“Good. I am their great-grandfather. Four of the children belong to Pretty Bird, Hawk’s cousin, sister to Blade, Ice Raven, and Willow. Two belong to their brother Red Fox, who died in battle.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“Thank you. So what do you think of us?”
“I think…I think that I still have a great deal to learn. I know that Sioux must be brave, strong, generous, and wise. I hope that you’ll be—generous with me. I—” She broke off again. “What do you think of me?” she asked him.
He was a great deal like his grandson—noncommittal. “I have much to learn,” he said.
She smiled, lowering her lashes, nodding and accepting his words.
“What do you want me to think of you?” he asked.
“I—I want you to like me,” she admitted.
“Because of Hawk?”
She looked at him, hesitated, then nodded.
He smiled and told her, “My English is good. My grandson and my son-in-law taught me to speak English. I do not share the fact that I speak it often.”
“I will never tell anyone,” Skylar promised.
He nodded sagely, then shook his old head as if in disgust. “I’m glad that you wish to learn. The whites, they are so quick to judge us. They think of us all as one out here on the plains. They talk of us being savages. You cannot imagine the things that have been done.” He lifted a hand, indicating the slim, immaculate white-haired woman with her neatly tied braids. “Deer Woman lived among our allies, the Northern Cheyenne. They are a people who call themselves the Human Beings, a fine people.”
She smiled. “Naturally, they are a fine people. They are your allies.”
“Yes. Good people. Our allies.” He had a wonderful smile. A strange wisdom. He could laugh at himself while speaking the truth with all seriousness. “The whites often say that the Sioux are the most warlike tribe on the plains. We didn’t seek war with them. There were things that we were promised. Certain lands that were to be ours until the grass no longer grew, the wind no longer drifted and bellowed over the plains, the sky was no longer blue. Cheyenne camped along the Washita at peace. The women worked with their awls, and the men cleaned their hunting rifles. The winter snows were on the ground. Children played, babies cried. The white soldiers’ bugles started to call. Their horses were racing through the snow, dozens and dozens of them. They pounded into the village, shooting, clubbing, setting fire to tipis. They didn’t care if they shot warriors, ancients, children, women, babies. Deer Woman’s daughter was killed with one child in her womb, one in her arms. The blood spilled over the snow in great pools. If we are savage, then what are whites? Deer Woman was left for dead herself. There were few survivors. So you see, granddaughter, we are all many things, and I am glad that you have eyes to see beyond what one sees first.”
“Thank you,” she murmured.
The old woman, Deer Woman, finished with Skylar’s feet and looked at her. She went away for a moment and then returned and hunched down before her, pressing the beautiful garment she had been working on into Skylar’s hands and talking to her. Skylar looked at her, listening. The woman spoke kindly, but Skylar had no idea of what she was saying.
Hawk’s grandfather interpreted for her.
“Deer Woman says you must take the dress.”
“Oh! It’s beautiful. But I couldn’t accept it?—”
“You must accept it. You have brought us ponies and cattle. The ponies are survival, the cattle are a feast. You will wear thedress and accept the other presents the woman have made for you.”
“The women?”
She heard a giggling. There were a number of women at the entrance to the tipi. They had been there, peeking in, watching her, she realized.
The pretty girl who had kept the children occupied while she ate rose, laughing. She drew Skylar to her feet and led her out of the tipi.
The women touched her, spinning her around. For a moment, there were so many of them, reaching for her hair, her gown, that she felt a rise of panic. She’d heard what Sioux women could do when torturing prisoners or stripping the bodies of dead enemies.
But these women were giggling, not hurting her. Perhaps, somewhere in the village, there would be those who might despise her for what she was. But these women offered her no malice. They were curious. She wished desperately that she could speak with them, know them, know their lives.
Suddenly, her arms were caught, and she was led forward.
And shown her present.
She gasped, amazed, touched. She thanked them profusely. And she was certain that they understood.
Because they were Sioux—Siouxwho were also wasi-chus, white—and because they had just come from their other world, Hawk and Sloan, who was called Cougar-in-the-Night among his father’s people, spent several hours engaging in the purification rite of the sweat bath, inipi. They atoned there for whateverwrongs they might have committed and cleansed themselves of outside forces.
