LITMIR.BIZ

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her shoulder. “I cannot heal you. You can only heal yourself, Dain Phillips. Groceries will not force me to support your desire to be well. You come like the coyote, the trickster. Groceries mean only one thing to you—a source of payment for services rendered. I was hoping the groceries were a gift given from your heart. A gift without expectations attached to it.” In her heart, she prayed he would leave.

      “Now hold on just a minute,” Dain yelled, struggling up the slick, clay bank as she walked away from him, surrounded by sheep. When he climbed out of the wash, she turned toward him, her hand on the staff. The white wolf was at her side, watching him through wary amber eyes.

      Breathing hard, Dain moved brokenly toward her, his legs visibly trembling from the sudden exertion. “Just a minute,” he rasped, gesturing at her with his index finger. “Just who the hell do you think you are, lady? What right do you have to judge me or these damn groceries I brought to you?”

      Erin felt her heart twinge as a feeling of compassion stole through her. She studied the man before her. Dain Phillips was at least six foot two and weighed close to two hundred pounds. He was obviously in good muscular, if not athletic, condition. He wore a bright red wool jacket over a dark blue denim shirt and tan pants that were splattered with red clay. Once again she felt his desperation and understood it better than he could at the moment.

      Calmly, she lifted her hand. “I have not judged you. You have judged yourself.”

      “What are you talking about?”

      She allowed his anger to bounce harmlessly off her. His blue eyes snapped with fury and his otherwise nicely shaped mouth was a thin line of bitterness. “You brought groceries to buy something from me that I cannot give you.”

      “Dammit, take the stupid groceries then! I don’t care what the hell you do with them!”

      “There are two elderly Navajo women who live near me. They have no transportation, and with the winter coming on, they can use the food.”

      “Fine,” he rasped, “they can go to them. Now what about you? What’s your name? You haven’t said whether you’re a medicine woman, yet.”

      “Some people call me Asdzaan Maiisoh. That is Navajo for Wolf Woman. Some call me Tashunka Mani Tu— Lakota for Walks With Wolves. Others call me Erin Wolf, the name listed on documents when I was born on the Eastern Cherokee Reservation in North Carolina. The federal government refused to accept my given Cherokee name, Ai Gvhdi Waya, so my mother chose the name Erin, which is Gaelic, from Ireland. Unlike most white names, which have no meaning, the Irish give as much importance to what a name means as we do. Erin means peace.” She frowned. “You may call me anything you like, so long as it’s not derogatory.” No white man respected Indians and she did not expect it from him.

      Ignoring her last comment, Dain studied the woman before him. Peace. Yes, he could see why she was named for that. For a moment, he hated the fact she seemed so damn calm and serene when he felt almost on the edge of losing not only his composure, but his control as well. Her face reflected an inner peace and he wanted to take that from her for himself. The sunlight bathed her, gave her coppery skin a beautiful radiance that was almost unearthly, he thought as he continued to stare at her.

      He was mildly aware of the sheep bleating now and then, and the fact that the animals had encircled him where he stood. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw them nibbling at sparse strands of grass sticking out of the red sand, and the sight, combined with the feel of the sun on his back, made some of the inner chill within him abate.

      “I’m not very good with Indian names,” he began, “so bear with me as I refer to you as Erin Wolf.”

      Her eyes sparkled with silent laughter. “It will take three days before the wash dries enough for you to drive your car out of there.” She gazed up at the clear, light blue sky. “The Navajo rain yei have been kind to you. It’s not going to rain for at least another week, so you’ll be able to retrieve your car.”

      “What’s a yei?”

      “Navajo for god.”

      “I don’t believe in such things.”

      She smiled.

      Dain glared at her. “Well, what do I do?”

      “I’d suggest that you walk back to the road and hitchhike back into Many Farms. Go home, Dain Phillips. What you seek I do not have.” Never had she meant her words more than now.

      He stared at her as panic set in, eating away at his anger, his strength. “But…” He floundered, opening his hands. “But Alfred and Luanne Yazzie said you’ve healed many Navajo of all kinds of disease. Why are you sending me away if you can cure me?”

      In that moment, Erin saw not a man standing before her, but a scared child. The image of a tousle-haired, freckle-faced little boy in a pair of coveralls and a red-and-white-striped T-shirt crying his heart out flashed before her eyes. The boy stood in the highly polished hallway of some huge, old home and her intuition told her that what he felt was utter abandonment.

      Gently, she whispered, “I am not abandoning you, Dain Phillips. You are abandoning yourself.” Shaken by what she’d seen and felt, Erin suddenly felt guilty. Her past experience with one white man was coloring her perception of this man. Her parents had taught her that skin color meant nothing—but she knew differently. Inwardly, she wrestled with her own dark prejudice.

      Dain was shaken by her words. How the hell did she know that what he was feeling so sharply was abandonment? Flattening his lips, he yelled, “I’m here, damn it! I came in good faith! I bought the stupid groceries I’ll give to those two old women! Now, you owe me, damn it! You can’t send me away. I won’t go!”

      Erin raised her brows as her heart wrenched in despair. “You won’t go?”

      “No.”

      Prejudice stared her fully in the face. The wounded part of herself screamed, No, go away! Clenching her hands at her sides, Erin realized the Great Spirit was testing her. She had been tested before and nearly died. This was a test of faith, a trial by fire of the worst sort. Taking in a deep, halting breath, she said, “Then I guess you had better go back to your car, get whatever luggage you have and come with me.”

      Nonplussed, Dain just stared at her for a moment. “Where are we going?”

      “To my hogan.” She pointed toward a set of low, rounded red hills in the distance. “We are about five miles from my home. If you are determined to stay, then you need to have enough clothes—and food.”

      He was feeling weak again, and hot. The fever was beginning to boil up from his toes, calves, and into his thighs. Soon Dain would begin to feel light-headed and he’d have to lie down until the fever passed. He saw Erin watching him expectantly. There was no way he could carry anything five miles in his present condition. Anger boiled through him. He’d be damned before he’d tell her he couldn’t make the trek by himself, or that he needed help.

      “Just tell me where you live. I’ll get there,” he snapped.

      Erin whispered, “What does it cost you to ask for help?”

      Her soft, compassion-filled words caught him off guard. Still, he snapped his mouth shut and glared. “I said I’d get there. Even if I have to crawl, I’ll get there.”

      “You stopped asking for help when you were eight years old.”

      Shock bolted through him and his eyes widened at her words. For a moment, he hated her for knowing the truth deep inside him. And then he realized there was no way she could have such intimate knowledge of him. His mind raced for answers, but logical solutions eluded him. Dropping his chin, he stared at his muddy, soaked hiking boots.

      “Asking for help is natural,” Erin continued, her voice wary. “Even animals, when they are sick, will go to a healthy animal to be licked, protected and cared for. Humans are no different.” She forced a gentle smile for his benefit. “Perhaps that was beaten out of you long ago, but if you want to heal yourself, you

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