He dressed himself effortlessly. He favored his better leg while he moved, but he still stood solidly on both. She suspected he would forever have the slight limp and wondered if that bothered him. Once he was fully dressed, he looked similar to one of the neighboring white farmers.
He dug into the simple meal she had prepared. His appetite was big. She hoped she had brought enough to fill him because this was the last meal she would bring him. Tomorrow, he would be gone from here forever.
She pushed her melancholy aside and reveled in her last moments with him. She enjoyed watching him. He looked less like a feral animal with the hair on his face trimmed. She hadn’t given him a close shave, not wanting to irritate his skin with the blade, but it would do. The shadow of hair around his face gave him a rugged allure she found dangerously appealing.
He glanced up at her from his bowl when she continued staring at him. “Are there others in your tribe like you?” he asked.
Siara tilted her head to the side, confused. “How you mean?”
“I mean dark,” he said plainly, returning his attention to his meal. “I admit I haven’t interacted with many natives, but I expected your people to look more like you.”
Siara tensed. He was obviously referring to Etu’s olive skin and bone-straight black hair. Whereas, her coloring was of a darker hue and her hair held deep ripples. Though her clan never treated her any different, she had spent most of her life coming to terms with the knowledge that she was a half-breed. In the eyes of others, she was different.
“Don’t misunderstand me,” he said when she continued her silence. “You’re a beautiful woman.” He placed his bowl beside him and stared at her contemplatively. “I guess I’m just trying to understand you,” he admitted ruefully.
She studied him, finding only sincere curiosity in his eyes. She guessed then there was no harm in telling him. “My mother Onyota’aka,” she began, “and my father African.”
He frowned. “Your people allowed this union?”
“My father was brave man,” she explained with a tinge of pride. “He danger his life for one of our people, blood son of Clan Mother. As honor, my tribe…how you say, take him inside and make him Onyota’aka.”
“Adopt?”
She nodded. “Yes, adopt.” Though the tribe always treated her father as one of their own, his dark skin and coiled black hair made him stick out like a pineweed in a dry wheat field. And though her father had embraced the customs of his new family, he had filled her with stories of his home across the ocean, not letting her forget that she had Africa in her blood.
“Where is your father now?”
She looked down at her hands. “He and my mother pass on from sickness.” The illness had raged through the tribes, claiming many lives. There were days she missed them fiercely, but there were nights they came to her in her night visions. They often spoke to her, and she took comfort in knowing they were at rest.
“I’m sorry to hear that, love.”
Her heart lurched from the tender compassion in his eyes. “Half of me feels deep love and kinship for my people here, for this land. But the other half of me, my father’s half, thinks on the land he comes from. I would like very much to know that land,” she admitted whimsically.
He gave her a gentle smile. “Perhaps one day we can travel to that part of the world.”
She returned his smile. “Yes, perhaps,” she said, though they both knew that could never actually come to be. She placed her hand over her heart. “For now, Africa lives here.”
He glanced down at her hand, his eyes warm with understanding. Though her physical home would always be here, her heart would always be filled with love for her unknown home. Being far from his own lands, he could obviously relate with her in that, and she loved him for indulging in her fanciful thoughts.
She froze.
I love him.
Her heart fluttered for a moment. It was freeing to finally admit those feelings to herself, even if a love between them could never exist. In the weeks she’d cared for him, there had been a strong connection between them. One that had compelled her to venture into these forsaken grounds and find him. Now that bond trembled from the tension of its inevitable break.
Siara didn’t want to leave him, but it was getting late and she had stayed away far too long. His wound was completely healed now and didn’t require her attention any longer. If anything, he was now capable of tending to it himself, which he had been. He didn’t need her anymore.
Heavy hearted, Siara rose to her feet. He followed suit.
“We leave tomorrow at first light,” she said quietly.
He gave her a curt nod. “I need my pistols, love.”
“Yes. Tomorrow.”
“No. Tonight.”
She sighed in frustration. She hadn’t forgotten, but she hadn’t had the time to unearth his weapons and carry them back to him. With darkness also coming soon, there was no way she could get them now. When she explained that to him, he finally relented.
“I am once again completely at your mercy,” he muttered. “Go then. I’ll wait for you tomorrow at dawn.”
She nodded and gathered her items. She started toward the opening, but he reached out and took her hand in his.
“Siara.”
She turned to him, a warm feeling passing through her at the sound of her name coming so affectionately from his low, deep voice.
“Thank you,” he said simply.
Something softened inside her and she gave his hand a gentle squeeze. “You are much welcome.” Instead of releasing her, he pulled her closer. She read the longing in his eyes and wanted nothing more than to be with him. Moving without thought, she took another step toward him.
Suddenly they both froze at the sound of a horse approaching.
“Siara!”
Her heart sank as she recognized the voice. Akando. She glanced behind her, toward the opening of the shelter, then back at James.
“Stay here,” she whispered fiercely before rushing out to meet Akando.
“Siara?” Akando rode up to her, his glare sharp and unwavering. “I’ve been searching everywhere for you. Why are you out here alone? You should be preparing with the others for the journey tomorrow.”
“I am already prepared,” she replied coolly, hoping he couldn’t see her nervousness. “I just wanted some time alone.”
He frowned, glancing around them. “Here? This is not a safe place for you. Come. Let’s—” He glanced behind her and gestured toward the shelter. “What is in there?”
“Nothing,” she said, walking toward him. “Just a place for me to rest.” She managed to control the anxious quiver in her voice, but there was a suspicious glint in his gaze as he stared hard at the crude shelter.
“I see something in there…” He slid down from his horse and her anxiety increased tenfold as he headed toward the shelter. When he walked past her, she grabbed for his arm.
“Akando, it’s nothing,” she said earnestly. “Please. I would like to return to the longhouse now.”
But he ignored her, shaking her hand away. She stood there frozen, unsure what to do. If she called out a warning, what then? She didn’t want either man hurt.
After a brief, internal struggle, she followed him. Maybe if she explained, tried to convince him the rightness in what she’d done, he wouldn’t harm the injured man lurking inside.
But James wasn’t lurking.
He rushed out, wrapping Akando with the blanket that had been kept inside. Akando let out a shout and fell back. James pulled out the flint knife, looking ready to charge toward the fallen man.
Akando quickly swept the blanket from his body and bounded to his feet. He was as tall as James and lean with muscle. She caught a glimpse of the tomahawk in his hand and the bottom of her stomach dropped. She ran toward them, her arms stretched out between the two men to keep them from advancing toward each other.
“Please stop this,” she shouted at James in English.
“Damn it, Siara,” James said fiercely. “Step away.”
She shook her head. “James, I will explain for him why. There will be no need for fight.” She turned to Akando and switched to their language. Though Akando’s English was superior to hers, it would be easier and quicker for her to explain. “Please don’t hurt him. He was wounded and I cared for him. That is all. He is not strong enough to do you any harm.”
Akando didn’t take his eyes off of James when he asked sharply in English, “You brought this white man here?”
She swallowed then nodded, well aware that admitting to such a crime would result in a severe punishment. Possibly even exile.
“Yes, but only because he was terribly hurt.”
“He appears quite fit to me,” Akando snapped.
“He has only just gotten better,” she said frantically. “He is preparing to leave here and return to his people.”
“Only to bring them back here to raid our village,” he spat, advancing toward James, his grip tight on the tomahawk.
Siara pushed against his chest with all her might. “No!”
Akando jerked away from her, his face twisted with rage. “Treacherous whore!”
She wasn’t prepared for the blow that came next. His fist connected with her jaw with such force, she tasted blood. A low snarl rumbled above her and in a blur, the two men landed with a loud thud on the ground beside her. She lay sprawled on the ground, dazed and her ear ringing. She vaguely realized she had bit her tongue.
James straddled Akando and landed blow after blow onto his face and chest. She scrambled to her feet and rushed to the struggling men. As James prepared to bring his fist down again, Siara rushed behind him and grabbed his raised arm.
“James!” she shouted, her voice cracking. “Please, no!”
He stopped and looked up at her. His eyes burned with a steely rage that took her breath.
Akando used that brief moment of distraction to slam his fist into James chest. Surprised by the sudden attack, James flew back against her with a loud grunt. She had no time to move away. Struggling to maintain her footing, she tripped over a raised tree root and went flying to the ground.
Akando released an ear piercing battle cry and the last thing she witnessed, before her head struck something smooth and hard, was James trapped beneath the warrior and his raised tomahawk.
****
James watched as the spiked-end of the tomahawk started down between his eyes. He kicked out at the warrior’s hand, knocking the vicious looking ax from the man’s grip. A second longer and it would have found a home in his skull.
James swung his other leg behind the man, forcing him back to the ground. He came over the man again and began landing blow after blow, beating him mindlessly, determined to finish him.
He’d struck Siara. He deserved to die.
But the warrior was strong. He managed to roll away from under James and crawl toward the tomahawk. James reached for him, but was too late. Akando clutched the tomahawk in his fists. James fell over him and wrapped his arm around the man’s neck, keeping him on his stomach. The man gurgled and strained beneath him as James increased the pressure and held him in the fierce grip. With his free hand, he wrenched the tomahawk from Akando’s hands. For a moment, James debated whether he should slam the blade into the man’s skull or simply snap his neck and be done with it.
I have no intention of causing anyone harm.
His words echoed in his head, jarring him out of his murderous rage. He’d made that promise to Siara—a promise he was seconds away from breaking. And she would hate him forever.
Suddenly, he remembered her sharp cry and fear flooded him.
Siara!
He turned to find her lying on the ground, unmoving. He released the unconscious warrior and pushed away from him. A moment longer and he could have strangled the warrior to death. He wasn’t all that convinced that he shouldn’t.
Instead, James rushed to Siara’s side. She was still breathing and he experienced a relief so great, he shuddered with it.
“Wake up for me, love,” he prompted hoarsely, brushing the loose strands of hair from her face. “Come on.”
She moaned softly, wincing as her eyes fluttered open. He scanned her body, to see if there were any obvious injuries. “Tell me where it hurts, love.”
Siara lifted her hand to her head. James ran his fingers gently through her hair until he brushed against the knot beginning to form. She winced again and moaned. He withdrew his hand.
“My head,” she croaked. “It’s hurt.”
“I know, love. Can you stand?” They couldn’t linger there much longer. The warrior was bound to wake up soon—if his battle cry hadn’t already alerted others.
When she struggled to her feet, James swooped her into his arms, bracing his weight on his good leg. He would not leave her here. Not to face retribution at the hands of her people just because she had saved his life. He carried her to the warrior’s horse and placed her atop it. “Wait for me,” he said. He grabbed the flint knife and the tomahawk and headed into the crude shelter that had been his dwelling for the past few weeks. He quickly gathered the supplies Siara had prepared for him and headed back to her. The warrior began to stir just as James climbed up on the horse behind her.