"You know I would!" she cried. "You know I would--if I could! But ours is a strange people, and our ways are not your ways. There is so much you do not understand, so much which even I do not understand! It all makes me afraid, oh, terribly afraid!" "Do not be afraid, Yasma dear," I murmured, slipping my arm about her shoulders. "I will protect you." "You cannot protect me!" she lamented, withdrawing. "You cannot even protect yourself! There is so much, so much from which none can protect themselves!" Not realizing what she meant, I let this warning slip past. "All that I know," I swore, passionately, "is that I want you with me--want you with me always! Let happen what may, I want you--and have never wanted anything so much before!" "Oh, do not speak of that now!" she burst forth, in a tone almost of command. "Do not speak of that now! First there are things you must know--things I cannot explain!" And she sat with eyes averted, gazing toward the scarlet and vermilion dishevelled trees, whose branches waved like ghostly danger signals in the rising wind. "What things must I know?" "You will have to wait and find out. Maybe, like us, you will feel them without being told; but maybe time alone will be your teacher. The traditions of my tribe would stop me from telling you even if I knew how. But do not be surprised if you learn some very, very strange things." "Strange or not strange," I vowed, "all I know is that I love you. All I care to learn is when--when, Yasma, you will say to me--" "Not until the spring," she murmured, with such finality that I felt intuitively the uselessness of argument. "Not until the flowers come out from their winter hiding, and the birds fly north. Then you will know more about our tribe." Without further explanation, she sprang impulsively from her seat of grass. "Come," she warned me, pointing to a gray mass that was obscuring the northern peaks. "Come, a storm is on the way! If we don't hurry, we'll be wet through and through!" And she flitted before me toward the village with such speed that I could scarcely get another word with her. CHAPTER X _THE IBANDRU TAKE WING_