Sundancer's Woman

by Judith E. French

  For a second, he was tempted to turn around and go back to the pool and dive in. That urge lasted for two heartbeats. Instead, he retrieved the blanket from the floor where she’d dropped it, knelt beside her, and covered her nakedness.

  She twisted around and looked up at him with bleak eyes. She hadn’t been crying; there were no tearstains on her face, but it was evident that she was terribly upset.

  “Nothing’s as bad as that,” he soothed, putting a hand on her bare shoulder. “It was my fault.”

  “No ... no,” she answered hoarsely. “I just wanted ...” She shuddered and closed her eyes. Her long lashes fluttered down like small, feathery birds, and he had to bite his lower lip to keep from kissing them.

  She laid her head on his knee. Her hair curled around her face, thick and unruly, its fiery red color so intense that he expected it to scorch his fingers as he stroked it. One of her hands had closed around the edge of the blanket. She clutched it so tightly that her knuckles shone white.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked. “You’re safe with me, I swear it.”

  “You ... you shouldn’t...” She sat up, opened her eyes, and looked into his face. “You shouldn’t lie to me,” she said. Her voice was stretched as taut as a bowstring, and her eyes were as cold as green glass.

  She made no effort to cover her bare breasts, and it was difficult for him to keep his mind on comforting her. “Elizabeth,” he began.

  She took his hand in hers and brought it to her breast. She was shaking, and her vulnerability made his throat tighten with emotion. “I know I’m ugly,” she whispered, “but surely—”

  “Stop that,” he replied. He grabbed hold of her shoulders with both hands and gave her a shake. “Why are you doing this? What do you mean, you’re ugly?”

  Her face flushed a deep rose and tears glistened in her eyes. “I know what I am,” she flung hotly back at him. “But that doesn’t mean I can’t satisfy you.”

  He pulled her against his chest and held her. “Listen to me,” he said. “No, don’t talk, just listen. Your father sent me to bring you back, and that’s what I’m doing. I don’t think you’re ugly. I find you very . . .” He took a deep breath and began again. “Desirable. But this isn’t right for either of us. I can’t do what you want. I’d like to lie with you. Hell, I’m about to bust out of my breeches just thinking about it, but it’s wrong. It’s the wrong time, and for the wrong reasons. I can’t do it, Elizabeth. And when you think about it, you’ll realize why it’s wrong.”

  He felt her tremble in his arms. She gave a faint sob and then whispered, “I had to try.”

  “I can see that,” he said. “I don’t hold it against you.”

  “You don’t want a woman like me ... one who’s been used by—”

  He pushed her far enough away to look into her eyes. “Get this through your thick head,” he said, trying to control his rising anger. “I don’t blame you for anything that happened. Who you’ve slept with or who you haven’t doesn’t mean a ha’penny to me. I don’t pay for my bedmates. I like you; I think you’re a courageous woman. I find you damned attractive. But I won’t take advantage of you, and I’m not going to be bribed or tricked into getting myself killed trying to snatch your boy from his father.”

  She stiffened. Her eyes narrowed. “I like you too, Hunter Campbell, but I won’t let liking you stand in the way of getting my son back.”

  “You can’t mean to fight me over this.”

  “I don’t belong to Yellow Drum anymore, and I don’t belong to my father. You’re dealing with me, no one else.”

  “I want to be your friend.”

  “Then be my friend. Take me back for my son.”

  “We’re not talking about this anymore, Elizabeth. I don’t want to hear another word. My answer is no. If I have to tie you up and drag you back to Carolina, I will. Make up your mind. Are we going to do this the easy way or the hard way?”

  “Take your hands off me.” Her tone was soft, compliant, but her eyes held daggers.

  He released her. “Best get your clothes back on,” he suggested. “We’ll forget this ever happened. Rest, and as soon as this storm passes, we’ll—”

  “I won’t forget about Jamie.”

  “You intend to make this the hardest money I’ve ever earned, don’t you?”

  “Are you a father?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “If you were, you’d understand. I can’t walk away from—”

  “No more!” he said.

  “What will you do, beat me?”

  “I won’t beat you, but I may gag you,” he threatened.

  “Bully.”

  “Shrew,” he snapped.

  “I am not,” she protested. Snatching up her deerskin dress, she pulled it over her head. “I have a sweet, warm nature.”

  “Woman, you try a man’s soul.”

  “You’re afraid of Yellow Drum. Admit it! You’re a coward, afraid of a few Seneca.”

  “Yellow Drum is a war chief. He didn’t get elected to that post by his skill in making maple syrup or weaving baskets. He’s a warrior, one of the best. And I’ll wager he kills for the thrill of it.”

  “And you? What are you? A yellow—”

  He shook his head. “You think insults will buy you what honey wouldn’t? I’m no coward, Elizabeth. I’ve killed men when I had to. I won my eagle feathers by-”

  “I don’t believe you won them. I believe that was a lie as much as—”

  “Silence, woman. You’ll wake the bats with your caterwauling.” He sighed heavily and put the fire between them. He’d not let her tirade anger him. He wasn’t a coward and he knew it. Neither was he a fool to let taunting cause him to use poor judgment.

  “Hunt ...”

  “I don’t want to hear it,” he said.

  “Hunt!” She blanched as white as milk and pointed beyond him, toward the chamber entrance. “Someone’s coming.”

  He glanced in the direction she indicated, then dove for his rifle when he saw the light of a torch bobbing toward them. “Back against that wall,” he ordered.

  Danger pumped through his veins as he checked the priming of his rifle. Hunt had one shot and one shot only; after that—if it came to a fight—it would be hand to hand.

  He was deep in Iroquois territory, and they were trapped here with no way out but that single passageway. If Yellow Drum or any of his warriors had found them, Hunt’s best chance, maybe his only chance, would be to shoot first and reduce the odds against them.

  Elizabeth flattened herself against the wall and crept closer. From the corner of his eye, he caught the gleam of steel and realized she’d armed herself with his knife.

  “Get my shot bag,” he whispered. “If I have to fire, I’ll throw you my rifle. Can you load it?”

  “Yes.”

  A curious feeling of pride swelled in his chest. She was obviously terrified, but she wasn’t dissolving into hysteria like most white women would have done. Elizabeth might be trouble, but she had grit.

  The bright ball of torchlight moved closer. Hunt cocked the hammer of his flintlock and tightened his finger on the trigger. A bead of sweat trickled down the nape of his neck. He held his breath, straining to hear footfalls.

  “Don’t shoot unless you have to,” she whispered.

  “Who comes?” he called out in Iroquoian, using as hearty a voice as he could muster. An exchange of lead and shot was the last thing he wanted in these close quarters. If gunfire erupted, he doubted either of them would come out of this cave alive. “Are you friend or foe?”

  “Greetings to your hearth, brother,” rasped a husky reply in the same tongue.

  “And to you,” Hunt shouted back. “Come forward and be recognized.”

  “He doesn’t sound like a Seneca,” Elizabeth whispered.

  “Shh,” Hunt warned. “Let me do the talking.”

  A scarred warrior with shaved head and blue-tattooed chin raised his torch high. His clothes were covered w
ith snow; ice clung to his scalplock and crusted his moccasins. His face was blanched with cold. “I am Powder Horn, of the Onondaga,” he said. “I seek shelter at your fire from the storm.”

  Chapter 7

  Hunt lowered his rifle and motioned to the Indian. “Advance and be welcome, Powder Horn of the Onondaga.” He motioned to Elizabeth. “Where are your manners, woman? Here is a cold and hungry man. Share all that we have with him.”

  Elizabeth exhaled slowly as terror receded from her brain and feeling returned to her limbs. Powder Horn was a stranger. He was Iroquois, but not Seneca. He might not even know that she’d belonged to Yellow Drum or that she’d been sold to a half-breed Delaware.

  “Come and eat,” she said to the newcomer, trying to keep her tone normal. “Warm your limbs at my hearth.” He was suffering from exposure to the storm. His face was blotched with patches of white, and he was shaking with bone-chilling spasms.

  Normally, she would have felt more compassion for the man, but she and Hunt were outsiders in Iroquois land where any stranger might be an enemy. She couldn’t forget that Raven hadn’t fed Hunt at her hearth place. Such a breech of custom could only mean that Yellow Drum’s chief wife was plotting something. Raven might have convinced the war chief to follow them and murder Hunt and take her prisoner again. Elizabeth wanted desperately to go back to her children, but not as a captive and not at the cost of Hunt Campbell’s life.

  “I was hunting a wounded bear,” Powder Horn said as he approached the fire and held out his stiff hands to the flame. “My comrades and I split up to try and find his trail, and we were separated at darkness. I’ve walked all night to reach this place.” He pulled two stiff rabbits from his belt and held them out to Elizabeth. “I have no haunch of bear to offer you, but I will share my rabbits.”

  “And fat rabbits they are,” she replied. She tried to catch Hunt’s attention and convey her suspicion to him without alarming Powder Horn. The Indian’s story stank like four-day-old fish. This was not Onondaga hunting ground, and it was a rare man who would walk for hours on a bad night to reach a cave when he could make a shelter, or find one, before dusk. Still, it would do no good to let the Iroquois know they hadn’t swallowed his tall tale.

  “Leave the rabbits for tomorrow’s meal,” Hunt said. “We have plenty tonight.” He leaned his rifle against a rock within reach and squatted next to the newcomer.

  Powder Horn rubbed his arms and began to pull off his frozen moccasins. “You are not of the Iroquois Confederacy,” Powder Horn said as he stuck his cold feet against the warm rocks. He was still shivering, but not as greatly as before. “You sound like a white man, but you do not smell like one.”

  Hunt laughed. “It is true that I’m not of the Five Fires, but I am human. My mother is of the Grandfather People,” Hunt explained casually, “the Delaware. I recently traded with the Seneca war chief Yellow Drum for this red-haired slave woman.”

  Powder Horn arched a thick eyebrow. “She is not your wife?”

  “If she pleases me, I may make her one.”

  Powder Horn made a clicking sound with his tongue and smiled at Elizabeth. His top front teeth were wide and protruding, the ones below narrow and yellow. He looks like a beaver, she thought, returning his false smile with an equally fake one. He should have been called Beaver Tooth.

  “A pity a man must travel so far to purchase a slave,” the Onondaga observed. “Are there no women to be had in the south?” He lifted a coal to light his pipe, puffed several times, and offered the pipe to Hunt.

  He accepted and took several draws on the carved mouthpiece. The pungent odor of tobacco filled the chamber. “There are many women,” Hunt replied, “but few want to leave their kin to travel with a half-white man who wishes to winter far from the villages. Females prefer the company of their own kind.”

  “True,” the Indian said, holding his hands out to the fire again. Tattooed designs ringed both his wrists and he was missing the first joint on one seamed finger. He was not as old as Elizabeth had first thought when she’d seen him appear in the torchlight. His body was lean and hard; his ropy muscles were those of a formidable warrior. Only his moon face seemed placid, or would have seemed so if she hadn’t noticed the shrewd feral light in his hooded eyes.

  Elizabeth dug through Hunt’s belongings to find food for the Iroquois. She must keep up the pretense of being a slave until they found out what Powder Horn was really doing here. And she must find some way of letting Hunt know that he couldn’t relax his guard, no matter how harmless the Onondaga pretended to be.

  “Any sign of the snow letting up?” Hunt asked. The Indian shook his head. Hunt nodded. “I thought it might be bad.”

  Elizabeth found dried meat and nuts. She laid them on a rock beside the guest and retreated to sit on Hunt’s buffalo cloak. Her eyes burned with fatigue, but she was still too frightened to sleep. This Iroquois was too friendly to travelers he’d never seen before. One so trusting didn’t survive long on the frontier. Whatever his mission, he meant them no good; of that she was sure.

  Minutes passed. Powder Horn wolfed down the dried meat and began to crack nuts with a rock. Hunt talked easily with him, relating the story of a grizzly bear hunt in the far western mountains. The Iroquois nodded and chewed noisily. Elizabeth curled up and pulled a blanket over her. She hadn’t intended to close her eyes, but she must have drifted off because Hunt’s hand on her shoulder made her start.

  “Shh,” he murmured.

  She tried to sit up as he stretched out on the robe beside her, but he draped an arm over her. “I won’t—” she protested, stiffening.

  He leaned close and whispered in her ear. “Be still. He asked to borrow you.” Hunt pulled her close and covered them both with the same blanket.

  She shivered despite his nearness and the weight of the thick wool. She wasn’t certain she could trust Hunt, but she knew she couldn’t trust the Iroquois. She looked for Powder Horn and saw a huddled form on the far side of the hearth. The fire had burned down to glowing coals.

  “I’m not going to hurt you,” Hunt murmured. “I. told him I don’t share my women. Still, I want you close. He may be the kind who doesn’t take no for an answer.”

  Her heart pounded in her chest. It felt strange, lying so close in his arms. She wasn’t sure if she liked the sensation or not. She tried to wiggle free and touched something cold and hard. Hunt gripped a tomahawk in his right hand.

  “It’s all right,” he said in English, so low that she could barely make out the words. “You sleep. I’ll keep watch.” He wrapped himself around her, snuggling against her back.

  Elizabeth’s breath caught in her throat as her buttocks grazed his groin. His long legs were hard with muscle; his powerful arms encircled her. He lay so close that she could feel the rise and fall of his chest with each breath. She wondered if he would mate with her now. The thought was both enticing and a little frightening.

  She didn’t fear the act of joining. Instinct told her that Hunt was no Yellow Drum. This long rifle had been gentle with her; he might mount her to quench his sexual hunger, but he wouldn’t be cruel. No, her uncertainty came from within her own heart. A strange Onondaga lay almost within arm’s reach. She should have been worrying about him leaping up and murdering them both; instead, she was remembering how good Hunt’s mouth had tasted when he’d kissed her.

  Unfamiliar sensations curled in the pit of her belly. She was acutely aware of the texture of the wool and leather garments that pressed against her skin. Her senses of smell and hearing seemed enhanced to the point of distraction. Hunt’s scent enveloped her. Each breath she took made her more a part of him. She could hear the dripping of water from far off, and the mass of earth above her seemed to sigh like a restless animal. She might have been experiencing all these things in a dream, but she had never been more awake in her life.

  Elizabeth’s chest felt tight, and her blood raced. It was difficult for her to lie still. Minutes before she had been sleeping; now
sleep was impossible. Hunt’s intimate presence was exquisite torture. If she didn’t do something ... anything to ease this tension, she was certain her heart would burst.

  Boldly, casting caution to the winds, she turned toward him, wiggling up until her lips touched his left ear. A lock of his silky hair brushed her cheek, and the clean scent of pine filled her nostrils. “Hunt,” she murmured.

  “Elizabeth.”

  Was that a hint of amusement in his whisper? She swallowed. Her mouth was suddenly dry and her breasts felt as full as though they were swelling with milk. She had stopped nursing Rachel months ago and it was impossible for her to be pregnant, so why did she feel so strange?

  She tried again to speak, but her mouth was suddenly as parched as if she’d been eating dry cornmeal. Heat washed over her throat and face; she buried her head in the hollow of his neck. His skin smelled clean and intriguing. What would it be like, she wondered, to have this man make love to her?

  A groan came from the far side of the fire pit, and Elizabeth heard the Iroquois stir. She tried to turn her head to look in that direction, but suddenly—without warning—Hunt rolled on top of her and kissed her mouth.

  She was so shocked that she offered no resistance as the heat of his loins burned through the layers of clothing that separated them. She didn’t fight; neither did she return the kiss. She lay rigid in his embrace.

  Reason told her that the Onondaga was dangerous and that she needed to keep her wits about her, but reason had nothing to do with the confusion in her mind or the murmurs of yearning that warmed her body.

  Hunt broke off the caress and whispered into her ear. “I’m not going to rape you. I doubt if our friend is really asleep. I want to convince him that we don’t suspect him.” Bracing himself with one knee and an elbow, he shifted his weight off her. “You’re safe with me. You have my word on it.”