"Wait."
Elias looked back.
The warrior's face had gone pale.
"Crane wants you to come."
Elias stared.
"He said the cowboy would follow his bride."
"And?"
"He has men waiting."
Iron Elk tightened his grip on his rifle.
"How many?"
"At least six."
Elias looked toward the eastern ridge.
The sky was beginning to pale.
Ren was out there.
Perhaps frightened.
Perhaps injured.
Perhaps fighting men who believed a woman could be carried away like stolen property.
He could not bear another minute of standing still.
But he forced himself to think.
He remembered his father.
The disappearance.
The forged surveys.
The men who had profited from the river.
And the warning Willow Song had given him.
Do not let anger make you careless.
Elias turned toward Two Feathers.
"Tell us everything."
The older warrior nodded.
And for the first time since the kidnapping, they stopped reacting to the danger and began preparing to meet it.
Ren awakened with her hands tied loosely in front of her.
The wagon was moving.
Its wheels struck stones in the dry canyon, sending sharp jolts through her shoulders.
A rough cloth covered her head.
She could hear three men talking nearby.
One rode beside the wagon.
Another drove.
The third followed on horseback.
Ren remained still.
She had learned long ago that frightened people sometimes revealed more by listening than by demanding answers.
Her father had taught her to identify sounds in the desert.
Different birds.
Different winds.
The sound of horses approaching over soft sand compared with hard stone.
Her grandmother had taught her something else.
When men believed a woman was powerless, they often forgot to be careful about what they said in her presence.
Ren listened.
"Crane wants her alive."
The driver sounded irritated.
The rider answered.
"Then he ought to have come after her himself."
"He's paying you enough."
"Not enough to get shot over some wedding."
Ren memorized the voices.
The driver had a rough, nasal accent.
The rider spoke with the clipped pronunciation she associated with eastern traders.
The third man rarely spoke.
When he did, his voice was low and unusually calm.
"Quit talking about her like she's deaf."
Ren remained motionless.
The driver laughed.
"She's got a sack over her head."
"Doesn't mean she can't hear."
A brief silence followed.
Then the third man said, "Crane wants the boundary papers. He doesn't care what else happens to the cowboy."
Ren felt her stomach tighten.
Boundary papers.
That confirmed something she had suspected for years.
Silas Crane had never been interested merely in her appearance.
He wanted the records connected to her grandmother.
And perhaps the old survey Thomas Whitlock had prepared.
Ren shifted slightly.
The rope around her wrists was tight enough to prevent easy escape but loose enough for her fingers to move.
She felt the small bone needle hidden inside the seam of her wedding dress.
Her grandmother had taught her to keep a needle nearby during journeys.