The Legend of Black Wolf - Sully's Journey Home

Chapter Forty Three

        It was mid-morning when the tribe came upon the summer hunting grounds and the area where they would raise their teepee’s.  Young shoots grew here and there to cover all the edges with a soft green carpet, but the central paths they had walked last season were still clear.  Sully followed Cloud Dancing and Snow Bird to where they would erect their tent for the summer.  Helping them to unload the sled of furs and skins, he was eager to lend a hand until Snow Bird was satisfied.  Then, Cloud Dancing’s sons returned the favor by helping Sully take his supplies out to the edge of camp where he would stay.

        Nodding his thanks to the young sons, Sully watched them disembark and go running off to meet up with their friends and celebrate.  The area was buzzing with activity as women hurriedly began cooking and setting up their homes.  Men were working on fires and watering horses.  Children ran and shrieked in between teepees and piles of belongings.  Turning to the pile of saplings and skins that was to become his lean-to, he suddenly felt the need to take a walk instead.  Wolf was looking up at him, quizzically.

        “You probably want to go get something for dinner, eh boy?”  Sully asked his friend.  Wolf gave a playful yip and dashed off into the undergrowth without further hesitation.  Laughing, Sully grabbed his tomahawk and took off after him.  The weather was nice enough to sleep without protection tonight.  Erecting and setting up things here could wait.  Dinner was not on his mind at that particular moment, however.  There was something else nagging him.

        When at last he reached the old clearing that Cloud Dancing had said was a sacred praying place, Sully seated himself among the new leaves of the undergrowth and remembered his vision of Abigail and Hannah months earlier.  He could close his eyes and see them standing there as clearly as if had just happened.  Pushing the hair back from his face, he leaned his head back and took in the serenity of the space.  After quietly praying a few minutes, Sully found himself asking the spirits to show him the truth of the winter vision he had been given.

        “Can it be?”  He whispered to himself ever so softly.  Painting the canvas of his mind with the vision of the woman and her cascades of hauntingly beautiful honey brown tresses, he felt his heart flutter a bit inside at the mere thought that he could meet someone so beautiful.  Moreover, if a woman like that did exist, he had no idea how he would ever meet her.  But what if it happened?  Could he really have been lucky enough to have been given a vision like Cloud Dancing talked so much about?

        For as hard as he had worked to convince himself that his life was now solely dedicated to helping the Cheyenne and giving his best efforts to help them secure a better life in cooperation with the United States government, for just that small moment, he set that heavy responsibility aside and daydreamed.  Feeling so close to Abigail there, Sully sat, his face turned towards the sky, eyes closed, and dared to let his heart muse over love.  ‘What if?’  He thought to himself.  ‘I’ll just sit here another minute.’ 

        Before he knew it, many minutes had passed.

        Cloud Dancing had followed Sully when he saw him walk away with his tomahawk.  Worried that his friend had seen or sensed danger, he wanted to see what might be going on, in case he could be of assistance.  But the further that Sully walked, the more Cloud Dancing knew something had to be on his mind.  Trying to be as quiet as possible, he followed him to where he had been given the vision of his late wife and daughter.  Watching his friend sit down, the medicine man stood guard to watch.