The Savage

“Fight you?” Summer echoed, her wits suddenly sluggish as molasses.

“Yeah, with knives. Hand-to-hand combat. Normally we would use lances on horseback, but that would give me too great an edge. The lance is my namesake, and powerful medicine for me.”

She heard him calmly explaining the rationale behind the choice of weapons and wanted to scream. What difference did it make when either could kill him?

She watched with growing alarm as Lance prepared to do battle, removing all adornment and excess clothing, till he stood before her clad only in his long breechclout and moccasins, armed with his knife.

“Lance, no!” Summer exclaimed, suddenly terrified. “You can’t fight him. You could be hurt.”

His black eyes sought hers. “Would you care?”

“Of course I would care! How can you say such a thing?”

He smiled faintly at her adamance. “You got a better plan, princess?”

“We could leave…Right now, this minute. We could take Amelia with us—”

“And get how far? Tuhsinah would be after us in a heartbeat, and he wouldn’t hesitate to kill us when he found us.”

“But we might be able to elude him.”

Lance shook his head. “Summer, luck was on my side when I rescued Amelia from him. I counted on the superstitious fear Comanches have of thunder and lighting to postpone pursuit, and it worked, but now I have to make a stand. I’d be branded as a coward if I ran. And to a Comanche, that’s far worse than death.”

“What…happens if you lose?”

He was silent for a long moment. “You have to decide whether Amelia would be better off dead than living as Tuhsinah’s captive.”

Summer pressed a trembling hand over her mouth, to keep from shrieking out her horror.

“If I lose,” Lance continued, his tone soft but relentless, “she’l

l belong to Tuhsinah again. I know what my decision would be, but it’s not my choice to make.”

He bent to rummage in a parfleche, then crossed to Summer and handed her another knife, smaller but just as razor-sharp.

“You’ll have to be strong enough to use this if you must.” Solemnly, holding her tear-filled gaze, he raised a hand to touch the side of Summer’s throat. “Draw the blade across the vein here…swift and hard. It’ll be over in a minute.”

The tears spilled over, flooding her pale cheeks and stabbing at Lance’s heart. “There are things worse than death. Summer,” he said softly. “I don’t think you want Amelia to suffer like she has the last three weeks. Either way, you’ll be safe. If I die, you’ll be under Fights Bear’s protection—”

“I don’t care about being safe!” she cried in a broken voice.

“I care. I didn’t go to all this trouble just to get you killed.”

When she would have protested, he cast a glance over his shoulder at the entrance. “Summer, I have to go. I’ll be back if I can.”

He bent to kiss her lips gently, the caress bittersweet and poignant. In response, Summer raised her hands desperately to twine her fingers in Lance’s black hair, drawing his mouth closer, pressing harder, this leave-taking even more urgent than the last because of the imminent danger he faced.

Finally, though, he pried her fingers loose and lifted his head. He stood looking at her for one long, final moment before he turned away.

Summer followed him to the entrance and watched as Lance strode swiftly toward the village arena. She cast an anguished glance at the tepee where Amelia slept. She didn’t want to abandon her sister, and yet Lance had greater need of her. She had to be present at the battle, to give Lance moral support if nothing else. And to discover the outcome, whether he won or lost. No, she wouldn’t think of that. He had to win. She wouldn’t lose her sister again. She wouldn’t let Lance die.

His enemy was already waiting for him when he stepped into the clearing, along with a crowd of observers from both bands. An air of tension flowed from the women and children, but the warriors were gesturing and arguing, much the way Summer’s brothers often had before a horse race when they’d wagered a sizable sum. Dear God, were the Comanches actually betting on the outcome of the fight? When men’s lives were at stake?

Summer saw Lance’s grandmother at the front of the crowd, her wizened face impassive, her piercing black eyes trained on the two combatants, and went to stand beside her. If Wasp Lady’s medicine was good, then Summer wanted to make every possible use of it.

The two men faced off in the grassy clearing and began to circle one another, each clad in a long breechclout, each wielding a knife whose wicked blade flashed in the sun. Summer dug her nails into her palms as she focused her gaze on her husband. If the stakes hadn’t been so terribly high, she might have admired Lance’s sleek, economical movements, the animal grace of his half-naked body, the lean muscles playing under sun-dark skin. As it was, she could only pray.

She drew a sharp breath as the opening feint and parry began. The knife blades flashed in a blur as each man looked for a weakness in his opponent. Tuhsinah was the first to make a serious move, but Lance dodged the brutal thrust, the ivory gleam of his teeth catching the sunlight as he grinned fiercely.