Marsha’s thoughts were interrupted when she saw Soft Wind walking toward her, smiling from ear to ear. Abraham stepped aside as Soft Wind came up beside him, smiling a good morning to him and then at Marsha.
“Marsha, Edward James told me that you wanted to attend the ceremony this morning and were planning to go alone,” Soft Wind murmured. “Would you like to attend with me? We could sit together.”
Marsha looked quickly over at Abraham, whose eyes were humbly lowered, as though she could read his mind—that he thought she would rather go with Soft Wind than with him. She looked quickly at Soft Wind. “I would love to, but I have already promised Abraham I would go with him,” she murmured, hearing a soft gasp coming from Abraham, and knowing why.
He was stunned that Marsha would choose him over Soft Wind! She quickly explained. “We could all go together,” she hurried out, having accepted the fact now that her brother would be marrying this pretty maiden. “Would that be all right, Soft Wind?” She turned to Abraham. “Would that be all right, Abraham?”
His broad smile and dancing eyes were enough response without his even saying anything, but then he hurried out, “Yes’m. I would like that.”
Soft Wind smiled. “I would like that, too,” she murmured. She turned to Abraham just as Marsha handed him the fawn. “The animal is sweet.” Then her smile waned. “But I do not think you should take the fawn to the ceremony. When you are there, you will see why I suggest this to you.”
Marsha wondered what there could be about the ceremony that would discourage having the fawn there, and then she remembered: The first buck kill was to be celebrated!
The animal that had been killed was going to be there. It would not seem right to celebrate the killing of one deer, while one that would one day be as big, and surely then hunted, was there.
“I, too, advise you to take the fawn to your home and leave it there,” Marsha quickly said. “Soft Wind and I will wait for you here, and then we can go together to the council house.”
“Yes’m,” Abraham said, quickly nodding. He turned and walked quickly away, the fawn held lovingly in his arms.
Then Marsha stepped aside. “Come on inside, Soft Wind, until Abraham returns,” she murmured.
Soft Wind smiled and walked past Marsha, then stopped and turned to her and smiled again. “Marsha, did Edward James tell you that we have decided to have the wedding ceremony in two sunrises?” she asked softly.
“Two . . . days . . . ?” Marsha said, her voice drawn, finding it hard to believe that her brother was marrying so soon.
“I’m happy for you,” she murmured. “I know how happy you are making my brother.”
She started to say something else even more positive—which she felt she owed Soft Wind because of how she had behaved earlier upon hearing the news—but stopped when several young braves ran past and into the forest, seemingly excited about something.
She quickly noticed that they were carrying bows, with quivers of arrows on their backs, all of which were smaller than those carried by grown adults.
“Where are they going?” she asked as she stepped outside again, watching. “Why are they so excited? Is it because of the council?”
“No, it has nothing to do with the council, for the young braves will not be there,” Soft Wind said. “It is for adults only.”
“Then where are they going armed?” Marsha asked, still watching as more of the young braves ran after those she had already seen.
“There is a target practice range not that far from our village where the youngsters practice shooting arrows from their bows,” Soft Wind said matter-of-factly as she came outside and stood with Marsha. “It is good for them to shoot at targets other than living creatures until their skills at hunting are more honed.”
Abraham stepped up to them. He was smiling broadly.
“We must go now,” Soft Wind said, watching Marsha remove her apron and hang it from a peg on the wall, then close the door behind her.
“Will you explain the ceremony to me as it happens?” Marsha asked as they walked toward the huge council house, where people were filing in, one by one. She glanced over at Abraham. “It would be good for Abraham to know, too, since he plans to join the hunt one day.”
“I will be glad to tell you both,” Soft Wind said, smiling at Marsha and then past her at Abraham.
They went on into the council house. Marsha grabbed Soft Wind by an arm when Soft Wind started to go down to sit at the front of the people. “Please let’s just sit here at the back,” Marsha murmured. “I always feel that my presence disturbs some of your people.”
“In time they will all accept you,” Soft Wind said, then smiled knowingly at Marsha. “As my chieftain brother has accepted you.”
Marsha hated it when she felt the heat of a blush rush to her cheeks!
Would he be able to read her feelings? Her mother had always told her that she wore her feelings on her face.
If she did so today, Swift Horse would know that she had fallen in love with him!
Chapter 14
Virtue, how frail it is!
Friendship, how rare!
—Percy Bysshe Shelley
Marsha was impressed by the huge council house. It was made the same as the Creek people’s homes, but much larger. Instead of wood flooring, however, the floor was bare earth, and in the center of the huge room a fire burned within a circle of rocks, the smoke being drawn through a hole in the roof that could be closed during inclement weather.
All of the warriors who had been a part of the hunt sat forward, facing the fire; the warriors who had not participated this time and the women and children sat behind them. Both Chief Swift Horse and his shaman, Bright Moon, sat on a platform facing everyone.
Marsha’s pulse raced when she caught Swift Horse glancing at her, holding his eyes on her momentarily before looking away when a young brave brought a calumet pipe to him, and then another brave brought him fire for his pipe. Marsha was mesmerized at how the young brave placed the flames to the tobacco in the bowl of the pipe as Swift Horse sucked on the long stem, soon sending smoke upward.
After the two young braves were sitting again among the crowd, Swift Horse stood up and faced the east. “I blow my first puff of smoke to where the sun rises,” he said, taking a drag from the pipe, blowing the smoke eastward. He repeated this process for the other cardinal points, then handed the pipe to Bright Moon, who also smoked from it, then handed the pipe to the warrior next to him, who passed the pipe on around the council house until all warriors had partaken of it.
When the pipe came back to Swift Horse where he again sat on the platform, he handed it to a young brave who came with a wooden case for it.
The pipe then taken away, Swift Horse rose again and faced everyone. “We are joined here today, as one heart and mind, to celebrate once again the first buck kill of the season, which will be sacrificed as our offering to the one above who allows this successful hunt,” he said proudly. “This, too, is done as a thanksgiving for the recovery of health of those who among us are ill, and for our former success in hunting, so that the divine care and goodness may be still continued to our Wind Clan of Creek.”
He motioned with a hand toward two warriors who had just come into the council house at the back carrying a large deer.
“Come forth,” he said, motioning toward the warriors with his hands. “Pull the newly killed venison through the flames of the fire, both by the way of a sacrifice, and to consume the blood, life, or animal spirits of the beast.”
Her eyes transfixed, Marsha watched as the deer that had been cleaned of the blood from the fresh kill was carried toward the huge fire, her thoughts returning momentarily to the small fawn that she had saved. She could not help but regret that one day it could be the first buck sacrifice. She tried not to think about that, for she knew the importance of these animals to the Creek.
Without smoked and preserved venison, the Creek would not be able to survive through the long win
ter months. Swift Horse’s people, she had learned, used every part of the animal, wasting nothing. Deerskins were used to make clothing and bedding, for shoes and shot pouches. Even the hollowed out hooves were fashioned into bells to be used during ceremonial dances.
She knew now that on the hunters’ return to the village, they were expected to distribute some of their meat to the elderly and to those who were unable to hunt for themselves, as well as to the able-bodied who had remained in the village to protect it from enemies, and the conjurer who provided the medicines that attracted the deer.
Marsha felt a bitter sort of regret, and even shame, when she thought of how comfortably most whites lived. They most certainly did not have to depend on animals such as this for their existence! Yet she saw this way of life, which was simple and even beautiful to her, something she hoped to be a part of now that she knew her true feelings for Swift Horse.
She would move quickly from her home to his if he asked this of her, for she fell more in love with him every time she saw him.
If her brother could marry an Indian maiden, so could she marry a handsome, wonderful chief! Her face grew hot with a blush when she realized where her thoughts had taken her.
Her musings were interrupted when she saw the two warriors pull the buck slowly back and forth through the smoke of the lodge fire and then the flames, and then place the animal on a platform covered with a huge piece of buckskin.
Swift Horse stepped down from his platform, drew his knife from its sheath, and stood over the buck. Marsha watched him cut into the animal and take a huge fat piece of the meat from it, which her brother had said was called the milt, and held it over the fire.
“Today I offer the choicest part of the animal to the fire!” Swift Horse said, releasing the meat from his hands, dropping it down into the flames. Soon the smell of roasted venison filled the lodge as it baked in the flames.
Swift Horse then motioned to two other warriors to come forth. “It is time to fully dress the animal and pass parts of it around to those warriors who joined the hunt,” he said thickly. “The pelt goes to the man whose first arrow sank into the flesh of the buck.”
He sat down while all of the animal pieces were been passed around to those who deserved it, then watched as the remains were wrapped up in the huge piece of skin and taken from the council house.
“This concludes this council,” Swift Horse said as he rose and stepped from the platform. Bright Moon stepped down beside him, then walked away and left the council house. Everyone else then rose and quietly left the council.
Marsha stepped out into the sun and saw how quickly Soft Wind ran away from her to the trading post where Edward James had stayed. Abraham had left earlier.
“And what did you think of your first council?” The masculine, deep voice caused Marsha to turn with a start.
She blushed when she found Swift Horse standing there, smiling at her.
“It was interesting,” she murmured. “I find everything about you and your people interesting. I am fascinated, in fact. Your lives are so different from what I have ever known.”
“It is a simple life,” Swift Horse said softly. “But not always easy.” He motioned with a hand toward the creek that ran snakelike along the edge of their village. “Come and sit with me? These days of lovely flowers, leaves, and warm air will soon be gone.”
“I would love to,” Marsha said, touched that he would take this time with her, when she knew that he had much more on his mind. She knew that the hunting season had just begun and that he would surely be leaving soon himself to join the hunt.
She felt uneasy to think about him being gone from the village. It was because he was his people’s leader and protector. And she now felt as though he was her protector, as well. Had he not come for her when he had seen her leave the village, knowing the dangers she could have been putting herself in? Had he not brought her home safely to her brother?
They walked alongside the creek for a while beneath the colorful leaves, and when they came to a more private place, they stopped.
“I saw Abraham with you at the council,” Swift Horse said as he and Marsha sat on a thick bed of colorful leaves that had fallen from the trees. “It is good that he shows such an interest in all that my people do. When he gets his full strength back, he will enjoy everything we Creek warriors enjoy, including the hunt, for from now on, he is a part of us.”
“You are so kind to have allowed him to stay and live among your people,” Marsha said. She pulled the skirt around her legs as she drew her knees up before her. “He is a kind man, someone whose life before now has surely been miserable.”
“No one should be held as a slave,” Swift Horse said, sitting down beside her. “There are many people of my color who have been slaves, too, of whites. And as people of my color move into what is called reservation life, by that, too, they are enslaved, for they are no longer able to roam the land as they wish. They are allotted a space and should they go farther, they are punished—sometimes even killed as though they are no more than that buck that was sacrificed today.”
“I am so sorry for the injustices done to people of your color,” Marsha murmured. “And of all color. There are many black slaves in Georgia where I was born and raised. My family was not as affluent as many are in Georgia, so no slaves were used at my father’s farm. My father planted and harvested his own crops. That is how we survived.”
“I am sad about your parents,” Swift Horse said, his voice drawn.
“And yours,” Marsha said, recalling how his parents had died. “It seems their fate was the same as my parents’. All were killed by renegades.”
She paused, then turned to him. “But I know exactly who killed mine,” she said tightly. “The one-eyed man I saw in my brother’s store. I am confident that he is the same man, Swift Horse, that you say is your best friend.” She swallowed hard. “How could you call such a man a best friend when he is guilty of so many crimes?” she blurted out.
“You are mistaken,” Swift Horse said thickly. “But I understand how you can be. There is more than one man whose eye has been removed due to warring.”
“Just how well do you know this . . . friend?” Marsha asked guardedly.
“We have been friends since we were young braves anxious to walk in the moccasins of warriors,” Swift Horse said, smiling over at her. “We have been together much. Do you not see that I would know an evil side of this man were there one to know? He is good, Marsha. My friend would give his life for me. He almost did.”
“I want so badly to believe what you believe,” Marsha murmured. “But I just can’t see it in the same way.” She visibly shuddered. “I will never forget that one eye leering at me right after he killed my parents. He . . . he . . . would have killed me, too, had it not been for those soldiers who had survived the ambush. He knew that if he stayed any longer, he would also die. He rode away quickly and was soon lost to my sight, as well as the soldiers’.”
“I will help you find the one-eyed man who did you wrong,” Swift Horse said softly. “But I must see to my chiefly duties first. Winter with its cold winds and snows will soon be upon us. It is important to get the hunt behind us, and then the harvesting of our crops is next. Once these things are finished, then I will gather together many warriors and will go on a different hunt—a hunt for the man who wronged you.”
“You would do this for me?” Marsha asked, her eyes wide as she gazed into his, then she sighed heavily and looked away from him, for she knew the real killer would be overlooked.
Seeing her look away, and hearing her sigh, Swift Horse placed a gentle hand beneath her chin and drew her eyes back around to gaze into his. “I promise you today that the man who took your parents from you will pay for his crime,” he said thickly. “I will be the one to make him pay. But you must trust me.”
His eyes searched hers, making her feel weak with passion, something she had never felt before for any man. She felt dizzied by it.
Sh
e collected herself and slowly nodded. “Yes, I do,” she murmured. “I do trust you.”
Suddenly he had his arms around her, and she found herself, as though by magic, twining her arms around his neck.
Their lips came together in a sweet kiss of bliss that made Marsha forget all ugliness of the world. While she was in this man’s arms, everything was wonderful—was safe!
Then he withdrew from her, yet he still had his hands on her cheeks as he smiled into her eyes. “I have not allowed myself to love before, because my duties as chief have been foremost on my mind since I took over those duties upon the death of my father,” he said thickly. “But I cannot help but love you.”
He gazed intensely into her eyes. “I can see it in your eyes that you love me, too,” he said. “I felt it in your kiss. Tell me. Tell me you love me.”
“I do,” Marsha murmured, sighing. “Oh, but I do. I felt something the first time I saw you, yet . . .”
“Yet you were afraid to feel something for a man whose skin is not the same color as yours—a man who is an Indian,” he said, his voice drawn.
“It was not so much that I was afraid because you are an Indian. It was just that I wasn’t sure of my feelings. For, you see, I have never loved before,” she murmured. “I didn’t want the attraction to be only because you were a powerful chief, whom everyone admires and loves. I wanted to be sure it was true love, and not infatuation.”
“And you are certain now?” he asked, placing his arms around her waist again, drawing her closer.
“Oh, so very,” she said, her breath captured in another kiss as his lips came to hers. She felt as though she were floating above herself, she was so taken by the kiss and his embrace. She knew now that everything in her life had changed, for love had taken center stage!
At this moment in time, even the memory of her parents’ death seemed to have faded to the farthest recesses of her mind.
“I love you,” she murmured against his lips as he slowly brushed them against hers now, not so much in a kiss, but a caress.
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