As she lay there, her mind spinning with pleasure, she not only loved him, she adored him.
Chapter 12
Suffer herself to be desired,
And not blush so, to be admired.
—EDMUND WALLER
Smooth hues of pale pink spread across the sky. Hawks soared overhead, shrieking their strange cry, awakening Leonida. She blinked her eyes open and discovered that she was still in Sage’s arms. She wasn’t so amazed that she had slept with him the full night through again, but she was in awe of where they had spent the night.
Her eyes widened when she discovered just how close they were to the edge of the cliff, realizing that should they have rolled away from each other very far during the night, they might have plummeted to the valley below. Then she became aware of the strength of Sage’s arm around her waist and realized that he had thought of the danger and had kept her locked close to him to avoid it.
She gazed up at him, studying him in his sleep, overwhelmed again by his handsomeness, his skin a copper sheen in the morning light, his face so peaceful and rested while asleep, momentarily unburdened of the trials of daily life.
Wriggling free of his tight embrace, Leonida moved closer to his face. Framing it with her hands, she kissed the lids of his eyes, his bold nose, the high cheekbones, and then his sculpted, beautiful lips. Her lips trembled as her kiss deepened, then rapture swept through her when she felt Sage’s arms locking her to him, his lips responding in a crushing kiss, his body pressed against her as he turned her so that she now lay beneath him.
As his hands worked their way up the skirt of her dress, Leonida felt dizziness claim her, wanting him as badly as she had the previous night. She moved her hands down from his face, across his bare chest, and lower still, and dared to touch his manhood through the sleek velveteen fabric of his breeches. He was as aroused as she. As his kiss and his probing fingers became more demanding, she began moving her hand over his hardness, eliciting a lazy sigh from deep within him.
But too soon this was brought to a halt when they heard the sound of a child crying in the distance, back where the others had slept at the camp.
“We will continue later,” Sage said, brushing a kiss across her lips. “Tonight. We will have total privacy in my hogan. Tonight Sage will love you as never before.” He gave her throbbing center another caress with his fingers, then pulled the skirt of her dress down and helped her to her feet.
Her face red and her knees trembling from the passion that had been aroused in her, Leonida half stumbled as she began walking quickly beside Sage down the steep grade that led to the campsite. The cries were louder now, and she could hear excited voices and other people crying, mainly the women of the camp. As Leonida and Sage came closer to the camp, she looked intently ahead, then grew numb inside when she discovered Trevor leaning over Carole, his deep sobs lifting to the heavens.
“Carole,” Leonida whispered. “Oh, Lord, something has happened to Carole.”
She tried not to blame herself for anything that might have happened, or feel shame for having been with Sage in such a wondrous way when it may have occurred. But if Carole was dead, Leonida wondered if she could help but blame herself.
She broke into a mad run, and when she reached Carole’s side, she fell to her knees. Leonida stifled a cry behind her hand when she found Carole gasping for breath. Trevor was overwrought with fright as his mother clasped his hand hard, her eyes wild.
“Carole, oh, Carole, I’m so sorry,” Leonida said, gently touching her cheek. She recoiled and withdrew the hand quickly when she found just how cold Carole’s flesh was.
Leonida gave Sage a troubled glance when he came to rest on his haunches beside her, his own hand testing the feel of Carole’s face.
When Sage slowly drew his hand away and gave Leonida a slow shake of the head, meaning that Carole was not going to make it, Leonida swallowed a growing lump in her throat. She had to find courage enough to face the next few moments. It was necessary for her to keep her composure.
A little boy would soon depend on her.
“Leonida?” Carole whispered, her voice scarcely a scratch of a sound as she turned and gazed up at her. “Lean close. I’ve . . . something . . . to say.”
Willing the tears not to fall from her eyes, Leonida leaned her face down close to Carole’s. “What is it?” she murmured, her voice breaking. “Tell me.”
Carole reached a trembling hand to Leonida’s and gripped it softly. “Trevor,” she whispered, stopping to hack a painful-sounding cough. “You promised to care for him. Please love him as though he were your own.”
Sniffling, tears near, Leonida replied, nodding, “I shall.” Her heart ached with the torment of the moment.
Carole slowly closed her eyes and sucked in a shallow breath, then looked up at Leonida again. “Do not cast blame,” she said, again coughing fitfully. “It is a blessing to die. The . . . pain is . . . unbearable. Teach Trevor not to cast blame either, upon the Navaho chief. He has done me a favor if traveling up the mountainside has hastened my death. If I had put a gun to my brow, God would not . . . have allowed me to . . . enter Heaven. Now I look forward . . . to . . . the opened gates of Heaven, finally . . . at . . . peace.”
Leonida could not hold back the tears any longer. They gushed from her eyes in warm torrents against her cheeks. Before she had the chance to say anything else, Carole was dead.
Trevor wailed and threw himself upon his mother. Sage rose to his feet, took the child away from his mother, and held him tightly as he walked him away from the death scene. He took him to the cliff and showed him the wonders of the valley below, trying to draw his attention from the truth of the moment—that he no longer had a mother.
“Do you see the sheep, Trevor?” Sage asked, pointing to a flock of sheep running down a hillside, three goats leading them, and a small dog barking alongside. Behind came a Navaho brave, carrying a tall, curved stick. “The sheep were named ‘churros’ by the Spanish. See how they are so long-legged? They are thin and light with long legs and coarse, smooth wool, often brown. Do you see how some have four horns? Do you not think they are strange-looking with so many horns?”
Trevor finally stopped wailing. He wiped his nose and sniffled as he leaned away from Sage to take a better look. “They are funny animals,” he said softly. Then he turned to Sage, his eyes wide. “You have a pretty animal. Your horse. I like it.”
Sage smiled down at him. “You like horses?” he said.
“It would be fun to have one of my own,” Trevor said, again wiping his nose with the back of his hand. He cast his eyes downward. “I will never have a horse. I don’t even have a father or mother now.”
Sage drew Trevor into his embrace again and held him close, feeling a sudden bonding with this small, innocent child. Sage felt in part responsible for his mother’s death. He would spend a lifetime making it up to the child. If Leonida had agreed to raise the child as her own, then the child would be Sage’s as well.
“You will have a horse,” Sage said, gazing down into Trevor’s dark eyes. “One day you will own many. You will be raised in the tradition of the Navaho, as a Navaho.”
Trevor’s eyes widened and his lips parted in a pleasurable gasp. “I have played Indian and soldier before,” he said. “I was always the Indian. Now I will be one for real? I will one day fight the soldiers for real? That will be fun.”
Sage frowned down at Trevor. “E-do-ta, no. Warring is never fun,” he said. “It is not a game that one plays for fun. When soldiers and Navaho shoot at one another, it is not with toy firearms. They shoot real bullets and fire real arrows. They kill. They maim. Never want to go to war with anyone, unless you are forced to.”
“You will soon be forced to fight the soldiers from Fort Defiance?” Trevor asked innocently enough.
“E-do-ta, no. I would hope that it would be prevented,” Sage mumbled, not wanting to be forced to explain to Trevor that he, the small child that he was, was one of the pawns i
n this real war game with the white pony soldiers.
In time, Sage knew, Trevor would understand how it had happened , and why, if fighting did break out between his people and the soldiers. And Sage expected that it might, now that Kit Carson and the soldiers had left Fort Defiance to search for him and the captives. Sage’s only hope was that they would not find his stronghold.
“We must go back and see to your mother’s burial,” Sage said, his voice guarded as he gazed down at the child in his arms. He expected another outburst of tears, but to his amazement, and growing pride, the child seemed to be accepting his loss like a man. He saw in Trevor many possibilities. He seemed the sort that could be taught well the ways of the Navaho.
Trevor nodded.
Sage carried him back to the campsite. Leonida met them and lovingly took Trevor in her arms. “Sage, there is too much rock to dig a grave for Carole,” she whispered so that Trevor would not hear.
“We will place her as we place our own to those whose deaths come to them in the mountains,” Sage said. He gazed over at Carole, and then looked over his shoulder at the very spot where he and Leonida had found such love and peace within each other’s arms. It was a place of sweet fragrances, soft winds, and sunshine. At night the stars and moon would caress Carole as she began her long journey to her land of the hereafter.
Yes, Sage concluded to himself. It was a place where this kind woman could rest in peace as she waited to join those who had passed away before her.
“The Navaho do not touch the corpses of their own people, and never those of outsiders,” Sage said, looking around at the mournful women. “Come together, women, and carry your dead to the cliff yonder. There she will rest in peace until eternity.”
Leonida went and stood dutifully beside Carole, looking at the other women, one by one, until they received her silent message that they must follow her lead. Not saying anything, the women went to Carole and lifted her gently into their arms and began carrying her toward the cliff, everyone solemnly following.
After Carole was placed on the soft bed of grass, Leonida moved to her knees beside her, beckoned for Trevor to climb on her lap, and then quoted remembered scriptures from the Bible over his mother.
Everyone gazed at Sage as he then sang a song of his people over Carole, touching everyone’s heart with the gentleness of his voice and the translation of the words as he then sang it in the English tongue.
“Yonder in the north there is singing in the lake,” he sang softly. His mournful voice mesmerized those listening until he concluded.
“Haijiash-iye-beasdje, there beneath the sunrise we have our being.”
Tears streamed from Leonida’s eyes. She had never loved Sage any more than she did at this moment.
* * *
It was a fatiguing, scrambling climb, alleviated by the increasing growth of jack pine and spruce. Winded and hungry, Leonida sighed with relief when she realized that Sage’s stronghold was finally in view. Holding Trevor’s hand tightly, she followed a winding path under firs. The horses were being led by the warriors. Beside them the cliff fell away over a hundred feet. Below, the world was red in late sunlight, the distant hills streaked with purple, the opaque shadows like deep holes in the world.
Though her knees would scarcely hold her up any longer, Leonida continued placing one foot before the other. Trevor’s whines and his sluggish steps made her feel guilty that she could not carry him, but she was finding it difficult enough to hold herself up under such fatigue, much less carry a child. And Sage was too busy keeping his horse at bay along this narrow passageway to be able to help her.
“Tsanti-hogani-la-lo, yonder the hogan,” Sage suddenly said beside her.
Leonida sighed. Before her, shimmering in the heat, were many little groups of domed hogans built on a rock terrace and nestled against moderately high cliffs, with black spots of doorways that watched the canyon.
As she moved closer and could see more of the village, she noticed one especially tall building, two or three stories high, and decided that it was a watchtower. On the top of the building she could see a platform where sentinels stood. She could envision the Navaho fighters rolling stones down upon approaching enemies from that strategic position.
Leonida followed Sage from the narrow path onto a wide stretch of rock that led into the village. From this vantage point she could see some families cooking outdoors and eating under a roof of brush held up by posts to keep the sun off. Sheepskins with the wool side down were spread for tablecloths, and she could see that each member of the families dipped into one big dish with his own spoon.
“You see much about my people already,” Sage said, handing the reins of his horse to a young brave as he came running from the village with eager eyes.
Sage nodded to the boy to take the horse away, and Trevor seemed to come to sudden attention at the sight of the youngster, who seemed no less than his own age.
“Yes, and I’m intrigued,” Leonida said, her insides tightening with a fear she did not want to feel when the attention of the villagers soon turned toward them. Some were already running toward them, shouting a welcome to Sage and the warriors; others were more cautious upon seeing all of the white captives. They stopped and watched Leonida guardedly when they saw Sage’s attentiveness to her. They stood and waited for them to advance farther into the village.
Leonida tried to pretend that she didn’t notice how apprehensive Sage’s people were toward her. “Your houses are all different,” she said, sensing more and more eyes following her approach.
“Yes, each one is a little different. Our homes are called hogans,” Sage explained. “And we believe they are a gift from the gods, a place for the Navaho to take shelter, to eat and sleep and pray. We build them of mud and logs in a round shape to honor Father Sun, and the door always faces east to greet him first thing in the morning.”
Trevor tripped and fell to the ground. Sage just as quickly leaned down and swept him up into his arms, carrying him as people parted to make a path for them.
Sensing Leonida’s uneasiness, Sage continued talking softly to her to steady her nerves. “After we finish making a new hogan, we conduct a Blessing Way ceremony, asking all the spirits to make it a happy place. But if it is struck by lightning, we consider it cursed and abandon it. I think you will find the thick walls of my hogan keep it warm in winter and cool in summer.”
Leonida’s eyes widened when Sage grabbed her hand and stopped her. “This dwelling is Sage’s,” he said, nodding toward one of the largest hogans. “We will go inside. You will acquaint yourself with your new way of living. Later you will become acquainted with my people.”
Glad to be given the opportunity to get away from the staring eyes of the Navaho people, Leonida willingly moved toward the small opening in the hogan that was the door. She went inside with Sage, surprised to find that the hogan was adequate in size, with two rooms leading off from the main one.
Once inside, she found that the light filtered in mainly from the smoke hole in the center of the domed roof overhead, and there was a fire that was burning brightly near the center of the room, where a round pit was edged with stones.
Quickly she took in the scene. On the walls were hung blankets, saddles and an anvil as well as other tools.
“When you being to cook here, there will be kitchen utensils around the fire,” Sage explained. “And perhaps you will have a loom as well.”
By the fire, Leonida noticed a hearth brush made of yucca leaves. It was tied in the middle, with the blunt sides all at one end, the spiky ones at the other. The stiff butt ends served as a broom to sweep the hearth and floor; the spiky ends made a hairbrush.
The hogan was neat and cozy, the adobe walls and clay floors clean, smelling pleasantly of the sweet aroma of the yucca leaf.
“It is to your liking?” Sage said. Trevor too was at her side, clinging to her skirt as he gazed slowly around at what was most strange to him.
“I think it’s lovely,” Leon
ida murmured, turning a smiling face to him. “Although I have been lucky to live with luxuries, since my father was a wealthy cavalry officer, I find this home much more suitable than most settlers’ homes that I’ve seen.”
She spun around and clasped her fingers together before her. “And it’s so clean,” she sighed. She eyed a thick cushion of blankets spread out before the fire. Her weary bones ached to go and sit down on them, but this thought was brushed aside when a familiar voice spoke up behind her.
“Sage, you bring white woman and child into your hogan?” Pure Blossom said as she stepped in. Then her lips parted in a gasp when she recognized Leonida. “It is you?”
Puzzled, Pure Blossom turned back to her brother, the hump in her back twisting strangely as she peered up into his eyes. “There are others outside,” she murmured. “What have you done, Sage? Are these people your captives? Are they? Is Leonida?”
She turned questioningly to Trevor. “Is this your son, Leonida?” she murmured. “I thought the blanket I was weaving for you was for a wedding. And you already have a son? I do not understand.”
Leonida took Trevor’s hand and urged him toward Pure Blossom. “This is Trevor,” she said softly. “Trevor’s mother is dead. I am going to raise him now, as though he were my own.”
Leonida gave Trevor a gentle shove, pushing him closer to Pure Blossom, realizing that his hesitation stemmed from her deformity, a difference that made her outwardly ugly.
Pure Blossom’s smile faded when she saw the fear in Trevor’s eyes. Yet she was glad that it was not disgust as he stared at the hump on her back. “Pure Blossom glad to know you,” she said, offering a frail hand.
Trevor bolted behind Leonida, then slowly peered around her with wide, wondering eyes.
Trying to hide the pain that his response inflicted, Pure Blossom went to Leonida and gave her a gentle hug. “My brother has not told me the reasons you and others are here, but I welcome you,” she said softly.
She eased from Leonida’s arms and turned back to Sage. “Is she captive?” she asked, this time more determined.
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