Jolena scarcely breathed as Spotted Eagle slowly drew her up the side of the cliff. She could hear the roar of the waterfall on one side of her, almost deafening, and the crash of the water below, where she would have surely fallen to her death.
Tears rushed from her eyes again as she gazed up at Spotted Eagle who had risked his life to save hers. She wanted to be held in the protective cocoon of his arms, never to part from him again!
She wanted to find ways to thank him, for she would always be in his debt.
"Soon you will be safe," Spotted Eagle said, as he worked hard at keeping hold of her. Although she was slight in build, his shoulder and arm muscles were straining as he struggled to pull her up in this awkward way.
Jolena saw that she was almost able to reach up with her knees, to help place herself on solid land. She leaned against the side of the cliff, the sharp edges of the rocks piercing her blouse and cutting into her breasts as she was pulled up to safety. Her knees gave her that last boost she needed as she pushed herself up and fell down limply beside Spotted Eagle.
He drew her fiercely into his arms and held her close, his face burrowed in the depths of her black hair. "My woman," he whispered, easing her away from the edge of the cliff as he held her tightly within his aching arms. "You are safe now, my woman." Jolena sobbed as she clung to him. "If not for you, I would have died," she cried, her tears soaking his buckskin shirt as she pressed her cheek hard against his chest. "Thank you. My darling, thank you."
So glad to have his woman safe in his arms, Spotted Eagle was speechless. He held on to her, yet looked past her shoulder at Two Ridges and Kirk, glowering at them because of their cowardice. He could understand the white man's failure to save his woman, for he was too lacking in muscle to have dragged her up to safety.
But Two Ridges? He was a noble Blackfoot whose bravery and courage had never faltered, especially when a woman's life was at stake!
As Spotted Eagle's eyes locked with Two Ridges, he saw something more than shame. It was as though Two Ridges was hiding a seething anger within his eyes, and this puzzled Spotted Eagle.
Spotted Eagle was the one who had cause to be angry at his brother Blackfoot! Two Ridges should be bending his head in shame, not defying his friend with a steady, angry stare, his jaw tight, his lips pursed tightly together.
Not understanding his friend's strange attitude, Spotted Eagle wrenched his eyes away, instead focusing his full attention on his woman. Placing his hands on each side of her face, he lifted her gaze to his.
"Let us return to the camp," he said. He glanced down at her torn clothes, wincing when he saw the bloodstains on her skirt. His gaze moved slowly upward, stopping where her blouse was torn, partially exposing her breasts. He sucked in a wild gulp of air when he discovered blood oozing from a would on one of her breasts, the blood spreading along the white fabric of her blouse.
Without further thought, and ignoring Kirk's angry stare, Spotted Eagle whisked Jolena quickly up into his arms and began carrying her down the side of the hill. He held her near, his fingers gripping her as gently as possible as she leaned against him, her cheek pressed against his chest.
''I love you," Jolena said, twining her arm around his neck, pulling herself up so that she could brush a soft kiss across his lips. "I shall always cherish you."
"No more than I, you," Spotted Eagle said, gazing down at her with heavy eyelids. "Should you have died…"
Jolena placed a finger softly to his lips, silencing his further words. "Darling, I didn't," she murmured. "But only because of you. I don't understand why Kirk and Two Ridges…"
Spotted Eagle was the one this time to place finger to lips. He sealed hers with his finger, not wanting her to waste her breath worrying about things that should have been.
This was now. She was alive. She was safely with him. They were in love.
He did not want to take the time and effort to cast blame.
He would now be there, always, for her. If ever he were called to his village for true reasons, he would take her with him!
No one would get the chance to trick him again!
This time such foolishness had almost cost his woman her life. If he had ventured on to his village, Jolena would most certainly have died!
The thought made an ache circle his heart, so he cast the thought aside and centered all of his attention on making Jolena comfortable after her terrifying experience of only moments ago.
When they arrived at the camp and everyone circled around Jolena and Spotted Eagle with frenzied questions after seeing Jolena's condition, Spotted Eagle answered their questions quickly, then pitched Jolena's tent and they sought refuge within, alone, away from everyone and everything but themselves as night fell in its purple and black shadows over the land.
"Remove your blouse and skirt," Spotted Eagle said as he wrung out a cloth in a basin of water that sat on the floor of the tent. "Let me bathe your wounds while you tell me how you happened to fall over the cliff."
Feeling no bashfulness in Spotted Eagle's presence, Jolena did not hesitate as her fingers went to the buttons of her blouse.
"I know I was foolish," Jolena said, unbuttoning her blouse, cringing then as she eased it off, the dried blood painfully adhering her blouse to her sensitive breasts. "But it is so strange. There was this butterfly. It seemed to be teasing me. It lured me onward until… until I lost my footing." She laid her blouse aside and quickly slipped off her skirt, and as the large campfire outside cast its golden dancing light along the inside walls, Jolena gasped, shocked to see just how scratched up her legs were. Blood was dried in streaks up and down her thighs, and she winced as Spotted Eagle began dabbing the blood away with the damp cloth.
"A butterfly lured you into danger?" Spotted Eagle said, giving Jolena a shadowed glance. "You know butterflies well. What was the name of this particular one?"
"I am sure that you know it well," Jolena said, tightening her leg muscles as Spotted Eagle continued cleansing her of the dried blood. "It is called the nymphalid, and it is a butterfly steeped in Indian lore."
When Jolena described the butterfly's destinctive markings, Spotted Eagle stared at her with a guarded look. "You call this butterfly nymphalid?" he said, his voice drawn. "That is the butterfly that lured you to danger?"
Jolena's spine stiffened, hearing the caution in his voice, frightening her. "Yes, I am certain it was that butterfly," she murmured. "I have studied about it. I would not be mistaken."
Spotted Eagle stared at her a moment longer, then wrung his cloth out and leaned closer to her, now softly dabbing the blood from one of her breasts. He ached to cup the breast and kiss its nipple, but instead he simply continued cleansing her wound.
"If you studied the butterfly of Indian lore well enough, you would know that it is a butterf
ly that Indians shun," Spotted Eagle said in a scolding fashion. "In your studies, you would have learned that the nymphalid causes bad luck. It makes people afraid. When it flies out of its pupa, it drops a red liquid like blood from the air. It is a sign of death."
"Yes, in my studies I learned these things," Jolena said softly. "But I don't take things like that seriously. Darling, surely you know myth from fact. The myth that the nymphalid causes bad luck, or is a sign of death, is only that. A myth. I can't allow myself to think that the butterfly caused me to plunge over the edge of the cliff."
As she tried to convince Spotted Eagle, Jolena began to remember how the butterfly had seemed to tease her, not once but over and over again.
A chill rode up and down her spine, as she thought that perhaps she was wrong and that Spotted Eagle was right to fear the nymphalid.
"You will ignore the beckoning of the nymphalid should it try to lure you again into danger?" Spotted Eagle said as he dropped his cloth into the basin of water, then clutched his fingers gently to Jolena's shoulders.
"Yes, I will," she said, then flung herself into his arms, forgetting the soreness of the scratches on her breasts. His fingers now on them, softly kneading, creating fires within her, meant more to her than anything else at this moment.
As he crushed his mouth to her lips and kissed her wildly, almost savagely in the way he moved his mouth over hers, Jolena cried out against his lips and wrapped him within her arms and pulled him down over her.
Frantically, almost desperately, she tried to shove his breeches down across his hips. His need rising for her, Spotted Eagle helped her, kicking them to the side.
Then his hand cupped her mound at the juncture of her thighs, thrusting a hungry finger inside her.
Jolena closed her eyes and sighed as he pleasured her in this simple way, then sucked in a wild breath of rapture when she felt something much better as he plunged his thick shaft deeply within her, magnificently filling her.
Spotted Eagle braced himself above her with his arms, his hands catching Jolena's and holding them slightly above her head as he started his rhythmic strokes within her. He kissed her eyes, her nose, and then her mouth, pressing his tongue through her trembling lips.
Jolena shuddered sensually when their tongues touched and danced against the other, in time, it seemed, with Spotted Eagle's continued strokes, his hips moving, hers rising, meeting him.
Spotted Eagle paused momentarily. He leaned up away from her and gazed with an intense longing into her eyes. "Am I hurting you?" he questioned softly. "Are your wounds too severe for my body to be against them?"
"They are mere scratches," Jolena whispered, leaning up, flicking her tongue across his lips. "What you are giving me is ecstasy." He responded to her as she thrust her pelvis toward him, resuming the strokes that made his whole world seem to be suddenly spinning around him as the passion built like heated strikes of white lightning through him. He held his head back and groaned as she clamped her legs around his waist, drawing him more tightly and deeply into her. He pressed down against her, his hips thrusting hard.
Jolena writhed pleasurably beneath him, scarcely aware of her own soft whimpering sounds as Spotted Eagle's lips closed over a nipple, sucking, biting, licking.
Jolena splayed her fingers across his tight buttocks, hearing him moan as her fingers tightened around him, her fingernails sinking in, mixing pain with pleasure.
Suddenly Spotted Eagle placed his hands at Jolena's waist and rolled with her until he had her sitting astride him, her eyes filled with wanton pleasure as he entered her and began bucking wildly up into her.
Heated waves of pleasure spread over Jolena. She held her head back, her hair billowing luxuriously across her shoulders. As Spotted Eagle's hands cupped and kneaded her breasts, her shoulders swayed in the incredible beauty of her passion, feeling herself drawing near to that joyous bliss of release.
When Spotted Eagle made another deep plunge inside her, and then made many more quickly repeated thrusts as he groaned and held on to her breasts, she relaxed and closed her eyes as the flood of pleasure swept raggedly through them both as he cried out his fulfillment…
Her heart pounding so hard it made her dizzy, Jolena slipped away from Spotted Eagle and lay down at his side. Taking several ragged breaths, she laid her hand over that part of him that still seemed alive as it throbbed against her flesh. Circling her fingers around him, she slowly moved them, his gasp of pleasure proving that he wanted it.
Soon he spilled his seed into her hand, then drew her against him once again, holding her tight. "My woman," he whispered huskily. "My beautiful, beautiful woman. Oh, how you make me alive when for so long I did not even know that I was dead."
Jolena knew that this was the perfect time to question him about so many things, but she did not want to ruin the intimacy of the moment with questions. There would be a more perfect time and place for such conversation. At this moment, she just wanted to cherish being with Spotted Eagleand being alive.
She would not allow herself to remember that her brother had been too cowardly to save her.
Chapter Fourteen
Traveling in the back of the wagon instead of on the seat beside Kirk, Jolena spread her journals around her, her fingers gingerly pinning first one specimen of butterfly onto a board, then another.
She stopped, and with a magnifying glass studied one of the most colorful and beautiful butterflies she had ever seen. Its wings were covered with overlapping scales, thousands of these tiny scales giving the insect its brilliant colors.
Jolena was scarcely aware of the thunder that was rumbling outside the wagon, muffled somewhat by the trees of the forest. Only moments ago, she had been sitting outside beside her brother, admiring the brilliant orange flowers staring out boldly from vines on the sides of the trees, their scent trapped in the steady air. She had been in awe of a colorful lizard as it basked on a rock in the ribbons of sun that broke through the thick foliage overhead.
She was not even aware of the struggling efforts of those who were leading the teams of mules through the thick forest in an effort to enable everyone to continue traveling along the narrow path that had been cut through the forest by earlier travelers, instead of being forced to travel on the mules or on foot.
Jolena busied her fingers to get together the collection of butterflies for her father, while her mind was busy elsewhere.
"Spotted Eagle," she whispered, thrilling at the mere sound of his name as it breathed across her lips.
She had never thought that being in love could make one feel so much more alive. It was as though all of her feelings were intensified now that she had fallen in love. She felt as though her very heart was singing!
A lurid flash of lightning close by outside
the wagon and an ensuing crash of thunder caused Jolena's fingers to slip so that the pin she was readying to stick into the board pricked her finger instead.
"Ouch!" she whispered harshly, wincing even more as blood began trickling down her finger.
Reaching for a clean, dry piece of cotton, she placed it over the tiny wound. She then jumped with alarm when lightning flashed again, sending its lurid light through the canvas of the wagon, followed by an even louder crash of thunder.
As a small child, Jolena had always covered her head with a blanket if it stormed in the middle of the night while she was alone in her bedroom. Now she crawled to the front of the wagon and gazed upward, gasping. Black, billowing clouds were visible through the break in the trees overhead. She grabbed for Kirk's arm when lightning flooded the forest with another series of blue-white flashes, thunder booming only seconds later.
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