The Captive Heart

by Griep, Michelle;

She held the front door open for Grace. “Come along, little one. We have a hunt ahead of us.”

  Eleanor paused on the porch while Grace worked her way down the few stairs. Cool air whispered through the pine boughs, lifting a wisp of hair across her face. She batted it back, taking strange delight in the way morning sunshine dappled patterns of contrasting greens on the cleared plot of land. England had its woods and forests, but not planted on rising slopes such as this.

  Grace scampered toward the stable, falling once with arms outstretched, but even as she surely must have felt the burn of gravel on the heels of her little hands, she never quit singing. “Edoda, Edoda.”

  Lifting her skirt above her shoe tops, Eleanor descended from the porch and crossed the yard. As soon as she pulled the stable door wide enough for Grace to slip through, the fair-headed pixie darted inside.

  “Edoda!” Whatever the girl babbled about, she emphasized with a shriek.

  By the time Eleanor stepped inside and her eyes adjusted to the dim light, Grace’s happiness folded into a fat-lipped frown. She sat on a brown-furred pelt next to a stack of crates, clearly as rankled as the woolen blanket twisted into a ball near her feet. One stall over, the big horse stamped her hoof and whickered.

  A guilty stain spread over Eleanor’s heart. Clearly this was where Mr. Heath had spent the night. She’d driven the man—her husband—from his own house to sleep in a stable. What kind of woman did that?

  Instantly the shame evaporated, leaving behind a hard set to her jaw. The kind that didn’t want to be married in the first place.

  She snatched a metal bar from the bench near the door and stalked over to the crates, determined to pry the lid off each one until she uncovered some oats. Whether she liked it or not, this was her lot now. She’d make this place the best possible proper-English-home in this backcountry wilderness—or die in the trying. With each wedge of the bar and accompanying lift, wood splintered, but wouldn’t budge.

  “You’ll never aspire to anything higher than a trollop, girl.”

  “Yes, I will. Yes. I. Will!” She hadn’t realized she’d cried the words aloud until little hands wrapped around her legs from behind. She froze, staring at ruined wood. The lid would never be used again, for she’d battered it into nothing more fit than kindling.

  Spent, she let the rod slip from her fingers to the dirt floor, then turned and picked up Grace. “Come on, wee one. I think I know where there is some jerky.”

  She stepped out into the light—and nearly rammed into the broad chest of Mr. Heath. The top of his blue trade shirt was loosely laced. This close, she could see the curve of his collarbone, the hard planes of tanned skin sporting the same dark hair that flew wild from beneath his hat. The morning coolness remained, but why was she so hot?

  She retreated a step. “Good morning, Mr. Heath.”

  Grace twisted in her arms, reaching for the man. “Edoda!”

  He grabbed the girl and swung her high, his long hair rippling with the movement, like a curtain blown back from a glass.

  Curious for a peek at his whole face, Eleanor stretched her neck.

  He bowed his head so quickly, his swath of hair plummeted back into place before she could sneak a glance.

  Settling the girl in one arm, he rested his gaze on Eleanor.

  La! She ought not be so inquisitive about his appearance when she must look every bit the savage herself. She grabbed her hair and pulled it back, holding it at the nape of her neck.

  He smiled. “Looks like you had a rough night, Tatsu’hwa.”

  She licked her lips, stalling. The foreign name chafed, sounding so strange. It was like the wiping of a slate, erasing who she was and forcing her into a creation of his own making. Ought she say something? But what was the alternative? The thought of her Christian name on his lips or worse—wife—was far too intimate. No, better he use his silly, made-up title than that.

  She met his gaze, noting a few stray bits of straw in his hair from his own rough night. “As did you.”

  “Trust me, I’ve had worse.” He winked. “Are you hungry?”

  “Famished.” She spoke loudly to cover the agreeing growl of her stomach.

  “Good. I’ve brought you something.” He set down Grace and unloosed a strap crossing over his chest.

  Oh, no. She would not be drawn into looking at his muscles again. Eleanor shot her gaze to her feet, not wishing a repeat view of his flesh. Two mounds of dun-colored fur landed near her shoes, sending up a puff of dirt where they hit.

  She lifted her face to his, brow crumpling. “What is this?”

  “Rabbit.”

  Her mouth dropped, horrified. Apparently he wanted more than a nursemaid and wife—but she was no cook.

  “Don’t tell me … ahh.” He nodded, and for a moment a wisp of breeze pulled his long hair to the side. He dropped, snatching up the rabbits and giving Grace a bucking ride that made her giggle. When he straightened, he turned slightly, the swath of hair once again hanging like a veil on his left cheek. Was everything about the man secrets and questions?

  “Why don’t you go fetch water, and I’ll skin these for you. This time, anyway.”

  She gaped, trying to gather his words and lay them out in a sensible fashion. Clearly he expected her to do something with the rabbits once the fur had been removed, and worse—she’d be the one doing the skinning in the future. “I am sorry, sir, but porridge is the extent of my culinary skills. I was a governess back in England, not a cook.”

  “Woman, need I remind you that you are not in England anymore?” He nodded toward a large metal bucket sitting next to the stable. “You’ll find water, what there is of it in this drought, at the creek. Think you can manage that?”

  She whirled, unwilling to let him see the flare of insult burning on her cheeks. Beast! He was more an animal than anything roaming these woods.

  Or was he?

  Suddenly the bucket weighed heavy in her hand, and she turned, forcing a light tone to her voice. “There are not any, em, wild animals around here, are there? I mean, this close to the house and all.”

  “You’re in the middle of the backcountry.” He chuckled, shaking his head like a shaggy dog. “Of course there are … bear, wildcats, wolves. But it’s the rogue Shawnee or Creek sneaking up on you with a knife that are the most dangerous.”

  Her heart pounded hard in her chest, yet she stifled any outward sign of fear until she stalked past him. Then she bit her lip, stiffened her shoulders, and swept her gaze from side to side, trying hard not to imagine advancing savages.

  No, indeed. This was not England.

  Samuel laid the rabbit skins out flat in the stable. He grabbed a stretching rack and tied off the first pelt, did the same with the other, then hung them to dry from the rafters.

  Stretching out a kink in his lower back, he eyed the bearskin on the ground. Maybe he ought to grab another one and double it over if this was to be his new bedchamber. He bit back a grin. What would the little governess do if he demanded to sleep under his own roof? In his own bed? The skittish filly would no doubt bolt and run—much as she’d almost done when he’d slapped the rabbit meat on the table. He could yet see the image of her wide eyes, whites as large as a summer moon.

  The shrill cry of a mockingbird shot through the open door. Nothing unusual—except for the repeated seven-note staccato at the end. Inoli’s call. He scrubbed his jaw. Should he invite the man in and introduce him to Red Bird? He snorted at that thought. If a mere rabbit set her skirts akilter, what would meeting a Cherokee warrior do for her constitution? Mayhap better to put that off a day or two.

  But if he joined Inoli for a day in the woods, would the woman be able to manage on her own, her first day here? And should he really neglect once again the smokehouse he ought be building? Put off clearing some farmland? What about the fence? The new pen? All the chores he’d saved for fine weather? No. He really should not run wild instead of tending to business.

  The call came again.
/>   Hang it.

  Snatching his quiver of arrows from a peg near the door, he strapped it on, then grabbed his bow and slung it over a shoulder. He raced outside and sprinted into the woods, legs stretched at full run, breeze fresh on his face. Ahh. He belonged here. Without Grace tied to his back, he ran like a stag, bounding through ravines and leaping over logs.

  Ahead, in a small clearing of mountain fern, stood his brother, black hair pulled tight and falling down his back like a horsetail. Inoli turned at his approach, raising his arm in greeting.

  Samuel shrugged off his bow, threw down the quiver, then launched his full weight atop his brother. Air rushed out of Inoli’s lungs as they hit the ground. They wrestled like lads of twelve, one gaining the upper hand, only to be taken out at the knees with the next strike.

  Finally, breathing hard, Samuel pinned Inoli to the dirt. “Enough?”

  His brother turned aside and spit out blood from a split lip. “Eligwu!”

  Samuel pulled back and half stood, resting his hands on his thighs as he drank in air.

  Inoli rolled over and swiped his hand across his mouth, then speared him with a black stare. “Why does Ya’nu strike?”

  “Why does my brother send women to my door? And don’t bother denying it. I know you had a hand in telling Running Doe about me taking a wife.” He strode to where he’d cast off his weapons.

  By the time he returned, Inoli stood with folded arms. “Running Doe is not happy.”

  He cuffed his brother on the back. “Then maybe you should be the one to bring her happiness, my brother.”

  “Pah! She will have none but you—and well you know it.”

  “Then she will have none.” He shrugged. “I am a married man now.”

  They turned in unison and headed into the woods, their moccasins silent on the deer path. Samuel narrowed his eyes. Overgrown fern fronds brushed against his shins. Ash and hickory volunteers flattened beneath his step. Though squirrels chattered and insects buzzed a low drone, no large animals had traversed this trail for quite some time.

  When the path widened, Inoli gained his side, creeping up like a shadow. “How goes it?”

  He cocked a brow at his brother. “I slept in the stable last night.”

  Inoli’s shoulders shook with held-in laughter. “White women know nothing of passion.”

  “Maybe not.” Or maybe … He batted away a persistent mosquito diving for his brow. Something flared in the Englishwoman’s cheeks whenever he stood too near. Fear, most likely, but she held it in check—and that took strength. “Grace will benefit from her, I think. The woman is intelligent and learned.”

  Inoli grunted. “At least you are free to hunt unhindered again.”

  The woods thinned, and they paused at the edge of a narrow-throated meadow. Inoli squatted and pulled out a pouch of pemmican. He took a bite, then handed some over.

  Samuel crouched beside him, chewing. He savored the salty sweetness, for his next words would leave a bitter taste. “I spoke with Ben Sutton in town yesterday.”

  His brother’s eyes shot to his.

  “He gave me this.” He reached into a pouch at his side and pulled out a small deerskin scrap with a crude map drawn in black. “Lifted it off a trader come from Keowee, making for Charles Towne.”

  Inoli traced the painted strokes with his finger, his lips forming the names of nearby rivers and landmarks, yet no sound came out. Eventually, lines hardened at the sides of his mouth, and his neck stiffened. “This is our land.”

  Samuel nodded. “That is right, my brother. It is as we suspected. Attakullakulla is making plans—plans of which the Sons must be told. Yet I daren’t leave Grace and Red Bird—”

  “Red Bird?” A furrow plowed across Inoli’s brow.

  He’d laugh at the sight, if the gravity of the future of their lands weren’t drawn out for sale on a piece of animal skin.

  “My wife,” he said simply.

  Inoli stared off into the meadow, as if reason might be found in the sway of the grasses. “You do not use her un’ega name?”

  “I will not. I tried civilized life with Mariah, and look how that turned out.” He rubbed the tightness in his neck, a vain attempt to smooth memories too knotted to ever be undone. “As I said, I daren’t leave the woman and Grace alone to make the trek to Charles Towne. Red Bird can hardly fetch water without fainting from fear. Before I venture away for days on end, I need to teach her some defense skills. Wouldn’t hurt to teach her to cook something other than porridge, either.”

  Inoli watched him, his sharp ears hearing the unspoken. They were two sides of the same blade—for he’d have done the same.

  “What are you asking, Ya’nu?”

  He scrubbed the last bits of pemmican from his lips. “I need you to make the run this time.”

  The caw of an overhead crow rode the crest of Inoli’s rumble of dissent. “I do not have enough English words.”

  “No need.” With one more reach inside the pouch, he pulled out another scrap, this one of rag paper, smaller, rolled into a tight coil, and sealed in wax. He held it out in an open palm. “I never meet my contact face-to-face anyway. Just slip into Circular’s Graveyard, off Meeting Street. In the third to last row, closest to the hedges, there’s a skull engraved on the fifth headstone, a space carved out in the mouth. Name on the stone is Simmons, though I doubt that information will do you any good. Tuck these inside the hole—but watch your back.”

  Inoli’s lips straightened into a line, unreadable in every sense, yet he reached for the note and the map.

  A movement on the far side of the lea drew both their faces aside. The smallest flash of fawn rustled in the undergrowth, maybe twenty-five yards off. They stood together, the quick jut of Inoli’s chin handing him the privilege.

  He frowned, but shrugged off his bow and reached for an arrow. It was certainly no privilege that he’d just handed his brother—it was a death sentence should Inoli be caught by the English.

  And his own life if they tortured his name from his brother’s mouth.

  Chapter 10

  Cool night air crept across the floor and wrapped around Eleanor’s ankles, working its way up her legs beneath her skirt. If the front door had blown open, she sure hadn’t heard the gust of wind. She turned from the table she’d fashioned out of planks, then froze in place. Her husband had not only entered, but had already shut the front door and hung his hat on a peg. How could a man that big move with such silence? His gaze darted from the newly made table, to a mug of wildflowers she’d picked with Grace, then swept the perimeter, taking in the straightened crates, the pots hung on a wall instead of heaped in a pile, and the folded pile of Grace’s clothing set sweetly in a basket.

  His lips parted, but it took awhile before sound came out. “What have you done?”

  Clasping her hands in front of her, she lifted her chin. “This place was in need of some tidying up, Mister—”

  His dark eyes shot to hers, and she clamped her mouth. Though he’d told her to call him otherwise, his name stuck in her throat, scraping it raw. It was too intimate to call the man Samuel, yet Heath seemed so harsh, something the likes of a pirate might catcall.

  And husband was out of the question.

  So she stood there, biting her lower lip, saying nothing.

  “Well.” He kept his voice even, the half of his face she could see as stoic as a rune stone and about as impossible to read. “Looks like you had quite the busy time of it.”

  Was he pleased? Angry? What? The longer she stood there trying to decipher the curve of his shoulders and set of his jaw, the larger her uncertainty grew—until it nearly squashed her beneath the weight.

  Oh, bother! Why care what the man thought? He’d been gone all day, leaving her to fend for herself and Grace. Desperate for her hands to do something other than twist into knots, she swept her arm toward the table. “Would you like some dinner?”

  His brow disappeared into the dark swath of hair covering his forehe
ad. “I already ate dinner at noon. Around here we call the evening meal supper. But in answer to your question, aye … I’ve a fair appetite.”

  In six long strides, he crossed the floor and straddled the barrel she’d hauled in.

  She stood near her own barrel, opposite his, waiting for the brute to rise until she sat.

  He merely picked up his knife.

  She cleared her throat, several times over.

  Finally, he cocked his head, suspending his speared piece of meat over the pot at center. “I suspect you’ve got something to say.”

  A retort sat on the edge of her tongue, prickly and condemning. She swallowed it back. Why should she presume a wild man to know anything about manners?

  “A gentleman waits for a lady to take her seat first,” she explained.

  “That so?” He grunted like the animal he was. But to his credit, he set the meat back in the pot and rose, towering over her. “That better?”

  “Much.” She awarded him a half smile, then spread her skirt over the barrel as she sat. The movement cut her stays into the bruises on her ribs, and she stifled a moan. Before he could load up his plate, she held out hers. “And a gentleman always serves a lady first, as well.”

  His barrel groaned as he shifted—or had the noise come from his throat? No matter, for he skewered a piece of the rabbit she’d boiled all day and scraped it onto her plate, using the rim to lever it off.

  A horrid odor wafted up from the grey chunk of meat in front of her, similar to the way leather shoes smelled when they’d been worn one too many times. She pressed down her knife—for knives were the only utensils she’d found—yet the meat in no way gave to the pressure. So she employed a sawing action, only to have the rabbit skate from one edge of the plate to the other. She dared a peek across the table, where he fared no better.

  “The meat may be a little overcooked, I think.” Oh, that was brilliant. Her conversational skills suffered as much as she in this godforsaken country.

  He wrapped his big fingers like a fist around the knife handle, then stabbed the point into his meal, pausing before popping the piece into his mouth. “I hauled home some venison today. Maybe you’ll fare better with that.”