Savage Beloved, page 16
“You are in such deep thought,” Two Eagles said, placing a finger beneath Candy’s chin and bringing her eyes around to meet his. “Do you have something you wish to talk about?”
Feeling as though he had read her thoughts, Candy almost blurted out the truth to him, but she couldn’t take the chance. She wanted nothing to spoil this happiness that she had found with him. Having Hawk Woman to worry about was enough!
“I still can’t help worrying about Shadow,” she said, hiding the truth.
“Whatever will be will be,” Two Eagles said. “You live your life, Shadow will live hers. It will be for her to choose and for you to accept.”
“Yes, I know,” Candy murmured, nodding.
She smiled as Two Eagles brought a piece of apple to her lips.
She opened her mouth and let him feed it to her. Deliciously sensual feelings swept her all over again, and she wanted nothing now but his arms around her.
She ate the piece of apple, then reached her hands to his cheeks, bringing his mouth to hers. “You taste much better than the apple,” she whispered against his lips.
He shoved the platter of food aside and swept his arms around her. He lifted her and carried her back to their bed.
Again they made soul-satisfying love.
Chapter Twenty-five
The sacred fruit forbidden!
Some cursed fraud
Of enemy hath beguiled thee.
—John Milton
Several days had passed and the harvest was completed. Everyone was pleased, because it had been a very fortunate planting season.
Candy was with Two Eagles taking a leisurely ride on their steeds in the early evening. Candy was feeling especially happy that she had participated in the harvest.
She now knew not only how to harvest corn, but also beans and pumpkins.
As she rode in the shade beside the river with Two Eagles, where tall cottonwoods stood like sentinels over the water, she recalled what she had done to help. She wanted to fix it in her memory until the next harvest season, for she never wanted to disappoint Two Eagles by failing in her duties as his wife.
After harvesting all the corn and preparing it for storage for the winter, the women had picked the beans. Still in their pods, the beans had been spread out upon a hide pegged to the ground. When the beans had dried, they were beaten with a stick to release them from the pods. Finally the beans were winnowed and then packed in bags.
After the pumpkins had been harvested, all the women sat down together in the shade of trees. Each woman took several pumpkins from the pile and prepared them in the traditional Wichita way.
The first step was to peel the pumpkins. Then some were cut spirally into strips from top to bottom, while others were cut into rings and hung on a cross-pole to dry.
After the whole pumpkin had been stripped, there was a disc left at the bottom, which was known as the “Sitting One.”
The pumpkin pieces were then left to dry for about a day. Afterward, the women gathered again to complete the process. The pumpkin strips were braided and formed into mats, which were left out in the sun to dry.
Two of these that Candy had helped to make lay even now in Two Eagles’s tepee, a reminder of how much she had already learned. She was eager to prove that she was worthy of being a Wichita chief’s wife.
There were other, less pleasant memories of the past days, too. Hawk Woman had not worked in the communal garden with the others. Instead, she had strutted around the village with her hands and clothes clean, her golden hair hanging down long and beautiful to her waist.
“What makes you frown?” Two Eagles asked, bringing Candy back to the present.
“I’m sorry,” she said, laughing softly. “I did not mean to think so hard on things. I am enjoying riding with you on this beautiful evening, but I couldn’t help thinking proudly of all that I managed to learn these past several days while helping with the harvest.”
“I would have preferred it if you had not gone away from the village without me there to protect you,” Two Eagles said, his voice drawn. “But I understand your need to prove to the people of my village that you are not the sort to sit by and watch while others do the work.”
“No, I would not want to get the reputation that Hawk Woman has,” Candy blurted out, her eyes wavering when she realized what she had said. The spiteful words had crossed her lips before she thought them over.
“You mean because Hawk Woman did not join the harvest,” Two Eagles said, drawing rein.
Candy followed his lead by stopping her horse, too. She gazed into his eyes, hoping that he would not think less of her for criticizing Hawk Woman.
“Yes, I still cannot help being curious about how Hawk Woman can sit idly by while the other women work so hard,” Candy murmured. Her eyes lowered. “Even I.”
She was not about to mention her hair, how she had been forced to have hers cut while Hawk Woman’s hung so beautifully down her back.
She might have already said too much about the woman; she didn’t want Two Eagles to think she was jealous.
Two Eagles dismounted as Candy slid from her saddle. He came and took her reins, then tied both horses to the low limb of a tree.
“Suk-spid, come. Come and sit with me beside the river,” Two Eagles said, taking one of Candy’s hands. “I have brought you here to share an unusual sight with you.”
His gaze moved approvingly over her; how sweet she looked in a new dress that one of the women had made for her. Many of the women had brought dresses for Candy since she had none of her own.
That was one of the next things she would learn to do—sew her own clothes and learn the fancy bead-work that would decorate them.
She had proven to be an astute student of all that was shown her, so he knew that the ability to sew clothes for the two of them would come quickly, too.
Two Eagles found a soft, velvety cushion of green moss and sat down on it with Candy beside him. The lowering sun was sending streamers of light down through the leaves overhead. Not far away a wood thrush sang its lovely song.
“What do you want to show me?” Candy asked, searching his eyes.
He gestured outward, across the water. “Follow my eyes and see what I have marveled over so often,” he said, now looking at a sand dune in the center of the river.
Candy looked where he was pointing and gasped. “What sort of island is that?” she murmured.
“It is no island,” he said, dropping his hands. He raised his knees and wrapped his arms around them. “It is what is called a sand dune.”
“In the Kansas River?” Candy asked. She looked quickly over at him. “How did it get there? It is so beautiful.”
As he began explaining, she gazed again in wonder at the sand formation in mid-river.
“This has been here for as long as my people have made their home on this land,” Two Eagles said. “It is there because of war between wind and land. Trees that once grew in the lee of the dune have now been entombed by it as the wind shifted the sand. They are called Ghost Trees because they still stand there, dead but not decomposed.”
“But there are huge cottonwood trees there, very alive,” she said. “Surely some are fifty feet tall.”
“But you will notice that most of their height is hidden under the sand,” Two Eagles said. “When their limbs were enshrouded by sand, they shot down roots and new trees sprouted.”
“I see so many other things,” Candy murmured. “Plants that one wouldn’t normally see in Kansas.”
“I have gone there by canoe, and, yes, there are a wide variety of wild plants, their seeds planted there by the wind,” he said. He looked over at Candy. “There are many other things there to marvel over, too.”
“Tell me,” Candy said.
“I have seen a prickly pear cactuses cozy up to arctic bearberry,” he said. “Southern dogwoods bloom just down the dune from northern ash pines.”
Candy’s eyes widened when several great herons and eastern woodpeckers took flight from the sand dune. “It seems to be a paradise,” she murmured.
When Two Eagles did not respond but instead looked solemnly at her, she wondered what had caused the change.
“What is it?” she asked softly.
“I brought you here, alone, to tell you something else,” he said. “I believe it is time to explain to you how Hawk Woman came to be among my people, and why she must be protected at all times from being seen by white people.” Two Eagles took Candy’s hand and held it on his lap. “While she is safely inside the boundaries of my village, where no white man can come without permission, I feel the woman is safe enough. She only leaves the village long enough to bathe, and the sentries posted at strategic points keep all the women safe by the river. I am the one who made the command that she not work in the fields with the rest of the women. She must be guarded against the man who would probably kill her if he ever found her.”
“Who is this man that Hawk Woman fears so much?” Candy asked.
“When I found Hawk Woman, she was called by the name Sara Thaxton,” Two Eagles said. “She was dehydrated, sunburned, and terrified. She knew not that I was a friend, even when I told her in her own language that I was.”
“But you brought her to your village anyway?” Candy asked, searching his eyes.
“Not until she felt comfortable enough to tell me what had happened to her. Only then did I bring her to the village,” Two Eagles said, nodding.
“What had happened?” Candy asked.
“She had been part of a wagon train,” Two Eagles said. “She became the lone survivor after Sioux renegades attacked and killed everyone and burned the wagons.”
“But how could she have survived if everyone else had been killed?” Candy asked.
“Just like you, she managed to escape,” Two Eagles said. “She was trying to find a safe shelter when two wagons happened along, one driven by a man named Albert Cohen, and the other by a woman he introduced as his wife.”
“But she ended up being saved by you,” Candy said. “How? What happened to that man and his wife?”
“Before I found her, she had been forced to travel with Albert Cohen and his family,” Two Eagles said. “At first she was happy they’d found her, but when she discovered who was inside the two covered wagons, she became alarmed. There were eight women and several children, and she was told that those women were his wives, and the children were borne of those wives and were all his, too.”
“The man had eight wives?” Candy gasped, her eyes widening.
“He professed to have eight wives,” Two Eagles said, nodding. “You see, he explained to Hawk Woman that he was of the Mormon faith, whose belief it was that a man should take several wives to bear him many children.”
“Yes, I have heard of this practice,” Candy said. “So what then did Hawk Woman—I mean Sara Thaxton—do?”
“She was mortified by this man who had such power over women. Hawk Woman then asked why he and his family traveled alone, and not with other Mormons,” Two Eagles said. “He explained to her that he had been banished from the Mormon people for something he had done, but he refused to tell Hawk Woman what that was.”
“So it was then that she fled?” Candy asked.
“She didn’t want to travel with him, but she decided that she had no choice until someone else came along that she could ask for help,” Two Eagles said. “But she soon realized that she was there to stay, that he was not going to let her leave, and after one night of forced sex with the man, she managed to flee into the night. She was alone for many days before he found her again. And then she was with him for six winters before she found a way to flee again, this time successfully.”
“And so that is why she is here now,” Candy murmured.
“I felt compassion for the woman at what she had been forced to endure and offered to protect her from Albert Cohen if she wanted to live among my people,” Two Eagles said. “She agreed, and as a part of the plan to protect her, she left behind forever the name she was born with. She became Hawk Woman. I gave her that name because the day I found her, several hawks had been circling overhead as though protecting her.”
“And so you took over the chore of protecting her,” Candy said. “Like you vowed to protect me.”
“It is not the same at all,” Two Eagles said. “Soon after she became a part of my people’s lives, it became known to me that she was in love with me, but I felt nothing but pity for her and could never return her love. She has tried everything within her power to make me love her, but the longer she is among my people, the more embittered a woman she proves herself to be. I can never return her attention, or love. But I had vowed to keep her safe . . . and I never go back on promises.”
“And so that is how she remains at your village, still protected, even though I have seen that she is not liked by those who know the true person she is,” Candy said. She was glad that he had shared this story with her, for she felt better now about her situation. Candy now knew that Two Eagles would never abandon his love for her to pursue the other woman with the long, golden hair.
She also knew that she must continue to be wary of the woman, but she would not share Hawk Woman’s antics just yet with Two Eagles. Candy felt that she could take care of herself.
“Do you think the man is looking for her even now?” Candy asked.
“She believes he is not the sort to easily give up a woman he considers his wife,” Two Eagles said stiffly. “A woman he feels he might have impregnated again, for he would not want to risk losing a son, if a son was born of their union.”
“Impregnated again?” Candy gasped.
“Ho. Hawk Woman had a daughter by the man,” Two Eagles said. “She named her, but never was she able to mother her. To make Hawk Woman pay for escaping the first time, the man took the child from her the moment she was born. She never had a chance to mother her baby. When she fled, it was to flee not only the man, but also the hurt of not being allowed to have her child.”
“How horrible,” Candy gasped. “Now I see why she is such a bitter, cold woman. I can’t help but pity her.”
“Do not waste pity on her,” Two Eagles said flatly. “Except for the kindness she showed my uncle Short Robe, she otherwise has no warmth inside her. And I feel it has nothing to do with having lost her child. People like her are usually born that way, not shaped by tragedy.”
“And so you do believe the man is looking for her?” Candy asked, reaching a hand to her cropped-off hair. If this man happened along and saw her from a distance, might he not think he had found his lost wife?
“We do not risk that possibility,” Two Eagles said. “That is why she seems to be getting special treatment. It is only because she might still be in danger, for I feel that if he found her, he would kill her. And although she is a cold and unlikable woman, she deserves to live as much as you and I.”
He looked over his shoulder into the distance, then gazed into Candy’s eyes again. “And one day that man might find her,” he said, frowning. “More and more white people are occupying land close to my people’s village,” he said tightly.
“Father was talking about that. He said that although he wanted to leave Fort Hope, he felt that some soldiers should stay to protect the settlers who are coming in so quickly,” Candy said.
“Those people who are making homes in this area are brazen,” Two eagles said bitterly. “I have not yet told you this, but tomorrow I will leave the village for a while to have council with another Wichita band. They have requested my help. They are having problems with a white family that recently moved into the area. The children of this white family have been caught stealing wood from outside the lodges of this band. I am meeting with their chief to offer advice.”
“Could this family possibly be . . . that of the man who is searching for Hawk Woman?” Candy asked, suddenly feeling threatened, herself, by Albert Cohen.
“That is one reason why I am getting involved,” Two Eagles said flatly. “I am going to see whether or not this man has one wife, or . . . many. If he has many, and he does not travel with others of his faith, I will know it is he.”
“Good Lord,” Candy said, paling. “I don’t think I want to go with you this time. Is that alright?”
“I would not want you to go,” Two Eagles said, twining an arm around her waist and drawing her closer to him.
He was aware again of the nearby wood thrush and its lovely song. “Do you hear the birdsong?” he asked, searching overhead for the creature.
“Yes, I know this bird,” Candy murmured. “It has been called a Shakespeare among birds.”
“Shakespeare?” Two Eagles said, lifting an eyebrow. “What is a Shakespeare?”
“It is the name of a man who wrote many beautiful poems and plays,” Candy said, looking quickly overhead when she heard the stirring of leaves. The bird began singing even more loudly on a closer limb, but Candy couldn’t see it. She didn’t really need to. The wood thrush’s true beauty was in his enchanting voice.
Suddenly she and Two Eagles realized there were two wood thrushes. They seemed to fire off notes at each other, each defending his portion of the forest.
Their weapons were their voices, their melodies their ammunition, each seeking to wound the other’s pride, but their sweet fluting pierced only the evening’s silence.
And then she saw one of the birds. He was pouring out his song from the middle of a low limb that was draped with leaves. He had a brown back and a speckled breast.
“Do you see him?” Candy asked as she found Two Eagles looking in the same direction.
“Ho, he is a part of the ancient magic which lives in these woods,” Two Eagles said softly.
“That is so beautiful,” Candy murmured. “And just listen. He sings more enchantingly than any other bird I know. Lyrical, liquid, and loud, his voice has beauty and depth to match nature’s own loveliness.”
They both went quiet as they continued to listen. Each song of the bird consisted of several phrases, variations on his basic “ee-o-lay” theme; the notes sounded like a flute, but richer, not airy.
