He threw himself off his horse before it had fully stopped. He scrambled up the slope, falling to his knees beside her. She opened her eyes. They were glassy with fever, but they cleared when they saw him. "Eli," she whispered.
Her voice was a dry rustle, like leaves blowing over stone. "I am here," he choked out. He pulled her into his arms, mindful of her wound. He ripped the sleeve of her dress, exposing the furrow where the bullet had torn through the muscle. It was angry and red, but it had missed the bone.
You foolish, stubborn woman, he said, his voice thick with tears and fury. "You could have died. You rode into the badlands alone. Why? Why would you do such a thing? " Maggie hissed as he poured water over the wound to clean it.
She gripped his shirt with her good hand, pulling him closer. Because you were in a cage, she said, her teeth gritted against the pain. Because I am your partner. And partners do not sit and wait for the end. Eli rested his forehead against hers.
He was shaking. The terror of losing her, the sheer awe of her courage. It overwhelmed him. "I thought I had lost you. I saw the blood at the pass.
I shot him. " Eli," she murmured, her eyes drifting shut. I squeezed the trigger, "Just like you said. You did good, Maggie. You did good. " He dressed her wound by the light of the moon, tearing his own shirt for bandages. He held her through the night as she shivered with the after effects of shock, his body acting as a shield against the wind.
He did not sleep. He watched the horizon, his rifle across his lap, daring the world to come for her again. They reached Granite Peak two days later. Maggie rode tied to her saddle, upright only by sheer force of will. Eli led their horses, his eyes dark and hollowed by exhaustion.
Judge Thaddius Blackwood was a man carved from oak. He sat in the small office behind the feed store that served as his temporary courthouse. Listening as Maggie Orr Mercer told her story. She did not hide the shame. She stood before him, her arm in a sling, her face gaunt, but her voice steady.
She told him of the tenements. She told him of the sewing shop. She told him of the landlord who called himself a protector and the sister who burned in a locked room because she owed money to men like Silas Crane. She told him of the ranch, of the cut fences, of the fires, of the threats to have her arrested for her past to leverage her husband's land. I have run from men like this my whole life.
Judge," she said, her voice ringing in the small room. I ran until I found a place that was big enough to be free. I will not let a petty tyrant with a bank ledger take it from us. I will not be owned again. " Then Eli stood. He spoke of his own failures.