Wild Splendor

She spun around and clasped her fingers together before her. “And it’s so clean,” she sighed. She eyed a thick cushion of blankets spread out before the fire. Her weary bones ached to go and sit down on them, but this thought was brushed aside when a familiar voice spoke up behind her.

“Sage, you bring white woman and child into your hogan?” Pure Blossom said as she stepped in. Then her lips parted in a gasp when she recognized Leonida. “It is you?”

Puzzled, Pure Blossom turned back to her brother, the hump in her back twisting strangely as she peered up into his eyes. “There are others outside,” she murmured. “What have you done, Sage? Are these people your captives? Are they? Is Leonida?”

She turned questioningly to Trevor. “Is this your son, Leonida?” she murmured. “I thought the blanket I was weaving for you was for a wedding. And you already have a son? I do not understand.”

Leonida took Trevor’s hand and urged him toward Pure Blossom. “This is Trevor,” she said softly. “Trevor’s mother is dead. I am going to raise him now, as though he were my own.”

Leonida gave Trevor a gentle shove, pushing him closer to Pure Blossom, realizing that his hesitation stemmed from her deformity, a difference that made her outwardly ugly.

Pure Blossom’s smile faded when she saw the fear in Trevor’s eyes. Yet she was glad that it was not disgust as he stared at the hump on her back. “Pure Blossom glad to know you,” she said, offering a frail hand.

Trevor bolted behind Leonida, then slowly peered around her with wide, wondering eyes.

Trying to hide the pain that his response inflicted, Pure Blossom went to Leonida and gave her a gentle hug. “My brother has not told me the reasons you and others are here, but I welcome you,” she said softly.

She eased from Leonida’s arms and turned back to Sage. “Is she captive?” she asked, this time more determined.

“No, she is not a captive now, nor has she ever been,” Sage said. “But the others? Yes, they are the prisoners of the Navaho. For now they are captives. Soon they will be freed. Until then, Pure Blossom, go to the women of our village and ask them to share their blankets, food, and drinking water with the women and children. Tell the young braves to build lean-tos for the captives so they can be comfortable while they are forced to live away from their loved ones. They will become as one with our people while they are in the village of the Navaho.”

Pure Blossom nodded and left, after giving Leonida a quick smile over her shoulder.

Touched by his concern for the other women and children, Leonida went to Sage and twined her arms around his neck. “Uke-he, thank you,” she murmured.

Trevor came to them and nudged them apart, his little arms reaching up to Leonida for her to pick him up. Leonida laughed softly and swept him up into her arms. Sage watched for a moment, then swallowed them both in his arms.

“I did not intend to find a family to bring home to my hogan when I planned the ambush on the stagecoach,” he said, smiling from Leonida to Trevor. “But it seems destiny made it so.”

He stepped away from them and Leonida saw a sudden sadness as he leaned down to stare into the slow burning flames of the fire. She put Trevor on the floor and leaned down on her knees beside Sage. “What is it?” she asked, placing a hand on his cheek. “What are you thinking about that pains you so?”

“The mention of family,” Sage said thickly, gazing slowly over at her. “Pure Blossom is all that is left of Sage’s family. Our parents died long ago in an attack by renegades when our village was elsewhere, away from these mountains. It will be good to fill my hogan with family again. Pure Blossom prefers to live alone, where she can fill her own hogan with her looms and what is required to make her fancy blankets.”

Trevor scooted onto Sage’s lap and wrapped his small arm around Sage’s neck. “Can I call you daddy?” Trevor asked, snuggling close.

Neither Sage nor Leonida had expected Trevor’s quick acceptance. They exchanged glances and then Sage said, “Yes, my son, it would please me to be called father.” One of his arms reached out for Leonida and brought her close. “Here is a child who has been given to us,” he said. “Let us, together, bring him to manhood.”

Leonida’s eyes misted with deep emotion as Sage pressed his lips to hers, ever so gently, yet with much, much meaning.

Chapter 13

Before I trust my fate to thee,

Or place my hand in thine,

Question thy soul tonight for me.

—ADELAIDE ANNE PROCTER

The light was soft in the bedroom from the shimmering shadows of the fire in the outer, larger room. Leonida knelt beside a narrow platform, where Trevor now slept peacefully on thick, soft pelts, after she had sung him to sleep with sweet lullabys.

Sage had stayed at Leonida’s side until Trevor had been almost asleep, and then he had joined the other Navaho warriors and elders to have council beside a roaring fire outside.

Before Trevor had gotten too drowsy with sleep, Sage had told him that soon Trevor’s bow and arrows and other objects that were important to the making of a young brave would be there with him in his room.

“Have dreams of angels, my little brave,” Leonida whispered as she smoothed a colorful blanket up to Trevor’s chin.

She ran her fingers through his raven hair, choked up with feelings that already grew within her heart, then kissed his brow. “I’m going to do my best, Trevor, to make life good for you,” she whispered as she rose slowly to her feet. She stood a moment longer looking down at the small, trusting child. “But I can never take the place of your mother. I know that.”