CHAPTER ONE
Two Years Later
Standing at the railing of the hurricane deck on the steamship, The Wanderer, Briella Fehér inhaled the fresh, yet muddy scent of the Missouri River while a curious sensation shot over her nerves.
She pushed her hair back from her face, tangling it because the wind that blew in from the west was strong as it swirled around this open deck.
Looking outward from the starboard side of the steamboat, she stared at the rugged gray and white cliffs shooting up from the river's bed.
At present, they were mirroring the bright red-and-pink colors of a morning sunrise, making them look very much like a gift from the Creator instead of mere land masses.
Briella remembered these same cliffs, recalled lying belly down and behind some scrub bushes on this very shoreline of the Missouri River.
She had been eight years old at the time and had been scouting, along with her brother George and her tutor at the time, Red Fox, as they all three had looked up at the very top of the cliffs, which had appeared to her to resemble the ruins of medieval castles rather than an act of God.
George and Red Fox had been scouring the environment at the time, looking for hidden war parties and had barely paid her any attention.
She recalled commenting to them both via sign language on how the bluffs appeared to resemble old castles from some long-gone civilization.
George had scoffed at her, of course, and he'd responded using sign language to say, "I have climbed those cliffs with Red Fox, and I can safely say there are no rooms or hallways within them. They are solid through and through."
Briella smiled at the memory, allowing her attention to return to the present. Ah, how she loved this land and these people who claimed this country as their own. Closing her eyes, she felt the thrill of coming home rush through her. She was back in Indian Territory—this, her home.
Saying a silent prayer to herself, she spoke to the Creator and entreated, "May this land ever be my home, and these people, the Pikuni people, be ever my own tribe."
A loud bell rang aboard the steamboat, signaling they were soon to round a bend in the river. Briella caught her breath, inhaling the warm and pleasant dry air, recognizing the scent of willow and cottonwood trees.
For these past two years, she had been gone from here. Two years too long, it was.
I am coming home to you, Red Fox. I have changed, yes. And, perhaps those changes you will not appreciate, but I am coming home to you all the same.
Had Red Fox married another in these past two years? One of the last letters she had received from her parents had insinuated Red Fox had, at last, found comfort in the institution of marriage—and with a sweet and pretty Pikuni girl. Was it true?
Briella had, of course, written to George asking him about Red Fox and if it were factual: was Red Fox now married? But, she had received no reply. Why?
As Briella gazed outward from the steamship's railing, the boat negotiated the bend in the river and she was able to look westward, taking in the beloved sight of the distant rugged-peaked, white-topped mountains.
There would be snow there, she knew. It was too early for the snow at those peaks to have melted.
Oh, how she had missed this, her country, almost as much as she had missed the man she still loved.
This land, this man, were a part of who she was, and neither could be easily taken away from her, though her elder brother Frederic, as well as her father, had arranged to take her away from all this.
They had both tried to change her, insisting it was for her own good.
Thinking about it now, she wondered if perhaps they were right.
They certainly knew the history of the indigenous people in this land better than she.
But, right or wrong, it made no difference to her.
She loved this land owned and roamed by the Pikuni people; to her, the Pikuni tribe and this land were hers.
Nothing…absolutely nothing could change this.
She caught a whiff of another scent she recognized: it was the sweet fragrance of sage, most likely drifting up to her from the green and grassy shoreline.
She closed her eyes as she remembered its pleasant fragrance from a moment in the past when it had combined with the smoke from a cozy fire within her sister Czanna's Pikuni lodge.
Briella had been helping her sister cook the evening meal; Red Fox had been there, too, she recalled.
Yes, she was returning to this land and to the Pikuni people she loved, but she carried with her now so many problems, she felt overly burdened with them. Indeed, she had little idea of how to solve her troubles, though they plagued her ceaselessly.
Her attention was taken again by the bluffs and hills, and, briefly, she caught sight of a lone wolf standing on the high plains that stretched out northward from behind the bluffs and peaks rising high above the river.
The animal seemed to gaze back at her with what appeared to be interest. She caught the eye of the creature and spoke aloud, but only in a murmur, "Will you help me, O wise wolf?
You, who are the smartest of all the Creator's creatures?
I am in so much trouble, and I fear…I fear what I might discover at the end of my journey. Will you help me?"
And then, because Red Fox had taught her how to listen, she "heard" in a manner of concepts, the wolf's reply, and it said, "Do not fear. It is he who has sent me to tell you he welcomes you again to his country."
"But, I hear he is now married," she answered. "Do you know if this be true?"
"He welcomes you home. This is all he instructed me to tell you," the wolf said in mind-to-mind speak.
"Then, I…I thank you" was all she murmured. She watched as the wolf looked away from her before it appeared to become alarmed, and then it scurried away.
Shortly thereafter, she heard the snicker of her fiancé's voice over the roar of the steamboat's engine only seconds before the man made a derogatory sound with his lips.
With great indignity, her fiancé, James Maximillian III, said, "What a bore this journey is, m'dear.
Yes, indeed, I will be glad to put this unpleasant duty behind me. "
"Oh, Max, my darling. I will be happy when it is done, too," cooed James Maximillian's mistress, Shiela Neuerman; although, for the delicacy of the general society, Sheila was known as Briella's companion.
"How I wish to be amongst my friends in New York.
But, it is necessary for you, after all, to be here to reinforce the plans for your marriage and your eventual inheritance of the bank.
I only hope she will not object too strenuously to our relationship. "
"Do not worry, m'dear. As I have told you before, my betrothed has promised to not interfere in my affairs once we are married."
"I know. But, oh, how I wish it were I who could openly be your bride instead of that…that…cowgirl." She almost spit out the last word.
"Sh-h-h-h! We are too near her quarters. She might overhear us."
Briella wished fervently that she had not heard them since this gave her only one of two choices: confront them here and now, demanding they become more discreet in their communications, or simply fade into the background and pretend she hadn't overheard their slander.
Deciding on the former, she stepped away from the shadows of the guest quarters on the texas deck of the steamship and took a few strides in the direction from where their voices had come.
But, when she realized the two of them were strolling away from her toward the stairway leading down to the boiler deck and the Grand Saloon, she realized they were most likely seeking to partake in their breakfast meal.
Slowly, Briella exhaled. Turning then in the opposite direction, she paced toward the bow of the ship, ignoring the wind whipping around her face.
With the sound of the water splashing up against the steamboat and the scent of the pines that bordered the river filling the air, she recalled again how it had all started…
It had begun with a mutual recognition of love between herself and Red Fox.
And, so it had been; although, it had been almost two years ago when, after surviving a buffalo stampede, she and Red Fox had approached her father to ask for his blessing before the two of them committed the act which would make them man and wife.
Both she and Red Fox had been required as scouts to return to the Pikuni camp and relate all they had learned about the buffalo herd to the chiefs, and this they had done.
Then, with their duty behind them, both she and Red Fox, with her brother George's help, had singled out about fifty of the ponies from Red Fox's herd of over a hundred horses.
These, both she and Red Fox had driven toward her father's homestead—it being settled in close to the confluence of the Marias and the Teton Rivers…
Both Briella and Red Fox were smiling at one another as they walked the short distance to her parents' homestead.
Red Fox's buffalo pony and her own horse were trailing behind them as Red Fox and she led their mounts by their buckskin reins.
They had left fifty of Red Fox's best horses in a pasture about a quarter mile away from her parents' home.
Shortly, they came into sight of her parents' ranch. She swooned a little, it being hard for her to believe this handsome man—so good, so kind and patient with her—loved her, too.