The wind did not just blow across the northern plains. It scoured them. It was a late season gale carrying the bitter promise of winter and grit that tasted of pulverized stone to the man stumbling through the stand of cottonwoods. The wind felt like a personal enemy, a physical weight trying to shove him into the freezing mud of the riverbank. His name was Elias Thorne, though he had not spoken it aloud in weeks.
Elias gripped his side, his fingers stiff and clumsy inside his leather glove. The blood had soaked through his coat hours ago, warm and sticky at first, now cold and stiffening against his ribs. The bullet had caught him just below the rib cage, a parting gift from a dispute over a card table in a muddy settlement 3 days ride south. Or perhaps it was from the posse that had mistaken him for a horse thief near the territory line. His memory was fracturing, peeling away like old paint under the heat of the fever burning behind his eyes.
He had lost his horse miles back. The roan had stepped into a gopher hole and snapped a leg, forcing Elias to do the only merciful thing left. Since then, he had walked. He had walked until the horizon began to tilt and sway. The river was a gray scar cutting through the dying grass.
Elias aimed for the water, thinking of drinking, but his knees betrayed him. He pitched forward, catching himself on a rotting log before sliding down into the dirt. The impact jarred his wound, sending a spike of white-hot agony up his spine that nearly made him vomit. He lay there, cheek pressed against the frozen earth, breathing in shallow, ragged gasps. The smell of decay, wet leaves, and stagnant water filled his nose.
Above him, the sky was a bruising purple, the sun sinking rapidly behind the jagged line of the distant hills. He forced his eyes open one last time. On the ridge above the river, silhouetted against the dying light, sat a row of shapes. They were motionless, carved from the same darkness that was creeping over the land. Riders, he counted, three, maybe four.
They were not wearing the slouch hats of the cavalry or the wide brim of cattlemen. They sat their horses with a fluid natural stillness that belonged to this land long before fences scarred. Elias tried to reach for the navy colt at his hip, but his arm felt like it was filled with lead. The darkness rushed in from the edges of his vision, narrowing the world down to a single pinpoint of gray light. "They are watching," he thought.
And then the darkness took him completely. The heat was the first thing to return. It was not the fever heat that had roasted him from the inside out, but a dry, smoky warmth that smelled of sage, burning pine, and cured leather. Elias drifted in the space between sleep and waking. The pain in his side had dulled to a heavy, throbbing ache, rhythmically pounding in time with his heartbeat.
He felt something soft beneath him. Furs deep and thick. He was not on the riverbank anymore. He opened his eyes. Above him, lodge poles converged toward a smoke hole where a patch of gray sky was visible.
The light inside was dim, filtered through the thick hide walls of the lodge. A fire burned low in the center pit, casting dancing shadows against the painted liners. He tried to shift his weight and hissed through his teeth as the wound protested. Stay still. The voice was soft, but it carried an edge of command that cut through the haze.
Elias froze. He turned his head slowly, fighting the stiffness in his neck. He was not alone in the bedding, lying next to him, close enough that he could feel the radiant heat of her body through the buffalo robes, was a young woman. She was propped up on one elbow, watching him with eyes that were dark, intelligent, and entirely unamused. Her hair was two thick braids that fell over her shoulders, dark as a raven's wing against the pale deer skin of her dress.
Elias blinked, his mind struggling to catch up. He looked down. He was under the same heavy robe as she was. His coat and boots were gone. He was stripped to his trousers and undershirt, bandages wrapped tightly around his midsection.
He scrambled backward, the instinct to retreat overriding the pain, but there was nowhere to go. The lodge wall was at his back. "Easy," the woman said. Her English was clipped precise. The vowels flattened in the way of someone who had learned the language from a strict teacher.
"If you tear those stitches, I will not sew them again." "Who are you?" Elias rasped. His throat felt like he had swallowed a handful of sand. "Where am I?
You're in the lodge of Chief Standing Elk, she said, her voice dropping to a whisper. I am Winona, and you are the man who decided to die on our riverbank. Elias stared at her. The chief's lodge, and he was in her bed. The implication hit him with a force of a physical blow.
He looked at the lodge flap, then back at her. "Why am I here?" he asked, gesturing to the furs, covering them both. "Like this." Because you were freezing, she said simply. Her face remained impassive, but there was a tightness around her mouth.
And because my father's warriors found you, to them, you are a trespasser, a spy, a threat. Outside the lodge, a murmur of voices began to rise. It started as a low rumble, like distant thunder, but quickly grew into a chaotic chorus of shouts and the heavy thud of footsteps. The camp was waking up. Or perhaps it had never slept.
Winona tensed. She sat up straighter, pulling the robe up to her chin, her gaze darting to the entrance. "Listen to me," she said, leaning in close. Her scent, wood smoke, and sweet grass filled his head. "The men outside are angry.