Savage Tempest

High Hawk had already heard.

He came into the tepee and sat on the opposite side from where Two Stars sat, waiting for the child to be pushed from Joylynn’s body, which happened only a few seconds later.

Two Stars wrapped the fetus in a blanket, while High Hawk held Joylynn’s hand.

Two Stars then handed the aborted fetus to Pure Blossom as she stepped into the tepee with water and cloths.

“Take it away,” Two Stars said softly.

It was then that Blanket Woman came into the tepee, her eyes soft and gentle as she gazed down at Joylynn.

She laid a hand on Two Stars’s shoulder. “I will see to the rest,” she said. She glanced at High Hawk. “You can leave now with our shaman. Joylynn will be all right. I will make certain of it.”

Joylynn was surprised that Blanket Woman was being so kind, but perhaps she shouldn’t have been. Hadn’t Joylynn’s body made certain the white child would not be born to her?

Wasn’t that what Blanket Woman had wanted all along?

“Ina, thank you,” High Hawk said as he gave Joylynn one last loving look, then rose and left the tepee with Two Stars.

“Pure Blossom, help remove the dress so I can wash Joylynn,” Blanket Woman said, already squeezing water from a soft doeskin cloth.

Once her clothes were removed and Blanket Woman was gently washing her, Joylynn closed her eyes and fought back the tears that were stinging the corners of her eyes. She was no longer in pain except inside her heart. Although she had planned to give the baby away, a part of her was overwhelmed by sadness.

She squeezed her eyes tightly shut so that Blanket Woman wouldn’t see the tears and tried not to think about what it would have been like to have kept and raised the child. She had always dreamed of having children. Now . . . would she ever?

Cleansed of all signs of the miscarriage, and now dressed in a soft doeskin gown that one of the women had brought, Joylynn could not help smiling at Blanket Woman as she gently drew a blanket up over her.

“You are so kind . . . to . . . do this for me,” she said softly. “Any other woman of the village could have done it.”

“You are in my son’s lodge. It is my responsibility to care for anyone who shares it with him,” Blanket Woman said, smoothing Joylynn’s perspiration-dampened hair back from her face. “Even you, a woman I had not ever thought to be kind to. But I do not like seeing anyone suffer. I am happy to have helped you.”

Joylynn started to thank Blanket Woman, but was stopped when Two Stars came back inside the lodge, High Hawk with him.

High Hawk knelt on the far side of Joylynn, while his mother and Two Stars knelt on her other.

Two Stars brought a wooden cup of what looked like broth up to Joylynn’s lips. “Drink,” he said. “This will make you rest and sleep.”

Welcoming the very thought of escaping a world that had cheated her of a child she now knew she could never have given up, Joylynn smiled and took the cup. She drank the sweet liquid from it.

She didn’t dare ask what it was made of. She would just welcome the sleep it brought and hope that when she awakened, things would be better for her.

She was glad of one thing . . . th

at Blanket Woman seemed to feel differently about her. She might even be a friend now, not a foe.

“I will leave you alone now,” Blanket Woman said, nodding over at High Hawk as a silent way to say that he should leave, too, but High Hawk ignored her and continued to sit there as Blanket Woman left with Two Stars.

Joylynn was already feeling groggy from whatever had been in the sweet drink. She gazed up at High Hawk, so glad when he bent low and brushed a soft kiss across her lips.

But the words he murmured next puzzled her, and her eyes widened.

“You may leave the village as soon as you feel like traveling,” High Hawk said thickly. “You are no longer anyone’s captive. My father wished your capture, not I. I am now chief, and I am not someone who wants white captives, especially not a woman like you who seems to love her freedom so much.”

He then explained to her why he had abducted her in the first place, that he had done it for his ahte.

Joylynn fought sleep now; she wanted to stay awake a while longer, while High Hawk was there. He was so close she could smell the sweet freshness of his skin.

“Do you understand now why I took you from your home?” High Hawk asked.