“He was always a contented man, so it would not be different when he knew that he was on his way to the stars and beyond,” Blue Thunder said. He stepped over to Shirleen and wrapped his comforting arms around both her and Megan. “He had done all that he could for his people, and he knew that. He also had found great contentment in finally having a wife.”
“I am so glad that he found such happiness on this earth,” Shirleen murmured. “So few have that opportunity.”
“I have found much happiness myself, caring for my people,” Blue Thunder said thickly. “And that happiness has become twofold since meeting you. Now I can share more happiness with you, since I know yours is more complete because you have your daughter with you again.”
“I can hardly believe she is here,” Shirleen said. Megan had fallen asleep again, but this time against her bosom, not Blue Thunder’s.
“Let us take her where she can rest comfortably,” Blue Thunder said, slipping gently away from Shirleen. “I will tell you all about her rescue, and then I must go and sit with my uncle.”
With Blue Thunder’s arm around Shirleen’s waist, they walked toward their tepee, leaving their horses to be tended by the young brave who remained dutiful to his chief’s wishes. Around them, families were reunited and speaking softly of the death that had come into their village, as well as a new life.
After Megan was resting comfortably on a bed of pelts, Shirleen and Blue Thunder knelt together awhile beside the sleeping child.
They each kissed Megan’s brow, and then went to sit beside the lodge fire.
After Blue Thunder added wood to the fire and the flames were leaping upward, sending warmth and light throughout the tepee, Shirleen and Blue Thunder sat down on a thick pallet of furs, and he told her in depth how the rescue had transpired.
“And so Earl actually stole our daughter away only to spite me, not out of love for Megan,” Shirleen said, anger like a hot poker inside her belly. “He did not concern himself for one minute how the child was feeling. He only thought of himself, as always. He is perhaps the cruelest man that walks the earth.”
“Just be thankful that Speckled Fawn was able to get Megan away from Earl so easily, and that she succeeded in leaving the fort without being seen,” Blue Thunder said soothingly. “All else is no longer important.”
“Tell me all of it,” Shirleen said, moving to her knees in front of Blue Thunder, her eyes searching his. “Tell me everything.”
He reached out and gently touched her face, then proceeded to tell her all that she was eager to hear.
And when he was finished, she was awed by Speckled Fawn’s daring, but mainly so happy that everything had worked out and her daughter was with her now, forever.
“Your Megan is quite wonderful,” Blue Thunder said. He reached out and drew Shirleen onto his lap. She twined an arm around his neck and nestled close to him. “As are you, my woman.”
“You have no idea how happy I am at this moment,” Shirleen said, then leaned away from him and gazed into his eyes. “Yet so sad. I could feel Speckled Fawn’s grief when she realized her husband was dead. I could feel the sadness of your people.”
“It is sad in one respect, good in another,” Blue Thunder said. He twined his fingers through her thick red hair, pushing it back from her face and draping it over her shoulders. “My uncle has been only half a man now for so long. He is whole again as he walks the road to the hereafter with those who went ahead of him. He is a full man again, in all respects. When he laughs, he realizes that he is laughing. When he speaks, his words are true and from the heart. And when he gazes down from the heavens to see his wife, he knows that she mourns for him, but knows, too, that she feels him with her now, as if he were sitting with her, holding her hand. You see, my woman, his body no longer functions, but his spirit is very much alive.”
“That is so beautifully put,” Shirleen murmured, more and more in awe of this man the longer she knew him.
She was so blessed that he would soon be her husband.
He would be her daughter’s father!
“I must go now and sit with my uncle alongside Speckled Fawn for a while,” he said thickly. “We will take but one day to mourn his death. He has been ready to go and join his loved ones among the stars for a long time.”
He took Shirleen’s hands and looked into her eyes. “In truth, his passing is a joyous time for me, as well as sad. It was painful to see my uncle so different from the way he used to be, a strong and vital person . . . a beloved shaman.”
He framed Shirleen’s face between his hands. “My woman, I feel deeply for my uncle’s wife, for if I did not know earlier, I do know now how much she loved him and is truly grieving his passing,” he said, his voice hoarse with emotion.
“Yes, she did love him so much,” Shirleen said softly. “I could tell by the way she talked about him to me. Were he young and more vital, she could not have loved him any more than she did.”
“Soon, my love, soon we shall join hands and hearts as husband and wife,” Blue Thunder said. He gently lifted her off his lap. “I shall make certain no harm befalls you or your child ever again. I will protect you, my woman, with my life.”
Shirleen flung her arms around his neck and met his lips with her own. Their kiss was all consuming, and then he was gone from the tepee, leaving her alone with her child.
Tears flowed from her eyes—joyous tears at the thought that she and her daughter had found a new life. They would be safe and happy among these beautiful people, and especially with Blue Thunder.
Going to kneel beside Megan, Shirleen gently touched her cheek, then bent low and kissed her tiny lips. “Sweet thing, you are with your mommy now, and I promise you that no one will ever harm you again . . . especially not your evil papa!”
Chapter Twenty-seven
Quick!
I wait!
And who can tell what tomorrow may befall.
Love me more, or not at all.
—Sill
Lurid flashes of lightning could be seen through the smoke hole. Loud rumbles of thunder ensued as Blue Thunder sat beside Speckled Fawn and they gazed at their lifeless loved one.
Speckled Fawn fought back tears. She had already shed so many as she sat with Blue Thunder in silence, both grieving the passing of a wonderful man.
Yet Speckled Fawn could not keep her thoughts completely focused on her departed husband. She kept hearing the horrible words that Earl had spoken . . . about how he had raped, then killed Blue Thunder’s wife!
The day Shawnta’s body had been found was one of pure horror. She had been brutally raped, then stabbed to death.
When she had been brought back into the village in her husband’s arms, it seemed that the world stopped dead still at that moment. The whole Wind Band had come from their lodges to see their fallen loved one, and to witness her terrible death.
Mourning had been sudden and intense. It had lasted for days upon days until Blue Thunder had finally given up his wife to the spirits.
But although she was in the ground, Blue Thunder had still not given her up completely. He had sat at that gravesite for hours at a time, usually only coming home to sleep.
He had not eaten during that time of grieving, nor had he performed his chieftain’s duties, which had been carried out by his most trusted warriors.
After he finally accepted his loss, he had spent days, weeks, even months, searching for the one who had killed his wife.
But no matter how far he rode with his warriors, searching for anyone who might know of a man who would be so evil as to ambush a lone woman and defile her body in such a way, no one knew the answers to his questions.
It was only recently that people had begun to whisper that Big Nose and his renegades were responsible. Yet Big Nose was elusive, seemingly impossible to capture.
Unable to hold inside herself what she knew any longer, Speckled Fawn reached a hand over and placed it on Blue Thunder’s arm, drawing his questioning gaze to her.
“My chief, I have something to tell you,” she said in a whisper.
Another flash of lightning lit up the buffalo covering of the tepee, and the following thunder shook the ground beneath them.
Blue Thunder looked at her askance, for this was not the time for small talk. He turned away from her, wondering what could be so important that she would speak up at such a time as this.
Yet he would not ask her. His respect for his uncle was too great to speak in his presence, although Dancing Shadow would never hear anyone again.
“Blue Thunder . . .” Speckled Fawn said persistently. “Please come outside with me. I have something that must be said.”
Blue Thunder frowned at her, then seeing something in her eyes, and hearing the insistence in her voice, he rose and stood over her as she pushed herself up from the mat-covered floor.
They walked outside, where the skies were dark and the lightning and thunder continued.
The first raindrop fell, and then two, and another and another from the savage skies above.
“Hurry and say what you must say,” Blue Thunder urged. He gazed up at the sky. He had never seen it look so threatening before.
He flinched when lightning zigzagged from one cloud to another, the ensuing thunder even more pronounced this time.
“Oh, Blue Thunder, I know you need to know what I have learned, yet I find it so hard to tell you,” Speckled Fawn said, her voice catching.
She lowered her eyes for a moment, to gather the courage to tell him the truth.
Blue Thunder was stunned to see Speckled Fawn actually having trouble saying something. He had never known a woman who loved to talk so much.
She was so loquacious, sometimes she got on his nerves!
“Just tell me,” he said, taking her elbow and guiding her toward his tepee when the raindrops came in a rush from the heavens.
When Speckled Fawn saw where Blue Thunder was taking her, she grabbed his arm and led him in a different direction. She did not want to tell him about Earl in front of Shirleen.
She knew Shirleen would have to hear what Earl had done, but Blue Thunder deserved privacy when he learned the awful truth.
She led him into the small tepee that had housed Shirleen upon her first arrival at the village. Although it was dark inside because no fire burned in the fire pit, the continued flashes of lightning provided enough light to see each other.
“I have never seen you behave so strangely,” Blue Thunder said, wiping Speckled Fawn’s face dry with the palms of his hands.
He wiped his own face dry, then lifted his wet hair back over his shoulders as he awaited some sort of response from Speckled Fawn besides a strange stare.
“It will be so hard to say,” Speckled Fawn murmured. “But oh, Blue Thunder, I must.”
Growing impatient, Blue Thunder placed his hands on her shoulders and looked intently into her eyes. “Say it,” he said tightly. “Say . . . it . . . now.”
Although he was urging her to tell him whatever it was she found so hard to say, he was now dreading her next words.
And something else was troubling him besides her behavior. The storm had worsened, bringing heavy sheets of rain. The air was heavy. The winds were howling, bringing gusts of rain down through the smoke hole.
He was sorry to realize that this rain could delay his uncle’s burial, for the burial grounds would be too muddy. He had wanted to get the burial behind him so that he could know his uncle’s spirit would be free.
“My chief, it was not renegades who took your wife from you,” Speckled Fawn finally blurted out. “It was not renegades who . . . defiled . . . her body so horribly.”
Blue Thunder was taken aback by what she was saying. His heart seemed misplaced inside his chest. It seemed to be everywhere at once, pounding, pounding, pounding!
“How would you know this?” he finally managed to ask.
His grip on her shoulders tightened so much she winced.
He saw what he had done and drew his hands quickly away.
“While I was at the fort, talking with Shirleen’s husband, much was revealed to me that had nothing to do with Shirleen,” Speckled Fawn said.
“What was revealed?” Blue Thunder demanded, his jaw tight, for he was becoming more and more annoyed by all the delays.
“Shirleen’s husband, Earl Mingus, was the one responsible for your wife’s death, not Big Nose and his Comanche renegades,” Speckled Fawn finally found the courage to say.
Blue Thunder felt as though someone had struck him. The news that Speckled Fawn had just told him was so shocking, it seemed unreal.
“How would you know this?” he finally managed to ask, his voice drawn.
“Because he told me,” Speckled Fawn said solemnly. “He had consumed quite a bit of whiskey even before I arrived at his cabin. After he drank more of what I brought, his tongue was loosened. He bragged about things that he had done, mainly finding a lovely Indian maiden in the forest, alone, and . . . and . . . raping and killing her.”
Blue Thunder felt himself grow dizzy as he heard this horrible truth. Yet when it had sunk in, he became strong in mind and body again.
He doubled his hands into tight fists at his sides. “Tell me all that he told you,” he said thickly. “Leave nothing out, not even something you might think would hurt me too much to hear. Remember that I am strong in all ways. I am strong enough to hear the worst.”
His heart pounded hard in his chest as Speckled Fawn told him about everything Earl had said, and how the man was so proud to have raped and killed an Indian woman.
Nothing in Blue Thunder’s lifetime had been as devastating to hear as what Speckled Fawn had just told him.
He hungered now for vengeance against this man who was not even truly a man, but a gutless, cowardly animal.
He could finally avenge the terrible wrongs that had been done to his beloved wife.
To remember her was to remember sweetness, the sort of sweetness that he had found again in the woman he would soon marry.
To take such sweetness from this earth was the worst possible crime a man could commit, in Blue Thunder’s opinion.
“What are you going to do?” Speckled Fawn asked guardedly as she saw the rage in her chief’s eyes. “And when? The riverboat should be arriving soon. Earl plans to be on it.”
Then she gazed out the entrance flap at the torrential rain falling from the sky.
She turned toward Blue Thunder again. “Yet I doubt now that the boat will be arriving, or leaving, anytime soon,” she said, slowly smiling. “You see, I know riverboats and the habits of their captains. During my years of being alone, fleeing from one town to another, I spent many an hour hidden on riverboats. When the weather is as bad as it is today, the rivers rise too much for the boats to travel. The captains find a safe place to tie up, then wait out the storm. This will give you enough time to stop Earl Mingus before he boards the paddlewheeler.”
Blue Thunder gazed with grateful eyes at Speckled Fawn. He reached a hand out and placed it gently on her face. “During your time in my village I have not treated you as well as I should have,” he said quietly. “You see, I never understood why my uncle preferred a white woman over one of his own skin color, but now I think I know why he wanted you as his wife. He saw in you what I couldn’t, or should I say, refused to. That proves just how wise a man my uncle was, for there could not have been any better wife than you were to him.”
Deeply touched by what he’d said, Speckled Fawn flung herself into his arms, sobbing. Their wet clothes clung as they hugged.
Then, wiping her eyes with the backs of her hands, Speckled Fawn stepped away from him. “Are you going to tell Shirleen what I just told you?” she asked softly.
“Every word,” Blue Thunder said flatly. “She already knows how evil Earl Mingus is, and now she shall know just how fortunate she is to no longer be with this man. I will also tell her that when I avenge my wife’s death by killing him, I shall also take revenge for
the beatings she received. He will pay for each of the scars that he inflicted on her back!”
He walked past Speckled Fawn and held the flap aside as he gazed up at the black sky.
There was no letup.
The lightning continued to flash. The thunder and the wind continued to roar.
He gave Speckled Fawn a smile over his shoulder, thanked her for being who she was, then ran out into the cold rain.
He had promised Shirleen that he would protect her forever.
Now he was even more determined to do so, for he knew there were countless men, both white and red-skinned, who were as evil as Earl Mingus.
But Earl just might be the worst of them all.
Chapter Twenty-eight
To nestle once more in
That haven of rest—
Your lips upon mine,
My head on your breast.
—Hunt
His hair dripping wet, Blue Thunder ran into his tepee, stopping quickly when he found Shirleen pacing, her eyes wild with fear.
He hurried to her, and forgetting how wet his clothes were, he took her into his arms and hugged her close to him.
“I . . . am . . . so afraid of storms,” Shirleen sobbed, clinging to Blue Thunder as she trembled against his powerful body.
She was so gripped by her fear, she did not even notice that his clothes were wetting her own.
“I am here,” Blue Thunder said, gently stroking her back. “You are safe from all harm.”
“I wasn’t when I lived with Earl,” she said, finally composing herself. She still clung to Blue Thunder even when she realized her clothes were becoming as wet as his.
But that didn’t matter.
The fact that he was there with her, protecting her as no man had since she had left the protective home of her father and mother, was all that mattered.
“He is someone you need not think about again, or fear,” Blue Thunder said softly. “He will never come near you again.”
“But it will still be hard to forget the terrible memories that are evoked by thunder and lightning. I am afraid I shall always associate storms with . . . with . . . Earl Mingus,” she said, vividly recalling Earl’s bizarre behavior during the most violent storms.
Savage Skies Page 17