by Shirl Henke
“As to holding a captive, we move like the wind deep in the mountains and leave no trails across the wide plains. No bluecoats would ever know you were here or see you if we wished to hide you. No one will harm the boy. He is of my blood and I will protect him, but I can make no promises about you.” He stood up and began to walk toward the opening of the lodge. “I will send women with food and water. Rest and refresh yourself. It will take several days to decide. And may Hunting Hawk return by then, he prayed silently.
Carrie sat alone, hugging herself in disbelief and numbness. What would happen to her and Perry? Shortly, two older women came in bearing bowls of fruit and stew, and a flask of water. They spoke no English and did not seem inclined to be friendly, so, Carrie simply indicated her thanks and settled back to feed Perry and eat to keep up her own strength. She knew she would need all her wits about her for the ordeal to come.
Gradually as her panic subsided, it was replaced by a low, simmering anger. She and her child were trapped in a hell not of their making. Of course, she felt horribly guilty for her careless wandering that had brought Angry Wolf and his cohorts down upon them, but it was certainly not her fault that an epidemic had decimated the village! Or that Wind Song was dead. She still felt mortified and furious remembering Iron Heart's accusing words, Where is your husband? The world and all its rules were made by men, red or white!
All through the next day Carrie waited, confined to another lodge where she and her son had been taken. She shared it with Calf Woman. The old woman was not unkind. In fact, she brought Perry a rawhide ball and a string of brightly colored beads to play with and watched his bright, alert movements with obvious delight. Toward the boy's mother, however, she showed no emotion at all, neither hostility nor friendliness. They waited.
Early the following morning Carrie was disturbed from her toilette by a great commotion outside. She had just finished washing her face and combing her hair with a bone comb given to her by Calf Woman when the furor erupted. Male voices speaking stridently in Cheyenne were calling across the clearing in front of the lodge. Then Calf Woman entered and motioned for her to bring Perry and follow her. Forcing herself to remain calm, she took a deep breath and scooped up the boy.
The brilliant morning sunlight blinded her for a moment. Then she saw him, standing directly in her line of vision, almost twenty feet away. Hawk. At least, he had once been Hawk Sinclair. Now he was Hunting Hawk, grandson of Iron Heart, a Cheyenne warrior. He was almost naked in the heat of the morning, dressed only in breechclout and moccasins with that same evil-looking knife strapped to his waistband. His sinuously muscled body glistened with perspiration, running in rivulets through the thick black hair of his chest, for he had ridden hard to get to the encampment. His hair was quite long now, plaited into two gleaming braids, woven through with rawhide thongs and feathers. Copper armbands gleamed on his hard biceps and a matching necklace lay suspended against his chest. Large copper earrings completed the barbaric adornment. He needed a shave, a task he rarely neglected.
His face was shuttered and expressionless, very Indianlike to Carrie. What was he thinking?
Hawk slowly walked over to her, his eyes shifting from her face to consider the boy. If he was surprised, he concealed it, or perhaps he just did not care that he had a son, she thought bleakly. Her heart lodged in her throat and she found herself unable to speak, desperately wanting him to say something in English, to prove to her that he was still Hawk, not some alien, savage stranger.
“What is his name?” He finally broke the silence between them as they stood face to face. He put out his hand and gently touched the boy's black shiny hair.
“Peregrine...Perry,” she managed to choke out.
He smiled enigmatically. “A name that means something. Good.” Then he turned and walked over to where Iron Heart and Angry Wolf stood. The old man motioned them inside his lodge, and they vanished behind the tent flap.
“She is mine. I claim the right of her capture. She is my slave.” Angry Wolf's voice was loud and carried far as he intended it should.
“You cannot have her. She is the mother of my son, Angry Wolf.” Hawk's voice was quiet. Dreading what might come, fearing what he might have to do, he looked at Iron Heart.
“The council has debated long and thoroughly, Angry Wolf,” Iron Heart began. “The woman is well known among the whites. Her firehair would be too difficult to conceal if she were your slave. It would bring soldiers to our camp, death to everyone here. We must send her back unharmed, her and her son.”
Angry Wolf's face grew rigid and darkened as his fury rose. When Iron Heart had finished speaking, he lashed out, gesturing to Hawk. “It is because of him! He is your grandson and she lay with him, giving him that child when they had no right! He has no claim on her under our law. She has a white husband!”
“He Who Walks in Sun is dead.” The old man said the words with finality, ignoring Angry Wolf's tirade and looking at Hawk as he spoke. Hawk's face still showed no emotion, but the old man heard him release a tightly held hiss of breath at the startling news. “The council has spoken, Angry Wolf. You cannot have the woman.” The chief watched his grandson stand poised. Hawk waited to see what the infuriated warrior would do next.
Angry Wolf whirled and vanished through the opening of the tepee. As he strode toward Carrie, he said loudly, for all to hear, “I will not give my captive to a half-blooded adulterer!” He challenged Hawk openly as a gasp of horrified indignation went up around the large circle of people gathered to witness the spectacle.
Carrie almost dropped Perry as Angry Wolf yanked her to him. She began to fight him then, kicking at his bare shins with her booted feet, but before she could do any damage, he struck her a savage blow across the face. As he raised his hand to hit her again, Hawk's body smashed into his, forcing him to release his vicious hold on Carrie.
They tumbled to the ground at her feet, rolling and thrashing in the dust as she clutched Perry and jumped out of their way. With a snarled oath, Angry Wolf rolled to his feet and drew his knife. Hawk did the same. The circle of men around them widened. No one moved to stop them, for indeed everyone, even Iron Heart, knew it could not be done.
The two men circled one another, right, then left, then right again, like two mountain lions, each poised and ready to spring. Angry Wolf feinted high with his blade, then lunged low, but Hawk parried his thrusts with uncanny accuracy. For several minutes the stalemate continued as they alternately attacked and retreated. Carrie let out a muffled gasp when Angry Wolf's knife slashed a bloody furrow across Hawk's forearm. Just as quickly Hawk opened up Angry Wolf's chest with a long gash, narrowly missing his throat and knocking him to the hard-packed earth. Soon they were both covered with a murky film of sweat, dust, and blood as they rolled on the ground until Angry Wolf came up on top. Hawk held his foe's knife hand in a deathlock, struggling desperately to keep it from his throat.
Angry Wolfs face grimaced in an ugly caricature of a smile. “Now you die and I get your flame-haired woman to replace Wind Song, white man!”
Just then Hawk gave a twisting roll and caught his leg around Angry Wolf's. The leverage pulled him over and they rolled again in a blur of flashing steel and dust. This time Hawk came up on top when they stopped, halfway across the clearing.”
“You have always coveted what was not yours, Angry Wolf. Now you pay for your greed!” Hawk's knife inched its way closer to his enemy's bare throat.
With a desperate surge, Angry Wolf broke free at the last moment as Hawk's knife plunged down to slash his shoulder. He twisted free of Hawk's grasp and they separated once more.
Carrie stood isolated at one end of the circular clearing. The majority of the Cheyenne onlookers gave her a wide berth. She shielded Perry's eyes from the bloody carnage taking place, fearful he would be scarred for life if he witnessed this butchery.
Hawk bided his time, circling like his namesake in predatory arcs, back and forth, taunting and infuriating Angry Wolf into making a
move. Angry Wolf lunged and missed, but as he was propelled forward into the open space where Hawk had stood a split second earlier, he felt Hawk grasp his right forearm, yanking him around while raising his knife hand harmlessly into midair. In a blur Hawk's own blade came up, slashing Angry Wolfs throat deeply.
After a few thrashing movements Angry Wolf lay still. Hawk stood staring at his dead foe for several minutes, then sheathed his knife and looked up at Carrie. Her ashen face spoke volumes as she stood clutching the boy to her. Hawk turned wordlessly and strode over to Iron Heart.
The old man's face was gray with anguish. Looking into his eyes, Hawk felt as if Angry Wolfs knife had twisted in his own heart. God, anything but this! Yet he knew the law and knew what his grandfather must do.
“You have shed Cheyenne blood,” the chief intoned. As if lending moral support to the old man, several other of the tribal elders gathered around him.
“I understand,” Hawk said simply, facing them. “The penalty for killing another Cheyenne is banishment for four years. I will take the white woman and child and go.” With a parting look at his grandfather, he walked dejectedly toward his lodge to retrieve the relics of his white life, a life to which he did not wish to return, not this way. Perhaps not at all.
Carrie did not know what to expect when Hawk stalked off and Iron Heart came toward her. His face was drawn and his words flat. “Hawk Sinclair has made his choice. He will take you and the boy to your home. Wait in the lodge until he comes for you.”
With that he turned and walked away. She did not understand what had just transpired, but she did know that it was unnatural for Iron Heart to refer to his grandson by his white name. Uncertainly she went inside and sat down. The keening death chant over Angry Wolf’s body had already begun. She gritted her teeth and waited.
It did not take Hawk long to change into a pair of denim pants and a white shirt. He strapped on the Colt .44 and resheathed his knife in the heavy leather belt. Gathering up his few possessions, he let out a bitter laugh. When he had left Circle S it had been the same. He owned nothing that could not fit in a pair of saddlebags. He probably never would.
When he pulled back the buffalo-hide flap and stepped into the lodge where Carrie sat with his son, Hawk moved noiselessly and reached for the boy. His silent entrance on moccasined feet took her by surprise, and she gasped in shock as one of his braids brushed her cheek. Flinching back, she clutched the fussing child to her.
“No! I'll carry him.” Her voice came out sharper than she intended. The gruesome fight and then the horrible wailing death chant had finally succeeded in breaking her iron reserve of calm. She had eaten and slept little in three days and was teetering on the edge of hysteria.
“Don't be foolish. You're exhausted and shaky.” With no more debate, he scooped the boy from her arms and turned to carry him outside.
Furiously she whirled on him, lunging at his back with a fierce maternal cry dredged up from the depths of her soul. “You can't take him! Let me have my son! He's mine. Damn you, you filthy savage! Let me—” She was sobbing and flailing by this time, and Perry responded with his own cry of fright.
Hawk stood very still, with his son on one arm, holding her away from him with the other. He released her shoulder when she stopped short.
My God, what have I done? One look at the set lines of his face made her realize the enormity of what she had said. “Hawk, I'm sorry. I didn't mean—”
He cut her off by turning sharply on his heel to leave with Perry, saying, “Get your gear. I have Taffy saddled outside. Mount up, or I'll leave you behind!”
Grabbing her hat and gloves, she quickly followed him out. By now Perry had stopped fussing and seemed well content to sit in front of his father on the big red horse. With the bright eyes of childhood he eagerly looked around the village as they rode away. Hawk never looked back.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Hawk stared straight ahead and held Redskin at a steady, ground-eating pace. Carrie was afraid to speak, alternately ashamed of her hysterical outburst, then angry with him for his brutal actions and bloodthirsty appearance. Even in a white man's shirt and pants, he looked savage with his long braids, barbaric jewelry, and arsenal of weapons.
Hawk's emotions were in turmoil as well. When he had arrived in response to the cryptic message from Iron Heart, he did not expect to see Carrie there, much less with a child. One look at Perry's face was all it took to know the boy was his son. Against all odds, the one thing that he had never considered had happened. The child was his, not Noah's. He had cursed himself for a fool, feeling overjoyed, guilty, and angry with her for endangering herself and the boy at Angry Wolf's hands.
Then he had realized how she had looked at him, the uncertainty, fright, even revulsion in her eyes as she had taken in his Cheyenne appearance. All he had really seemed to her in white man's garb was an exotic version of a veho. Now she had seen him as he was, as a Cheyenne, and she did not like it. A filthy savage.
The hurt festered along with the guilt. He had just killed a man, one of the People. He should have let the elders stop Angry Wolf. They had already decided he could not have Carrie. But Hawk could not bear to see him put his hands on her and flew at him in a rage of possessive jealousy. Perversely, he blamed her for being there, for wandering off so far alone and getting captured. Then he looked across at her and saw his medallion. She wore it proudly, and he cursed himself for the sudden surge of desire that seized him. He had many things to ponder.
As they rode silently through the hot morning air, they were both wrapped in misery and did not hear the approaching horse until the rider was almost upon them. Then Hawk recognized the wiry little frame of Kyle Hunnicut.
“Longlegs, yew son of a bitch!” Kyle was relieved and overjoyed, pulling up to reach over and thump his old friend heartily on the back. “I tracked her 'n' th' boy there, but couldn't git near 'nough ta git 'em out. Been watching’ nigh onta three days on th' other side o' th' camp. Shore glad ya come along when ya did. Yew all right, Carrie?” He shifted his gaze from Hawk to Carrie, confused as to what had been said between them. He noted the careful and possessive way Hawk held his son. One thing had been settled, at least.
Carrie nodded, still numb from her ordeal and the turmoil of confronting Hawk. “I'm fine, Kyle.”
She didn't look fine, but he held his peace. What a pickle this was turning out to be, he swore to himself. The tension between Hawk and Carrie quickly transmitted itself to the Texan who rode toward Circle S with them, the silence broken only by desultory conversation in which Hawk related how Carrie and the boy were captured and how he freed her.
Kyle swore, realizing what it meant. Long ago Hawk had told him enough about Cheyenne law for him to realize that his friend had been banished from the only place where he had ever felt he belonged. And he had left a wife behind. Did Carrie know about her? Surely her child had been born by now. What would Hawk do? He needed to talk with Hawk alone after they arrived at Circle S.
* * * *
I can't go back, Kyle.” Hawk's voice was weary as he sat in Frank Lowery's cabin that night, sharing a drink with his friend. Since the departure of Rider, the small cottage had become Hunnicut's place.
There had been no chance for them to talk until now. Feliz had fussed endlessly over Hawk's wounds, all superficial but encrusted with dried blood. She had insisted on a hot bath, poultices, and pounds of ointment, Then there had been supper and all the arrangements to be made about sleeping quarters. Hawk firmly told Feliz that he would stay in his mother's cabin, not return to the big house. Carrie had moved her things and Perry's into the room he used to occupy. He could scarcely sleep there now, much less occupy Noah's old room.
Hawk knew he must learn from Kyle the details of what had happened in his absence. They sat at the table in Frank's old kitchen and hefted two glasses of whiskey.
“Ain't yew got a reason ta go back, Hawk? Mebbe two o' 'em now?” Kyle's eyes were shrewdly assessing, knowing his friend
would tell him in his own good time.
“Wind Song died last winter, Kyle. Diphtheria. Our child died with her. Even after my four years of exile are over, there'll be nothing left for me in my grandfather's village. I've betrayed him and all the People. I can imagine what he thought when he saw Carrie with my son.” He gave a self-deprecating laugh. “You know, it's ironic. When I took her there with Bright Leaf, the old women gossiped about us, saying that we were lovers, betraying her husband, my father. Their suspicions were vindicated with proof positive, weren't they?”
“Don't appear ta me yore bein' fair ta Carrie 'er yerself, Longlegs.”
Hawk rubbed his hand over his eyes and made a dismissing gesture. “Tell me what's happened while I was gone. When did you come back?”
They talked late into the night about Frank's murder, Noah's death, Caleb Rider and Karl Krueger's collusion, the precarious state of Circle S's finances, all the things that needed to be settled, except the most basic one—the relationship between Hawk and Carrie. That, Kyle hoped, would work itself out.
Carrie lay in bed late that night, exhausted but unable to sleep. She had sat at the big kitchen table earlier in the evening and studied him covertly as he ate. Was I watching to see if some residual savagery would linger in his table manners? She scoffed angrily to herself as the confusion and hurt washed over her once again. He was half red Indian. She had always known that, but somehow she had never really considered what it implied until she saw him bronzed and naked, locked in a bloody death struggle with another savage. A part of him was savage, had always been, would always be.
She tossed and pounded her pillow, realizing that her reaction was only one of initial shock. Buried deeper lay the memory of Wind Song—Wind Song and her unborn child, Hawk's child, too. While I carried Perry, he lay with his Cheyenne wife, giving her a baby. Tears stung her eyes. Could she forgive him?