She desperately waited for him to speak, but he barely even acknowledged her presence, even though they were molded intimately together on the back of the horse as they rode through the darkness. Several times, Meadow had felt his hold on her grow slack, and she had feared that he was going to lose consciousness and fall off the horse. She had asked him repeatedly if he was well, but his only reply had been a quick grunt. She tightened her grasp on his arms where they encircled her waist, and each time, to her relief, she felt him straighten up again. Still, he was growing weaker with every passing mile.
As the first streak of daylight broke through a starless sky, they reached an area where a hillside harbored a small cave. Meadow slid to the ground and grabbed the pack tied to the back of the horse and then reached up to help Black Horse down. He refused her help as he eased down to the ground. She opened her mouth to speak.
“No, not now,” Black Horse said in a tired voice.
She nodded her head. The pained expression on his face told her that now was not the time to try to talk to him. In the growing daylight, his poor condition was more evident than ever. The sight of his face—swollen and discolored, it was obvious, by beatings—made her knees weak and her stomach twist. There was hardly an inch of his body that did not appear to be black and blue, but the dirt that covered his skin made it difficult to determine the severity of his injuries. Though he was coated with filth from the white man’s prison, Meadow could tell how thin his frame had become. She would nurse him back to health, and as she never planned to leave his side again, he would have no choice but to listen to her reasons for being at Fort Keogh with the white soldiers. She would make him understand—somehow! She only hoped that the wound of the betrayal he believed she had committed would heal faster than his other injuries.
“There are no animals or snakes,” Walks Tall announced after he checked the interior of the cave. He reached out to help Black Horse enter the cave, and when he glanced at Meadow, he gave her a reassuring grin.
“The others and I will take care of the horses and find a place to hide them,” Walks Tall said.
“I’ll try to make him as comfortable as possible,” Meadow said as she bent down to enter the small opening at the mouth of the cave behind Black Horse. The inside of the cave was small, only about six feet wide and maybe double that in length, and not high enough for even Meadow to stand up straight. Black Horse hunched down and made his way to the back of the cave. He said nothing as Meadow spread out the fur blanket that she had in her pack. The heavy sigh he gave was the only sound he made as he laid back. There was enough light coming through the cave entry that she could see that his eyes were already closed. She took one of the medicine pouches out of her pack and removed a soft cloth. She dampened it with water from her flask and gently began to wipe the dirt from his upper body. Afterward, she carefully packed the cuts that she could see on his chest and stomach with a mixture of the herbs and powders that were in the bag. She noticed that there was a deep scar on his left shoulder, only inches from his heart, and it did not match the old scars that had been made during the Sun Dance Ceremony when he was inducted into manhood. This scar was from a much more recent wound. Meadow wondered if this was where the soldiers had shot him when he had been captured. She rubbed a tiny bit of bear grease on the scar. He slept through the entire process.
With a weary moan, she leaned against the hard wall of the cave as she listened to him sleep. She had so many things to tell him, but would he even want to hear them?
“You should try to rest, too,” Walks Tall said as he ducked into the cave opening. “We have plenty of men to keep watch.”
“Do you think they followed us?” Meadow asked.
He shrugged. “Maybe, but they had prisoners going every direction at the fort.” He shrugged again. “Even if they did come, they will not catch us before we cross over into Canada. The American soldiers cannot follow us there.”
The confidence in his voice gave Meadow a very small amount of hope that there was a chance that they could find some sort of peace, once they returned to their village. Then, Walks Tall spoke again.
“We are not going to travel far into Canada. Only far enough to make sure the American soldiers have given up on catching us.”
“Where will we go?” Meadow glanced down at Black Horse. “He needs time to heal.”
“He will get it, but not in Canada, and not at the Sioux village. After Black Horse’s escape from the prison, the Americans will ask the Canada soldiers to help them bring him back for punishment. We will put the entire village in danger if we are anywhere near there.” Walks Tall sat down at the front of the cave opening where he could see the landscape below. “We will be staying here in Montana until he is better. There is a small band of Oglala Sioux in the mountains that we will join for a while, and eventually we will travel back to our homelands in the Dakota Territory,” he added.
“We can’t,” Meadow gasped. “It’s too dangerous.”
“There is no place that is safe for our people anymore, but at least here we have a chance for survival. In Canada, we do nothing but wait to starve to death or die of disease.” He looked at his sleeping friend. “That is not an acceptable death for men like us.”
Meadow knew there was no use arguing with him. His mind was made up, and Black Horse would undoubtedly agree with him. So, where did that leave her and Gentle Water? Her dear friend believed that she had a future with Walks Tall, and Meadow wondered what would become of her once Black Horse woke up.
“I thought I was dreaming,” Black Horse whispered when he opened his eyes. “But then I saw you, my brother, and I knew this was real.”
A smile bloomed on Walks Tall’s face. “I can tell you are doing better. I wasn’t too sure about you when I first saw you in that white man’s prison. You are lucky you had a good medicine woman to care for you.”
Black Horse ignored the other man’s comment. He grimaced as he rose up to a sitting position and let his eyes adjust to the dim light in the cave. He took the water flask Walks Tall held out to him and drank deeply. He could feel Meadow’s presence beside him as she stirred slightly. “Why did you allow her to come with us? She does not belong here.”
“She saved your life. I foolishly believed you were dead all of this time. If not for Meadow, I never would have known that you did not die that day you were attacked by the soldiers.”
“I saw her at the fort, dressed in the clothes of a white woman and surrounded by our enemies,” Black Horse said, his voice filled with venom. “She said she would never leave the Sioux, but I saw her with my own two eyes!” His voice grew louder, and he noticed that Meadow began to move slightly as if she was waking up. Black
Horse scooted as far away from her as the cramped area would allow him to move.
“There is much that has happened,” Walks Tall retorted. “You must understand that we all thought you had been killed.”
“But she said she would never leave the Sioux, no matter what happened. She wasn’t as strong as I thought she was.”
Walks Tall lowered his eyes to the dark ground. “White Buffalo was gone, and we thought you were, too.”
Silence engulfed the dark cave for a moment as Black Horse digested this sad news. “But she ran off to be with her own kind, instead of returning to our village when the Blackfoot released her?” he finally asked in a low voice.
“There is much more, but it is her story to tell. I’ll check the horses and give the two of you some time to talk.”
Even after Walks Tall exited from the cave, the silence remained. Black Horse knew Meadow was awake, because he had heard her sniff as if she was crying. His pride would not allow him to be the first to speak.
Meadow pushed herself up to a sitting position and wiped away the tears that escaped down her cheeks. She searched for the right words. He would only give her one chance. “I don’t even know how to begin to tell you what the past several months have been like—”
“You were there, surrounded by white men,” Black Horse interrupted, “dressed as a white woman and acting like one, even after you had told me that you would never return to the whites.” His voice trembled as all
his hurt and anger came rushing out, “Your promise—and that night we shared together—meant nothing to you.”
His callous words caused a deep pain to slice through Meadow’s heart. Did he really believe that she would turn her back on her adoptive people?
“I thought you were dead,” she cried. “And White Buffalo was gone, too. I was a burden to everyone in the village. Even Sitting Bull thought I should go with the Mounties. I went, but only because I had to know what happened to you. In my heart I couldn’t believe that you were dead, and I was right.”
“Sioux women do not become traitors when their men are gone—they survive. But you had a choice didn’t you? You’ve always had a choice. Lucky for you that Mountie saved you from becoming my wife. I used to think I would hunt him down someday and kill him for what he had done, but now I think I should just thank him.”
The coldness of his voice made Meadow wince. She was glad the dimness in the cave did not allow her to see clearly the hatred she knew must be in his eyes. “My choice was to be with you—ever since the first moment I saw you—and that will never change.” Meadow answered in a quivering voice.
The permeating quiet made the atmosphere almost unbearable, and she felt as if she couldn’t breathe. She would not beg him to forgive her, because she had not done anything wrong. He had to realize that what she did was because of their love and her devotion to her adoptive people, and until he was ready to accept the truth, there was nothing else to say.
She crawled past Black Horse and out through the
narrow opening of the cave, and he said not a word. By the time she had stood up in the open, the sting of his rejection was ripping a hole in her heart, and she could not stop shivering. She wrapped her arms tightly around herself and glanced out at the broad expanse of prairie that stretched out below the hill where she now stood. The tall grasses were a goldenrod color and blew slightly with the breeze. Almost a whole year had passed since she had first set eyes on her beloved Black Horse, and so much had happened since then, most of it bad. They had had such a brief time of happiness during their courtship, and that one perfect night. Was it enough?
She sighed heavily. For as far as Meadow could see, there did not seem to be anything other than the waving prairie grass and a few distant hills. As badly as she had wanted to return to their homelands here on this side of the border, she almost wished now that she was back in the deep forests of Canada. At least there she could hide behind the tallest tree while her heart shattered into a million tiny pieces.
“We should not spend much more time here,” Walks Tall said as he walked up the slope. “The others are getting the horses ready.”
Meadow blinked back the tears as she tried not to meet his inquiring gaze. She did not want him to see her cry any more than she wanted Black Horse to.
“He has been through a horrible ordeal, Meadow. Give him time to heal. He will understand.”
She shook her head in a defeated gesture. “I’m not sure that he will. He only sees an enemy when he looks at me now.”
Walks Tall reached out and rested his hand gently
on her shoulder. “But his love for you will eventually overcome his anger.”
“What do I do until then?” She looked directly into Walks Tall’s eyes, hoping to see the answer, but he seemed to be nearly as worried as she was. “I knew it might be difficult to make him understand, but he does not even want to hear my explanation.”
“I will talk to him,” Walks Tall replied.
“There’s nothing to talk about,” Black Horse said as he climbed out of the cave. “She did not remain true to our people, and for that, I can never forgive her.”
As he straightened up to his full height and started walking toward them, the agony he still felt was obvious. He grimaced with each step. His wounds, however, looked much better since Meadow had cared for them. She thought his pain would eventually go away—unlike hers.
“We need to get moving,” the war chief stated in a flat tone. He did not look at Meadow again as he limped past her and started down the incline.
With a heavy heart, she began to follow the two men to where the horses were tied. When they reached the horses, Meadow held back, not sure if Black Horse would ride with her again. He walked to one of the spare horses and mounted. A sharp pain tore through her breast as she climbed onto her horse alone. She let her horse fall in behind his when they headed out. He made no effort to speak to her throughout the long day.
They did not stop riding until darkness set in and the horses began to trip over rocks or uneven ground. By the time the sun had disappeared Meadow had convinced herself that no matter what happened between
her and Black Horse, she would never regret what she had done to save him from certain death in the white man’s prison. She only hoped that someday he would realize the depth of her love.
“We should stop for the night,” Walks Tall announced, after his horse stumbled for the third time.
“Yes, I think we are far enough now that the soldiers will not catch up to us,” Black Horse answered.
Meadow noticed that he sounded exhausted, and for the past few miles she had seen his body slumping farther and farther down on the back of his horse. A couple times she had thought about suggesting that they stop, but anything she recommended would probably not be welcome. She sighed with relief when Black Horse decided to make camp for the night.
She sipped water from the flask Walks Tall offered, and then handed it to Black Horse, who took it from her without saying a word.
“We should reach the camp at Hidden Springs in two days’ ride, but we will have to slow our pace. The ponies are tired,” Walks Tall said. He handed each of them a strip of jerky. “We should find food, too.”
“Ask a couple of the warriors to go hunting for small game, but tell them to use arrows or knives, not guns. We can’t take any chances,” Black Horse said as he reached toward the spot on his hip where his knife sheath usually hung. He pulled his hand away slowly and turned back toward his horse.
As if he knew what was going through the war chief’s mind, Walks Tall pulled out a brown leather sheath that hung from a worn leather belt from his saddlebag and handed it to the other man. A nod of Black Horse’s
head was his only reply as he took the gift and wrapped the tattered belt around his waist.
Meadow watched the men’s exchange in silence. She would make him a new sheath, and it would be sewn with love.
Black Horse grabbed the pack from the back of her horse and removed a fur blanket and a smaller woven one. He held the fur blanket out to Meadow.
She opened her mouth to argue with him about which of them needed the heavy blanket worse—he was wearing nothing more than a breechcloth and the ragged leggings—but decided it would be useless. She took the fur blanket and retreated to a spot by a nearby clump of sagebrush. The men tied the horses to the sturdiest bushes they could locate in the darkness, and then they all settled down for a restless and uncomfortable night.
Wrapped tightly in the fur, Meadow did not even see where Black Horse had bedded down. A terrible hurt gripped her heart when she thought of him lying alone on the cold, hard ground with nothing more than the flimsy cover, especially after all the torturous months he had spent at that horrible prison. She had heard Walks Tall offer him his fur blanket, too, but he had stubbornly refused.
Meadow could not make her eyes close without seeing Black Horse’s eyes filled with hatred every time he looked at her, or hearing the sound of his cold words when he had said she was a traitor to the Sioux. He thought she had chosen the easy path by going to the fort. She knew that life as a white woman was simpler than the hard life of an Indian, but if all she wanted
was an easy life, she could have stayed with Brandon Cornett or her brother. They would have taken care of her. But she had chosen to return to the Sioux, and until he realized her loyalty to them there was nothing else she could do.
As tired as she was, sleep would not come on this night, so Meadow rolled onto her back and stared up at the velvet black sky that sparkled with millions of stars. White Buffalo and Little Squirrel were up there with
Wakan Tanka
, and she sensed that they were watching out for her even now. They would always be her guiding lights, and she knew that they would never lead her astray. That was why she was here now.
The night was not totally dark, and by the light of the nearly full moon she could see Walks Tall and the other warriors snuggled up in their blankets. Somewhere close by she knew a couple of the men stood watch over the camp. She closely searched the area until she spotted Black Horse’s form curled into a tight ball beneath a shaggy sage bush far away from the other men. She was sure, by the way he was huddled up, that he must be freezing.
Slipping from beneath her cozy fur, Meadow rose up to her feet and gathered up the blanket. As quietly as her clumsy, boot-clad feet could carry her, she crossed over to where Black Horse lay and carefully laid the blanket over him. He did not react to the gesture, but when Meadow started to turn to walk away, she was stopped abruptly when his hand reached out and grabbed her ankle.
She gasped. “I—I was unable to sleep, and I thought you needed the fur more than I did.” His tight grasp on her ankle remained for a few more seconds, but
then he pulled his hand back as if he had been bitten by a rabid dog.
“Thank you,” he muttered. “For the blanket and tending to my wounds. You did well.” He rolled over.
Meadow hesitated. She wanted to tell him about her decision to continue with her father’s work, but his silence told her that this was not the time. She turned to walk away, holding her breath; she still hoped that he would say something else. But the night engulfed her as she walked away from him. Each step that took her farther from him grew harder, and the pain in her chest threatened to break her heart in two. How could she even continue to breathe if he never wanted to be with her again?
When it seemed she could not make her feet take one more step, Meadow twirled around. She would run back to him, and tell him again why she had been in the fort, and this time she would not stop until he really did understand. But she had barely turned around when she was pulled up hard against his lean body. He had moved so quietly that she had not even heard him come up behind her. She gasped as his warm lips claimed hers.
His kisses were so filled with demand that they were almost painful and rough. Meadow responded urgently. They had been apart far too long to worry about tenderness now. She raked her fingers through the tangled mass of his waist-length hair and drew herself even closer against him. Their lips melded in hungry kisses, and she felt him pull up one of her legs until it was wrapped up around his hip. His manhood pressed rock-hard into her abdomen, causing such a fierce ache in her loins that it made her feel faint.
As her body swayed in his arms, Black Horse seemed to sense her weakness and with one swift motion swept her up from the ground and into his arms. Meadow moaned weakly as she let her entire body grow limp within his embrace. His sudden burst of strength surrounded and protected her, and at that moment she realized that every beat of her heart depended on this man’s touch.
He carried her to the more secluded spot where he had just been lying. The fur felt cool against her back as Black Horse placed her on top of the thick blanket. As he lowered himself down next to her, he grabbed one end of the fur and rolled it over both of them so that they were huddled together within its warmth and protection.