Read Sweet Savage Surrender for Free Online

west of her tribe's camp grounds she knew just where she was going to take her precious burden.  Though she would have preferred taking him to the sweat lodge  or to the medicine lodge to be tended by her grandfather , her instincts warned her on such a brazen move.  Some of the braves did not like the white eyes and might stir up trouble.  Lone Wolf for one. They might resent her for bringing him to the village.  This was a time of change , when m ore white men were co ming, threatening to alter the Arapaho’s traditional nomadic way of life. She could not be assured that this white man would be totally safe among her people. She remembered a small cave she had discovered while searching for herbs. She must take him there , to the special place she thought of as her cave, where she often went to be alone .  It wasn't a deep cave , nor a wide one , but it would do for a hiding place. . As far as she knew , no one else was aware of its existence.  The cave was not too far away from camp, yet it was not so close that sea rching eyes would discover it.
    Somehow the thought of the w hite man being enclosed within Mother E arth in this shallo w cave and watched over by the Earth S pirit gave Skyraven the hope of a speedy re covery for the yellow-haired stranger .  It was as close to a sweat lodge as she could manage, considering the circumstances. Clasping her pouch closely to her chest s he guided her horse to a stop close to the mouth of the cave.  Positioning the white man safely on Running Antelope's back,  she  carefully slid from the animal .
    From the medicine pouch she took a small handful of the sage she had collected for her grandfather and walked to the mouth of the cave, sprinkling the poignant smelling herb along the way.  At the mouth of the cave's entrance , she turned in the directions-- east, t hen west, then north and south-- chanting softly.  When the cave was purified she collected some fallen branches and fashioned a bed, taking her own buffalo robe from her saddlebag and using it as a cover , then, hurriedly  collected some wood and started a fire to bring warmth to the chill of the cave.   She managed to bring the soldier to consciousness long enough to get him inside. Once inside the cave  she tried to make him as comfortable as possible.   He had drifted in and out of consciousness along the way, and now he moaned as he tos sed his head from side to side.
    Leaving him only for a moment, Skyraven gathered some horse mint which grew abundantly just outside the cave, chewed the leaves and placed the moistened vegetation on his most severe wounds to reduce any swelling and stop possible infection.  She secured the leaves by tying them to his wrists and arms with  wide rawhide strips. He winced and cried out  from time to time as she tended his injuries but drifted into a deep sleep, relishing the softness of the buffalo hide  as soon as she had completed the treatment.   Somehow he seemed to sense his danger was over.
    Skyraven let her eyes roam over what she could see of the whiteman's body.  His skin was several shades lighter than her people's , yet dark where the skin had been exposed to the sun.  His arms and chest were well-muscled.  Fine golden   hair covered his broad chest and trailed in a thin straight line down to his navel.  The strange red leggings kept her from seeing further yet she couldn't help but wonder if he was as well endowed below as the braves she had seen bathing in the river. She supposed all men were much the same. That unmaidenly thought caused her face to flame , for it was more like Whispering Wind's boldness than her own resolve. She hurriedly pushed such questions from her mind as being unseemly for a young woman who held su ch high honor in her tribe.
    While he slept , Skyraven climbed to the edge of the ridge and peered over.  Down below she could see the trail of smoke which rose from her village, swirling into the air. There were more than a