Lord of the Wolves (2 page)

Sarah’s
heart turned over in her breast, and a fine sheen of cold sweat dampened her
palms and dotted her brow. His unshorn raven locks and dark, penetrating gaze,
the buckskin hunting shirt he wore over breechclout and leggings, the
ornamentation he wore in his ears, all marked him as an Indian.

A
savage.

Flashes
from that afternoon flickered behind Sarah’s eyes.

Poor
Mr. Windham begging Mr. Bones for help for his fallen son; the bright crimson
bloom that had appeared on Joshua Standhope’s shirt just before he fell; and
the screams... the images were underscored by the hoarse, inhuman screams of
Benjamin Bones that had filled the air throughout the long afternoon.

A
chill of dread swept through Sarah.

Who
was this man?

What
did he want?

Did
he belong with the renegade band that had attacked their party that same day?

For
some reason, Sarah didn’t think so. The Indians with
La Bruin
had
plucked the hair from their heads, leaving but a wiry tuft standing straight at
the crown, like the comb on a rooster. Their faces and bodies had been painted
with vermillion, yellow, white and black.

This
man’s hair flowed unfettered down his back, and his skin was free of paint. He
did not have the look of
La Bruin’s
savages, yet Sarah was afraid to
trust him. As she watched, he assumed a waiting stance, both hands still
resting on the rifle barrel. “The wolves are gone now,” he said in a clear and
ringing voice. “You are safe from harm. It is time to open the door and come
forth, into the moonlight.”

Several
seconds passed before Sarah realized he’d spoken in lightly accented English. The
realization was oddly comforting. Perhaps he was not as savage as he seemed. It
was not enough, however, to convince her to open the door, and so she waited,
heart knocking violently against her ribs.

“You’ve
nothing to fear,” he persisted. “I come in peace.”

Leaning
on his Pennsylvania rifle, Kingston Sauvage repeated his promise, first in
French, and then in Delaware, his mother tongue, hoping to draw a response from
the occupant of the cabin.

He
knew without a shred of doubt that someone had sought refuge within the
decaying walls—someone who continued to watch him warily. He could feel their
gaze upon him, could sense the fear almost as keenly as his brothers the wolves
had sensed it.

Fear
was a potent force, not easily conquered. Kingston glanced at the heavens. The
moon was high above the trees. It was nearing midnight. If he lingered here,
talking the night away, he would regret it come the morning.

Hell.
I am beginning to regret it already.

Perhaps
this person’s fear was well justified. Perhaps he should just leave her. It
seemed to be what she wanted.

He
hoisted the rifle with one hand and with a final glance at the crumbling
structure, started to turn away when he caught a flash of white from the corner
of his eye. Slowly, carefully, he turned toward it and saw
her
standing
there among the trees, as pale and ethereal as she’d been on their wedding day.

“Caroline,”
he groaned low, afraid to move, to breathe, for fear of frightening her away. She
had the child, his child, in her arms, and she was smiling. How young she
looked. How vulnerable. Instinctively, he reached out, wanting so badly to hold
her again, to gaze into the face of his son, that he could not stop himself.

The
movement startled her. She glanced up, clutching the babe protectively to her
breast, and slowly faded, leaving nothing but the vast, throbbing emptiness
that had become so much a part of his existence.

Torn
between the overwhelming need to quit this place and the intangible force that
bade him stay, Kingston turned reluctantly back to the black bulk of the
hunter’s lodge. The least he could do was to ascertain if the woman inside was
injured or alone—and it
was
a woman who’d sought shelter within the
decaying structure. A man would have answered his summons in some fashion. With
words or with musket fire.

But
a woman, even one who was armed, would not be so hasty. She would watch and
wait, weighing her chances, judging her adversary, hoping to avoid a
bloodletting, keeping silent in the hope of hiding her vulnerability.

And
she is vulnerable. Just as Caroline had been.

If
only there had been someone to help Caroline, she would be in his arms, in his
life, instead of lying in a lonely wilderness grave.

For
Caroline’s sake, he could not just walk away and leave the occupant of the
lodge to the return of the wolves. He had to force the woman out of hiding—
or
find a way of getting in.
“Very well, then,” he said in a clear and ringing
voice. “It is plain that my presence is unwanted, and so I shall leave you to
the wolves.”

Turning
his back to the cabin, he mimicked the chilling howl of a wolf, projecting the
cry in such a way that it seemed to come from the woods at the rear of the
cabin.

It
was a trick he had learned as a youth, employed to deceive the enemy, and in this
instance, it proved very effective, for a gasp issued clearly through the
cracks in the cabin walls, followed by the sound of furtive movement. Pressing
his momentary advantage, Kingston sprinted forward, kicking in the door.

The
tactic caught Sarah off guard. The door came crashing in, and she spun,
uttering a cry of dismay as she raised her makeshift bludgeon to ward off this
unwarranted attack.

Her
adversary was faster, and before she could beg for quarter, he seized her,
easily plucking the stick from her grasp, imprisoning her in a rough embrace.

She
wriggled in his grasp, trying desperately to avoid the warm hard masculine form
pressed intimately against the soft curves of her buttocks and back. She had
never been this close to a man, outside her marriage bed, and even then, the
physical contact, the closeness, had been brief. Timothy’s health, which had
always been frail, allowed nothing more.

Her
captor was anything but frail. The arms encircling her waist were hard as iron,
the hand placed high on her ribs, just grazing the full lower curve of her
breast, strong. He exuded an animal heat that Sarah found at once strangely
attractive, yet terrifying, a heat she wanted badly to escape. “Please,” she
said in a soft, trembling voice. “Let me go. I meant you no harm.”

“In
good time,” he replied, close to her ear. “Why did you say nothing when I
called out to you a moment ago?”

Sarah
wet her lips. When she answered, her voice trembled, yet she couldn’t be
certain if her fright, or his nearness caused the reaction. “I was too
frightened to answer. There was the ambush—and then the wolves—and I could not
tell if you were friend or foe, or if you belonged to the Frenchman’s band, and
then there was Kathryn—”

Sarah
would have rattled on had he not turned her in his embrace and placed the tips
of his fingers over her lips. “You are raving, Madame. Quietly now. Calmly. Tell
me about the ambush, and the Frenchman, and how you came to be here with this—”

“Kathryn,”
Sarah said, when he removed his hand. She forced herself to be calm. Perhaps if
she did exactly as he said, he would let her go. Perhaps he would allow her to
step back, to regain some small semblance of control over her beleaguered
senses. “Kathryn and I were en route to Harris’ Ferry—well, at least Kathryn
was. I was going on, to the Ohio country—the Muskingum River, to be precise—”

Sarah
saw him frown. “The Muskingum lies deep in the Ohio country. What possible
reason could a fine Quaker lady like yourself have for traveling there?”

“I
am Moravian, not Quaker,” Sarah corrected. “And I have business there.”

“Business?”
he said, his frown growing more pronounced. “What business?”

“Business
of a personal nature,” Sarah said, blushing. “Business which, at the moment, I
would prefer not to discuss.” It took all of her inner strength to deny him,
yet it hardly seemed proper to speak of Brother John Liebermann while she was
in the arms of this handsome stranger. And he
was
handsome.

His
features had a Gallic cast—the fine, strong nose, the high, prominent
cheekbones and squared chin. It hinted at an obstinate streak, that chin, a
willful, determined nature. It was odd to see a man with silk tassels dangling
from his ear lobes, and odder still that they should suit him so perfectly,
lending a splash of color, a touch of the flamboyant to an already terrifyingly
dashing figure of a man.

She
could see that he was not satisfied with her evasive replies, but he let her
have her head, pursuing a different course instead. “I believe you mentioned an
ambush.”

Sarah
nodded. “They caught the men of our party unawares. By the time Kathryn and I
reached the summit of the hillock, it was too late to help them, so we hid in a
hollow log. It was nearly dark when we left the log and walked to this place.”

“‘They,’”
he said, “who is ‘they’?”

“Savages,”
Sarah blurted out. “Like—”

“Like
me?” he supplied with a quirk of a dark arched brow.

Sarah
was mortified. “How perfectly rude of me,” she whispered miserably. “I did not
mean to say that you—” She blushed furiously.

He
laughed at her discomfiture. “You did indeed, but not to worry, Madame. I have
been called worse. Besides, what you say is true—at least in part. My mother
was half-French, half-Delaware; my father a French trader from Quebec. Now,
suppose you tell me about these savages?”

“They
were painted, and armed to the teeth, and their hair was shorn, with a tuft
sticking up on top.”

He
grunted. “Scalp locks and paint. A war party.”

“There
was a man with them. Kathryn called him ‘Bear’.”

His
head came up. “
La Bruin?”

“Yes.
He was with someone called Tall Trees.”

“Damn,”
he said, releasing her. He stepped away, then swung around to face her again. “Where
did this attack take place?”

“Three
miles, perhaps four, west of here.”

“When?”

“This
afternoon,” she said. “We had just stopped to sup. But I cannot see what
difference that makes now.”

“It
makes a great deal of difference to me,” he shot back. “If I leave now, I can
find them before they break camp before dawn.”

“Leave?”
Sarah’s
newfound courage deserted her, and a surge of panic flooded in. He had found
them, had forced his presence upon them, had exuded calm and competency,
raising her hopes, and then, with that one little word he dashed those hopes to
bits.
“Leave?
But you cannot leave! You have found us, and now you must
rescue us! It is the gentlemanly thing to do!”

He
chuckled in the face of Sarah’s horror and outrage, spreading his hands wide. “Therein
lies the crux of your difficulty, Madame. I fear, I am no gentleman.”

He
picked up his rifle, which he’d dropped during their brief struggle, and turned
his broad fringed back upon her.

“But
you cannot leave!” Sarah said, following after him. “Kathryn is wounded! She
needs your help! Wait! Oh, please wait!” In complete desperation, she folded
her hands, squeezed her eyes shut and beseeched God to intervene with this
stubborn individual on her behalf. “Father, please! You must convince him! Reveal
to him the error of his ways!”

It
was not God who answered, but a thin and wavering voice from the rear of the
structure. “Damn you, Sauvage. If you turn your back on that child, you turn
your back on decency.”

To
Sarah’s amazement, he stopped in midstride, turning slowly, disbelievingly
toward the woman who had spoken so unkindly. “Kate? Kate Seaton, is that you?”

“Come
closer, damn you,” Kathryn said. “I’d like to look you in the eye when I curse
you for a pitiless bastard.”

Sauvage
propped his rifle by the door, moving closer to the pallet, while Sarah
continued to gape. When he reached the pallet where the wounded woman lay, he
knelt and took her hand. “I had no idea,” he said gently, his voice tinged with
regret. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry
that I am dying?” she demanded. “Or sorry that you were about to abandon that
poor girl?” She shifted on her bed, groaning low in her throat. “Oh, never mind!
I don’t have the time to listen to you try and justify your actions! I don’t
have time for anything, except perhaps for setting this situation to rights,
and by all that’s holy, whether you like it or not, you are
going
to
help me.”

“Kate,
for pity’s sake,” Sauvage began. “
La Bruin
and his men are but four
miles from here.
Four damnable miles.
Do you know what this means?”

“I
do,” Kathryn replied. “It means you are likely to go off and get yourself
killed, leaving Sarah alone and defenseless!” Sauvage’s mouth hardened, as did
Kathryn’s voice. “I was
there
, Kingston! There are too many of them; one
man doesn’t have a prayer against them. Not even a man like you. They killed
Joshua and the others, and then they tortured Ben Bones.”