Shattered Lives (Flynn Family Saga Book 1) by Erica Graham Read Free Book Online Page B

the fire.  “I don’t know.  I
wanted—I had to get Timmy away from there.  They were going to kill him.  I
guess I thought I could track down Pathfinder...”  His voice trailed off into
silence.
    Ridgeton sighed.  “He couldn’t take you back.  Not
right now.  In the past six months, there have been massacres on both sides. 
Do you have any family anywhere?”
    Eagle Heart shook his head.
    “You could stay with me,” Ridgeton said quietly.
    Eagle Heart stared at him.  “Why?”
    Ridgeton looked away.  “It’s been lonely since Light
On The Water died.”  He looked back at Eagle Heart.  “ I’ve been lonely,”
he said in Lakota.
    Tears burned Eagle Heart’s eyes.  “So have I,” he
said in the same language.
    “Light On The Water called me Shadow Beneath The
Trees, because when I hunt, I am as silent as a shadow.  My friends call me
Shadow.”
    Eagle Heart nodded, mindful of the honor Ridgeton
bestowed on him by giving him his true name.
    “Tell me about your friend.”
    Eagle Heart drew a deep breath.  “His name was Timothy
Brown.  He was brave and smart and funny...”  And so, Eagle Heart spoke of his
friend, in the way of the Lakota, in the language of the Lakota.  And Ridgeton
listened.  And when Eagle Heart was finished speaking, Ridgeton spoke of his
wife, also in Lakota.  They talked long into the night, and for Eagle Heart, a
little of his sorrow eased with the telling.
    *  *  *
    In the morning, they broke camp.  Eagle Heart and Shadow
Beneath The Trees traveled north until they came to a sheltered valley.
    Shadow stopped at the top of a hill.  He stared at
the valley a long time.  “I spent so many winters here with Light On The
Water.  We lived in the tipi she made with her own two hands.  I burned it when
I built her scaffold.”  He turned to Eagle Heart.  “But we need to find a way
to live in peace with the whites, Eagle Heart.  So I think we need to build a
cabin.  We won’t live in it, most of the time.  Only in winter.  The rest of
the time, I’ll take you to all the places I’ve seen.  I’ll teach you the trails—and
the ways that aren’t trails but will get you where you need to go when the
trails aren’t safe.  I’ll teach you where to find water from here to the snows
that never melt in the north.  If you’d like that.”
    Eagle Heart looked down at the valley.  The brown
grass was beginning to turn green, and there were buds on the trees.  It was
good to hear the language of his people again.  And as Shadow spoke of the
mountains that raked the sky and a canyon so large it could almost swallow the
world, he longed to see these things for himself.  He nodded.
    Shadow smiled and nodded back.  Then, he led the way
into the valley.  Together, they felled the first tree.
    *  *  *
    Two years later, Eagle Heart and Alexander Ridgeton
returned to the valley.  Eagle Heart smiled with pride when he saw the cabin he
and Ridgeton had built.  The cabin nestled next to a tall pine.  There was a
lean-to for the horses and a small corral.  The two men rode into the valley
and dismounted, almost in unison.  They seldom spoke now.  They had seen both
beauty and sorrow together, both of which were too great for words.
    Eagle Heart swatted the rump of his pony and let him
graze freely.  Ridgeton folded his arms on the top rail of the fence and
watched as the two horses frisked in the crisp March air.
    “We’ll have to go to Leavenworth for supplies soon,”
Ridgeton said reluctantly.
    Eagle Heart nodded.  He, too, was loathe to return
to the white world after the vast silence of the wild.
    They spent the night in the cabin, and in the
morning, they rode toward Fort Leavenworth.  Just outside the stockade,
Ridgeton laid a hand on the bridle of Eagle Heart’s pony.  “Inside the
stockade, your name is Flynn.”
    Eagle Heart nodded.
    The two men rode through the stockade gate.
    “I tell you, there’s gonna be a war.”  The