They went through this process for each of the sacred directions. Keeho commanded every aspect of each round. He entreated the spirits, led the prayers, initiated the songs, and controlled the amount of heat and steam within the lodge. Sometimes the singing and chants were loud and boisterous, and at other times, they were soft and low.

Sarah lost track of time and very nearly who she was within the dark facsimile of Mother Earth's womb. She couldn't even remember the ending of the last two endurances, and now it was time for the fourth and final folota.

A drum sounded and Sarah wondered why she hadn't heard it before. Suddenly, the intense heat disappeared. A gentle spring breeze cooled her body. Sarah laughed aloud, realizing that she still had her eyes closed. She opened them and met a breathtakingly beautiful blue sky. She knew that she was still in the lodge. Part of her could hear the elders chanting and Keeho praying.

Sarah stood and turned in all directions. She was in the lodge, but at the same time, she was standing out in the open prairie. Every one of her senses felt ten times more acute. She could smell the loamy earth under her feet and feel the tall gra.s.s as it brushed against her hands. The prairie was alive and Sarah was a part of that life. The vista changed and the spring gra.s.s dried. Leaves fell from the trees and nuts and berries fell to the ground. It was fall.

Her newly heightened senses picked up an unmistakable odor.

Smoke.

Suddenly, there was a feeling like panic rushing through her. Everywhere she turned, animals ran in different directions. Sarah clapped her hands over her ears to shut out the sound of thunder. It was as if she were right on top of a thunderhead. The sound grew so loud it shook the earth. Her eyes opened wide when she realized that the sound wasn't thunder.

Looking in all directions, she saw walls of burning hot flames. They quickly spread across the range, feeding on everything in their path. Just ahead of the flames came the source of the deafening sound. It was cattle and buffalo, hundreds of thousands of them. Mixed breeds of cows, longhorns, and ma.s.sive buffaloes the size of which she'd never seen before. They all rushed away from the red-hot evil nipping at their heels.

Sarah watched helplessly as the animals vied for escape, but suddenly, wires sprang up before them. Barbed wire and tall fencing, the sort the cattlemen used to mark their land. The animals had no way to escape. The fire ran at them from the rear and the wire halted their progress. It didn't matter to the crazed animals. They pressed in and strangled the animals in the front with the wire.

Sarah screamed again and again. She shouted and yelled at the beasts to stop their stampede, but there was nowhere else for them to turn. The white man's wire blocked their only route of escape. Thousands of animals trampled one another as still more were cut to shreds by the razor-sharp wire. Sarah could do no more than weep at the sight, crumpling to the ground in her fatigue and anguish.

When she looked up again, the clan surrounded the dying animals. Now the cattle were gone and only the scores of buffalo remained, huge beasts that lowed, snorted, and tore at the ground in their anger and frustration. Soon, even they succ.u.mbed, trampled underneath their brothers' hooves.

Sarah saw Tima and the others of the clan that she had grown to love so well. She thought that perhaps they would help her save the animals. It became apparent that the Chahta had no knowledge of how to save the buffalo. The beasts supported the people of the clan, but the Chahta could not undo the white man's power.

Sarah watched, and with every buffalo that fell, a member of the clan disappeared in the mist that surrounded them. She felt a voice inside her head again, but this time, it wasn't Keeho. The voice told her that once the buffalo were gone, the Chahta people would pa.s.s away also.

"No!" Sarah screamed out when, one by one, the buffalo dropped to the ground.

"Help us, Sakli." Tima raised one hand to Sarah as the white mist engulfed her body.

"No!" Sarah screamed one last time.

She thought she had already been lying on the ground, but how could that be, she wondered, as her legs crumpled underneath her. The last thing she remembered was the feel of the moist earth below her cheek and the oppressive heat as the flames swallowed her.

Devlin had paced the same patch of ground for hours. She was on the verge of being punished by her grandfather for her earlier behavior outside of the prayer lodge. Now she risked banishment by interrupting a medicine man's ceremony, but the only thing on Devlin's mind was Sarah.

"Do not," Tima warned as she spied Devlin eyeing the entrance to Keeho's chuka.

"I need to know how she is. What could be taking so long?" Devlin hissed.

Tima didn't answer, but Devlin didn't need to hear one. Devlin could see by the expression on her mother's face that Tima was worried, as well. It had taken three men to hold Devlin when she had heard Sarah scream the second time. Devlin had tried to cling to her beliefs, but the idea that Sarah needed her pushed every other thought into second place.

Tima had tried to calm Devlin, but it was nearly impossible for the men to hang on to the hysterical woman. When at last the fire keeper opened the prayer lodge, two men carried Sarah's limp body out and straight to Keeho's chuka.

"Redhawk, Tima, come," Keeho ordered from inside the chuka. His voice was hoa.r.s.e and he looked as if he'd just run the footrace of his life.

Devlin rushed into the chuka and would have burst into tears at the sight before her had she been alone. "Sarah!" she cried out as she dropped to her knees and crushed Sarah with a fierce hug.

"It's all right, love," Sarah whispered. "I'm okay."

She didn't feel okay. In fact, Sarah felt as if all the energy in her body had been wrung out of her like a dirty shirt on wash day. Sweat and grime covered her, and her golden hair was plastered around her face. The acrid odor of herbs clung to her hair and skin.

"How is she really?" Devlin asked Keeho.

"She has seen much." Keeho looked at Sarah with something like admiration evident in his gaze. "She is drained and needs to eat and rest, but she will be fine. It was the intensity of the vision and no malady that struck her."

Sarah sat up slowly, as if it were a great effort to move. "I know what Taano's message means, Dev," she said in a tired voice.

"Later, sachu-kash," Devlin said. "You need to get some rest first."

"No, Dev, it can't wait, it's too important." Sarah looked at Keeho and Tima, then into Devlin's eyes. How can I tell them that with the end of the buffalo comes the end of the Chahta? Sarah remembered that Tima had told her that, as a medicine woman, Sarah would be privy to information that might have to be kept from the clan. Sarah knew she wasn't a clan mother, but she made the decision anyway.

"There's going to be a prairie fire...in the fall, I think. Hundreds of thousands of cattle and buffalo will die because of the ranchers' wire fences. That's what Taano meant when he said the buffalo must run free. I saw them, Dev. It was horrible. The way they died was just hideous."

Sarah leaned into Devlin's embrace. Devlin didn't need to look into Keeho's face as he nodded, confirming Sarah's vision as truth. She could see it in Sarah's eyes, feel it in the way Sarah's body trembled. It was as if she were reliving the horror of that moment once again.

Sarah pulled away from Devlin and ran a hand through her long hair. She looked at her arm, covered in sweat, dirt, and bits of dried gra.s.s. "Good Lord, I'm a mess."

Sarah smiled weakly at Devlin, and Devlin felt better. Sarah was becoming more like herself again. Devlin continued to hold Sarah, needing the constant contact.

"I will speak with the elders. I will tell everyone of your vision, Sakli. Now that we know the riddle, perhaps the spirits will bless us with the answer. Go rest, little one. You have done well," Keeho said.

Tima stayed to speak with Keeho, but Devlin helped Sarah to her feet. Keeho wrapped an extra blanket around Sarah's shoulders before sending her from his chuka.

"Are you okay with walking?" Devlin asked with concern.

Sarah had to admit that she was unsteady when she first stood but was now feeling stronger, although mentally exhausted. "I have to clean up. I need a bath," she said, turning toward the creek.

"It's pretty darned cold."

"I think I'm too filthy to care. I feel like I'm covered in dirt. Tell me the truth," Sarah stopped to look up at Devlin, "how do I look?"

"Not too bad..." Devlin trailed off.

Sarah chuckled as they reached the water and she laid the blanket on the bank. "So diplomatic of you. I know I look-"

"Absolutely beautiful," Devlin interjected. She suddenly realized that Sarah was removing her wrap. "What are you doing?" she asked in surprise and turned to eye one of the young men with a fishing spear who stood in knee-deep water a short way off.

"I'm going to bathe."

"Well, why don't we go downstream a ways? It's quieter and...I thought you didn't like bathing in front of other people," Devlin tried to say in a low voice.

"I'm just too tired to care, love." Sarah dipped her body into the cool water. She scrubbed her face and body, working on her hair next.

Devlin tried to use her own body to block anyone's view of Sarah. She could have sworn that the young man fishing had sneaked an eyeful. By this time, Devlin was standing in the water up to her knees, and the brave sat on the bank removing a fish from his p.r.o.nged spear.

"What are you looking at?" Devlin growled in warning.

"Uh, nothing," he said.

"Haven't you got anything better to do?"

"No," the brave said in confusion.

"Then find something!" Devlin hissed and the young man scuttled backward like a crab. He grabbed his gear and moved off to the deeper part of the stream.

"Dev?"

"Hmm, what?" Devlin finally came out of her watchdog stance to look at her lover.

"Are you taking a bath, too?" Sarah asked.

"What?"

Devlin followed Sarah's gaze in the direction of her own legs, all the way to her boots, which were underwater.

Sarah laughed and the sound was so precious to Devlin's ears that she was willing to look the fool. Devlin grinned and walked to the bank. "I was just cleaning my boots off," she muttered.

Sarah didn't understand why, but for the first time in a long while, her laughter felt completely free. She finished her bath, much to Devlin's consternation and, shivering, wrapped herself tightly in the warm blanket.

They shared an afternoon meal with Tima within Tima's chuka and spoke of only inconsequential things.

"I have many things to do yet today," Tima said. She touched each woman as she left the chuka. Devlin suspected Tima understood the need for Sarah and her to share some time alone.

"Come here, sachu-kash," Devlin said.

Sarah needed no further coaxing. She lay beside Devlin, feeling a strange energy within her own body. She knew she should be tired. She had been devoid of strength when she left Keeho's chuka, but now, it was as if there was something humming inside of her.

"We need to go home, Dev," Sarah said. "We need to talk to people, see if the a.s.sociation will help us. We have to get the ranchers to take down their fences."

"It won't be easy, sachu-kash."

Sarah leaned up on one elbow. "You believe me then?" She sounded surprised.

"Of course I do. Did you think I wouldn't?"

"I don't know. Dev, what happened to me in that lodge, it was the strangest, oddest thing I have ever experienced, but for some reason, it all felt...I don't know." Sarah brushed her bangs from her forehead. "It felt perfectly natural. I was afraid at first, but once it was happening, it felt right somehow. I know I'm explaining it badly, but-"

"Sarah," Devlin interrupted. "This is the way my people live. None of it seems strange to me. I'm happy and surprised that you're able to accept it so willingly. I've never spoken of these things because I thought it might disturb you. The spirits are talking to you. It's a great honor. It's almost as if you were already Chahta."

I am Chahta...I have always been Chahta.

The words that had come unbidden into Sarah's mind at the prayer lodge called to her again.

"There was more to my vision, Dev." Sarah moved herself into a sitting position beside Devlin. "More that I didn't tell the others." She guiltily revealed the rest.

"Maybe I'm interpreting it incorrectly." Sarah attempted to rationalize her feelings.

"No, I think your first impression was correct." Devlin looked up at Sarah with sad eyes. "This isn't the first time I've heard this. Anyone who knows the land and how it was before the white man swept west feels the same way. For thousands of years, mutual need has tied together the buffalo and the tribes on the plains. Our clan's been blessed. Our village still stands where it was when I met them. Most of the Indians on the prairies in the west are nomadic. They go where the buffalo go." Devlin paused to touch Sarah's face.

"I think you're right, Sa. Your vision tells us of a great disaster, but I think it says so much more. If the buffalo disappear from this land, I think so too will the clan. As a people, they'll still exist, but I think their way of life will fade. That will be the real loss. These people, all the tribes across the land, knew this earth thousands of years before the white man got here. Now the government reduces them to nothing more than slave status. They have to go where and when the government tells them."

Sarah felt an incredible sadness for a race of people who had suddenly learned that they were no longer the captains of their own fate. "If people like me had never come west, we wouldn't be having this problem," she said tearfully.

"Sa, there has always been enough for all. It was never the white man's entry into this land that brought about destruction. It was what he brought with him, his mentality and his thought that he had the right to take what he could. The Indian people look at the land as if they are a part of it. They are just one point in a circle that includes everything that has life. The white man looks at it as something he needs to own, to bend to his will."

"Why? I don't understand why it had to be that way." Frustrated, Sarah balled her hands into fists.

"Who can say why one man has certain instincts and another doesn't? The Chahta believe that all men came from the same original tribes. Somewhere along the line, they separated. Grandfather tells a story that describes the people who came west across this land as Indian tribes. He seems to remember that his grandfather told him that the tribes that traveled east became the white men."

Sarah settled herself back against Devlin, her body growing tired. It was almost as if she had the energy to have this discussion and no more than that. She thought about all the mysteries of life surrounding her in this Chahta village. She wondered how differently she would look at the happenings in her life now.

"Tell me one of your grandfather's stories, Dev."

"A story?"

"Mm-hmm. Something to make me forget bad thoughts."

Devlin wrapped the fur robe around Sarah and kissed the top of her still damp hair. Devlin grinned and knew what tale she would tell. "This is a short story, but when I was younger, it always made me think. It still makes me smile because it reminds me to be thankful for what I have." She crossed her ankles and placed her arm around Sarah's shoulder.

"I asked my grandfather how the racc.o.o.n and the opossum could be brothers when they looked so different from each other. He said the racc.o.o.n's beautiful fur coat had always been a source of envy for brother opossum. He said that at one time, the opossum and the racc.o.o.n had thick furry coats.

"One late summer day, racc.o.o.n and opossum met and stopped to speak. As they relaxed, opossum looked at his brother's finely colored coat, but especially his exquisite tail. You see, the opossum and his brother had shared the same plain coat, just as Hashtahli had made them.

"'Halito, brother, are you well?' racc.o.o.n asked.

"'Halito, brother, yes, I am well, and you?' opossum asked back.

"'Yes, I am well, too,' racc.o.o.n replied.

"Now the opossum was admiring his brother's fine tail so much that he couldn't think of anything else to say.

"'Where are you off to this morning?' racc.o.o.n asked.

"'I'm on my way to the forest,' opossum said, all the while staring at racc.o.o.n's tail.

"'What for?'

"'For persimmons. I love persimmons and I hear they're almost ripe.'

"'Well, I just pa.s.sed a persimmon grove and the trees are all full, so you're just in time,' racc.o.o.n said.

"'Where are you off to then, c.o.o.n?'

"'I'm going down to the creek to look for crawdads.'

"'Oh, I just came from the creek. There are crawdads everywhere!' opossum said as his gaze drifted to his brother's tail once again. 'Your tail is so beautiful, c.o.o.n. How did you get it that way, with the rings all around?'

"'I took hickory bark, wrapped it around my tail, then singed it. That's how I got the colored rings.'