Guided Home by a Native’s Heart – Extended Epilogue

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Belle stood near the cooking fire with Tahu and his wife. A kettle hung from a green willow hook; another sat back in the coals where the stew thickened. Belle’s hands moved slowly, with certainty, slicing onion with the small knife Tava had sharpened, then laying fresh sage between strips of trout. Tahu’s wife, Payúuchi, would then wrap them and set them on flat stones to bake.

Tava watched from a distance as Belle worked methodically, though her belly curved full before her. Every so often the baby turned under her palm as if testing the world.

His mouth eased into a quick grin, and he pushed out of the trees, shirt damp at the neck, hair pushed back by river wind. He carried a small stringer with three trout flashing like coins in the sun. He went to Belle first, set his free hand to her cheek, kissed her softly, then laid his palm on her belly and waited like a man listening for a drum he knew by heart.

The baby answered with a small kick.

“You two make deal without me?” he asked the bump, pretending to scold.

Belle laughed.

“We practice,” she said. “You can join.”

He set the fish on Tahu’s tray. “Good water,” he said. “Stones sing today.”

“They sing because you listen,” Payúuchi answered. She took the fish and gave Tava that look women give when a man has done a thing right.

Tava squeezed Belle’s fingers once, then stepped to the work area by the shade, where his knife and small gouge waited. A half-finished carving lay in his palm: a little elk for Pahose. He had promised the child a new toy when she came, as last year’s elk had been loved to softness. He cut two clean lines to suggest the antlers, burnished the grain with a smooth river stone, and smiled to himself when the wood took shine.

He noticed Belle watching him a moment, and he knew that she was thinking about the quiet of his shoulders and the way his hands slowed his mind. Sapiah always said, When his hands move, his thoughts sit down.

A strip of laughter came from the pines, then the sound of boots and moccasins on the hard path. Around the bend came Tapuche first, hat in his hand, his step quick the moment he saw who waited. Towee walked beside him, braid neat, a small pack on her back. Between them stomped Pahose, no longer carried high against her mother’s chest, but walking with great effort and greater pride, chin up, eyes set on the ground ahead as if to keep from tripping on her own certainty.

Behind them rode Sapiah on a low pony, steady as ever, and Miriam behind him. Two men from Blue River came with blankets and a sack of seed to trade. Farther back, Caleb led a packhorse piled with a tin box and books.

Towee reached Belle first and pulled her into a hug that was laugh and sob all at once.

“You look strong,” Towee said, drawing back to lay both hands on Belle’s belly. “Baby strong too.”

“Baby kicks all day,” Belle said.

“Good,” Towee answered. “Baby wants to come see everything.”

Tapuche embraced Belle like a sister.

“We made it before the stew,” he said with a straight face that cracked into a grin. “I was afraid.”

“You would eat cold,” Payúuchi called, not turning from the fire. “But today you will not.”

Sapiah slid down with help and put both hands on Belle’s shoulders the way he did when he meant to mark a moment. He looked from her face to her belly and back again, then nodded once. The pride in his eyes sat quiet and deep.

Pahose paused, finger in her mouth, deciding whether to be shy. Tava solved it by going to her, scooping her up, and swinging her once. Her small shoes kicked at air; she squealed and then settled, with her hands finding his braid as if no time had passed at all.

“You walk now,” Tava said, mock stern. “You say you are big. You do not need me.”

Pahose held out her palm, very serious. Tava set the new elk there.

“For you,” he said. “For running.”

She held it like it might jump from her hand. Towee touched Tava’s arm.

“She sleeps with the old one still,” she said. “But she will let the new one run in the day.”

Tava bent his head and spoke near Pahose’s ear as if telling a secret.

“You will have a cousin soon,” he said. “Show the way to run.”

Pahose nodded with the solemnity of the important new task and wriggled down to demonstrate her steps.
Horses were led away; bundles were shouldered; a child was bribed with dried meat so her mother could finish a greeting. Belle leaned into Towee a moment, took her hand, and pointed with her chin toward the edge of the village where a low circle of saplings rose from the earth.

“Our home,” Belle said.

Towee looked long. “Good bones,” she approved the rising structure of their new lodge, like a horseman approving legs.

They saved the news for later. Late in the afternoon, when plates had been scraped and the men from Blue River had given up trying to out-eat one another, a horse came down the path at an easy pace. Caleb waved his hat and slid down, wincing like a man who had been in the saddle too many days in a row.

“News,” he said. He looked across faces he knew and felt the ease in the set of shoulders. “Denver sent a man from Pueblo to hold the office till election. The former sheriff stays where he belongs, behind iron, for a long time. The judge kept his back straight.”

A small murmur went through the group—relief worn enough to be quiet now. Caleb went on.

“Bart writes that he minds himself. He’s courting a lady who teaches letters to small ones. Says he keeps his talk shorter than his work these days.” Caleb’s eyes touched Belle with a note of care. “He sends good will.”

Tava glanced at Belle and set his hand over hers under the table board, thumb moving in that small circle to remind her he was there. Belle nodded to Caleb.

“Thank you,” she said. “I hope he keeps to straight ground.”

The sun eased down the ridge. People rose and moved as camps do, some to wash, some to bank a fire, some to make a little music. Payúuchi laid more willow leaves on the coals, and the smell of fish and sage rose again.

Belle and Tava stepped away from the talk when the evening turned soft. Hand in hand, they walked the path toward the frame of their lodge. The half-built cradleboard leaned against the door post. Tava had sanded it smooth with a river stone and laced one edge in soft buckskin; the rest of the lacing waited for a quiet hour.

They stood a while without talk, listening to Pagwanap breathe. Then Belle said what the day had held behind everything else. “Names.”

Tava nodded. “Names.” He touched the door pole as if it were a person listening. “I think on one. Not mine. Yours.”

Belle looked up, already seeming to know the shape of it yet still needing to hear. “Say it.”

“I think on your grandmother,” he said. “I think we carry her. Boy or girl, first or second, I do not care the place. I care that the sound lives in this house.”

Belle stopped walking. Tava instinctively placed a hand over her belly, only to feel the baby turn once under his hand as if to listen. Belle took Tava’s face in her palms and kissed him soft.

“Yes,” she said. “I wanted it too.”

“Our child,” he repeated, as if the two words were a place. He glanced toward the river, then back to the frame. “We speak her name here. But I want a short name from my people too. Water brought you here. Water holds this camp. Tahu likes when we remember that.” He paused, choosing the line. “There is a word we use, Páa, water. Simple. Strong. We can give it. For boy or girl. It fits both.”

“Páa,” she echoed, the sound small and clean. “I like how it sits in the mouth.”

“Sapiah says simple names carry far.” He shrugged, honest. “We ask Tahu in the morning. If he says it sits right, we keep it. If he says we twist it, we listen.”

Belle laughed through the last of her tears.

“We will do it his way. And… we give my grandmother’s name too. First or middle, we will see when we see the child’s face.”

“We make room,” he said. “Names are light if you carry them right.”

They walked around the frame of the lodge. Tava pointed to one of the joints.

“I cross this tie tomorrow,” he said. “Then we bend the next ribs. Sapiah will complain the pole has warp and then he will say it is good enough.”

“He always says both,” Belle answered, and they laughed because it was true.

They stood by the cradleboard and traced where a small back would lie.

“I will tie a little willow rattle here,” Tava said. “Not loud. Just for the baby to hear this place.”
“And we’ll hang my pendant above the bed,” Belle said. “Not for tiny fingers. For me, when night is long.”

They stayed until the ridge took the sun. Then the baby pushed hard under Belle’s hand and sent them back to the circle where stew still waited. By the firelight, Tava tied the last lacing on the cradleboard and hung it where evening wind made a small sound in the willow. He set the board down by the bed and sat beside Belle, close enough that their shoulders touched.

“I feel it now, Tava,” Belle whispered as she put a hand to her back, closed her eyes and held her breath for a long moment.

“It is time,” she said.

Payúuchi stepped over quickly and took her arm, leading her into the lodge, Towee and Miriam close behind. The kettle went back on; clean cloths came out. Tava remained just outside, listening.

“Hold the screen. Breathe with me,” Payúuchi said, and a quick glance allowed Tava to see her setting Belle’s hands to the willow lattice. Towee was counting the breaths. “In. Hold. Out,” and wiping Belle’s face when heat rose. Miriam poured water, laid warm stones near the hide to keep the air gentle, and tied her hair back with a strip of cloth.

Sapiah put a hand on Tava’s shoulder. “Walk the lodge,” he said. “One circle. Bring water each time.”

Tava walked once, twice around, counting steps he could trust. He heard the low talk inside; the soft murmur women use when work is close. On the third pass he heard Belle gasp and Payúuchi telling her to bend her knees.

“Good,” Tahu’s wife said, calm as ever. “Now.”

A thin cry cut the dusk. Tava stopped suddenly with his cup in his hand but did not spill it.

They brought him inside. Belle lay, the child against her chest, hair damp, eyes bright. Tahu’s wife tied the cord with boiled thread and snipped it with a knife passed through the flame. She rubbed the small back till the crying turned to a steady breath, then wrapped the baby in soft hide and set an extra fold under the feet.

“We did it,” Belle whispered.

Tava knelt by her side, kissing her brow as he touched the baby’s head. “We have a boy.”

Tahu burned a twist of cedar and touched smoke to the baby’s brow. “Clear water. Steady feet,” he said. He nodded toward a small bowl. “After the feeding, we’ll carry what remains to the willow. Ground remembers.”

Belle bent and spoke the short name they had chosen.

“Páa,” she said, and then, softer, she said, “Elijah. Sounds like Eliza, doesn’t it?”

The baby blinked like he knew both sounds.

“Tomorrow,” Tava said, “we carry tobacco to Tahu and say the two names together. After you are strong, we go to the ridge. Sapiah will speak there.”

Belle nodded, eyes on the small face. “And water will hear us,” she said.

“Water already does,” he answered.

Outside, Pagwanap settled. The willow fence clicked a little in the breeze. The river kept its even talk. Belle hummed the tune her grandmother had used, and the baby stilled as if he had been waiting all along for that exact sound.

Tava leaned his head against the door pole and closed his eyes for a breath. He had been many things in the last year—hunter, tracker, brother, husband. Father sat new and solid in his chest. He did not need to say it out loud.

Belle looked up and found him watching her, and she smiled as if she had heard his thought anyway.

“We belong,” she said.

“We belong,” he agreed. He took her hand and laced their fingers, and together they listened to the river and the quiet of a village that had room for one more name.

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OFFER: A BRAND NEW SERIES AND 2 FREEBIES FOR YOU!

Grab my new series, "Courageous Hearts of the West", and get 2 FREE novels as a gift! Have a look here!

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