“Good,” Serena said, closing her eyes as the pain began again. She held her swollen belly with her hands. “I’ve never felt such awful pain.”
“That is why women have the children,” Wolf told her as he removed the damp blankets and replaced them with dry ones. “You are stronger than any man. You have the force of spirit within you to tolerate such agony.”
“Right now,” Serena quavered, “I don’t feel very brave.”
Wolf placed a rolled buffalo robe behind her back so that she could lie in a partially reclined position. “You are braver than any ten women I have ever known.“ He picked up her left wrist, which had been chained with the iron cuff, as if showing her an example of her bravery. “You never stopped trying to escape Kingston, did you?“ He gazed at the black and blue bruises that mottled her flesh.
“Never. I had to try and get away, Wolf.”
“I can tell.“ He sighed heavily and placed the blanket over her shoulders. “With each pain, I want you to push with all your strength, my woman. That will bring our daughter closer to my waiting hands.”
Perspiration was beginning to dot Serena’s face. She felt as if she was being ripped in two by the gutting pain. With a nod, she clenched her hands into fists beneath the blanket and did as Wolf instructed. She kept her eyes firmly planted on the mourning dove that cooed and walked back and forth at the cave entrance. It was a miracle, Serena decided as the hours wore on, and her strength threatened to dissolve; each time she wanted to give up, the mourning dove would leap into the air, fly around them in circles and then land back at the entrance. The bird would coo, as if trying to communicate in dove language that she should not give up.
Hair matted against her sweaty flesh, Serena groaned as Wolf eased her into a kneeling position. A small cry tore from her parched lips as the baby bore downward within her. She heard Wolf’s soothing voice, low and comforting, and felt his arm around her, steadying her. The agony sliced through Serena and she cried out, throwing back her head and arching her back into a taut, bowlike shape. She felt Wolf’s arm tighten around her while blackness danced before her wide, unseeing eyes.
Wolf smiled broadly as his daughter slid into his large, waiting hand. The baby was a healthy pink color, the thick umbilical cord lying across her stomach and she was slowly moving her tiny arms and legs. Placing the baby to one side, Wolf helped his wife to lie back against the robe. With his fingers, he removed the mucus from the baby’s nose and mouth.
Serena gasped for breath, her gaze riveted upon the baby in Wolf’s hands. With a little cry, she stretched her hands outward to receive her daughter, who was now wrapped in a fawnskin.
“She’s beautiful,” Serena cried softly, and gazed up into Wolf’s face.
“Yes,” he agreed, drying off the baby’s thick black hair. “Beautiful like her mother.”
With a little laugh, Serena stared at the infant in amazement. “She’s so tiny. So perfect. Oh, Wolf, she’s ours. Ours, beloved….”
Tears stung his eyes as he gently wiped his daughter’s arms dry, each of her small fingers perfectly formed. “She has my hair,” he murmured proudly. As he cleaned his daughter’s face, she opened her eyes for the first time. His smile deepened as he held his wife’s luminous gaze. “And she has blue-green eyes.”
Words were useless. Serena felt an incredible tiredness overwhelming her. Just then, the mourning dove flew into the air, circled around them and then disappeared out the opening of the cave. Amazed, Serena looked up at Wolf, who cared tenderly for both of them.
“She just flew away.”
“It was just as White Buffalo Calf Woman promised,” Wolf said thickly, his voice uneven with joy and emotion. As he touched his daughter’s drying hair, he whispered, “Wakinyela, we welcome you into our arms and into our hearts.”
Serena’s vision blurred with her tears of joy. Wolf caressed her hair and leaned down, pressing a kiss to her lips.
“Your tears of happiness are shared with me,” he whispered against her lips. As Wolf eased away, he positioned Wakinyela to her milk-swollen breast. “I do not think,” Wolf said with a chuckle as he guided his daughter to find the nipple, “that she is going to have an appetite of a bird, my woman.”
Serena agreed as the infant made noisy sucking sounds, her tiny bowlike mouth moving strongly as she latched on to the nipple that would give her sustenance. Wolf knelt over both of them, his arm around Serena’s shoulders, and his other hand—almost half the size of Wakinyela—positioned against his daughter.
Serena closed her eyes and rested her head tiredly against Wolf. Her mind was spongy with fatigue, but the worry of what would happen to them ate away at her like a living thing. Kingston thought she had killed his son, and he would never cease trying to get his revenge.
As much as Serena wanted to talk to Wolf of her worries, she could not. She ached for Kingston’s loss of his son. No child should ever be placed between adults who hated or feared one another. More than anything, Serena wanted Wakinyela to be raised in peace, with the fierce love of Wolf and herself surrounding her.
Chapter Twelve
“Cante Tinza is to blame for us having to move! My hands turn blue from the cold. It is her fault!” Deer Woman whined to her parents. Everywhere she looked, families were busy taking down their tepees and packing the horses and dogs alike to proceed to another wintering ground far away from the Dried Willow region, in case of attack by miners hunting for Cante Tinza or Wolf.
“Do not complain,” Swift Elk chided as he helped her roll up a buffalo robe. “We would do this no matter who had been kidnapped by the wasicuns. This is not Cante Tinza’s fault.”
Glaring at the brave, Deer Woman watched with envy as several older women, who had gone over to Black Wolf’s tepee earlier, did the packing there that normally would be done by the wife. Two days ago, Wolf had ridden in on his buffalo runner through the knee-deep snow, his wife and new baby in his arms.
“I’d like to know how she got free,” Deer Woman muttered defiantly, throwing the robe onto the packhorse and tying it with numb fingers. Her breath came out in white clouds as she spoke. The dawn was a pale pink color along the horizon. Steam rose off the river like a curtain, even though ice covered nearly half of the blue water. The Lakota people were heavily bundled against the icy chill of the clear morning. It was so cold that Deer Woman had heard the snap and pop of trees at night as they buckled from the plunging temperature.
Swift Elk followed her back to the pile of lodgepoles that had been taken down. “I hear Black Wolf gelded the man who took her.”
“What?“ Deer Woman jerked to a halt, and her mouth fell open. “I did not hear that!”
“It was the same wasicun who held her prisoner before.“ With a grin, Swift Elk picked up the first lodgepole, which had been scraped smooth of bark. He carried it to a horse that would drag the poles. “Perhaps that is gossip. If you are so curious, Deer Woman, why don’t you go to Black Wolf and ask him yourself?”
“She is going to bring nothing but death and unhappiness to our people!” Deer Woman stood there with her hands placed petulantly on her hips. “Who’s to say the wasicun won’t come after her again when the snow melts? We are in danger no matter where we move!”
Swift Elk shook his head. “The chief moves us far away. The wasicuns won’t find us.”
Jerking up one of the poles, Deer Woman snapped, “Are you so blinded by that wasicun’s red hair that you have not thought of the horse soldiers? There is talk that the horse soldiers will ride into an Indian camp if there is any wasicun, child or woman, among the tribe.”
“Stop screeching like a wounded owl,” Swift Elk muttered with a frown. “We have a treaty with the wasicuns. The horse soldiers have better things to do than hunt each tribe searching for a wasicun. Besides, Cante Tinza stays of her own choice. She has never been our prisoner.”
Jealousy ate at Deer Woman. “Treaty!” she spit angrily. “The wasicuns break our treaty with them whenever it suits
them and you know that! They want the gold that lies in our streams and rivers. You are blind like an old man, Swift Elk!”
How could her carefully laid plan have gone so wrong? Deer Woman wondered. Kingston was gelded. Would that frighten him into staying away? Deer Woman prayed that it did not, for the miner was a man as ruthless and vengeful as she’d ever seen.
Luck had been on her side when she heard several drunken miners talking about Kingston’s family dying in the fire. She had entered the camp beneath a trade blanket, and pretended to be one of the Indians who lived there and drank the firewater. She had eavesdropped behind one of the canvas tents and heard the miners discussing the fire. Then, the plan had formed in her mind. She told Kingston that Cante Tinza had bragged about setting fire to his cabin herself in order to get revenge against him for raping her earlier. Deer Woman knew it was a lie, but she was frantic to rid herself of the wasicun.
Clinging to what little hope was left, Deer Woman didn’t know what else could be done. Nearly everyone in the village had gone to greet Wolf and his wasicun wife shortly after their arrival. Talk raged about the beauty of their daughter, Wakinyela, who had black hair and blue-green eyes.
If only Kingston would come after Cante Tinza again….
* * *
Wolf stirred drowsily. His arm was wrapped around Cante Tinza, who lay naked against him. The buffalo robe kept them more than warm, for it was the moon of the green leaves, when all things blossomed beneath the returning sunlight and warmth. Cante Tinza slept deeply beside him, and he gently eased her onto her back. Outside the tepee, the snort of horses—the first sounds of the camp coming awake—caught his attention.
Wolf inhaled deeply as he pressed his face into her thick, rich hair, which had been recently cleansed with soapweed and then rinsed with bergamot-scented water. Rising on one elbow, Wolf checked on their children, who slept nearby. Dawn Sky, who would soon be three summers old, slept with only a few strands of her black hair visible above the robe. Wakinyela lay in the cradleboard that Cante Tinza had made for her before she was kidnapped by Kingston. Between the children lay Kagi, who had instinctively become their guardian.
His brows moved downward for a moment as he transferred his attention to his wife’s tranquil features. In the five moons since her release from Kingston, she had been unusually tense and edgy. Her sleep was broken, disturbed by bad dreams. Wolf caressed her unmarred brow and marveled at her beauty—the ripe color of her parted lips, the cover of copper stars thrown across her cheeks and nose….
He felt himself becoming hard with need of her, and his mouth curved slightly as he allowed his fingers to trail from the slender length of her neck downward to cup one of her milk-filled breasts. Normally, her breasts were small, but Wakinyela, who had the hunger of six wolf pups combined, had swelled them to nearly twice their size. Wolf marveled at their rounded perfection and beauty. He realized that some of the terrible scars put there by Kingston were still receding, and he hoped, over time, that the scars would become less of an embarrassment and shame to his wife.
His heart swelled with such fierce love for Cante Tinza that he felt his eyes fill with tears of gratitude. Each day was a gift to them, he realized as he watched her slowly begin to pull from the wings of sleep. With his thumb, he caressed the hardening nipple, and he smiled as he heard her moan softly with pleasure. Outside, Wolf could hear the melodic song of a nearby meadowlark, always a harbinger of good news. Sliding his hand across her rounded belly, he splayed his dark fingers against her lustrous flesh. In several more summers, after she finished nursing Wakinyela, Wolf wanted to create another child from their love. She was a good mother, a loving one in the tradition of Lakota ways.
Serena pulled from sleep as heated ribbons of longing flowed through her lower body. She smiled softly as she felt Wolf’s large, callused hand slide downward to the juncture of her thighs, and she opened them to his knowing exploration. Slowly opening her eyes, Serena drowned in his dark, gleaming gaze as he lay above her. His hair was an ebony curtain, loose and hanging across his broad shoulders. As he caressed her, discovering her moistness, she moaned again and pressed herself against his body.
Wolf leaned down and captured Cante Tinza’s parted lips, tasting the yielding softness of her as with his fingers he continued his grazing touch against her swollen womanhood. Her moan was caught as he hungrily slid his mouth against hers and silently communicated how much he wanted her, how much he loved her. Soon the children would wake on their own, but he wanted to love his wife before that time arrived. As he eased his mouth from her smiling lips, he felt her hands range across his shoulders and back.
Teething one of her nipples, Wolf could taste the sweetness of the milk that she carried for his daughter. Cante Tinza’s fingers dug frantically into his back, and he smiled to himself as he gently moved to cover her, to bury himself deeply within her welcoming depths. As he lifted his head and placed his hands around her hair, his fingers buried in the strands, he met and held her luminous eyes. She opened her thighs, arching slightly to receive him, all of him, into her.
Wolf bit back a groan and thrust his fingers into her red hair as she pulled him within her slick, heated depths. Her hands moved across his hips, and her legs entwined to capture his so that all he could do was lie there in the scalding beauty of her. As she rocked her hips, his lips drew away from his teeth, and his hands clenched slowly into fists that held her fiery-colored hair.
Wolf became lost in the hotness of Cante Tinza, the strength and love of her as she met, matched and challenged his rhythm. He had awakened with the intent of pleasing his wife first, but she had other ideas. Helplessly snared within her unselfish and loving gesture to give him pleasure this morning before their children awoke, Wolf surrendered to her generosity and beauty. Very quickly, he tensed against her, his world anchoring to a halt of intense feeling as her damp, soft body cajoled the essence out of him and into her. Moments later, Wolf relaxed and buried his head beside hers, breathing raggedly. He kept most of his weight off her as he lay captured by her loving form.
Perspiration dotted Serena’s face as she lay there with Wolf blanketing her. She smiled and, with her eyes closed, ran her hands gently up and down his back and hips. “I love you,” she whispered, and kissed his damp cheek. Serena wasn’t disappointed as Wolf lifted his head, slid his mouth reverently across her lips and kissed her deeply for a long, long time. She absorbed his power, his undying love for her. Since returning to the camp, Serena had seen a change in Wolf. He was more attentive, if possible, more on guard for her safety than before. And he revealed his feelings toward her openly, and without apology.
Serena sighed happily as Wolf moved to one side and positioned her on top of him. He smiled at her and brought the robe across her shoulders. With her hands, she caressed his brow and then moved her fingers through his silky black hair. “It seems as though you share our daughter’s appetite—only in a different way,” she teased him with a softened laugh.
Wolf’s brows moved upward and his mouth pulled into a lazy smile. He reached up and tangled his fingers through her hair, which lay pooled across his chest. “At least I left the milk for our daughter.”
Giggling, Serena luxuriated beneath Wolf’s adoring caresses. “That’s true,” she breathed, and leaned down to touch her lips to his mouth. His mouth was strong, chiseled and, often, not smiling. When he dealt with his patients or with tribal business, he never smiled. But in the privacy of their tepee, his mouth rarely moved into that hard, unyielding line. Running her tongue lightly across his flat lower lip, she felt him grip her hips firmly and move her provocatively against him.
“So, even now,” she breathed, “you want more.”
He felt himself growing hard once again beneath the heat and teasing of her tongue, and from her sinuous body rubbing against his own. Although the children had been aware of them loving each other sometimes during the darkness, Wolf knew that Dawn Sky would awaken very shortly. She always climbed into
their arms, snuggling down between them, and Wolf didn’t want to be aroused then. “You are at fault,” he told her archly.
“Me?“ Serena slowly eased off Wolf because she saw Dawn Sky stirring. She shrugged her deerskin dress over her head and shoulders. The front of the dress had been specially designed so that she could unfasten the top to feed Wakinyela.
With a chuckle, Wolf sat up. He put on his breechclout and then brought the elk comb from the parfleche against the wall of the tepee. “Yes, you.“ He turned Cante Tinza around so that she knelt with her back to him. His thighs bracketed her slender body as he began to brush the snarls out of her hair. This was something he enjoyed doing each morning. The moments with his wife were precious and far between. The tribe was beginning to gather foodstuffs for the coming year, and in groups of five or ten the women often ranged over the hills gathering wild onions, bulbs and other herbs used in cooking. He saw Cante Tinza only at night, after Father Sun had slid beneath the horizon.
Serena sighed and relaxed, her hands resting on Wolf’s curved, muscular thighs. She enjoyed rubbing her hands across his athletic legs and feeling them tense beneath her ministrations. “I love being pampered like this,” she admitted quietly as Wolf’s fingers moved gently across her scalp.
“A wife deserves respect,” Wolf told her darkly, and he leaned over and placed a kiss on the side of her neck to prove his point.
“I never saw a white man respect his wife like this,” she admitted.
“Wasicuns keep their women like slaves,” Wolf growled. He asked her to turn so that he could begin to braid her hair. Before he did, he reached for his knife. “I want two lengths of your hair.”
Serena looked at him. “Why?”
Wolf smiled. “I had a dream last night. I saw a strand of your red hair braided with a strand of my black hair. I saw a pair of hands take our hair and braid them into one, and then make it into a circle.“ A pleased expression lingered on his face as he held her curious gaze. “I want to make such a necklace for each of us to wear. It will have great power because it was given to me in my dream. The braided hair we wear will symbolize our undying love for each other. Nothing can break the circle that binds us.”
Brave Heart Page 19