Ethan Walker’s collarbone knit with the slow, stubborn resilience of a working man’s bone. Every morning at first light, before the heat began to rise from the red sandstone bluffs, Ayana would untie the buckskin wraps, wash the pink, puckered entry and exit scars with boiled infusion of oak bark, and knead the stiff tendons of his shoulder with warm bear fat.
At first, the touch of her hands had made Ethan stiffen with the awkward modesty of a drifter unaccustomed to gentleness. But as the days drifted by like dry leaves on the creek, her touch became the anchor of his waking world. They spoke in a fluid, easy blend of frontier English and Apache phrases: he taught her how drovers read cattle brands and the way a surveyor used an iron chain; she taught him the names of the hidden water seeps in the dry hills, the roots that stopped bleeding, and the subtle shift in desert birdsong that signaled an approaching rider three miles distant.
"Your arm is strong enough to swing a rope again," Ayana noted one morning, pressing her thumb against his shoulder joint. She tilted her head, her obsidian eyes catching the morning glare. "A good thing. Your longhorns have eaten half the clover in the upper bench. Tahzay says they are growing fat and lazy like prairie dogs."
Ethan let out a quiet laugh, pulling his faded blue work shirt over his head and buttoning the cuffs with his uninjured right hand. "Those Mexican steers don't know how lucky they are. On the drive from Tucson, they were living on bitter scrub and alkali dust. Put a cow on wild clover beside a running spring, and she thinks she’s gone to the sweet by-and-by."
He stepped outside the small lodge that had been built for him near the chief's dwelling. The air smelled of clean morning earth and sweet cedar smoke. A hundred yards away, beneath the massive cottonwood where he had stood cornered during the choosing ceremony, three young boys were practicing with miniature willow bows. When Ethan walked past, they stopped, placing their fists over their chests and shouting a greeting in their native tongue: "Shi-k'is Ethan!"—My friend Ethan!
The suspicion that had greeted his arrival had not vanished overnight, but it had dissolved into a deep, enduring respect. Ethan was not an arrogant conqueror seeking to impose white customs, nor was he an idle hanger-on. As soon as his left arm could bear weight, he had set to work. He repaired the village horse corral using mortise-and-tenon joints that needed no iron nails, constructed a stone-lined cooling basin where the women could preserve wild fruit and fresh meat, and showed the younger hunters how to care for their captured repeating carbines so the delicate springs would not jam with fine desert sand.
Walking up to the horse corrals, Ethan found Tahzay leaning against the cedar rails, chewing on a sweet grass stalk. Dutch, Ethan’s gray gelding, and the red bay pack horse were standing side by side in the shade, their coats brushed glossy and clean.
"The gray horse is restless," Tahzay said, nodding toward Dutch. "He wants to smell the open flats."
"He’s a range horse, Tahzay," Ethan replied, leaning on the rail beside the warrior. "He likes room to run. But he’s got good water here and no rattlesnakes snapping at his heels. He won't complain."
Tahzay looked at Ethan, his scarred face unreadable for a moment. Then he reached to his belt and pulled out a newly carved ash bow, strung with braided deer sinew, and held it out with both hands.
"Take it," Tahzay said in his accented English. "Kaelen cut the wood before the choosing. He seasoned the stave over mountain cedar. I backed it with sinew from a white-tail buck. A hunter who lives in Whitehawk’s camp must have teeth that do not rely on cartridges."
Ethan looked at the weapon. It was a masterpiece of Apache craftsmanship—short, powerful, with recurved tips designed for shooting from horseback at close quarters. To receive a weapon finished in memory of Kaelen was an honor of immense tribal weight.
Ethan took the bow with both hands, feeling the smooth, polished wood, alive with tension and balance.
"I won't ever shoot as straight as you or Kaelen, Tahzay," Ethan said honestly, meeting the warrior’s dark eyes. "But I’ll carry it with honor. Thank you, brother."
Tahzay gave a single, firm nod, a ghost of a smile touching the corner of his lips. "You shoot like a cowhand. We will teach you how to shoot like a man."
Before Ethan could answer, the sharp, hollow call of a scout’s whistle echoed down from the northern lookout perched atop the high bluffs.