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“They were, they still are, the best of friends,” Strong Wolf said, nodding. He smiled as he again glanced over at White Wolf. “But for a while, when they were both seeking husbands, there was some competition between my mother and Dawnmarie. My mother told me that she had first loved White Wolf, then my father, Sharp Nose. She said that White Wolf saw no other woman in his eyes once he caught sight of Dawnmarie.”
Strong Wolf shifted his gaze. “Violet Eyes,” he murmured. “White Wolf calls Dawnmarie Violet Eyes. And I see why. Her eyes are quite intriguing, wouldn’t you say?”
“Yes, they are so beautiful,” Hannah said, following his gaze. “So deeply violet in color, like the violets that spread across the ground in early spring.”
“But yours, the color of new grass in the spring, are as intriguing,” Strong Wolf was quick to say as he placed a finger to her chin and drew her eyes around, to lock with his. “You are ever so beautiful tonight, my woman. When this celebration is over, we shall retum to our camp down by the river. We will attempt, again, to make a baby.”
Hannah laughed softly, squeezed his hand, then leaned into his embrace at his side as he placed an arm around her waist and drew her against him.
“I’ve never been as content,” she murmured, his tightened hold on her assuring her that he had heard her.
Together they watched the dancers perform their dances. Everyone had already eaten a feast of dried venison, bear’s meat, and duck, accompanied by corn dishes, blueberries and pine-needle tea.
Hannah didn’t see how the dancers could be performing so vigorously after having eaten such a feast.
To the rhythmic throbbing of the drums, the young people danced, while the older ones looked on, enjoying the music of flutes, gourd rattles and bird-bone whistles.
Hannah’s eyes were quickly averted when a woman entered the council house in a huff, causing the instruments to become suddenly quiet and the dancers to stand ghostly still.
Hawk standing quickly to his feet drew Hannah’s attention to him.
Then she looked in jerks again at the woman, and followed her movements as she stamped up to Hawk and suddenly slapped his face. The sound of her hand against his flesh made a strange, hollow sound in the large room.
Gasps reverberated around the room as Hawk reached a hand to his burning face, where his mother’s handprints were engraved onto his flesh from her having hit him so hard.
“Mother . . .” Hawk said, his voice almost failing him.
“You are no longer my son!” Star Flower screamed, livid with anger. She slapped him again. “How could you? Word came to me that you were here! You are in the council house of my enemy? You sit as friends sit while a celebration is in progress?”
She turned and looked slowly around the room, her whole body stiffening when she found Strong Wolf slowly moving to his feet, and then Proud Heart.
Again she turned to Hawk. “They are still alive!” she screamed, starting to hit Hawk again, but this time stopped as Hawk reached a hand up and grabbed her by the wrist.
“Mother, you should not be here,” Hawk said sternly, his ability to speak having finally returned. “And, yes, Strong Wolf and Proud Heart are still alive. I would have it no other way. And although you wish them dead, they have become my friends again, as they were when we were children.”
Tears rolled down Star Flower’s cheek. She wrenched her wrist free and hung her hands in tight fists at her sides. She looked slowly over at Doe Eyes, fire entering her eyes at the sight of the woman standing beside her son.
Then she glared up at Hawk again. “And you even take the daughter of my enemy to be your woman?” she cried. “Hawk, you have disgraced me. You shame me!”
“Mother, Doe Eyes and I have loved each other for many moons,” Hawk said, keenly aware that everyone was watching and hearing. Shame filled him over a mother who could belittle him in such a way in front of people he now saw as his friends. “We are going to be married.”
“No!” Star Flower cried, lowering her face in her hands. “I wish to die! I . . . wish . . . to die!”
Another presence in the room drew everyone’s eyes to the door. Buffalo Cloud, Star Flower’s husband and Hawk’s proud Sioux father, came on into the room and swept Star Flower up into his arms and held her close.
His eyes wavered as he looked slowly around him, his gaze holding on White Wolf as Star Flower pounded on his chest, ranting and raving to be set free.
“I apologize for my wife,” Buffalo Cloud said, his voice coming through loud and clear over his wife’s continued tirade. “She has not yet learned how to forget a brother whose spirit even now laughs from the hereafter at her foolishness for fighting for something he gave up long ago when he died at the hands of the Chippewa.”
Star Flower’s screams ceased as Buffalo Cloud held her closer. She shrank into a tiny ball within his arms as she buried her face shamefully against his muscled chest.
“I will take my wife home now,” Buffalo Cloud said, his voice breaking as he glanced over at his son. “And, son, please forgive your mother. At times she knows not what she does. It seems as though a demon is set loose inside her. Please see past it as I have learned to do, for when she is her normal self, no one could be as sweet and kind.”
Hawk nodded, then went to his mother and placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Mother,” he said softly. “Please turn and look at me.”
Star Flower’s body tightened. She clung fiercely around Bu
ffalo Cloud’s neck.
