The Bride Series (Omnibus Edition)

by Bittner, Rosanne

  He held her more firmly. “You will not die, Emma. I will not let you die. The Maker of Breath brought us together. He will not take you away from me that way.”

  They heard horses then, and voices. She clung tightly to him, curling up against his chest when she heard the familiar voice, catching only some of the words—“River Joe…white girl…came up here…my friend Deek…”

  There were quiet answers from the Cherokee men. Emma covered her ears when she heard Tommy’s raised voice, cursing the Indians, demanding to be allowed to search every cabin.

  “It’s him! It’s him!” she squeaked. “It’s Tommy and that Deek Malone! Deek is as bad as Tommy!”

  “Hush, Agiya,” River said, holding her tight and rocking her gently. “Think of the baby. Think only of having your own little baby.”

  How he wanted to break free and kill Tommy Decker! It would be so easy. But it was hard to say who had sent them. Perhaps they had come on their own; but if not, and they were killed, even more would come, looking for Tommy and Deek. That would mean big trouble for the Cherokee. They didn’t need any more trouble than they already had.

  Apparently for now only Tommy and Deek had come searching. River tried to determine why. To him it only confirmed his suspicion that someone else had sent them. They were sniffing things out, perhaps trying to keep it all quiet, probably for the sake of Sam Gates, who might not want other people to know that he bought and sold young women like slaves.

  He could feel Emma’s heart pounding against his chest, and it angered him that these men had come and upset her. He had no doubt that she was pregnant; and although he would say nothing to her, he too feared that her mother’s problems might be visited upon her. He wanted a child badly, but more than that he wanted Emma alive and well.

  They waited for what seemed hours, until finally Peter came and pulled away a board. “You can come up now. They have gone to search other villages. But none of our people has told anyone from other villages that you are here. If someone from another village comes here and finds out, we will tell them they must say nothing.”

  He stood back as Emma appeared at the top of the ladder. He reached down then and took her arm, helping her up and again admiring River Joe for the beautiful white woman he called his wife. “No Cherokee would betray River Joe,” he said to her. “You do not need to be afraid.”

  Emma turned then, half-collapsing against River’s chest and hugging him tightly. “Oh, River, they know! They’re looking for us! They’ll come back.”

  “And we will be ready for them, just as we were today,” Peter said. “Do not worry, Emma.”

  She pulled away from River, blinking back tears. “I’ve brought you so much trouble. I know Tommy Decker. If he finds out, he’ll come back and raid your village and do terrible things to you.”

  Peter tossed his head. “We have been raided many times. If it happens again it will not be your fault. I am not worried.” He looked at River Joe and grinned. “It worked! You are safe. Our scouts have been watching. The red-haired one and his friend are moving on in search of another village.”

  “Did he say why he came? Was it for me and Emma?”

  Peter sighed. “I am afraid so. They say you killed a man and stole a white girl who belongs to a man in Knoxville. The man wants her back. The red-haired one has promised to find her.”

  Emma let out a little groan but River kept an arm around her. “Let him try to get her back!” he growled. “She belongs to no man but me!”

  River Joe led Emma back to their cabin, and Emma cried out when they went inside. Clothes had been torn from the homemade dresser. The table was overturned and several dishes were broken, dishes given to them by Grace, who had few to spare. The bed was torn apart, and the mattress that Emma and Grace and Mary had worked on so lovingly was slashed open, its feathers and leaves and branches strewn about.

  “Oh, River! River!” Emma broke into tears, and River Joe felt a burning desire to follow Tommy Decker and murder him there and then. But he could not risk getting his Cherokee family in trouble. Instinct told him that Sam Gates was very powerful. Maybe Tommy would not come back. At any rate, he could not run after him, nor could he drag Emma off to Texas now, if she was pregnant.

  Mary came inside then, her dark eyes flaming at the sight. She looked up at River Joe. “They did this to almost everybody,” she said, hatred in her words. “They are bad!” She put a hand on Emma’s shoulder. “Don’t you worry, Emma. We will put the mattress all back together again. It will be fun,” she said, trying to get some cheerfulness into the words. “We can tell more stories.” She took Emma’s arm. “Come on. Look! Most of the stuffing is still in the mattress.” She pulled Emma over to the mattress and began picking up the stuffing material.

  River Joe turned to Peter. “I know John Ross says you cannot fight back and kill white men when they attack us, or the government will say we are at war,” he told his Indian brother. “But someday I must find a way to kill Tommy Decker. I need to kill him as sure as I need to breathe. And somehow I will find a way to do it without getting the rest of you in trouble, if I have to go all the way to Knoxville!”

  “River, don’t!” Emma said, rising from the floor. “Don’t go there! You would be hanged!”

  His eyes blazed. “It just might be worth it to watch Tommy Decker turn purple with my hands around his throat!”

  Their eyes held, hers full of terror. She shook her head. “River,” she whispered.

  He walked closer and grasped her arms. “I told you not to ever worry about that redheaded bastard, and I meant it, Emma Rivers.”

  “But they know now! I was so sure they all were drowned, so sure we wouldn’t have to worry.”

  “You let me do the worrying. You are my wife. All I want you to think about is having my baby, Emma.”

  “Baby! Are you going to have a baby, Emma?” Grace asked.

  Emma blushed, for by then Gray Bear and Peter and Grace and her husband, Red Wolf, had all come into the cabin.

  Emma wiped at her eyes. “I…I think so.”

  “Then tonight we will celebrate,” Grace said calmly. “We will celebrate tricking the white men and the fact that Emma is with child.” She put a hand to her own thickening waist. “Surely our children will not be born far apart, Emma.”

  Emma looked at her kind, smiling face, which was getting rounder as Grace grew more plump. “That’s right. Aren’t you scared, Grace?”

  Grace smiled more. “No. And neither should you be afraid. Your baby was conceived in love. It will be a healthy baby, and you will be fine. I know in my heart the Maker of Breath wants our River Joe to have a son.”

  Emma looked up at River. “Promise me you won’t go to Knoxville?”

  She saw his jaw flex in a struggle to control his anger. His eyes finally began to lose their bitter hatred and return to their usual gentle brown. “I promise…as long as you are safe and here with me.”

  He pulled her close, looking at Peter then. “Keep a good watch. Make sure that bastard keeps going.”

  Peter nodded. “We will make sure.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  It was November 1824 when Grace gave birth to a baby boy. Helping with the difficult delivery only deepened Emma’s fear over giving birth. Her belly was big, and the other women guessed that by the first of the year her child would be born. She could feel its movements, and was over-whelmed that something alive actually moved inside her, a baby fathered by River Joe.

  She could only pray that Grace was right when she said that a baby conceived in love would surely turn out to be healthy and strong. River believed it too, and she tried to believe it in her heart. But she was still haunted by her mother’s many painful miscarriages and death.

  In watching Grace’s agony, it was obvious to Emma that bearing a child had to be one of the most painful functions a woman could experience; but she swore to be brave about it for River wanted this child very much. Her biggest fear was that it would die or that som
ething would be wrong with it, and she would disappoint River, who had been so good to her.

  Grace recovered quickly, and Emma gained new hope when she saw that the child, named Jonathan, was healthy and handsome. He fed hungrily at his mother’s breast, and Emma began to get excited over her own baby. A child would be the first thing she had ever had that would be all her own, that no one could take away from her. She could love it, and it would love her back. Emma’s sense of womanly responsibility began to change her whole personality, so that much of her childishness began to vanish. River enjoyed watching the change, began loving her even more for the woman she was becoming.

  Winter set in at the mountaintop with a deep chill that kept fireplaces burning and the women and children in heavy sweaters and thick stockings. Emma, Grace, and Mary spent a lot of time together, helping one another read, knitting, and talking about Martin Crow, who, it was rumored, intended to ask for her hand in marriage in the spring. It was wonderful food for gossip, and Mary secretly began sewing a marriage quilt.

  Emma grew so big that doing anything was an effort. She wore tunics borrowed from some of the fatter Cherokee women, and just getting out of a chair and walking around seemed an accomplishment. River did many of her chores, treating her as though she were a piece of china about to break. He kept the fires going, determined she would not take a chill and get sick, and every night he lay beside her feeling her stomach, running his hands over it lovingly as though he were touching the baby, enjoying the kicks and rippling movements of the life inside her belly.

  Lovemaking had ceased, and Emma missed it. Sometimes she wondered if he gave more than a passing thought to the still-slender Cherokee girls in the village, but he seemed not to mind her huge belly and the swollen look to the rest of her. He was so attentive that she seldom let her thoughts of his being attracted to someone else cause her much worry. River Joe loved her. She was carrying his baby, and after it was born they would finally have each other sexually again. All that mattered now was the baby.

  It was early in January 1825 when the raiders came. Emma sat at the table in Grace’s house reading a story to Grace, Peter, and Mary. Outside, a bitter wind blew, and everyone wore heavy jackets inside the cabin. River Joe came in first, followed by Red Wolf.

  “We have to get into the hole, Emma,” River said. “A lot of men are coming this time!”

  “The hole!” Grace protested. “River, it is so cold outside.”

  “No choice. We are lucky the bad weather is slowing them down. These men look like the kind who would prefer to surprise the village and ride down hard on us. Get Mary and the other young girls into the hole with us.”

  He helped Emma get out of her chair, his heart aching for her. He grabbed one of Red Wolf’s bearskin coats and threw it around her, helping her walk to the door, but then Emma cringed, grasping at her belly.

  “River, I can’t!” she cried out. She clung to his arm, unable to straighten up because of the pain. “Something…hurts bad!”

  River Joe looked at Grace, his eyes full of fear. “The baby!”

  “We have no choice,” Grace said. “You must not be seen. The baby will come when it will. Being in the hole will not matter. It will just make it harder for Emma, but not as bad as if you were seen and taken away. You must hurry, Joe.”

  River Joe picked Emma up in his arms, and Grace ordered Mary to put on a warm coat and follow.

  “River, no!” Emma protested. “I can’t…have my baby…down there! It will die! It will die!”

  “Our baby will be fine, Agiya,” he said, holding her close. “Do not be afraid. I will be with you.”

  Emma was aware of others hurrying. Pain ripped through her again as cold air penetrated her nostrils. She felt River let go of her for a moment and she screamed for him not to leave her.

  “I’m not going to leave you, Emma.”

  She was being lowered, and someone else was helping her as she tried to climb down the little ladder.

  “I’ve got her, Joe.” She recognized the voice of Gray Bear.

  Now it was dark. She bent over with another pain. She remembered that with Grace, when the pains came this closely together it meant the baby was coming. Surely it didn’t happen this suddenly! Grace had lain in labor for a very long time. Did this mean something was wrong? Was she just excited, or was something terrible going to happen?

  She heard River’s voice again, felt him lift her, and heard him giving orders for someone to put down a blanket. She heard the voices of other women, young women—and Mary. Hearing Mary’s voice comforted her, knowing that at least River and her good friend Mary were here.

  “You must keep her quiet, River, or they will find the young women,” she heard Gray Wolf tell River. Then all was darkness, and the girls were whispering. Another pain came, and River held Emma close, putting a hand over her mouth.

  “I am so sorry, Agiya,” he said, squeezing tight as the scream came. “Please, you must try not to cry out.”

  The pain left her and she laid her head back in the crook of River’s arm, panting from the strain and shivering from the cold. “I can’t…help it,” she squeaked. “How can I…not scream…the pain…River, the baby is coming! It’s coming soon! It’s not like with Grace. It won’t…take very long. River, it will die! It will die, and so…will I!”

  “No! You will not die, Emma, and neither will our baby.”

  He sat on a blanket with Emma on his lap, his back against the dirt wall of the hole. He cursed the raiders and the darkness and the cold. How could he help her when he couldn’t even see?

  “Emma.” It was Mary speaking. “Remember, this is your baby—yours and River’s. Do you want the raiders to find River before the baby is even born? Do you want them to take River away so that he never sees his child?”

  “No! No,” Emma squeaked, grasping at River’s jacket.

  “Then you must not scream,” Mary said. “If you scream, they will find all of us—take River away, hurt one of the young women—maybe take you away and kill your baby.”

  Mary spoke harshly but truthfully, trying to make Emma understand the importance of keeping still, while wanting to cry herself at Emma’s predicament.

  Another pain came, just as they heard the thundering hooves of horses. The thought that Tommy Decker might be with the raiders made Emma’s pain even worse. She turned her face, burying it against River’s thick fur jacket and pressing her mouth against his upper arm, biting hard on the jacket and forcing back as much of the scream as she could. It was almost totally muffled by the fur.

  River reached inside her heavy jacket and rubbed her lower back with expert hands. It seemed to help the pain a little. “That’s my brave, strong Emma,” he said softly. “Esaugetuh Emissee is with us, Emma. You will be all right, and so will our baby.”

  The black pain ripped through her again, and she felt an odd burst and then a wetness on her bloomers. Again she muffled the scream into his fur coat.

  “Try to relax, Emma,” River said. “I know it is hard, Agiya. Breathe the way Grace did, the way the midwife told her.” He held her in a half-sitting position, the position the old midwives said was best, and Emma breathed in quick pants.

  “I think…I wet myself,” she squeaked.

  “Her water must have broken,” Mary said, feeling very grownup for knowing so much about birthing babies. She had watched Grace’s delivery and was not so sure at the moment that she wanted to marry Martin Crow after all. To marry meant to get pregnant. But then again, the sweet babies that were the result seemed worth it. “We had better take off her bloomers just in case the baby does start coming out.”

  “No, wait.” Emma’s mind swam with confusion, all reason beginning to leave her. She felt suddenly angry and contrary, and she argued about removing her bloomers. She pushed at River and told him to leave her alone, and another pain came. She started to cry out, but River quickly clamped a big hand over her mouth, firmly and forcefully, so that in her deepest moment of pain she
could think of nothing but Tommy’s attack on her. Tommy! Tommy had come for her, and had found her! She began fighting River so that he had to turn her back to him and keep one strong arm firmly around her chest and arms, while he kept his other hand tightly over her mouth.

  “Emma, it’s all right!” he whispered hoarsely. “It’s me, River! Nobody is going to hurt you. And if you just relax, the baby will be all right, too.”

  Mary managed to get the bloomers off in the dark, then wrapped part of the blanket around Emma’s legs as Emma began to relax again. Reality returned for the moment, but that was no better than her imagined danger. Reality was that she was having a baby. How many babies had her mother lost?

  River’s chest hurt from the effort of holding her to keep her from screaming. He realized that the screaming probably helped. A woman should be allowed to do anything she wanted in such a time, if it helped relieve the pain. He slowly took his hand from her mouth so that she could breathe in the short pants again, and with every breath she whispered, “River.”

  “I am right here, Emma. Soon those men will be gone and we can get you up to a bed.” He heard someone above scream, and rage burned in his soul. How much longer must his people put up with such abuse?

  The worst part was that he was certain it would only get worse, until all of them agreed to leave Tennessee. Perhaps every Indian from the Smokies to the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic would have to leave before it was done. It made no sense. They were bothering no one and they lived well.

  Already there were rumors of men in government working on a federal policy that would remove all Indians east of the Mississippi River to Indian Territory. It was food for much discussion over Cherokee supper tables. How could the white men just decide what to do with people, as though they were ruling gods? This was the Indians’ home. They had a right to stay here if they chose. They were industrious and bothered no one. None of them could understand the white man’s thinking.