So Wide the Sky

by Elizabeth Grayson

  Sunlight shafted through the branches of the trees like ribbons of gold as she wandered from the woods into a mountain meadow. It lay broad and flat, a medley of colors and textures hemmed on the far edge by a tumble of rocks. Cass waded in among the swaying plants, cutting yellow yarrow and mugwort, hyssop and goldenrod. She found the curly-leafed mint as much by its smell as by the shape of its stem, searched out milkvetch and a few bright sunflowers.

  She heard laughter as she came down the trail toward the clearing, Meggie's high-pitched giggle, underlain by a deep rumbling chuckle that seemed to find an answering vibration somewhere inside her. She couldn't think when she'd heard either Meggie or Hunter laugh with such abandon.

  She stopped on a boulder above the clearing to watch the tiny girl and the broad-shouldered man as they knelt together on the bank of the stream. The child's silver-floss hair gleamed bright beside a thatch of hair so black that even the sun got lost in it. She watched with a smile on her lips as Hunter bent above the child to help her bait her hook. His hands enfolded Meggie's tiny ones like broad dark petals around the delicate heart of a flower.

  She supposed she should wish this was Drew spending time with Meggie, laughing with her and teaching her things, but somehow Cass couldn't manage that.

  She spread the plants she'd collected on the gauze and went out for more without disturbing the pair fishing by the stream. When she returned well over an hour later, Meggie charged toward her across the clearing.

  "We caught six fish! " Meggie declared. "We cut them open and took out all their guts. Now we're cooking them over the fire!"

  Hunter looked up and motioned for her to come. "These are almost ready," he called out.

  Taking a blanket and provisions from their packs, Cassie ambled over to where Hunter was tending their meal.

  "I guess you had some luck fishing, after all."

  "I guess we did."

  "It's been a long time since I had trout cooked like this."

  "Is that how the Cheyenne cook them?" Meggie asked.

  Cassie nodded. "With a bit of salt and certain herbs." From the smell of things, Hunter knew the recipe.

  While Hunter cooked, Cassie spread the blanket in the soft, cool grass. She took out tin plates and cups, bread and cheese, the cookies she'd baked the night before, and a canteen of lemonade. Now that they were finally beginning to harvest vegetables from the company gardens, the army thought to send lemons to ward off scurvy.

  When the fish were done, Hunter brought them to their makeshift table. Cass burned her mouth on the first flaky bite, but the delicate flavor of trout and herbs made up for the discomfort. They shared the meal, Cass slicing bread and cheese, Hunter helping Meggie with the fish bones, Meggie offering around cookies when they were done.

  Cass washed and then packed away the dishes and the rest of the food. Once she returned to the blanket, she unlaced her high-top shoes, took them off, and wiggled her black-stockinged toes. She smiled and stretched, wishing she could gather the whole of this day up in her arms and carry it back to the fort. Perhaps then the closeness of the cabin wouldn't chafe so much, and the slights of old friends wouldn't hurt. With a shake of her head, she put thoughts of the fort from her mind.

  "I love it here," she said, half to herself.

  "I love it, too," Meggie piped up from where she'd plopped down beside Cassie. Though she knew Meggie would never admit it, she was curling up for her nap. She pillowed her head on Cassie's thigh. "Let's stay right here and build a house."

  Cass stroked the little girl's hair. "Now wouldn't that be nice—living someplace on the top of a mountain where you can see for miles and miles."

  "Someplace with a stream where I can fish, and with a field where Cassie can gather herbs," Meggie wished generously. "And with a—" Meggie looked up at Hunter. "What do you want, Hunter?"

  "I already have the place I want. It's in Montana."

  Cass turned to look at him, and found he was concentrating on a spot beyond the trees where an eagle was riding the currents rising off the face of the hill. He was hiding from the admission—or trying to.

  She allowed herself the sliver of a smile. "Where in Montana?"

  He hesitated for a dozen heartbeats before answering. "Up between the Gallatin and Yellowstone Rivers. I staked my claim right after I got mustered out of the army."

  "You served out here?"

  "At what's become Fort Caspar. I decided I liked this part of the country well enough to want a piece of it."

  She wanted to ask him more, but just then Meggie whimpered a little on her way to sleep. Cass bent to soothe her.

  "It's been a busy day for her," Cassie said.

  "And what about you? Has it been a good day for you?" Hunter wanted to know.

  Cass smiled up into his eyes. Eyes that were warm and intent and dark, so dark she was surprised that they were such an extraordinary shade of blue.

  "It's been a wonderful day," she told him.

  "I'm glad," he said and reached across to pat her hand. His fingertips rasped against her skin, warm and rough and so compelling. A tingle of awareness danced up her arm.

  "Cass," he said in a tone that made her stomach dip. "Cass, there's something I need to tell you. Something important."

  Her heart lurched. Her throat went dry. There was something in the narrowed line of that generous mouth that she didn't want to acknowledge, didn't want to think about. She looked away, but it didn't help. She was aware of Hunter's height and breadth beside her, of the scent of wood smoke that clung to his clothes, of his closeness and his warmth. Anticipation collected behind her breastbone like a logjam.

  He cleared his throat twice before he spoke. "I—I wanted you to know..." he said and hesitated.

  "Wanted me to know what?" she demanded, suddenly afraid to look at him, afraid of what she might see in those deep blue eyes.

  "I wanted you to know I'm the one who helped Many Buffalo escape."

  Cass let out her breath in a rush. "You what?"

  It was the very last thing in the world she'd expected him to say. She stared at him, grappling with his confession and what it meant. She was glad he'd set Many Buffalo free, glad the Arikara had escaped from the fort with his life.

  "You?" she demanded, stiffening one vertebra at a time. "You let him out?"

  "I gave him the means to escape."

  And had gotten clean away with it!

  "Did you start that fire?"

  "I did."

  Outrage roared through her. She jerked her hand away. "Don't you know that people could have been killed in that fire? Don't you know we could have lost our families and our homes?"

  "I had it under control."

  She was suddenly shaking inside, remembering the intensity of the blaze, the smoke spiraling into the sky. No one had that fire under control.

  "What if those wagons had been closer to the barns? What if wind came up? What if no one had rung that bell?"

  Hunter's jaw hardened. "I made sure those wagons were well out in the field. I waited not a hundred feet from that fire bell to make sure one of the sentries sounded the alarm."

  "So much could have gone wrong!"

  He glared at her, color high in his face. "What did you want me to do, Cass, let him stay locked up?"

  She heard the low, stark shudder in his voice. He knew what it was like to be locked in that cage. He understood captivity, the way it strangled you, the terrible black futility.

  "They would have hanged him!" His voice frayed a little more as he went on. "They would have marched him to the gallows and hanged him because of who he was, not what he'd done."

  She had stood in that cell and seen the panic in the Arikara's eyes. She'd understood it, wanted to set him free, and known she could not. Hunter had been able to save the man. Yet salvation had its price, and this time she had paid it.

  "I didn't know you'd get blamed for what I'd done," he murmured as if he'd read her mind.

  She heard the remorse in his
tone, his guilt at having made her life more difficult.

  She leaned a little closer, wanting him to know she understood. "Of course you were right to help him. I know what being a captive means. I'm glad you set him free."

  He covered her hand with his and again, for just a moment, Cass allowed herself to absorb Hunter's warmth, his strength, the vitality that nourished her in ways she refused to even consider.

  Then she pulled away. "It doesn't matter about the blame. I've been an outcast half my life. It's Meggie who needs protecting, and as long as I can keep her from being hurt..."

  "I've tried to look after her, too," he said.

  "I know, Hunter, and I thank you for doing that."

  After a moment she tipped her head a little to the side and eyed him speculatively. "So how did you break Many Buffalo out of the guardhouse?"

  Hunter's mouth curled at one corner. She could see that in spite of her lecturing, he was pleased with himself.

  "I made an impression of the extra guardhouse key in Ben McGarrity's office. Once I had an impression, it was easy enough to file a blank to fit the lock. I slipped the key to Many Buffalo during the hearing and told him to wait for his chance to use it."

  His smile faded away. "I swear if I had any idea that you had gone to visit him, if I had any way of knowing they'd think it was you—"

  "I told you it doesn't matter."

  "Of course it matters."

  "What matters to me, Hunter, is today. What matters is being out of the fort, being able to lie back in the grass and hear the wind humming in the trees. What matters is that you gave this world to me—and I will always be grateful."

  Hunter nodded slowly. She could see he understood what no one else ever would. He loved the sun and the trees and the sky, just as she had learned to love them. He saw the world as she did, through the filter of two lives, with the joy and pain of two disparate souls.

  They were connected in that way, and all at once she needed some more tangible connection. She leaned across and curled her fingers around the back of his hand. She smelled the wind and the sunshine in his hair. He raised his gaze to hers, and she fell headfirst into those dark, dark eyes.

  He turned his hand and caught her fingers in his own and pulled her closer. He stroked her hair, touching the windblown strands as if they'd been spun from gold. His breath slid over her like a veil of silk. She watched his mouth, mesmerized by the way the corners deepened, the way his lower lip softened as he smiled at her.

  "Cass," he said, as if that single word could communicate a hundred things that needed to be said.

  Her heart thumped in answer as loud as drumbeats on a windless night. A flush of longing rose in her so fragile and yet so compelling. Cass shivered and forced herself to pull away.

  Hunter let her go and released his breath in a thready sigh.

  In that moment Meggie stirred. She raised her head and looked from Cassie to Hunter. "Is it time for us to go already?"

  Past time, Cassie thought and reached to lace on her shoes. Hunter levered himself to his feet and squinted out at the sky. "Well, Meggie," he said, "I promised your father we'd be back to the fort by suppertime."

  "Then I suppose we should go," the girl said, her head drooping with resignation.

  When Hunter went to see to packing up the horses, Meggie chased after him. Cassie wandered to the boulder above the stream.

  From there she could look out over the glade, over the whole wide world that lay beyond it. She filled her eyes with the yellows and greens and golds of the towering hills and the plains that spread toward the horizon. She drank in the blazing hue of the sky, savored the caress of the wind against her cheeks and the scent of the pines. She listened to the murmur of the trees and the bright ripple of the creek as it danced down the mountain. She held on to this world as long as she could.

  "Cass," Hunter finally called out to her. The word was as much an apology as a summons.

  "Yes," she called back. "I'm coming."

  * * *

  "Oh, Soooo-ban-na,

  Oh, don't shoe cry for meee

  'Cuz I come from Aba-ba-lama

  With my ban-jo on my kneeee."

  Hunter laughed as Meggie warbled the last somewhat mangled verse of her favorite song. They had wound their way out of the boulder-studded hills at the foot of Caspar Mountain and were well out onto the rolling grassland. In an hour and a half, they'd be back at the fort.

  As before, Hunter had taken Meggie up into the saddle with him and was letting her use the reins to guide his gelding. Cass straggled behind, keeping to herself. Hunter glanced back now and then, uncomfortable with the way the afternoon had ended, at a loss as to how he could have made things different.

  He slowed his mount and waited for Cass to catch up. "Did you get what you needed today?" he asked her.

  "Far more than I expected."

  He shifted his gaze to the basket of cuttings tied to the back of her saddle. "Are there other things you need?"

  She hesitated, looked across at him and then shook her head. "No," she said. "No, I can't think of anything else."

  The light that had been burning so bright in Cassie's eyes was dimming, and Hunter didn't know how to stop it. Words of apology and concern pushed up his throat. "Oh, Cass—" he began.

  Meggie cut off whatever wild and inappropriate thing he'd been about to say. "Hunter," she queried, "did you like my song?"

  Hunter smiled with a flutter of relief. "It was a wonderful song, Meggie, and you sang it so well."

  "Now you sing one."

  "Oh, Meggie, I don't sing."

  "Don't you know any songs?"

  "No."

  "Not even from when you were little?"

  "Any songs I might remember would be in French."

  Meggie cocked her head and looked at him. "What's French?"

  "It's another language, like Cheyenne or Sioux."

  "Sing one for me anyway."

  "Now, Meggie," Cass warned. "I don't think Hunter wants to sing."

  "I sang for him."

  "Meggie." Cassie's voice held a note that suggested the child turn her attention to something else. Meggie puffed out her lip and slapped the reins against the gelding's neck. The horse ignored her.

  "Where did you grow up speaking French?" Cassandra asked him.

  "In St. Louis."

  "St. Louis?"

  He could hear curiosity in her voice, and it surprised him. No one at Fort Carr had ever asked him where he came from or what had brought him west. That Cass wondered about it, about him, brought her in too close, made him squirm a little inside his skin. Still, he knew so much about her that it didn't seem fair not to answer.

  "My father came up the Missouri from St. Louis to trade at one of the Arikara camps. My mother was the daughter of an Arikara sub-chief. When she accepted my father's suit, it was considered a very advantageous match for both of them.

  "My parents lived together for the next two summers. In the third year I was born, and when my father came, he told everyone how pleased he was to have a son.

  "But that year the traders brought smallpox up the river to the Arikara. The sickness had visited the Assiniboine a year or two before, and many died. It had all but wiped out the Mandan nation. When it reached the Arikara, nearly everyone fell ill. Before my mother died she made my father promise that if I lived, he would take me with him to St. Louis."

  Hunter drew a long, slow breath, picking through the memories as if they were shards of glass.

  "Your father had a city wife, didn't he?" she asked softly, and Hunter was grateful for her perceptiveness.

  "Madame Jalbert didn't want to know about my father's Indian wife or his half-breed child. All the years I lived in my father's house, she never once spoke to me directly. Her children thought it was their place to remind me whenever they could that I was less than welcome there. My father did see that I was fed and clothed and taught my letters. But only when I found my way to the Indians that lived on
the edge of St. Louis did I feel as if I belonged somewhere."

  Oblivious to what the two adults were discussing, Meggie clapped her heels against the gelding's sides, hoping to spur him to greater speed. Hunter eased the horse into a trot before he continued.

  "One of the Osage men befriended me. When I was not at my father's house, I was with Man Who Stands Alone. He taught me how to ride as the Indians do, how to make and hunt with a bow, how to track, and how to live on the prairie. One night he had a vision that I must go to the village where I was born and to the people who would recognize and honor me."

  Hunter could feel the intensity of Cassandra's eyes on him. She understood the importance of such a vision. "Did your father let you go?"

  "He took me himself. We found what was left of the Arikara—a few families living on what they could grow, a few small bands too weak to defend themselves from the Sioux. My grandfather was the only one of my family who had survived the smallpox. When my father asked White Water to take me and teach me the Arikara way, he said I was too old to begin training as a warrior."

  "But you learned," Cassie said with admiration. "Anyone can see how well you learned."

  Hunter smiled both at her compliment and at his memories of that tough old man and his gentle heart. "For seven years I devoted myself to warriors' ways, but the Arikara were weak. They could barely defend their herds from the Sioux and Pawnee. It wasn't much of a life for a man who wanted to fight.

  "When one of the traders brought word that my father was dying, I took a steamboat to St. Louis to see him. While I was there, I got my chance to go to war. There were recruiters on every corner. They were signing men up to fight for the North and South. The Confederates seemed to have the finer leaders, so I signed up to fight with them."

  Cass glanced out across the rolling waves of prairie grass. "My family and Drew's left Kentucky because they were afraid war was coming. I know both Drew and Ben McGarrity fought for the Union, though I don't know much about what happened."

  "It's just as well you didn't hear about the war," Hunter told her. "There wasn't any glory in it, at least not an Arikara's kind of glory. There wasn't much to make a man feel like a warrior—just marching and taking orders and being shot at."