by Tess LeSue
The colonel was conversant enough with a woman’s needs to make sure she had time to change out of her traveling clothes before dinner. Ava had brought a couple of dresses with her this time: a day dress and an evening dress. This was probably an evening-dress occasion, she thought with a sigh, envisioning a long night ahead.
She cleaned herself as best she could with only a washbasin and struggled into the sage purple gown she’d had made up in San Diego. It had a two-tiered skirt and a V-shaped bodice and looked halfway decent, despite being rumpled from her luggage. She brushed her hair out and then hastily pinned it up again. There was no mirror in her room, which was probably a blessing.
Captain Scott was waiting to escort her to dinner, and he made sure he sat next to her. He was a nice sort. Soothing. That probably wasn’t much of a compliment, except that after the last year, soothing was about all she could handle. She was grateful the men didn’t expect her to speak much. She ate her beefsteak and potatoes and listened to them talking excitedly about the festivities ahead.
“I would imagine you’ve met an Indian or two in your time, Miss Archer?” the superintendent asked eventually, when the conversation was winding down. By then Ava had squirreled away lots of interesting facts about the treaty they were intending. The colonel was flushed from the bourbon, which they’d been drinking liberally, and he fixed her with a singularly patronizing smile. He used to be a fur trapper, she’d learned, and he still had more than a few of the rough edges you’d expect to find in a trapper.
“Indians? I’ve met one or two,” she replied politely. She was trying to keep her answers to a minimum. If she proved dull company, they might let her slink off to bed early.
No such luck. At her answer the superintendent burst into laughter. “One or two!” he hooted. “I’ve read your books, Miss Archer, and I happen to know that one or two includes the Plague of the West himself!”
Ava flinched as though a horse had trodden on her foot.
“I met him once!” the man on the other side of Captain Scott exclaimed, leaning forward to smile shyly at Ava. “You write about his eyes in your books, but nothing quite prepares you for them in real life!”
No. Nothing does, she thought wistfully, remembering their clarity, like sunlit ice.
“It’s like looking into the eyes of the devil,” the man continued.
She had an insane urge to laugh. If that was how the devil looked, she was doomed. She pressed her lips together and made herself nod.
“Do you think he’ll come?” Captain Scott wondered. “Fitzpatrick says he’s back with the Arapaho, and they’re coming.”
This time Ava felt like a horse had kicked her in the chest.
He was here.
Not here here. But here. On the plains.
And, Jesus wept, maybe here, in Laramie.
“If he does come, he’ll just be one killer among many,” the colonel snorted. “He doesn’t hold a candle to some of them.”
Ava started to shiver. It was the shock of it. She might see him again. . . .
“Oh look, you’ve scared her,” Captain Scott protested. He put an arm around her. “There, there, Miss Archer, you have the United States Army to protect you.”
“I do beg your pardon,” the colonel apologized. He was flushed with consternation. “But Scott is quite right. You’ve nothing at all to worry about with our fine men guarding you.”
Ava barely restrained herself from rolling her eyes. She wasn’t frightened. She was . . . She didn’t know the word for what she was. Overwhelmed with a mess of feelings, most of which were stunningly foreign to her. She was nervous and excited, anxious and breathless and tingling from top to toe; her heart was racing, and her palms were sweating; and suddenly, madly, she felt like dancing. Twirling in circles and singing at the top of her lungs.
She hadn’t realized how gray and flat the world had felt for such a long time. Now, with just the hope of seeing him again, all of the color had rushed back in all at once. Everything positively sang with delight.
Deathrider was nearby. He was alive, and he was close.
And she didn’t care what kind of idiot she made of herself, or how many times she had to risk her life, she was going to see him again.
Because they had unfinished business.
* * *
• • •
THE SIOUX WERE the first to arrive. Or, rather, the Lakota, as Ava quickly learned they called themselves. On her third day at Fort Laramie, she’d discovered the women. She’d been led to believe she was the only woman in camp, but it wasn’t true. There weren’t many others, but they were there, discreetly hidden from her supposedly delicate eyes. At least until everyone learned that she wasn’t that delicate after all. Then the women emerged from the woodwork and went back to their normal lives. Ava followed them, happy to find people to talk to who weren’t soldiers.
These women were the camp wives, and each and every one of them was Indian, although they were from different tribes. They’d been given white names by their “husbands” (who all had actual wives at homes, but no one seemed to blink an eye at that), but Ava ferreted out their real names. The colonel’s “wife’s” name was Laughing Raccoon, which Ava thought was a much better name than “Jane,” which is what everybody at Fort Laramie called her.
“It’s only one of my names,” Laughing Raccoon told Ava cheerfully. “Among my people, names can change. You can have different names at different periods of life.”
Laughing Raccoon was a Lakota woman, which is how Ava learned that Sioux was a white name for the tribe.
“And within the Lakota there are seven . . . groups? Families?” Laughing Raccoon struggled to find the right word in English.
“Clans?” Ava suggested. She was taking notes. Meeting Deathrider had thrown her ignorance into sharp relief. She still cringed with shame at remembering that she’d mistaken him for an Apache. . . . She was going to work to remedy her ignorance.
She was zinging with energy since learning he might be coming, and she needed somewhere to put that energy. Interviewing people was the thing she knew how to do best, so that was what she did. The soldiers were all busy, so she turned her attention to the camp wives instead. They were much more interesting anyway.
“My people are the Brulé,” Laughing Raccoon said proudly, as she stood with Ava, watching the Lakota come in a tide toward Fort Laramie. “That’s them over on the right flank.” She beamed with pride as she watched her people approach. “Agnes is Lakota too, but she’s Oglála.”
Ava was astonished at the sheer number of Lakota heading toward them. She had a feeling the colonel and the superintendent were too. There were some nervous soldiers in Fort Laramie today. The dragoons and the infantry stood on parade, chests puffed out, faces inscrutable, brass buttons shining in the sun. But they looked paltry compared with the sea of Lakota moving their way.
There must have been more than a thousand warriors alone, without counting the women and children. They came parading in full war paint, and the headmen and warriors wore magnificent feathered headdresses. There was a strict order to their assembly; the younger warriors followed their leaders in columns, and at the back came the women and girls, decked out in ornate ceremonial tunics, draped in beads and shells. They were all spectacular, resplendent with ribbons and feathers, and architecturally ornate hairstyles.
“There,” Laughing Raccoon said reverently, directing Ava’s attention to one warrior in particular, “that’s Red Cloud.”
“Who?” Ava had never heard of him. She wasn’t alone. His fame hadn’t spread to the whites yet, but it would. His name was already legendary among the Plains Indians. She made a note.
“Our allies come behind us,” Laughing Raccoon told Ava, shining with pride. “The Lakota are the most powerful tribe in all the world; even our allies are fearsome.”
Ava didn’t have the hear
t to tell her that the paltry collection of soldiers on the parade ground was just the tip of the iceberg. The United States Army might well be the most powerful tribe in the world. They would be the worst foe the Lakota had ever faced—but if this treaty did its job, perhaps they would never need to come face-to-face, except in friendship.
Knowing what she knew of humans, though, Ava had her doubts.
The other women had joined them on the porch of the colonel’s house, craning their necks to see the incredible display of power from the Lakota.
“Who are your allies?” Ava asked, her pencil flying over the pages of her notebook.
“The Cheyenne”—Laughing Raccoon pointed to the next wave of people arriving behind the Lakota—“and the Arapaho.”
Ava snapped the tip of her pencil against the page. Arapaho.
Deathrider.
There was no way she would ever spot him in that mass of humanity. But she tried. She stood there as the Lakota came to a halt, closest to the fort, and she watched the ripple of movement stall, spreading back through the Cheyenne and the Arapaho, who were at the very farthest edge of the crowd. The superintendent went to welcome the leaders as the army bugler sounded “Boots and Saddles,” a tune Ava would forever after associate with a dry mouth and a pounding heart. The three tribes were the only ones to arrive that first day, so the dragoons didn’t need to worry about any of the groups fighting, as they were all allies.
Ava stood on the porch long after the other women had dispersed, the Lakota and Cheyenne women off to find their friends and relatives and the others back to their daily chores. She watched, enthralled, as the Lakota, Cheyenne and Arapaho staked their lodges and built their camps, intermingling and talking. There was laughter in the air as the shadows grew long.
“Quite a sight, isn’t it?” Captain Scott marveled as he came to join her.
She nodded, not quite able to speak. There was no way Deathrider wasn’t out there. No one in their right mind would miss this.
But now that she saw the tribes, she felt how alien she was from him. These were his people. This was his life. And it looked nothing like hers.
She didn’t care, she thought fiercely. She didn’t care how alien they were from each other. She wanted to see him again. And then . . . and then she’d see what would happen next.
“We won’t see the likes of this again in our lifetimes, I’ll wager,” Captain Scott told her. He unhooked his spyglass from his belt and handed it down to her. “Here. You’ll see better.” He gave her a concerned look. “But don’t go any closer. You stay right here on the porch, in view of the boys. We don’t want to go losing you in the crowd. Or to have some brave take a shine to you.”
Ava took the spyglass without tearing her gaze away from the scene before her. She was watching entire villages form before her eyes. Temporary lodges were going up in the blink of an eye.
“Miss Archer,” Captain Scott said, his voice husky. She finally looked up. He was staring down at her with a puppy-dog expression, which startled her. “You’re mighty pretty when you’re in a state of wonder.”
Oh no. That wasn’t something she wanted to deal with.
What did you say to that?
“Thanks for the spyglass,” she said awkwardly.
That seemed to be enough for him. He grinned at her, tipped his hat and headed back to his work. Jesus wept, she hoped he stayed mild, or she might be in for some trouble.
But Captain Scott faded from her thoughts the moment she lifted the spyglass to her eye. She spent the rest of the day watching the tribes setting up camp; she moved the spyglass ceaselessly, looking for a certain pair of broad shoulders, a single black-tipped eagle’s feather, a mouth that looked like an archer’s bow turned sideways and a pair of blazing pale eyes, the shade of ice.
By the time the evening had fallen, ashy lavender, and the campfires were flaring orange in the darkness, she still hadn’t found him. But there was a slow-burning glow of hope that was rising in her like daybreak.
He was out there somewhere.
27
THE NEXT DAY brought tension. Deathrider watched the Shoshone arrive, feeling the thrumming animosity rising in the camps of his allies. That damn army bugler started up again with that honking reveille that rang out over the camp, playing in the arrival of the Shoshone. As they saw the Shoshone warriors, the Lakota women let loose with their blood-chilling death songs, lamenting the sons and fathers, brothers and husbands lost in battle to the Shoshone.
“This could get nasty,” Two Bears said mildly.
But it didn’t. The army was clearly worried it would, the soldiers moving forward to visibly remind the tribes they had promised peace, but the Shoshone ignored the Lakota women; in fact, they seemed to enjoy the spectacle, treating it as proof of their prowess as warriors. Deathrider saw Micah only from a distance. He was gleaming with armbands; brass disks hung from his headdress like miniature suns; and his neck was draped with so many layered threads of white beads that it was amazing he could hold his head up. He was fit and dark from the summer sun.
Deathrider was glad to see he was looking well. He hadn’t seen his friend since they’d returned to the plains. When Deathrider had found Micah and Pete Hamble, Micah had been in a sorry state. He’d been bruised and sunburned and sullen; he looked like Hamble had barely fed him. He was just a bag of bones. Deathrider had crept up on Hamble easily enough; the idiot was too busy talking to hear Deathrider’s near-silent footfalls. Micah had seen him, though. At first he’d lit up, glad to see Deathrider was alive and strong enough to come rescue him. He’d saved the bitching for once they were free and clear.
Deathrider had knocked Hamble unconscious before the bastard had even registered that he’d been ambushed. Hamble had been bent over the fresh-laid campfire, trying to get it lit, yapping about some woman he’d known back in Frisco. One blow and he was down. But not dead. Deathrider figured that honor should go to Micah.
“He’s all yours,” Deathrider had told his friend as he unknotted Micah’s bonds.
“I don’t need your help,” Micah complained as he tried to shake his hands back to life. “I can take care of myself.”
“I can see that,” Deathrider had said dryly. “You had him just where you wanted him.”
“I did.” Micah nudged Hamble with his foot, rolling the man over onto his back.
“Sorry to ruin things for you.”
“I’m used to it.” Micah reached down and began yanking Hamble’s clothes off.
Deathrider watched as he took all Hamble’s belongings and left the man naked. “Remind me never to piss you off,” he said
“You already pissed me off. Many times.”
“You want me to find some stinging nettle for you to rub into his eyes too?” Deathrider asked as he watched Micah lash Hamble’s body to a Joshua tree.
“You’re always so ungrateful,” Micah bitched as he saddled up Hamble’s horse. “If it weren’t for me, you’d be dead. I saved your life with that nettle.”
“And now I’ve saved your life, so I figure we’re even.”
“I didn’t ask for you to save me,” Micah snorted as he swung into the saddle. “I had him—”
“I know, I know, you had him just where you wanted him.” Deathrider eyed Hamble’s packhorse. Hell. It was a sorry way to travel.
“Where’s your horse?” Micah asked him, surprised to see Deathrider astride the packhorse.
“I had one on loan—I had to give it back.” Deathrider had given a longing look over his shoulder, toward where he’d set his lordship’s Arab free. He’d much rather be on the Arab than on the packhorse.
“Where in hell have you been anyway?” Micah demanded as they rode into the inky night.
“It’s a long story.”
“That’s fine. We’ve got a long piece of traveling ahead. And the least you can do, af
ter all you’ve put me through, is keep me entertained while we travel.” He was fumbling through Hamble’s saddlebag as he spoke, looking for food.
As they rode home, Deathrider told his friend some of what had happened—but not all. Some of it was too tangled up and sore for him to tell. The bits of it with red hair and sloe-dark eyes . . .
“Traveling with you was blasted misery,” Micah told him, sounding cheerful enough when they finally parted ways on the plains, pausing to watch the grass heads flick and wave in the winds.
“Back at you,” Deathrider agreed. He was going to miss his friend. “Stay safe.”
“I will—you won’t be anywhere near me.”
Deathrider had laughed. But the laughter had faded as he’d watched Micah ride off into the sea of grass. He’d had a bittersweet feeling that things had changed forever.
Now as he saw Micah with his people here at Fort Laramie, Deathrider knew for sure they had. Micah had changed. Hell, he had changed.
Jim Bridger came in with the Shoshone, escorting them with his head held high. The trapper had married into the Snake band, and he came as a full-fledged member of the tribe. The army seemed more than a little startled to find a white man among the leadership group accepting their welcome.
The Shoshone were armed to the teeth, Deathrider noted. Just as he was, just as the Cheyenne and Arapaho and Lakota were. Everyone had come prepared for this meeting to go terribly wrong. And no one was particularly hopeful.
“You brought the white man, I see.” Running Elk joined Two Bears and Deathrider as they watched the Shoshone set up camp. “Just like the Snake. Bringing white men where they don’t belong.”
