Candace McCarthy by Fireheart Page B

hers.
    “Why don’t you put it on?” Mary eyed her young cousin with concern. Since her return to the village, Joanna had slowly become more at ease, yet the girl was holding back her emotions. What had happened to the spirited young child who had lived among the Indians?
    I did that to her, Mary thought. I sent her to a life that tethered her happiness and spirit.
    “Perhaps I’ll wear it later,” Joanna said.
    Mary kept her concern hidden as she nodded before setting out to prepare dinner.
    The guests in the village were easily accommodated. The eight women and ten children had been taken into Lenape homes, many of them invited into the larger wigwams with a few settling into the small dome-shaped lodges like Mary’s. Watching Mary gather the implements needed to prepare the main meal, Joanna began to wonder about her cousin’s life.
    Why didn’t Mary have any children? There were too many years and too much that had happened between them for Joanna to ask.
    Mary would have made a good mother, Joanna thought. Hadn’t her cousin stepped into the role for her after her mother died?
    She began to realize that while life had been terribly unpleasant for her, perhaps it hadn’t been a cup filled with happiness for Mary either.
    “May I help?” Joanna asked as she bent to help Mary move a large sack of ground corn from under a sleeping platform.
    Their hands touched briefly as they dragged the sack to where they could reach it more easily. Mary glanced at her with such affection that Joanna felt the resurgence of tears.
    “I would like that. Thank you,” Mary said quietly.
    Joanna nodded and asked what she could do to assist.
     
     
    Fireheart entered the wigwam of Moon Dove’s clan and followed Moon Dove to where the maiden’s mother sat on a rush mat, shelling beans.
    “I have brought him, mother,” Moon Dove said.
    The old woman looked up from her bowl of beans. “Fireheart, I must speak with you about my son White Cat.”
    Surprised, the brave inclined his head and took a seat on the mat that Moon Dove, on her mother’s instructions, had set on the dirt floor for him.
    “You may leave us, daughter,” Berry Tree said.
    Moon Dove appeared relieved before she went away.
    Fireheart watched her leave before turning back to the girl’s mother. He found himself the object of Berry Tree’s intense scrutiny.
    “You like Moon Dove?” she asked.
    “Kihiila,” he said, surprised by the question.
    “Why have you not asked her to be your wife?” the woman demanded with a puzzled look.
    “I do not wish to take a wife now.”
    Berry Tree made a derisive sound. “You are a good warrior. Soon Wild Squirrel will die and you will be chief.”
    “Wild Squirrel has many years as our chief.”
    The woman shoved a pile of beans in Fireheart’s direction, and with a nod of her head instructed him to shell them.
    Fireheart did so, without thought, even though the job was women’s work.
    “Wild Squirrel is doing well. He will recover and be the leader of our people,” the brave said.
    Her expression filled with compassion, Berry Tree shook her head. “Wild Squirrel has been ill for much longer than he has shown. He grows tired of this life. The Spirit World calls him.”
    Fireheart scowled as he opened a bean pod and separated bean from shell before throwing the bean in with the others in Berry Tree’s bowl. “Why do you say this?”
    “It is something I know. Something I feel.”
    “Must we speak of our chief?” Fireheart frowned. “You wish to talk about White Cat, your son.”
    Berry Tree gazed at him a long time without answering. Fireheart shifted uncomfortably under her gaze, but continued to shell beans while waiting for her to speak. “My son wishes to know when his sister will marry,” she said. “And he wishes the great warrior Fireheart to take him on a hunt.”
    Fireheart raised his eyebrows at the first, then smiled at the second statement. Despite the old age of Berry Tree, her son White Cat