Wolf Tracker (12 page)

Glory finished the basic outline of the sketch she was making and showed it to Tami. The sketch showed Tami with her head turned a little to the right, looking at Carla with an expression of slight surprise, a shadow of a smile on her lips. Of course, Tami thought, Glory had flattered her quite a bit. She wasn’t that pretty. Her face was more angular than gently curved, and her mouth was thinner than Glory had drawn it.

“That’s really good,” Tami said with surprise. ”Were you an artist back home?”

“Are you kidding? You can’t make money off art unless you’re really popular. No, I was a marine biologist. You want it?”

“The picture? Sure.”

“Then I’ll take it back to the den and finish it up. If I don’t come back to town before me and Shadow take off, I’ll send it with someone.”

Chapter Twelve

Tracker rode to the Clan’s winter camp in the Black Hills and was surprised by the building going on. A dozen half-built houses in various stages of completion stood like aliens on the snow-dusted valley floor. The houses were in the center of the camp, built in a square facing each other, around an open area. The teepees fanned out from there in the traditional concentric circles. The idea of living in a house like that made Tracker feel trapped. He rode slowly down into the valley to give the sentries a chance to recognize him.

His stepfather, Kills Bears, met him at the outer ring of teepees. It was good to see him. “Tracker, you’ve been missed.”

Tracker slid off his horse and embraced the older man. “I’ve missed you.” The simple Lakota words came from his heart. His stepfather was one of the elders of the tribe at sixty years of age, and he was one of the holy men of the Clan. He had been a robust man, but age had stooped his shoulders and thinned him down to gristle. It was a hardy gristle, though, and Tracker felt the energy and strength in him.

“Come,” Kills Bears said. “Let’s go find your mother. She’ll be pleased to see you.”

Tracker gave his horse over to his cousin Raven to unload and followed Kills Bears through the camp, exchanging greetings with his extended family as he passed them. He was amazed when Kills Bears led him to one of the houses.

Hi mother and sister stepped out onto the porch, blankets wrapped around their shoulders. “Dan!” shrieked his sister, flinging herself at him with the joyful abandon of a child instead of a woman only eleven months younger than he. His mother stood back, smiling broadly, catching his sister’s dropped blanket, until his sister released him. Then she came forward to fold him in a loving embrace which he returned with controlled fervor.

“Come in,” his mother urged him. “Eat. There is food ready.”

His stepfather nodded. “Go. Spend some time with your mother. After supper we will meet at the men’s lodge to talk and pray.”

As he ate his mother’s cooking, a stream of visitors came through the house to greet him. His sister’s younger sons Chase and Grass hung on him while he ate. It was good to be among family, at least for a short time. Family was precious to him, but to spend all his days with the Clan would suffocate him, especially in a house like this. He sat at a newly constructed table, in a room whose interior was still rough and smelled strongly of raw wood, and wondered how anyone could bear to live in a house all the time. Later that evening, while he was with his stepfather in the men’s lodge, he asked that question.

“Women are different,” Kills Bears said, throwing more sage onto the fire. “Particularly the women from the towns and the Times Before. They like unmoving dwellings. If the men of the Clan want mates, we must have houses for them. Does that trouble you?”

Tracker breathed deeply of the aromatic smoke and felt himself relaxing. He opened his eyes and looked through the smoke to his stepfather across from the fire. “No.”

“Something troubles you. I can feel it in your spirit. Will you tell me what is in your heart?”

Unlike the brick and wooden walls of a house, the hide walls of this lodge did not press in on him. Tracker looked up, watching the smoke drift out of the hole at the top of the teepee, while he tried to find the word he needed to say. English was too small and barren a language for what was in his heart, so he used Lakota.

“A man asked me to find his stolen wife and bring her safely back to him. When I found her, I learned she had not been stolen. She ran away because she was badly used. Badly used.” Tracker took another deep breath of the cleansing, purifying smoke to drive away the ugly memory of the bruises on Tami’s throat. “Her heart has been scarred by the way she was treated by men who should have cherished her. I brought her to Taye’s den, where his Pack could keep her safe.”

Kills Bears remained silent, using his eagle-feather fan to waft the smoke toward his stepson, simply waiting for Tracker to continue.

“Father.” Tracker swallowed. Relief and contentment spread through him as he finally said out loud what his heart had been telling him since Leach had handed him that piece of stretchy gray fabric. “She is mine. If my wolf exists, he would have chosen her for my mate.”

“Ah. And have you told her this?”

“No. Her heart fills with fear if I come too close to her. I will kill the ones who put the scars on her heart, but the scars will remain. She will never accept a husband.”

“Never is a long time.” Kills Bears swished his fan, creating beautiful, fleeting patterns in the smoke. “Even a stubborn boy who has become a man may learn to accept his wolf. Even a woman’s heart-scars can grow lighter with time. If this woman is your mate, can you wait for her fears to ease?”

Tracker ignored the part about the wolf to concentrate on the part about scars growing lighter. He knew the answer to that question. A man who lived alone as he did, watching the seasons unfold, knew patience. “Yes. I can wait.”

“Then wait and be her friend.”

Chapter Thirteen

Be her friend.

Kills Bears’ words stayed with Tracker as he rode back to the den with all speed. He had stayed only the one day with his family. The Grandmother, who was known in the Clan for her eerie mysticism, had sent him there not just to see his mother, but to receive his stepfather’s wisdom.
Be her friend.
He could be her friend. The first thing he would do to prove his friendship was remove the cause of her nightmares. First, however, he would visit Taye’s den to assure himself she was well. He wanted to see her, needed to inhale her scent. The yearning was almost painful.

But when he arrived at the den in the late afternoon, he couldn’t detect a fresh note of her scent anywhere. It made him uneasy. Her dun horse was still in the stable, but she hadn’t been there lately. He strode into the den through the kitchen door, sniffing carefully. His cousin Hawk in Flight’s mate was there, raising her metal ladle as if it were a weapon, but she relaxed when Chad jumped off the counter to hug him.

“Dan!” Chad’s molasses-colored eyes looked hopeful. “Have you come to get help killing the rapists in Greasy Butte?”

Tracker could feel his lips twitch into a half-smile. Chad was young, and his left leg was weakened from having been badly clawed by a bear when he was a kid, but he didn’t let it get in the way of the possibility of a fight. Or anything else. Tracker shook his head. “Naw. Where’s Taye?”

“Rec room. I’d follow you, but I’m on guard duty today.”

The woman with the ladle sighed as if in aggravation. “I’m inside a kitchen, inside a building with wolves all over the place, inside a guarded fence. I don’t need a guard to stand next to me while I make English toffee. You’re just here to be sure you get the first piece.” The woman snorted and went back to stirring something that smelled almost as good as Tami. “Quit bothering me or it will burn.”

Chad managed a wounded look. “I promised Hawk I’d keep an eye on you while he’s hunting,” he was saying innocently when Tracker headed out to the dining hall. The tables there were empty as he passed through to the rec room across the hallway.

There were several people in the rec room, including Glory, Shadow’s pink-haired mate. She was at a table by the window with her art supplies before her, and Rose, Marissa, and Carla were knitting close by the fire. But no Tami. Taye was sitting on the floor with his head tilted against his mate’s thigh, but he jumped up right away when Tracker came in.

“Dan! I thought you were heading up to visit the Clan.”

“I already did. I’m back. Where’s Tami?

Taye arched a brow. “That was a fast trip. Miss Tami is living in Kearney right now.”

“What?” Tracker wasn’t sure what he felt, but it wasn’t a comfortable feeling.

“It’s only for a month or two,” Taye assured him. “She’s just visiting while she’s seeing the doctors. She’ll be back before Christmas.”

Tracker felt a hand grip his heart and then move to cut his air off. “She’s sick?”

Taye scratched at the back of his neck. “Nah, her body is doing fine. But Carla tells me she’s sick in her spirit. Two of the women from the plane are special doctors who are trained to heal that kind of sickness, so I sent Tami to stay with them.”

Tracker remembered the nightmares that had plagued Tami. “Good,” he said, his heart calming. “If they can help her get better, that’s good.”

He greeted the other women in the room, and went to look out the window at the heavy gray sky that threatened either rain or sleet. He was sorry to have missed Tami. Some undefined thing inside him was mournful and restless. If he did have a wolf, maybe it was unhappy he didn’t get to see her. Her scent affected him in ways no other scent did. Wasn’t it that way between mates?

Taye joined him. “Did you find what the Grandmother sent you to the Clan for?”

Tracker slanted a glance at his cousin. “I reckon. I talked to Kills Bears. I think Tami is my mate. Maybe I do have a wolf, but it’s too shy to come out. I reckon he wants Tami. But Tami is too scared of me for anything right now.”

“That’s why she’s in Kearney. Carla says she’s getting better.”

“I’m glad. But maybe it won’t matter. Dunno if I can ever settle down in one place. Even the Clan is too settled for me. They’re building houses, Taye.” Tracker shook his head in disbelief. “My mother is living inside a wooden house.” Tracker glanced around the den. “No offense.”

Taye’s teeth flashed in a quick, white smile. “None taken. No one says
you
have to live in a house. Keep traveling. Tami can stay here, or with the Clan, while you’re wandering. She’ll be safe and waiting for you when you return from your wandering.”

“Naw.” Tracker’s tone didn’t lose its usual coolness, but he was definite about that. “Jimmy White Elk does that to Sandra. You don’t have to have a wolf’s nose to tell she ain’t happy. A blind man can see that. Besides, I don’t like the idea of leaving Tami for long. She’s good company on the trail, and strong. So maybe she could ride along with me sometimes.” Tracker hated talking all the time like this, but he wanted to get the words out. “But Tami would expect a husband to give her a house, too. She deserves to have what she wants.”

“So build a house for her,” urged Taye. “Shadow’s been telling me about the house he’s building for Glory. He expects to hate it, but he’s ready to do it because he loves his mate. Can’t you do that, too?”

Tracker made his fists relax. “What if I’m not the right one to give it to her?” Maybe he didn’t love Tami enough to give up his freedom. Or maybe he loved her too much to want her to be miserable with him. “I just dunno.”

Taye put a hand on his shoulder. “You have time to decide. Tami won’t be back from Kearney for a while. Why don’t you come for Christmas? Spend some time with her then, get a chance to court her a little.”

Yeah, maybe he’d do that. He turned his head a little and his eye landed on the piece of paper Glory was drawing on. The drawing looked like Tami. Tracker moved with quick, silent steps to Glory’s side, staring at the upside-down image of Tami’s face.

Glory looked away from her work to blink up at him. Taye came to stand with him.

“That’s Tami,” Tracker said through a tight throat.

“Yeah,” Glory agreed, holding the paper up for him to see. “I’m almost done with it.”

Tracker stared, transfixed by longing, at Tami’s penciled image. “It’s real nice. How much you want for it?”

Glory looked at him doubtfully. “I don’t know. I told Tami I’d give it to her.”

Tracker wished he still had Leach’s gold coin. He slipped a hand into his waist pouch and let his fingers explore his trading options. He gave a surreptitious caress to the gray scrap of fabric before settling on the carving he’d finished while bringing Tami to the den. “I have a stone wolf,” he offered, bringing it out and showing it to her.

Her long, cold fingers snatched it away from him. Her face was delighted while she turned it this way and that, letting the light of the sinking sun catch its details. “Sold!” she announced jubilantly.

Her enthusiastic jubilation was less than his when he took the paper she handed to him; he just took the trouble to hide his feelings. He allowed himself only a few moments to study Tami’s beautiful face before folding the paper with care and tucking it into his pouch.

“Wait!” Glory protested. “Don’t you want me to finish it?”

“Naw. It’s good.”

And it was. He accepted Taye’s invitation to stay for supper and Des’s invitation to crash in his room tonight, but he couldn’t wait for a few minutes of privacy to be able to look at Tami’s face at his leisure. Between her scrap of shirt and this picture, a part of Tami would always be with him.

Shadow came into the rec room and immediately swooped Glory into his arms for a long hot kiss. Only after properly greeting his mate did he slap Tracker heartily on the shoulder and ask how things were. Tracker watched with hidden envy at the hot way Shadow and Glory eyed each other, and the soft loving touches Carla gave Taye. He wanted that for himself. But only with Tami.

After supper, while he was in the stable to settle his horse for the night, he took Tami’s picture out and unfolded it to gaze at it. Her face looked relaxed and happy, as he had never seen it. Her lips had a slight curve, as if Glory had caught her a split second before a smile would have bloomed. The woman in this picture looked like she’d never had a nightmare or reeked of terror when a man came too close to her. There were no shadows in her eyes, or tension in the set of her mouth. He touched a callused fingertip to the pencil outline of her lips.