Fire Dancer

by Colleen French

  She felt as if she were in a bizarre dream.

  Kindly hands brushed her hair and washed her body. They fed her broth and gave her cool, sweetened water. A woman sang softly as she moved about. And then there was the bone flute. At times it seemed to go on for hours. That was the one thing she recognized and took comfort in.

  Fire Dancer . She couldn't remember clearly who he was or how she knew him. All that mattered was that he was there, touching her, kissing her, whispering words she didn't understand.

  The melody of the flute kept her from drifting away from this place. Fire Dancer's touch prevented her from falling into the deep sleep that tempted her so. She wanted him and she refused to let go of this little piece of him.

  "Mack-en-zie, Mack-en-zie," a voice whispered. "Will you not come back to this man?"

  It was his voice. He held her hand, squeezed it, and then let it fall.

  Mackenzie wanted desperately to get his attention. "Don't go," she cried in her head.

  He slipped away. A woman spoke softly. Though Mackenzie didn't understand the words, she knew they were meant to comfort Fire Dancer. It wasn't fair. Mackenzie wanted to be the one to comfort him. She didn't know why he sounded so sad, but she wanted to be the one to ease his suffering. If she could have, she would have played the bone flute for him.

  Mackenzie sifted through her drifting thoughts. It occurred to her that Fire Dancer's sadness had something to do with her. It was her fault he was unhappy. Was it because she was sleeping and couldn't wake up?

  She fought with every ounce of strength she could muster to call out to him. Fire Dancer .

  No one heard her because his name was only in her head. She hadn't actually spoken the words. She tried again. "Fire Dancer . . ."

  This time she could have sworn she heard a voice . . . her own voice, throaty and ragged. "Fire Dancer."

  "N thathah, weel la kahlawee . She speaks." It was the woman's voice.

  Mackenzie heard someone kneel beside her. Was she on the ground? No, but very close . . . on some sort of platform, nestled in furs.

  "Mack-en-zie, kitehi?"

  "Fire Dancer?" She tried to open her eyes. The dream drifted away and her head hurt. Fuzzy images appeared before her eyes. Baskets. Strings of dried herbs and flowers hung from rafters overhead. She could smell a pungent burning scent strongly . . . and she could smell him.

  She blinked, afraid. She felt as if she'd been drugged with laudanum, like that time when she'd been ill as a child. "Fire Dancer, where am I?" she croaked.

  He squeezed her hand and his face appeared above hers. Just the sight of his handsome smile calmed her.

  "It is all right, my heart. You are safe, here in my village with me."

  Dizziness was making her sick to her stomach. She closed her eyes. "The . . . the fort. Why . . . how did I get here?"

  He paused a moment. "You do not remember? This man brought you here. It has been many days since we were at Belvadere. A fortnight by your count."

  Pieces of memories drifted back like parts of a wooden puzzle and fell into place. She remembered making love with Fire Dancer. Then the portrait . . . the way he had shouted at her like a madman. She remembered screaming for help, afraid of him. Josh had burst through the door. He was going to shoot Fire Dancer. She felt the same sense of the panic she'd experienced then and she gripped Fire Dancer's hand tighter. She remembered jumping between them and nothing after that.

  Mackenzie opened her eyes again. "You kidnapped me," she said softly. It was an accusation.

  "The fort was under attack. Hurons. You had been injured. Shot by the white man's musket. This man brought you here to let you heal."

  If her memory served her correctly, he had already made the decision to kidnap her before he knew anything of Hurons, before she'd been shot, prompting her to scream for Josh. It was all because of that stupid portrait she'd painted. Fire Dancer had been so angry with her. "The portrait, where is it?"

  "Here. Safe."

  So it was because of the portrait that she was here. Mackenzie wasn't sure how she felt about all this. She was too confused. Her head hurt too badly. She rubbed her forehead with the heel of her hand. "You say I was shot? Josh shot me?"

  "The boy-man was afraid. He did not mean to injure you. He meant to save you from me."

  Even in her state of confusion she noticed he was defending Josh. "Where did he hit me?"

  Fire Dancer released her hand and indicated her left temple. His touch was like the brush of a butterfly's wing. "Here."

  "It doesn't hurt." It was difficult to keep her eyes open. She let them drift shut. "Well it does, but not there. All over. I feel like someone ran over me with their ox cart."

  "The musket ball did not enter the skull. It only cracked it." He took her hand again. "It was not your day to die, Mack-en-zie."

  She fought the pain and opened her eyes. "But it was my day to be kidnapped." She couldn't help herself. The words just came out.

  He released her hand, his face was devoid of emotion. "Laughing Woman will see to your needs. This man must speak to the holy man, now that I know you will live. He will know what must be done with you, kitehi. "

  His tone was ominous. Mackenzie felt that creeping sense of fear again. She knew from the way he looked at her that he was still angry with her about the portrait.

  She squeezed her eyes shut, afraid she was going to cry. Why was Fire Dancer the only man who could make her feel vulnerable?

  "Soup, Mack-en-sie?"

  Mackenzie opened her eyes to see a beautiful Indian woman. Fire Dancer was gone. It was the same woman who had been here with her from the beginning. She recognized her tender voice. Only now she was speaking English in the same lilting manner that Fire Dancer did.

  "Mack-en-sie, you must eat so that you will be strong again."

  Mackenzie gazed up at the woman. "I've done a terrible thing," she whispered. "I didn't understand. I painted him. He really thinks I've stolen a part of his soul. I didn't mean to harm him, only to finish the task I'd been hired for." As she babbled she realized how ridiculous she must sound. She wasn't even sure the woman understood that much English.

  "Shhhhh," the Indian woman comforted. She knelt beside the sleeping platform and set down the hollow gourd soup bowl. She brushed the hair off Mackenzie's forehead and touched her as a mother would soothe a sick child. "Do not worry over Fire Dancer of the Thunder Sky. He is a man of honor, above all."

  "But he's so angry with me. He took me from my father." She opened her eyes wider, suddenly remembering her father. Her head pounded so hard that she had to close her eyes and lay her head back again. "My father. He must be worried sick. I have to let him know I'm all right. I have to—"

  "Shhhhh," the Shawnee woman whispered. "Do not let yourself worry. Nothing happens that there is not reason for. No one will hurt you here. Take some of the good turtle soup I have made you and then sleep. Sleep will take away the pain in your head and in your heart."

  "I . . . I'm not hungry." But then Mackenzie smelled the soup that the woman was holding right under her nose.

  "One bite and this woman will leave you to sleep."

  Mackenzie opened her mouth. She was hungry. She slurped the soup from the wooden spoon. She had another spoonful, then another. When a little of the broth dribbled down her chin, the woman wiped it with a soft cloth.

  When Mackenzie had consumed half of the gourd bowl of soup, she laid her head back. "Thank you. You have been too kind."

  The woman set the bowl on the floor and busied herself rearranging the neckroll under Mackenzie's head. "I would do anything for Fire Dancer."

  Mackenzie glanced at the woman through half-closed eyes. "Are you his sister?"

  The woman smiled and shook her head. Tiny silver bells in her ears tinkled as she moved. "No. I am not a sister. I am Laughing Woman." She rose. "Now sleep. When you wake you will feel better."

  Mackenzie had so many questions. Laughing Woman? Fire Dancer had not mentioned her
. Who was she? And who was this holy man he had just spoken of. What did this holy man have to do with Mackenzie?

  Her head hurt so much that it was hard to think, but easy to give in to her exhaustion. She let go of her fears and drifted off to sleep.

  Fire Dancer stood outside the holy man's wigwam, preparing himself for their meeting. He was so relieved to see Mackenzie awake and well that it was difficult for him to turn his attention away from his emotions.

  Now that he knew she would live, he had to speak with Snake Man. Snake Man would know what to do with her, how to punish her for her crime. He would know what to do with the painting. He would know how to recapture the part of his soul she had taken.

  Fire Dancer's thoughts wandered. He should have stayed away from Mackenzie and none of this would have happened. He felt guilty about the death of her father, not because he had been wrong, but because it would hurt Mackenzie. He didn't hold himself responsible for Franklin Daniels' death. The man had chosen his own path of dishonor by firing when he had sworn he would not. But the white manake were strange about such matters. Fire Dancer knew that Mackenzie would not understand. That was why he hadn't told her . . . not yet. First she had to gain back her strength.

  Fire Dancer tugged at the single braid he wore down his back. Then what? Nothing was turning out as it should have. He had intended to return to the village and marry Laughing Woman. Now what would he do? He did not feel passion for Laughing Woman. Loving Mackenzie had made that all too clear to him in his mind.

  Laughing Woman was a good choice for a wife to the chief's son. She was a proper Shawnee woman. A holy man's granddaughter. Fire Dancer cared deeply for her twin toddlers who had no father who walked this earth. But he felt no burning passion for Laughing Woman and now that he had held the flame-haired beauty in his arms, he knew he never would.

  Fire Dancer stared up at the moon that hung brightly in the sky. He was angry at Mackenzie, as angry as he had even been at anyone, even Okonsa. He had trusted her and she had betrayed that trust. Perhaps he truly didn't love her at all. What if it was merely her sorcery at work? What if the act of her painting his portrait had made him feel this way toward her.

  If it was magic, though, it was strong magic.

  "Do you come in, or do you stand outside all night, son of chief?" The gravelly voice spoke from beyond the doorflap of the wigwam.

  Fire Dancer grinned. How did the old man know he was there? He lifted the doorflap and stepped inside. He spoke in the tongue of his ancestors. "Snake Man, you honor me by this invitation."

  "Sit. Sit. This man makes tea."

  The wigwam was comfortably familiar to Fire Dancer. He had been coming here since he was a small boy. When he was a child, the hundreds of shedded snake skins hanging from the wigwam rafters had been scary. The live snakes that slivered through the rushes on the floor had been terrifying.

  Fire Dancer stepped over a striped green snake that moved sinuously over one of his moccasins. As an adult, he simply accepted the holy man's fascination with his totem.

  He took the mat the old man pointed to. "I have missed your tea, Snake Man. It will be good to feel it in my belly." The woven floor mats moved, alive with snakes; black ones, brown ones, green ones. There were short snakes, long snakes, snakes with forked tongues, snakes that hissed, and snakes that slept curled in baskets about the wigwam.

  Fire Dancer wondered what Mackenzie's reaction to the holy man's pets would be. Would she be afraid? Would he be able to calm her fears as he had that night in her sleeping chamber?

  The old man made a smacking sound with his toothless gums. "Bring me sugar?" He offered his palm across the banked coals of the fire pit.

  Fire Dancer pushed aside his thoughts of Mackenzie as he reached into his leather pouch and pulled out a small lump of brown sugar wrapped in paper. He could not think of her now, not in such an emotional way. It might hide the truth. "This man would not forget your taste for the English sugar."

  The holy man took the sugar and sniffed it. Then he gave it a lick, as if testing to be certain Fire Dancer hadn't cheated him. Satisfied, Snake Man dropped the sugar into a little basket to the left of him.

  The old man's aim always amazed Fire Dancer. How did he know where the basket was without feeling for it? He'd been blind from birth. One could even move the sugar basket as Okonsa had once done as a boy's practical joke. Yet Snake Man had made the drop accurately; he always did.

  Fire Dancer watched as the holy man lifted the English kettle off the hot coals and poured the boiling water into a porcelain tea pot painted with green vines and yellow roses. It had been a gift from Fire Dancer years ago. With the water poured and the tea left to steep, Snake Man returned the kettle to the coals and retrieved two mismatched teacups from behind his back. He set them on a flat rock between his folded, withered legs.

  "You come for this man's advice?" Snake Man's raspy, but strong voice broke the silence.

  "Yes. This man comes for your wisdom, holy man. This man has found himself in great trouble."

  Snake Man held up his finger for Fire Dancer to wait with his story. The old man poured the tea and handed Fire Dancer the first cup. Then he took the lump of sugar from the sugar basket and scraped off a little into his tea cup with a long thumbnail. He did not offer any of the sugar to Fire Dancer. He never did.

  Fire Dancer waited patiently for the shaman to blow on his hot tea and slurp it loudly. The old warrior made that smacking sound between his gums again. Satisfied, he set down his cup.

  "Now this old man is ready to listen. Come, come, do not be shy. Tell Snake Man what troubles your heart and I will see if I can ease your pain."

  Fire Dancer took a sip of the bitter, dark tea and set down his cup. Out of respect for the holy man's totem, he waited for a black snake as thick as his wrist to creep over his thighs and slither away under the sleeping platform. Then he began to relate the story of how he met the red-haired English woman and what she did to him.

  Snake Man listened patiently as he always had, asking a question occasionally, clarifying Fire Dancer's statements. He asked about details that seemed inconsequential to Fire Dancer. But Fire Dancer told the holy man everything, trusting him unconditionally. He even confessed that he had made love to the white woman.

  Finally, the tale complete, Fire Dancer sighed and took a sip of his now-cold tea. Relating the events had tired him. He didn't know how he could have been so blind as to not have seen what Mackenzie was doing to him. She had lured him with her beauty and her laughter. She had made him, a Shawnee warrior, vulnerable. She had made him want her, and then she had taken a part him that perhaps he could never regain.

  Snake Man sat so quietly, breathing so evenly without making a sound that Fire Dancer wondered if he had drifted off to sleep. There was no way to tell with those milky white eyes of his that never blinked.

  Finally the old man gave a nod of acknowledgement. "This is bad, indeed. Worse than I had thought."

  Fire Dancer watched a snake drink from a shallow water dish left out for just that purpose. "It is indeed serious, holy man of my mother's people. That is why I came to you. I do not understand such matters of the soul."

  "Did you speak to the chief?"

  "It was the chief who said wait until we see if the woman lives and then come to you."

  "Our chief is wise.

  Fire Dancer grimaced. "Indeed."

  "So, now that the white woman lives, now that you have this por-trait," —he said the word in English—"you ask this man for advice."

  "I truly do not know what to do, Snake Man. It is my belief that she possesses a part of me. My thoughts are always with her thoughts now. I cannot eat nor drink nor sleep without thinking of her. I feel as if a part of me is gone when I am not with her. This man has seen and experienced many frightening things in this world, but never one as frightening as this."

  The old man stared straight ahead with those eerie white eyeballs of his. "You understand that by coming to me, Fire
Dancer, you give up your choosing of a solution. The decision is mine."

  "Ah"

  "The decision is mine no matter how cruel you may think it. You must understand that my job is to save you, son of chief, not concern myself with the woman, or even with you personally."

  Fire Dancer felt a tightening in his throat. Magic or not, he loved Mackenzie. The idea of seeing her come to harm—he stared straight ahead at the holy man. Fire Dancer knew that his own life or that of Mackenzie's was not as important as the life of the village, nor that of their tribe. For a white woman to possess a Shawnee warrior's soul could mean greater disaster than one could imagine. Someday, Fire Dancer might be chief if the Council so wished it. The life of the Shawnee might depend upon him. "Ah," Fire Dancer said softly. "This man understands that the decision is yours."

  "And you will abide by that decision without argument," Snake Man intoned. A shiny black snake with coral strips rested on his lap. He stroked it.

  "Ah . This man will accept without question. You are a wise man, our holy man. Only you can know what is right in matters such as these."

  "Go then." Snake Man flipped his wrist in dismissal. "This man with think. He will pray. Maybe he will even dance. Bring the white thief here tomorrow at the setting of the sun and I will pass my judgment."

  Fire Dancer stood at the wigwam door. Snake skins from above brushed his hair. "Ah , Snake Man. This man thanks you for your wisdom." He stepped out into the darkness with a heavy heart.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Mackenzie lay perfectly still on the sleeping mat and stared up at the woven baskets and strings of herbs that hung over her head. It was dark, except for the glow of light from a fire pit.

  Where am I? she wondered, her mind still fuzzy. Then she remembered. With Fire Dancer. He kidnapped me and brought me here .

  But where was here?