Free Blackbird by Nancy Henderson Page A

He is crying.”
     
    “Good!  And I’m going to give him something to really cry about!”
     
    Little Jay came running toward them pulling her mother, Sunshine, along behind her.  Seeing a white woman holding her hysterical son by his leg, Adahya’s sister-in-law lunged at Katherine, knocking her down.
     
    “Odankot, stop!”  Adahya pulled the woman off Katherine.
     
    Katherine fought him like a wildcat.  “Let me go!”
     
    Adahya held Katherine back with one arm and his sister-in-law with the other.  “Katherine, stop!  Odankot, take the children and go back to your lodge.”
     
    Sunshine lunged for Katherine again, and Katherine spat in her face.
     
    Adahya forced them further apart.  “Sun, go away!  This is all a misunderstanding!”
     
    He jerked Katherine by the arm and pulled her toward his lodge leaving his enraged sister-in-law to deal with all five now-crying children.  “You do not pick on children here.”
     
    “They started it!”
     
    “And you are old enough to know better.”
     
    She defiantly pulled her arm from his grip.  “I’m through arguing with you.”
     
    “Good.”
     
    He held the lodge door open for her, and Katherine ducked inside.  The dwelling was too short to stand up straight, so she sat upon his pallet of hides.  Adahya sat across from her.  Today he wore a different pair of leggings, she noticed, ones that ended at mid-thigh a revealed strong, powerful legs.  His chest was bare, and he wore a sleeveless vest beaded with floral designs.
     
    He handed her a poultice of some sort and motioned for her to place it on her eye.
     
    She made a face.  “It smells funny.”
     
    “It will help you heal.”
     
    Katherine took the poultice and placed it on her throbbing eye.  She could feel his black gaze upon her, but she refused to look at him.  Her uncovered eye scanned his lodge.  Copper pots were scattered in piles along with various pieces of clothing thrown haphazardly about.  The home had lacked a woman’s touch for quite some time.
     
    “You live like a pig.”
     
    He chuckled, but, still infuriated, she refused to look at him.  She continued to inspect her surroundings.  From the center of the lodge pole, she noticed a red-colored wooden mask.  Its face was turned toward the pole, but she could make out its profile which contained large, protruding lips and long white horsehair attached to the sides of its face.  “What’s the mask for?”
     
    Adahya followed her gaze.  “I am a member of the False Face Society.”
     
    “What’s that?”
     
    “I cannot explain it to you, for it is sacred and must be hidden to non-members.”
     
    “Why is the face turned inward?”
     
    “It is respectful to turn the Face when it is not being worn.”
     
    As with most of the customs of his people, Katherine did not understand.  Adahya had such a strong sense of what was honorable and deserving of respect, yet he had dragged her to his home by force and commanded that she stay with him.  He made about as much sense as everything else that had gone wrong in her life.
     
    “Do you dislike all children?”
     
    Katherine shot him a glance.  He was smirking at her in that teasing way, but she refused to be nice to him.  He tried to hold the poultice to her eye for her, but she pulled away.
     
    “Why do you not trust me?”
     
    Fear and rage knotted inside her.  “Hmm…let’s see.  You tell me you’re taking me to Fort Ontario, and that was a lie.”
     
    “I was taking you.”  He looked indignant.  “At first.”
     
    “You ask me to live with you, and when I refuse, you kidnap me.”
     
    “I have not kidnapped you.  I told you that.”
     
    Rage blinded her, and she wanted to slap his smug arrogance right off his face.  The lying bastard!  He tied her up and forced her here like a dog.  Then sat here and acted like he had done nothing wrong.
     
    She clenched her teeth and felt a tiny pulse in her temple.  “I won’t