But Wolf Runner had not noticed. After mounting his horse, he glanced about to see if he had overlooked anything. His gaze skimmed over the two dead trappers with no more emotion than he would have felt for a flea on a dog. “Let us leave this place,” he said, urging his horse forward.
Cheyenne was glad that clouds now covered the moon so she could not see the scene of death and carnage they were leaving behind.
They had been riding for over an hour and Cheyenne was not sure how much longer she could go on.
She was relieved when Wolf Runner finally halted his horse beside a creek and turned to look at her.
“You said you wanted to wash. There is ice in the water and it will be cold. But it is neither swift nor deep, so there is no danger.”
Resolutely, Cheyenne slid off her horse, already unlacing her dress. Despite feeling dizzy, she hurried toward the creek. “I don’t care if it is cold.” She ripped off the traveling gown and tossed it to the ground, knowing she would never wear it again.
Wolf Runner had turned away to gather wood for a campfire. “After you have rested and warmed yourself, we must ride farther before we stop for the night.”
“I will hurry,” Cheyenne said, testing the water with her toe and shivering.
After Wolf Runner had built a campfire, he stood with his back to the creek. He could hear Cheyenne splashing in the water and he closed his eyes, imagining his hands were touching her. When he heard her make a small shivering noise, he wished it was his kiss that had made her react in such a way.
Wolf Runner heard her come out of the water, and without turning, handed her a blanket. He did not look at her until she was wrapped in the blanket and sat trembling with cold before the fire.
Long, wet hair clung to the sides of her face and her lips were trembling with cold. “The water was so icy it was painful,” she said, her teeth chattering. “But I’m glad I washed.”
Wolf Runner’s gaze dropped to her shapely legs, which were not entirely covered by the blanket, and he turned away, not wanting to think about her naked body beneath that covering.
“When you are warm, you should dress,” he said huskily.
When Cheyenne nodded, the movement of her head sent the world spiraling around her. “I’ll do that right away.”
The pale moon cast very little light as they rode across the creek. They had been riding for some time when Cheyenne realized she could no longer sit her saddle. With a cry of alarm, she slid sideways and landed on the hard ground. She must have blacked out for a moment because when she came to her senses, Satanta was licking her face and Wolf Runner was bending down beside her.
She tried to rise. “I’m…sorry.”
Wolf Runner gathered her in his arms, holding her as gently as he would have held a baby. “You should have told me you were ill,” he whispered against her cheek. “I would not have pushed you so hard.”
Then for a long moment he just held her, saying nothing.
Too weak to speak, Cheyenne nestled closer to him. She felt safe and warm in his arms and there was nowhere else she wanted to be.
When Cheyenne awoke, the sun was streaming through a pine grove. Sitting up quickly, she looked about her, but Wolf Runner was nowhere to be seen. She had a moment of unease, trying to remember what had happened. Then it all came back to her in a flash and she was momentarily terrified of being alone. That was when she saw the wolf, and he came to her, dropping down to rest his head on her lap.
She was not alone.
She gripped Satanta’s face and made him look at her. “You are a wonderful animal. As mysterious and unpredictable as your master.”
Satanta’s eyes focused on her and she could see the intelligence in the golden depths. “You stayed here to guard me,” she said, laying her cheek against his head.
“I am afraid you are going to spoil my wolf and he will be useless to me,” Wolf Runner said, coming into camp and smiling.
Cheyenne watched him drop an armload of wood. “The wolf will always obey you.”
“I am not so certain. Lately Satanta prefers your company to mine.”
She smiled. “I am glad he has accepted me at all.”
“His loyalty has turned to you,” Wolf Runner said thoughtfully, wondering how such a thing could happen. “Satanta has become devoted to you.” He tossed several logs on the campfire and made a neat stack with the rest.
Cheyenne watched him move toward her, and her heart stopped. When he knelt beside her she could not catch her breath.
He looked her over carefully. “How are you?”
Cheyenne met his worried gaze and reached out to him. “I feel strange.”
He tilted her chin and looked into her eyes. “Such a thing sometimes happens when you have a blow to the head.” He touched the knot on the back of her head. “Like the one you have.”
Her lips curved slightly. “I am even more embarrassed to tell you how I got that knot. Although my hands were tied behind me, I tried to outrun them and fell off the horse.”
Standing, Wolf Runner looked down at her, his expression unreadable. “You will rest for today. We will start out early tomorrow morning.”
Scrambling to her feet, Cheyenne shook her head. “I can ride on now. I don’t want to hold you up.”
“You will rest,” he reiterated in a strong voice that brooked no disagreement.
The morning was warm, and he had stripped off his shirt. Cheyenne watched Wolf Runner move away, the muscles rippling across his back.
A strong new feeling took hold of her and she did not know how to react. She wanted to be in his arms. She wanted him to hold her like he had when she had been hurt.
The difference between their two worlds yawned between them. In his case, that part of him that was Blackfoot was dominant, and she had been raised as white. She doubted the two of them would ever fully understand each other.
Pushing her troubled thoughts aside, she moved to the campfire where Wolf Runner had meat roasting on a spit and her mouth watered. She did not care what kind of meat it was—she was starved and would have eaten anything at the moment.
He swiveled and looked into her eyes. “Rest. I will bring you meat when it is done.”
She nodded and returned to her blanket as a new and troubling thought took hold. Before long they would reach her grandfather’s village, and Wolf Runner would leave her.
Turning her head away so Wolf Runner could not see her face, tears of grief rolled down her cheeks. With an angry wipe of her hand, Cheyenne gritted her teeth.
She must not allow him to mean so much in her life.
Chapter Twenty-one
Somehow Cheyenne’s relationship with Wolf Runner had changed. She felt shy with him, especially when he watched her, which he often did. Unlike all the other men Cheyenne had known, with the exception of Señor Mendoza, Wolf Runner did not want anything from her.
Not wanting to think about how she had recently become so drawn to him, she examined her boots and scowled at the holes in the soles.
Wolf Runner knelt beside her, raising her foot, and examining the bottom of her boot.
His gaze met hers accusingly. “You should have told me before now that your boots had worn through,” he said, turning the boot over and noticing how small it was. When he glanced back at Cheyenne, he saw her face redden, and he frowned. “Remove your boots and let me see the bottom of your feet,” he said in that voice that made it a command and not a request.
Reluctantly she lifted the hem of her gown past her ankles and removed one boot and then the other. “It is of little matter.”
Wolf Runner’s brow lowered into a scowl when he saw that the bottoms of her feet were bleeding. Gripping her boots, he stood and went to his satchel, where he took out a strip of buckskin, which he placed on a boulder. Using his knife to trace the leather, he made it a fraction smaller than her boot so it would fit snugly inside. Seeing that the laces were broken he replaced them with thin rawhide strips.
When he return
ed to Cheyenne, he brought a tin of salve, which he rubbed on the bottom of one foot and then the other. At first she winced in pain, and he must have noticed because he gently massaged both feet. She shivered at the gentleness of his touch.
“Thank you,” she said, putting on her boots and lacing them past her ankles.
“I know you are uneasy because I left you unprotected and the two men came upon you. I do not want you to worry anymore because if I have to leave you, Satanta will guard you.”
“I’m not uneasy.” She raised her gaze to his. “I feel safe when you are nearby.”
Wolf Runner drew in his breath as he stared at Cheyenne’s amber-colored eyes. He suddenly wanted to be the man who would always be responsible for her care and protection.
He was shocked by the new feelings that swamped him. The change in his attitude toward her had happened so suddenly, he had not been aware of it until now. Cheyenne was everything a man would want in his woman; she had beauty of face and of spirit. She had not complained although the journey had been difficult. Cheyenne would be the kind of wife who would go with him to his mountain and glory in the experience.
He was angry with himself for having such thoughts when he was promised to another. Setting his jaw in a hard line, he reminded himself that Cheyenne could be no more to him than the means to get to Night Fighter. He must take her to her grandfather and be done with her.
There was no place in his life for a half-Indian girl who had been raised as a white woman.
He did not understand her, and he doubted she understood him. But his heart thudded inside him when he thought of lying beside her and holding her in his arms. But Wolf Runner could never hold Cheyenne to him—she was not his.
In an attempt to get his emotions under control, he stared up at the sky, watching a flock of geese migrating before winter set in.
“I will return soon,” he said, moving away from the camp, leaving a puzzled Cheyenne staring after him.
It was midday when they crossed into Montana.
They had only been riding for a short time when Wolf Runner glanced up at the sky, focusing on the dark clouds gathering in the north. He sensed a storm was coming—a bad one—a “blue norther” that always descended without warning.
He found a cliff wall that would help protect them from some of the wind. But he had little time to prepare for the storm that would soon be upon them.
He held his hand up for Cheyenne to stop and he slid off his horse. “Cheyenne, find the rawhide among the supplies and cut it into slender strips to be used for ties.”
Cheyenne dismounted and followed his instructions without plying him with useless questions.
Wolf Runner quickly hacked large pine branches from a tree and threw them in a pile to be used as lodge poles. After eight of the poles were deeply embedded in the soil, he reached for the leather strips Cheyenne had cut for him. Then Wolf Runner began attaching a long canvas strip to the poles and secured it with the rawhide, his fingers deftly threading the knots.
Since the storm was coming out of the north, Wolf Runner faced the opening to the west. Lastly he drove wooden pegs through the canvas to keep it from flapping in the wind.
He instructed Cheyenne to gather what supplies they would need for warmth and place them inside the lean-to. They had hardly finished their tasks when the frigid wind struck, and struck hard.
It took Cheyenne’s breath away as icy needles of sleet hammered against her face. She turned to ask Wolf Runner what else she could do, and he placed his hand on her shoulder and guided her inside the lean-to.
“I will see to the horses while you remain inside. This is going to be a bad storm and it is hard to tell how long it will last.”
“How will the animals weather such a storm?”
“I will lead the horses to the side of the cliff that is facing away from the wind. They are sturdy and will press together for warmth. They will survive if the temperature does not drop too low. Do not be concerned if I do not return right away. It may take a while to see to the animals’ well-being.”
Cheyenne heard him give an order to the wolf, but she did not understand what he said because he spoke in Blackfoot.
A moment later Satanta entered the lean-to and flopped down beside Cheyenne. Without thinking, she rested her hand on his head. It seemed the wolf audibly sighed with contentment and he laid his head on her lap as he usually did.
Cheyenne heard a new sound—sleet pelting against the canvas and the wind whistling down the gullies with such a force the noise was deafening, sounding almost like a woman screaming. Satanta whined and she stroked his head while her heart constricted. “I know. He’s cold out there and you want to be with him. So do I.”
Suddenly Wolf Runner climbed inside and tossed a fur robe to Cheyenne. “There is not much help for the weather; it must merely be endured.” He glanced down at his wolf and smiled. “You have turned Satanta into a tamed lapdog.”
Cheyenne could not see his face in the darkness of the lean-to, but his voice sounded like he was teasing her. “I might agree had I not seen him attack Ezra. I believe the man would have died of fright if Satanta had not ripped his throat out.”
“You are becoming a vicious little thing. We will make a Cheyenne out of you yet.”
She fell silent, listening to the wind hitting the lean-to, and fearing it would rip their shelter from the stakes at any moment.
“We are fortunate it is this cold,” Wolf Runner said, trying to offer her comfort. “If it were warmer, it would be raining and we would certainly get a good drenching in this wind.”
Her teeth chattering, she pulled the fur about her shoulders. “I have never been this cold,” she said. “Not even when I bathed in that icy creek.”
Moving closer to her, Wolf Runner pulled her into his arms, and she did not object. “You must share mine and Satanta’s warmth.”
For a moment Cheyenne held herself stiff. She felt Wolf Runner’s breath against her cheek and forgot about being cold. It was as if she were melting on the inside. Her body relaxed, and she sank nearer to Wolf Runner as the deep stirrings of womanhood awoke within her body.
“Do not fear,” he whispered. “I want only to keep you warm and take a little of your warmth for myself.”
“I don’t distrust you, Wolf Runner.” She pressed her face against his shoulder, loving the feel of him close to her. “I can’t imagine now why I ever did.”
It was the first time she had called him by name, and it pleased him mightily. For a long moment neither of them spoke. At last Cheyenne broke the silence with a question. “Will you tell me about your life in the Blackfoot village?”
She fit just right in his arms and he resisted the strong urge to nuzzle her neck. “There is not much to tell. I have a younger brother and sister. My father is the shaman of the tribe, and my mother is its heart. My grandfather, Broken Lance, is the chief, and rules the tribe.” Wolf Runner laughed. “He is ruled by my grandmother, Tall Woman.”
“Your mother is the heart of the tribe? What a wonderful tribute.”
“My mother sings like an angel, and everyone wants to hear her song. Her gift has helped the passing of many who were drawing their last breath on this earth.”
“She was brought to your tribe as a child.”
“Yes.”
“Against her will?”
Wolf Runner shifted his weight and brought her closer to him, hearing her soft sigh. “That is right.”
“Will you teach me some Blackfoot words?”
His voice deepened and he found it hard to breathe with her in his arms. “If you would like.” He thought it might be prudent to concentrate on something other than how right she felt in his arms.
He thought himself a pathetic specimen of his powerful tribe if he could not control his emotions. A strong yearning hit him so he quickly said, “Ni’t means one.”
“Ni’t. One,” she repeated.
“Nããsi. Two.”
She repeated the wo
rds.
“Nioõkska. Three.”
“What is the word for love?” she asked.
He was quiet for a moment. “There is no word for what you ask.”
“But you feel love—surely you do.”
Again he was quiet while he thought how to answer her. “What we feel cannot be put into one word. It is deep, meaningful, too powerful a feeling to be described in a single word.”
“Oh.”
He untangled his arms from about her. “You need to sleep if you can,” he said, turning his back on her, but still able to feel the heat of her body next to his.
How could she be expected to sleep with him so near? How could a feeling be so powerful there was no word for it?
Her mind in turmoil, she listened to the howling wind and thought of the man who was so near, yet kept himself so closed off from her. She had never known a man with such integrity. He had risked danger to see her placed with her mother’s people. She could not think of anyone else who would have made this journey for her.
But what of the day when he would leave her and she would never look upon his face again?
“Ni’t. One,” she said quietly, repeating the numbers he had taught her.
When Wolf Runner heard her, he smiled and turned over, dragging her into his arms. “Cheyenne, the world was not built in one day. You can learn more words tomorrow.”
Grateful to be back in his arms, she nestled her cheek against his shoulder. “I have wasted so many years trying to forget my Indian heritage, when I should have embraced it.”
“Then you will be all the more eager to learn about your Cheyenne culture, not Blackfoot.”
She stiffened. He was reminding her that she had no place in his life.
Outside the small lean-to the weather was fierce, the wind building, the sleet heavy, but inside Cheyenne felt safe, and warm, yearning for something that was just out of reach.
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