The Endless Sky (Cheyenne Series) (36 page)

      
Stephanie swallowed, then quickly slipped out of her tunic and slid beside Chase on the pallet, pulling the robe over them. She lay on his left side, careful not to touch his injured right shoulder.

      
The old woman watched as his fevered thrashing subsided. “It will be good,” she murmured to herself as she left the lodge with a smile on her face.

      
Alone with Chase, her naked body pressed to his, Stephanie whispered softly, “Now who's the liar? The Cheyenne
do
torture their captives.”

* * * *

      
Chase awakened slowly to the dull throbbing ache in his shoulder. He tried to move, then felt the softness of a woman's body. Without turning his head he knew.
Stevie
. Even without her apple blossom perfume she possessed an essence all her own. The covers provided a warm cocoon with her snuggled closely against him. A strand of long bronze hair feathered across his cheek. In spite of the weakness of fever and the pain of his wound, he felt a sense of contentment the like of which he could not recall.

      
He remembered her with the knife, digging Hugh's bullet from him, hesitant and pale but her hand steady. She had more grit than any woman he had ever known...even his mother. Nothing, not even a demented sadist like Phillips, had been able to break her. Turning his head against the luxuriant curtain of her hair, he drifted back to sleep.

      
Stephanie blinked her eyes, suddenly awake in Chase's lodge, lying with her body fused intimately to his. Carefully she moved away from him, sliding from beneath the robes and pulling on her tunic. Only when she had removed her body from such intimate proximity to his did she reach out and touch his forehead. A light film of moisture dampened it but his skin felt almost normal. The feverweed and her body heat had worked! She began to gather up the bowls and utensils when she felt his eyes on her. Slowly, her hands stilled and her lashes fluttered up as she looked at him, “Your fever's broken.” It seemed an idiotic statement but was the first thing that popped into her head.

      
“I’m afraid I stink of sweat...and that it's rubbed off on you.” He enjoyed watching her blush. “In spite of months working in the sun your complexion still gives you away,” he said in a husky voice.

      
“I...I must summon Stands Tall and Red Bead. They'll want to know you're going to be all right.” She leaped up to get away from him.

      
“Wait, Stevie, please.” He saw her hesitate but then she turned back to him. “I thank you for saving my life.”

      
“I would’ve done the same for any injured man.”

      
“Even sleeping naked beside him?”

      
That old teasing light was back in his eyes, the same way it had been in Boston. She found herself returning his smile. “You did the same for me. I owed you.”

      
“All I did was warm you, not dig a bullet from your shoulder.”

      
“I was terrified, Chase. You lost so much blood. I thought I'd killed you at first. How did it happen—who shot you?”

      
His expression sobered and a wary look came into his eyes. How could he make her understand? Damn, no matter if Phillips was her husband, she was better off with him dead. “It was Hugh Phillips.”

      
She felt everything go black and the ground began to spin for a moment. Taking a deep breath she asked, “Did you kill him?”

      
“Yes....with my knife.”

      
She knew he'd dressed as a tame Indian and ridden into a fort or a town to spy. “You didn't encounter Hugh on a raid, or by chance, did you?”

      
He met her level gaze openly. “No. I intended to kill him—but not for the reason you think,” he added as she hugged herself and started to turn away. “He was a rabid wolf, Stevie, hunting down every small band he could find, attacking them as they slept, butchering women and children. Even Custer never pursued a mad vendetta like that. It had to stop.”

      
“And you were the one to stop him.” Her eyes stung with tears. “He'd been searching for me, hadn't he, Chase?”

      
He could not deny it. “Yes—to kill you. You must know that.”

      
“But I never...” Her voice faded. Hugh would never have believed that she'd remained untouched. After all, hadn't all the officers' wives assured her it was their duty to take their own lives rather than fall into the hands of savages? Just living with the Cheyenne had contaminated her. She would be an embarrassment to him, a humiliating object of pity, another reason for him to be denied promotion. “Yes, he probably would want me dead,” she said, her voice beyond sadness, sapped of all emotion. She turned away and opened the tent flap.

      
“Stevie, you're better off without him.”

      
Her eyes were glacial when she looked back over her shoulder. “Do you expect me to thank you for killing my husband for me?”

      
“I didn't kill him for you. I would have done it anyway, dammit.”

      
“How can I believe you? Even if I could, how can that make it right? He was my husband and you took his life. Dead as much as alive, he'll always be between us, Chase.” She stepped through the opening, leaving him alone in the lodge. He did not try to stop her this time.

      
Over the following weeks Chase mended swiftly. Stephanie avoided him as much as possible, spending her days with Kit Fox and the other unmarried young women. As her command of the language improved a bit she approached Crow Woman who allowed her to share in caring for Smooth Stone and Tiny Dancer. Among the Cheyenne, watching over children was always a communal responsibility. Her love of the children and her willingness to learn and work with the other women earned her the trust of many of the villagers. If everyone wondered why the White Wolf did not take her to his blankets or at least use her body as his slave, no one was impolite enough to speak of it in front of her.

      
As soon as he was strong enough, Chase joined the other men in their duties around the camp, repairing war weapons, standing sentry duty and overseeing the training of the young boys as warriors. One morning he took Smooth Stone, along with several other little boys, to practice snaring rabbits.

      
“This is how you set the snare.” He showed them, holding up the little rawhide loop with its slip knot. “Be certain you conceal it carefully, just so, but not so much that it won't slide fast enough when your quarry is ready to be snagged.” The lessons continued as each boy took his turn fastening the snare and finding a spot on a rabbit run in which to conceal it. As Chase watched, giving encouragement, Smooth Stone sat down beside him, glum and silent. “What is wrong, little brother?”

      
“You and Stephanie never speak anymore,” he said in serviceable Cheyenne. “My sister says she is very sad. Why do you not take her to your blankets?”

      
A grimly ironic smile touched Chase's lips.
The very question I've been asking myself.
“It is difficult to explain white people's ways to a Cheyenne,” he said carefully.

      
“She is very beautiful, even if she is a white woman...and you, too, have white blood so that should not matter,” the boy persisted.

      
“It is not her blood—or mine that is the problem, Smooth Stone. I killed her husband and she cannot forgive me.”

      
“But everyone says he was an evil man. Surely she did not love him.”

      
“No, she did not...but he was her husband and that makes her feel all the more guilty for his death. It is very complicated.”

      
The boy sighed. “She should not be angry with you. Maybe if you brought her presents she would be happy and forgive you,” Smooth Stone ventured hopefully.

      
Chase ruffled his shiny black hair and smiled sadly. He would never have a son of his own. The Remington blood would die out with his generation. Perhaps this was the way the Powers intended for things to be. “I will think on what you have said, Smooth Stone,” he replied gravely.

      
From the hillside across the creek, Stephanie watched Chase with the boys.
What a good father he would make.

      
Kit Fox observed where her friend's eyes strayed and she smiled. “Blue Eagle and I are to wed at the Freezing Moon. There would be great rejoicing among our people if you and the White Wolf were to wed also.”

      
What could she say? That Chase was a murderer? Or that she was so riven with guilt she could not sleep at night for loving him instead of mourning Hugh?

* * * *

      
“Yesterday I overheard Stands Tall and Red Bead talking,” Smooth Stone confided to his sister a few days later. “They say the White Wolf will soon be strong enough to leave the winter stronghold and go raiding again.”

      
“If only we could do something to make him and Stephanie join their lives before he has gone,” Tiny Dancer said.

      
“That is what his aunt and uncle said, too,” he replied with excitement. But then he added glumly, “They decided it was up to the Powers to decide if their fates are truly to be one.”

      
“Then we can do nothing.” She sighed, clutching the doll Stephanie had made her.

      
“I have a plan,” her brother ventured, then proceeded to tell her about it.

      
A few days later the first snowfall of the winter occurred, turning the rich golds, browns and reds of autumn color to dazzling white. By afternoon the sun shone brightly and the children all ran to the hillside with their sleds made of buffalo ribs, eager to slide on the fresh snow before it melted away. Both Chase and Stephanie joined the crowd of adults watching the little ones' antics, but among dozens of spectators, they managed to stay well clear of each other. They both had their eyes riveted on the two Crow children as they slid down the hill repeatedly, shrieking and giggling.

      
“Come, watch me, White Wolf!” Smooth Stone yelled at his hero. He then picked up the sled and ran toward another slope some distance away where the ground was not so smooth and open. Tiny Dancer, who left her brother and ran breathlessly into Stephanie's arms, distracted her as Chase followed her brother. Then she tugged on Stephanie's hand. “Come, Smooth Stone has found a new place to sail our sled.” With that she dashed off.

      
Smiling, Stephanie sprinted behind her. Not until she walked clear of a copse of snow-laden yellow pines did she spy Chase watching the children climb aboard their sled and take off. She stood back silently.

      
Suddenly the sledge veered into a bank of snow-laden hawthorn and tipped over. A loud wail echoed up the hill. Chase skidded down the slope from one direction while Stephanie came running from the other. They nearly collided as they reached the bushes. Chase knelt down and pulled Tiny Dancer from beneath the overturned little sled. She ran into Stephanie's arms, saying, “That was such fun!”

      
“Then why did you cry out?” Stephanie asked suspiciously.

      
The little girl looked abashedly over to her brother, who was tugging his sledge from the bushes as Chase watched. “I was excited,” she replied.

      
“Now we will go for another ride,” Smooth Stone said, seizing his sister's hand. The conspirators dashed off, pulling the sled behind them, leaving Chase and Stephanie standing in the shelter of the tall pines, alone.

      
She stood, unable to tear her eyes from him. He looked like a dark sentinel against the whiteness, dressed with rich wolf skins thrown across one broad shoulder. Light flecks of snow sparkled like diamond dust in his raven hair. His eyes glittered like his namesake's as they swept hungrily over her. She tried to break the spell. “That was a dangerous thing for them to do.”

      
“I'll speak with Smooth Stone. I rather imagine he was the instigator,” he replied.

      
“He meant well,” she said awkwardly, knowing she should turn and leave him at once. But she did not.

      
He drank in her loveliness. Her face was framed by a soft doeskin hood trimmed with beaver. Even swathed in heavy winter clothes, he could scent the female heat of her. She was as no other woman to him. “They want us to come together. You are my captive. No one understands why I do not take you. It must be my white blood,” he added with a bitter smile.

      
When he raised one hand and brushed a bit of snow from her cheek, she closed her eyes in agony. “Don't...please.” And still she did not walk away. Her conscience screamed for her to do it, but her heart refused.

      
He lowered his hand, still standing close to her. Their breaths mingled, tiny puffs of white, like clouds colliding and merging in the crisp, bright air. “I'm leaving with my warriors tomorrow,” he said at length.

      
“Kit Fox and Blue Eagle are to be wed in less than a month. Will he return in time?” She could have bitten her tongue. She should not have spoken of weddings.

      
“I'll bring Blue Eagle back in plenty of time.” He hesitated, then said, “I still want you, Stevie. Nothing will ever change that.”

      
“You've changed that,” she said flatly. “Where do you go tomorrow? Off to burn and loot some more, to kill more soldiers?”

      
He felt her words like a lash tearing into his flesh. Pain and anger rose in equal portions as he fought the urge to take her in his arms and shake her...but he knew if he did he'd soon be ravishing her instead. “You've seen what those soldiers do—don't deny it. They're killing these people!” He flung out his hand toward the circle of lodges nestled in the valley below. ‘‘Every year game is scarcer, slaughtered wantonly by whites who leave the meat to rot on the earth. Every year we die of smallpox and diphtheria, measles and cholera—all gifts of the white man.