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around the waist, yanking her onto his saddle in front of him.
    â€œLet me down,” Leonida cried, trying to pry his arms from around her waist with her fingers. “Sage, I don’t want to be on your horse with you. Let me down.”
    â€œ E-do-ta, no,” Sage said, his hold on her not weakening. “I did not intend for you to be a part of my vengeance. You will not suffer for it more than I can help.”
    â€œIf you don’t want me to be a part of it, then let me go,” Leonida said, unable to control the sensual feelings that looking into his eyes caused.
    â€œFor many reasons Sage cannot do that,” he mumbled, wheeling his horse around, then leading it into a soft trot behind the frightened women and children. “You will go with me to my stronghold. There you will stay.”
    Leonida’s lips parted in a slight gasp. “Do you mean that I am to be your captive forever?” she finally managed to say in a stammer. “The others will be captives forever also?”
    Sage did not respond. He just gave her a look that she could not define.

Chapter 8
    I strove to hate,
But vainly strove.
    â€”G EORGE L YTTELTON
    Â 
    Â 
    Aspens and fields of wildflowers brightened the wayside as the trail began to climb gradually into the mountains. Leonida noticed that Sage’s horse would turn, stop, or start at the mere pressure of his foot. The silver ornaments jingled on the horse’s bridle. They flashed brightly in the sun, reflecting into Leonida’s eyes as she sat much too close to the man that she had so many torn feelings about. Yet she had given up struggling with him long ago, knowing that he was as determined to hold her there as she had been to be set free.
    Glancing ahead at the women and children stumbling along the trail, dread filled her. What could Sage be planning for these innocent women and children? Even herself?
    Licking her parched lips, which had been baked the whole afternoon, Leonida glanced over her shoulder at Sage. He looked past her, his jaw tight, his eyes cold. But she could not hold her silence any longer. They had not stopped once since they had left the stagecoach. There had been no water offered or moments of rest. She was afraid that if they went any farther, those moving on foot might drop, not only from exhaustion but from thirst as well.
    â€œSage, when are we going to stop?” Leonida blurted out, her voice raspy from her thirst. “Have mercy on those who are walking. The children. The women. They must have a chance to rest. And they are in dire need of water.”
    She regretted having not said something earlier, for the moment she asked, Sage drew his reins and motioned his warriors to stop. He gave his warriors commands in Navaho, then rode up to the women and children and told them to make a turn to the right.
    â€œI will take you to a wet place where cattails can be found, pulled, and eaten raw,” he said. “This will quench your thirst even more than water. It will sustain you much longer once we move again farther into the mountains, toward my stronghold.”
    Leonida’s heart cried out to the children, especially Trevor. He looked in worse condition than all the rest. His eyes were scarcely open and his mother had to keep pulling him up as he would slowly crumple toward the ground. Leonida understood why Carole did not lift the child up into her arms. She was too weak herself to carry the burden of another.
    Leonida turned to Sage. “Let me walk with the others,” she pleaded. She nodded toward Trevor. “I can carry the child. I doubt he can go much farther on his own. Please allow me to help him, Sage. What should it matter to you that I do?”
    Sage peered into her eyes, finding it more and more difficult to look at her as his captive. It was still hard for him to comprehend that she had been in the stagecoach. Seeing her there had brought many feelings to assail him.
    But most