NO WITNESSES.
Corvin felt the morning tilt around him.
Another line followed.
Bodies to be left in manner consistent with hostile attack.
His mouth went dry.
The captain stopped shouting.
Corvin looked up.
“Who gave this order?”
Silence.
He stepped closer.
The officer’s jaw tightened.
“Captain?”
The man looked toward the ridges.
Then back at Corvin.
“You don’t understand what you’re holding.”
“I understand my name.”
“You understand nothing.”
Corvin crouched.
The officer smelled of sweat and blood.
“What’s your name?”
“Captain Warren Hale.”
“Who ordered my death?”
Hale laughed once.
It was a terrible sound.
“You think this is about you?”
The woman moved closer.
Hale immediately fell silent.
Corvin glanced toward her.
Yesterday she had seemed half-dead.
Today she appeared capable of breaking Hale’s neck with one hand.
“What’s your name?”
Corvin asked.
She answered with a name he struggled to catch.
Seeing his confusion, she repeated only part of it.
“Sena.”
“All right, Sena.
Why were you carrying this?”
She touched the wound near her forehead.
Then pointed south.
“Men followed me.”
“Hale’s men?”
She nodded.
“Why?”
For the first time, something changed in her expression.
Pain.
Not physical pain.
Something older.
“They knew I saw.”
“Saw what?”
Captain Hale lunged forward despite his bound hands.
“Don’t listen to her!”
The old warrior moved faster than Corvin thought possible.
One moment he stood behind Hale.
The next, the barrel of Hale’s own revolver rested against the captain’s neck.
Hale froze.
Sena looked at Corvin.
“Three families.”
Her voice softened.
“Near Dry Creek.”
Corvin knew the place.
Twenty miles south.
“What happened?”
“Dead.”
His stomach tightened.
“All of them?”
She nodded.
“Men wore army coats.”
Hale shouted, “Raiders steal uniforms!”
Sena turned toward him.
“So do soldiers.”
Hale’s face whitened.
Corvin unfolded the map again.
The meaning began to settle over him.
Someone intended to attack his ranch.
Then blame the Apache.
Three murdered families would make the story believable.
His death would become another reason for soldiers to ride north.
A war could begin before anyone bothered asking questions.
“Why?”
Corvin whispered.
Sena pointed toward the well.
That caught him completely off guard.
“My well?”
The gray-haired elder spoke again.
Sena listened.
Then faced Corvin.
“He says the answer is under the stones.”
Corvin almost laughed.
“Under what stones?”
She pointed again.
“The well.”
Captain Hale suddenly struggled against his bonds.
“No.”
That single word changed everything.
Corvin looked at him.
Hale immediately realized his mistake.
Corvin stood.
“What’s under my well?”
“Nothing.”
“You just told me plenty.”
Hale spat into the dirt.
“Your father should have burned this place thirty years ago.”
Corvin stopped breathing.
“My father?”
Hale closed his mouth.
Sena watched Corvin carefully.
“What do you know about Abel Torne?”
Corvin demanded.
No answer.
Corvin grabbed Hale’s uniform.
“My father has been dead eleven years.”
The captain’s expression changed.
Only slightly.
But Corvin saw it.
And fear moved through him colder than anything he had felt since the riders appeared.
Hale smiled.
“Has he?”
Corvin had buried Abel Torne himself.
He remembered the day clearly.
