Free Brave Warrior by Ann Hood Page B

hopefully. “But it’s not pronounced the way it’s spelled, like the French boy’s name. It’s pronounced like
peer
.”
    He could picture Avery Mason giving the report on South Dakota, her beautiful hair glistening as she made the class repeat after her:
peer.
    “I don’t think it’s even a state yet,” Maisie said. “We must be in 18…what? Fifty-something?”
    “Alabama became a state in 1819,” Felix said.
    “Big deal! We’re not in Alabama!” Maisie said, frustrated.
    “I know, I know,” Felix said.
    “The square states didn’t become states until the late 1800s,” she said. “Right?”
    “Right.”
    He tried to remember what else Avery Mason had said in her report.
    “I think the state flower is a pasqueflower,” Felix said, suddenly remembering Avery Mason making them repeat that after her, too. “It’s like a buttercup,” he added.
    “Great,” Maisie said. “I’ll be sure to look out for pasqueflowers while I’m there.”
    Little Thunder passed a cup of water to Felix. As thirsty as he was, he couldn’t help but think about how that cup had been made from a buffalo’s horn. He squeezed his eyes shut and forced himself to take a sip. Relieved that it tasted like water and not at all like horn, Felix took another big swallow before handing it to Maisie.
    Too soon, they were back on the horses, their arms wrapped around the boys’ waists, galloping across the Great Plains.

    To Maisie, the ride across the Great Plains was about the dullest thing she could remember doing. The landscape was just grass and grass and more grass. Sometimes she would glimpse a herd of buffalo in the distance or see the smoke rising from a village of tepees. But those sights did nothing to alleviate her boredom.
    Felix, however, grew to think the plains were quite beautiful. The sky seemed bigger out here. And closer, as if he could reach out and actually touch it. The blue was bluer than back home, a dramatic, breathtaking blue that he had never seen before. The way the sky met the grass seemed almost unreal, like he was living in a giant painting. Late in the afternoon, he watched as storm clouds gathered. Gray and tumultuous, they rolled across the sky toward Felix and the small party of travelers. Lightning split through the clouds and met the ground somewhere far off.
    When the rain finally reached them, Felix found it uplifting. He had watched the storm gather itself and move across the sky. He lifted his face and let the rain fall on him. It was his rain, he thought. He’dobserved it as it developed and seen it coming toward him.
    Soon, though, the rain stopped, and they were now on the horizon hills of craggy rocks loomed.
    Felix wondered how Curly knew where to find his tribe. But he had no chance to ask him. In no time they were stopping at a village of tepees, and a man was running out of one to meet them.
    “Father of Curly,” Little Thunder explained. “Worm.”
    By the time they had gotten off their horses, Worm had arrived. He listened as Curly described in Lakota what had happened to Little Thunder’s village. His eyes were gentle as he studied Maisie and Felix, nodding as his son spoke.
    “Worm is not a warrior,” Little Thunder told them. “He’s a shaman.”
    “A what?” Maisie asked.
    “An interpreter of dreams,” Little Thunder said. “And a healer.”
    Curly had finally gone silent. He led the horses away, but Worm stayed put.
    “Welcome,” he said to Maisie and Felix.
    The fear that both of them had felt since theattack that morning began to melt away in his presence.
    “You are from the Holy Road?” he asked them.
    Maisie shook her head no.
    “No?” he said, surprised. “White settlers are growing in numbers there.”
    He didn’t wait for them to say anything more but rather motioned for them to follow him into the village.
    “You are lucky,” Little Thunder said. “The Lakota are tolerant people.”
    The familiar smell of roasting buffalo meat greeted them.