by Karen Kay
Closer and closer it came, its rays ever more radiant, until Kali had no choice but to turn aside and shield her eyes. And then it stopped. All was darkness again.
Opening her eyes, Kali glanced up to meet the piercing gaze of an elderly man. White hair peeked out from beneath a heavy Indian headdress, and between his eyes sat a lock of hair, which fell to the bridge of his nose. On his head sat a headdress of white fur. Two buffalo horns, decorated with scalp locks on the pointed ends, angled straight up and away from the head in two semicircles. Feathers, too numerous to count, fell to the floor and, like a train, followed the man as he paced slowly forward. A long, painted buckskin tunic reached well below his knees; beaded and quilled leggings stretched to the tops of his moccasins. Scalp locks and fringe dangled from sleeves, from the sides of his leggings, the bottom of his tunic and the back of his moccasins. In his hand he carried a lance decorated with more scalp locks, medicine bags, feathers and an animal skin.
Kali couldn’t take her eyes from him, though she tightened her grip on Soaring Eagle’s hand. One slow step followed another as the old man came toward them. He didn’t relax his stare at her, either, not even when he at last came to stand directly in front of them.
Kali alternately wanted to run, then remain where she was. She leaned toward Soaring Eagle, who threw his arm around her shoulders.
The old man waved his lance in front of them. At once two women came forward, each one carrying a large shell and a braid of sweet-smelling sage, which was smoking at one end.
“Smudge them,” said the old man.
At once, the two women went to work. One of them brushed smoke from the sage over the top of Kali’s head, down to her face, her shoulders, over her entire body. The other woman was doing the same to Soaring Eagle.
“May your minds be free,” said the old man as this was being done. “May your hearts be true.”
The entire process was repeated. Then again and once more, four being the sacred number.
At last it was done, and the old man stepped forward. He said to Kali, “So long have we been apart. So long have we suffered. But now go from here as one. For from this day onward, where there was but one heartbeat, now there are two.”
Then, turning to Soaring Eagle, he said, “Do you promise to love this woman and no other?”
“I will.”
Kali smiled, and it eased some aching part of her to hear Soaring Eagle speak these words.
The old man turned to her. “And do you accept this man’s promise? Do you believe he will honor you from now for the rest of your lives?”
“Yes,” she said. “I do.”
Again Kali smiled.
The old man waved his arms, ordering, “Come forward, my wife, and clothe our children in their ceremonial gowns.”
An old woman stepped forward, holding in one arm a dress of the skins of a deer or mountain goat. It was a white, three-skinned dress, with row after row of elk teeth on its yoke. At the center of the dress, front and back, was a triangular piece of hide, painted blue and sewn into the dress. At the bottom of the dress were two square patches, also painted blue. Knee-high moccasins completed the regalia and were sewn with beads and quillwork in geometric patterns that matched the dress.
A man’s white buckskin tunic, leggings and moccasins, painted with the same geometric designs as the dress, were held in her other arm. With a clap of the old woman’s hands, both Kali and Soaring Eagle donned the clothes, which shimmered over their forms as though the material had been sewn with magic instead of stitches.
“Know then that the past lives in you no longer. Go now, my children,” said the old man. “Go and be merry, aware that from this day and for the rest of your lives, your search is done.” He clapped his hands.
Soaring Eagle turned to Kali, took her in his arms and kissed her. And Kali, closing her eyes, forgot to breathe.
“Come, my wife,” said Soaring Eagle, raising his head.
Kali, perfectly content, smiled back at him. “Yes, my love,” she said, placing her hand in his.
Arms around one another, they turned toward the waiting assemblage, only to face…nothing. Where previously had stood the old man, the old woman and all the honored guests, now there was nothing save ground, grass and a slight wind that whistled through the cottonwood tree.
Soaring Eagle leaned back against the cottonwood tree and glared at Gilda.
“Damn,” he muttered under his breath. There was something wrong with intrusion when one least expected it—it left one with the feeling of having committed some wrong. Indeed, for Soaring Eagle, the interruption might even be physically painful, for Kali had more than a little excited him.
Would he have to start at the beginning again with Kali, he wondered idly. Trying to regain what precious ground he might have won this night?
Grimacing at his thoughts, he listened to Gilda’s song. Odd that he’d never heard that particular chant, since he was familiar with most Blackfeet melodies. It was an unusual ditty, too, a soothing song. He shut his eyes—if only for a moment. Strange, he thought, this lethargy that had come over him. Stranger still how young he felt, as though he were no more than a child being sung to sleep…
She lay beside him, beautiful and pure, here in their wedding bed. She was perfect, lovely, and he wanted her as a man needs the woman he adores.
He had been right about Kali. She was the one, the only one for him. And now she was his.
He let his fingers graze down the length of her cheek, so soft, so flawless. He watched as shivers of anticipation raced over her skin, making her tremble. Repeating the gesture, he observed the same movement within her yet again. In faith, he could feel her need.
All in good time, he thought to himself. All in good time.
For now, he longed to kiss away every shudder, every quiver. And he drew his hands down the length of her neck as though he might begin the process this moment.
But not quite yet.
Picking up a lock of her mane, he twirled the reddish curl through his fingers. She was startlingly beautiful, his sweet Kali, with her unusual coloring of golden-red hair and deep green eyes. She mesmerized him with her comeliness, he thought, gazing lengthily at her. He was truly ensnared, caught, held captive by the beauty of her.
Ah, that time could cease at this moment. And he thought that perhaps, for him, it might have done so. Always would he see her as she was now; his Kali, his love, the perfection of his most exquisite fantasy.
It was then that he resolved that this night, their wedding night, would not be a painful experience for her. No; he would make this, her first time, memorable, wonderful. Yes; with the pleasure and passion of sweet love, he would bind her to him, and he to her.
Bending, he brushed his lips over the path his fingers had so recently forged. So silky was her cheek where he kissed it, so fragrant her skin, that his senses spun. “You are my love,” he whispered. “Know that I will do all I can to make this, our wedding night, good for you.”
“Yes.” She nodded. “I would make it good for you too.”
“It is already perfect for me. You are here with me.”
“But there is more, isn’t there?”
“There is more, much more,” he said, “but we are in no rush.”
“Aren’t we?” she asked. “It seems as though there is something urgent awaiting me.”
“Not in this, our dream.”
“Oh yes,” she said, “not in our dream.”
He reached down to gather a soft breast in his hand, kneading it gently. In reaction, she moaned, the sound pure music to his eager ears.
He murmured, “It is good that we are, at last, united in marriage, for it would be a great wrong were we to be apart. Together,” he said, “we can be strong; greater than if we stood one, alone.”
“Yes,” she mumbled, smiling at him, “the two of us together could be our strength… Oh, that’s nice,” she said as his lips found a vulnerable spot on her neck. She shifted, throwing
back her shoulders and presenting him with the full length of her neck and breasts.
He accepted the gift as a child might a present, and he nuzzled against her, tasting the sweetness of her skin.
And with his lips, with his fingers, he paid homage to her, though after a moment he rose up, coming to look down on her face-to-face. He whispered, “Were I blindfolded, I would always know you. For your skin tastes of honey, its fragrance like nectar, its touch softer than the wild rose.”
“Really? You’re only saying that so that I’ll make love with you,” she said, winding her arms around his neck and pulling him to her.
“No, for that is a given. What I say is true. I am glad that you changed your mind about us.”
“As I am too.”
Again he grinned at her, wishing with all his heart that this were real, not simply an illusion. Still, as he looked at her, he knew pure joy, for she was as naked as the day she was born, and what was going to happen between them was as inevitable as day turning to evening.
He murmured, “You are mine now. Whatever may come, we will face it together. Do you agree?”
“Always.”
“It will not always be an easy road for us.”
“I know.”
“There is much prejudice from your people, from mine. But together we can weather it.”
“We will,” she said. “And I will do what I can to bring the truth to light about your people, your problems.”
“That is good, and I know that you will,” he said. “But your cooperation in this is not the reason why I wish to love you.”
“I know that too,” she said.
“Are you aware of the first time I knew what was in my own heart?”
“You mean as regards me?”
“Yes.”
“No, no, I don’t,” she said, reaching up to run her fingers through the length of his hair. “When was that?”
“There, on top of Chief Mountain, under the beams of a midnight moon. The first thing I thought when I first saw you was that I had at last found beauty. I was drawn to you, and I believed initially that you might be a part of my fast, my vision. For it is on Chief Mountain that many of my people experience contact with the spirits. At that time I thought you were from their realm, the spiritual world, for your hair seemed to be on fire. And then you touched my fan and I knew you were of this world…and that we were, perhaps, tied to each other.”
She nodded. “I felt that way too.”
“Some hearts are like that,” he said. “No one else will do for them. And so it could be with us, I think.”
“Do you?”
“Yes, but I must admit that you also confused me that night.”
“I did?”
“Yes. When you left, I did not know what to think. Were you part of my vision, or just a silly white woman who had chanced upon me at an inopportune moment? It occurred to me that you could be a bad thing to come into my life.”
“Oh no. You did? Is that why you were so angry at me at first?”
He nodded. “What was I to think? You had run away.”
“But—”
“And then I kissed you, out there on the range, and you responded. And somehow, at that moment, something powerful took hold of me. For as I looked at you, I understood who you are. Joy filled me, and I think I lost a little bit of myself in that kiss, for I have not been the same since then.”
“Truly?”
He nodded. “Though these feelings, too, confused me. You are, obviously, from a section of humanity that has caused great turmoil to mine. However, had there been any doubt about my feelings, it would have been dispelled when I watched you stand up to those hired cowboys. It was then that I knew that if I wanted the happiness you might present me, I had to reach out and take it.”
“I see,” she said, her fingers combing through his long hair. “And is that why you asked me to marry you?”
“Yes.”
She was silent for so long, he began to wonder if perhaps he had said too much, had been too open with her. And for a moment, he sensed about himself a vulnerability that was almost shocking.
At last, however, she said, “I, too, experienced something that caused me some confusion as well as joy.”
He swallowed. “What was that?”
“I’m not certain. As you did, there, that first night on Chief Mountain, I thought you might be an apparition, or perhaps a dream. Something drew me to you…something I can’t explain. I kept telling myself that I was imagining things, that you weren’t real, and when I reached out and touched your fan, it was as though I awoke. It scared me. You scared me…and I am not one easily frightened.”
“I see. That is why you left so quickly?”
“Yes.”
“And now, are you still frightened of me?”
Her mouth twisted as though she might smile. “A little,” she admitted.
“And for the same reason?”
“Oh no. Not for the same reason at all.”
“And yet,” he said, “there might be more cause for fear now, for the spirits have united us, one to the other.”
“Soaring Eagle,” she sat up slightly, “do you know of many people who have been married in this way?”
He shook his head. “There are some who have been married within the Medicine Pipe ceremony, and when that happens, it is as though they have been united by the spirits. But I know of only one other couple who were brought together by the spirits themselves, and they are now very old.”
“Have you met them?”
“Yes. She was once a white woman.”
“Was?”
“No one remembers that about her now.”
“I see. She has been here so long that she is now Blackfeet?”
He nodded.
“I would like to meet them. Do you think I might?”
“Perhaps it could be arranged. But not now. There are, I think, other pressing needs.”
He glanced at her to witness a most radiant smile. She said, “Yes.”
He leaned over her, his lips finding hers, tasting hers. “I will never forget the pure joy of your taste. Perhaps I should warn you that before this night is done, I will know every part of you.”
She groaned.
With his lips, he proceeded to make good on his word. He forged a path to a sensitive spot on her ear, tasted it, then treated the other to the same.
She melted against him as though her body had suddenly become as soft as wet clay.
He murmured, “How exciting is your response. I will never forget it.”
She made a high-pitched whimper, deep in her throat, the sound inviting such excitement from him that he could feel the effects of it to the very tips of his toes.
“I love you very much,” he said.
“And I love you,” she admitted. “Promise me,” she said, “that you will always be true to me, no matter what comes.”
“I promise.”
She sighed against him, and he hugged her. He moved lower, toward the length of her neck.
She shivered in his arms. “That feels good.”
“Yes,” he said, “doesn’t it?”
He lingered there, his lips, his tongue, showering praise on her, and in response, he felt the stirrings of her hips as she began to twist against him. Ah yes, he would come to know all of her yet this night.
He moved lower, his lips tasting the tip of one sweet breast. And this time, it was he whose moans whispered on the wind.
He murmured, “It is good between us.”
“Yes.”
He nibbled on one and then the other breast for some time, being in absolutely no hurry. Aa, slowly, slowly. He would have her experience pleasure even this, her first time.
She shivered beneath his ministrations, and he rejoiced to see it, for it meant the right moment had come for him; he would shift his attentions lower still. Rising up onto his elbows, he scooted downward over her feminine curves and valleys, his lips skimming lower, openin
g her legs to accommodate him.
“Soaring Eagle,” she protested at once, shifting her weight and tightening her thighs as though she might oust him from her.
Briefly he glanced up at her. His eyes met hers, and without a word being spoken, he let her know that he would have his way in this matter.
Silently, she objected.
And just as silently, he made his wishes known once more. He touched her…there.
“Soaring Eagle, I—I…”
He didn’t speak. Instead he smiled at her and continued his caress.
“Soaring Eagle—”
“Sh-h-h-h. You will like it. I promise.”
“I like it already. But—”
“There is not a part of you that I would not know.” With this said, with his lips he proceeded to adore her.
Shy at first, she at last began to respond. In answer, his excitement rose. Her breathing changed, becoming short and rapid. Ever so gradually she changed position, opening to him, straining against him.
It practically sent him soaring into the heavens.
And then he felt her rising ardor, pushing upward as though toward a peak. She was almost there, he knew it; there, at the edge of their carefully made precipice, ready to fall. And as she pushed higher and higher, her inhibitions seemed to dissipate. Gladly, she opened to him fully.
Her hips swayed, her breathing caught and tiny beads of perspiration appeared on her skin. It was as though he were witnessing the opening of a blossom. And then it happened. She reached the apex, the accompaniment of tiny, high-pitched sounds like pure music.
His head spun. He groaned, he growled. What rapture, what bliss. Aa, yes, she was his. His alone.
And he could not remember being ready for someone or something more.
Rising up onto his forearms over her, he rained kisses over her belly, her breasts, her throat, slowly kissing his way back up to the very top of her head.
At last, he came to rest over her, on her, and she whispered, “That was wonderful.”
