Chapter Seven
The close shrilling notes of a songbird startled me. Blinking my eyes open I tried to gather my thoughts.
My face blushed hotly as all that had transpired last night came vividly to memory. Well and truly did I feel like a woman this morning.
My slave tunic had been draped over me and cautiously I turned my head, only to confirm what I had thought. My captor was gone.
Sitting up I looked down at what was perhaps the oddest sight that I would ever have expected to have seen. There on the pressed down grass where he had lain lay a bouquet of flowers.
I looked around, but he was nowhere to be seen. I looked back to the flowers in consternation.
I didn’t know what to think. The flowers didn’t go at all with the man, who’d wordlessly had me repeatedly all night long. Well…….maybe they did.
I shook my head as if to clear it of the confusion I was under. I felt strange and more than anything I wanted a bath. No, make that food. I was starving!
I slipped the dress on and stood up.
I looked down to the flattened grass and thought it a poor indication to relay all that had happened here last night. Feeling flushed again I picked up the bouquet of flowers.
I should crush them was my first thought and yet they were beautiful. A similarity came to mind. It had been in his power to crush me, only he hadn’t. Was this what the symbolism of the flowers was?
Why had a man who I’d never even heard say a word left me flowers?
I heard grass moving and looking up I watched him come toward me. With interest I took him in and where I should’ve felt hate I…… I didn’t. I wasn’t sure why that was.
He motioned me to come over to where a rock thrust up out of the ground. Obediently I did so and watched with interest as he unloaded an arm full of green balls which seemed reminiscent of garden melons.
Taking a short sword out from his belt he halved the melon into pieces. I looked to the blade of the sword expecting to see dried blood still on it, but it was clean.
He’d noticed my look at the sword and shaking his head I actually saw him smile briefly. The smile was there one moment and gone the next, but it was good to know that he could at least smile.
He offered a piece of the juicy looking fruit that was yellow inside and I took it from him. It was really good!
I consumed the edible part and tentatively I reached out for another piece of the fruit. He said nothing, as usual, as he continued to chop up the garden melon like things so I continued to eat them.
I made sure to at least leave a half share of the fruit for him to eat though. I watched him bite into a piece and chew then he did a curious thing by lifting his head and jerking it backward slightly.
I watched the swallowed food pass down his throat. Odd.
Then he did the whole process over again with his next bite of fruit. What he was doing not only looked odd but awkward as well and I felt myself staring at him.
He noticed my stare and his hand moved then quickly in what I was shocked to see was sign language. Different indian tribes used sign language to communicate and yet I knew he understood Cherokee.
“Could you repeat that?” I asked, as I brushed some of my hair back over one ear.
His hand flashed again and in astonishment I looked to his face and said, “You don’t have a tongue!”
He nodded and kept on eating.
“Why?”
His hand moved, “They cut it out. Say Cherokee have nothing worth saying to be heard anyway.”
I put my hand over my mouth as I suddenly felt a little nauseous at the thought of what it would be like to have my tongue removed. Looking at him I said, “I’m sorry.”
His head cocked to the side as his hand moved, “Why?”
“I…… I just am. It must be terrible to be without a tongue.”
He shrugged and looked back down to the fruit he was still chopping up. I wasn’t hungry anymore and turning away I faced the prairie that stretched out as far as the eye could see.
I felt him then standing behind me. The man had taken me against my will and I…… he just didn’t seem like someone I should hate.
He stepped off to the side of me and glancing to him I asked, “Are we being followed?”
He shook his head no. I turned back to the fruit, but his hand caught my arm halting the action.
His hand signed again, but he really didn’t have to because what he wanted was plain to see in his face. I looked down to his hand as what he’d said reverberated throughout me, “I want you again before we go.”
Looking up I met his gaze not sure how he would react as I quite honestly said, “I’m sore. Could we please not right now?”
His eyes stared into mine and I was beginning to think I’d made a mistake when he nodded his head. His hand flashed and there was no questioning the message of it, “Tonight.”
“Yes.” I whispered out in acceptance as I felt myself about to catch on flame and burn alive.
I needed to get away. I pulled to be free and he let go.
I hurried off toward some bushes, but stopped when I heard him snap his fingers. Looking back he signed, “Thank you for letting me go. My spirit die if I be there much longer.”
What did a person say to that?
I could well sympathize with what he meant. The thing though is that I felt his admission of gratitude deserved an answering one, “Thank you for waiting till tonight.”
I hurried on then feeling very strange inside. Where had the man who had yanked on my hair and knocked me out with his fist gone to? Thinking about it I realized he’d had little choice but to subdue me while in the city in order for us to escape, but that didn’t excuse him for pulling my hair the way he had or for what he’d done last night.
Shaken I walked on as I quite numbly contemplated on what an afterthought, ‘last night’ had been in my previous thought. What was wrong with me?
*****
The hours of the day fell by one by one. Endlessly riding across the shifting field of grass that lay ever before us.
Thankfully I made the journey on my own horse and wasn’t pressed up against him as I had been last night. He’d let me have the saddle while he rode the other horse bareback.
He really was the finest horsemen I’d ever seen. You could see it in just the way he moved with the animal. It was almost as if he was one with it somehow.
About midafternoon he dropped back to ride beside me. There then commenced a period of time that he indepthly studied me.
I kept waiting to be pulled off the horse and pressed into the grass again. The passion to do that was there in his eyes, but the look about him was more contemplative than passionate.
Finally his hand moved, “Why you not run? I ride ahead all day and give you plenty of chances.”
In shock I gazed at him before switching my gaze to the horizon before us. Why hadn’t I made a break for it?
It was true what he said, I’d had plenty of chances throughout the day to run for it. However the thought of running from him hadn’t even occurred in my mind!
I put my hand to my head that had suddenly begun to hurt. Maybe I was getting too much sunlight. My many freckles were no doubt loving it.
I glanced to him only to see him still watching me so I asked, “What would you have done if I had run?
“Catch you.” Came the swift response and that was that. We rode the rest of the day side-by-side.
*****
Towards evening we cleared a rise and below us was a pond of water in a low point in the land. The water called out to me. Not so much because I was thirsty, but because I wanted a bath.
My captor however remained still for a long time on the ridge studying the water hole and the land around it quite thoroughly. I felt very safe from other dangers when with him.
Finally he eased forward and we made the short journey down to the water. We all drank deeply and then surprisingly he went about making a fire.
I wouldn’t have thought that safe to do, but I trusted his instincts on the matter far more than my own. While he was busy with that I stood by staring at the cool water longingly.
Snapping out of my daze I went about gathering dry brush with which to feed the fire. To my surprise he came up and stopped me. He pointed to the water before then taking what brush I had gathered and going back to where he was working on making the fire.
“Thank you.” I said to softly for him to have heard.
Never would I have expected him to be this nice to me. In the cell bay he had seemed only slightly less animal than the others. In truth he was a good deal different from the others.
I turned away to the water and without hesitation I dove into it. I took my tunic off and I did my best to wash the sorry garment. My efforts did little to visibly improve it, but at least perhaps it would smell better.
I looked up to see him standing there along the shore and self-consciously I ducked lower in the water. He motioned to the tunic and in surprise at his generosity I tossed it to him.
He took it toward the fire and hung it over a nearby bush. I smacked myself in the head then for what I had just done. Oh well it really didn’t matter as I wouldn’t have had a covering much longer anyway.
Something smacked into the water near me and I have screamed in startlement to the tune of his chuckle from the shoreline. I caught a hold of his pants before they sank below the surface of the water.
The implication was obvious. He wanted me to wash his pants.
I looked at the worn material in my hands. Then not quite believing it I started to do my best to clean them, but like with my tunic there was little to be done to salvage what hadn’t been great to start out with.
Looking up from my task after a while I saw him waiting patiently. I tossed the pants to him and he walked away stark naked. Modesty wasn’t his strong suit. Admittedly what did it matter in this setting.
With a gasp I watched him dive into the water and become gone from view. It wasn’t overly a surprise when he resurfaced right before me. His hand found mine and he began to lead me toward the shore and I went along willingly.