“I will be willing for that kiss whenever you are,” Bear Claw said.
Her eyes widened and she turned away. She didn’t know if he was teasing her. But was he? He had never hidden the fact that he was attracted to her. She watched as he walked away. She didn’t know what desire felt like. She had never lain with a man. But she used to read books written by the female librarians. Romance books of men and women who fell in love and did things married people used to. When she read those books, she had felt warm. She had stopped reading them when Samuel carted them away, calling them sinful tools right before burning them into ashes. Yet, the memories remained with her. As much as she had been the one who had fended for her and her mother, she had lived a rather closeted life when it came to men. She’d had a few callers, but she had always been too busy to attend to their feelings for her. Samuel had intended to marry her off when he got married to her mother, to a young missionary who looked just like him. Thankfully, it was the first, and probably the last time her mother stood her ground, insisting that Hannah wasn’t ready for marriage. The few times she had spent with that young missionary, he had not caused such a stir in her like the savage did.
Her feelings confused her. And they scared her. How could she feel such for a man who had kidnapped her? She was supposed to hate him. The sooner she left here, the better it would be, and her strange feelings would stop, she told herself.
Chapter 9
“The people are warming up towards your woman,” Sparrow said.
Bear Claw had gone to see the old woman in her tepee. The woman sat surrounded by her herbs, and totems. She looked at peace. In her old age, he saw a bit of his mother, her younger sister in her.
He nodded. The hostility and curiosity still lingered, but it was little. But would things change when he made aware his intention for her?
“Do you know why?” Sparrow asked.
He looked to her, knowing she would answer without his response.
“She made you laugh.”
He lifted a brow. “I laugh.”
Sparrow smiled, she leaned towards him, caressing his face with her old hands, the smell of camwood which she rubbed all day over her body drifted to him comfortingly.
“It has been a long time since you were free. Since you let down your guard and let someone in. The woman made you laugh. She made you dance. No one has seen you that way since.”
Since he lost his parents he completed. He had thought he put up a good front, burying his emotions and happiness for the betterment of his people. He barely got time to indulge as his mind were always on protecting his people. While he dined, he wondered if adding extra men to the gate would be better. While he rode, he thought of the harvest they would yield. Barely, did he get time for himself. And he had accepted his fate. It was the curse of being a leader. To sacrifice all for his people. To choose another life was to be selfish and greedy, and he had seen too many of such leaders be destroyed by their people as well as their greed.
“It is good, that they like her,” Bear Claw said.
“How does she fare?” Sparrow asked.
“She fares well,” Bear Claw said. Women were complex beings to understand. White devil. Native Indians. They were all the same complex beings. One moment she was warm towards him, smiling and laughing. And the next, she was cold, eager to be out of his presence. He never could clearly figure her out. But what he did know was that she desired him, even if she tried so hard to hide it. He saw it in the little shy looks she threw at him. He saw it when she watched him, thinking he wasn’t aware of her gaze on him. Yet, she fought so hard to accept what it was between them. Was he that disgusting that she couldn’t be with him?
“The right time will come,” Sparrow said, placing a hand over his.
He scoffed. He was tired of waiting for the right time. He wanted to be with her now. The flap of the teepee opened, and Rain Cloud came in. He was one of the lads at the gates.
“We have visitors,” Rain Cloud announced.
At the gate was a small party, one of whom he recognized very well. It was his sister White Dove. She had left years ago to be married into the tribe of Arapaho, a marriage which had been arranged by his father. A union they all regretted. Her husband was the reincarnate of the devil, for he had abused his sister with his fists and his words. Several times, Bear Claw had tried to bring his sister back home, but she had been with shame, and felt she amounted to nothing, something her husband had caused. She had chose to remain in the dwellings of her husband. As much as Bear Claw had spited him, and had wanted to get rid of him for good, he had respected his sister’s decision, for he who wore the shoe, knew where it pinched.
His sister had aged since the last time he saw her. She looked tired. Weak. Unhappy. She rushed into his arms, and his hands went around her as she wept. Anger whelmed in him. He should have removed the head of her husband and placed it at her foot. A sweet and kind woman she had been, but now she was an empty shell. He should have pushed harder and brought her home.
Aiyana, hearing the news of their sister’s return hurried towards them. He let go of White Dove and his sisters embraced. He looked to the small party that had escorted her, and glared at them. They were made of mostly men, with a few women. None of them had stopped their kin from hurting his sister. They had let his atrocities go.
“Bear Claw, they are not to blame,” his sister held his arm, clearly reading his thoughts.
“I will kill him,” Bear Claw said.
“You do not have to. He’s dead,” his sister said. There was no sorrow in her voice. And he expected none. No one should feel sorrow for a wretched man like her husband.
“How?” he asked. Had his sister summoned the bravery to kill him? The clans did not take to such murders, regardless of the cruelty. Life was sacred to them, and war was the only valid reason for death.
“He was mauled. By his horse on the terrain,” White Dove said.
“Was his death swift?”
White Dove shook her head, a smile on her face. “He stayed three days before he joined the other world.”
