Sundancer's Woman

by Judith E. French

  “I’m not most men. And I wouldn’t risk adding to your troubles by leaving you unwed with a babe to raise alone.”

  But I already have two, she thought. Then he kissed her, and she pushed back the regrets and worry. This was their time, and she’d not spoil it with heartache over what could never be.

  “You are wonderful,” she murmured.

  “I’ll take that as a vote of approval.”

  He kissed her again and teased her nipple with the pad of his thumb until she sighed with pleasure and began to return the favor. One thing led quickly to another, and before she realized, the afternoon vanished and darkness fell. Still the rain beat a tattoo on the shingled roof and wrapped them in a snug cocoon of happiness.

  It was sometime after midnight when Hunt finally fell into a deep, contented sleep. And it was only then that Elizabeth crept from his embrace with tears staining her cheeks. “I’ll never forget you,” she whispered. She silently dressed in the firelight and returned to take a final look at Hunt.

  He had thown the blankets back so that his chest and hard-muscled shoulders and arms were bare. His dark hair had fallen over his face, and she could catch only a glimpse of his senual lips and strong nose. “I will miss you,” she murmured.

  She turned away, then stopped and looked back a final time. “Good-bye, Hunt.”

  She was weeping so hard that she could barely see as she slipped out of the cabin door and closed it firmly behind her. “I’ll head due north,” she murmured aloud to give herself courage. “I’ll follow the stream north.” She couldn’t think about Hunt or what he’d given her for a short time. She couldn’t think about his pain when he awoke and found her gone. She could think only of her children and that precious lives—their happiness—must come ahead of her own.

  Chapter 12

  Fitful moonlight illuminated the shadowy forest floor. Raw wind tugged at Elizabeth’s hood and scoured her exposed cheeks and forehead. The half-melted slush underfoot had crusted over, making her snowshoes useless; they hung over her back along with a rolled blanket, some food, and a fire-making kit. She’d not brought a gun. The flintlocks were heavy and she was a poor shot at best. Her only weapon was the scalping knife thrust into her belt.

  When she’d traveled about half a mile through the mud and snow, she removed her moccasins and leggings, girded up her dress, and waded into the ice-crusted creek. The black, rushing water was so frigid that her feet went instantly numb. Elizabeth gasped, then forced herself to take one step after another. Slipping and sliding, she traversed about fifty yards, then could stand the penetrating cold no longer. She climbed out on the far side, dried her feet, and pulled on her moccasins. Then she began to stamp up and down to restore the feeling and flow of blood to her toes before she headed into the deep woods.

  She knew Hunt would be furious when he woke and found her gone, but she hoped that when his temper cooled he would realize she’d done what was best for both of them. She was wrong to have suggested he endanger his life again by going back for Jamie. She did not think the Seneca would kill her if she returned of her own free will. Even if they made her a slave once more, there would be no point in murdering her. Hunt was another story. Raven could think of a dozen reasons why he should be put to death, and Yellow Drum would be all too happy to satisfy his evil wife’s lust for blood.

  Before Elizabeth had come to care for Hunt, she’d been willing to sacrifice him for Jamie and Rachel—but no more. Her children had to come first; they had no one else to stand for them. But Hunt had no part in this. The day and night of loving that they’d shared had given her a happiness she’d never known existed. She’d ask no more of him.

  How close she’d come to murmuring promises and words of endearment that would have made her a fool in Hunt’s eyes. He’d bedded her in spite of her ugly red hair and freckled complexion. He’d ignored her grotesque green eyes and pale skin and treated her with tenderness. For his kindness she would be eternally grateful. Now she must forget her own wants and needs; she must think only of her babies.

  She’d been little older than Jamie when she’d first discovered that she was physically unattractive, and that memory was burned into her mind. She’d come skipping down the wide front stairs of her father’s elegant town house to join her parents for Sunday morning church services. She remembered the crinkle of her nursemaid’s starched petticoats and the annoying buzz of a green-head fly that circled the bowl of honey water on the hall table.

  She’d been bursting with excitement, eager to show off the new cherry-colored velvet gown with satin bows and red silk slippers to match, which had just arrived by ship from her mother’s favorite mantua-maker in London. “Papa, see my dress,” she’d cried as she dashed into the front parlor.

  Her father’s frown and pursed lips had stilled her dancing feet, and she’d taken a hesitant step backward as she heard his stern voice say, “I don’t know where the child got that vulgar red hair and those awful freckles, certainly not from my side of the family.”

  “It’s God’s truth,” her pretty mother had replied airily. “Elizabeth is a wood thrush in a flock of bluebirds—plain as Charles Town mud and leggy as a colt, I admit. But none of my relatives had carrot hair and legs like a stork. You can’t blame me. Aren’t our other children lovely enough to turn heads?”

  Elizabeth had stared in disbelief and begun to say something in her own defense when her mother noticed her.

  “God’s heart, child. Go back up to nurse and change out of that gown. Red velvet will never do for you. You look like a great freckled strawberry.”

  Tears of shame had spilled down her cheeks, and she’d begun to feel sick to her stomach. Suddenly, her stays were choking the breath out of her, and black spots danced in front of her eyes.

  “Stop that caterwauling,” her father scolded. “What is she weeping about, Madam? We will be late for services. Have you no control over your daughters?”

  As she fled from the room, she crashed into her older brother in the hall. “Strawberry! Strawberry!” he’d taunted her.

  Later, when her grandmama had found her hiding on the attic landing, the old lady had dried her tears, offered a twist of licorice and practical advice. “No matter if you’re red as an Indian, Lizzy, you will never have the sin of vanity to atone for. It’s a pity you’re the homely one in the family, but your father will provide enough dowry to find you a husband just the same.”

  “But I don’t want to be an ugly thrush,” she protested. “I ... I want to be ... a bluebird too.”

  “Stuff and nonsense. Beauty’s only skin deep. You’re clever enough for a girl. Curb the devil’s temper that goes with that hair and learn to pretend obedience even when you don’t feel it inside. Fathers and husbands are all cut of the same cloth. They favor females who listen to every word they say. Your father is no different. He loves you dearly.”

  “But ... but he called my hair vulgar.”

  “And so it is—loud enough for a butcher’s brat. You’d not have heard what you weren’t meant to if you weren’t eavesdropping on adults’ conversations. You must learn to accept your hair and stay out of the sun. If you didn’t run about the woods and fields with the servants’ children like a wild rabbit, you’d not have so many freckles.

  “Trust in your father, Lizzy. He’ll find you a suitable husband somewhere.”

  She’d tried not to care if her two younger sisters were pretty and she wasn’t, but she’d never grown accustomed to her brother’s teasing. If she tried hard enough, she could hear Avery and his friends shouting “Strawberry! Strawberry! Red-topped strawberry!”

  It was silly to feel hurt over something that had happened so long ago in another world, she thought. She’d adored her brother. He wasn’t always mean to her. Besides, being homely had its advantages. It had taught her to use her brains and develop a hard right punch.

  Besides, she thought wryly, if she had been more attractive, Yellow Drum might have enjoyed bedding her. Then she would
have had to put up with his sexual abuse over and over, instead of the few times that Raven could browbeat him into doing it.

  Elizabeth slipped and nearly fell, catching herself on a sapling and regaining her balance. Her feet still felt like chunks of ice. She shuddered, remembering the bitterness of the black water. Crossing the creek had been necessary; wading upstream was an Iroquois trick meant to slow down a tracker. Anyone following would look for a trail directly across from where footprints went into a stream. Hunt would have to search both sides of the water, and that would take time. If luck was with her, she would be far away from the mission when the sun rose. With that much head start, he might not be able to catch her.

  A wolf howled from beyond the far ridge, the long, eerie cry raising gooseflesh on her arms. The white wolf was dead, a stiffened carcass on the stream bank below the crazy man’s cabin, but there were many more wolves in the pack. Would she become their prey tonight?

  Hunt said that wolves rarely attacked humans. So the Seneca believed, but rarely was not always. If the white wolf had tried to tear out Hunt’s throat, would not others of the band be equally bloodthirsty? She hoped she’d not made a fatal mistake by leaving without a firearm.

  It was hard to gauge distance in the dark. Trees loomed ahead and on either side of her. The ground was rocky, cut by deep ravines. In spring, it would have made for hard walking; in early winter, in ice and wet, it was a nightmare. She thanked God for Many Blushes’s fur-lined moccasins. The tight seams and layers of bear fat made the high skin shoes nearly waterproof—not enough to wade through a creek, but snug against this slushy snow.

  Another low, plaintive baying brought to mind every ghost story that Raven’s father had ever uttered around a winter fire. “Unholy creatures roam the forest at night,” he’d said. “Faceless things with long, streaming hair, and hideous skeletons that devour human flesh.”

  It had been Elizabeth’s experience that skeletons rarely did the living any harm; but there was that word, rarely, again. She chuckled aloud at her own fainthearted foolishness and kept walking.

  When she was a child, her mother had read stories of wolves to her. In those tales, the wolves had all been evil, and she knew that wasn’t true. Wolves were good parents to their young and faithful to their mates. Once, when she was hunting berries with Raven, they’d come upon a den with three playful cubs. Raven had given the little wolves a wide berth, but she’d not feared them. “Only in famine do wolves turn desperate,” the Indian woman had said.

  “Hunt tried to steal the deer,” Elizabeth reminded herself. “The wolf attacked because it was defending the kill.”

  Hunt’s wounds came to mind. Surely, he could not be hurt too badly if he’d been able to make love to her with such vigor. If his injury was going to mortify, she would have seen redness and infection. She—

  Her reverie was broken by a sudden feeling of impending doom. She froze and saw the silhouette of a running man appear along the ridgeline.

  Her heart in her throat, she moved with infinite slowness to hide herself behind a tree. When she peered out, she caught sight of the intruder headed straight toward her. She couldn’t make out who it was. Frightened, she pressed herself into the bark of the tree, hoping to make herself invisible.

  Scudding clouds parted, and for a few seconds, moonlight illuminated the figure—not Hunt but an Indian. Was it? Yes, she was certain. The man loping toward her was Powder Horn.

  Turn, turn, she thought in desperation. As if by magic, he angled to the left around a fallen log. He passed within a dozen yards of her and continued on in the direction of the creek and the mission. And as he ran by, she saw war paint streaking his cruel face.

  I knew we should have killed him, she thought fiercely. Hunt had let him live, and now the Iroquois brave had come to seek revenge for the insult they’d dealt him. She hadn’t seen a gun, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t dangerous. If he found Hunt still asleep ...

  She knew she should take the opportunity to flee—to put as much ground between her and Powder Horn as she could, but that would mean leaving Hunt defenseless. Instead, she began to follow the Indian. On this moonlit night, a child could have tracked Powder Horn. The hard part was trailing the warrior without being seen.

  This was not the way she and Hunt had come to the mission, Elizabeth reasoned. Powder Horn must have assumed that they would take shelter there. The course he was heading would take him to the creek within a few hundred feet of Baptiste’s cabin.

  If she could wait until he got far enough ahead, she could follow in relative safety. But if she did that, Powder Horn might cross the stream and surprise Hunt before she could give warning. How she would do that, she didn’t know. It would be impossible to get in front of the Iroquois; he was taking a direct route while she’d come a roundabout way.

  Heartsick, she continued tracking him, occasionally catching glimpses of him up ahead. As Powder Horn neared the creek, she became frantic. If she’d brought a rifle, she could have shot him—or at least fired a warning shot. Now she had nothing with which to defend herself except Hunt’s knife, and she knew she couldn’t best an Iroquois warrior in hand-to-hand combat.

  Suddenly, she choked back a scream of fright as a gray-white form glided down through the branches. The huge owl seemed more ghost than bird as he flapped on great silent wings and bared taloned claws to snatch a small animal from the shadows. The hapless prey gave one gurgling squeal and then there was only muffled rustling in the snow.

  Blood pounding, Elizabeth dashed past the owl and scrambled up on a large ice-encrusted windfall. Ahead of her, she saw Powder Horn wade into the waters of the creek. In minutes, he would be standing over Hunt with murder in his soul. In desperation, she cupped her hands to her mouth and uttered a piercing Seneca war cry.

  Powder Horn whirled and splashed back out of the stream. He hesitated for a brief second, then began to run toward her. His lean body stretched out over the snow like that of a hunting wolf, but he made not the slightest sound. Elizabeth scrambled off the log and fled back through the trees the way she’d come.

  Branches tore at her face and clothing. Her moccasined feet slipped and slid on the wet leaves and icy underbrush. She didn’t look back. She ran with every ounce of strength and will she possessed.

  Twice she fell. Both times she regained her footing and continued her wild dash to escape her pursuer. Her lungs ached; her legs felt as though they were made of wood. A sharp pain in her side threatened to double her over in agony, but still she kept running.

  ... Until she could hear the thud of Powder Horn’s footfalls behind her ... until the sound of his heavy breathing nearly drowned out her own. Then she stopped short, spun around, and drew her knife.

  He laughed.

  When he dove at her with outstretched hands, she slashed the backs of three fingers on his left hand. “Aiyee!” he cried out in surprise. His grin became a grimace, and his eyes narrowed as he yanked a war club from his belt. He raised the weapon high, and for the space of a heartbeat Elizabeth wondered where he’d gotten the club.

  “Now you die,” he said.

  She sidestepped the terrible blow and tried to duck away. Powder Horn caught her sleeve and dragged her around to face him while he lifted the club to dash her brains out on the snow. “Your scalp—” he began. But his words were lost in the roar of a flintlock rifle.

  Powder Horn’s fingers tightened on her arm, then relaxed. His eyes widened in shock, and the war club fell to the snow. Blood bubbled over his lips as he staggered, clawing at his chest.

  Struggling to comprehend what had happened, Elizabeth drew in one ragged breath and then another. She began to back away from the Iroquois.

  “Are you all right?”

  Hunt’s voice. She nodded. It was Hunt’s voice. But was she really hearing it, or was it in her mind? A strong arm tightened around her shoulders, and she looked up into Hunt’s grim face.

  Powder Horn gave a long, gasping groan and dropped to his
knees. Blood poured between his fingers, still clutching his chest. He went limp and fell facedown in the trampled snow like a boneless cloth doll. His feet churned weakly, and then he lay still.

  “What the hell did you think you were doing?” Hunt demanded. “You could have been killed!” He let go of her and began to reload his smoking rifle.

  She inhaled deeply. The pain in her side had faded, but her heart was still hammering. She looked down at the Iroquois and shuddered. “He ... he was coming to kill us,” she said. “Just like the wolves. He was hunting us.”

  “Appears that way,” Hunt answered. His tone was brusque, his features hard.

  “I told you to kill him back at the cave.”

  “You did that.”

  “You should have killed him.”

  “He’s dead, isn’t he?”

  She clenched and unclenched her hands. They were stiff with cold, and she’d dropped her knife. She bent and retrieved it, carefully wiping the blade dry before she tucked it back in her belt.

  “What were you doing out here, Elizabeth? You were running away from me, weren’t you?”

  She straightened her spine and stared at him. He was white-lipped with fury, but she knew he wouldn’t hit her. No matter what she did, she’d never have to fear that. She matched him, glare for glare. “I was,” she admitted.

  “What happened between us—back there in the cabin—it didn’t mean a thing to you, did it? Just another roll in the blankets.”

  The unfairness of that accusation cut her deep. “I risked my life to save you,” she flung back. “If I hadn’t given that war cry—”

  “Sounded like an Iroquois yell to me.”

  “It was ... but ...” She stopped. “You knew it was me. You weren’t in the cabin, were you? You were tracking me. You didn’t have time to—”

  “Hell, no, I wasn’t in the cabin. And yes, I was tracking you. I thought I’d let you wander around in the woods until you got cold and wolf-scared. I saw him ...” He kicked at the dead man with the toe of his moccasin. “I couldn’t shoot because you were between me and him.”