Free Shawnee Bride by Elizabeth Lane Page B

choked with emotion that she could not trust herself to speak. She could only hope Swan Feather would understand and forgive her.
    The forest loomed in her tear-blurred vision, its shadowy depths offering a place to hide. She plunged onto the meadow path, running blindly, wanting only escape and the release of exhaustion. She ran until her ribs heaved and her chest ached and her gait had slowed to a stumble. She ran until one dragging toe caught in a tree root, sending her into a headlong sprawl.
    She landed hard, but a hundred seasons of rotting leaves cushioned her fall. She lay there, facedown on the damp forest floor, too tired to get up and too humiliated to go home—wherever home might be. Nothing seemed solid or certain anymore, least of all who she was and where she belonged.
    Wolf Heart gazed at Swan Feather through the drifting haze of smoke. There was no need to explain what had happened between himself and Clarissa. The old woman had seen both their hot flushed faces. She knew.
    He spoke formally, choosing his words with care. “My bones are mending swiftly. You have cared well for me, friend of my mother, and I am grateful, but it is time for me to return to my own lodge.”
    “You know you are welcome to stay.” Her own speech too was guarded and deliberate, allowing him to save face. “But perhaps you would sleep better alone, without the snores of an old woman to trouble you.”
    “I have slept very well here, but I have wearied you. You are the one who needs to rest.” He studied herthrough the smoky haze. Her eyes, of late, appeared shadowed, sunk deeply into the wrinkled pits of their sockets.
    “You may sleep in your own lodge, then,” she conceded as if it were her decision. “But you must let me bring your meals and change your wrappings, unless…” She let the words trail off as she stared into the smoke. Then, as if picking up a dropped thread, she finished. “Unless, of course, you would rather have the girl do it. She has learned well and is quite capable of caring for your needs.”
    There it was. Behind his own stoic facade, Wolf Heart felt his pulse skitter like a youth’s. Swan Feather’s words had opened the door to his asking for Clarissa in marriage. He had only to make the next move.
    He was searching for words to explain his dilemmawhen she spoke again.
    “You promised the council you would take a Shawnee woman. Once, as I told you, I believed that she could never become Shawnee. But she has proven herself many times over. She is strong and brave and not afraid of hard work. She is worthy in every respect.”
    “Worthy, yes. Willing, no,” Wolf Heart said. “She has no wish to become Shawnee or to become my wife. These things she has told me.”
    “Naturally she has.” A wistful smile flickered in Swan Feather’s ancient eyes. “Before he took me in marriage, I told my husband much the same thing—that I had no wish to live with a Kispoko warrior, among his people. But even as I spoke the words, my heart was straining to go with him.”
    “At least you were Shawnee,” Wolf Heart said, warmed by her manner in spite of himself. “That made things simpler.”
    “True. But the girl cares for you, I know. The day youwere carried here, so badly hurt, she never left your side. I have seen the way she watches you when you aren’t aware of it. I have seen the softness in her eyes.”
    “And I have felt the sharpness of her claws.”
    “Would you choose a woman without passion? Without spirit?”
    Wolf Heart shifted his weight against the willow brace, remembering how Clarissa had gone molten in his arms—and remembering the contempt in her eyes when she had pulled away from him.
    “Enough. We’re talking in circles,” he growled, pushing to a crouch, then rising unsteadily to his feet. His legs quivered as he started toward the door, waving away the old woman’s efforts to help him.
    “It’s too soon for you to leave,” she argued. “Surely you can stay a few