Cherokee Storm Page 6

  “He could have hurt me, but he didn’t.”

  Gall pursed his lips. “My mother says he is dangerous and will lead us to war. My mother is a wise woman. Take care, Shan-non. My cousin wears two faces. If he gave you this pony, he had a reason. I only hope that Corn Woman sold him. It would be a bad thing if you had a stolen Tsalagi pony. People would not understand.”

  “I agree. I didn’t want to accept the gift, but my father said it would be an insult not to.”

  “Maybe a worse thing to keep it. Among your people, do women take gifts from men?”

  “Small things, impersonal. Not expensive things like a horse.” She could see that the conversation was becoming too complicated. “You could return the pony for me.”

  He sighed. “I can not. We travel west, away from Corn Woman’s village. And I do not want to make my cousin angry with me. He is not a man you want angry. This is between you and Storm Dancer, I think.” He tilted his head and peered into her face. “You are a pretty woman, I think, even if your skin is too pale. Your hair is like corn silk. I have never seen a woman with yellow hair. Are many of your tribe like you?”

  “Some.” She brushed a stray lock away from her face. His manner had been so open and friendly, she hadn’t expected the conversation to turn personal. And there could be no doubt that his gaze was more than casual. He was staring at her in exactly the same way as the Clark twins did when they thought she wasn’t looking.

  “Mary Shannon!”

  She turned at the sound of her father’s voice. He and two Indian men were walking down the trail toward the pool. The Cherokee were leading the three horses. She could see that the animals wore heavy packs. “Here, Flynn.”

  He smiled at her. “Runs Alongside Bear, Ghost Elk, this is my daughter,” he said. And then to her, continued, “I see you’ve already met Gall.”

  “Yes,” she answered, “and he tells me that he is a cousin of Storm Dancer.”

  Ghost Elk frowned and said something to his companion in his own language. Runs Alongside Bear, a stout, middle-aged man with a wide band of red cloth tied around his head, kept his features immobile.

  Her father’s mouth tightened, and then he chuckled with a forced sense of heartiness. “These men tell me they speak no English. They are some of my best customers.” He turned and repeated his words in Cherokee. “But they are good bargainers.”

  “Very good,” Gall said.

  “Oui.” Ghost Elk signed with his hands. “No Englaise.” Ghost Elk was older than Gall but younger than Runs Alongside Bear. He was short and muscular with a broad face and three dots tattooed down his chin.

  “Don’t bet on it,” her father said with a wink. He shook hands with each man in turn and presented them with a small cloth bag of tobacco as a gift. “Next time you come, I’ll try to have that red cloth.”

  A few more pleasantries were exchanged in a mixture of English and Cherokee, and then the three Indians mounted and rode off through the woods. Before they vanished into the trees, Gall turned and waved at her, and she returned the wave.

  “Best not to mention Storm Dancer to anyone,” Da said quietly. “He’s not in favor with the council according to Ghost Elk.”

  “Gall said that this pony belonged to his mother’s friend, a woman named Corn.” She took hold of the animal’s halter. “I feel guilty about keeping him. Gall thought…”

  “Don’t put too much stock in what Gall says. He’s half-French. Cherokee are devious, but a half-breed is worse.” Her father shook his head. “Gall is way too talkative for a Cherokee. He pretends to be a harmless fool, but I think he’s far from it.”

  “Da.” She stared at him. “It isn’t like you to judge someone by the color of their skin.” She thought with a start that men would label Da’s child with Oona that name—half-breed. She wondered if it was fair to bring an innocent baby into the world where it would never truly belong to white or Cherokee.

  “It’s not the Indian half I worry about in Gall,” Da said. “It’s the French half. The boy’s never done me wrong, but I never feel quite easy with him. Oona don’t think much of him, I can tell you.” He turned back toward the house.

  Leading the pony, Shannon fell into step beside him. “I gathered that much—that Oona didn’t like Gall.” She kept thinking of the baby, her new brother or sister. Would it look Indian or Irish? She vowed to love it, no matter. A mixed-blood child would face prejudice from all sides and would need all the champions he or she could get.

  “Oona’s a pretty good judge of character,” her father mused.

  “I don’t think she likes me.”

  “Give her time. Oona doesn’t know you. She’s never known any white women. She’s just shy.”

  “I hope you’re right.” Shannon didn’t think it was shyness…more like jealousy. “I want to…Oh, I forgot the bucket of water.” She glanced back. The bucket was lying where she’d dropped it near the spring. “Can you take him? I’ll get the water.”

  “Come back to the store after you fetch the water, and we’ll get started. I want to give you the prices on our bestselling trade goods. Some things are locked up for safekeeping.” He pulled a rawhide cord from under his shirt and showed her a key. “I do the trading for powder, shot, and steel hatchets.”

  She nodded and walked back toward the pool. She was eager to learn all about the business. Buying and selling goods had always interested her, although she’d had little chance to develop her skills at the tavern. She didn’t want to be a burden on her father.

  She picked up the bucket and carried it to the spot where clear water rushed and bubbled out of the rock. She rinsed out the container and began to fill it, conscious of the tranquility and beauty of this spot. How many times in the past years she had wished she was here…a child again without worries or fears…an only child who knew how much she was loved by both her parents.

  It seemed to her as if the trees were bigger here than in Virginia…their branches more massive…the leaves greener. Even the sky seemed larger…higher…the blue more intense. She closed her eyes and drank in the familiar scents of the warm rock, the lush moss, and wildflowers spilling down the hillside. Maybe her father was right…maybe this was the closest either of them would ever be to heaven.

  Sighing, Shannon opened her eyes and held the bucket under the spring until the water reached the rim. Why, she wondered, had her mother never fallen in love with this unspoiled wilderness? Why had she longed for the dark, crowded streets of her native—

  A voice tore her from her reverie.

  “I have thirst. Will you let me drink from your spring?”

  She whirled around on Storm Dancer so fast that water spilled down her dress. He stood only a few feet behind her. “What are you doing here?” she demanded.

  “What were you doing with Gall?”

  “We were talking. And what business is it of yours?”

  “You should stay near your father when he is here. Gall can be dangerous for a woman.”

  She glared at him, refusing to be intimidated. “He said the same of you.”

  Amusement twinkled in Storm Dancer’s eyes, as if he knew some secret, but wouldn’t explain it to her. That infuriated her. Was it some joke on her?

  She clutched the dripping bucket to her chest, making it a solid barrier between them. “It was good of you to let me borrow your pony,” she said, “but you can take it back now. I don’t need him anymore.”

  A muscle twitched at the corner of his thin lips…lips that had thrilled her only yesterday. “Why would I take your pony? He does not belong to me. He is yours.”

  Had she forgotten how tall he was? How she had to tilt her head to look into his fierce black eyes? How broad his chest? His lean muscular body? He could break her in those strong hands…hands that had touched her so gently. She shivered, despite the warmth of the sunshine. “I don’t want him,” she lied. “He’s…he’s ill-mannered. And his gait is as rough as a mule’s.”

  He shrugged. “
Then eat him. He is fat.”

  “That’s savage. We don’t eat horses.” Her voice sounded high and foolish in her ears. Thoughts tumbled in her head. She had to get away from him. If he didn’t let her pass, she’d shout for her father. He’d come and see that Storm Dancer was here. He would make him go away.

  “Horse meat is very sweet.” Storm Dancer reached out and caught a lock of her hair. He rubbed it between his fingers. “So fine.”

  She stepped back, yanking her hair free, splashing more water down the front of her dress. “Your cousin said that he knew this pony, that it belonged to a friend of his mother’s.”

  “Yes, Corn Woman. I traded a bear for him.”

  “You killed a bear?”

  His eyes gleamed with amusement, but his words, when he answered, were solemn. “This is not the time for hunting bears. They are thin and sour in summer. When the snow flies, in the Trading Moon that you call November, I will track yona and bring him down. I will take the rich meat and the thick winter bearskin to Corn Woman. It is a good trade.”

  “I don’t want you to kill a bear for me, and I don’t want your gifts. I want you to leave me alone.”

  His expression hardened. “I would do that, but I cannot.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “It is not a good thing, that we should come together. It means trouble.”

  “Yes, exactly,” she agreed. “Not a good thing. So go away. Go, and don’t come back.”

  She tried not to stare at him. Today, he wore a short open buckskin vest, fringed and decorated with porcupine quills, over a short leather kilt and high moccasins. Six inches of muscular chest gleamed bare between the fringed seams. She fought the urge to caress that copper skin, to move so close that her thighs would press against his naked ones.

  He touched her face, lightly grazing her lips and chin with his long fingers. The bucket fell out of her grasp, splashing them both. Her senses reeled, and she shuddered, conscious only of her pounding heart, of the bright sensations running through her veins.

  “Please…” she begged. “Don’t…”

  His almond-shaped eyes pierced her. “I thought of you many times since you go away to the East.”

  “I never thought of you,” she lied.

  “You did,” he corrected. “Your spirit calls to mine. It always has.”

  “No, that’s not possible.”

  “When I first saw you as a woman grown, it was in teeth of a great storm.”

  “At the cave.”

  He nodded. “In the strike of lightning. It was a sign.”

  “No, it wasn’t. I was chasing a cow and got lost. How can that be a sign?”

  “Shan-nan!” Oona’s voice. “Shan-nan!”

  “I have to go,” she said. “Please, let me go.”

  “Then your spirit must cut the bond between us.” He stepped aside and she dashed down the path without looking back.

  Oona waited at the bend in the trail. “Your father is asking for you,” she said. “Why did you not come?”

  “Tell him that,” Shannon said, suddenly breathless. She pointed back along the path toward the spring. “He’s here. Storm—” She glanced around. He was gone. “He was there,” she insisted. “Storm Dancer was here.”

  “I do not see him,” Oona said.

  “No, he’s not here now. But he was. Don’t you believe me?”

  “I think you play with fire, Shannon O’Shea.”

  “What fire?”

  The Indian woman’s sloe eyes narrowed. “Storm Dancer is not for you. Do not meddle with what you do not understand.”

  “I’m not meddling. Don’t you understand? It’s him. I’ve done nothing wrong.”

  “You did not bring the water. I need water for the house.” Oona brushed past her. “I will fetch it.”

  Frustrated, Shannon stalked toward the cabin.

  “He is a prince among the Cherokee,” Oona called after her. “A great one.”

  “I don’t care,” Shannon flung back.

  “And he is promised to another.”

  “He’s nothing to me! Nothing.” But even as she shouted the words, she knew she was lying. And she knew because her stomach knotted and she could see that the sunlight had gone out of the morning, leaving all the brilliant greens and blues and browns of the forest muted and gray.

  Chapter 6

  A week passed, and then two, as Shannon eased into the daily routine of her father’s trading post. She became accustomed to the luxury of sleeping in a bed and having a room all to herself without being awakened by someone snoring or the stench and tinkle of another woman using a chamber pot inches from her head. If she heated water at night, she was free to drag the big copper washtub into her private space and bathe from head to toe with real soap.

  A handful of beeswax candles hung in a leather case on the wall near her window. Shannon could read by candlelight with ease instead of squinting until her eyes ached, as she had for so many years. At the tavern, where she’d been apprenticed since she was thirteen, the only light after dark was a fireplace or tallow burning in a smoky Betty Lamp. And, to her delight, Flynn had given her the silver-backed antique hand mirror that her mother—afraid it would break—had carried from Baltimore every step of the way over the mountains from the coast when they’d first come to Cherokee territory. Shannon could gaze into the precious mirror as often as she liked, squint her eyes and imagine she could see her mother’s beloved reflection staring back at her.

  Shannon felt like a princess in one of her father’s old tales. Each morning, Oona prepared a hot breakfast for the three of them, and Shannon was encouraged to eat as much as she wanted. She could put honey on her hot-cakes and stir fresh berries into her porridge. No one tossed leftover scraps retrieved from tavern customers’ plates into a pot of soup for her to share with the other serving girls, and no one watched to see that she didn’t take a second helping of bread. And after she and Flynn and Oona had eaten, he would take her to the store to teach her the art of trading.

  Soon she’d realized that the post’s account book was a mess. Flynn was repeatedly making errors in his arithmetic, and his handwriting was so bad that often he couldn’t read it. Was that “8 trade mirrors” or “no trade mirrors”? Zero pairs of French scissors remaining or nine?

  And the picture darkened once Shannon began taking inventory of glass beads and trinkets, clay pipes, cheap cloth, men’s hats, and bottled medicinals. It was obvious that the store had far too many boxes of those frivolous items gathering dust on the shelves, while the trade goods the Cherokee seemed to desire most, such as steel knives, hatchets, needles, powder and shot, were in short supply.

  Worst of all, Shannon found lists of customers who bought supplies on ticket and never paid with the promised furs or gold nuggets. Some debts went back a decade, and others were simply written off. Shannon had even discovered sales of gunpowder or knives that were marked “no charge.”

  In theory, the isolated trading post was a solid business. No other store existed for days in every direction, and her father had enjoyed the friendship of the prosperous Cherokee nation for many years. But the account books proved that Da had made less profit every season for the past five years. And the money he’d paid to buy her indenture and pay her passage west had cost him most of his savings.

  When Shannon questioned him about the problems, he laughed off her concerns, saying that she was like her mother, thinking she could teach a rooster how to crow. He knew the Cherokee, he insisted, and he knew his trade. Some customers might be slow to make good on their promises, but in the end, most would honor their obligations. As for the items he’d given away, the recipients were on hard times and needed assistance rather than a debt. That was the Cherokee way, and to live among the people, he was expected to adopt some of their ways.

  In those two weeks, while Shannon struggled to understand her father’s business sense, they had no visitors. And although Storm Dancer continued to invade her dreams and he
r pulse became erratic every time she went to the spring to fetch water, she saw no sign of him in the flesh. Neither she nor Oona told her father about Storm Dancer’s visit that first morning. At least, Shannon assumed that Oona had kept her secret, because Da said nothing to her about it.

  And as for her lustful dreams, they were most disturbing…so lascivious, that an unwed maid should be ashamed of knowing such behavior between a man and woman existed, let alone being party to it in her mind. If her bedroom door hadn’t been barred from the inside and her window too small to admit a grown man, she would swear that Storm Dancer had been with her in her bed every night. She would swear that Storm Dancer had licked and nibbled and kissed every inch of her body from the crown of her head to the tips of her toes, and that she had eagerly done as much to him.

  She wondered if she were bewitched. Was she too weak to resist the temptation of her nightly fantasy orgies? If she couldn’t banish the dreams, decency should have compelled her to try to stay awake, to sit late by the kitchen fire, refuse to lay her head on her pillow and give herself over to her wicked imagination. Instead, to her shame, she welcomed them…seeking her bed early and savoring the licentious memories the following day.

  And worse, after she’d gone to bed, in the moments before she fell asleep, she would touch herself…rubbing her nipples until they tingled…massaging the mound where her nether curls sprang…sliding her fingers into her woman’s cleft until she shuddered with pleasure.

  Usually, her dream lover came to her in her soft featherbed within the four posters, but sometimes the two of them sought out secret places in the mountains. There, they would swim naked in the creeks or race hand in hand into an enchanted hollow where wild strawberries and violets grew thick and the air smelled of perfume.