Chapter 9 - Greyhawk’s Daughter
Sahale rode Willow to meet Greyhawk.
Asa stayed behind.
This conversation belonged to her.
Father and daughter sat beside a stream.
For a long time neither spoke.
Finally Sahale said, “Asa asked me to marry him.”
Greyhawk’s expression remained unreadable.
“And?”
“I said yes.”
Greyhawk nodded.
“Does he treat you well?”
Sahale almost laughed at the inadequacy of the question.
“He treats me as though I am a person.”
Pain crossed Greyhawk’s face.
“I should have.”
“Yes.”
He accepted the answer.
Sahale told him she might take Asa’s surname.
Greyhawk looked away.
“You would leave mine.”
“I was never allowed to carry yours with pride.”
That hurt him.
Again, she meant it to.
But anger was no longer the only thing inside her.
“I do not want to spend my life hating you,” she said.
Greyhawk looked at her.
“I do not know how to forgive you yet.”
“You do not owe me forgiveness.”
“No.”
Sahale breathed slowly.
“But I want someday to remember you without remembering that trading post first.”
Greyhawk’s eyes shone.
It was the closest they had come to reconciliation.
When Sahale returned home, Asa was repairing the porch.
“Well?”
She dismounted.
“I am going to be Sahale Rich.”
Asa froze.
She walked toward him.
“Not because you rescued me.”
“I know.”
“Not because you own me.”
“I know.”
“Because I choose the family that name means.”
Asa’s eyes filled.
Sahale touched his face.
“And because somebody needs to stop you from storing salt in three places.”
He laughed.
This time openly.
Their wedding was planned for early summer.
But Red Bluff had one final reminder that the past did not surrender easily.
May you like
A week before the ceremony, Asa found one of Ruth’s old belongings missing.
And beside her grave were fresh footprints.
