in this!”

  Julia looked at the Pawnee, who, she noted, looked more ferocious than anyone she had ever seen. “You must not do this,” she yelled again to Neeheeowee, then more calmly, “You must spare his life.” She advanced right up to them, falling onto her knees beside them both. “You have lost a wife and a child, my love. I know this is difficult, I know your wife haunts you, but if you do this thing, if you see it through, it will change you forever. Do you not see? It will harden your heart, even against me.” She took a deep breath and plunged. “I know a harder way, but it is a better path,” she said, her words rushing together almost in a slur. “You lost a child, a boy child I think you said. I say you should invoke the kinship appeal right here, right now. You had a son you lost, make this man your son. Do this deed as no one else has ever done it before you. Show mercy to your enemy. Right here, right now.”

  Neeheeowee, who held the other man’s head in his hand, howled at her. “He is not Cheyenne!”

  “He doesn’t have to be!”

  Neeheeowee screamed. “I cannot do it!”

  “Yes, you can!”

  Neeheeowee howled again, the sound a screech against the morning air. Then, pushing the man’s head
down hard on the ground, Neeheeowee jumped to his feet. And though he let the Pawnee come up onto his knees, Neeheeowee glared at the man. Proud Wolf’s glance clearly let the man know that one move—any move—and the Pawnee would yet die.

  “Your life might be spared,” Neeheeowee spit out, clutching a knife in one hand while he signed out the meaning of his speech with his other: “My wife desires this revenge to end. My wife seems to think you are honorable enough to keep your word. My wife would have you take the place of the kin which you took from me five years ago. My wife would have me take you into my home as…my son.” Neeheeowee’s voice faltered, although his stare remained fixed. “You, my friend, have a choice. One given to you by the wisdom and compassion of my wife. You can either die the same death—here now—that you had delivered to my kin five years ago, or you can accept the gift that I will give to you now to show you my sincerity; the gift of my finest warhorse. For I will honor my wife’s wisdom and the feelings from her heart. What say you now?

  “But I would caution you. If you accept what my wife and I offer you, you must pledge to me—your solemn oath—that from this day forward, you will take the place of my lost kin, ever to be obligated to fulfill that role, that you will never falter from that duty. Know you now that it is hatred for you that has brought me to this camp on this day. Know you, too, that I will not leave it until I have obtained either your death or your vow of kinship. The choice is yours.”

  Julia had arisen while Neeheeowee had been speaking, moving off to the side to get Neeheeowee’s war pony. She brought it down to them now; standing behind Neeheeowee, the three of them, the pony, Julia and Neeheeowee, awaited the Pawnee’s decision.

  The Pawnee warrior looked up toward the gift, looked up to Julia and then back toward Neeheeowee. He trembled, looking at the Cheyenne’s knife, still clutched firmly in hand and poised to wield a death blow. The Pawnee then glanced up toward the sky, then down at himself and at last, not being able to withhold himself, he screamed, but as he cried out, tears streamed down his face.