Victorio looked at Elias. "We do not have the warriors to spare for a massive ambush. If it fails, the camp is left defenseless."
Elias looked at Tala, Catori, and Elu. They exchanged a silent, fiery glance. They had trained for this. They were the vanguard.
"You don't need a massive force," Elias said, his voice cold and resolute. "You just need us. The four of us will ride out. We will hold Dead Man’s Pass. We will break their spirit before they even see the canyon."
Victorio’s eyes widened. "Four against fifty? You will die, cowboy."
"Maybe," Elias said, checking the action on his Winchester. "But we’ll take forty-nine of them with us."
They rode out under the cover of a moonless night, four shadows slipping across the desert. Elias, Tala, Catori, and Elu moved with grim purpose. There was no fear in their hearts, only the icy resolve of those who had accepted their fate.
They reached Dead Man’s Pass by dawn. It was a brutal, jagged scar in the earth, barely wide enough for three horses to ride abreast, flanked by steep, unscalable cliffs of red rock. It was the perfect choke point.
Elu immediately scaled the canyon walls, finding a perch high above where she could see for miles. She would be their eyes and their sniper. Catori set to work preparing the ground. She planted sharp wooden stakes in the sandy floor, concealing them with brush, and readied her medical supplies in a small cave near the rear of the pass.
Tala and Elias took positions on opposite sides of the gorge, hiding among the boulders. They built small stone barricades and piled their ammunition neatly beside them. Elias looked across the gap at Tala. She had painted her face for war—a stark crimson stripe across her eyes. She caught him looking and raised her rifle in a silent salute. He nodded back.
Hours passed. The sun climbed, turning the rocky pass into a baking oven. Sweat stung Elias’s eyes, but he did not move. He controlled his breathing, letting his mind go still, just as Catori had taught him.
Then, the cry of a hawk echoed through the canyon. It was Elu’s signal. The enemy was approaching.
A low rumble vibrated through the ground, the sound of dozens of horses. Soon, the vanguard of the Redbone Gang came into view. They were rough, hardened killers, laughing and passing canteens of whiskey, completely unaware that they were riding into the jaws of death. At the center of their column, just as Elias had predicted, a heavy mule carried the disassembled parts of the Gatling gun.
Elias waited. He let the first ten riders pass his position, drawing them deeper into the kill zone. He looked up at the cliffs. He saw a flash of sunlight on steel—Elu’s rifle barrel.
Wait for it, Elias thought. Wait...
The lead rider's horse suddenly shrieked and buckled, its hoof driving through the brush into one of Catori’s hidden stakes. The rider pitched forward into the dust. Confusion erupted among the mercenaries.
"Now," Elias whispered.
A shot rang out from the cliffs. Elu’s bullet struck the mercenary holding the reins of the Gatling gun mule, dropping him instantly.