The Spirit Path (8 page)

“The
Wakinyan
of the north is red. The
Wakinyan
of the east is yellow and the fourth is white. He has no eyes and no ears, yet he can see and hear. No one ever sees a whole thunderbird, though very holy men sometimes see a part of it in dreams and visions.”

“Have you ever seen him?” Maggie asked.

“No, but Heart-of-the-Wolf once saw his wings.”

“Tell me another of your beliefs.”

“You are not like other whites,” Shadow Hawk mused. “You speak our language, you do not frown on our ways. I think perhaps your heart is more red than white.” He smiled down at her, pleased that her eyes were no longer filled with unhappiness. “Have you heard the story of how the Lakota came to be?”

“No. Tell me.”

“Long ago, when the earth was still young,
Unktehi
,
the water monster, fought the people and caused a great flood. No one knows why. Perhaps
Wakán Tanka
was angry with the people. Maybe he let
Unktehi
win because he wanted to make a better kind of human being.

“The water got higher and higher until everything was underwater except for one hill where the sacred red pipestone quarry now stands. The people climbed the hill to save themselves, but it was no use. The water swept them all away and everyone was killed. Their blood formed a pool and the pool turned to pipestone and created the quarry. That is why the pipe, made of that red rock, is sacred to our people. It is made from the flesh and blood of our ancestors; the stem is the backbone of those people long dead, the smoke is their breath.

“After the flood,
Unktehi
was turned to stone. Her bones can be seen in the Badlands even today.

“Only one girl survived the flood, saved by a big spotted eagle.
Wanblee Galeshka
carried the girl to the top of a tall tree which stood on the highest pinnacle of the
Paha Sapa
. It was the only place not covered by water.
Wanblee
kept the beautiful girl and made her his wife. Soon she got pregnant and bore him twins, a boy and a girl.

“When the water finally disappeared,
Wanblee
helped the children and their mother down from the rock and put them on earth and they grew up. After the mother died, he was the only man and she was the only woman and they married and had children and became
Lakota Oyate
,
a Great Nation.”

“It’s like Adam and Eve and Noah and the Flood all rolled into one,” Maggie mused.

Shadow Hawk looked puzzled. “Adam and Eve?”

“It is our belief that Adam and Eve were the first man and the first woman. God, the Father, put them in a beautiful garden and told them to multiply and replenish the earth. He told them they might partake of the fruit of every tree in the garden, save the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. But Eve disobeyed God and ate the forbidden fruit, and they were sent out of the garden.”

Hawk grunted softly. “And No-ah?”

“He lived in a time of great wickedness and God decided to send a flood to cover the earth and destroy all the children he had created. But Noah found grace in the eyes of Lord and he built a great ship called an ark and saved his family.”

Shadow Hawk nodded, his gaze meeting Maggie’s, making her pulse begin to race.

“It’s amazing, isn’t it?” she said. “I mean, imagine two cultures as different as ours producing such similar tales.”

She looked at the Black Hills, feeling their magic even as she felt the magic in the hand that rested lightly on her shoulder. She could feel Shadow Hawk’s dark-eyed gaze resting on her face, could feel the mysterious bond that had drawn them together growing stronger. Had her loneliness truly called to him across the years? Was that why he was here? And what would she do when he was gone?

She could not, would not, let herself begin to care.

Shadow Hawk was riding the black stallion in the corral the next day when Bobby climbed up on the top rail to watch.

“You did it!” the boy exclaimed, his voice tinged with pride and a bit of envy.

“But only after you took the edge off.”

Bobby ducked his head, pleased at Hawk’s praise.

“Come,” Shadow Hawk said, riding closer to the rail. “Try him.”

“Maybe later.” Bobby took a deep breath and then blurted, “It’s hard to believe you’re from the past, I mean, it seems so impossible.”

“It is hard for me to believe as well,” Shadow Hawk replied quietly. His gaze strayed toward the Black Hills. Soon he would go to the Sacred Cave and see if he could find the Spirit Path that would lead him back home, back to his own time, his own people.

“Tell me, Bob-by Running Horse, what is it like to be an Indian today?”

“Not so good, at least not for the people on the reservation. Many are sick in their souls and they look for answers in whiskey, or worse.”

“Reservations,” Shadow Hawk muttered, his voice thick with disgust.

“They’re worse than you can imagine. Our people are poor. Many are discouraged. I was lucky. Miss St. Claire gave me a job here and I have a good life. I send money home to my brother.”

“Money?”

“It’s what the white man uses to get what he wants.”

“And he always gets what he wants. That, at least, has not changed. How is it that you did not grow up speaking Lakota?”

“No one bothered to teach me until I came here. My mother died when I was very young. My father spends whatever money he gets on whiskey.”

Shadow Hawk grunted softly. In his time there were Indians who could not leave the white man’s firewater alone, warriors who traded furs for whiskey, much to the shame of their families.

“Tell me, what was it like in the old days?” Bobby asked, his dark eyes glowing. “Was it wonderful?”

Shadow Hawk stroked the stallion’s neck, his expression thoughtful. “It was a good way to live. A man knew who he was.”

“What was it like to ride into battle?”

“To ride against an enemy tribe was a good thing. A man gained honor on the field of battle. It was a brave thing to count coup, to steal your enemy’s horse, to take his weapons. But the white man does not fight for honor. He fights to kill, and he does not care whether he kills a man or a child. To him, it is all the same. He has no respect for the land, or the animals, or the people.”

“It is the same today. They are polluting the water and the earth and the sky. They destroy the forests and kill the animals.”

Shadow Hawk nodded. Was this why he had been sent to the future, to see the destruction of his people, of the land the Lakota held sacred? He looked at Bobby, dressed in the clothes of the white man, and felt a deep sadness that a young man should grow up ignorant of the ways of his people, ignorant of their language.

Bobby stared at Shadow Hawk, trying to imagine himself in the other man’s place. All his life he’d wanted to be a warrior, to live in the old way as his forefathers had lived, to follow the buffalo across the plains, to go to battle against the Crow. “Did you…?”

“What?”

Bobby gestured at the scars on Shadow Hawk’s chest. “You bear the marks of the Sun Dance. Did you also seek a vision?”

“Yes.”

“Would you…do you think you could help me?”

Shadow Hawk nodded. “If that is your wish.”

“When?” Bobby asked, his voice rising in excitement. “Today, tomorrow?”

“You must think about it. A vision is not something one rushes into. You must pray for guidance, and when you feel ready, we will have a sweat. And then you must go into the Hills, alone, and seek the Spirit.”

“
Pilamaya
,”
Bobby said, his dark eyes glowing with excitement. “Thank you! Wait ’til I tell Veronica!” Jumping off the fence, he ran toward the house.

“So,” Maggie said, “Bobby says you are going to help him seek a vision.”

She had been sitting at the window watching the two of them, her eyes drawn, as always, to Shadow Hawk. Now he stood before her, talking of sweat lodges and visions, things she had read about and written about. Things she had never truly believed in until a Lakota warrior entered her life.

Shadow Hawk nodded. “It is a good thing, to seek the guidance of the spirits.”

“Do you think he’ll get one? I mean, I didn’t think Indians did that anymore.”

“If his heart is right, if he truly believes,
Wakán Tanka
will grant him that which he seeks.”

Maggie nodded, remembering that Hawk claimed to have seen her in his vision. When he’d first told her that, she had found it hard to believe, but no longer. She felt a kinship with Hawk, a spiritual bond that she could not explain, and it frightened her.

“I watched you riding the black today.”

Hawk grinned, his pleasure in the horse obvious. “He would have made a fine war pony.”

“He’s yours.”

“Does he not belong to Bob-by?”

“No, he belonged to me, and now he belongs to you.”

“I have nothing to give you in return.”

“Nothing is required.”

“Why do you have a horse you cannot ride?”

“I have several horses I can’t ride,” Maggie reminded him, “but I bought the black because I thought he was beautiful and I liked looking at him.”

Hawk nodded. “Come,” he said. “I will take you for a ride.”

“No.” She shook her head vigorously. Once she had loved to ride, but now the thought of being on a horse filled her with trepidation.

“Yes.” He smiled at her as he lifted her from her wheelchair.

Maggie thought again how powerful that smile was, how quickly it changed her “no” to “yes”. If she could only bottle that smile, she thought as she wrapped her arms around his neck, she could light up the world. And then, selfishly, she decided she wouldn’t share him if she could. She wanted to keep Shadow Hawk to herself, for just a little while, because too soon he’d be gone and she’d be in the dark again.

While Shadow Hawk bridled the black, she sat on a flat-topped rock near the corral watching his every move. Veronica had bought Hawk a pair of Levi’s and a black T-shirt, but he continued to wear only his clout and moccasins, and she couldn’t help admiring the dark bronze of his skin, the way his muscles flexed as he lifted her effortlessly onto the stallion’s bare back, then swung up behind her, his movements as light and graceful as a dancer’s.

She felt her heart quicken as his arm slid around her waist, and then they were riding toward the Hills.

The air was fragrant with the scent of pines and earth, alive with the hum of insects, the song of a bird. The sky was a clear azure blue, deep enough to swim in. Off in the distance the gray mountain crags of the Hills rose in majestic splendor, the evergreen trees covering the slopes like a blanket of varying shades of green.

Hawk lifted the stallion into a trot and Maggie let out a sigh of delight. She’d missed riding, missed the sense of freedom it had once given her. Most men never understood why so many girls loved horses, but Maggie knew it wasn’t just the sheer beauty of the animals that fascinated women, it was the feeling of power, of being in control of an animal that weighed ten times your weight, the sense of freedom and speed.

Men loved fast cars, but cars were just chrome and metal, they weren’t living beings, capable of love and devotion.

Moments later, Hawk urged the black into a lope and Maggie felt her heart soar with excitement. It was wonderful to feel the wind in her face again, to imagine that she could feel the surging power of the stallion beneath her.

The black ran effortlessly, its long legs carrying them ever closer to the foot of a low range of hills. Shadow Hawk reined the horse to a walk and they began to climb upward. She was conscious of Hawk’s broad chest at her back, of his arm around her waist, holding her tight.

Higher and higher they climbed until they came to a plateau. Hawk reined the black to a halt. Dismounting, he placed his hands around Maggie’s waist and lifted her from the back of the horse to cradle her in his arms.

She stared at him, puzzled when he didn’t put her down, felt her breath catch in her throat as she gazed into the depths of his eyes.

“I…you… Why don’t you put me down,” she stammered. “I must be heavy.”

Slowly he shook his head. She felt good in his arms. Her scent filled his nostrils, sweeter than the scent of the pines.

“Hawk, I…” Her voice trailed off as she realized she didn’t know what she wanted to say, only that she liked to say his name.

“What is it, Mag-gie?”

“Nothing.”

Still cradling her in his arms, he sat down, his back against a ponderosa pine. He gazed at her for a long time, and then he looked up the hill. The Sacred Cave. Was it still there?

“It’s beautiful,” Maggie said, following his gaze. “I often wished I could climb to the top.”

Shadow Hawk nodded. “Bob-by will come here for his vision quest.”

“I hope he’s successful. He’s a good boy. He’s hoping to be accepted at one of the colleges this fall.”

“College?”

“It’s a place of learning.”

“White man’s learning?”

“Yes, he hopes to be a doctor, a modern medicine man, so he can help his people on the reservation.”

“One learns this in college?”

“Yes. In the old days I know that such things were handed down from one medicine man to the next, but things are more complicated now. A man needs a paper of permission to practice medicine. We have learned many things in the last hundred years or so.”

“Have you? You have not learned how to live with the land. Or with each other.”

He was very quick to comprehend what he saw and heard, Maggie reminded herself. He watched the news on television, appalled by the wars, the poverty, the murders. Some things were hard to translate. It was difficult to explain what AIDS was to a man who came from a culture where there was no such thing as casual sex. It was hard to explain child abuse, the drug scene, the high crime rate, the pollution of the air and the water, oil spills, abortion.

Maggie let out a sigh. Up here, where the sky was clear and the air smelled of pine, it was hard to think of the awful state the world was in. Sitting in Hawk’s lap, with his arms around her, his breath warm upon her neck, it was hard to think at all.

“Tell me how you got your name?” she asked after awhile.

“During my vision quest the shadow of a hawk merged with mine and for a time we were one. The medicine man said I would be as strong and wise as a hawk if I followed the Life Path of the Lakota.”

He was quiet a moment, remembering old Heart-of-the-Wolf, and then he gazed at Maggie. “I saw you that day also, though I did not tell anyone. I did not see your face clearly, only the shadowed image of a woman with dark hair. I saw you again during the Sun Dance. And once, when I went to pray, I saw you as clearly as I do now.”

His words washed over her as warm as liquid sunshine. There were people who believed in reincarnation, who believed that spirits could travel between worlds. People who believed in ghosts, and in time travel. She had always been a skeptic, until now. She wondered why she found it so easy to believe he had come from the past, why she had never doubted it for a moment.

Shadow Hawk gazed deep into her eyes, his soul reaching out to hers. “The land of the
Paha Sapa
is in my blood. It is a part of me.” His dark eyes caressed her for several moments, warming her from the inside out in a way no fire ever could. “Everything of value or importance in my life has come to me here,” he said quietly, “in the sacred hills of the Lakota.”

They gazed at each other for a long time and then, slowly, he stroked her cheek, the curve of her neck, the inner flesh of her arm. Heat flowed in the wake of his touch and she felt suddenly shy and awkward. She lowered her gaze, swallowing hard as she saw his broad shoulders, the muscular expanse of his chest.

Nervously, she licked her lips, wishing he would kiss her just once. Wishing she was young and carefree, that she could take him by the hand and walk beside him in the sunshine, swim in the lake beneath the light of the moon.

Mute, her heart aching, she looked into his eyes.
Just one kiss
,
she thought. What could it hurt? And leaning forward, she placed her lips to his. It was the lightest of touches, the merest whisper of a kiss, but it was more satisfying than anything she had ever known.

She drew back, embarrassed at her boldness. Hawk was looking at her strangely and it occurred to her that he might he married. The thought was like a knife in her heart. But surely he would have mentioned a wife if he had one. Then again, maybe not.

“Are you…I mean, do you have a family waiting for your return?”

“Only my mother, if she is still alive.”

“Then you’re not married, or anything?”

Hawk shook his head.