It didn't fall.
A warrior whose face was painted black across the eyes suddenly grasped her. She struggled as he pulled her arms behind her back, tying her wrists securely. He issued a few harsh commands to the others, then dragged her behind the outcropping of rocks before thrusting her down. Though she could see a great deal around her, the rocks would conceal her from anyone coming from the east. She stared up at him belligerently. He made a sitting motion with his hands. She realized that she was to remain where she was. For the time being.
She leaned against the rock, closing her eyes.
How long did she have?
She opened her eyes. The last of the daylight had gone. Night had come. A full moon was rising, casting its glow over the beauty of the landscape.
She looked around her. The Crows were not far from her, on the flat stretch of plain on the westward side of the rock and cliff formation. They sat around a small open fire upon which two spitted rabbits roasted.
One lone warrior stood closer to the rock, a rifle in his hands. She strained to see what it was. It appeared to be a very old Enfield, a weapon she knew well because it had been in heavy use during the Civil War. It wasn't a repeater, but she had heard that soldiers good in the use of the rifle had managed to get off several shots in a minute during the war. It wouldn't compare with a six-shooter, she thought.
She wondered if he was waiting for his friend to return— or if he was prepared for an attack.
She sighed, closing her eyes again. She couldn't just sit there: she had to plan. Something. Anything. How could she plan? She was numb with fear and pain and worry.
She had to plan. Things could become much worse. These Indians might well decide to kill her. Torture her. Scalp her. At the very least, she'd be scraping buffalo hides for the rest of her days for the men who might very well have killed her husband.
Don't think that way! she warned herself.
She forced herself to watch the braves again. The two who had abducted her, it seemed, were acting out what had happened. The Crow who seemed to be the leader of their party asked questions. There seemed to be laughter, then sorrow as well, and then amazement. The leader with the painted face suddenly turned and stared at Skylar thoughtfully. He smiled in a way that brought a new terror into her heart.
She had to escape. There was no reason she could not. She was not tied to the rock; her wrists were merely tied together. If she could just free them ...
Never. He had tied her with some kind of rawhide. It was very tight, chafing. Perhaps if she worked the strip of leather against the rock . . .
She did so. It was slow going, painfully tedious, but she concentrated very hard on her work.
She realized suddenly that someone was near her. She went dead still, slowly looking up.
He had come over by her, the one who seemed to be the leader of the war party. He hunkered down in front of her, a piece of the rabbit in his hand. He brought it near to her lips. Skylar stared at him and at the meat and shook her head. She thought that he might insist on her eating, but he did not. He smiled and shrugged, standing. He watched her curiously, then looked to the others, shook his head, and started to laugh again. When he walked away, she had the uneasy feeling that he would be back.
Hours crept by. The warriors continued to talk and laugh.
And wait.
Skylar kept working away at the rawhide bonds that held her.
She was very thirsty, but no one offered her water. Her shoulders and arms cramped painfully. She glanced toward the warriors, who were illuminated by the firelight, and saw that they all seemed very involved in their conversation. She inched forward, getting into position, rising on her bare feet. The earth was studded with pebbles, gravel, and stone. She wished she'd never shed her shoes to go after the stupid mule. Then she felt hysterical laughter bubbling inside her once again. She wished Hawk had never seen fit to leave her with the damned mule. She wished she'd never been so determined to be away from him. She wished that he was alive. Oh, God, she wished so badly that he was alive.
She wished that she would live as well...
The Crows still talked, bragging, she thought, of their own exploits, laughing at the expense of the man she had struck, then mourning his loss as well.
She started to tiptoe away, heading for another rise of rocks back toward an easterly trail, praying that there might be somewhere in the formation of the rock and hill where she could hide. She had barely gone five feet when she became aware of movement.
The Crows.
The man with the black-painted face leaped before her, laughing still. He didn't seem to want to hurt her, though. He seemed far too amused by her.
When she looked over her shoulder, she could make out two of the other braves behind her.
She didn't want them to touch her.
She turned around and went back to the rock. One of the braves stopped on his way back to the fire, crouching over her, touching her cheek. The man with the black-painted face spoke to him. He shook his head in disgust but left Skylar alone.
She leaned back against the rock in misery. The warrior with the black-painted face stood before her, holding what looked like a drinking gourd. Keeping her eyes on his, she accepted the water. So far, they had not harmed her. Hawk had not come riding over hill and plain to save her, but neither had the man he fought reappeared to join his war party. She couldn't fall prey to despair; she had to have hope. She had to live and escape these warriors. She needed water to live, and that was that.
The brave pulled the water gourd from her lips, tossing it aside. For another few minutes, he studied her. Then, to her horror and amazement, he suddenly grabbed her bare ankles, jerking her so that she was drawn down to lie flat on her back in the dirt.
She started to shriek; he clamped a suffocating hand hard over her mouth. With her hands still caught in the rawhide bands behind her back, she was almost powerless to struggle. His weight and form were between her legs, his hands were upon her, ripping her pantalettes. She tried desperately to twist and squirm, since there was no denying the man's intentions at this point. She could barely breathe; the pressure he put against her mouth was great. When she tried to rise, his weight merely pushed her back down. She could barely even kick or thrash, he had pushed her thighs so far apart.
His hand slipped. She bit into his fingers with a fury that drew blood and a curse. She saw his face lowering furiously before hers. He raged at her in his own tongue, still keeping his voice low. She inhaled to scream again, hoping that she might create trouble among the men, cause them to fight each other and forget her. She never managed to scream. The side of his hand clouted her head. She fell back, dazed, only very dimly aware that she was nearly stripped of her pantalettes.
Then quite suddenly, she saw a flash of silver. She stared at a knife. And that knife was set at the throat of the Crow on top of her. She looked up at a hard, bronzed, merciless face.
"Hawk ..." She could barely form his name. No matter. Something inside of her gave rise to a staggering happiness; he lived.
And even as the simple joy of that thought filled her, her attacker was wrenched from atop her. The Crow faced Hawk, whipping out a knife of his own from a sheath at his hip. For a moment the knives glittered in the glow of the moonlight. Then there was no contest. Hawk moved like lightning. Again, his knife flashed. The Crow still held his high. The knife remained high in the air. The Crow fell forward, onto Hawk.
Hawk had given his combatant a chance. His ancient and traditional enemy slipped down the length of his body and fell dead at Skylar's feet.
It all happened so quickly. So quietly.
Hawk reached out for her, aware that her hands were bound behind her back. He plucked her up by both shoulders, spinning her around so he could cut the rawhide bonds with his knife. He paused for a just a split second.
"You'd nearly worked through them," he said, surprised.
Her knees were wobbly; she was afraid she wouldn't be abl
e to stand, afraid that tears of relief would suddenly spill from her eyes. But he spun her back around again, staring at her, assessing her quickly and gravely.
"Are you all right?"
She nodded. "You came just in time."
"I've been here."
"What?" She almost shrieked the word before his hand clamped down over her mouth.
"I had to wait for a few of them to drift off!" he whispered in return. "I know that I'm just supposed to up and die for you, but it wouldn't have done you any good if I would have walked right in and been shot by the guard."
"All he has is an Enfield!"
"Enfields can kill! Believe me, I've seen a few men downed by Enfields!" he told her. "Skylar, we have to argue later; we've got to get out of here now."
He started walking, pulling her along. She stepped upon a particularly sharp rock, and despite her will to be silent, she cried out softly. He turned back, staring at her. "I'm sorry!" she hissed. "It hurt."
"What are you doing barefoot?"
"I was after your stupid mule, remember?"
Something suddenly whistled by her ear. A knife stabbed the earth by their feet.
"Sweet Jesu!" Skylar breathed. She grit down on her teeth when Hawk pulled his Colt from the holster at his hips, quickly firing off several rounds. The reverberations were deafening. A cry in the night assured her that at least one of the Crow war party had been hit.
She gasped when he swept her up, carrying her then as he hurried away from the rocks. She swallowed hard as he stepped over the body of the Crow guard who had been carrying the Enfield.
"Duck!" she suddenly heard.
Sloan was before them, falling to his knees. Hawk went instantly downward to a hunching position. An arrow flew past them, slamming into a tree beyond. Sloan, still on his feet, fired off several shots. Skylar heard a shriek of pain. Hawk spun around, his Colt raised, just in time to stop the warrior who was about to pitch his entire weight against him. The man went down in absolute silence. Another warrior followed behind him, tomahawk raised. Hawk fired again. The second warrior fell upon the other.
Skylar closed her eyes tightly, biting back a wave of purely hysterical screams. God, the death and mayhem seemed to be all around her.
"Do we finish it?" Sloan asked.
"Do we have a choice?" Hawk queried in return.
Still clinging to Hawk, Skylar began to shake. She raised herself against him, grabbing his shoulders. "Let's go, let's just go—"
"Skylar, they'll come after us. All the way," Hawk told her.
"There can just be two men left alive. They—"
"Skylar, these Crow are very far from home. They were pushed from these lands a long time ago. They're on a war party. They've come for something. They may not be alone. There could be many more warriors who might join up with them. Perhaps they've come to raid the whites—to most Indians, there is far more profit in stealing from white settlements than there is in raiding other tribes."
"Let's just go—" she insisted again, but Sloan cut her off.
"Skylar, you don't understand. You humiliated that warrior who accosted you by the brook. You struck him. That was like a woman counting coup against a brave. He's dead, but sometimes humiliation is worse than death. Don't you understand? They might come after you until they've found a way to take you."
Her agreement or disagreement didn't matter any more. Arrows suddenly began to land again, so near them that her skirt was shot through and pinned to the ground. Despite herself she screamed, only to find Hawk pressing her down to the ground and rising over her. He didn't get off a shot; one of the Crows threw himself against Hawk and then went rolling into the dust and earth.
"Stay down!" she heard Sloan command when she would have risen. The second surviving warrior came catapulting over her, striking Sloan. All four men were now engaged in life-and-death battles, rolling in the earth around her.
She couldn't stay down any longer. She jumped to her feet, then dove back to the earth for Hawk's Colt. How many shots remained? She had no idea. The gun seemed hot and heavy in her hand. She tried to aim it. She looked over at Hawk and one brave, Sloan and the other. They all twisted and rolled so frequently and so fast she was afraid to fire. She might kill one of them.
Hawk was suddenly on his feet, along with the one brave. They circled one another. Skylar raised the Colt. Just as the brave went rushing for Hawk, she fired.
She heard Hawk cursing. The brave was slumped against him. She shook, thinking she had killed the brave. Hawk pushed the man from him. He fell on his back and she saw that he had been stabbed in the heart.
Hawk was clasping his arm. She saw him staring at her, but it was too dark to read his expression.
"I shot—"
"Me!" he announced. "Get down!" he suddenly commanded.
She did as she was told. She saw her husband's bloodied knife go whipping past her, just in time to prevent the last surviving Crow from bringing a rock crashing down on Sloan's head. Sloan, too, had been prepared. The Crow died with one knife in his back, another through his heart. Staring at him with horror, Skylar dropped the Colt and backed away, her hands upon her face as she fought the waves of blackness engulfing her.
"Uh-humm!"
She drew her hands from her face. Hawk was coming toward her, one hand clasped over his arm. "Did you miss the man trying to kill me—or was your aim just a little off and you hit my arm instead of my heart?"
She rushed toward him, feeling absolutely hysterical at this point. She slammed both fists against his chest. "Oh, God, oh, God, how can you ..."
"Hey! Shh . .. shh ... it's all right, I was teasing. I think. Skylar, it's all right."
She buried her face against his chest. "It's not all right. There are dead men everywhere."
He lifted her chin. "Did you want us to be the dead men?"
She shook her head. "No!" Suddenly, no words would come. Shaking she threw herself against him again. Over his shoulder, she could see Sloan collecting their knives from the body of the Crow brave.
"Oh, God," she whispered again. "Can we go? Can we just go now, please?"
"Not quite yet," Sloan said. He had come to stand behind Hawk. He touched her cheek, offering her a dry smile.
"But—"
"We haven't scalped them yet," he told her.
"What?" she cried.
"Skylar, he's teasing you," Hawk assured her.
"Of course. Neither Hawk nor I have scalped an enemy in almost twenty years."
Hawk disengaged himself from her. "Skylar, we're going to bury them."
She looked at him uncertainly. "Indians don't—get buried, do they?"
Sloan cast Hawk a glance. "Sometimes. Most Plains Indians scaffold their dead, but occasionally, the dead are buried in shallow graves near cliffs. Not that that particularly matters at the moment. We don't want what happened here to be obvious to other warriors who might be meeting up with this war party."
"Oh," she murmured.
"Think you can watch the horses?" Hawk asked her.
She nodded. She didn't think that the horses were going anywhere; Hawk and Sloan just wanted to keep her busy.
She started to walk with Hawk again and winced, her feet in desperate pain by then. He picked her up again, telling Sloan briefly that he'd leave her with the horses and be right back. He carried her to a cove of trees just fifty feet down a slope. Among the trees stood Tor, Sloan's horse and her own roan. He set her down atop the gelding. She stared down at him.
"You got the horse back from the Crow?" she said.
He patted the roan's neck. "Nutmeg is a fine animal," he told her. "Important to me."
"You got the horse back before you came for me?" she whispered.
A smile twitched at his lips. "We didn't know how many braves there were here. And we didn't want to be followed.
The Indian ponies are scattered ahead of us; we'll take them to my grandfather's band along with the cattle."
"You rescued the hors
e before you rescued me?" she repeated.
Again, he laughed. "At least I didn't shoot you."
"Oh!" She was about to ask after his wound, but it was still too galling that the horse had mattered more than her.
"You went for the horse!" she repeated.
He shrugged. "Among the Sioux, one man's family may pay a husband with a horse if one of their kind steals that man's wife. Both are actually property."
"I should have aimed better!" she warned him.
But he still smiled. He stood very close to her, his fingers moving very gently over her injured foot. "Sloan went for your horse and the Crow ponies," he told her. "I came straight for you. I watched, and I waited. I told you before, my love, that I'd kill any man, red or white, who threatened to take what was mine."
She felt very warm suddenly, still shaken by the events. His voice had been very intense. She wanted him closer, yet she was suddenly so afraid in a different way that she wanted to back off as well.
"So," she murmured lightly, "did you kill them for me, or for the horse?"
He reached up, touching her cheek. The moonlight caught his eyes, and they glittered strangely against the rugged lines of his handsome features.
"Both, my love," he murmured. "Both."
He turned and left her, ready to join Sloan for their burial detail.
Sixteen
When they rejoined Willow, he had moved their camp farther northwest and alongside a different little stream. The eight Crow ponies they'd taken were tethered with their own, and the cattle were gathered in a makeshift corral.
The coffee was perking away. They had Meggie's biscuits, along with a few waterfowl Willow had snared. Skylar also took a huge sip from the bottle of brandy Hawk had handed her. When they had finished eating, Willow on watch all the while, she realized that Hawk was staring at her, smiling slightly.
"Smudge on your nose," he told her.
She lowered her lashes, biting her lip. Smudge everywhere, she thought. Her clothing was torn and dusty.
"Stream's just about thirty feet down that way," Sloan said.
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