Savage Dawn (16 page)

“Yes, oh, yes,” she murmured. She flung herself into his arms.

He wanted to postpone what their bodies ached for, and she knew that was right, so she just hugged him and his words to her heart.

This moment would always be precious to her, for it was the moment they gave their hearts to each other.

For Nicole the future was once again promising and wonderful. Because of Eagle Wolf.

“It is my turn now to braid your hair,” he said, gently holding her away from him. Then he turned her so that her back was to him. He lifted her hair, sniffed its clean smell, then began braiding it, slowly, almost meditatively, for this moment was one he would never forget.

It marked the beginning of their lives together.

It was midmorning as Nicole rode her mare beside Eagle Wolf’s majestic white stallion.

While they had eaten the breakfast that Dancing Snow Feather had brought to them, Eagle Wolf had said that he wanted to acquaint Nicole with this wondrous land that was now her home.

They had been riding for perhaps an hour beneath the cottonwoods, their yellow leaves brilliant in the morning sun.

The grass that had been so green and bright only a few weeks ago was now turning brown and blew stiffly in the wind today. Only a few wild-flowers remained, their colors now faded and their stems wilted from last night’s sudden frost.

Nicole could hear the splash of the waterfall, and she marveled at the rainbows formed as the water plummeted to the river below.

She glanced over at Eagle Wolf, feeling the connection between them, which she still marveled over. The soft breeze on the mountain lifted his long and flowing hair so that it blew behind him like sleek, black satin.

She was glad that he had chosen to leave his hair loose today. She loved to see it and run her fingers through it.

She loved to smell it, too. It always smelled clean, like fresh river water!

Today he wore only a breechclout, and most of his copper body was revealed to Nicole. She marveled over his muscles and his handsomeness as though this were the first time she had seen him.

It was not only his looks that had captured her heart. She would never stop appreciating his kindness toward her.

It seemed a miracle that she had been led to him that day, where he lay so ill beneath a tree. Had she chosen a different path up the mountain, she would never have seen him or known the love of this man who had given his all to her.

Soon they would be married.

He had told her that he must go on a hunt before they could stand together and speak the words that would make them husband and wife. The autumn hunt. He would leave tomorrow.

But today was theirs, and he rode beside her to acquaint her with his land, the marvels of it.

She was glad that the breeze had turned warm. When they first arose this morning and stepped outside for a breath of fresh air, frost had lain on the pumpkins that had not yet been harvested in the garden.

It had not been a heavy enough frost to damage the vegetables that had not yet been harvested.
But it had left a brownish tint against the orange of the pumpkins.

Despite the nip in the air, Eagle Wolf, had left Nicole long enough to take his morning plunge in the river, while she had returned inside the tepee to do her own washing from a basin of water. She had to admit to missing the copper tub in her parents’ lovely bathroom back at their home in St. Louis.

Even her aunt Dot and uncle Zeb had a beautiful tub. They also had an outdoor shower they had prepared. One stood in a small cubicle where one could look up and see the sky while tugging on a rope that sent water splashing down from a contraption her uncle had invented.

The water was always cold, but it was fun to take a shower in such a way.

“You are so quiet,” Eagle Wolf suddenly said, drawing Nicole’s eyes to him. “You are as captivated by my mountain as we Navaho. You feel safe here, do you not? You feel the mountain’s embrace?”

“I feel so many things as I ride beside you,” Nicole said, smiling at him. “And, yes, I do feel safe and I do feel your mountain’s embrace. It is wonderful, Eagle Wolf.”

“In this mountain you will find sanctuary as we Navaho have found. When we first came here, we were fleeing the wrath of the white pony soldiers and the United States government, who
stole from us all of the land that has been the Navaho’s from the beginning of time.”

Nicole saw the hardening of his jaw. She knew he was struggling to control his rage over what had been done to his people.

She felt ashamed of her own countrymen, for she had seen how they had wronged the red man, sometimes even worse than those whose skin was black. There was more than one way to enslave a person.

“Let us ride to where I can gather salt for the women of our village,” Eagle Wolf said, quickly lifting his head and changing the subject.

“There is salt up on this mountain?” Nicole asked.

“Come with me. I shall show you,” Eagle Wolf said, already heading toward a sandstone ridge.

Nicole was always ready and anxious to learn something new.

Tomorrow she would join the women as they worked in the large garden. Last night’s light frost was a reminder that there was not much more time to store food for the long winter ahead.

Tomorrow she would help harvest crops for their winter cook pots, while Eagle Wolf would go with his warriors and hunt to provide meat.

He had lifted his nose into the wind today and told her that he could smell snow in the air. When they looked at the higher elevations of the mountain, they saw a fresh dusting of snow.

Nicole thought the snow was beautiful, but she knew that it could bring devastation to the Navaho if they were not prepared with wood at the sides of their lodges, and with food in their storage bins.

She followed Eagle Wolf as he led her down where willows grew in abundance along a gully.

“Moisture is always dripping here, leaving behind a buildup of salt crystals,” Eagle Wolf said, pointing to where long spikes of alkaline crystals hung like the icicles Nicole remembered hanging from the roof of her parents’ house on the coldest days of winter.

She drew rein as Eagle Wolf brought his horse to a halt. Then she watched while he took a small leather drawstring pouch from his saddlebag and went to where the salt crystals were hanging. With a rock, he easily knocked the salt into his bag.

“Here is all the salt you will need as you learn the art of Navaho cooking,” Eagle Wolf said, closing the drawstring pouch and returning it to his saddlebag.

Nicole felt a hot blush rise to her cheeks. “I do not even know how to boil water,” she confessed. “My mother never taught me how to cook. Both she and my father were more interested in my getting an education than spending time in the kitchen with my mother.”

“You will have a good teacher in Dancing Snow Feather,” Eagle Wolf said, going to Nicole and reaching for her reins.

He took them from her and secured them with his own on the low limb of a cottonwood tree, then lifted his arms up for her.

“Come with me,” he said thickly. “Let us go and sit beside that shallow stream over there. I will bring a blanket for us to sit upon.”

Nicole felt deliciously warm at the mere touch of this man’s hands as he helped her from her horse. They had not made love yet and she felt embarrassed that she wanted to so badly. She could almost burst from the need that overwhelmed her when she was with Eagle Wolf.

As he held her in his arms now, their lips so close, Nicole felt dizzy from a hunger she had not known of until she met Eagle Wolf.

“I need you,” Eagle Wolf whispered against her lips. “You need me. I can feel it in the way your body quivers and strains against mine. Now is the time, my woman. Now. I want to make love with you.”

“And I want to make love with you, too,” Nicole said in a strangely husky voice.

They kissed passionately, and Nicole felt overwhelmed by the emotions that swept through her. She knew it was right for her to give herself to this man today.

Soon they would speak vows. Theirs was a love that would endure everything and would last an eternity.

Forgetting the blanket, Eagle Wolf swept Nicole fully into his arms and carried her to the soft
moss that spread down the embankment, into the water.

Quickly, they undressed each other, and suddenly Nicole realized that she was nude for the first time in the presence of a man. Her cheeks flushed hot when she looked over and saw Eagle Wolf standing beautifully nude before her, everything about him so masterful.

She gasped when she saw that part of him that would soon be inside her, where no man had been before. He was very well endowed there, and she wondered how it was that he could fit inside her.

But the way she was throbbing, she knew it was meant for them to come together as men and women had done from the beginning of time.

She would not allow herself to be afraid of this first time, for she knew the gentle side of this man. She knew that he would treat her with tenderness as he entered her. She would learn from him the wonders of lovemaking.

He wrapped his arms around her and with his body urged her down onto the moss, which felt so soft and wonderful against her back.

He swept his body over hers, and with a knee gently parted her legs so that he could enter her without having to shove so hard.

He wanted the pain that came with the first time to be brief. He wanted her to remember the good of their first joining, not the bad.

As birds sang overhead in the trees, like soft music being played just for this moment, Nicole lay in her lover’s arms, his mouth eager on hers. She had dreamed of being with Eagle Wolf, of making love, and now her dreams were coming true.

As she clung to him, her body yearning for his, she felt the possessive heat of his kiss. Slowly, gently, he thrust his manhood where she was throbbing with a need all new to her.

She held on to him as he gave one last shove, and she felt a slight stabbing of pain upon his entry. But the pain lasted for only a moment. Then, as he began to move gently within her, a pleasure she had never known began to grow within her. She strained her body against his, hungry for more of the exquisite pleasure he was awakening within her.

She instinctively wrapped her legs around his waist, and rode with each of his thrusts. His movements aroused the most wondrous of feelings within her.

“My woman,” Eagle Wolf whispered against her lips. “I love you
ka-bike-hozhoni-bi.
Forevermore.”

“And I shall love you
ka-bike-hozhoni-bi
,” she whispered back to him.

Then he moved more earnestly within her, and she felt the sweetest of currents spreading through her.

She closed her eyes and allowed herself to feel it all as he again kissed her with such passion, she sighed with pleasure. She clung to him, her body moving with his.

She was flooded with emotion as Eagle Wolf swept a hand around one of her breasts and kneaded it so that she felt the nipple grow tight against his palm. She sucked in a breath of utter pleasure when he moved his lips to that same nipple and gently sucked it between his teeth, softly nibbling.

Then he swirled his tongue around it, and again sucked the nipple into his mouth.

“What you are doing is…driving…me wild,” Nicole whispered, feeling heat surge through her whole body, this sensual awakening that was so sweet and wonderful.

“Just enjoy,” Eagle Wolf whispered against her cheek. “You feel it all now, do you not? You feel my need for you. You feel my want of you.”

“I feel everything wonderful, my darling,” Nicole said, gazing up at him through passion-clouded
eyes. “My handsome Navaho chief. Oh, how I do love you.”

“We were destined to meet and to know a love so fierce it should shake the heavens,” Eagle Wolf said, smiling into her eyes. “It should awaken all of nature. Hear the birds? Their songs accompany our love dance.”

His lips came down onto Nicole’s and kissed her more passionately than before. He swept his arms around her and held her tightly against his body, experiencing something with Nicole that he had never felt before with any other woman, not even his wife.

Now he saw how wrong he had been to marry for the wrong reasons.

This time his wife, his Nicole, would experience everything that love could give. He knew that she would always return his love, twofold, as she was doing today.

She clung and rocked with him, and heat spread through him, a liquid heat that melted his insides. His whole body was quivering with anticipation.

His skin actually tingled with an aliveness he had never felt before. And his stomach was churning wildly.

No, never before had he experienced anything even close to how he was feeling now with this woman.

That day when he lay there so overwhelmed with fever, it was fate that led her to him. Had she
not come, his life would never have been complete.

Now that they had found come together, they completed each other.

Nicole was almost mindless with the pleasure that Eagle Wolf was introducing her to. She was feeling a strange sort of pressure building within her.

And then, as his lips came to hers again in a demanding kiss, she arched her back and hugged him tightly to her.

Suddenly it seemed as though lights were flashing inside her brain, and the most delicious feeling swept through her, rocking her with an intensity she had never imagined possible. She clung to him. She sighed. She cried out his name just as he cried out hers against her lips. His body trembled and he thrust himself over and over again inside her, and then lay quietly against her, his breathing as quick as her own.

“What I just felt…” she said, marveling over what had happened to her body. It was as if she had been reborn into a new and different world, a world of sensuality.

“I felt the same,” Eagle Wolf said, rolling away from her and stretching out on his back on the soft moss. “You just discovered the truth about lovemaking and what can happen inside the body, inside the soul, when you truly love someone as you and I love each other.”

He turned on to his side toward her. He bent
his head to her breasts, and swept his tongue around one nipple and then the other, feeling the heat of her flesh against his lips.

Nicole threw her head back and closed her eyes in ecstasy as Eagle Wolf then kissed her lips with a warmth and passion that would always be there.

She would always need him.

She would always love him.

She twined her fingers through his long black hair, loving the feel of it against her hand. Then she swept her hands across his muscled back, stopping at his buttocks, where she splayed her fingers across his flesh.

“Your body is so magnificent,” she murmured as he leaned his face away from hers, his eyes gazing intently into hers.

“Your body is more than that,” Eagle Wolf said, laughing huskily. “I cannot keep my hands or lips off you.”

“I am yours, for always,” Nicole murmured, closing her eyes in ecstasy again when he kissed first one breast, and then the other.

They were abruptly startled away from each other when they heard a noise behind them, in the bushes.

All Nicole could think of was Sam Partain!

Had he found his way onto the mountain? Had he observed their lovemaking, only to kill them afterward?

She knew that the knife Eagle Wolf always
carried in a sheath at his hip was now with his clothes and hers, too far away for him to grab it.

His rifle was in the gun boot on his horse.

They were defenseless.

Both sat up quickly.

Nicole trembled as she covered her bare breasts with her hands and looked toward the bushes where the noise had come from.

Eagle Wolf sat beside her, his hand inching out toward his sheathed knife. But he realized that it was too far away for him to get it without leaving Nicole’s side. That might give whatever was there time to attack Nicole in his absence.

He could not chance it.

Suddenly they both saw a pair of golden eyes through a break in the bushes. Both recognized those eyes at the same moment.

“The wolf,” Nicole gasped out as Eagle Wolf whispered the same.

“It’s the wolf I’ve seen before,” Nicole said, wondering why the animal continued to stand there. “I recognize it by that large scar.”

“It is the same wolf that I have also seen many times before,” Eagle Wolf said, his eyes looking deeply into the wolf’s. “It is the very one that I saved those many sleeps ago. It has appeared to me since then more than once.”

“Yet…yet…it is not attacking either of us,” Nicole said, her voice trembling with fear.

“We are not what it seeks,” Eagle Wolf said, just as the wolf turned and ran away from them.
It was soon lost from sight in the shadows of the aspen forest.

Nicole sighed with relief. She scambled to her feet, went to her clothes and hurried into them while Eagle Wolf did the same.

“You said that you saved the wolf,” Nicole murmured. “How?”

“The wolf came to me that day, injured from a fight. It trusted me enough to allow me to use medicine on it, herbs from the forest that my shaman taught me how to find. Since then it has appeared to me many times, but it’s never come as close to me again as it did on the day that I found it near death.”

“I saw the wolf when I was all alone on the mountain. I was afraid that it would attack me, yet it didn’t,” Nicole murmured. “It gave me a look that I could not comprehend, and then went on its way. It appeared to me more than that one time. It is so mystical a creature, Eagle Wolf. I just cannot help wondering why it appears, yet never attacks. I see that as a miracle.”

“The miracle is that the wolf survived its wounds,” Eagle Wolf said, taking Nicole by the hand and leading her to her mare. “Although I did what I could for it, I doubted it would survive. It had lost a lot of blood.”

“Yet there it was again today,” Nicole said, mounting her steed while Eagle Wolf went and mounted his own. “It’s quite a mystery.”

“I believe the wolf is on a hunting expedition,”
Eagle Wolf said, riding away from the stream at Nicole’s side.

“A hunting expedition?” Nicole repeated. “For food?”

“No, for whatever scarred it in such a horrendous way,” Eagle Wolf answered, slowly nodding. “I pity the enemy, two-legged or four-legged, that is the reason for its restlessness. If the wolf did not have this need, it would have returned to others of its own kind.”

“I had always thought that wolves were quite fearful of humans,” Nicole said, now riding through tall, blowing, sandy-colored grass.

“Wolves normally are afraid of humans, and stay away from them, but from all that I see about this wolf, it is very different,” Eagle Wolf said, looking over his shoulder in the direction where he had last seen the wolf. “I do wonder sometimes why it seeks me out as it has more than once.”

“Because it sees you as a friend,” Nicole murmured. She smiled softly. “I believe I am seen as a friend, too, for the wolf has never threatened me.”

“Perhaps it senses your feelings toward me,” Eagle Wolf said, now guiding his steed into a forest of aspens.

“But how?” Nicole asked, following behind Eagle Wolf because there was no room to ride beside him.

“That is where mysticism comes into play,” Eagle Wolf said, smiling over his shoulder at her. “My woman, as you live among my people you
will be exposed to many things that puzzle you, but always remember that there is a reason for everything and there is always something or someone to watch over you.”

“I feel it already,” Nicole said, returning his smile. “And I feel so blessed because of it…because of you.”

“I hunt tomorrow while you help in the garden. Soon there will be a wedding for my people to celebrate,” Eagle Wolf said. “Ours, my woman. Ours.”

That made Nicole feel a sense of happiness and peace that she had never known before, and it was all because of a man most whites would kill if they saw him riding alone in the forest.

That thought made her shudder with a strange, sudden fear that was new to her.