The King`s Commission

As he came more awake, and listened to the sounds of the Creek town beginning to stir around their chickee, he was filled with an out-of-character sadness, not just because he had to leave her behind and probably never see her again. There was sadness regarding the whole Indian way of life, too. From all that McGilliveray and Cowell had said, there was little hope that the Creeks could retain their ancient traditions. The Rebels, who styled themselves Americans now, would press against the borders, the rum and whiskey and trade goods would contaminate the old ways. If there was unity of purpose for now between the Creeks and Seminolee and the fragments of other tribes, then it would not last long, and they would face their future uncoordinated, prey to any outside aggression. Even if Cowell and McGilliveray could convince the Shelburne government to commit troops and money to retake Florida with Indian help, the Indians would still wither away in the face of white civilization, nibbled to death instead of going out in one brave battle. There was no place for them to run, no lands further west that did not already have owners. They could survive by imitating white ways of living, but at what a price, and how much suffering and degradation?

And this dear little girl sleeping so soundly beside him would be doomed to be a part of it, one of the losing side, and, God help him, so would the child she carried-his child. Nobody had ever come back on him with a bastard and a belly-plea for support (so far, anyway), and he began to worry about what he might do, what he might be able to leave behind, some legacy or something of value to improve Rabbit's life, and the child's life, against the bad times to come.

God, what a bloody mess I've made of things, he thought, railing against his nature. If she wasn't pregnant, I could ride out of here without a backward glance, I think. Knowing our politicians, they'll not want to put out a penny more than needed, which means nothing Cowell dreamed up will ever be put into action. Rabbit'll be just another victim we've lied to. Oh shit, if this is growing up and acting like an adult, then I don't care for it, thank you very much.

He clasped his arms tighter about her and she nuzzled to him deep in sleep, her soft, satiny-smooth flesh warm against his, maddeningly sensuous and comforting. He breathed deep of her aromas of hair and flesh, clean woman-smell and hint of sweat, the faint scent of their love-making, her exotic muskiness of burned pine and loamy earth, of deer hide and cooking, native greases or oils with which she had been anointed for the marriage ceremony, and the foresty smell of the chickee and the green wood and mats around them.

'Ah-lan,' she cooed, coming awake as he held her too tight.

'Dear little Soft Rabbit,' he whispered back, brushing her cheek with his lips, feeling an almost fierce desire to protect her from all that would come.

'Ah-lan… mine,' she said, drawing his face down to her hot round breasts inside the blanket, stroking his head and hair and making pleased noises as he sprang into sudden, overful arousal, willing as any bride for another proof of love before dawn. She rolled onto her back and stroked his back, drawing him between her open thighs.

'In for the penny, in for the bloody pound,' he told her with a shaky laugh. 'One for the road, old girl?'

'Ah-lan mine!' she giggled.

Chapter 7

There had been a lot more room in the boats on the journey back down-river. The man Tom/Red Coat had come along, just to see the coast region once more, and get a share of rum, most likely. While the Creeks and Seminolee went overland with pack-horses and mules, the men from Shrike were alone with their own kind for the first time in over two weeks, and it felt odd.

Not totally alone, even so. McGilliveray, still dressed Indian fashion, was with them, and Cowell in his new deerskin clothing, and three of McGilliveray/White Turtle's younger male kin and their traveling girls. And Rabbit.

At the last, Alan could not bear to leave her, and she could not bear to let him ride away on a spotted Seminolee horse and never be with her new husband again, and against his better judgement, he had let her accompany him. She rode as well as he did, it turned out, and she and the traveling girls did all the cooking for their party, delaying the day the soldiers and sailors had to fend for themselves again.

Not that he had minded the night on the trail, or the night in a Seminolee chickee at the lake where they had left their boats, for she had left him wheezing after their passion. She had never been in a real boat before, but adjusted quickly, and sat aft with him at the tiller of the twenty-five-foot launch, treating the whole trip like a honeymoon jaunt, and full of wonder at the life in the swamps, which she had never seen. And when Cony or Andrews fetched her an egret plume or some flamingo feathers she was as delighted as any miss just given a ruby bracelet. The hands treated her as deferentially as they would have a proper officer's wife, and she had begun to feel like a queen, or a chief's bride.

'You talwa!' she exclaimed, after McGilliveray had talked to her about what Alan did in the Royal Navy.

'Not a chief, dear,' Alan laughed. 'My captain is chief. I am his mikko. Tell her, McGilliveray.'

With Soft Rabbit by his side, he felt charitable enough to accept the whole world, even McGilliveray and his ponderous lecturing.

'And an imathla lubotskulgi,' McGilliveray informed her to her great delight. 'A little warrior, too young to be an imathla thlukulgi, a big warrior chief. But he has killed many foes, haven't you, Lewrie? How many, do you think, so that I may praise you to the skies to her?'

'Well, I've fought two duels, cut one and killed the other. With swords, mind, not pistols at twenty paces,' Alan bragged. 'Damme, maybe a dozen more in boarding melees.'

'Most impressive.'

'And God knows how many with artillery,' Alan concluded.

Soft Rabbit was thrilled that her man was such a bloody-handed warrior, and her awe of him, which was already considerable, went to new heights of reverence after McGilliveray translated that to her.

'She says she is honored to be the wife of such a brave young man, and is sure that your son shall be a man- slaughtering Hector as well, she'll make sure of it. Man-Killer will be his father and will teach him to be a warrior.'

'Man-Killer? He'll be her husband when I'm gone?'

'No, you misunderstand. It's more important to Muskogee who your mother's relatives are,' McGilliveray went on, happy to find an opportunity to preach. 'The husband and father is not of the mother's clan, where she shall live. She's Wind Clan now, a very important clan in our way of life, and Man-Killer and all the males are her uncles, so to speak, and they fill the role of the father when it comes to rearing the child. You are only of their fire, anhissi, which means friend. What clan you are doesn't matter, as long as you weren't Wind Clan. Marrying into your own clan is a sin.'

'She'll be well-treated, won't she?' Alan pressed.

'Do you really care, Lewrie?' McGilliveray asked, almost mocking him.

'Damme, yes I do care,' he shot back, putting an arm around her, which she understood more than words, and she came up from her pad of blanket between the thwarts to sit at his side.

'Yes, she shall be well-treated,' McGilliveray finally softened, after taking a long moment to consider Alan's fierceness on the subject. 'She will have an honored place in my mother's huti, and in the clan. I suppose, technically speaking, she could never re-marry as long as you are alive and could come back to claim her. But since we both know that you shall never see her again, it would best if she used your absence at the next Green Corn Ceremony as proof that the marriage didn't take. Love-matches can be repented then, if they aren't working out, even if children have already resulted. Being with child will make her more desirable as a wife, since it proves she is fecund and able to bear children. She could do right well.'

'I'd like to leave something for her, something to help her in future. What do you suggest?' Alan asked in a soft voice, and some of his concern and sadness must have communicated to Rabbit, for she tucked her head onto his shoulder and hugged him back, eyes downcast.

'As a sop to your conscience?' McGilliveray snapped.