Wild Embrace

k inside the house,” she said, trying to move Elizabeth along. She tilted a heavy, gray eyebrow up at Elizabeth when she refused to budge. “Elizabeth, honey. You come in the house. You gonna catch a chill standing out here without a wrap.”

“I’m fine,” Elizabeth said, easing from Frannie’s grip. She gazed down at her sweet and caring friend. “I’m going exploring, Frannie. This is my new home—one that has been forced upon me, so it is my decision to acquaint myself with it and the grounds that surround it. I can’t be expected to sit in that dreadful house every day and night, rotting away doing nothing.”

“You ain’t goin’ nowheres,” Frannie fussed, again grabbing Elizabeth’s arm, “’cept in the house with me, where you belongs.”

Elizabeth detached her hand again. “Frannie, I’m not going inside the house until I’m good and ready,” she said stubbornly. “I’m going exploring. That’s final!”

“It ain’t safe,” Frannie grumbled. “It just ain’t safe for a young lady to be wanderin’ alone away from home. If you insist on goin’, then ol’ Frannie goes with you.”

“No, Frannie, you’re not,” Elizabeth argued, her patience running thin. “But you can go and fetch my shawl. It’s apt to be much colder in the forest than here. I would prefer my wrap, if you please.”

“If you please,” Frannie echoed, angrily folding her arms across her thick bosom. “If you do as I please, you’ll stay here with me and not out there where Indians can take your pretty hair from your scalp.”

Elizabeth paled somewhat at these words, having read many novels in which Indian scalpings had been described in gory detail. But all that she had to do was remember the handsome Indian, and his gentle arms and eyes, to know that she surely had nothing to fear from him.

Especially being scalped!

“I’ll get my wrap myself,” Elizabeth said, wanting to end this debate with Frannie.

“There ain’t no need in that,” Frannie said, sighing resignedly. “I’ll fetch it. But mark my word, Elizabeth, if you don’t get back home when I’m expectin’ you to, I’se comin’ after you. Does you understand?”

Elizabeth placed a gentle hand to Frannie’s fleshy cheek. “Yes, I understand,” she said, filled with much love and gratitude for this woman who had become a substitute mother to her. “I’ll try not to stay long. I don’t want to worry you.”

“Huh! If you don’t want to worry me none, you stay home with me,” Frannie said, then shook her head and marched inside the house for the shawl. When she saw the stubbornness in Elizabeth’s eyes, she knew that it was useless to argue with her. She had never seen anyone as stubborn as Elizabeth, except perhaps Elizabeth’s mother. Now that was one redheaded stubborn woman who knew her mind better than she should have. She had walked away from her daughter because of her stubbornnesses.

Frannie took the shawl back outside to Elizabeth and devotedly placed it around her shoulders. She then watched with a heavy heart as Elizabeth began making her way through the brambles that stretched out across the lawn to the grotesque fence. She watched Elizabeth until she was out of sight. Then she moved back inside the house, unable to shake a feeling of doom that seemed to have suddenly come over her. She wanted to run after Elizabeth and beg her to return to the safety of the house, yet she knew that would be a futile attempt.

Frannie had to accept that although Elizabeth loved her, the child had her own mind and would do as she wanted, for, in truth, Frannie was only Elizabeth’s maid, not her keeper.

* * *

Holding her shawl securely around her shoulders, Elizabeth moved into the deeper gloom of the forest, where the musty aroma of rotted leaves arose to her nose, stinging the tender flesh of her nostrils. She looked guardedly from side to side, everything too eerily quiet, as if she had stepped into a tomb. Except for herself, there seemed to be no life in this section of the forest. No birds sang and no squirrels scampered about collecting acorns for the long, cold winter vigil that was just ahead. She felt as if she might be intruding on some deep, dark secret, and that the trees surrounding her resented her presence.

She saw a break in the trees up ahead, which could mean that she had reached the Sound. Welcoming anything besides what she had found so far in her explorations, Elizabeth hurried her pace. As the sunshine began spiraling more vividly through the umbrella of trees overhead, and she could see even more light just up ahead, she began softly running toward the opening.

But when she finally reached the cleared land, where the sun drenched its warmth on all sides of her, what Elizabeth saw made her heart leap into her throat, and her mouth go dry. She stopped and stared at the many posts that had been driven into the ground, skulls topping each one of them, their eye sockets all facing her, as if looking at her accusingly.

Finding the courage to move again, Elizabeth edged her way around the skull-crowned posts, her heart pounding.

As she circled the hideous sight, she was able to think more clearly. She guessed that she had just found the graveyard of some Indians—burial grounds she may have desecrated by her intrusion. Burial grounds that were much, much too close to her house for comfort.

Breathing harshly, Elizabeth turned and fled onward, toward the welcome sight of a grass-covered bluff that overlooked the Sound. When she arrived there, she tried to blot the horrible sight of the skulls from her mind by looking at the beauty of the view.

She stepped closer to the edge of the bluff, gazing down at the thundering surf. But there was something foreboding in the rhythm of the waves and their steady splashing seemed for a moment to mesmerize, then disorient her. She found herself weaving, feeling as if she were going to fall. Then she cried out with alarm when she felt strong hands on her waist, stopping her.

When those powerful hands drew Elizabeth away from the edge of the bluff and turned her around, she was stunned to find herself again looking up into the steelgray eyes of the handsome Indian. Although she knew that she should be wary of him, a stranger—she could not deny that being near him again made her heart take on a crazy, erratic beating.

His hands on her waist were like fire, scorching her clothing, burning her flesh.

Elizabeth shivered from the boldness of his hold. Then she found the strength to speak to him. “Thank you for stopping my fall,” she murmured. She glanced down at his hands which still held her, then looked up at him. “You can let me go. I’m . . . I’m safe enough now. I’ve regained my balance.”

“Your husband is pel-ton, foolish, to allow you to move about alone on land that is not familiar to you,” Strong Heart finally said, scowling down at her from his tall height. “Does your husband not know about the bandit gangs and warrior bands that are known to roam the forests and the unguarded valleys? These men stop at nothing to get their pleasures and lusts fulfilled.”

Elizabeth cast her eyes downward, her face coloring with a hot blush.

Then she boldly lifted her chin and met his steady stare with one of her own. “I’ll have you know that I answer to no husband, because I have none. And under normal circumstances I am capable of taking care of myself,” she blurted. “Furthermore, I have the right to wander on property that is owned by my father. Why are you here? Do you make it a habit to trespass, to go where you do not belong?”

When he did not answer her, she saw anger in his eyes, which changed quickly to pain. She wished that she could erase all that she had just said. Again she reminded herself that this land had once belonged solely to the Indians. This man’s very ancestors might have lived here.