Wild Embrace

Ah-hah, he would soon have this much needed talk with his woman.

Anger flared in Elizabeth when Strong Heart ignored her mention of the salmon run.

Well, she quickly decided, she had taken all that she could of his silent moodiness!

“Let me off the horse,” she said, her eyes flashing into Strong Heart’s as he turned his head quickly to look at her. “It is apparent that my mere presence is a bother to you, so stop your horse so that I can walk the rest of the way.”

She glared at him defiantly. “Better yet, perhaps I should just turn around and start walking back toward Seattle,” she stormed. “I don’t want to be anywhere I’m not wanted, or be with someone who treats me as though I am nonexistent.”

Strong Heart stared at her, stunned by her sudden rush of temper. Then, remembering his own reason for being angry with her, he turned his eyes ahead. He kept his horse going in a steady lope, refusing to allow Elizabeth to do as she wanted. At this moment, he was determined to have his way. She would not get away from his questions that easily!

He smiled to himself, though, thinking that perhaps she was even more beautiful angry—with her green eyes flashing, and her cheeks rosy with rage. It would be so easy to forget his suspicions and return to the way it had been between them before he had discovered that she had not been totally truthful with him. Instead of questioning her and finding out something that might cause a total estrangement between them, ignorance might be best.

But he was a man of truth. So his wife must be a woman of truth.

“Stop!” Elizabeth shouted, pummeling his back with her fists. “Let me down. If you don’t, I’ll jump.”

Strong Heart wheeled his horse to a quick stop, then turned to Elizabeth and jerked her around, so that she was on his lap. He held her in place with his strong arm, and proceeded on toward his village.

“Nah, look here,” he grumbled. “We are almost at my village, and then we will go to my longhouse and talk. But until then, sit quietly and do not make a spectacle of yourself.”

“Why are you doing this to me?” Elizabeth asked, angry tears spilling from her eyes. “Last night, everything was so perfect between us. Today? You act as if you don’t love me. Why did you set me free from the prison if . . . if . . . you don’t even care for me anymore?”

“I will care for you until the end of time,” Strong Heart said, his voice solemn as his eyes looked into hers. “But there is something left unspoken between us. Today, before the sun dies in the sky, I will have the answers that I am seeking.”

“Answers?” Elizabeth said, sniffling and wiping tears from her eyes with the back of her hand. “Answers about what? You seemed content enough last night. Why now, Strong Heart? Why?”

“Last night was last night,” Strong Heart grumbled. “This is now. Now is when I want the answers. Perhaps I should have questioned you last night, but I didn’t. So be it, Elizabeth. Just be patient with me. I have been, with you.”

Elizabeth shook her head slowly, her mind seething with frustration. “Sometimes you talk and act in riddles,” she murmured, turning her eyes from him. Her shoulders slumped dispiritedly. She knew she would feel better if she allowed herself to have a good cry.

But she did not have time to think further on it, for Strong Heart’s horse had reached the outer fringes of the village and children were running toward them already, shouting Strong Heart’s name, their dogs yapping at their heels.

Strong Heart smiled at them and kept riding on past the newly erected totem poles and into the village. Women sat outside their lodges, spinning the underside of the cedar bark which looked like flax, with distaffs and spindles. Others wove it with strips of sea otter skin on looms which were placed against the sides of their houses.

When Strong Heart started riding past his parents’ large lodge, Elizabeth saw his mother step outside. A smile of relief was on her tiny face as she gazed adoringly up at her son, a fist clutched over her heart as she bid a silent welcome to Strong Heart. He returned the welcome, in kind, and rode on, drawing rein before his longhouse.

Strong Heart eased Elizabeth from his lap until her feet were placed firmly on the ground, then slid from the saddle himself. Elizabeth stood with her arms folded stubbornly across her chest as he secured his reins to a post. She jerked away from him when he reached for her elbow to escort her into the house.

“Don’t worry,” she said, her voice low, yet angry. “I shall go into the longhouse without assistance.” She turned and stood on tiptoe, lifting her face to his. “And I shall not make a scene. I’m just as anxious to get this over with as you.”

Then, her lips quivering, she reproached him. “I hope to understand soon why you are behaving so . . . so . . . cold to me. It wasn’t my fault that I was taken to the prison and jailed there.”

She raised her eyes to his. “I didn’t ask you to come and get me either,” she said, her voice breaking. “You could have left me there just like my father. Why did you come for me, if all that you had planned was to

chastise me for . . . for . . . only God knows what? In truth, I am now no better than when I was in prison.”

Strong Heart’s eyes wavered and a slow pain circled his heart to see his woman tortured by what he was forced to do.

He gestured with his hand. “Go inside,” he said softly. He followed her, then he pointed toward a soft buckskin cushion filled with cottonwood floss. “Mit-lite, sit down beside the firepit.”

Disconsolately, Elizabeth sat down on the cushion and crossed her legs beneath her skirt. She was suddenly mortified by the appearance of her dress. During their journey, she had not thought to be concerned about how disheveled she was after being imprisoned for so many days. Each evening she had been given a basin of water, with which she kept herself clean, but her clothes not only smelled of the jail cell, but now also of horse sweat.

As Strong Heart sat down beside her, and began building the fire in the firepit, Elizabeth watched him, her heart pounding. She was glad when the flames were curling around the logs, so that Strong Heart could say what he wanted to say to her.

When he turned her way and began talking, she turned pale and gasped. His question was proof of why he had been treating her as if she were no more important to him than a stranger.

“Elizabeth, it is me-sah-chie, bad, to tell lies, especially to tell a lie to the man you have professed to love,” Strong Heart began solemnly, his gaze steady on her. “Why did you lie to me about why your father is in the Pacific Northwest?”