“Don’t worry so,” Storm Dancer said. “In the eyes of our people, you have taken Cardinal’s place.”
“How could I take her place? Surely, her mother…her aunt…”
He shrugged and reached to lay a warm hand on her arm. “It’s difficult to explain. But to my mother, you have become Cardinal. I was supposed to marry her, and in a way, I have.”
“I’m not certain I like that.” The pony snatched a mouthful of grass.
“You are of the Deer Clan,” Storm Dancer said patiently. “You have fulfilled the prophesy by marrying me. Mother will not only accept you, she will love you as the daughter she never had.”
“I’m not certain I want to be married to a prophet. It sounds painful.”
He laughed. “I never said that I was a prophet or a hero. I only said my mother believes it.”
He caught the end of her braid and gave it a playful tug. Blue Sky had helped Shannon to dress for her ride to the honeymoon lodge, and the Indian woman had plaited her hair into one thick braid so that it wouldn’t become tangled in the tree branches.
“Somehow I find it hard to imagine your mother loving me.”
“You’d be surprised. She is a woman with the weight of authority on her shoulders. First comes our village, then the Wolf Clan, then her family. She isn’t nearly as intimidating as she pretends.”
“So your father comes last? Your parents have a strange marriage.”
“They are devoted to each other.”
“But they don’t live together,” she protested. “I wouldn’t want to be apart from you—ever. Will you leave me to live in the warrior’s lodge as other married men do?” She looked at him, silhouetted in the moonlight, her big, wonderful husband, and thought how lucky she was to have found him in a most unlikely place.
He laughed. “We are different from other couples, you and me. We will make our own customs, some from the Tsalagi way of life, some from your Irish.”
She dropped Badger’s reins and leaned close to press her palm to his. “Promise me we will,” she said.
“Haven’t I married you in your own religion as well as my own?”
She nodded and sighed. “Both weddings were lovely, but I think I like the Cherokee one best. You were much prettier this time.”
He snorted. “Pretty? Me? Storm Dancer, great warrior of the Wolf Clan?”
“Beautiful.” She smiled at him. Strange that most whites believed the Indians to be dour and solemn. Most of the time, someone was joking or playing a prank on someone else, and no one enjoyed a hearty laugh more than her husband.
He pushed his heels into his stallion’s sides. “It’s not far now,” he said. “I think you’ll be pleased.”
“Anywhere that we’re together, I’ll be happy.” She hesitated, wrinkling her nose. “There’s one thing I don’t understand. They said I’d be tried for stealing the mask, and no one asked me any questions about it. If Cardinal hadn’t been dead already, she would have repeated what she’d said. Won’t people think I’m guilty and got away with it?”
He glanced back over his shoulder at her. “No. No one believes now that you stole the mask. They accept your innocence.”
“How can you be sure of that?”
“A small friend, who wears woodpecker feathers in his hair, whispered to me that his mother whispered to him that the spirit of the Corn Mask told the council of your innocence.”
“The spirit told them?” She mused for a minute or two on the time she’d spent in the sweat lodge. It had been dark and hard to see, but she was certain that a blue shape had materialized…. No, she wouldn’t think of that. It smacked too much of things that go bump in the night. “So who did steal the mask?”
“It never happened.”
“Never happened? I saw it broken. They found it under my bed.”
He urged his horse ahead, and she could hear his amused chuckling. “It didn’t happen. Shannon doesn’t exist. You are Spring Rain, wife to Storm Dancer, daughter of Corn Woman.”
“But…”
Storm Dancer turned again to fix her with a reassuring gaze. “Never speak of it again. That act is wiped clean. If the spirit of the Corn Mask is pleased with you, then none can speak against you. Accept it, wife.”
“It makes no sense to me.”
“In time it will. In time our customs will seem normal. In faith, all things are not rational. They just are.” He pointed through the trees. “There. There is our honeymoon home.”
She kicked Badger and the pony broke into a trot. As the deer path opened up, she saw a rise with a hut built into the hillside. If he hadn’t pointed it out, she never would have seen it. The roof and sides were covered in pine boughs so that the cabin blended into the mountain. The pony quickened his trot. Just ahead, between where she was and the shelter, a tiny stream rushed and gurgled through the clearing. Thick grass reached almost to her ankles.
“It’s beautiful,” she said. “A fairy place.”
“Our home,” he said. “For the passing of a moon, four of your weeks. Women have left food and blankets inside. We will have nothing to do but watch the foxes play in the grass, sleep in the sun, and grow fat.”
“And make love?”
“Yes,” he agreed. “I will make love to you so often that you will beg me to go hunting, anything, so long as you can sleep.”
“Never!”
He laughed. “We’ll see about that, heart of my heart. We’ll see.”
As Storm Dancer had promised, they were entirely alone here except for the birds and animals that inhabited this mountain. They did not even keep the horses with them. The morning after they arrived, he’d stripped off the bridles and sent them trotting off home.
“Not enough grass in this valley for them,” he’d explained. “When our moon of loving is up, someone will come for us and bring the horses.”
“But they’ll be safe? Wolves won’t—”
“They are both wise and battle tested. Any wolf that comes head to head with Badger or my black stallion will go home with an empty belly and hoofprints in his side.”
Storm Dancer turned, dropped the bridles, and caught her around the waist and lifted her high in the air. “And now, my yellow-haired woman, I am yours to command. So long as we remain here, my only mission is to do your bidding and bring you joy.”
She raised an eyebrow mischievously. “I may prove a hard taskmistress.”
“Then we’ll have to do something about that.” He lowered her to the ground and dropped onto his knees. She threw her arms around his neck, and, laughing, the two of them rolled over and over in the tall grass.
And, as he had promised, they made love. Neither day nor night mattered. They laughed and played together. He caught trout by lying on his stomach and dangling his hand in the cold water until a fish swam by. Then he would snatch it up and toss it into the grass. Later, they would grill them over the fire and take turns popping morsels of food into each other’s mouths.
They lived on the food the women had brought them, on dried berries and honey, on fish, on squash and vegetables, and on small game. For the month of their aloneness, he would kill no deer, in honor of her clan. Shannon must do no labor, use a knife, or touch the blood of any animal. In this time, she was to be cherished, protected, and cared for by her new husband.
Once, he took her up the mountain where they could watch a sow bear playing in the hollow with her twin cubs, one black, and one russet brown. He taught her to tell the difference between hawks, to watch the young eagles hunting with their parents, and listen for the wild geese flying north.
Storm Dancer delighted in cooking for Shannon, showing her how to find edible mushrooms and greens, and how to turn leaves and blades of grass into whistles. He gathered wildflowers for her, brushed out her long blond hair, and braided it with blossoms and green leaves as adornment. He rubbed special oils into her feet and massaged her arches, then kissed his way from her toes to the crown of her head. Never, in all her life, had
she felt so pampered, so spoiled.
One afternoon, when rain had kept them inside the honeymoon lodge, Storm Dancer amused her by telling her the tale of why the opossum had no fur on its tail, when she remembered something that had troubled her since she’d met him. She listened to the story, laughed in all the right places, and kissed him soundly once he was finished. Then she took his large hands in hers and asked, “Your black stallion, the one you rode here, where did you get him?”
“I raised him from a colt. My father bought a mare from—”
“I wondered,” she said, cutting him off. “When we were on our way west, some white trappers passed through our camp. They had a horse that looked exactly like yours…and like the other animal I saw in the cave.” She looked up into his eyes hopefully, wanting to be told that horses often looked alike, that she must have been mistaken.
“Bearded men,” he answered. Storm Dancer’s mouth became a thin, unsmiling line. “Are you certain you want to know?”
A lump rose in her throat. “Yes, I do.”
“The horses were stolen. Not by me, but by the white trappers. They killed two of my friends, one only fifteen years of age. I followed them and took back the horses.”
“And killed them?”
“No man, white or red, comes to Tsalagi land and sheds blood without paying the price.” He took hold of her shoulders roughly. “Know that I will never harm a hair on your head, but I protect what is mine. I could not call myself a man if I would not fulfill my duty as a warrior of the Wolf Clan and of my nation.”
She nodded. “I understand.”
He enfolded her in his arms. “Do not let this stand between us, wife. You must take me as I am. I do not take life easily. It brings me no joy to kill even an evil man.”
“All right.” She clung to him. “But you would never kill a good person, would you?”
“The Creator forbids it,” he said. “I have killed only to defend my own life or another’s, or to deliver justice to murderers.”
Truth rang in the conviction of his words. Shannon sighed as she pressed her head against his chest and listened to the strong, rhythmic beating of his heart. Storm Dancer readily admitted hunting down the killers of his friends, but he could never have harmed Flynn O’Shea. She had to let that fear dissolve or let doubt destroy her own happiness.
God help me, she prayed silently. I know what it means to be falsely accused. She would accept Storm Dancer’s innocence and never consider the alternative again.
They slept and ate and made love, and the time slipped away until the night air began to take on a bite and they needed to wrap themselves in furs in the early hours of the dawn. And finally, long before Shannon was ready, Flint, and Firefly, and three young warriors came riding into the clearing leading Badger and the black horse. One brave Shannon recognized as Muskrat, a second, Whistler. The third man, she didn’t know by name.
“Greetings,” Storm Dancer called. “What news?”
“The women are beginning to harvest the corn and the pumpkins have turned from green to orange,” his mother answered. “I see neither of you has killed the other yet.”
“She tried,” Storm Dancer teased. “She wore my lance to a short eating knife.”
The young men laughed, and Shannon blushed, but she took it in stride. Much of the Cherokee humor was bawdy, but she’d heard plenty of that at Klank’s tavern. She knew the jesting was in good humor.
“Have you made me a grandfather yet?” Flint asked, swinging down off his dappled gray.
“No more of your nonsense,” Firefly said. “They need not worry about babies yet. Let them enjoy each other for a year or two.”
“We’re planning a great hunt,” Muskrat said. “All of the men are going. The elk are fat in Beaver Valley this year. Your father wanted to go last week, but we didn’t want you to miss out.”
“What do you think?” Storm Dancer asked as he helped his mother down from her brown mare. “Is the time right for hunting elk?”
“Egret Hatching says that two days from now will be the best time. And your father has been scouting the herds. There are fat yearlings ready for good hunters to bring home.”
Firefly handed a covered basket to Shannon. “Leave them to their talk of hunting,” she said. “I’ve brought fresh baked bread and roast goose. Let us go inside and gather your things. After we eat, we will return to the village together.”
Shannon glanced at Storm Dancer. For the first time in weeks, she wasn’t the center of his attention. She sighed. Her mother-in-law was right. It was time to go home, time to help prepare food stores for the coming winter. It was time to leave this special place and return to her new life as Spring Rain.
Shannon looked around the meadow. She didn’t know if they would ever come here again. If they did, it could never be quite the same. She and Storm Dancer would never be quite the same people again. But she would always carry a little of this special spot in her heart, and she could revisit whenever she wished.
“Yes,” she said to Firefly. “Let’s go inside. I want to hear everything that’s happened in the village since we’ve left. How are Oona, and Blue Sky, and my new mother, Corn Woman? And how are Snowberry and her friend Nesting Swan?”
“You cannot guess,” Firefly said. “Nesting Swan thought she was past the age of ever having another baby, but she is with child.”
“Is she happy?” Shannon asked.
“It was her heart’s greatest wish, to give Winter Fox a new son, but he is afraid for her health. Silly man, she glows with health and…”
Shannon smiled as Firefly chatted on. It was as if Firefly had never looked at her with angry eyes, as if she was the favored daughter. Warmth seeped through her. Perhaps Storm Dancer was right. Perhaps she and her mother-in-law could learn to live together peacefully.
Her animosity for the older woman drained away. For her husband’s sake, she would try to start anew. And today seemed a good day to close the door on past unhappiness and welcome the new days and years to come.
Back at the village, Shannon eagerly settled into her new home, a cabin that the women had erected for her as Storm Dancer had told her they would. Her lodge stood at the edge of the clearing, not far from Nesting Swan’s and Snowberry’s houses. She had returned to find her wedding gifts installed in her house as well as stores of food.
“You’ll be well provided for until I can get home with an elk for you to butcher,” Storm Dancer said before kissing her good-bye. “We’ll be gone three days, four at most. You’ll not even notice I’m gone.”
She did notice. The first night she’d slept alone in more than a month, had seemed lonely. But she rose early, eager to accomplish as much as possible in the days that her new husband was off hunting with his friends. She tidied the small cabin, cleared the sleeping platform in case she had visitors, and changed into a clean skirt and vest. Next, she hurried to the creek to bathe and wash her hair before returning to the house for a gathering basket. She’d decided to go to the gardens to help the other women and knew she might need a basket.
But, once back in her lodge, she couldn’t help stopping for just a moment to survey the new home, the first she’d ever had that she could call her own. The lodge was about fifteen paces across, from the entranceway to the back wall, round as a striped melon, with a waterproof, conical roof and a hard-packed clay floor that she could sweep clean.
Strings of dried pumpkin and beans, herbs, dried fish, bags of bear fat, and smaller containers of maple sugar hung from the peeled rafters. New mats lined the floor; kindling and small logs were stacked neatly beside the fire pit, and blankets lined the sleeping platform. Along one curved side hung fishing nets, a hoe, and baskets of all shapes.
There were hooks for Storm Dancer’s weapons, but the only thing that remained was a hatchet, two spears, a blowgun, and a string of fish hooks. His knives, bow, rifle, and powder horn he’d taken on the elk hunt.
“I helped make the fire pit,” Woodpecker procla
imed, poking his head through the doorway. “My mother sent me to bring some of her squirrel stew. Do you like squirrel stew?”
“I do,” Shannon got in before the little boy went on in a great enthusiastic burst of words.
“I brought rocks from the creek for your fire pit. Tadpole would have helped too, if he was here. I miss him a lot. He was my best friend.”
Shannon took the bowl of stew, set it safely aside, and hugged the boy close. “It’s hard to lose good friends,” she agreed. “I’m not as much fun as Tadpole, but I’d like it if you’d be my friend.”
“I will.” He grinned. “And guess what? We’re not going back to our old village. My mother says we are going to live here now. She wants to be near her sisters.”
Shannon was delighted to hear that. Blue Sky was close to her own age, and she liked both her and her husband, Woodpecker’s father.
“I have to go. Two Ponies and some of the other big boys are going swimming.”
Shannon tried to hide her amusement. Two Ponies was a year or two older than Woodpecker, no more. “See, you’ve already found someone to play with.”
“He’s my cousin,” Woodpecker shouted as he dashed out of the lodge.
By the time Shannon had ducked through the open doorway, the boy was already out of sight. She stopped to wave to Oona. Her stepmother was stirring a pot on a fire outside Snowberry’s lodge. Shannon had thought that once she and Storm Dancer returned, Oona would come to live with them, but she found that Oona and baby Acorn were already firmly established in Snowberry’s care.
“It’s better this way,” Corn Woman had advised. “You are newly married and need to be alone with your handsome husband. My sister needs someone to look after. She and Oona are good for each other.” Corn Woman had winked. “And it doesn’t matter if Oona doesn’t talk. Snowberry talks enough for two women.”
This morning, as Oona added pieces of pumpkin to the pot, the baby was safely tucked into her cradleboard and propped up against the side of Snowberry’s cabin. Shannon supposed that Snowberry was already in the cornfield. She’d heard Snowberry say that she wanted to get an early start on harvesting her corn. Shannon thought that if Firefly didn’t ask for her help, she’d offer her services to Snowberry. Next year, she’d be expected to tend her own garden, but this year she could expect a bounty of corn and vegetables from every woman in the Deer Clan.
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