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"Not until you are made to listen to reason," Terrance growled. "Melanie, you've been nothing but bullheaded since Pop's death and it's time for that to stop. I am your older brother. Pop depended on me to see to your welfare." He leaned closer to her face, the stench of alcohol heavy on his breath. "You know that Pop and Jared Brennan planned for you to marry Josh. Damn it, Melanie, that's exactly who you are going to marry. Do you understand?"
Melanie squared her shoulders angrily. She jerked her wrist away from Terrance. "You may be my older brother and Pop may have asked you to look after me, but, Terrance, Pop wasn't aware of just how much you drink," she hissed. "When he was alive you did a damn good job hiding this from him. You never let him hear you come in at all hours of the night, drunk. Somehow you managed to be there for him, to look after the farm like a devoted son. But since his death you've let yourself go to hell, Terrance! How on earth can you expect me to listen to anything you say?"
Placing her hands on her hips, Melanie looked up at Terrance defiantly. "And do you truly think I want to marry someone just like you? It's enough, Terrance, that I have to put up with your nonsense," she stormed. "I will not marry Josh, no matter what either of you says, or does!"
Terrance doubled his fists at his sides. His face was red with rage. "Well, my dear sister, you sure as hell aren't going to marry that Indian-lover," he shouted, turning and stamping away from her.
Melanie flinched as the front door slammed. She turned and watched through the window as Terrance went to his horse reined at the hitching rail and swung himself into his saddle. Scarcely breathing, she watched him ride away, his dark hair flying in the wind.
Wasn't it enough, Melanie thought, that she had Shane to worry about? Why did Terrance have to choose this moment to cause more problems?
Melanie lowered the wick in the kerosene lamps around the room, then left the parlor and wearily climbed the stairs. She hadn't been able to eat. She most surely would not be able to get one wink of sleep!
Until Shane returned home and convinced her that he truly loved her, a part of her was dead inside.
The moon sheened everything in silver as Shane moved stealthily among the fenced-in horses close to the Chippewa village. Red Raven quietly pointed out the ones that had been traded to Gray
Falcon while Shane slipped a rope over each of their heads.
Running alongside each other, Shane and Red Raven led the horses away from the village, then stopped and caught their breaths after tying the horses together and securing them to a post that Shane had pounded into the ground earlier.
''I will return with you to your farm with the horses and then I will have to say a final goodbye, my friend," Red Raven said, clasping his hands onto Shane's shoulders. "I can no longer find it in my heart to stay among my people. It would be hard to look at Gray Falcon's face every day and not see Cedar Maid's eyes locked in death, knowing that he is responsible."
"What will you do?" Shane asked, sadness engulfing him over these continued losses in his life. "Where will you go?"
"My horse will carry me far away," Red Raven said, swallowing hard. "Perhaps back to Canada."
"You don't have to go, you know," Shane said, glancing over his shoulder as the roped horses began to whinny. "You can go with me. You can learn with me the art of raising the cattle with the long, white horns. We could hunt together again. Perhaps one day we will hear word of Trapper Dan trapping in the forest again. Our hunt would be for him. We could live as brothers on land that is now mine."
"Land that is also your brother's," Red Raven growled. "Land that was once the Indian's! Land that is now fenced in!"
"Yes," Shane said, nodding. "It is all of those
things. It is the way of the white man." His eyes wavered. "I am a white man, Red Raven. My parents were white. And since I am not allowed to live with the Chippewa, I will now live like the white man!"
Red Raven dropped his hands to his side and stepped away from Shane. "That is why I cannot come to live with you," he said. "I am Indian."
"I understand," Shane said softly. He turned and looked at the stolen horses. Hidden in the shadows of a butte, they were grazing on knee-high grass. "You do not have to travel with me to my farm. It is I who chose to steal the horses. It is I who will take the responsibility for them."
"It is I who shared in the revenge," Red Raven said flatly. "I wish to see that you get the horses to your farm without any confrontation with Gray Falcon's braves."
"That is generous of you," Shane said, staring through the darkness at the outdoor fires in the Indian village in the distance.
"And now we will go and steal the pelts from Gray Falcon's wigwam?" Red Raven asked, following Shane's intent stare.
"It must be done to complete this act of vengeance," Shane said.
"We could be caught and slain," Red Raven warned him, drawing his knife from its buckskin sheath at his waist.
Shane slipped his own knife from its sheath. "It is the hour of night when everyone is asleep," he said. "Even Gray Falcon. We will come and go and no one will be the wiser."
"Ay-uh," Red Raven said. "But if Gray Falcon does awaken, it is I who will plunge the knife into his heart."
Shane heard the venom in Red Raven's voice, and knew he would kill Gray Falcon with pleasure. He hoped it would not come to that. Shane hated Gray Falcon with all of his being, but he did not want to be forced to participate in an act that would make Chief Standing Tall cry out from the hereafter. No. With luck, the remaining chore of the revenge would be silent and swift!
"Let us go," Shane said, grasping hard onto his knife. "Tomorrow Gray Falcon will realize that he slept too soundly tonight!"
Grim-faced, Shane ran alongside Red Raven through the night. On the outskirts of the village, he stopped and looked guardedly around him. Then he focused his full attention on the largest wigwam of all.
