Free Wind Warrior (Historical Romance) by Constance O'Banyon

She always sings to me.”
    “Sing! What does she sing?” White Wing wanted to know.
    “It’s pretty, and I like to hear it,” the child said with a pout on her small lips.
    Marianna’s gaze shifted to Lillian. “Why don’t you explain to your friend about my singing, Lillian? And while you’re at it, tell them I told Little Bird she could walk with me and I don’t intend to break my word to her.”
    Lillian’s eyes narrowed, and she answered in the Blackfoot language. “You dare speak to me in English and call me by a name that no longer belongs to me? You know very well I am Spotted Flower,” Lillian replied in a sugary tone. “While you cling tothe old ways, I have found a better life here,” she said mockingly.
    For the first two months in the Blackfoot village, Marianna and Lillian had not been allowed to see each other—probably it was the Blackfoot way of bringing them into the tribe. Now, Marianna knew Lillian was denying her old life for the benefit of the other maidens, and not saying what she really felt. Lillian couldn’t be happy living with the brute who had kidnapped her.
    Lillian had always been unpleasant, but now she was even worse. Why was she trying to stir up trouble?
    “You have a very short memory,” Marianna said to her in English. “Have you forgotten Susan?” Marianna looked into Lillian’s blue eyes and saw the shadow of pain reflected there. Turning away, she guided Little Bird toward the river path with anger driving her footsteps.
    Glancing back at the other girls, Little Bird asked, “Why is she so mean?”
    “Sometimes when people are unhappy, they strike out at others.”
    “Why?”
    “I do not know, Little Bird.”
    Becoming aware that they were being followed, Marianna whipped her head around in time to see White Wing just behind her. Before Marianna could even react or defend herself, the Indian maiden gave her a powerful shove that sent her flying. Not wanting Little Bird to go down with her, Marianna released her grip on the child’s hand before she fell. It angered her when she heard the other girls laughing.
    White Wing towered above Marianna, scowling. “You offend me by breathing the same air I breathe.”
    Marianna scrambled to her knees, examining Little Bird, who was in tears. When pain ripped through her side she tried to ignore it for the child’s sake. “Do not cry, Little Bird. I am unhurt,” Marianna assured her.
    Marianna’s anger soared when she turned her attention to White Wing. “Do not ever do that again. If you do, you will regret it.”
    “I am not afraid of a puny white girl. What do you think you can do to me?” White Wing taunted as if she was trying to goad Marianna into a fight. “Can you not see that none of us like you?”
    “I care little what you or your friends think of me. But if you had hurt Little Bird, I would teach you to fear me.”
    For a moment shame flashed in White Wing’s eyes before she shook her hair so her long dark tresses swept her shoulders. “My contempt for you is such that I forgot about the child. I would not harm her.”
    A shadow fell between them, and both girls looked up in astonishment. “What did you say to White Wing that would warrant such anger?” a husky male voice asked Marianna.
    She faced Wind Warrior, her onetime savior, and the most mysterious and honored warrior of the tribe. “I…do…not know why she is angry. You will have to ask her.”
    White Wing backed up a step as Wind Warrior turned to her. “If you had hurt the child, White Wing, you would have been brought before the elders,”Wind Warrior remarked. “Why would you chance hurting Two Moons’s little daughter?”
    White Wing shook her head. “I was not—I was just—”
    Wind Warrior held his hand up to silence her, the look in his dark eyes sharp and dangerous.
    “Think on what you did and said here today. I have known you all your life without realizing you were capable of such an unwarranted act.”
    The child,