"A man's worth is measured by his choices when no one is watching. " "Damn it," Jesse said to the empty air. To the ghost of a chief 28 years dead. "You never did let me rest easy. " He turned Smoke toward the gunfire and kicked the horse into a gallop. 800 yards out, Jesse saw them through the shimmering heat. Three men.
White, dirty clothes, unshaven faces. The look of bounty hunters or worse. Armed with Winchesters and belt guns. They were dismounted, walking slowly forward, rifles ready. Their target ran ahead of them.
A woman. Apache, no question. Dark hair in a single braid down her back. Buckskin dress with traditional beading. She was wounded.
Blood darkened her left shoulder. She was out of the arrows, her quiver empty. Only a knife remained in her hand. "Stop running, [ __ ]! " one of the hunters shouted. He was 30-ish, heavy-set with a scar across his face that looked like it came from a knife years ago.
"Boss Crane pays $200 for Black Feather blood brought in alive. " The woman stumbled, but didn't fall. When she spoke, her voice carried clearly despite her exhaustion. "Chinajiniya. " The Apache words were sharp as broken glass. Then in English, accent thick but understandable. "I am daughter of Silver Hawk.
I do not kneel. " Jesse's heart, that damaged and failing organ, suddenly beat so hard it hurt. Daughter of Silver Hawk. The second hunter, younger and thinner, laughed. "Don't care whose daughter you are. You're merchandise now.
Crane's got plans for you and your sisters. " Jesse was already moving. Smoke ate up the ground in powerful strides. Hooves throwing up clouds of red dust. The hunters heard him coming, turned, rifles swinging around. Jesse reined in 40 feet away.
Smoke danced sideways, fighting the bit. But Jesse held him steady with his knees. His hand rested on the butt of his Colt. Not drawing yet, but ready. "Three grown men chasing one wounded woman," Jesse said.
His voice was quiet, but it carried the flatness of a man who'd killed before and would do it again if necessary. "Real brave. " The scarred hunter spat tobacco juice. "Ain't your business, stranger. Ride on. " "Just made it my business. The lady's under my protection now. " The younger hunter grinned, showing teeth stained brown.
"Your protection? Who the hell are you? " Jesse's eyes, pale and flat as weathered stone, moved from face to face. "Someone who doesn't like cowards. " The scarred hunter's hand tightened on his rifle. Jesse moved first. His draw was smooth, practiced, the result of 20 years carrying a gun.
The Colt came up and fired in one motion. The first shot took the scarred hunter in his right shoulder, spinning him around and dropping the rifle from his hands. The man screamed and went down. The second hunter fired his Winchester, but he rushed the shot. The bullet whined past Jesse's ear, close enough to feel the heat.
Jesse's second shot caught the man in his left thigh. He collapsed, howling. The third hunter, younger than the others, tried to flank left. A knife flew through the air and buried itself in his right thigh. He screamed and stumbled.
The Apache woman had thrown it. Even wounded, even exhausted, her aim was true. All three hunters were down and bleeding. The young one managed to crawl to his horse and pull himself into the saddle. The other two followed, clutching their wounds.
They rode off at a hard gallop, leaving a trail of blood and curses. Jesse didn't pursue. He never killed unless he had to. He'd seen enough death to last several lifetimes. He dismounted and walked to where the Apache woman had collapsed.
She was conscious but fading, her face pale beneath the sun-darkened bronze of her skin. The wound on her shoulder was bleeding freely. Dehydration hollowed her cheeks and darkened her eyes. Jesse knelt beside her. He opened his canteen and held it to her lips.
She grabbed his wrist with surprising strength. Her eyes, dark as obsidian and just as hard, fixed on his face with suspicion and exhaustion in equal measure. Wait. Her voice was barely a whisper. Why you help?
White soldiers killed my people. Not all white men are soldiers, Jesse said. Drink. She drank slowly, her eyes never leaving his face. Jesse used the water to clean her wound, then tore a strip from his shirt to bind it.
Yes, sir. The shoulder wound was a graze, painful and bleeding, but not fatal. As he worked, he noticed something, a scar on her left shoulder, partially hidden by the blood. Shaped like a crescent moon. Jesse's hands froze.
The woman saw his reaction. It is mark of my bloodline, chief's family. Why you stare? Jesse reached into his vest with shaking hands, drew out the leather charm, held it where she could see, the moon wing symbol, identical to her scar. Because, Jesse said, his voice rough with emotion he couldn't name, 21 years ago, a Chiricahua chief saved an 8-year-old boy lost in this desert.
Before he left, he gave the boy this. Said if I ever saw this mark again, I'd know they were family. The woman's eyes went wide. Her hand, still bloody, reached up to touch the tattoo on her right wrist. The same symbol inked in traditional Apache style.
The symbol of moon wing, she breathed. My father spoke of you. The white boy with blue eyes who survived alone 3 days. He said you had warrior spirit in wrong colored skin. Jesse felt something crack open in his chest, not as heart, though that ached, too.
Something deeper. Your father, he said, Chief Silver Hawk. Where is he? Her face hardened. Pain flashed in her eyes, but also rage, carefully controlled.
Dead. Murdered 3 months ago by a land thief named Silas Crane. And Crane did not stop with killing my father. He took my five sisters, sold them like cattle. I have hunted 3 months and found nothing but lies and cold trails.