She Paints My Soul by Karen Kay

Author:Karen Kay [Kay, Karen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: P K & J
Published: 2023-07-30T18:30:00+00:00

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

As Strikes Fast sat on the opposite side of the fire from his wife, he gazed at her with all the love and admiration in his heart, it was true, but, within his glance was also a great quantity of apprehension. All through the previous night, he had tried to envision how to begin to tell this woman what he must. However, even as tired as he'd been after their escape from the storm, he had tossed about, nightmares of his past consuming his dreams. These were not the dreams of medicine nor power, however. He knew the difference.

So frightening had the nightmares been, he had sat up in the middle of the night, jerking himself awake. What was he to do? How could he say to her what he had promised he would and expect her to still love him? Truly, not dying, not fighting, not even the Cree war party frightened him as much as sharing his secrets with this woman.

What would her response be? Would she tell him she could never remain married to the man she would soon discover him to be? Would she leave him? Would he then be alone…again?

Those deeds he had committed in his past he knew were wrong. Yet, he had considered himself to be well justified in seeking revenge, hadn't he? After all, the Pikuni had killed his entire family, with the exception of himself and his sister. They had also slaughtered the young woman he had once been pledged to marry.

But, his rage and his triumph at seeking his rightful revenge had taken a wrong path. Perhaps if he had known the specific men who had committed the murders, and maybe if he had sought out only those men, he wouldn't now be less than human.

The old Crow medicine man who had once been his teacher had warned him against taking any other lives than those who had committed the crime. Also, this same medicine man, Weasel Fighter, had gone on to instruct him in the proper way to seek war against the slayers of his family. Weasel Fighter had even carefully predicted what would happen to him spiritually were he to take innocent lives.

But, he hadn't listened. Éeh, yes, he had been young at the time; he had been alone and grieving. But, were these reasons enough to really justify his actions against others?

And, always there were the spirits of his dead relatives who, even to this very day, encouraged him to do more, to kill more. Additionally, the ghosts of the innocent lives he had destroyed sometimes haunted him.

Indeed, it was true; he was haunted…by the dead. Never did the images of his dead relatives and the innocent lives he had taken recede.

He had taken revenge too far, to the point where he no longer felt empathy for another. Didn't being human infer having or feeling humanity for others? And, except for the Pikuni brothers and the medicine man, Gray Falcon, he'd felt nothing for anyone, especially the Pikuni—no sympathy, no empathy, nothing—until this woman.

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