The moonlight filtered through the tree branches and leaves creating a maze of shadows on the forest floor. To the untrained, it would have seemed impossible to travel in the gloom. Yet, the young brave moved silently and more swiftly than most could have done when the sun was at its highest. He flowed within the sounds and through the forest growth as only his mother’s people could.
He had never known his father, as he was the offspring of a lovely squaw named Turtle Dove who had been caught and used by a white man passing through. Her distraught husband had found her two days later, bloody and barely alive. The only description she could provide was that he had been huge with white hair before he had knocked her senseless and raped her brutally.
She had been beaten so badly, none thought she would live to see the next moon. However, her will to live was strong enough to provide the haven for the child it soon became apparent she was carrying. Her final act in life was to give birth to the child she carried. It was to be her final gift for the husband who had cared for her so tenderly.
“Call him Little Bear and take care of him for me,” she had gasped with her last breath as soon as she heard it was a boy.
“I will,” he replied.
Her husband, Standing Bear, loved her dearly and kept his promise to raise the child to the best of his ability. Even though he knew the child wasn’t his own, his love for his wife would let him do nothing else. The mane of pure white hair had removed all doubt as to who the real father was.
Time after time the other village boys beat Little Bear senseless before Standing Bear could rescue him from them. Even Standing Bear’s new wife, Morning Rain, went out of her way to make Little Bear’s life miserable by denying him shelter or food whenever Standing Bear was gone. Finally, when his Standing Bear did not return after a winter hunting trip, Little Bear knew it was time to leave. With only fourteen summers behind him, he left the only life he had ever known.
Life was not easy for him. His white hair made it impossible to be accepted by the Indians, while his dark coloring scared the white settlers. Many times he barely escaped with his life when he attempted to join with either of the two groups. His body bore countless scars from these encounters as he fled from certain death. Only his severe upbringing made it possible for him to tolerate the pain and hunger he often endured.
All of that changed one day as he fled through the woods with several braves on his heels, each and every one of them longing to possess his mane of white hair for his lodge. He easily outdistanced them to the river which he could have crossed easily, but he was tired of running all of the time. Instead, he became truly one with the forest for the first time. None of the braves returned home that day or the next. Future hunting parties found them each attached to one of the great white oak trees of the forest. Each had been impaled on a low branch. The legend of the White Oak who stalked the forest was born that day.
No longer did he fear the white or the red man, now they feared him as they passed through his domain. While he did not seek out men to kill, he would no longer run for his life. His white father had also passed on to him his large body build; he had grown to be a giant among the men in his area. Indeed, most men were lucky if the top of their head can to the bottom of his chin or if their shoulders were as wide as his chest. His large frame provided the ideal structure for the lean muscles built from living in the forest; muscles which gave him both great endurance and strength.
Tonight he was hunting, though. His long white hair was braided with dark strips of hide to help him blend in with the shadows. The desire to have a woman was strong upon him. He knew his size and appearance would scare most women, but he also knew they were capable of accepting what he had to offer. He had found a woman’s body to be as capable of stretching as his was of performing great feats of strength and endurance. He still remembered fondly the first woman he had ever had and the trail he had traveled to reach this point in his life.
His dead father’s second wife, Morning Rain, had wandered far from the camp in search of berries when he had come upon her. Quickly he had bound and gagged her before carrying her for half a day away from the camp. Deep into the white oak forest they had traveled with her over his shoulder. Her weight was meaningless to the powerful muscles of his body.
“Scream once and I will remove your tongue,” he told her as he removed her gag.
“Little Bear let me go,” she begged him. She could see the lust in her eyes and she was afraid of what he might do to her. She had known many strong men in her life, but she was well aware of how easily he had carried her. Such ease could only come from someone who possessed strength greater than she had ever known.
“No.”
The coldness of that single word chilled her to her very core. Vividly, she remembered all of the times she had refused him shelter or food when it was within her power. A shiver ran through her body as she realized he had never once cried out at her cruelty to him. He would show her no mercy.
“Please have mercy on me,” she implored him. “I was young and foolish then. I was jealous of the love Standing Bear showered upon even though he knew you were not his real son.”
“I am no longer called Little Bear. I am now known as White Oak.”
