But she didn’t share this tidbit with Andrew, not yet. She wanted to be sure that he was a truthful person, who was not lying to save his neck. She hoped that he was sincere about wanting to be a preacher.
“Bring the young man a horse,” High Hawk shouted at his braves. “But leave the rest. We cannot take horses with us, although I hate to leave a steed behind. But in these circumstances we would be slowed, trying to get them up that narrow pass while keeping ourselves and our horses from sliding to our deaths.”
“Sliding . . . to . . . your deaths?” Andrew gulped out. “Is where we are going to travel so dangerous?”
“Very,” Joylynn murmured. “But if you are being truthful about your belief in God, you don’t have anything to fear. He will keep you safe.”
She gave him a lingering gaze. “He allowed you to live today while others died, did He not?” she murmured.
Andrew swallowed hard, nodded, then got up and limped to the horse that was brought to him.
High Hawk helped him into the saddle, then mounted his own steed. “Let us leave this place of death,” he shouted, riding off with Joylynn at his right side.
Andrew soon caught up and rode on High Hawk’s other side. With eyes straight ahead, the group rode for the mountain pass they had only a short while ago left behind them.
Joylynn was bone-weary from the long day of riding and fighting. But she had to find the courage and strength to ride for many more hours.
She gazed heavenward and said a silent prayer for strength, and for reassurance that the young man was not lying through his teeth in order to save his hide!
As she rode onward, she again thought about Mole. Could he even now be hiding and watching her, another plan hatching in that evil mind of his?
That thought made her shudder.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
A soft breeze whispered through the canyon as High Hawk and Joylynn edged their horses closer to each other while riding into the hidden valley that was to be their home.
Finally they had arrived.
A beautiful stream, its water clear and sparkling, lay just beyond, and a great herd of deer were drinking from it.
Groves of trees were set back from a grassy meadow. Overhead they saw flashes of color as birds flew by, chattering and playing.
Somewhere in the meadow, a field lark sang, high and musical.
And as High Hawk led his people across the lush grass of the meadow, brown flocks of quail rose from it, fluttering away, only to resettle again nearby.
“I have never seen anyplace as beautiful as this,” Joylynn murmured as she drew rein beside High Hawk. “It truly is a paradise.”
She was aware of the Pawnee people coming in from all sides, stopping to take in the grandeur of their new home.
“Do you hear the whispering of the wind blowing all around us?” High Hawk asked, lifting his chin and inhaling the sweetness of the air. “To me it is the voices of my ancestors saying this is where I will have a son!”
Joylynn’s eyes widened just as he turned to her with a wide smile. “A son,” she said, her pulse racing.
Yes.
Ho.
They would now have time to marry and make that son, as well as many more children they both would adore.
Then her smile waned as she recalled her recent miscarriage. Did that mean she could not carry any child full term?
The thought made her feel sick to her stomach. If she was not able to give High Hawk a son who would one day be chief after him, would he still want her as his wife?
“We will be married soon after the hunt,” High Hawk said, reaching over and taking her hand. “The hunt is necessary to replenish our meat supply. The women must prepare it for use during the long, cold months of winter that lie ahead of us. With the vegetables each woman has brought from her cache pot, and with fresh meat prepared for storage, there will be enough to sustain us until new crops are planted in the spring.”
He looked over his shoulder where they had left the canyon walls behind, then gazed into Joylynn’s eyes again. “Canyon walls can be climbed, but not these,” he said. “These walls and this land belong now solely to the Pawnee.”