Elias covered the hoofprints with dirt.
It was a small movement, almost casual.
A boot dragged once across the damp ground.
Then again.
But Aiona had already seen enough.
“Don’t.”
Elias looked over his shoulder.
She crossed the yard toward him.
Nielli followed.
“What were you trying to hide?” Aiona asked.
“Nothing.”
“You’re a bad liar.”
“I’m not lying.”
“You just kicked dirt over tracks.”
Elias glanced toward the ridge.
“I didn’t want you panicking before we knew what they meant.”
Aiona stopped close enough that he could see exactly how little patience she had for that explanation.
“Someone cut my fence. Someone rode around my house before sunrise. You don’t get to decide what I know about danger on my own land.”
Something flickered across Elias’s expression.
Respect.
He nodded.
“You’re right.”
Nielli crouched beside the tracks.
“How many?”
“Six. Maybe seven.”
“Men?”
“Can’t tell from hoofprints.”
Aiona looked at him.
“But you think so.”
“Yes.”
Elias pointed toward one deeper impression.
“Horse carried weight. Rider, saddle, gear. Maybe a rifle.”
His finger moved to another.
“This one stopped here for several minutes.”
“Why?”
“Watching the cabin.”
Nielli straightened.
Her color had faded.
Aiona hated seeing fear on her sister’s face.
They had worked too hard to build a life that did not depend upon someone else’s mercy.
Their parents had died three winters apart.
Their father left them the land, thirty-one horses, an aging barn, and more debt than either daughter expected.
Men from town assumed the sisters would sell within a year.
They did not.
Aiona learned to bargain for grain.
Nielli learned to treat hoof infections and broken harnesses.
Together they paid the debt down little by little.
They lost animals to winter.
They rebuilt a roof after lightning.
They survived drought.
The cabin was not large, but it was theirs.
So was the land.
Aiona refused to let six unknown riders change that.
“What do they want?” she asked.
Elias hesitated.
“That’s what I’m trying to figure out.”
He walked toward the damaged portion of fence.
Aiona and Nielli followed.
Elias inspected several posts he had repaired the day before, then continued farther west.
Nearly one hundred yards beyond the obvious damage, he stopped at a post that still stood straight.
A thin pale line crossed the base.
Another partial cut.
The storm simply had not broken it yet.
Then another.
And another.
“This wasn’t one man passing through,” Elias said.
“Somebody planned it.”
Nielli hugged her arms.
“To steal horses?”
“Maybe.”
Aiona stared toward the distant creek.
The strongest horses were grazing in the lower pasture.
Sixteen mares.
Four geldings.
Their best stallion.
Enough value to attract thieves.
But something bothered her.
“If they wanted the horses, why not cut the fence completely?”
Elias looked at her.
“Because they wanted you to believe weather did it.”
That answer sat badly in her stomach.
They spent the morning reinforcing the remaining posts.
Elias showed the sisters how to identify tool marks in weathered timber.
He also pointed out small signs in the grass where horses had been standing.
Nielli found a cigarette butt pressed into mud.
Elias lifted it carefully.
“Fresh.”
Aiona looked around.
“Whoever they are, they’re comfortable getting close.”
“Not anymore.”
Elias sounded certain.
Aiona studied him.
“What does that mean?”
“It means they expected two women alone.”
“And now?”
Elias hammered a brace into place.
“Now they know there’s somebody else here.”
Aiona did not know whether to feel safer or more afraid.
By afternoon, Elias had turned the homestead into something closer to a defensive camp.
He moved water barrels against the cabin.
Cleared tall brush from the windows.
Shifted a wagon that had blocked sight of the northern trail.
He repaired a loose roof board.
Then he climbed onto the barn and studied the landscape.
Aiona stood below.
“You always do this?”
“Do what?”
“Turn somebody’s home into a fort.”
Elias looked down.
“Only when people keep circling it.”
He came off the roof and landed lightly despite his exhaustion.
Nielli brought him a bowl of stew.
“You said you didn’t want food.”
“I didn’t.”
“You worked yesterday without supper.”
“I’ve done worse.”
Nielli held the bowl out.
“This isn’t payment.”
Elias glanced toward Aiona as though asking whether accepting it violated some agreement.
Aiona almost rolled her eyes.
“Eat.”
He did.
For several minutes, they sat beneath the shade near the cabin.
Nielli asked where Elias came from.
“Everywhere.”
“That’s not a place.”
“Colorado for a while. Wyoming before that. Kansas before that.”
“Family?”
Elias stared into the bowl.
“No.”
Aiona caught the answer’s weight.
“No living family?” Nielli asked gently.
“No family that wants me.”
Silence.
Nielli did not press.
Aiona did not either.
Later, while Elias checked the southern line, Nielli cornered her sister inside the cabin.
“You trust him.”
Aiona kept folding blankets.
“I didn’t say that.”
“You let him stay.”
“Because six riders came here during the night.”
“That isn’t what I mean.”
Aiona stopped.
Nielli smiled faintly.
“You watched him sleep.”
“I was making sure he didn’t kill us.”
“You watched him like you felt sorry for him.”
“I did not.”
Nielli’s smile grew.
Aiona threw a folded blanket at her.
“Go clean the lantern.”
The moment of normal sisterly teasing vanished before sunset.
Elias returned carrying something.
A piece of leather.
He placed it on the table.
Burned into the surface was a crude mark shaped like a broken crown.
Aiona had never seen it.
Elias had.
His face told her that much.
“What is it?” she asked.
Elias took a long breath.
“Rourke gang.”
Nielli whispered, “You know them?”
“I know what people say.”
The gang had moved across three territories for more than a year.
Horse theft.
Freight robbery.
Extortion.
Several isolated ranches had been pressured into selling land cheaply after barns burned or stock disappeared.
Their leader, Silas Rourke, rarely stayed long enough for a marshal to catch him.
“What does he want with us?” Aiona asked.
Elias pointed toward the creek.
“Water.”
The answer confused her.
“Our creek?”
“Your property controls the easiest water access for nearly five miles.”
Aiona had never thought of it as valuable beyond keeping livestock alive.
Elias had.
“If a man wanted to move stolen horses through this valley, he’d need water and a place to hold them before heading north.”
Nielli’s eyes widened.
“Our land.”
“Exactly.”
Aiona’s anger overtook fear.
“They’re trying to scare us off.”
“Probably.”
“Then they picked the wrong women.”
Elias almost smiled.
“I was starting to suspect that.”
Aiona leaned against the table.
“What do we do?”
“We prepare.”
“For how long?”
“Until we know whether they’re coming.”
The answer arrived before nightfall.
One of the horses screamed.
Elias was on his feet instantly.
Aiona followed him outside with the rifle.
Near the western fence, an arrow had been driven into a post.
A folded piece of paper was tied beneath the feathers.
Elias removed it.
Aiona opened the message.
SELL BEFORE FRIDAY.
No signature.
None was needed.
Nielli’s voice shook.
“Tomorrow is Thursday.”
Aiona crushed the paper.
“We’re not selling.”
Elias turned toward her.
“They may not ask twice.”
“Then they can learn what no means.”
Elias stared at her for several seconds.
“Your father raise you this stubborn?”
Aiona lifted her chin.
“My mother.”
For the first time, Elias laughed.
Only once.
Quietly.
But it changed his whole face.
That evening they ate together.
Elias still refused the bed.
He slept on the floor near the doorway rather than between the sisters this time.
Aiona noticed.
“You said being near a wall was dangerous.”
“I’m staying awake tonight.”
“You can’t stay awake forever.”
“I’ve tried.”
The words were not a joke.
Aiona sat across from him.
“You didn’t hurt us last night.”
“That doesn’t mean I’m cured.”
“I didn’t say it did.”
Thunder rolled far away.
Elias looked toward the dark window.
“I don’t want to become another thing you need protection from.”
Aiona softened despite herself.
“You’re not.”
He looked at her.
She added, “Yet.”
His mouth almost turned upward.
Hours later, Nielli slept.
Aiona remained near the fire.
Elias sat by the door.
“Why did you stop yesterday?” she asked.
“Stop what?”
“Your hand. In your sleep.”
Elias understood.
“I heard my own voice.”
“You kept saying we were safe.”
“I needed to.”
“For us?”
Elias shook his head.
“For me.”
He stared at his hands.
“I spent seven years believing the only way to keep people safe was to stay away from them.”
Aiona looked toward the darkness beyond the window.
“And now?”
“Now I’m wondering whether that was another kind of cowardice.”
She turned toward him.
“You came onto land belonging to two armed women and asked to sleep between them.”
A small smile appeared.
“Maybe cowardice isn’t your biggest problem.”
Before Elias could answer, a horse snorted outside.
Then another.
Every animal in the corral raised its head toward the western ridge.
Elias stood.
His hand hovered near his weapon.
Hoofbeats carried across the prairie.
Slow.
Measured.
Not one horse.
Several.
Elias stepped toward the door.
Aiona grabbed his sleeve.
“How many?”
He listened.
“Six.”
Exactly the number that had circled the cabin.
The hoofbeats stopped.
Far enough away to remain unseen.
Close enough to be heard.
Then a man’s voice drifted through the darkness.
“Tomorrow night, Ward.”
Aiona’s grip tightened.
The unseen rider continued.
“Leave the women.”
Silence followed.
Elias opened the door.
No one was there.
Only darkness.
Then the voice came again, farther away.
“You already killed one friend.”
Aiona felt Elias go completely still.
Whoever was out there knew his past.
And for the first time since arriving at the ranch, Elias Ward looked genuinely afraid.
Not of dying.
Of what his enemies knew.
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