I sat alone by the window as the snow fell silently outside. It had been days since I left this spot, days since I had not had my eyes faced toward the window. How many days, I didn't know anymore.
"Little Mustang?" A voice from the door sounded softly.
I did not answer, I kept staring out at the ice gathering on the ground.
"You must eat something, or else you'll die." A white man- he told me his name was Clint- came toward me holding a bowl. His boots were dirty and he tracked mud in as he walked.
"You killed brother Red Hawk," I said to him when he had sat down next to me by the window.
Clint did not answer my remark, "eat." He placed the bowl in my lap.
"And Mother and Father."
"I told you how sorry I was."
"That will not bring them back," I gave the bowl back to him and made my way over to the other window. I loved the snow, and it seemed to be my only comfort in this strange place.
"Mustang," Clint had blue eyes that stared at me. He got up and joined me at the other window, placing his hand on my shoulder. I flinched away from him.
"Go away," I crossed my arms.
"Little Mustang, I'm truly sorry for the death of your parents, but you have to forgive me. I saved your life." Clint tried touching my shoulder again, but this time I swatted it away.
He finally stopped trying and walked out of the room, leaving me alone once again.
When all was silent, but still listening for boot steps, I went back over to where the cooling bowl of stew sat. Desperately, I devoured the stew, then laid down on the bed in the corner of the room, realizing just how hungry I was.
Later, Clint returned, carrying another bowl. At the sound of his boot heels and the smell of stew, I sat up, and when handed the bowl, I inhaled the food, then retreated back into the covers of the bed.
I feared this white man, although he gave me food and shelter, I feared. I had heard of the villages the white men burned and the women they defiled, and it terrified me. My own village had been burned, my family killed and my horse lamed, then shot. I had yet to receive the fate of the other women, and I wondered how far away I was from it.
***
The following night I decided to get out. My nightmares haunted me, and the fear of being hurt gripped me every time I heard Clint's footsteps coming.
I pried the window open and slipped out into the freezing cold. I ran off, but soon the biting wind turned me toward the town, where I found shelter in the saloon. Although it was crowded and stuffy and people unabashedly stared at me, it was warm, and I sat myself down at a table in the corner.
"Little Mustang, I thought you were back at the homestead, why did you run off?" Clint emerged from the crowd of cowboys at the bar. He sighed and shook his head as I tried to hide my shivering body from his sight.
"Is she Camanche?" A cowboy asked bluntly, roughly setting down a shot glass on the bar.
"Yes," Clint replied, sitting himself down next to me. He wrapped my hands in his, warming my icy fingers.
"Hey, that's the little girl you took from the village a fortnight past," another man whistled from the bar. He set down his drink and made his way over to me, taking hold of my braid. "Little Mustang; Cute for a Camanche girl." I pulled my braid from his fingers. "She runs fast like the wild horses." He grinned, and I shrunk back. I remembered him; he was the one who lit my village on fire. He had chased me on horseback for miles, until I had reached the woods, and had hidden amongst the underbrush until he had gone.
"Don't touch her," Clint growled, sitting forward.
"She don't belong to you," the cowboy grinned and lifted my chin up to look at him.
"Maybe not, but I don't like the way you're treating her. Get your hands off her." Clint stood up and slapped the man's hand off of my chin and pulled me away. I watched guiltily as they brawled on the saloon floor, but was quite relieved when Clint sent the cowboy stumbling out, the Sheriff leading him away in cuffs.
"I'm sorry," I said after Clint returned to me.
"No need," he shrugged as he wiped blood from his nose. "I've been itching to give him a whippin' for a long time. He deserved it." Clint smirked and offered his hand to me. "What do you say we get a room at the inn? It's snowing too hard to go home."
I accepted his hand and we walked up the stairs to the inn.
***
The next morning Clint found me at the window, watching the snow.
"Thank you for helping me yesterday," I said.
"No need to thank me." Clint smiled and watched the snow with me.
"Why did you kill Mother and Father?" I asked after a while, apparently taking the white man by surprise.
"I did not kill her. I didn't kill your father either. It was your brother I killed; he killed my brother. I didn't know your village had been raided until I found you."
"A life for a life," I whispered. My brother Red Hawk had been an unruly one, no dignity, just hate within him. He hated the white man. I understood why Clint had killed him.
"Why did they raid?" I asked, looking into Clint's deep blue eyes.
"You are Camanche, that's why." Guiltily, Clint sighed, seemingly ashamed of his own race.
"Why are you letting me stay with you?"
Clint didn't answer for a moment. He looked at me, his blue eyes stirring up a warmness inside that I had not known before.
"I reckon I might love you," he said. He looked at me hopefully as I tried to digest the unexpected remark. I looked back to the window, wondering what to make of it.
It is odd how friendships- or love- can begin. Small acts of kindness add up to more than large acts, and as Clint and I sat silently at the window side, I decided I would no longer fear him. White men could be good men too, this I came to realize as Clint locked his fingers together with mine.
I reached back, pulling an arrowhead from my pocket. I placed it in his palm.
"It was my father's; you keep it," I smiled and closed his fingers over it.
"Thank you," he said and kissed my cheek, and I decided I would stay. I would stay with this man, and live as a white woman. Though I knew life would never be the same, I knew it would be better than before.
"I reckon I love you too," I said, and Clint smiled.
GadSul
Ithildaeforever
