In fact, she had. “My mother grew angry whenever I asked when I was little, so gradually I stopped asking and forgot about it.”
He nodded. “And just what did she tell you?”
Kimi shrugged. “That I was kin to the White Buffalo Woman, sacred to the Sioux.”
Hinzi snorted with disdain. “That’s only an old Sioux legend; even I’ve heard it. What about your bright green eyes?”
She didn’t have a good answer. Maybe she hadn’t delved too deeply because she didn’t really want to know. If she weren’t Lakota, who was she? What was she? “Again, Wagnuka grew impatient with my questions and I stopped asking.”
Hinzi reached out to grasp the medicine object that hung between her breasts. “What is this?”
“My sacred medicine.”
He turned it over in his hand, face puzzled. “It looks almost like a gold acorn. Where did you get this?”
Kimi shrugged, pulled away from him. “I don’t know. I’ve always had it.”
He caught her shoulders in both hands. “Do you remember anything of your past? Perhaps you were stolen from some ranch in a long ago massacre.”
The past was a blur to Kimi. When she reached back into her mind, all she remembered was her spirit song, being very thirsty, a big man carrying her. It suddenly dawned on her that the man was white and had eyes the color of her own. Kimimila. The Lakota word for butterfly was the only other memory that surfaced. She didn’t want to think about it. As devastating as Hinzi’s questions were, she wanted to cling to the familiar life of her people, the only life she knew.
“Hinzi, the warriors will be trailing us soon.” She went to the mouth of the cave and peered out. The big buckskin stallion still grazed nearby, the first beams of sunlight glistened on rain drops that clung to the grass. How did she feel about this man? Did she want him to escape? Certainly she didn’t want to be taken as a prisoner to the fort.
She took a deep breath, thinking. “Hinzi, riding double will slow your horse. Leave me here and go on. One Eye will find me when he comes and by then, you’ll be safely back at the fort.”
He swore under his breath in that soft drawl. “Don’t be a silly little fool! I can’t leave you here. You’re white, Kimi, somewhere a family is looking for you.”
“Are they?” she challenged him. “Even if that is so, I have been among the Sioux so long, I don’t even remember any other life, and more than that, I want no other. My white family may all be dead so that I have no place to go.”
His face furrowed in thought and he brushed his blond hair out of his sky-colored eyes. “We’ll figure all this out when we get back to civilization.”
She listened to him gathering up his things as she turned and stared out across the landscape. What she waited to hear was that after last night, he wanted her as his woman and that was why she must go with him. If given the choice, what would her answer be? Everything seemed so different in the harsh light of day.
However, he said nothing, and she remembered that there was a white girl waiting for him. Kimi had only been a night’s entertainment for him. The realization both hurt and annoyed her, but then she had known about the other girl from the first. It couldn’t be jealousy, she told herself, it was only that she had been used as casually as most white men used an Indian girl with no thought of her feelings. Wagnuka had been right.
On the ridge to the east, outlined against the coming sun, Kimi saw something move. She stiffened, watching ... riders. A line of riders strung out along the rim of the world. “Soldiers,” she whispered.
Hinzi peered over his shoulder, his hairy chest brushing her bare arm. “No, those aren’t soldiers.” He sounded disappointed. “Paint ponies and I don’t see any reflection off brass buttons. It’s One Eye and his men.”
Kimi shook her head, her heart sinking as she suddenly realized who the riders might be. “Enemy Crow.” She watched them ride closer for a long moment, then they disappeared into a ravine. “I can tell by their hair.”
He acted as if he weren’t sure whether to run out and yell after them. “Are they hostile?”
“To any Sioux, yes; to a soldier, maybe; depending on whether they’re renegades or not. Look like they’re on a war raid.”
Hinzi shrugged as he came around her, caught the horse. “That’s not our problem. They’re headed west, away from the fort.”
She caught his arm. “Hinzi, I’d say they may be headed for my people’s camp.”
“Well, that’s the first good news I’ve had in a while,” the soldier quipped. “Maybe they’ll keep One Eye and the others busy long enough for us to escape.”
“Hinzi, don’t you understand?” she implored, “those are my people they are going to attack–”
“Kimi, those are not your people. You’re as white as I am.”
“Not in my heart,” she said stubbornly. “Why don’t you let me take the horse? Scout is fast, and I know a shortcut through the ravines. I can get there before the Crow surprise the camp.”
“And what am I supposed to do? Walk all the way back to the fort?” He raised one sardonic eyebrow. “You’d leave me out here afoot? I reckon you know what my answer is to that!” He swung up on the horse, held out his hand to her. “Let’s get out of here.”
Instead she turned and started running back toward the Sioux camp. “Go on then, white soldier. I am a swift runner, perhaps I can still get there before them.”
Behind her, he called, “and what if the Crow find you out there alone before you reach the village?”
She looked over her shoulder, shrugged, although her soul flinched at the thought. “They will do what men always do to an enemy girl, no matter her color.”
“Kimi, don’t!”
“Go on, white soldier; forget about me. What is it to you if a bunch of old people and Lakota babies are massacred? You’ll be safe back at the fort and they can all laugh when you tell them about making love to a little savage.” She turned and began to run.
She heard the sound of Scout’s hooves and then Hinzi was beside her, reaching down to lift her, kicking and struggling to the horse before him as he swore under his breath. “Stop kicking me! I’ll be damned if I’ll let some Crow buck have you!”
“You had me first, so what do you care what man has me next? I hate you! Let me go!” She struggled to get away, but he held her firmly against his hairy, muscled chest.
He didn’t say anything for a long moment as he reined in the horse uncertainly. “If I turn this horse and ride to the fort, you’ll never forgive me, will you?”
“Forgive you?” she spat it at him, “I’ll try to kill you first chance I get!”
“And if we go back to the Lakota, they’ll kill me; not much of a choice, I’d say. What a mess!” He nudged the horse and they started toward the Sioux camp at a gallop.
Kimi looked up at him with horror. “What are you doing?”
“Taking you to warn the village.” His expression was stoic and he didn’t look at her.
“You can’t do that; they’ll torture you to death!”
“Then do you want to go to the fort?”
So that was his game; putting her in a position to beg him to take her to the fort, thinking maybe she cared enough about him that she didn’t want anything to happen to him. “You’re not really going to do that,” she scoffed.
“Watch me.” His arrogant face looked set, determined.
She didn’t say anything as they rode. She still didn’t believe he would return to the Sioux camp. He would have to be crazy–or care about her very much–to do such a thing, knowing what fate awaited him there. No doubt he would drop her near the camp and take off at a gallop.
Kimi watched the prairie ahead, thinking about One Eye and his warriors that were somewhere in between the pair and the Lakota encampment. She wondered if Hinzi had forgotten about them? If the big Crow war party continued in the direction they were headed, there was a good chance they might cross the trail of One Eye’s patrol and w
ipe them out.
He said nothing more to her as they traveled. Hours passed and the sun climbed in the sky. Now and then they dismounted and walked to cool the lathered horse, then rode on.
Abruptly they topped a rise and saw the Lakota war party riding toward them.
Kimi gasped. “Hinzi, free me here and you can get away with the horse. Once I tell them about the Crow war party, they will lose interest in chasing you.”
“Too late. They’ve spotted us,” Hinzi sounded resigned to his fate. “I might as well die facing them as to be ridden down like a cringing dog. I can at least die like a Randolph would be expected to. Besides I’ve heard Indians won’t harm a crazy man and I must qualify.” He nudged the horse forward.
One Eye and the others reined in, sat their horses staring in disbelief as Scout loped up. Even as several of the braves put an arrow to their bows, Kimi held up her hand, shouted a protest. “Wait! Hear what we have to say! Hinzi has ridden back to warn you of a Crow war party!”
The Sioux warriors paused. Perhaps they suddenly realized they couldn’t get a clear shot at the white soldier with Kimi sitting the horse in front of him.
One Eye frowned as they drew up a few yards away. “Kimi, do you lie to save this white dog?”
“I will bite the knife to show I tell the truth, if need be,” Kimi said. Biting the knife was a sacred ceremony throughout the whole Sioux nation. To go through the ceremony swearing words were true when one lied would bring great misfortune, even death to the liar.
Hinzi said in broken Lakota: “Kimi speaks true. We saw almost double the number of warriors who ride with you crossing the rim rock.” He gestured toward the horizon. “Kimi thinks they come to ambush your camp tonight.”
One Eye looked at him thoughtfully, slowly lowered his bow. “And you, soldier, riding my stolen horse; you return, knowing it means certain death?”
“The Crow warriors will hit your camp hard, perhaps tonight as it sleeps,” Hinzi said. “Many will die. I do not intend that Kimi be one of them.”
“You are a fool!” One of the other warriors spat out. “The Crow are often allies of the white soldiers and sometimes scout for them. If you had gone to them, they would have helped you escape.”
She felt him shrug. “She refused to go with me and I could not be sure she would be safe with them.”
“You are either a crazy man, very brave or a fool for a woman’s soft body,” One Eye said, “and I don’t have time to decide that now.” He gestured to one of the others. “Tie him up.”
She felt Hinzi tense as if he might try to turn his horse and gallop away, then seemed to realize he didn’t have a chance. The brave reached to tie Hinzi’s hands behind him while another warrior kept an old musket trained on the soldier.
One Eye nodded to Kimi. “Now tell us about the war party you saw.”
Torn between her concern for Hinzi and the safety of her people, Kimi told the braves all the details she could remember. “I think we could take a short cut and ambush them at that little spring where the willows grow.”
A murmur of approval of her idea ran through the war party.
One Eye said, “Yes, this is what we will do. If we can take the Crow by surprise, their superior numbers won’t matter. Here, Kimi,” he gestured. “Take one of the spare horses for yourself.”
She didn’t really want to leave Hinzi. It had felt so comforting to have the heat of his big body against her. Looking at One Eye’s stern face, she decided this was not the time to argue. She slid from the horse and took another. Perhaps in the heat of the fight, she might be able to free Hinzi, give him a fresh horse and a head start. The choice between his safety and her people had been a hard one, but she didn’t intend that her first lover should die.
“You, soldier, ride next to me so I can watch you.” One Eye gestured and Hinzi nudged the buckskin up next to him. His expression showed that he admired Hinzi’s reckless defiance. “You have good taste in horses.”
Hinzi laughed. “If a man must steal a mount, he should take the best that the most valiant man owns!”
The warriors laughed in spite of themselves. The Sioux liked arrogant courage, even in an enemy. All wheeled and set off at a lope for the spring. She saw grudging admiration on the warriors’ faces. Hinzi might be white and he might be a reckless fool, but he had courage and the Sioux respected bravery above all else. They paused once to eat a bite of dried pemmican and cool the horses.
One Eye rubbed his red eye patch. “Wasicu, you ride well—for a soldier.”
The white man smiled, cold disdain in his blue eyes. “I shoot well, too, as you would find out if I had a gun.”
“You will die quickly as befits a brave man when we get you back to camp.”
The stout Gopher, protested. “No, he should die slowly for taking the woman and your best horse.”
“I went with him willingly,” Kimi lied, and then wondered why she did so. Maybe because she thought it would be a bad omen for her first lover to be killed.
“So even though you are raised a Sioux, the white blood calls to you.” One Eye frowned.
Hinzi snorted with haughtiness. “The girl lies. I wanted her; I took her. Do not the Sioux sometimes carry off women and make them their own in a raid?”
The warrior nodded. “You would protect this girl at risk to yourself? I have never known a white man like you, Hinzi. When we finish with the Crows, I will almost be sorry to see you die.”
“You will see I die as bravely as I speak,” the soldier said coldly. “The girl had no part in my escape; she is blameless.”
Kimi started to protest, realized no one would listen to her.
One Eye directed that the wasicu be gagged to keep him from shouting a warning to the Crow, should he decide to. Kimi kept her mind busy as they mounted up and rode out, still scheming ways to save the yellow-haired man. She didn’t want to wonder why or think about the fact that when he left, she would never see him again. Last night had been worth it. The memories of his kiss and his embrace would last her the rest of her lifetime even if she ended up married to some Lakota warrior and bearing brown children.
One of the warriors had ridden several miles ahead, scouting the terrain. Now he returned at a gallop to tell them the spring where the willows grew was not far and that the Crow were coming toward the spring from another angle.
“To water their horses, no doubt,” One Eye muttered, and rubbed at the scrap of red patch over his right eye. “We will be there waiting when they arrive.”
She had never been in a battle before, and she was nervous about it, knowing that the Sioux were outnumbered. If they lost, she would be raped by the victorious Crows.
They dismounted in the little grove of trees and a warrior tied the soldier to a stump, making sure his gag was in place so he could not cry out and warn the enemy. Then each man put a strip of buckskin around his mount’s muzzle so it could not whinny and alert the coming riders.
At last the warriors took their places behind stumps and rocks. “Give me a bow,” she begged, “I’m a fair shot.”
One Eye shook his head. “Stay back in the brush with the horses. At the first sign that we might be overrun, you ride out as fast as you can and warn the camp.”
Kimi ran her tongue over her dry lips, listening to the approaching riders. “What about the soldier?”
“What about him?” One Eye shrugged. “If the Crow win, they will free him. If we win, we will bring him back to the camp so all may see his death.”
She started to protest, but another warrior motioned her to silence. The enemy was very close now.
Kimi retreated to where Hinzi was tied up near the horses. He gave her a long look and she glanced away, unsure what to do. The warriors crouched down behind brush and small trees, waiting. It occurred to her that in the ensuing fight and confusion, she might be able to get a knife and cut the soldier free. While the two sides fought, he could probably grab a horse and escape. She tried to explain to him with sil
ent gestures what she intended to do.
He looked puzzled a long moment, then troubled as he seemed to understand. His blue eyes asked an unspoken question: what about you?
Kimi shook her head. It really didn’t matter what happened to her if she could save Hinzi and her people. She hadn’t had time yet to think about her white blood, and anyway, what did it matter now? Maybe she had really known it all along and closed her mind to it. Her skin might be white, but inside, she was as much a Sioux as Wagnuka. And she would never think of the old woman as anything but her mother. The time before that was lost to her. Besides she could never fit into his civilization, and Hinzi had a white girl waiting for him when he went back to his people. There was no place for her in his world.
Rand watched the girl, understanding now that in the confusion, she intended to free him so he could escape. He pulled at his bonds, cautious of the warriors who crouched only a few feet away. If he could get the gag out of his mouth, what he should do was yell out and warn the approaching Crow. They might be a friendly bunch who would reward him by helping him return to the fort.
And yet ... He looked at Kimi, not sure how he felt about her. He had never experienced such ecstasy in a woman’s arms, and he was both drawn to her and ashamed. She was not much more than a child, although she had a woman’s body. He had taken this ignorant little savage’s virginity, so he owed her something, but what? He was pledged to marry aristocratic Lenore Carstairs. Kimi would not fit into his life; in fact, his mother and sister would be appalled and horrified by this primitive girl raised by Indians.
He shifted his cramped muscles, listening to the sounds of horses moving closer. Somewhere a quail called and a grasshopper jumped across the brush near him. His wrists were rubbed raw and his tongue felt parched with the gag. If she managed to free him, should he force Kimi to go with him? No, better he should leave her with the people she loved.
But suppose he did that and the Sioux lost this coming fight? Rand winced, knowing what Kimi’s fate would be. In his mind, he saw her spread-eagled naked and staked down for the animal pleasure of the Crow braves
Sioux Slave Page 11
