Grey Bear John, humming his chants, finished a fresh poultice for Heath’s wound. Before he placed it he checked that the swelling was still low, that there were none of the killing initial lines of color that might radiate outwards from such an injury. The wound itself was oozing clear still, a bright lipless grimace well under the smooth shoulder. It looked horrific. It could look so much worse.

“This’ll hurt,” John murmured apologetically, then pinched the wound open a bit so that the seeping herbal soup from this latest, unique poultice could work its magic.

“Shittt,” Heath hissed, wanting to turn his head, buck, anything—but knowing that stillness was his only choice just now.

“Don’t worry, Horse Heath. Had to do it. Stings like hell, but this is special medicine. Gonna make the muscles in there go to sleep a bit, relax, so I can dig in easier. Been saving it for when I needed it.”

So saying, John sat cross-legged down beside his patient, grabbed Heath’s hand and squeezed it, then paused for a time. “Hey,” he finally offered. “While we wait for that to take, how ‘bout a smoke?” After rolling it, the young man lay beside his patient, facing the cave ceiling, one tightly muscled arm crooked behind his head. Heath still lay belly down, quivering in painful spurts and now clutching the furs beneath him with one clenched fist. John took a drag on the fat smoke, then passed it carefully to Heath, holding it to the shaky blonde’s gray lips so he too could take a steadying drag.

John pulled it over, took another long drag himself, letting the smoke calm him, spitting out a touch of leaf from his tongue. He gently passed it back and forth for a time. “Spect I can do this?”

“’Spect you can try.”

“Poultice working yet, you think?”

Heath twitched his shoulder slowly, offered the barest nod. “Starting to feel all… funny.”

“Funny is good.” John checked the poultice, nodded back, sighed out through his nostrils, blowing a final twin curl of smoke. Then he leaned forward, rested the butt gently between Heath’s lips. “Hold up. One more thing for ya.” At that he roused and fished out a half empty bottle of whiskey from his stash amongst the interior rocks. “Take a hit. Best I can offer.”

“What do you have to do back there?” Heath asked, blowing a glad hiss through his teeth at the belly-warming burn of his only anesthetic.

Grey Bear John settled back on his heels, eyes closed as he visualized the process. His face was young, narrow, beautiful… and now bordering on agonized. “Won’t be fun. Gotta cut a ‘T’ through the skin first with this here knife of yours so I can see if all the muscles are closed back up over the head. If so, I gotta slice 'em or finger spread 'em, depending on what I find. Gonna use this handy device,” at that he held up what appeared to Heath’s sliding eyes as an arrow shaft, “to help me wedge in and separate the ribs once I get to the arrowhead.”

“Sorta ironic.” Heath indicated the bottle with his chin and John leaned down to help him with another hit.

The shaman continued. “Then I’m gonna use these,” he held up for Heath what appeared to be a pair of handcrafted, narrow-tipped tongs… perhaps made from willow, “maybe use your blade, to wiggle and wedge Charley’s arrowhead out. Based on the time you’ve been laying here and on what I’ve seen doing this sort of thing before, I’m gonna be up against bleeding some time after.”

Heath watched John’s visualization through sideways blue eyes, the lean man’s nervous hands clutching his leather clad thighs. John’s own dark eyes bore the bright hint of sad tears. “You’ll either rally fine or you’ll move on to the spiritworld. I hope for whichever is right.”

“Yup. Let’s get to this, m' friend,” Heath ground out. And he meant it.

Some two hours later John found himself wanting to whoop for joy when he finally retrieved the flint arrowhead. He’d spent most of the time straddled in a perch across Horse Heath’s behind. It both gave him the right angle for the gruesome task and helped to hold his patient still. As he’d expected of this man, it had proven unnecessary to bind his hands. Heath had clasped the furs beneath him into a strangled lump, had involuntarily quivered at the worst of it, but had fought valiantly to keep himself still.

The only true complication—and a near-fatal one at that—had been when the blond had unexpectedly, violently retched just as John was using the arrow’s shaft to gently spread the ribs. It had caused the shaman to jerk, almost shoving the shaft fully in with all of the careful pressure he’d been using to bit by bit just slide and wiggle it in. They’d both needed a quick pause after that one.

But now it was over. The ribs had only been cracked in two places, and the shaman was ready—as best he could be—for any extensive bleeding to follow. Sometimes it came right away, sometimes later.

Grey Bear John couldn’t quite determine if Heath was sleeping or in some far-off, almost meditative state. He didn’t seem fully unconscious. None of it mattered, though, as long as Horse Heath wasn’t here with his throbbing, pestered wound just now.

John lay back against the cool rock wall, a protective hand on Heath’s good shoulder. It was a position he’d become most familiar with. He would, ironically, be sad to see their horrific sojourn together end. Talking to Heath, caring for him, had reminded him that talking and caring for and all things human were good. While he watched the blond breathe, and hummed the songs that kept bleeding at bay, he danced weary fingers up the faded rosary.

Nick and Jarrod, by simply marching into the sheriff’s office and announcing their intent, had found it easy to join the posse. They had found it far more difficult, however, as the group thundered out into the wilderness, to feel any sort of acceptance from the men. Especially when they let it be known that they were "also" searching for their brother, Heath.

“Ain’t that that molly coddlin’ do-gooder with us last time?” a narrow-eyed man in a yellow shirt asked. Off Nick’s deadly glare he shrugged and looked off. “I’m just sayin’….”

“Yeah, that was the one,” a man named Emmett nodded. He was thunderously big, Jarrod noted wryly, and so too stupid to recognize a threat when he saw one. He was underestimating the potential wrath of Nick Barkley just now as he’d probably underestimated that of Heath Barkley days earlier. “We was beginning to think we’d have to string him up ‘longside those injuns, if’n we caught 'em. Was maybe his lucky day when we didn’t.”

Nick reigned his horse, dismounted, an action which stalled the whole curious group. He marched to Emmett, grabbed him by one meaty leg, and in a lightning move, jerked it violently upwards thus dismounting the man and landing him with a resounding thump on the other side of his horse. As the animal danced skittishly away, Nick leaned in. “Stand up and say that all again.” His voice was a low gravel and his eyes were hard rocks.

Sheriff Bender (who seemed merely amused) finally halted the proceedings. “Alright, fellas, we got the peckin’ order out of the way. Now let’s go find us some renegades.”

When that failed to move Nick, who still loomed over the fuming (but now silent) Emmett, Jarrod closed in on his brother, laid a hand on his shoulder, felt the bunched muscles there. “Let’s just get moving, Nick. Sooner we find them, the sooner we may find Heath.”

Nick let out a sound that was part sigh, part growl, and then whirled to stalk after his brother. The Barkleys remounted, each wondering darkly how they’d manage this experience, keeping it from becoming the catastrophe it had all the earmarks for. And, more importantly, how the hell they were going to find their wounded little brother.

As they rode, Jarrod evaluated the men as he would potential members of a jury. Sheriff Bender SEEMED straightforward enough, but a bit too comfortable riding with a bunch as obviously itching to see a hanging as this one was. Either the man was confident in his powers to rein the group in or he, likewise, didn’t really care about the outcome of their dark endeavor. The man in the yellow shirt was malleable, could be pulled in any direction.

Although Nick would disagree, Jarrod deemed that Emmett was the kind of loudmouth that needed to be watched, and closely… especially now that he’d been brought down a peg by Nick’s wrath. That kind of man had to prove his size… he had to be right no matter the cost, and regardless of whether he was indeed wrong. The other two—Wayne and Hank, Jarrod had gathered—were as yet non-entities. Wayne rode always to Emmett’s left, however, which probably indicated his allegiance. Hank kept mostly to himself, a true enigma thus far.

Jarrod also kept a close eye out for the flasks Heath had alluded to in his missive. And sure enough, the drinking started early… with Emmett, who shared freely with Wayne, which could be a simple explanation for Wayne’s seeming allegiance. Hank also took an occasional nip, but he was much more surreptitious about it. Jarrod sighed deeply. This foray into hell was beginning to take the eternity hell was famous for.

“What?” Nick asked in response to the sigh.

“Don’t like this, Brother Nick. Not one bit.”

“What’s to like?” Nick kept his voice low, but only through the clenching of his jaw. “Heath’s somewhere out here in all of this.” With an expansive arm he indicated the gorgeous piney green of the surrounding country, dancing in the crisp morning brightness. “He could be behind that tree back there or fifteen miles away. Meanwhile, we’re here, with this group of horses’ asses rounding up a few renegades who happen to like murdering stray travelers. I don’t think, even if we find the Modocs, we’re going to find the body.” Both brothers jolted to a halt at that one slip of a word.

Nick was aghast. “I’m sorry.”

Jarrod reached over, gave a light punch to Nick’s bicep. “It’s alright. We’re both worried. And I think it’s time we did something more about it.” He spurred ahead to catch the sheriff, Nick following. “Where are we headed?” he asked as Bender looked up expectantly.

“Grey Bear John’s old cave.”

The Barkleys’ questions were fired off in tandem. “Who?... Where?”

“Grey Bear John. Indian that’s lived around here for awhile now. Some kind of medicine man or some such. When this business with the renegades started in we tried to round him up too, but he was too slick for us. Hidin’ out someplace else now, I ‘spect.”

Nick and Jarrod shared a look, a tiny glimmer of hope sparking in their dying hearts. “So,” Jarrod tried, “because he’s an Indian you decided he’s with the renegades?” The words were accusatory but they were wrapped around a tone that was comedic, delightful… and wily, Nick noted.

“Didn’t decide nothin’. Wanted to make sure is all. The fact that he slipped off into the wilderness might just support the idea that he’s guilty, though, mightn’t it?”

“Might also support the fact he likes his neck short instead of all stretched out,” Nick growled, eyeing the motley group riding around them.

The sheriff only grinned. “There is that too, I ‘spect.”

“So if he’s someplace else, why head to his old cave?” Jarrod asked.

“It was a nice spot to lay low. When we were there lookin’ for him, there was all kind of trash left behind that a renegade might take a fancy to. Furs and dried weeds and such. Might just be the perfect place for a body to take refuge.”

“I see,” Jarrod nodded. “You make good sense, Sheriff Bender.”

Nick swallowed a grin at his brother’s diplomacy. It wasn’t his way, but it was a way that worked time and time again for Jarrod. In the distance, a crow cawed its greeting to the morning.

They were some yards from the cave, the sheriff pointing out its dark entrance to the Barkleys, when the shot rang out. The sheriff seemed to startle, then looked at Jarrod, his face merely curious. After a beat he slid bonelessly from his horse. It took a molasses moment, but suddenly the men found themselves dismounted and dashing for cover. The sheriff would never need to take cover again, Jarrod determined after a hasty attempt to find his pulse.

Jarrod scrambled to where Nick had hunkered down behind a huge redwood, providing random covering fire at the rocks in the distance, and the two of them settled in for the horrific battle to begin.

Grey Bear John finished packing all of the most essential items that he could, wrapping them carefully in bundles of fur that could later double as bits of warmth for Heath. One bundle held what was left of his medicines: herbs, both dried and fresh, whiskey, rag bandages made from Horse Heath’s spare clothes, even some iodine. Another held all that remained of their food supplies: jerky, hardtack, a few last tins of fruit and beans, some smoked fish and quail wrapped in leaves, flint and steel for fire, the last remnants of their tobacco. Heath’s saddle bags held what they had when he’d originally met John, minus those things John had used to keep his new friend alive through these long, grueling days. John would begrudgingly wear the sidearm until Heath was well enough to take it back.

The saddle, however, he would leave behind. The horse could carry a blanket-and-fur swaddled Heath, with the bundles slung evenly over its rump. Because if it had to, for some desperate reason, support the two of them and the supplies, the saddle would be one less bit of burden. Grey Bear John had no doubts in Heath’s ability to stay astride a horse bareback; he and the creature were one-soul, and would simply lock together despite Heath’s wound.

Heath’s wound. Grey Bear John sighed, straightened and stretched. He ached from too many long hours of jittery alertness, the bunched muscles of pain and horror and troubling times; he felt far older than his 25-odd years. But then, he always felt somehow ancient. He headed back to Heath, who had finally settled into a restful sleep, helped by the fresh poultice to deaden the pain of the surgery. Thankfully, the bleeding thus far had been sparse. The mild fever was hopefully more of a reaction to the trauma he’d just undergone than anything else.

As John was lifting the bandage, probing the wound gently, Heath opened one bleary eye. John offered him a sip of the rich broth kept constantly warmed and nearby, which was gladly, slowly received. Then Heath cleared his ragged throat. “Guess this ain’t the spiritworld?”

Grey Bear John chuckled. “I’ve got higher hopes for the place than this. Think you can lay here and not die some more while I make a forage out?”

Heath slid his eyes towards the entrance to the cave. “Still daytime. Think it’s safe?”

“We’re gonna get movin’ at nightfall, I think. I had a dream about owls. Wanna head on, if that’s alright with you. Owl might not wanna kill you, but he ain’t too fond of me.”

“I can move,” Heath stated flatly.

“Figured as much. Hoped so, anyhow. But I’m low on some herbs, and I wanna take one last check at the hand rock.” Off Heath’s curious frown he rephrased it. “God’s hand, I think you called it.”

“What for?” Heath’s voice was a rasp again, so John offered him another careful sip.

“That last note you wrote your brother? I penciled a little map on the back of it… the river, the rock, this cave. Since you’d mentioned the rock in the letters I thought they might think to look for it as a starting point. I been checking for signs of them there whenever I go out for water and gatherin’ and such.”

“Be careful,” Heath sighed, closing his eyes again.

“Drink your broth,” Grey Bear John parried, and then he headed stealthily into the stark light of day.

In the lightning moment it took to find cover, Hank Handy recalled all of the reasons he was here with this weak excuse for a posse. Handy, once a scout for the army during the Indian wars, was now a plain ole bounty hunter. He was gone from home for long periods of time, but this last return had enraged him more than usual. His woman had been letting his son work. His SON, Billy, named after a long-dead soldier, delivering messages like some crawlin’ Chinese. She claimed that the money from Hank had been slow coming, but Hank knew it was just ‘cause she was no better at running a household than she seemed to be at anything else… including motherin’. When he went in to have the talk with his son about appropriate behavior and such, he found the boy sitting on his bed and playing with a carved coyote.

A coyote, it was revealed, that had been carved by a damned Indian—one that bawling Billy thought of as a friend! He’d beat the boy but good, watched while he marched the coyote to the fireplace and burnt it. He beat the woman for good measure. Then he headed out. No Indian was gonna talk to HIS boy. Never again, anyhow. He’d track him, find him, skin him, and then maybe bring the skin home to reinforce his lesson to the boy. Boys had to learn somehow, and he wanted Billy to learn without all the trouble of joining the damned army and its shit-heel attempts to control the Indian problem. Hank Handy KNEW how to control the "Indian problem"… and had gotten a dishonorable discharge for his efforts.

Another gunshot from the rocks ahead broke his reverie, shored up his resolve. He took aim, returning sparing fire… just enough to try and determine the position of this unseen foe.

Although Jarrod could do nothing about the remaining posse now scattered around them, he could control Nick. “Don’t shoot,” he pleaded. Off Nick’s startled glare he explained. “That cave up there… it could be where Heath is!”

Nick settled against the rough bark of the tree, pondered the possibility, then shook his head. “Think about it, Jarrod. The sheriff said the shaman Indian, Bear John or whatever, had moved on from here. If he’s managed to stay alive around these fools this long, I’m sure he’s not stupid enough to return to a den they already know about.”

“We can’t be sure!”

“I think we can. Think, Jarrod. Heath’s last letter. He said he thought he was in a cave… and that he thought he was still near the Truckee because he could hear water.”

Jarrod closed his eyes for a moment, tried to hear beyond the sounds of gun battle, into the sweet sounds of nature as it moved on around them, either ignorant of or uncaring about their plight. He listened with all that he had. He could hear birds, wind, tall trees whispering and creaking. Finally he got it. “But we can’t hear water from here.”

Jarrod checked his sidearm, craned his neck to watch as the posse made little spurts and leaps to move forward.

Nick waited for him, gave him a gentle nudge to one shoulder with his own. “This has to be the renegades. So let’s just try to keep this from turning into a lynching, Pappy. It’s what Heath would want.”

Jarrod heard Emmett shouting orders to Yellow Shirt and Wayne. On the big man’s call, they cut far to either side of the invisible foe that was so carefully tucked up in the rocks ahead, the men staying all the while behind boulders and trees and any manner of cover. Emmett himself crept slowly and steadily forward, laying down an infantry’s worth of cover fire.

“The man must be hauling a whole army’s store of bullets,” Jarrod quipped wryly.

“At least he thinks he is,” Nick scoffed. Then he studied the threesome’s movements for a flash. “They’re flanking him. Since they’re cutting loose, it’ll probably be safe for us to dodge on in too. I think it’s only one man firing up there, so as long as we stay low, cover each other, we should be fine.”

“And when we get there?” Jarrod asked.

“First priority, make sure Heath ain’t anywhere around. If he is, all bets are off. Second, make sure not to die. Third, try not to let these blame fools kill unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

“What else do you notice about our foe up there?” Jarrod asked, falling back effortlessly on his years in the military.

“He’s not firing very often at all,” Nick nodded.

“Wounded?”

“Or he has to conserve shells. In our favor either way, I suppose.” Nick craned his head back, checked for Hank, who was still behind them and to the right. “We need to keep an eye on that one too if we can. He’s laying down just enough fire to keep the fellow up there busy, and to figure things out. But I never trust a man who voluntarily brings up the rear.”

“Maybe he figures those three fools will do all the work for him,” Jarrod chuckled grimly. Gallows humor in the face of horror; he remembered it well.

In tandem, the brothers made careful moves forward, each laying down suppressing fire for the other until they were safely ensconced behind their next perches. Their movements were fluid, almost graceful, as opposed to the stumbling, cracking crashing of their “colleagues” as the lead threesome butchered their way through the landscape ahead of them.

Then Yellow Shirt caught a bullet and dropped. He howled, grabbing his leg, writhing for a few long beats in clear range of the foe.

“Take cover!” Nick hollered a reminder at the man, while rolling his eyes at Jarrod at the seeming insignificance of the wound. Yellow Shirt seemed to remember himself, then fairly flopped behind the nearest rock. “Keep pressure on it!” Nick yelled again and Yellow Shirt nodded, still howling and cursing. A passel of birds rose and whirled, annoyed, and cursed along with him.

Heath decided it was time to live again. He reached a quavering hand forward, clutched at the tin cup, dragged it to his mouth, and took a long few moments to carefully sip its warmed contents. Slowly he drained the mildly thickened, salty broth, then waited for the possible violent betrayal by his body. Although it was starving, his body was also enraged, and might just as soon spray the broth back all over the cave as accept it. After a long time of aggressive swallowing against the dreaded mouth watering of nausea, Heath decided his body had finally chosen to be marginally agreeable.

Ultimately the broth stayed where it should, so Heath decided to further test his body’s begrudging partnership. The arrow wound was low on his left, but it affected everything on that side, including his arm, which gradually alternated between complete numbness and feeling like it had become a flaring torch that he could probably light up the whole cave with. So, using his right arm along with both legs, he tried to wedge himself into a shaky kneel. It took two agonizing tries, and by the time he got there he was panting in tiny gasps and running with a sweat profuse enough to chill his skin as it dried—but there he was… halfway to a stand. He crawled and slid a bit until he reached the wall, and then leaned forward, letting the icy cool rock kiss his face.

He wasn’t certain how long he rested there, but finally he decided to work on the next stage. Sucking in a great lungful of air, smoky from the low-burning fire, he clawed his right hand into a rock hold and, using his legs, pushed upwards. “Thank god for rocks,” he mumbled. Without them, he knew he’d be face down again. He rested against the wall, standing for the first time in… how long, he wondered thickly?

How long had he been trying not to die (or to die) in this cave… and would his family, or rather his oldest brother, really come looking for him? “Be careful, Jarrod,” he whispered, “it’s a sharp world out there.” Tears rose, unbidden, to his eyes, but he was pretty sure they were tears of debilitating weakness, of the constant heartbeat throb of pain. And definitely of worry—for his new friend, nay savior, and for his older brother who would no doubt now try to save him too. They didn’t seem to be tears of loneliness anymore.

Jarrod and Nick picked their way up the rocky incline in time to take in a scene of utter bewilderment. Emmett and Wayne had narrowed in and were carefully closing on the cluster of boulders that apparently hid their shooter, even though the shots were coming at greater and greater intervals—indeed, had tapered to seemingly nothing.

But standing in a clear opening to the right was a bedraggled looking Indian, clearly undernourished and wearing ragged leathers. He was masterfully firing a bow… but nowhere in sight were there any arrows! Still, he pulled the bowstring taut and fired imaginary missiles again and again and again. And not even at any targets. He just stood, eyes glazed, and fired at enemies unseen well over the heads of the posse now closing on him.

“What the hell?” Nick whispered sadly.

Obviously Emmett and Wayne had already taken in the sight of the pitiful bow-wielder and chosen to ignore him. “Bear Stink Charley, you miserable bastard,” Emmett yelled gleefully to the still-unseen man behind the rocks ahead, “throw the iron out and come on down for what we got waiting for you.”

“Yeah,” Wayne guffawed, “a rope.”

“I’m Jarrod Barkley; I’m an attorney,” Jarrod hollered in turn. He knew the words would be meaningless, particularly if the man spoke no English, but he hoped the tone would hold all the comforting weight of a mother's warm arms. “You need to just give up the weapon and my brother and I will see that you receive proper treatment.”

There was a long, eerie pause. The men even began to gradually slide their way from behind their various perches. The lone Indian—"Delilah’s Man Charley," Wayne had yelled back to the Barkleys with an indicative nod—still stood, shooting his imaginary arrows at invisible foes.

Jarrod and Nick kept hopeful eyes on the gunman’s rocks, sad eyes on the tortured bowman. Then, as one, it dawned on all of the men that the shooting had stopped altogether. They began to creep cautiously forward.

One final muffled shot cracked and echoed through the ironically beautiful afternoon.

All in the posse either flinched or hit the dirt again, but it soon dawned on them that this particular shot hadn’t been headed in their direction. There was a long beat of checking limbs, calming hearts, and wondering if the whole tiring episode was just about over.

The eerie silence was broken by a long, singing howl from the mouth of Delilah’s Man Charley. It was a wail that tightened already-nervous guts. He set down the bow, carefully, almost reverently, and began to walk, eyes dragging, away from the scene.

The posse, including Jarrod and Nick, all scrambled forward, not concerned about the wandering one-time bow-wielder who would prove an effortless catch. Instead, they all closed on the boulders to find what turned out to be the body of Bear Stink Charley. He had clutched his rifle and had used what was, according to the empty boxes around him, his very last cartridge to end his own misery here on this earth.

He’d cradled the gun like a lover, pressed its barrel like a deep kiss into his mouth, and passionately jerked the trigger. Even Nick winced, but not for the sight—for the sad thought of the life that had brought a man to this. And then Nick looked closer. Although it was bathed in gore, he KNEW that rifle. It was his younger brother's.

He had to make a quick run to the cave ahead to search for this brother, although he knew his earlier opinion had been true—that Heath (or his body) was still hidden from them, in some other cave, but one closer to the Truckee River.

Jarrod, meanwhile, had taken off on a slow trudge along with Emmett and Wayne as they followed Delilah’s Man Charley, who seemed to wander meaninglessly. Even the two “hardened” posse members were now more aghast than afire, looking constantly to Jarrod for clues as to how they should handle this unique situation.

At first the Indian was silent, then he began mumbling softly in both Modoc and English. Nick caught up with them, reverently cradling Heath’s rifle and hoping the Indian would either rouse enough to give him the information he needed about the firearm, or cross fully over into the void of insanity so that nobody could bother the poor man ever again.

Finally Delilah’s Man Charley staggered, crying. The fascinated, horrified men following him thought the pitiful wandering had ended. But then Charley found another slow pace, dragging one foot and then another farther and farther away from the spot of his friend’s suicide and towards nothing in particular.

Now he walked, arms stretched out like the killing branches of a crucifix, sobbing the while.

Never had a posse been so broken, enthralled, curious, stumbling, as this small group of men who wandered after mumbling, weeping Charley. The only words the group could initially make out were “love” and “Delilah,” then a rambling, agonizing string: “love Delilahlove Delilah love love. LoveDelilah.”

Charley gasped, halted for a second, raised his tear-stained face to stare at the men behind him, as if they understood. “So pretty, Delilah. Pretty. Love.”

And way behind them all, bringing up the far rear, Hank Handy quietly raised his rifle, narrowed through his sights.

Now Delilah’s Man Charley dropped to his knees, face in his hands, then he spread his arms again, talking to the wind in Modoc, then in English. “Oh Delilah. Sweet Delilah. Little baby boy? Little baby girl, Delilah?” He wept into the sky now, but his face was beautiful with its sadness. He breathed a happy sob, “Death.”

The rifle shot dropped him before it was even heard.

The men watched, all horrified but one as, from his dying position on his belly, Delilah’s Man Charley reached a quavering hand up, grabbing at something none of them could see. Something warm, beautiful, divine, remembered. He sobbed at it, called it by its Modoc name.

But his fingers must have just missed touching it. They strained, quivered, then dropped. He twitched in one last pain as his smile slowly stiffened into a grimace. Then his heart was dead, his black eyes blank, as the murmuring wind from the pines slowly dried the tears on his face.

Jarrod heard the cawing of a crow. It snapped him from his horrified reverie. “He was unarmed,” he mumbled. Then he was hollering, shoving at the men next to him, barging towards Hank, his voice a controlled, slicing fury. “So help me god, he was UNARMED!”

For once, Nick found himself stopping JARROD from battle. “Jarrod,” his voice was low. “Jarrod, we’ll deal with that in time. You’ll bring him to justice, I swear.” Jarrod’s blue eyes could hardly find Nick’s, and when they did they still flitted madly. “Jarrod,” Nick whispered, blinking back his own sorrow, “this is… Heath’s rifle. The Indians, they had Heath’s rifle.”

Heath had found his legs and began to trust them to support his weight a bit at a time. He had to simply marvel at Grey Bear John’s care for him thus far. But then, Heath had always been in favor of nature’s bounty where medicinals were concerned. He was in no way well, could keel over at anytime, but he was moving when, as far as he was concerned, he should have been long dead.

With a push off the wall he made a slow, shuffling stagger towards the fire to try and find things to wear. He was dressed in his thick socks and tan slacks—obviously they’d been washed often by his new benefactor, whether due to blood or vomit or just plain filth, personal or otherwise—but he still needed some kind of shirt or jacket. The drying sweat from his efforts left him chilled and shivering, which sent jolts of wild slitting-knife pain through his back and side that left him hissing out silent swear words.

But he managed a weak, pained grin when a scan around the cave revealed that, while John had obviously packed them up for a move, the man had left out a cleaned shirt, Heath’s jacket, and a handmade sling meticulously crafted from some bits of thin, treated leather. Perched carefully beside Heath’s warm palette were his well-worn boots. There was also Heath’s coffee pot, set at the edge of the fire and putting off the flowery but acrid scent of one of John’s herbal teas—a scent that Heath didn’t know he’d forgotten from his injured stupor until he suddenly discovered that he remembered it. He settled in for the long, painful task of dressing himself, intended to sip on a bit of the tea—probably it would be one of those that helped with this merciless, grinding pain.

He’d need to be ready and able when Grey Bear John returned so that Heath could try to repay the life-debt he now owed. So that Heath could keep the young man alive when they encountered what his clenching gut somehow told him that they soon would… men out to kill another man because of some old, dripping-poison greed for land that was fueled by fear and hostility over a difference in cultures.

And the man now in danger was quickly becoming one of his truest friends.

“Well fellas,” Hank Handy bellowed to Emmett and Wayne as he grinned at the body of Delilah’s Man Charley. “That was mighty fine work. Now let’s just head out after that last one, the one that’s been pesterin’ my boy, Billy, and we’ll be all through with our solemnly sworn duties.” He doubted the men would follow him, but he really didn’t care. They could prove as much of a burden as a help. It was worth the try, however, to get numbers beside him as he made his way from this scene and the damned “Do Good Brothers.” The Barkleys were as bad as the army!

“You join him,” Jarrod hissed at the pair, “and you’ll be brought up as accessories if anything happens to that last Indian. He’s not even one of the renegades. He’s your NEIGHBOR, for god’s sake.”

“Brought up as accessories,” Emmett laughed (although it seemed just a touch nervous to Nick’s ears). “That sounds awful fancy, Lawyer. Brought up to who? Sheriff is dead.”

“Well, shall I start with my godfather, the governor of this fair state, or just the closest federal marshals that I regularly play poker with? Take your pick.” Jarrod’s narrowed eyes told that he spoke nothing less than the truth… indeed, that he was holding a hand full of plenty more cards than that.

Nick again laid a calming hand on Jarrod’s shoulder, but each word spoken to Emmett and Wayne was a stiletto. “What I suggest you two do is pick up your shot-up friend back there, load the sheriff over his horse and head back to town. Jarrod WILL see that justice is done for this SAVAGE” he punctuated the word with a glare at Hank “MURDER as soon as we find my missing little brother. But trust me, none of you want to be anywhere near my big brother, here, when he marches this into a courtroom.”

Hank Handy merely shrugged and headed back for his horse.

“You freeze,” Nick barked, whirling and pulling his sidearm.

Hank paused, hands in the air, but his voice was full of laughter. “Problem is I’m going to keep walking away with my back to you. And I am clearly not reaching for my weapon. So unless you plan on shooting a man in the back… in front of all of these witnesses… there’s not much you can do to stop me.” And Hank marched on, not even flinching as Nick fired a round into the ground at his feet.

“Let it be, Nick,” Jarrod sighed. “You were right; we have bigger things to deal with.” The two men watched as Handy reached his mount, carefully and obviously stowed all weapons, tipped his hat jauntily, and rode off. The tension was still rife, however, until Emmett—perhaps remembering the earlier encounter with a hostile Nick, perhaps picturing a future encounter with the other formidable brother… perhaps even overwrought by what they’d all just experienced—finally cleared his throat and nodded at Wayne to follow him back to Yellow Shirt.

Once it was clear that the remaining members of the posse were, indeed, headed back to Landers, Jarrod turned sorrowful eyes towards the bloody rifle Nick still clutched. “Are you sure?”

“’Eye ball or button and pow’… I think that’s what he said.” Off Jarrod’s curious gaze, Nick continued, his voice husky with pain. “The first day I saw this rifle was when we dumped each other into that damned river. Before I beat him into telling us who… before I decided to act the part of a damned fool for long enough to drive my brother out here and into this utter madness.”

“Let’s bury these two,” Jarrod said, and then we’ll head closer to the Truckee. Try to somehow figure which way to follow it.” Then he mirrored what Nick had said earlier in regards to keeping the posse from becoming a lynch mob—a task they had somehow sadly failed. “It’s what Heath would want.” Jarrod's voice was also ragged with pain, because each step closer to Heath seemed to take them a hundred steps farther away.

It seemed fitting, somehow, to bury the two renegades closer to the river—and farther away from the site of their final destruction. And it certainly didn’t cost the brothers any extra travel time because they were headed there anyway. The first grave, Bear Stink Charley’s, was relatively effortless. Both men were physically rested—indeed restless with pent up energy—although they were twitching at the very end of their emotional ropes.

When they got halfway through the second grave, however, Nick dropped down, cross-legged, at its edge. Jarrod looked up, frowning. “Brother Nick?” His voice was pressed with all of it: concern, longing, worry, terror, and a crippling sadness. When Nick raised his head, Jarrod knew from his younger brother’s look that they shared all of those emotions, but particularly the last… the wringing sadness had dropped his brother in a way that day after day of the most grinding physical labor never could.

Nick reached over and picked up, again, Heath’s rifle, which he had since reverently cleaned and which he seemed to be keeping always nearby. “It still feels right to bury them, but they killed him for this, didn’t they?”

“The facts… the last letter… testify otherwise.” Jarrod’s words were optimistic, but his tone was leaden.

Nick set down the rifle and fished out the bundle of letters which he had adopted as his own cross to bear. He fingered them lovingly, reread the last aloud. Jarrod paused in his digging to listen. Nick’s voice was wrung-out, laced with bitterness.

“’Jarrod, I have been sorely injured. I do not recall the matter and cannot tell the cause. The wound is in my back. The man is still with me and is treatin it, Modoc medicin. He has suggested that we are in a bind and that I pen for help. I do not wish to bother you with trubles, but fear I must.’” Nick reared up. “He doesn’t wish to bother us with troubles! ‘Cause god knows we’ve got too much on our fancy china Barkley plates to be bothered with the likes of a dying baby brother.” He hung his head and continued.

”’I do not know the day or how long I have been insentient, but I do know that I will probly not rally without your aid. The young man here is kind, but he will not take me to town. I do not even know rightly where I am. I hear the water, so I must be still near the Truckee. In a cave, it seems.” Nick skimmed past a few lines, and then pointedly read the last. ”’If I do not see you, I think it only fair to say that, given time, I would have deeply loved you all. Heath.’ Deeply, he says, meaning he probably loved us, most of us, already. And he could have even loved me.” The word “me” was spat out as if envenomed.

Nick carefully folded the letter, head still hung. In a whisper he confessed all of his sins. “’I will probably not rally without your aid.’ That’s a fine state. If he has to ask you for aid out here in the wild instead of me… if he’s counting on Barkleys to find him when I couldn’t even find my brother right there on my own ranch, hell, in my own parlor. That boy’s dead, Jarrod, and I’m the one that killed him.”

Jarrod opened his mouth to argue, then snapped it shut and continued digging. Nothing he could say would help Nick just now. Later, but not now. Nick continued to caress the letter. After a time, curious, he held it up to the light. “What’s this, now?”

Jarrod dropped down next to him, suddenly just as weary. “What?”

But Nick was hopping up, raising the letter to the sun. “Look… a wavy running line, some circles, and those… those are marker trees… a map.” He shoved it under Jarrod’s nose.

“I don’t think Heath wrote that.” Jarrod frowned. “What is it? Or rather, where?”

Nick paced a moment or two, squinted ahead at the river. “It’s the Truckee, Jarrod, and see this little mark… looks like a hand, don’t it?”

There was a beat and then Jarrod grinned. “God’s hand! The rock Heath wrote about!”

“And up from it a bit,” Nick traced the distance with his finger, “there, that could be a cave.”

“So where are we?” Jarrod pondered, looking around.

Nick squinted behind them, picturing the town in the distance, then pointed at a lone hieroglyph of a building, low on the corner of the paper, apart from the rest of the marks. “That’s Landers. This tiny circle here might be the old cave. We’re about here.” And for the first time since leaving, Nick had a swell of real hope. Looking at Jarrod, Nick saw that his Pappy had found some too. They whooped and hugged each other, and then Nick took over with furious digging while Jarrod mounted and rode forward, sacred letter in hand, to trace the river’s edge for precious landmarks.

Grey Bear John was satisfied with the herbs he had gathered, but disappointed that he’d cautiously trekked all the way to the hand rock only to find it vacant. Not a sign of anyone. He began to wonder if this “family” of Horse Heath’s cared in the least. How could they abandon such a wild and wonderful spirit? He knelt to fill his waterskins and Heath’s canteen now that he was closer to the den and wouldn’t have to haul them so far.

A cracking of branches alerted him and he lowered into a frozen crouch. As he’d done through the whole journey, he had only paused at the river once he was behind the safest cover. A quick sweep of the opposite shore revealed the origin of the sound. In the distance was a lone figure, squatted and looking for tracks. John was usually light on his feet, deadly cautious, but so many recent exhausted late-night forays were bound to leave some tracks. If the man knew his art, he’d soon find the cave.

John sighed and began the long, slow slink towards Horse Heath’s hidden pony. His guts told him they had to make the cave before the man did. His nerves were as taut as a bowstring, his body relying on the participation of all of nature for his silence, even willing the sticks and pine needles to bend with his feet instead of snapping.

The problem came when he reached the cove where he’d berthed Heath’s mount. Unfortunately, the pony didn’t know the same tricks about being quiet. As John led it forward, Handy, in the far distance, reared up from his search at the bank, spotted his quarry, and began firing. Grey Bear John leapt onto the pony’s back and rode it straight towards the cave. He thanked the spirits… even Owl… when he reached the entrance without catching any bullets, and ducked low to avoid the rocks there.

“Time to go, I take it?” Heath drawled as John tossed himself off Gal’s back and grabbed, first the packaged gear, and next the arm of his friend.

“Damn Owl. Why’s he always gotta be right? Always out to get me…” John mumbled as he struggled to help Heath up onto the pony’s back, threw the supplies across her, and then swung up behind his friend.

Heath hissed in pain as he settled on Gal, giving her a greeting pat with his good hand. He wanted to lean forward over her mane, felt too weak still to stay upright, but leaning forward felt far too bad on the tugging razor teeth still gnawing and chewing at his back.

“Maybe,” he tried through a clenched jaw, “Owl ain’t out to get you. Maybe he just likes warning you… keeping you on your toes.” He took the tiniest glance backwards, noted that John carried his new sidearm, purchased just after he’d joined the Barkleys. “You can fire that thing?” Heath asked, since his only good hand was now wrapped with reins.

“I’ll do.” John shrugged, quickly checking the chambers. “Can you maneuver this pony?”

Heath grinned. “Mostly.”

“Then heaven help that man. He’s about to face the crack team of his nightmares.”

Somehow, the two men were chuckling as Heath squeezed Gal’s sides and set her on an explosive charge from the mouth of the cave.

The ride was furious, the air singing with angry bullets, like killing wasps. And Heath knew it the second John was stung. There was a jerk behind him and then John’s head dropped to Heath’s good shoulder.

“Hold on, please!” Heath could only hope that his friend was conscious enough to hear the warning. Spurring the horse forward with only his legs, and thanking the good lord that she was so well trained because he was about to let loose the reins, he fumbled with his good right hand backwards for the firearm. His heart thudded happily when he felt John pass it to him because he knew that, at least for now, his friend was still alive.

Heath had to crane around to fire at the man pursuing them. The movement ruined something in his insides, he knew it. He squinted and cursed against the closing pinpoints of unconsciousness. Then, with a wavering aim, he squeezed off several rounds, all the while steering Gal with his trembling thighs—trying to get her to run in a random pattern so that they were tougher targets to hit.

A bullet whizzed past his ear; Heath felt the burn and a hot ooze of blood where it nicked him. Somehow, that tiny final insult jolted him into a frenzy. He sucked in all of his air and, giving out an Indian war cry, fired once more. He heard Grey Bear John chuckle quietly into his shoulder at the irony of his battle cry; he also heard the deadly sound of his pistol’s hammer clicking and clicking on a now-empty barrel. Heath, still squeezing Gal forward with his weakening legs, feeling the ever heavier weight of John as his friend sprawled more and more into his own bending back, could only wonder at his calmness in this horrific moment.

Nature was indeed a balm to his soul! He was about to die—had no doubts about it—here in the midst of her most gorgeous bounty, with one of her truest sons at his back. And it felt just fine. As Gal raced forward in her magnificent stride, along the bright banks of the dancing Truckee, Heath remembered something he’d thought of one morning so long ago in Jarrod’s bedroom. At the time he’d thought that life was a gift, a divine accident. That he was wasting it, moment by moment, in a place where he wasn’t wanted.

Well, here he was, in a place where at least one other soul wanted him, needed him. And so, if it had to be, this was a gorgeous, wondrous, magical time to end such a divine gift. He sighed almost contentedly, and wasn’t afraid as he took one more hasty glance backwards to find their foe, maybe plan a dancing cut across the river or some other last attempt to shake the man.

But it didn’t matter because Heath saw that Hank had stopped his own mount. The man sat, staring down. Heath clicked and Gal halted too, blowing almost gleefully from her first good run in ages. The blond squinted and saw what Hank saw… that one of Heath’s bullets, undoubtedly his very last, had found purchase. The two men stared at Hank Handy’s ruined chest in equal states of almost disinterested sadness.

Then Hank jolted backwards and down, as if the force of the shot had just caught up with him. As if seeing the devastation was necessary to make the feeling real. His boot caught in a stirrup and his neglected mount, confused at first, finally gave in to the thirst that had been bothering it for awhile, and wandered lazily towards the river, dragging the man with it.

Heath found his last bit of strength and reached behind himself to clutch John, who had been slipping steadily off to one side. John’s head lolled off of Heath’s shoulder and the blond hissed as the weight of his falling friend ripped at his own wound. He felt more gushing warmth there, swimming pain, and then the strength in his one good arm—in his very soul—was gone.

Heath and Grey Bear John slid together off of Gal, landing in a tangle of legs, arms, a sling, and pooling, mixing blood. The rosary beads, broken, sparkled like pretty berries on the ground.

After a long time John rose up the tiniest bit, trying to check Heath, but the blond was unconscious. John pressed a sluggish, quavering hand to the wound at Horse Heath’s back, which was now bleeding fiercely. But he knew his own wound, deep and low in his side, was also heavy badness. It made him want to weep that he could no longer care for this, his friend. Indeed, as much as he wanted to, he couldn’t even find the muscles to disentangle himself from Horse Heath. So they both settled down into the arms of the earth, locked in an odd and dying embrace.

“…hate owls,” Grey Bear John mumbled as he too passed into nothingness.

The Barkley brothers had run hell’s gamut. They’d been horrified, sickened, emboldened, terrified, lost, found, found, and lost again. With every wind-whispered sigh of hope they’d also heard a banshee’s killing sough of despair. And when the wailing died, there it was… more hushed, murmuring hope.

Just now, despite everything, they had chosen in tacit agreement to lean into the warming, quiet current of hope again. Following the map was something tangible, real, concrete. Nick had taken the letter back from Jarrod, traced its marks reverently, continually as they progressed. These were the marks of life: hot tear tracks, umbilical cords, winding thick scars… the map was a hurtful, gorgeous wavering lifeline.

“Wonder who this Indian is?” he finally asked Jarrod. “The one who penciled this map?”

“I think we’ve both decided it has to be our local shaman, recently put on some death-list by all the fine folks around here.”

“The John Bear fella’,” Nick nodded. Eventually he added, “Wouldn’t matter if he was Modoc, Cheyenne, Blackfoot, or Sioux, would it? It’s all the same to most, hey?” Nick spoke, not as if he were learning something anew, but as if he were reminding himself of some black fact long known.

“So, unfortunately,” Jarrod nodded, "if he’s caring for Heath, it’s no doubt he has to keep the two of them hidden so that he isn’t plain shot or hung if they’re found. Despite his efforts to help our little brother.”

Jarrod’s words were important, but Nick was only listening with his ears, not his eyes. He pulled his mount to a halt, squinting at the long, verdant grass dancing at the river’s edge.

“What?” Jarrod trotted Jingo up behind him, careful not to trample anywhere near Nick’s sighting.

“Tracks. One set. Fresh.” The brothers shared a dark glance and spurred forward, finding still more reserves of energy… and lifting their hearts to the wind for its calming, caressing gusts of dumb hope.

Nick and Jarrod steadily followed the tracks along the side of the river, heads down, weary eyes flitting madly. The wandering trail indicated one recent mount, which, according to Nick, was most likely Hank Handy’s. Nick’s expert eye also eventually detected the older tracks that Handy himself was obviously following. Here and there were the subtlest traces of one man, afoot... one man almost impossible to trail. Nick himself would have perhaps never noticed these hints if it weren't for Handy's obvious tracks of pursuit. Nick couldn't help but whistle at Handy's prowess.

Although astute Nick was in the lead, clever Jarrod was the first to notice the sight in the distance. “Whoa!” Both his mount and his brother responded. Nick, after craning backwards to his brother, swung his head up and forwards to follow Jarrod’s nod. Ahead of them, right at the edge of the water, was a large rock formation. It looked like a huge, welcoming palm, surrounded by upright rocky fingers… with a pinky that had fallen over and dangled lazily in the water.

“God’s hand,” Jarrod whispered.

The brothers paused for a moment, stunned at what finally, finally felt like a sure clue. Now they could say that Heath had really existed right here, that he had lived and walked on this very ground, breathed this brisk, piney air. Enjoyed coffee here, fires and blankets and the freshest fish—had wept the tears of the living here.

And that he had just maybe found a friend who could have been working all this time to keep him alive... despite whatever possibly killing tragedy he’d also encountered here.

Their reverie was broken by the sudden distant echoing of gunfire. Their hearts thrumming in sickening staccatos, both men sharply spurred their mounts. Nick’s Coco reared up prettily just a bit before launching all of himself into a rampant charge.

It was another desperate mile or so before they found the sight that stopped their hearts. And Nick's mind.

A single horse wandered towards them. At the moment the animal was interested in the change in scenery—of the approaching men and their mounts—since it had already glutted itself first on water, and then on some more of the rich grass it’d been nibbling at every stop even before this last long one. But even a casual walk was still painfully annoying; the full weight of the man, still dragging off one flank, had kept the horse feeling irritatingly imbalanced.

The brothers were immediately out of their saddles and bolting forward. Hank Handy was dead. A single shot had turned his chest into a pretty dead bloom, like a fleshy red tulip. Nick, feeling compassion for the horse but not the man, worked to unhook the boot so stubbornly trapped in the stirrup. As Nick worked, the horse turned towards him, nipped at his shoulder, but it was so gentle as to be a toothy nibble of merely irritated thanks. And then the horse wandered a bit further away, finding a fresh patch of the richest green grass and lounging there, one leg bent casually.

Nick, now afoot and leading his mount, meticulously followed the wandering, almost chaotic trail of the horse he’d just released from its weighty burden—and the sludge-deep imprint of the body it had been dragging. It all led him to a small black Modoc pony, which shot wary brown eyes at him, but stood her ground.

With the pony as their final clue, the Barkley brothers closed further in a lightning moment that lasted endlessly. Beside the pony, in a pool of blood, were the bodies of two entangled men. The top man was dark-haired, thin, young, and had obviously been bleeding from what appeared to be a gunshot to the side. Beneath him was the stilled form of another. The top, darker man was clutching—indeed, perhaps wrapped protectively over—a blond man, their limbs flopped around each other like a painful hug.

The top man seemed to have been using his last scrap of strength to press his hands against some bleeding laceration high in the blonde’s back and had, in turn, been incapable of doing anything to halt the blood from his own glaring wound.

This was what Nick saw: nameless men clutched together in an annoying pool of blood. Because he was incapable of seeing the probable portrait of horrible death in front of him. Death he caused. Death he could have prevented. Death that was killing parts of his soul just now.

Jarrod saw other things. He did not see some random blond head, he saw Heath’s golden crown. His younger brother and the Indian, John, had somehow dropped Handy, but it was the very last of such acts possible for any of the three men—the last act of aggression—because all had been grievously wounded in the process.

The two before him—now under his moving hands, since he’d fallen to his knees and was frantically assessing them—had obviously then toppled from Gal’s side, and were either dead or dying in one another’s arms. He needed to figure it all out, get them comfortable if that could even matter, and somehow get them immediate medical attention.

If they weren’t dead already, they soon would be if the Barkley brothers, Jarrod AND Nick, didn’t pull their last scraps of emotion together and work like the mighty team they could be. It was time they pulled together as one and took care of this runaway catastrophe.

Under his right knee, Jarrod felt a light and distant pain. While pressing one hand to each of the man’s wounds, he glanced almost unconsciously down. He was kneeling on a single bead. It looked as if it had once formed a rosary string. The rest of the beads sparkled around him, like pretty drops of candied blood on the ground. Overhead he heard the rich, mean caw of a crow.

The sound somehow calmed him in this moment, because the blood of both men ran quicksilver fast through his fingers like clots of crimson life.

Jarrod looked around frantically, one hand still pressed to Heath’s wound, and another pressed to John’s. Nick merely stood staring at the scene. “Nick, start a fire,” Jarrod barked, not even sure where they should begin.

“I caused this, Jarrod.”

“Nick, if they’re still bleeding they’re still alive. We’ve got to stop this, maybe, I don’t know… cauterize. Start a fire, get blankets.” It still wasn’t working—Nick seemed almost as if he were in physical shock—so Jarrod tried pleading. “Help me, Nick, please!”

Nick began to move, sluggishly at first, like the fumbling, frozen efforts in a nightmare, and then he found his rhythm. He dropped down next to Jarrod, checked both men for pulses with shaking hands. His voice was a whisper, a chant, a prayer. “They’re still alive. Both of them.” He leapt up, darted to their horses for their bedrolls, spread them out beside the pair, now making lightning decisions. “Let’s get them separated first? We’ll be able to better get a feel for their wounds.”

Together, he and Jarrod gently lifted John from their brother, laying him face up on the first bedroll. The young man tossed his head fitfully, reached a bloodied hand out, perhaps searching for Heath. Jarrod clasped it, mumbled a mantra of healing words. “You’re fine. You’re with friends. Calm down for me. I need to take care of you.”

The young man whispered disjointed words back, eyes still squeezed shut, but Jarrod could only stare curiously at Nick, who shrugged and dashed over to kneel beside Heath. “Did he say… ‘Hate owls’?”

“And I think he called this one ‘Horse Heath.’” Nick was kneeling at Heath’s side now, shifted him gently, rolled him face down onto the second bedroll. “It’s his back alright.” He was afraid to remove the original bandages, which were now sodden and scarlet, although he did cut away the strange leather sling so that Heath’s arm wouldn’t be trapped beneath him. After checking the arm itself for injuries, he gently unbent it and clasped the hand once before letting it go. He raised his eyes to catch Jarrod’s. “No telling… bullet, arrow, stab wound. You don’t think…”

“No, this one was helping him. It’s obvious.”

Nick nodded, satisfied at that, dashed from his younger brother to Jarrod’s mount, retrieved the clean shirts he knew would be in the saddlebags there. He tossed one to Jarrod, who deftly caught it, ran with the other back to Heath’s side and pressed it firmly to the wound. “Stop bleeding, okay Heath. We’re with you now, Boy. Finally. But you gotta help us out a little. Just stop bleeding. It’s that simple.” He ran a tender, pleading hand through the sweaty blond hair.

Jarrod, likewise, was working on bandaging his own patient. He frowned in unconscious distaste at the sweet smell of blood that was tainting everything. “The bullet passed through him. I can’t tell what kind of damage we’re looking at inside, but at least we don’t have to dig out a slug.”

There followed a long few moments, each brother tending a man, each looking worriedly at the other. Finally Nick let out a breath. “I think it’s slowing up.” He used the opportunity to start the fire requested seeming ages ago, then caught and tethered Heath’s Gal. He pulled the furs and blankets that he found there and brought them over to cover each man.

“Check to make sure,” Jarrod said grimly, “because I need your help here. Now.” Jarrod’s voice was steady, but Nick reared his head at the words. Sure enough, Jarrod seemed to be almost up to his elbows in blood. He was painted with it. Nick, eyes dark, grabbed for the bottle of iodine that he always kept in his own saddlebags, pulled a few bullets from his gun belt, began to carefully take them apart. Jarrod crooned softly at the young man in his arms… begging him to stay asleep for the next few moments of hell.

Instead, as Nick knelt down beside them with the iodine, matches, and a glove full of gunpowder, Grey Bear John opened his eyes.

“Hey,” Nick’s mouth smiled at the man, but his eyes were worried frowns.

John’s eyes slid first to Nick, to what he was offering Jarrod, then to Jarrod himself, who was cradling him and pressing gentle agony into his side.

“You gonna burn me?” he asked, but it was a soft question.

“Got to,” Nick nodded.

“How’s Horse Heath?”

“Better than you, just now, I’m afraid,” Jarrod offered with a gentle chuckle, his rich voice a balm.

John sighed. “’Fraid of that.” He gave the two men frank, appraising glances. “Don’t ‘spect you fellas know no medicine dances?” He got no answer, but he hadn’t expected one. Instead, he clasped Jarrod’s offered hand, bore down, gritted his pretty teeth, and waited for the murder that might save him.

...Continued