Ethan turned to look at her. In the starlight, her dark eyes were filled with an intense, calm clarity.

“I could,” Ethan admitted. “But if I ride away, Vance destroys this village, kills your father, and uses my name as a cover for murder. I wouldn’t be able to live with that kind of shadow on my soul.”

He paused, offering a faint, warm smile. “Besides… a very wise woman told a whole village today that she chose me because I showed respect. It’d be a terrible shame to prove her wrong twelve hours later.”

Ayana looked at him, a soft laughter escaping her lips before her expression turned serious again. She reached into her wool shawl and pulled out a small, beautifully carved amulet made of polished turquoise and braided leather.

“My mother gave this to my father before his first battle as chief,” she said, stepping closer and placing the lanyard over Ethan’s head. The turquoise sat cold against his chest. “It is said to guide the steps of those who walk through the dark to protect others.”

Ethan touched the cool stone. “I’ll bring it back to you tomorrow afternoon.”

“I know you will,” she said softly. “Because if you do not, I will come out into that gorge and find you myself.”

Part VI: Fire in the Canyon
The sky was the color of bruised steel when the first light of dawn began to seep over the eastern rim of Whispering Gorge. A thick, icy mist clung to the bottom of the rocky ravine, muffling sound and distorting shadows.

High above the gorge, hidden among the red rocks and twisted pine trees, Kaelen and twenty Apache warriors lay flat on their bellies. They held heavy boulders, wooden levers, and jars of black powder that had been traded for years ago. They were invisible, completely merged with the ancient stone.

At the narrow mouth of the gorge, Ethan sat atop his bay horse, hidden in the shadows of a massive fallen monolith. His heart hammered against his ribs like a trapped bird, but his hands on the leather reins were steady.

A low rumble vibrated through the earth.

Ethan pressed himself flat against his horse’s neck, watching through a gap in the sandstone.

Emerging from the morning mist was a formidable force. At least forty men, clad in dust-caked duster coats and armed with heavy Henry repeating rifles, were riding in tight formation. At the head of the column rode Silas Vance himself—a tall, gaunt man with a silver-streaked beard, a cold glass eye, and a wide-brimmed black hat.

Beside Vance rode a scout holding a pair of field glasses.

“Hold up,” Vance’s raspy voice echoed faintly through the mist. The column ground to a halt just outside the gorge. “Where is the scout’s signal? He was supposed to light a smoke fire at the mouth.”

“Maybe the redskins caught him, boss,” one of the riders muttered, cocking his rifle.

Vance sneered. “Doesn’t matter. The cowboy’s horse was driven in yesterday. The rancher is either dead or trapped inside. Move the men forward. We burn the village before the sun hits the high peak.”

It was time.

Ethan kicked his bay into a sudden, explosive gallop. He burst out from behind the monolith, cutting right across the mouth of the gorge in full view of the mercenary column. He made a deliberate show of looking back in terror, striking his horse’s flanks with the reins as if fleeing for his life.

“Look!” the scout yelled, pointing wildly. “It’s Walker! The rancher! He’s got saddlebags—he’s trying to break out toward the west trail!”

Silas Vance’s glass eye glinted in the dim morning light. “He’s seen the staging area! If he reaches the army post at Fort Lowell, the whole contract is blown! After him! Cut him down before he clears the gorge!”

Vance dug his spurs into his horse’s flanks. The forty mercenaries let out a chorus of harsh yells and surged forward in a thunderous wave of hooves, charging directly into the narrow, trap-like corridor of Whispering Gorge.

Ethan rode like the wind, his horse’s hooves sparking against the river rock. The canyon walls rose hundreds of feet on either side, narrowing until only three horses could ride abreast. Behind him, the roar of pursuing hooves echoed off the stone walls like thunder.

Bullets began to snap through the air around him, ricocheting off the red rocks with sharp, dangerous whines.

Just fifty more yards, Ethan thought, leaning low over his mount’s neck. Just fifty more yards.

He reached the narrowest point of the pass—a section flanked by towering, undercut sandstone spires.

Ethan pulled hard on his left rein, sliding his bay into a hidden side-crevice that opened into a tiny rock pocket—a natural bunker barely wide enough for a horse and rider.

Vance and his lead mercenaries roared past the crevice, unable to check their speed in the cramped, rushing column.

High above, on the rim of the gorge, Kaelen raised his bow, tipped with a burning rag, and fired a single shot into the sky.

“Now!” Kaelen shouted in his native tongue.

The cliffside exploded into motion.

Warriors used heavy timber levers to pry massive sandstone boulders—tons of solid rock—off the edge of the precipice. The immense stones tumbled down the sheer walls, crashing onto the narrow canyon floor with a deafening, earth-shattering roar.

The front of Vance’s column was instantly blocked by a mountain of fallen rock and blinding dust.

Before the rear of the column could turn their horses around in the narrow corridor, Apache warriors at the southern end dropped another barrage of rock and timber, completely sealing the exit.

Silas Vance and his forty men were trapped inside a stone vault.

“It’s a trap! Get up the walls!” Vance screamed, his voice cracking with panic as he drew his revolvers and fired blindly upward.

From the high ledges, the Apache warriors did not fire arrows into the crowd. Instead, they dropped jars of black powder equipped with short, sputtering fuses into the floor of the canyon. The explosions rocked the gorge, sending thunderous shockwaves through the rock, shattering the mercenaries’ morale and throwing their horses into total chaos.

In the blinding smoke and dust, Ethan stepped his horse out of the crevice, his Colt revolver drawn.

Through the haze, a figure came charging toward him on foot—Silas Vance, his face black with soot, his silver beard singed, his eyes wild with fury.

“You!” Vance bellowed, raising a heavy Remington pistol directly at Ethan’s chest. “You dirt-farmer cowboy! You ruined everything!”

Before Vance could pull the trigger, a shadow dropped from the low rock ledge directly above him.

It was Ayana.

She landed with athletic grace, sweeping her wooden hunting bow across Vance’s outstretched arm. The impact knocked the heavy pistol from the outlaw’s hand, sending it clattering into the rocks.

Vance stumbled back, reaching for a hunting knife at his belt, but Ethan leaped from his horse, charging forward and tackling the mercenary commander into the dust.