Angelia grabbed hold of his hand and held it to her heart. “I would never think any other way.” Her gaze looked deeply into his. “I have realized that if you have not said something to me before now, you must have your reasons.”
“Haa’he.I do. I have. But now you should know too.”
He positioned her hand over his chest. “Know that what I say comes from my heart, for what I tell you will seem strange to you. I have seen how the white man lives, and I have come to understand that he keeps himself separated from the spiritual aspects of life.”
“That is not true,” she said. “We are a very religious people.”
“Religious perhaps,” he agreed. “But not necessarily spiritual. There is a difference. For what I have to say is, indeed, spiritual.”
“All right,” she conceded, then nodded.
“Come.” He pulled her close, into his arms. “Let us curl up with one another, chest to chest, skin to skin. Let us take strength from the closeness of our bodies, and I will tell you of my mission, and why I am here. But I must warn you that what I will say is a thing of great mystery, and you may not believe me.”
“I will believe you, for I honor you, my husband.” Grasping hold of his hand, she brought it up to the side of her face where she rubbed her cheek against his fingers. “Yes, my dear, I do honor you.”
The sun hadlong since left the sky when Swift Hawk at last finished the recounting of his story. Outside, the rain still fell from the clouds, though it did so in a much gentler fashion. Though the moon was hidden by dark clouds, sounds of the night crept into their shelter—the crickets, the locusts, the nighthawk, the wolf. Even the coyotes yipping in the distance added to the sounds of the prairie at night.
Angelia and Swift Hawk reclined toward the opening of their lean-to, the fire at their feet, a supper of prairie chicken well eaten. At present, it was calm outside, so quiet it was hard to imagine that only this afternoon their world had been amok.
Angelia lay cuddled within the warmth of Swift Hawk’s embrace, her head on his shoulder, one of her legs straddling his thigh. The trade-blanket was thrown haphazardly over them both, though neither seemed to need it. And why should they? They had each other.
Swift Hawk had finished speaking to her only a few moments past, and Angelia lay within his arms, silent. Odd how she had become used to the soft whisper of his voice.
What should she say? How did a person respond when confronted with such a fantastic story?
Glancing up at him briefly, Angelia was beginning to wonder if it might be true, what Swift Hawk had earlier observed. Perhaps it was so that the white manwastoo divorced from the spiritual. For she was having a difficult time coming to grips with this.
In faith, to say that his story was fantastic was an understatement. And yet there was one thing about it that was, indeed, a certainty: Swift Hawk believed the story implicitly.
And, in the end, she believed in Swift Hawk.
Drawing in a deep breath, she said at last, “And so, you are here to free your people?”
“Haa’he.I am.”
“And you had hoped that I could help you free them?”
“Haa’he.”
“Why?” she asked. “Why me?”
His arms tightened around her. “Because I saw you in a vision.”
“In a vision?”
“Haa’he. As I sat alone upon a high butte, I prayed to the Creator for a vision. For many days there was nothing. And then you came to me. You and your brother. I saw you, in a wagon. Your brother was driving it, and you had your rifle in your hands. You were bent down, facing backward and leaning over the seat. And you were shooting at something behind you.”
A muscle flicked wildly in her cheek. “How did you know that?”
She hadn’t meant her words to be sharp, although to her own ears, they stung. However, Swift Hawk merely inclined his head. “I have seen it. I have seen you and your brother in a vision, more than once.”
“More than once? You have had more than one vision? About us?”
“Haa’he. About you.”
This gave her pause, although presently, she said, “So when you came to the fort, you were really looking for me and my brother?”
He nodded. “I was.”
