I will see what truth the white man speaks." Nantan looked at Luke. Luke nodded slightly. He knew there was no stopping her. "Stay back." Luke warned her. "Out of sight.
If things go wrong, you turn and ride. You don't look back." They rode out in silence, a grim procession of three moving through the shimmering heat waves. The town of Verde was a scar on the desert floor, a collection of adobe buildings and rough-hewn timber shacks huddled around the dusty parade grounds of the military outpost. As Luke and Nantan rode down the main street, the noise of the town, the clang of a blacksmith's hammer, the shout of a muleskinner, the tinny piano from a saloon, seemed to falter and die. People stopped in the street.
Men stepped out of the shade of overhangs, their hands drifting to their belts. Women pulled children behind their skirts. The hostility was a physical weight pressing against Luke's chest. He felt the sting of their eyes. He saw the shopkeeper in a stained apron spit onto the boardwalk as they passed.
He heard the whispers, loud enough to be meant for his ears. "Look at him. Traitor. Red-loving trash. Should string him up right next to the savage." Luke kept his eyes forward, staring between Roan's ears.
He felt a burning shame, not for himself, but for the hatred that radiated from his own people. He felt more foreign here, on this street lined with English signs and American flags, than he did in the wikiup of the Apache. Ayanna had pulled off the road a half mile back, tying her horse in a stand of mesquite and creeping forward on foot to the rear of the command post. She found a spot behind a stack of crates near the back door, where a window was propped open to catch the faint breeze. She crouched there, listening, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird.
Inside the office, the air was stagnant and smelled of stale cigar smoke and old paper. Captain Harlan sat behind a heavy oak desk, wiping his forehead with a handkerchief. He was a thickset man with a mustache waxed into sharp points and eyes that were as cold and flat as a snake's. Luke stood before the desk, hat in hand. Nantan stood beside him, silent and imposing even in his worn buckskins.
"Captain." Luke said, keeping his voice steady. "You remember me?" Harlan smiled, but it was a smile that didn't touch his eyes. "Carver." "I remember." "Best scout in the regiment, until you decided the mountains suited you better than your oath." "I didn't leave because of the mountains." Luke said. "I left because I didn't sign up to butcher starving families." Harlan waved a hand dismissively. "War is ugly." "Carver, you know that.
Civilization requires a strong stomach." "We are not here to talk of the past." Nantan said, his voice deep and resonating in the small room. "We are here to talk of the valley. My people are hungry. We want peace. We will stay in the high rocks.
We will not raid the cattle, but we cannot go to the reservation. The water there is poison and the ground is dead." Harlan leaned back in his chair, the wood creaking. "It is not up to me, chief." Harlan said, his tone dripping with false sympathy. "The territory is changing. Progress is coming.
The railroad. New settlers. Silas Morgan." "Luke cut in." Harlan's eyes flicked to Luke, sharpening. "Mr. Morgan is a prominent citizen." Harlan said.