Savage Beloved

“Would I . . . like . . . a new name?” Candy stammered, her eyes widening. “Yes, oh, yes, I would. Do you have one that you have chosen for me? What name do you see me as?”

He placed his hands at her waist and drew her even closer to him, yet leaving enough distance between them so that they could still peer into each other’s eyes. “My woman, I noticed how delicately beautiful you were the first time I saw you—so beautiful you reminded me of a butterfly’s wings,” he said. “I would like to call you Painted Wings, since all butterflies’ wings seem to have been created by an artist.”

“Painted Wings . . .” Candy whispered, in awe of the lovely image. She smiled into his eyes. “Oh, yes, I adore that name.”

She flung herself into his arms. “I will love being called that,” she murmured, then leaned away from him and gazed into his eyes once again. “But you must understand that it will take time for me to get used to it.”

“I understand,” he said. “For now, I shall think of you as Painted Wings but I will not call you that just yet. You tell me when you wish to be addressed that way by me, and everyone else.”

Candy still couldn’t get over how understanding he was about everything.

But there was one problem. No matter how lovely she thought the name Painted Wings, she felt it might be hard to adjust to being called an Indian name. Perhaps after she was married to him, and felt more Wichita, she could feel like the Painted Wings he had named her.

They stretched out beside each other again near the fire on the rich, thick pelts and talked of so many things that thrilled Candy’s heart. The more she was with him, the more she adored him.

It still surprised her that she could lie nude with a man and not feel uncomfor

table or bashful.

Just like making love with him, being naked with him was so natural . . . so right!

Suddenly Candy recalled something that even now seemed too strange to be real.

She turned on her side and faced Two Eagles. “You would not believe what I saw while I was looking for Shadow,” she blurted out, then told him about seeing the three buffalo kill two huge bears, when she would have thought that bears, with their massive claws and teeth, would have been the victorious ones.

“I understand how that can happen,” he said. “For it is now the Moon of Strawberries, when bears are seeking green sedges, or roots, anthills, and berries, and when buffalo sharpen and polish their horns for bloody contests among themselves. They fight over the female buffalo that they want to mate with. Those horns and that fighting spirit are enough to overpower any other animal.”

“That is so interesting,” Candy murmured, impressed that Two Eagles seemed to know so much about so many things.

She could hardly wait for him to teach her about such things, and especially about the ways of his people. She wanted to learn to adjust to living with them, for she never wanted Two Eagles to be disappointed in her.

“I have wanted to ask you about something but felt that I shouldn’t,” Candy said.

“Never hesitate to ask me anything,” he said. “Asking is learning. I will gladly teach you my people’s customs. One day, you will know as much as myself.”

She blushed. “I doubt that,” she said, then gazed into his eyes. “Outside, there are five poles that project from one side of your entranceway. Why are they there? Is there a meaning to them?”

“There is much meaning,” he said. “Four of them represent the four world quarters, or gods, while the upward peak is symbolic of Man-Never-Known-On-Earth, or Kinnekasus, the Creator.”

He gestured toward the entranceway. “And the door of all homes of my people is placed on the east side so that the sun may look into the lodge as it rises, while the small circular opening overhead is placed there not only for smoke to escape through, but also so that the sun may look into the lodge at noon, and at night, the star gods are thought to pour down their strength into our homes.”

He then gestured toward the fire pit. “The fire’s place in all my people’s lodges is considered sacred,” he said. “There offerings are made, food is cooked, and medicine is heated. We Wichita people view our home as a miniature of the universe itself.”

“There is so much to learn,” Candy murmured.

“You are like a newborn babe, who learns something at each new sunrise,” he said. “When you give birth to our first child, who will then learn as you learn now, you will be the teacher while I, the father, will be busy at my chieftain duties.”

“It is all like a dream, my life now, in comparison to how I lived before I met you,” Candy said softly.

She knew now why her father had been stationed at Fort Hope. It was to fulfill her destiny . . . to find Two Eagles and fall in love.

“My woman,” Two Eagles said huskily as he wrapped his arms around her and drew her beneath him. They made love again as Shadow slept soundly beside the warmth of the fire, one ear lifting to the sound of wolves suddenly howling in the distance.

Chapter Twenty-one

Love not me for comely grace,

For my pleasing eye or face,