Calder felt a dark, fiery heat surge in his chest—a sudden, terrible rage that burned far hotter than his quiet blacksmith
forge. “Children?” he echoed, his voice dropping to a deathly whisper.
“I was trying to reach the mine when Pike’s men caught me,” Lozen said, tears finally glistening in her dark eyes.
“My sister’s daughter... little Magdalena... she is among them. Pike knew I was searching for them. That is why he tortured
me. He wanted to know if the men of our band were coming to attack his camp.”
Calder stood up slowly, his tall frame blocking the faint light of the fire. The quiet, passive rancher who had sought
only to live in peace and forget his past was gone. In his place stood a warrior—a man who knew the unfathomable horror
of losing a child, and who could not, would not, stand by while innocent lives were traded for blood money.
He walked over to his saddlebags, pulled out his belt of heavy .50-90 cartridges, and slung it across his broad chest.
He checked the action of his Colt revolver, the metal clicking sharply in the mountain quiet.
“Where is this mine, Lozen?” Calder asked, his gray eyes shining like polished steel.
Lozen looked up at him, a fierce, beautiful hope dawning across her bruised face. “It is called the San Carlos Shaft.
Two miles past the northern rim.”
“Then that’s where we go,” Calder said. “We aren’t running from Silas Pike anymore. We’re hunting him.”
False dawn brought a ghostly grey light to the high peaks of the Red Mesa. The morning air was bitterly cold, carrying
the sharp scent of cedar needles, wet stone, and pine smoke. Calder and Lozen left their horses hidden in the shelter of
Devil’s Alcove, knowing that the final approach to the San Carlos copper mine had to be made on foot over steep,
treacherous terrain where a horse’s shoe striking rock would sound like a gunshot.
Lozen led the way. In her native mountains, she moved like a shadow—effortless, silent, her feet finding purchase on
tiny stone ledges and slipping between thickets of scrub oak without disturbing a single leaf. Calder followed close behind,
his heavy boots moving with surprisingly light, deliberate steps. The heavy Sharps rifle was strapped across his back, and
in his hands he carried a lever-action Winchester .44-40 carbine.
As they crested a ridge overlooking the northern gorge, Lozen suddenly dropped flat against the cold granite. She
raised a hand, gesturing for Calder to down.
Calder crawled up beside her, pressing his belly into the red dust. Below them, tucked into the narrow crotch of a
desolate box canyon, lay the forgotten San Carlos copper mine. It was a bleak, desolate place: a crumbling wooden
headframe leaned precariously over a dark vertical shaft, surrounded by rusted ore cars, collapsed timber shacks, and
mountains of grey slag tailing.
In the dirt yard before the main shaft, a campfire flickered. Four men sat around the flames, drinking coffee from tin
cups, their rifles resting against wooden crates. Among them was Miller, the skinny gunfighter, his pale face smeared with
dirt, and Delgado, who sat on an inverted powder keg cleaning his double-barreled shotgun with an greasy rag. Two other
mercenary thugs—heavy, bearded men armed with repeating rifles—lounged near the entrance of the main timbered mine
tunnel.
Standing near the mouth of the tunnel, barking orders at his men, was Silas Pike himself. He was strapping a heavy
leather belt over his thick waist, a pair of handcuffs dangling from his iron buckle.
“Where are the children?” Calder whispered into Lozen’s ear, his breath warm against her cheek.
Lozen pointed a slender finger toward a heavy oak door set directly into the side of the cliff wall near the timber shaft
—a former explosives storage bunker, reinforced with iron bars and secured with a heavy iron padlock.
“In the powder house,” she murmured, her voice tight with suppressed anger. “It has no windows. They are trapped
inside like cattle.”
Calder scanned the camp with a cold, tactical eye. There were five men down there in total, all heavily armed, holding
superior ground inside a narrow canyon. A direct frontal assault down the steep gravel slope would be suicide; they would
be picked off before they reached the floor.
“We need to split them up,” Calder murmured. “Make them come to us.”
“How?” Lozen asked.
Calder reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, forged steel strike-a-light and a tin of sulfur matches. He looked
back up the ridge toward a dry, dense thicket of resin-rich pine brush that sat directly upwind of the canyon mouth.
“Desert timber burns hot and fast,” Calder whispered. “If that thicket goes up, the wind will drive a wall of thick,
blinding black smoke straight down into the canyon floor. They’ll think an entire Apache war party is burning them out.
When the smoke hits, they’ll panic.”
Lozen looked at him, her dark eyes flashing with sharp intelligence. “And while they fight the smoke, I go for the
key.”
“No,” Calder said firmly, grabbing her wrist gently. “You stay high and cover the ridge with the Winchester. You
aren’t fully healed yet.”
Lozen pulled her wrist from his grip, looking down at his hand with a proud, stubborn smile. “I am a daughter of the
Chiricahua, Calder Vann. I do not hide behind rocks while my people’s children are in chains. Give me the carbine. I do
not miss.”
Calder looked at her fierce, magnificent face—the determination in her jaw, the blazing fire in her eyes—and realized
that trying to stop her would be like trying to hold back the mountain wind. He handed her his Winchester .44-40, levering
a round into the chamber.
“Three shots as a signal,” Calder said softly. “When the smoke fills the yard, aim for the men with the long guns. I’m
going down the dry chute on the east side.”
Lozen took the rifle, her fingers sliding over the polished walnut stock with natural familiarity. She looked at Calder,
her expression softening for a fraction of a second.
“May the spirits of the high rocks watch your back, blacksmith,” she whispered in her native tongue, before
translating it for him.
“Keep your head down, Lozen,” Calder replied. He slithered backward down the ridge, keeping below the skyline,
slipping into the dry pine thicket like a phantom.
Two minutes later, a thin thread of blue smoke rose from the dense brush above the canyon. Within seconds, fed by
the dry mountain breeze, the resinous pine burst into a roaring, crackling wall of bright yellow fire. A massive, billowing
cloud of thick, pungent black smoke rolled down the canyon walls, swallowing the morning sun and plunging the San
Carlos mine into a swirling, blinded hell.
Down in the yard, shouting erupted. “Fire! The ridge is burning!” Miller yelled, springing to his feet and grabbing his