In the cabin, late into the night, Jenny’s lists were growing longer—positives canceling negatives—though not answering her need to know: Was Austin having an affair? Painful confusion prompted her to step outside the cabin into the solace of a perfect summer night.

Far-away stars set in a blue-black, velvet canopy above her seemed close enough to touch. A few steps up the trail, she took in a breath. Clean mountain air reached deep inside her lungs, spread throughout her body. Exhaling, she pushed away the most oppressive pain. Some days before out of the blue, it came to her the way her ribcage had been injured. That night a Pines’ Woods when Austin hauled her from the fairway, she’d struggled. He wouldn’t let her go. In his mind, he’d kept her out of harm.

In Chicago, she’d been confined, not free to move about like this. She spread her arms, turned her body full around, once ... twice. “Free,” twirling, she said aloud. “Free as the girl I once was.” Not truly free. Never again would she be the girl she once was. She had a child.

Out of breath, she dropped down on the smooth rock at her feet—her thinking rock—the place she’d spent so many nights stargazing. The lake, spread out before her tranquil as a looking glass; an unfamiliar image gazing back, disturbing. Her gaze shifted to the heavens, Gemini above her. Was there nowhere she could hide, escape his overpowering presence? People said that Austin was a rising star. She lived in his orbit. She hadn’t found her own as the glamorous, egocentric Pam had found an orbit all her own.

Chicago. After the move, the trouble began. She wanted a baby. Preoccupied, he had reservations. She felt incredibly lonely, isolated, in that complex designed to keep residents “secure.” Security at what price? There was no escaping this awful war. The images of death and destruction she wouldn’t let Daniel see, turning off the set when war news came on the screen.

Austin believed he was protecting her and Daniel. Or was he locking her away from wagging tongues; the people who knew him ... and Pam. She cringed in pain. Suspicion—the most evil of demons—sinking its sharp, poisonous talons more deeply into her wounded heart. Her flesh crawled.

She drew her sweater around her, a breath of mountain air calming, comforting. Still, she couldn’t push away that night at Pines’ Woods. Confusion flooded back; the dinner conversation a jumble of small talk and innuendo. She’d determined that Pam was drunk.

On the dance floor, he’d readily admitted he’d known Pam before they met. Pam made it clear she’d been with Austin; they were lovers when he bought the Corvette. A spark of insight brought Jenny to her feet.

“The Corvette,” she whispered. Pam asked Austin if he still owned the Corvette. He’d sold it soon after his transfer to the west coast. Were they having an affair, Pam would have known. Was she pretending not to know? No. She didn’t know.

She didn’t know. There was no affair. Pam lied.

As though the demon lifted its claws from her heart and flew off into the darkness, Jenny’s pain eased. A sweeping tide—relief—washed over her. Just as rapidly, regret. She covered her face with trembling hands. “Oh, Austin,” she murmured, “I’ve been so unfair to you.” One mistake that he regretted and it hurt. He’d told the truth; “Pam lied.” Words carried out across calm waters of the Lake Where the Great Mud Turtle Dwells, came back a resounding echo. “Pam lied!

As Jenny fell into the only peaceful sleep she’d know since that fateful night at Pines’ Woods, her thoughts would be of Austin; the last time they’d made love on that afternoon in Welborne House. As though he were here with her, she felt his warm breath on her body, his hands stroking her hair. Thrills rippled through her, a rush, a desperate yearning. If he were with her in the flesh, his power would set her soaring wild and free. Alive. The most wondrous sensations a woman could know.

She’d never wanted to be with any other man. She knew her husband’s rhythms, he knew hers. A lover’s rhapsody accompanied their love dance. With him, she heard the music, a haunting love song old as time, fresh and new as sunrise. A melody as lush as midnight sky, compelling as the pull of moon tide. How could she give up what she had with him?

In the moments before she opened her eyes on a glorious new morning, Austin’s words were in her head. ‘I want you back, here in Pittsburgh, or in Chicago. It’s your call.’

If it truly were her call, she would choose that house on Summit. A two hour drive from the lake, they could spend weekends and Daniel’s school vacations here. Daniel was at home here, so was she. They’d never had a real home, except the lake. From these lands, she’d been adrift too long. If only Austin could see this magical place as she did. He’d kept her and Daniel away from the lake; for his own reasons. She’d deferred to him on that score as she had on everything. That had to change.

Yet how could she tell Austin she wanted to live in that house in harmony with each other and their surroundings? No, she couldn’t. He’d always set his own course, made his own decisions. Pittsburgh had never been included in his long-term plans.

She’d been in the room—a passive observer—when he’d discussed with John, or AJ, or a colleague the moves he’d need to make. The upwardly- mobile positions with prestige, perks, stock options were in New York, Chicago, L.A., overseas or Texas—almost a foreign country.

The Welbornes had dissuaded him from Texas where the climate was “perfectly ghastly” and Texans were the same. The Eastern old guard held a low opinion of brash, bold, Texas oil barons, who refused to play by corporate rules. Garish displays of new-found wealth made the industry appear a greedy, grasping corporate monster in the public eye.

“Wildcatters” seemed an apt term. Though Audra Welborne preferred: “Boorish Cowboy;” and John: “Redneck” or “Maladroit,” derisive comments made when their Texas associates were well out of hearing range. Sagacious Yankees the natural enemy of swaggering oil barons, she’d heard AJ say. Secure in their good ol’ boy network, the barons could care less what Yankees thought of them. “One would venture in the Lone Star State at one’s own peril,” his words of warning. A long history of misfortunes leading to distrust, AJ’s one concession: the industry needed Texas Tea as well as Yankee expertise; so much for the Great State of Texas.

Why would Austin now have an interest in Pittsburgh? To placate her? Were she to tell him she wanted them to live there, would he take the offer? It seemed he would. And if he were unhappy with the choice she’d made, would he then blame her? Not overtly, she decided, knowing him as she did. He would hold it all inside where it would fester, taint their life together. Daniel would be caught between them, poisoned by their venom.

Another move, were it to be, had to be Austin’s choice, his call.

Alone in the cabin, Jenny rose from her bed, moved to the kitchen where she poured a mug of morning coffee from the old enamel pot. Gramps and Daniel were out on the lake. From the window, she could see their small boat trolling the shoreline with the canoes of her cousins from the hamlet of Tall Elk. There would be fresh walleye for lunch. Delicious. Her mouth watered as she added a log to the wood stove in the kitchen, acrid smoke tearing her eyes. Civilization had advantages. One she dearly missed, a warm bath drawn into a smooth, deep tub. The lodge had no such luxuries.

A few minutes later, over her arm she carried a split-wood basket containing fresh under things, toweling, and a dollop of the soothing, herbal soap used on reservation; her destination, the women’s bathing place—a secluded, spring-feed pond where for time remembered the women of her tribe enjoyed communal bathing—a sacred place where magical waters cleansed the body and mind, renewing the spirit.

A warm morning, sisters would be bathing with their infants and young ones in tow. Silent sisters, knowing pleasure and pain each sister suffered living with a man. The bathing pool a haven where no man could cast a taller shadow.

Nodding a traditional greeting to her sisters as she came upon the pool, she removed her boots, jeans and shirt, spreading them over the branches of a willow, its roots protruding steps at the water’s edge descending into the shallows. Wading, she immersed to her waist, splashed cool, clear water over her shoulders. Methodically, she massaged creamy suds, into the folds of her body, a rich, syrupy residue into her hair. Tingling, she breathed deeply a soothing scent, calm chasing turmoil.

Into the depths of the pool she swam. Dipping deep beneath the surface—shutting out sound, sight, earth-bound feeling—she drifted pain free ... coming to the surface only when her breath was spent. “Ohhhh!” She pulled a breath, deep, deeper still, into her empty lungs. And as her lungs filled, clean and fresh, a sense of peace washed through her. Paralyzing pain gone; her spirit, renewed, able to face what lay ahead.

While young mothers bathed, Jenny cradled sturdy, thrashing infants swaddled in bright-colored flannel. The urge to nurse, her nipples twitched, phantom milk swelling her breasts. Hurtful as it was imagined lactation, gratifying. Does this yearning ever end, she wondered. As she gazed into the dark and shining, worldly-wise eyes of a baby girl—survivor of an oppressed people, as were she and Daniel.

In this special place she felt the sorrows of women, the joy of motherhood cut from their bodies, left barren without knowing what had been taken from them. Boarding schools no more, the evil practice stopped—condemned, too late to save a generation. She’d escaped their fate, she could conceive another child. From time remembered, Native women slept with White men, bore their mixed-blood children, raised strong leaders; a bridge between two worlds. Jenny saw the past, and a future she desperately sought.

The small boat carrying Gramps and Daniel was drifting towards the cabin as she made her way along the homeward path. They met on the dock where she took the line from Gramps securing bow to post. Moments before, she’d indulged a childhood ritual: walking in her father’s footprints, her connection to his force, his life, his death, his living spirit. How could she be a coward after standing in the footprints of so brave a warrior?

“Look Mom!” Daniel held up a string of walleye and bass as tall as he was.

“Oh, Daniel, those are beauties.”

“Good eatin’,” Gramps commented. “Take all three of us to clean ‘em time for lunch.”

A sumptuous noontime meal filling their bellies, Jenny was up to her elbows in warm, soapy water when Gramps came into the kitchen picking up a dish towel. “Daniel can do these, Gramps ... or I will.”

He waved her off. Red Feather had rowed across the lake to visit with Daniel. “Let the boys have some time to be boys. They’ll grow up soon enough.”

She nodded. “Sometimes I wonder, who’s the grown up.”

“You are,” Gramps assured her. “You’ve done a good job with that boy ... you and Austin.”

She smiled in his direction, made no comment.

He finished a stack of plates returning them to open shelving. “About worn out that thinkin’ rock this trip, haven’t ya’?”

He’d been more aware of her comings and goings than she’d realized. “I had some things to work through. Decisions to make.”

“Guess that means you and the boy will be leavin’ here soon?”

“Not just yet. It’s complicated.”

“Someone’s hurt you Jenny Dawn. … Austin?”

“We’ve hurt each other, Gramps.”

At the appointed time and place, Austin called to say he wanted her and Daniel to meet him in Pittsburgh that coming weekend. She knew what was in his mind: They’d be together in one place so he could drive them back to Chicago. Could she go back to Chicago? No. She’d be too vulnerable there; they’d end up badly—worse than they were now. The line was open. She couldn’t answer yet.

“Tell me where we stand.” There was impatience in his tone.

She couldn’t ignore the worried rasping in his throat. She drew a long, determined breath. “I believe you. I’m sorry I doubted you.”

The sound he let escape—relief. “Okay ... You and Danny will meet me in Pittsburgh then,” he said, reading too much into her apology.

Was she strong enough to face him? “We could be there.”

“That sounds tentative. There’s a problem. What?”

“We need to talk, not on the phone.”

“Agreed.” They’d meet at the Tracy’s early on Saturday afternoon. He’d rent a car and drive there from the airport. He had the Stankowskis’ number; he’d made an appointment to tour the house. Once again, he’d taken charge, made plans without consulting her. There was a pause, he shifted style and tone. “I miss you and Danny… like crazy.”

His words rang true. She felt an irresistible pull that had always drawn her to him, held her fast. “We miss you too. We’ll see you this weekend.” Was she being swept up in his wake, a force too powerful to resist? She’d agreed to meet him; she had to follow through.

Friday, she packed their bags, unpacked, re-packed, so undecided was she, and uncertain of the outcome: separation, or reconciliation. She would need to keep her wits about her. He could so easily sway her from a path she blazed one day at a time.

At sunset from the cabin door, she watched a fading light, a setting sun. Within the muted streaks of red-gold, blue-black, purple, appeared the figure of a woman, her hair in long, dark tendrils, drifting high above the lake. Sky Woman, pregnant and alone, destined to survive, nurture new life, a long-surviving people. Creations mystery: was she pushed from the lands of He-Who-Holds-up-the-Sky, or did she choose to fall into the great unknown, a vast expanse of water that would come to be her Planet Earth, and ours?

Gramps spoke to Jenny as she stood in the cabin’s threshold, contemplating. “Sara liked to stand there, as you do, watching the sunset.”

“Mmm humm, I remember.” Just as Jenny did, Gran saw Sky Woman in the sunset, as did her mother and grandmothers before her back in time. A woman’s vision. Men saw nothing but changing colors, a pretty sunset.

“Does Austin know this place is meant for you when I’m gone?”

Gramps was ageless as the sky above them. She couldn’t imagine a time when he would be ‘gone’. “I’ve never discussed it with him.”

“Because of the Welborne’s claim?”

“The State could take it from us.” Tribal claims had been in dispute for generations.

Gramps nodded agreement. “In recent years, the courts have looked with favor on the Seneca claims.” His eyes scanning the horizon, he stepped across the threshold onto the path that led to the lake.

Daniel within hearing range, Jenny followed. “Have you heard something about the allotments, Gramps?”

“Nothing specific.” He turned, faced her. “Don’t you think Austin should be told?”

She had her reasons. Folding her arms, she remarked, “He can’t inherit; only I can.”

“And Daniel, when he’s been adopted.”

Gramps was right. Daniel carried the blood, and clan ties, were he to be adopted, as Gramps was sure would come to pass. Even so, there could be legal challenges. “I’ll tell Austin about the allotments when the time is right.”

She felt no urgency about a revelation. For so many years claims had been in limbo as these lands had been in limbo. More recently, these lands awakened, her people, their way-of-life revived. The way of life she’d known with Austin hanging in the balance.

Jenny Dawn of the Deer clan reborn these days at Indian Lake; away from here, could Jenny Dawn survive?