Forbidden Fires

by Madeline Baker

  When the rabbit was cooked, Summer Wind offered Stalking Wolf the biggest portion, then divided what was left between herself and Caitlyn. She knew the white woman objected to her presence, and the thought made her smile. Stalking Wolf had been Summer Wind’s favorite suitor. She knew he had once loved her; he had killed a man because of her. Perhaps, if she were very lucky and very clever, she could win him back again.

  Rafe sat between the two women while they ate, aware of the ever-growing tension that hummed between them. Summer Wind was all smiles as she chatted with him about old times, her liquid black eyes warm when she gazed at him.

  Caitlyn remained mute, her expression sullen. She did not appear to be paying any attention to Rafe and Summer Wind, but she was acutely aware of every smile that passed between them, of the many excuses Summer Wind found to reach out and touch Rafe’s arm, his thigh, his hand.

  Caitlyn rose to her feet, unable to watch the two of them any longer. “Excuse me,” she said coldly, and turning on her heel, she stalked into the darkness, tears stinging her eyes and burning her throat.

  She walked for a long time, unmindful of the distance, heedless of the danger of straying so far from camp. The night was warm and dark, comforting, somehow. Here, alone, she could let her tears flow unchecked. She was losing Rafe to the Indian girl and she didn’t know how to fight it. Perhaps there was no way to fight it. Rafe had said he liked living with the Indians; perhaps he would take Summer Wind and return to the Black Hills. She knew he could not return to the Lakota, but another tribe might take him in.

  She heard muffled footsteps and then Rafe was standing behind her, his arms folding around her waist.

  “Come back to camp, Caty,” he said, his voice low, his breath warm when it whispered against her ear.

  “Why should I?”

  “Because I want you to.”

  “You don’t need me. You’ve got Summer Wind to keep you company.”

  “You’re my wife,” he reminded her.

  “Does she know that?”

  “Of course she knows.”

  “But she doesn’t care.”

  “What do you mean?” It was a stupid question, he knew exactly what she meant.

  “She’s always flirting with you, touching you, talking to you in her language so I can’t understand. She’s still in love with you,” Caitlyn said bitterly. “A blind man could see that.”

  “She’s just grateful because I got her away from Beech, that’s all.”

  Caitlyn made a very unladylike sound of disgust.

  “Caty…”

  “Send her away, Rafe. I don’t want her here.”

  “I can’t, Caty.”

  “I understand.” She turned to face him. “You’re still in love with her.”

  “No.” Rafe shook his head. “I don’t love her, not the way you mean. But I feel responsible for her. I can’t just abandon her.”

  “Fine.” She placed her hands on his chest and pushed him away.

  “Caty.”

  “I’m going back to camp,” she said curtly. “I’m tired.”

  “Dammit, Caitlyn, why can’t you understand?”

  “I understand only too well,” she retorted, and all the while a little voice told her to keep still, that she was only making things worse. Behaving like a shrew would only send Rafe into Summer Wind’s arms.

  With her head high, she started toward camp, but Rafe would not let her go. Reaching out, he grabbed a handful of her hair and yanked her against him. She uttered a little shriek of pain, certain he had jerked out a handful of her hair. But before she could lash out at him, he was kissing her, his mouth hard, brutal, his arms holding her captive. He kissed her as if he wanted to hurt her, and he did hurt her, the force of his kiss grinding her lips against her teeth. And then his tongue plunged into her mouth like a dancing flame of fire, searing all else from her mind, draining all the strength from her limbs, leaving her limp and pliant in his arms.

  She was dazed and breathless when he took his mouth from hers. His eyes were dark, ablaze with passion and some mysterious expression she could not fathom.

  “Rafe.” Her eyes searched his. “Tell me you love me, only me.”

  “Stalking Wolf? Are you there?”

  Rafe cursed under his breath as Summer Wind’s voice broke the stillness. He kissed Caitlyn one more time, a short quick kiss of promise, and then he let her go.

  “We’re here,” he called.

  Summer Wind moved through the trees until she found him. As she had suspected, he had not gone to check on the horses, but on his woman. She glanced from Stalking Wolf to Caitlyn and felt a sense of victory. Whatever had been about to happen between them had been thwarted by her approach.

  “I was afraid,” Summer Wind said, slipping her arm through Rafe’s and smiling up at him. “Beech found me at night.”

  Rafe nodded. “Let’s go back to camp and get some sleep. Caty?”

  She nodded. Ignoring the hand he offered her, she started toward camp, her back rigid, her palms fairly itching with the desire to slap Summer Wind’s face. Afraid indeed! The girl wouldn’t be afraid of a two-headed snake.

  Caitlyn slept little that night, and in the morning there were dark shadows under her eyes. Summer Wind looked lovely and well-rested. There was a glow in the Indian girl’s eyes, a smile on her lips, as she made breakfast and carried it to Rafe.

  Caitlyn refused to speak to him all day, even though she knew that she was being childish, and that such behavior would only drive him farther away. But she was afraid. So afraid.

  Fear of losing Rafe to Summer Wind turned to terror for her own life as they topped a low rise later that day and rode into the midst of a dozen warriors.

  Caitlyn stared in horror at the hideous paint that streaked their faces, the scalps that fluttered from their lance tips, and the feathers entwined in their long black hair.

  She turned frightened eyes on Rafe, her heart hammering a wild tattoo. These were the people who had killed her brothers and her father. Would she now meet the same horrible fate? Her gaze settled on a long blonde scalp, so similar to her own, and she felt her own scalp prickle as she imagined one of the warriors hacking off her hair and attaching it to a scalp pole.

  Rafe felt the hair on the back of his neck raise as the warriors boxed them in. They were Cheyenne, allies of the Lakota, but he recognized none of them. He felt a quick stab of fear as the warriors gazed admiringly at Caitlyn and Summer Wind. The braves were armed and painted for war. It would be a great coup to kill him and capture the women.

  He raised his right hand in the traditional sign of peace, but before he could speak, Summer Wind rode toward one of the warriors.

  “Hou, sic’esi,” she said, smiling. “Hello, cousin.”

  Shinte Galeska frowned and then smiled. “Hou, hankasi,” he replied. “You are far from home.”

  “I have come for a visit,” Summer Wind said cheerfully. “This is my husband, Stalking Wolf.”

  Shinte Galeska kneed his horse forward and the two men grasped forearms in greeting.

  “Who is the white woman?” Shinte Galeska asked.

  “A slave,” Summer Wind answered with a wave of her hand. “Pay her no mind.”

  Rafe threw Summer Wind a warning glance, but she only smiled archly and asked her cousin how his wife and family were.

  Caitlyn stared at the Indians uneasily as Summer Wind conversed with them. Her palms were coated with sweat and her mouth was suddenly dry as Summer Wind waved a negligent hand in her direction. The smile on the Indian girl’s face made Caitlyn decidedly uneasy. What was going on?

  Summer Wind reined her horse alongside that of the warrior she had been talking to and they started back the way the Indians had come. The other warriors raced ahead, leaving Caitlyn and Rafe to follow in the rear.

  “What’s going on?” Caitlyn asked nervously. “Where are we going?”

  “To their village.”

  “Their village!” Caitlyn exclaimed
. “Why?”

  “It seems one of the warriors is Summer Wind’s cousin. She told him that I was her husband and that we had come for a visit.”

  “What did she say about me?”

  Rafe chewed the inside of his lip a moment before answering. “She told him you were our slave.”

  Caitlyn glared at Rafe, unable to believe her ears. “How could you let her tell such a lie?”

  “What did you want me to do, call her a liar in front of her cousin?

  “I guess not,” Caitlyn muttered. No wonder Summer Wind had looked so smug. A slave, indeed!

  The Cheyenne camp was laid out in a large circle with tipis of various sizes. Most were painted with moons or suns and stick figures representing horses or people, deer or buffalo.

  Caitlyn’s anger at Rafe quickly dissipated as she was surrounded by Indians and she stayed close to his side, needing to be near him, to feel his strength. Surely he would not let these savages harm her.

  “Relax, Caty,” Rafe murmured, giving her shoulder a comforting squeeze. “We’ll only be here a day or two.”

  A day or two, Caitlyn thought. She could stand anything for a day or two.

  The Indians stared at her, fascinated by her long blonde hair and bright green eyes. They pointed at her as though she were some rare species of animal, talking rapidly in a harsh guttural tongue, occasionally reaching out to touch her fair skin, or stroke her hair. She cringed at their touch, was humiliated by their laughter.

  Shinte Galeska took them to his lodge and introduced Rafe to his wife, Rainbow Woman, a tall, slender woman with enormous black eyes, a wide forehead, and a generous mouth.

  Summer Wind and Rainbow Woman hugged each other, then sat down on a pile of furs and began the pleasant task of bringing each other up to date on what had happened since they had last seen each other.

  Shinte Galeska invited Rafe to sit down, then offered him his pipe, leaving Caitlyn standing alone near the door.

  “Sit down, Caty,” Rafe called softly. “Over here, behind me. Don’t talk.”

  Caitlyn sent him a mutinous glance, but she did as she was bidden. She had no robe to sit on, so she sat on the hard ground, her legs tucked beneath her, and tried to make some sense of the conversation between Rafe and Shinte Galeska, but the language was unlike anything she had ever heard before and she was amazed that anyone could understand it.

  After a few minutes, Rainbow Woman offered Rafe and her husband bowls of venison stew. Then she handed one to Summer Wind and prepared to sit down again.

  Just then, Caitlyn’s stomach growled loudly. Rainbow Woman frowned, then glanced at Summer Wind. “Do you want me to feed her?”

  Summer Wind was about to say no when Rafe spoke up, “I would appreciate it if you would feed the white woman,” he said, smiling. “She is a good worker and I would not see her strength depleted by a lack of food.”

  Rainbow Woman nodded, then grudgingly offered Caitlyn a bowl of stew. She had no love for the whites and it annoyed her to share her food with a paleface woman.

  After dinner, the women sat in the back of the lodge, talking softly, while Shinte Galeska complained of the increasing number of white eyes crossing the plains, of the small Arapaho village that had been massacred several days earlier. He spoke of the Sun Dance, just passed, and lamented the fact that Stalking Wolf had missed it.

  Shinte Galeska offered Rafe his pipe again, and then the two men went outside. Rainbow Woman and Summer Wind rinsed out the bowls, and then they, too, stepped outside.

  Caitlyn sat there for a moment, angry at the way Rafe was ignoring her. Frowning, she rose to her feet, intending to find him and tell him so, but as soon as she stepped outside, Summer Wind ordered her back into the lodge.

  “You slave,” the Indian girl said haughtily. “Stay inside.”

  “I will not,” Caitlyn retorted.

  “Stay inside or you will cause much trouble,” Summer Wind hissed. “Here, I am wife to Stalking Wolf, not you.”

  Stalking Wolf. Caitlyn repeated the name in her mind as she glared at the Indian girl, too angry to notice that Summer Wind’s English had improved drastically in Rafe’s absence.

  She felt her spirits rise when she saw Rafe returning to the lodge.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “She won’t let me outside,” Caitlyn said petulantly. “She said it would cause trouble.”

  Rafe let out a long breath. “I’m afraid she’s right, Caty. An Arapaho village was wiped out by the Army last week, and tempers are high. It might be wise for you to stay out of sight.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “One of the warriors is celebrating the birth of his first son. He’s giving a feast in his child’s name. As a guest of Shinte Galeska, I was invited to attend.”

  “What am I supposed to do?”

  “Stay inside and sit tight. I’ll be back as soon as I can get away.”

  Caitlyn glanced at Summer Wind. “And what will she be doing?”

  “Sitting with the women.”

  Caitlyn’s shoulders drooped disconsolately. She did not like it here, and she wanted to go home. Without another word, she turned on her heel and went back into the lodge and sat down on a thick buffalo robe. She hated to admit it, but she was lonely and scared. The lodge was filled with alien smells and furnishings. The ground was hard beneath the robe. From outside came the sound of laughter and singing and the rhythmic beat of a drum. She heard voices she could not understand.

  Bored, she rose to her feet and peered outside, curious to see what an Indian celebration was all about.

  She quickly spotted Rafe. He was sitting next to Shinte Galeska, nodding as the warrior spoke to him.

  There was a change in the beat of the drum and one of the men stood up and walked to the center of the circle. Dropping his robe, he began to dance around the fire. She could not understand his words, but she had the impression that he was telling a story about a battle he had fought, and how he had killed three enemy warriors.

  She was surprised when, a few minutes later, Rafe stood up. He did not speak, but she had no trouble understanding what he was doing. In steps and movements that were easy to follow, he told of hunting the buffalo with the Lakota, how his horse had stepped into a prairie dog hole and been crushed to death when it fell beneath the hooves of the herd. He had barely escaped with his life, and then, on foot, he had brought down a big buffalo cow with a single well-placed arrow.

  He was magnificent to watch. Clad only in breechclout and moccasins, he was a sight to take her breath away. The orange flames cast shadows on his swarthy skin and ebony hair, making him seem like something out of a dream. Or a nightmare. There was an eagle feather in his hair, a streak of paint across the bridge of his nose, and a copper band around his right bicep. She did not stop to wonder where he had gotten such things; she only knew that he looked as if he belonged there.

  She watched the other men as they danced, each man’s steps unique, stirring up the dust as the drums beat faster and faster. There were shouts and war cries from the dancers, answering cries from the spectators.

  The women danced next, their steps more subdued. She saw Summer Wind among the women, and her heart grew heavy with despair. The Indian girl had borrowed a doeskin dress from one of the women and the garment fit as though it had been made for her. She wore her long black hair loose, parted in the middle. Huge earrings dangled from her ears, a shell necklace lay against her throat. The part in her hair had been painted with vermillion. She looked primitive and sultry and quite, quite beautiful.

  There was a pause in the drumming, and when it began again, the women had formed a large circle. They shuffled slowly to the right and then to the left and when the drumming stopped, each woman went to the man of her choice and tapped his arm. Summer Wind went straight to Rafe and when she tapped his arm, he rose to his feet and followed her to the circle. Now the men and women stood facing each other. The drumming resumed and the dancing began. The cou
ples never touched as they moved right and left, forward and back, but there was a undercurrent of sexuality in the moves, a sense of waiting, of expectation.

  Caitlyn stood up so she could see better and at that moment, Summer Wind smiled at Rafe, her eyes aglow, her expression radiant.

  She couldn’t watch anymore. Closing the lodge flap, she curled up on the buffalo robe, her heart aching.

  She was still awake when Rafe and Summer Wind entered the lodge an hour later, followed by Shinte Galeska and his wife.

  She listened as Summer Wind and Rainbow Woman exchanged a few words, and then Summer Wind crawled under a pile of furs on the left side of the lodge. Caitlyn nearly choked when Rafe crawled in beside her.

  This was carrying their little charade too far, Caitlyn thought, stricken by the idea of her husband sharing a bed with another woman.

  She stared at Rafe, saw him shake his head, warning her not to make a scene. Feeling wretched, Caitlyn buried her face in her arms, trying to block out the whispers of Shinte Galeska and his wife as they settled down for the night. She heard Summer Wind whisper to Rafe in Lakota, heard his hushed reply, and then there was only silence.

  It was a long time before she fell asleep.

  Someone was shaking her arm, and she groaned softly as she opened her eyes, her whole body feeling stiff and sore after a mostly sleepless night.

  “Wake up,” Rafe said.

  “What’s wrong?” Caitlyn asked anxiously.

  “Nothing. Shinte Galeska has asked me to go hunting with him.”

  “You’re not going!” Caitlyn cried, frightened at the thought of being left alone with the Indians.

  “I’ve got to go, Caty. It’s an honor to be asked, and I’ve no reason to refuse.”

  “Aren’t I a reason?”

  “You’re supposed to be a slave. Don’t worry, Summer Wind will look after you.”

  “Oh, sure,” Caitlyn muttered sarcastically.

  “Caty…” He placed a finger over her mouth when he saw she was about to argue with him. “Listen to me,” he said urgently, his voice low. “I don’t want to do anything to arouse Shinte Galeska’s suspicion. I’ve been banished from the Lakota. It’s like a death sentence, Caty. The only reason I’m still alive is because I killed Hump Back Bear in a fair fight, but the fact remains that I killed one of the People. If Shinte Galeska finds out what I’ve done, there’s no telling what might happen. He has a quick temper. I know all this is hard on you, but I’ll only be gone for a day, two at the most. Trust me, Caty, please.”