“You will come no farther!” shouted Red Hawk to the Thunder Being, as he stood his ground on the prairie, his lance lifted upward and his bow held ready. “I know that you stalk my wife. I know you are trying to keep her from being successful because she might help my people. But I will not let you near her. So long as I exist, I will keep you from her.”
Stepping forward, the Thunder Being laughed at him. “Each day you challenge me, little warrior. Each day you walk away. You talk big. You do little.”
“Stay away from her camp!”
“Or you’ll what? Walk away? Again? Yell at me?”
“Do not tempt me. Were it not for the love for my grandfather and for his people—”
“I am tired of your words,” said the Thunder Being. “Let us begin this fight. Long have you sought your revenge. Now, come take it.” The Thunder Being beckoned Red Hawk forward.
Red Hawk stood his ground. “I cannot do it and save my people, and well you know it. So I will show you mercy, instead.” His lips spat out the word mercy as though it were a nasty one.
The Thunder Being merely laughed, although he did retreat. Taking his black clouds and his lightning bolts with him, he set his path for somewhere besides Effie’s camp. At least for the time being. Tomorrow would be another day.
“Haiya!” Red Hawk used the word as though he were swearing. The Thunderer baited him. Though Red Hawk would stand his ground and show mercy, as he must, everything within him rebelled.
“Someday,” he said to the heavens. “We will battle. I swear it.”
It must have been around midnight by the time the sky finally darkened. However, this place was so far in the northern regions of the country that even when night finally fell over the land, it seemed no more dusky than a dim version of early evening.
At last, Effie blew out the light of her candle, and setting down her pen, she stretched. There was still much to do, for this site abounded in artifacts, many of them quite old.
So far they had found several ancient arrowhead points, most of which were made from bone or flint. There were also various buffalo skulls and bones, some beads, some well-preserved hides, knives made of bone and flint, and yesterday, Madeline and her husband had found some awls fashioned of bone, as well as one buffalo-horn spoon.
The last had been quite a find, and Madeline had asked to clean it, which Effie had been only too glad to allow.
However, to date nothing had been found that resembled the artifacts she still carried on her person.
Effie was beginning to wonder if she and the others were on a wild-goose chase.
Amazingly enough, the heat of the day remained with them into the evening. It was an unusual circumstance here in the far reaches of the Montana Territory. Because the area wasn’t known for its humidity, once the sun retreated from the sky, the atmosphere and the land usually cooled.
Maybe she had become too accustomed to it doing so. Whatever was the case, Effie suddenly yearned for a midnight swim.
Ah, to feel the gentle rush of water over her heat-soaked body. She only wished Red Hawk were here. But he wasn’t, she reminded herself, and she wasn’t going to restrict herself because of that absence, either.
It would be a perfect chance to bathe, since at this time of night everyone else was usually asleep. Surely she’d be safe enough to allow herself a quick dip, and perhaps, if she were brave enough, a brisk bath in the nude.
Sighing, she rose from her desk, shuffling through her papers and placing the more important notes neatly inside folders, which she promptly stored away. After grabbing hold of her shawl, she left her tent.
Glancing up toward the sky, she looked for the Big Dipper to tell her not only direction, but the time. If she were right, it looked to be well after midnight. Perhaps, to another, midnight was not such a perfect time to swim. To some, the evening might hold shadows, phantoms and fears.
But Effie had become accustomed to the trail, to the wild, and had found that the late evenings, instead of frightening her, endowed her with a feeling of independence, to say nothing of allowing her privacy.
Besides, something in the air tonight pulled at her, encouraging her to let go, to come to the water.
Drawing in a breath of the warm night, she stepped toward the great Missouri River, heading to a particular pool that was caught off in a nook. One that was surrounded by willows and pine. In her youth she had used it often, it being the same place where she had first met Red Hawk.
The grasses were dew covered, wet and cool against her slippers, and she fretted that the bottom of her dress would pay the price for her tête-à-tête with the river. But she wasn’t about to let a little dew stop her.
At last she arrived. As she bent down to test the water with her fingers, a deep voice behind her said, “I thought you were never going to come. Because I saw you working, I decided not to disturb you, but I have waited here the evening through.”
She gasped and jumped, but she wasn’t frightened, if only because she was well aware of exactly who had spoken to her. As she drank in the sight of him, she said, “I wonder if I shall ever get used to your sneaking up on me.”
He didn’t answer. Instead, he opened his arms wide.
As though one were the magnet for the other, they fell into each other’s embrace. While he rained kisses over her face and cheeks, he ran his hands up, down and over her back, her hips, her neck, her hair.
“I have missed you,” he said.
“And I, you,” she responded. “I had begun to worry that you had forgotten about me.”
“Forgotten? Could a mountain forget her streams and forests? A lake her fish and currents? You are as much a part of me now as these things are to a mountain or a lake. How could I ever forget you?”
She sighed. “You have been gone so long.”
“Fourteen or fifteen suns. That is all.”
They sank to their knees.
“That is a long time for me,” she said. “Have you finished visiting your relatives?”
“I have.”
His lips then captured hers. She welcomed his taste, his touch, his tongue.
Her shawl had long since hit the ground, and his fingers fumbled with the buttons on the back of her dress. He murmured against her lips, “Again, you wear many clothes.”
“As do you.” She indicated his shirt, his buffalo robe, breastplate and leggings.
“The robe is to cushion you against the harshness of the ground.”
“Oh.” Her insides were throbbing with need, and her stomach seemed to be performing somersaults and handsprings.
He whispered, “I intend to make love to you, my wife.”
The endearment sent her pulse soaring. “Please do. Please make love to me, Red Hawk. Now.”
They should have finished undressing. Goodness knew their clothes would be mussed by their activity, but need drove them both.
After throwing his buffalo robe over the ground, he lowered her onto it, kissed her and raised her skirts. “I am glad to see that you have given up wearing leggings beneath all these clothes, but are you certain you do not need them because of these things tied to your waist?”
“It has been hot.”
He grinned at her. “For that I am grateful. Are you ready?”
She nodded.
He joined himself with her, without preamble. They wanted each other. It was enough.
His thrusts were deep inside her, exactly what she needed, although she found herself responding as though, even skin to skin, body to body, it wasn’t sufficient. She yearned for more. She moved with him, against him, straining, for the pleasure was too good, too splendid to stop.
He kissed her neck, her lips, her cheeks, her ears, her eyes. With his lips, he adored her.
Rising slightly onto his forearms, he thrust into her and out, over and over, watching her face. “You are so beautiful, and if I could, I would look at you as you meet your pleasure.”
Not knowing how to respond to such devotion, she increased her action and pushed her hands through his hair, pulling him down to her. Only then did she whisper, “I love you, my husband. I truly love you.”
Her confession seemed to send him over the edge.
Indeed, he murmured against her, reaffirming his love again and again, his thrusts becoming deeper and deeper. Though he seemed incapable of speech, he managed to utter, “I love you too.”
With that, while she welcomed him, he shuddered and spilled his seed into her.
Effie decided that watching him was a little like capturing a bit of heaven into her own universe. Moreover, she followed his rise into bliss, and with short gasps, she soon met her own pleasure.
Ah, it was truly pure enchantment.
The water beckoned them both.
He removed her clothing, piece by piece, kissing her delicate skin beneath. At the same time, she tried to remove his shirt, her hands sliding over each and every muscle in his chest, his arms, his stomach.
However, she discovered that she was not as adept at removing his clothing as he was with hers. Soon she found herself completely naked, while he was still almost fully dressed.
“Hmmmm,” he groaned, sliding his chest—which was bare, except for the necklace she had once given him—over hers. “Hmmmm,” he moaned again. “I want you anew,” he said, as he moved his hips over hers.
“I too,” she agreed, although her response was almost unnecessary. He had already joined with her.
He strove against her over and over. She opened herself to him, receiving him, tightening her inner muscles to secure him better. Each time she tightened, he whimpered all over again.
“’Tis good,” he uttered huskily.
“Yes.”
He came up to his knees, bringing her with him. Pulling her legs into position around his neck, he leaned into her, boring against her in their quest for pleasure.
It was a good position. They could gaze directly into each other’s eyes as they strained against the tide of passion.
His movements all at once became frenzied, and staring so deeply at her she thought he might be looking into her soul, he said, “Kitsikakomimmo.”
She met his passion with her own, and as he lost himself to her, she gave herself to him, straining, driving, pushing toward that one plateau. They were almost there, almost there, and then…
They burst, their bodies paying complete tribute to one another. So intimate was it, so close were they, she felt that at that moment it would have been hard to tell where her spirit left off and his began. She felt complete. Utterly, wholly, complete.
As her body, racked with pleasure, began to relax, she felt herself move away from herself, looking down on them both from above. Interestingly enough, he was there with her…
Together, they soared.
“Perhaps, my wife,” he said, “there will come a time when we can see, perchance even feel each other’s naked bodies, without at once having to make love.”
“Perhaps,” she agreed.
“But that time is not now.”
“No,” she conceded. “That time is definitely not now.”
“My wife.” Red Hawk came onto his elbows and leaned over her. “I have news.”
“And what news do you bring me?”
“There is only one way I can bring this news to you. I must show you. But do not fear. You will like it, I think.”
She sighed. “Do I have to put on my dress?”
“Saa, ’tis better that you do not.”
“It must be in the water you are taking me, then?”
“Aa.”
“All right,” she said. “Lead me to it.”