Under the Same Sky (16 page)

“I will find ye,” he murmured through soft, gentle lips.

I stared at him, mesmerised. There was a pleasant lilt to his voice I couldn’t place. It drifted through me like a lullaby but woke every part of my body to an exquisite awareness. He lifted my hand and brought it to his cheek, where it hovered, a promise, a breath away. I imagined the warmth of his breath tickling my palm and my fingertips touching the bristle of a new beard. He watched me without blinking, then kissed the sensitive skin of my hand. A breath away.

“I know,” I replied.

I did know. I had only to wait.

Suddenly, without warning, Wolf and the meadow were gone. I lay alone on a hard, gray stone that jutted against my back, rendering
me numb from its cold, jagged edge. Soquili was leaning over me. His lips moved but I couldn’t hear the words.

“What?” I demanded, angry at him for pulling me from the dream. If he sensed my irritation, he didn’t show it.

“It is time to go, Ma-kee. It grows late.”

He helped me to my feet and I stretched my back, still chilled from the stone seat. A storm was approaching, and the air cooled under the trees. Soquili was right. We had to go, although every part of me wanted to return to that meadow. I turned away from the stones, but the vision stayed with me. I could still close my eyes and see Wolf beside me, hear his simple words.

I will find ye.

Adelaide created beautiful crafts. I did not. I tried, but I eventually abandoned my tangled attempts and moved to tasks where I could be more useful: skinning, preparing food, and watching children for their busy mothers. That was one of my favourite duties. I ran and laughed with them, chasing and being chased. Fears and worries vanished when I joined their games. We took walks through the woods, collecting berries and nuts, picking flowers and herbs for Waw-Li and the other women. These were simple days of pleasure, filled with laughter and learning.

On other days, when I craved quiet, I knew where to go. Scattered around the village were numerous stone-covered mounds that marked burial places of clan members. The surrounding air quivered with restless death. Echoes of past voices haunted the burial mounds, whispering words never spoken. The ground beneath my moccasin-clad feet hummed.

For the Cherokee, it was comforting, I supposed, to know their
ancestors were nearby. The only graveyard I had ever known was at an old church in the valley, hours from my home. The churchyard was dotted by wooden crosses. Our father was buried beneath one of those. We paid the church a fee we couldn’t afford so he could lie there.

We were not a religious family. My mother read the Bible to us and told us stories of the saints, but we weren’t given to much prayer or contemplation. Ironically, it was here, in a village that did not worship Christ, that I began to understand the power of prayer. The spiritual beliefs of the Cherokee gave me sanctuary. If, as they said, the earth connected us all, then my mother and Ruth were together right now, still connected to Adelaide and me. Sometimes I still felt them with me. My mother and Ruth deserved a peaceful burial spot like those I saw around the Cherokee village.

One day Adelaide came to sit with me on the stony riverbank, where the women went to do the washing. She needed to talk. I could see the lines of concentration on her brow. Ever since we had come to the village, we had avoided speaking about important matters. I suppose it was the fear of upsetting her that kept me from talking about those things, possibly opening a wound not quite healed. So it was a relief when she, not I, spoke first.

We dangled our toes in the cold running water and let the current tickle between them. She held a small chunk of wood in the palm of one hand and was slowly shaping it with a short, sharp blade that she held in the other.

“What are you carving?” I asked.

She held it up to eye level, considering. “I’m not sure yet,” she said. She lowered it and resumed cutting into the soft wood. “Do you remember their faces?” she asked, eyes on her work.

I thought I understood whose faces she meant, but it didn’t matter. I remembered them all. Strangely, the face I saw most clearly
was that of the man whose throat I had slit by the river. I couldn’t rid my memories of his stunned expression under thin red curls, darkened by sweat.

“Mm-hmm,” I said.

“I sometimes have trouble seeing Mama’s face,” Adelaide said, her words barely more than a whisper. “I speak to her at night, when we’re falling asleep. But sometimes, when I really want to, I can’t see her face. Does that happen to you?”

I thought for a moment before I answered. If I closed my eyes, without concentrating, then yes, the soft features of our mother’s face might escape me. But because of my dreams and their clarity, she was always with me. She and Ruth. I saw them from before, and I saw them as I hoped they were now: together, at peace.

“I think we’re supposed to let them go,” I said gently, my eyes trained on the tiny carving in her hand. There were no sharp angles cut into the wood, only curves and curls. Soft. Like Adelaide.

She turned toward me, gripping the small wooden figure in one fist until her knuckles whitened. She blinked quickly over unshed tears and her cheeks flushed. She looked much younger than her fifteen years.

“I can’t,” she said. “Maggie, I can’t let them go. I won’t. Sometimes I hurt
so much
. I need Mother so bad, and now when I can’t see her, I get scared that I can’t do anything without her. I’m afraid, Maggie. I’m afraid of
everything
.”

I wanted to hold her. But there had been too many times when I had held her and taken away her fears. She needed to learn how to fight them on her own. I kept my arms at my sides.

“It’s okay to hurt, Addy, and it’s okay to be scared. Do you think I’m not? Ever since we were little, it was
you
who always showed
me
how we should go on when I was unhappy or frightened.” I took a deep breath, then reached out and held her free hand. “We have to
learn to understand our lives now, Addy. Everything is different. But they are our lives.”

Her eyes were rimmed with red. She was trying hard to smile. “Help me, Maggie.”

I held her then and thought I needed her as much as she needed me.

Every few days the men of the tribe went hunting. They disappeared into the woods, each with a quiver of arrows and a bow slung over his back, a sharpened tomahawk tucked into his breechclout. Bronze, tattooed skin and dark eyes made the men as visible and
in
visible as the trees and shadows around them. They
became
the forest.

Sometimes they travelled on foot, sometimes on horseback. The Cherokee didn’t use saddles, or even bridles. They rode bareback, their intuitive balance strong enough that their legs hung freely down the horses’ sides.

The brothers, Soquili and Wahyaw, decided to teach Adelaide and me how to ride. As the summer wore on, I became more comfortable urging a horse forward, changing direction, and pulling my mount to a gentle stop using only my legs. I loved the movement, the sensation of flying a horse could give me.

Adelaide could ride, but didn’t enjoy it like I did. She preferred knowing exactly where the ground was at every step. While she
stayed in the village to sew or bead with the women, I often asked the brothers to let me go with them when they went hunting. Wahyaw was unsure, assuming I would somehow alert their prey. I persisted and promised I would be quiet, so Soquili persuaded Wahyaw to let me come once in a while, as an observer. Sometimes their father, Ahtlee-Kwi-duhsgah, or Does Not Bend, joined us. He was as powerful as a bear. An impressive fountain of feathers adorned his black comb of hair, still untouched by the white of age. His eyes flitted incessantly, constantly aware, like those of his elder son. He was a quiet man, issuing short commands only when necessary. His tall gray stallion had no patience for other horses.

More and more often, when the successful hunters emerged from the shelter of the woods, Soquili’s eyes would meet mine. His dark brown gaze suggested he was interested in more than simply a friendship with me. I liked Soquili very much. We always seemed to have a lot to say to each other, and we laughed a great deal. It didn’t hurt that he was handsome and cut from the rugged cloth of the bravest of warriors. I liked watching him move, and I liked the way he made me feel: confident and desired.

We spent the summer as friends, getting to know each other better. By August the corn had grown taller than anyone in the village and the stalks were heavy with fat, ripe cobs. The harvest heralded one of the biggest ceremonies of the Cherokee year: the Green Corn Ceremony. Soquili and Kokila told me what to expect over the four-day festival, but its reality still impressed me. Hundreds of Cherokee from other villages crowded into our longhouses, filling them with laughter until the early morning hours. The days and nights were filled with dancing, singing, and drums.

The festivities involved everyone, but the most obvious participants were the unmarried young people. It was impossible, in such a huge gathering of people, not to form new relationships, and not
all of them were based purely on friendship. Anticipation of sex hovered like a cloud, low and thick in the air, adding heat to the fires where we all danced.

On one of those nights Soquili sat beside me and took my hand in his. He raised one eyebrow and grinned. Then he leaned forward and kissed my lips.

I wasn’t completely surprised, but had no idea what to do or say. So I simply looked at him, smiling faintly, studying the tiny lines around his eyes, the soft pinkish bronze of his lips, the curl of his lashes when he blinked. I had noticed them all before. Now I took the time to see them.

My only other contact with the mouths of men had been brutal. This was a completely different sensation. Like a question, asked with intimate care. He reached forward with his free hand and placed it gently behind my neck beneath my braid. With smooth pressure he pulled my face closer to his and I closed my eyes. I felt the warmth of his breath touch my skin. Then his mouth was on mine, moving slowly, tenderly, not pushing but wanting. I could smell his musky scent under the smoky air. The taste of him was intoxicating, and the combination of his touch and the wildness of the celebration made me dizzy. I returned his kisses, giving in to the desire that tingled through me. His other hand released mine, and still kissing me, he moved his palm to the side of my face. He stroked my cheek, and his thumb traced the line of my jaw. His caresses were as soft as rabbit’s fur, but unmistakably male.

I wanted this; I wanted to kiss and touch and feel and breathe him in.

But another layer of emotion emerged, one I had tried to ignore for the past few months. It bubbled up like sticky black tar: the fear, the outrage, the disgust, and the horror of my rape. The panic pushed
upward in waves, and I shoved it back under. I trembled with the effort, and Soquili felt my movement. He pulled away.

“The night air is cold on your skin. Stay here, Ma-kee. I’ll get a blanket for you.”

He stood and smiled down at me, looking pleased with himself. Then he turned toward his longhouse, leaving me to my reverie.

The fire snapped in front of me, jerking me back to my surroundings. Across the flames from me, men and women huddled close together in pairs, smiling, touching, kissing.

The closeness they shared still reminded me of the men in the woods, and it terrified me. And yet I craved touch. I craved closeness. Would I ever be able to want a man like the girls across the fire did? Would strong, male hands ever soothe instead of panic?

Soquili strode back toward me, a blue woven blanket slung casually over his shoulder. He turned to laugh at something another man said, then swung back, still smiling, still walking with his dark eyes focused on me.

Suddenly my world dropped and I hung suspended in disbelief. I stared at Soquili, but it was no longer him that I saw.

In my vision, Wolf’s hair fell in long, brown waves. His thick eyebrows were raised slightly in the middle, almost meeting under a well-defined widow’s peak. His eyes were deep, flecked with gold.