Wild Splendor (15 page)

He understood just how little his sister trusted the Kiowa chief. Little did she know that he trusted Four Fingers even less. He was just tolerating the Kiowa chief because it was best to have him as an ally at this time instead of an enemy. Sage would even ride beside Four Fingers if it meant ridding this land of the white pony soldiers. Only time would tell which was most necessary—tolerating the Kiowa chief or the white pony soldiers.

“We have seen Kit Carson and the white pony soldiers searching the land,” Four Fingers said, turning his attention to Sage. “We rode quickly into hiding. Is it you he seeks? It was rumored that you walked away from the council you were having with Kit Carson and the others at the fort.”

He puffed his bare chest out proudly. “Four Fingers did not go to council,” he said smugly. “The humiliating words of the white man did not enter my ears and touch my heart. They did not reach as far as the mountains where I have my stronghold. There I stayed, minding my own business, leaving the white man to wonder how he can force this powerful Kiowa chief out of hiding.” He chuckled low. “And so it is now that they are looking for you instead of Chief Four Fingers. Did it not prove who was the most wise between chiefs?”

Sage's jaw tightened and his eyes flashed in anger. “You speak loosely to this chief with whom you have come to trade,” he said flatly. “Let us get it behind us so that you can return to your tepee and I can return to my hogan. The day is waning. I have other pleasures awaiting me than being with a chief whose words tire me.”

They discussed trading, making bargains between themselves that suited both tribes of Indians well enough. And when Sage thought it was over and had risen to his full height, even having helped his sister and wife up from the blanket, he was stopped dead when Chief Four Fingers said: “This white woman, she is your slave? She is one of the captives that I heard you took from a stagecoach? She is pretty. I will pay much for her. She will make a delightful love slave.”

Lightheadedness swept through Leonida at the Kiowa's words. She reached for Sage and clung to him, glad when he felt her distress and placed a comforting, possessive arm around her waist, to steady her against his side.

“This woman you speak of is my wife,” Sage said, glaring at Chief Four Fingers. “Do not speak of her again to me.” He gave Leonida a comforting glance, then turned to the Kiowa chief again. “Your horses are now loaded with the supplies you have traded for. It is best that you leave.”

Chief Four Fingers stepped around Sage and took it upon himself to touch Leonida's hair, sighing at its utter softness, and then he gazed into her eyes again, giving her a slow, sure smile.

Then he turned abruptly and left.

Sage held Leonida close until they could no longer see the Kiowa descending the mountainside.

“I'm frightened,” Leonida said, trembling. “Did you see the way he looked at me? He does not seem the sort to take no for an answer.”

“Chief Four Fingers needs the alliance of the Navaho too much to do anything foolish that might harm their peace,” Sage said, swinging her around so that he could hold her in his arms. “Do not fret so. While you are in my village, among my people, nothing will happen to you.” He looked in all directions, then into Leonida's eyes again. “My sentries are posted well. They would let no one get past them, especially Chief Four Fingers, if he is caught sneaking about.”

A sudden soft cry next to them drew them apart. Leonida stifled a scream behind her hand when she discovered that Pure Blossom had fainted and lay sprawled out on the blanket, looking more dead than alive.

Sage fell to his knees beside Pure Blossom and whisked her slight form up into his arms. “I will take her to her hogan,” he said across his shoulder to Leonida. “Go to ours. I will return when my sister awakens. Stay in the hogan, my woman. You will be safe there.”

The fact that he was ordering her to stay in the hogan made Leonida realize that he did not trust that she was safe from Chief Four Fingers all that much, either. The thought of Four Fingers even getting near her, much less touching her, made shivers of dread envelop her.

“Let me go with you,” she pleaded, hurrying after him. “Perhaps I can help.”

“You must be at the hogan for Runner,” Sage said, again over his shoulder. “He was among the children moments ago, watching the council. He is probably in our hogan now, awaiting your return. We do not want to give him cause to become frightened. Go to him. Stay with him.”

Realizing that Sage was right, Leonida stopped and watched him carry Pure Blossom into her hogan, then turned and headed hurriedly toward hers. She glanced all around her, seeing the shadows deepening as the sun sank behind the high cliffs around the village.

Again she shivered, hurrying toward the hogan. She would be counting the minutes with her every heartbeat until Sage returned to her and she could find a safe refuge within his powerful arms.

Chapter 18

How small a part of time they share,
That are so wondrous, sweet and fair.

—E
DMUND
W
ALLER

 

 

Runner smelled clean from his bath as Leonida bent over him and drew a soft blanket up to his chin. She then kissed his brow and smoothed his black hair back from his face. “How sweet you are,” she whispered, touched by how he had listened so intently to her latest bedtime tale. She knew that soon she would have to start teaching him more than made-up tales. Since he would never have the opportunity to go to school, she would be responsible for giving him an education. Having been fortunate enough to have a thorough education herself, she knew even more than the fundamentals of English, mathematics, and . . .

A noise in the outer room catapulted Leonida's thoughts elsewhere. “Sage,” she whispered. “Finally, he's returned home.”

Anxious to find out how Pure Blossom was, she turned and walked briskly from Runner's room, but stopped abruptly and gasped when she discovered Chief Four Fingers and two of his warriors.

Leonida's knees grew rubbery and a scream froze in her throat when a third Kiowa warrior stepped up behind her and clasped his fingers around her mouth, his other arm grabbing her tightly around her waist.

Fear gripped her heart. She was too stunned to think straight, and then suddenly something seemed to snap inside her brain, releasing her from her fears. Finding the courage and strength to fight back, she pulled on the man's hand that covered her mouth but couldn't budge it. She grabbed and pulled at the arm locked around her waist. She kicked at him, but nothing caused him to loosen his hold on her.

Knowing that she was wasting her energy, which she might need later in her attempts to escape, Leonida stopped struggling and glared at Chief Four Fingers as he moved stealthily toward her. Her heart was pounding at the thought that perhaps the whole village was at the mercy of his warriors, the fear that perhaps even now Sage lay dead.

The thought sickened her, yet she bravely held her chin up, her eyes looking unwaveringly into the Kiowa chief's. She reminded herself that she had not heard any gunfire in the village or any commotion which might mean that the Navaho people had been taken by surprise in their sleep.

This gave her hope that perhaps she was the only victim tonight.

Her heart skipped a beat when she remembered Runner asleep in the next room. Should he awaken and come into the outer room to see what was happening, surely the Kiowa would kill him for his interference.

“No one denies Chief Four Fingers anything,” the Kiowa chief said. He held a rifle in one hand, and with his free hand he traced the outline of one of Leonida's breasts with a forefinger, causing her to shudder with distaste. “Four Fingers wants a white woman slave? He takes her.”

Four Fingers stepped back from Leonida, smiling devilishly at her, and in what seemed a flash, she was gagged with a bright neckerchief and wrapped in the rabbit-fur cloak that had cushioned her back while Sage made love to her. A Kiowa warrior secured it around her with long strings of animal-hide rope.

Totally disabled by the cloak, Leonida could not fight back when she was lifted onto the shoulder of one of the warriors and carried like a bundle of potatoes toward the door. The last thing she saw in the hogan was the squash blossom necklace which had broken and fallen from her neck during her struggles.

And then she was outside. She strained her neck to look around to see if anyone else was being taken hostage. Seeing no one, she knew that Chief Four Fingers had dared to enter Sage's village only for her. She had to wonder why the sentries had not stopped the silent midnight invasion. Sage had placed several in strategic places. It seemed impossible that the Kiowa warriors could have gotten past them.

As she was carried hurriedly into the shadows of the hogans, she peered anxiously toward Pure Blossom's hogan, knowing that Sage must still be there. Tears of frustration stung her eyes as she was then carried on away from the village. Soon she saw the outlines of horses and other warriors just ahead of her.

Then spirals of despair swam through her when beneath the light of the moon she could see more than one Navaho sentry lying dead, arrows piercing their backs. Now she understood how the Kiowa could have gotten away with the abduction. They had killed everyone who had gotten in the way.

As she was laid over the back of a horse and secured there with a rope, Leonida realized that Chief Four Fingers did not want an alliance with Sage and his people any longer, or he would not risk losing it over the abduction of a woman.

Now tied onto the horse, hanging over its back, Leonida found her head spinning, the blood flowing quickly to it. When the horse began traveling down the steep incline, a keen dizziness overcame Leonida.

She soon drifted off into a black void of nothingness.

* * *

Sage felt hopeful for his sister again when her breathing became easier and more even. Finally she lay on her platform, sleeping soundly. He stayed on his knees a moment longer and watched Pure Blossom sleeping, remembering her when she was a small child, even then battling all sorts of ailments. His mother had told him that it did not appear that Pure Blossom's health would ever be strong and had warned him even then that she might not live past three years.

“My sweet sister, you fooled them all,” he whispered, stroking her cool brow with his fingers. “Even now you tease death and are victorious. Perhaps you will live to see my children? Little one, that would make your brother happy.”

When she emitted a shaky sigh and turned to lie on her side in a fetal position, Sage made sure the blankets were still fully covering her, drawing them up over her, smoothing them out just beneath her chin.

“I think I can leave you now,” he whispered as he rose to his full height next to the sleeping platform. “My wife has been without her husband long enough. When the sun replaces the moon in the sky I shall return and check on you again.”

Anxious to be with Leonida, always desiring her as though it were their first moments together, Sage left Pure Blossom's hogan and hastened his steps until he entered his own dwelling. A soft fire was burning in the fire pit as he walked past it. He stopped and looked into Runner's room, smiling when he found that the child was fast asleep.

Stopping just outside his bedroom door, he stepped out of his breechclout and moccasins. He smiled down at himself, seeing how aroused he had become at only thinking of her. Perhaps he would awaken her and let her see how he hungered for her even at this midnight hour. Surely she would want him as much.

His loins on fire with desire, Sage walked on into his bedroom, having decided that he must awaken her. He could not wait until morning to quench his passions.

When Sage looked over at the empty sleeping platform, he stopped short. Where was she?

Not believing she could be gone, Sage rushed to the sleeping platform and gazed down at it with wide, worried eyes. Then he spun around and raced back to the outer room, looking frantically around him.

He slopped when he discovered the squash blossom necklace on the mats beside the fire. His pulse racing, he swept the necklace up from the floor and spread it out between his fingers, inspecting it. His eyes locked on the break, and he realized that only a struggle would have caused such a break. Leonida had not just wandered away from the hogan.

She had been abducted!

He dropped the necklace to the floor and began pacing in agitation. “Who would do this?” he growled, his fists tight at his sides.

He recalled the time when Harold had grabbed the necklace from Leonida and had forbidden her to wear it. Seeing the broken necklace reminded him that the white man just might do anything to get Leonida back, perhaps even risk entering the village alone to achieve his foolish goal.

“But he knows not where the village is,” he said, kneading his brow feverishly.

He stopped and his jaw tightened. “Chief Four Fingers,” he said, his teeth clenched. “He desired her. Has he risked everything to have her?”

A rush of feet in the hogan made Sage spin around to see who had entered, hoping it was Leonida. Instead he saw two breathless Navaho warriors standing there, their eyes filled with anguish.

“What brings you to my hogan this late?” Sage asked, fearing the answer.

“All of our sentries have been slain,” Spotted Feather said in a rush of words. “It was time for change in sentries. All those who went to relieve the others found death on the mountain. They are all dead, Sage. All of them had Kiowa arrows in their backs.”

Sage was taken aback by this news. Despair and anger fused within him. He shook his head back and forth, not wanting to envision his friends all dead, or wanting to think that his beloved was now in the hands of those who betrayed him.

“My wife has been abducted,” he said, turning to grab his clothes. He hurried into his breechclout and moccasins, then yanked his rifle from where he had leaned it against the wall. “Gather together many warriors. We must go after Four Fingers. He is responsible for this.”

“It is such an unwise thing to do,” Black Thunder said, walking from the hogan with Sage and Spotted Feather. “And all for a woman? I see her as special also, Sage, but to destroy peace over her? It is not something I will ever understand.”

Sage turned to his warriors. He clasped his hands on Black Thunder's shoulders. “It is not hard to see why he chanced all for my woman,” he said, his voice drawn. “First, I denied her to him. Second, he realizes that Kit Carson and the white pony soldiers are near, and perhaps he thinks our time of camaraderie has been outlived. He has taken my woman and will ride even farther than the mountains. He is fleeing life as he has always known it, believing it is gone anyhow. He no longer sees a need for an alliance with the Navaho. Taking my woman was a way to throw sand in my face to say that he is no longer my friend and ally, but as before, my archenemy.”

“He is foolish,” Spotted Feather mumbled, and Black Thunder nodded in agreement. “Never can he outrun the Navaho.”

“Yes, that is so,” Sage said. “We will overcome them soon. But we must be cautious in how we approach them. Getting my wife back is more important than how many Kiowa we kill.”

Sage's thoughts went to those warriors who had been killed. He ordered Spotted Feather to take others with him to return the dead to the stronghold.

Black Thunder rushed away to awaken many other warriors.

Once he saw that his orders were being carried out, Sage stamped away toward the corral. It was hard to control the rage that was searing his insides, yet for his woman he had to keep a level head.

Her survival depended on him.

And he would not allow himself to think that the Kiowa chief would take the time to stop to ravage his woman. He would keep thinking that her body would be left pure, to be touched only by her husband.