**Some time in the past when the west was really wild and Indians still roamed free**
*All characters in this story are 18 or over*
Leotie was scared. She had never been this alone in her short life. She had always had her tribe around her, but she no longer had them. While she had been on her spirit trip before officially becoming a woman of the tribe, a band of Comanche had ridden into her Kiowa village and killed all the men and took the women and children as slaves. She was happy to have not been made into a Comanche slave, but she was sad at the same time because now her tribe would never be a tribe again. She was all alone and knew not how to survive for long alone on the open prairie. With only what she had taken with her for her spirit trip Leotie walked away from what had always been her life, and everything that she knew.
She had been walking for what seemed like a very long time but in reality was no more than one moon. She had been living off of berries and nuts; she could feel her stomach rumbling with hunger. As the sun was setting Leotie noticed a small fire up ahead. Very slowly with her buffalo robe over her back she crept towards the fire.
Clayton was sitting at his fire slowly roasting the sage hen he had shot for his dinner. He was sore from riding all day, and yet he knew that it would be almost a week before he could get to a town and find a soft bed and a willing woman. He laid back against his bedroll and thought of Ophelia and the fun that they had shared when he was last in San Antonio. If he closed his eyes he could almost feel her hands on his skin again; moving over his hot aroused body sending sensations through out his entire body.
As Clayton was laying against his bedroll he thought he heard something moving in the grass just to the left of where he was laying. Keeping his eyes closed he kept listening. Something was definitely roughing up the grass and Chico was nickering softly in warning. Someone was creeping up on his camp. Clayton knew his rifle was next to his side, he thought about reaching for it but decided that it would be better to have who ever was sneaking up on the camp to think that he had fell asleep.
Leotie could smell the cooking hen before she could even see where the white man lay sleeping. From the smell of the bird Leotie knew that it was done, and if it was left on the fire much longer it would be dry and tough. Moving a little faster than she had intended, do to her hunger she moved up next to the fire to remove the hen. She could already taste the flavor of the meat against her tongue. Just as she pulled it from the sticks holding it up Leotie heard the man move. As she moved to flee the camp she felt the man grab her braid.
"Put my dinner down before I hurt you," Clayton said as he pulled hard on the Indian girl's hair. Clayton was a little surprised when the girl turned to face him without setting the hen down. She stared up at him with scared large almost black eyes. It was then that he actually looked at the girl. Clayton had never thought that he would be attracted to an Indian maiden, but this one was simply beautiful. She had such dark eyes compared to her soft brown skin, and her hair, even pulled back in a braid was incredibly long. Her body let Clayton know that he was not staring at a child but a woman true. No child would have the body that this woman had. He could see the fear in the woman's stance, and she had yet to put his dinner down. "Can you understand me?"
Leotie was shocked that the man must not have been sleeping after all with the way that he caught her as she took the hen. She could feel his eyes looking her over but she was too scared to do anything more than stare up at his scruffy face. Leotie could tell he was trying to talk to her but she did not understand the white man's speech. In Kiowa she told tried to tell him she did not know what he said. She watched him shake his head side to side as she spoke, Leotie may not understand the significance of his shaking his head but she was guessing that meant that he could not understand her either.
Damn this was going to be difficult, he could not understand the young woman and she most likely could not understand him. Clayton only knew a tiny bit of Comanche and that was not what they woman was speaking. Deciding to try Comanche to see if she understood he asked her name.
Upon hearing something that she finally understood a little of, Leotie was quick to reply, she told him her name was Leotie and asked after his.
Clayton was immensely relieved to realize that they would be able to converse a little, and soon he would have his dinner back under his control. Clayton answered Leotie's question and then motioned to the bird in her hand and told her it was his.
Leotie looked down at the bird then back up at Clayton. She was so hungry she did not want to give the hen back the Clayton. That was such an odd name. She just wanted to eat something other than berries and nuts.
Seeing the look of unrestrained hunger on Leotie's face Clayton knew what he was about to do he would probably regret later. Motioning down at the hen he pointed first to Leotie then back to the hen then himself, as he did not know much Comanche beyond asking for names, and telling someone to put their weapons down.
Leotie watched Clayton's motions and figured out that he would split the chicken with her. Looking down at the bird again she decided that it would be big enough to split with him. Leotie took the chicken over to a rock and sat it down, pulling her rock knife from its holder and started to cut the hen in half. Taking half the bird Leotie sat down and started pulling the meat from the bones, eating in a hurry.
Clayton watched the young Indian woman tear into the hen. All the sudden he was not so regretful that he offered to share the hen with her. She was eating it like she had not eaten in weeks. Picking up the second half of the hen Clayton moved back to his bedroll and sat upon it to eat his dinner. He was by no means as near as ravenous as Leotie, but he was hungry too.
After they had ate the bird Leotie stared over at the strange white man. For a white man he was not as repulsive as Leotie had been lead to believe, he did not seem like he would spread a disease to an entire village in an hour. Leotie was wondering if everything that she had ever been told about white men was wrong. Well maybe not everything was wrong, Clayton definitely looked dangerous. Maybe she should leave his camp before he did something evil to her. Leotie was looking for the safest way out when another thought entered her mind. If he was going to do something evil to her why would he have allowed her to have half of his hen, she did not believe he was evil.
With the firelight playing with her hair and on her skin a guy could almost mistake her for a tanned white woman. Her skin looked incredibly soft and smooth, it was a gentle brown coloring so light it looked white in the fire light. Her dark braids hung in glossy brown strands over her shoulders, when she moved her head just right she appeared to have red highlights threading through the dark brown tresses. She was a beautiful girl.