“Sorry is not an answer.”
“No. But it’s the only honest thing I have.”
She turned from him and walked to the water’s edge. Jack did not follow. He wanted to explain that he had never known her name, that he had not forgotten her deliberately, that he had been a child with no power over the adults around him. But those explanations would have served his comfort, not hers. He waited until she turned back.
“My mother used to say that a person could belong to more than one place without being divided,” he said.
“If we share a past, it doesn’t erase the family you chose or the family that chose you.”
Isabel’s gaze searched his face.
“You speak as if you believe that.”
“I need to believe it.”
She tied the scarf around her head, covering part of her hair but leaving her face visible.
“We will not solve this today. There are more urgent matters.”
He nodded.
“The company.”
“And the warrant. And Daniel.” She spoke his brother’s name carefully, as if placing it on a table between them.
“I will not marry you because of a pendant. Nor because my father believes it may strengthen an alliance. If I marry you, it will be because I trust the man you are now.”
“That’s the only reason I’d accept.”
They returned to the settlement, where Chief Samuel had summoned the elders and several families to discuss the danger. A messenger had arrived before sunrise with news from Red Hollow: Judge Voss had scheduled a hearing in five days to determine whether the valley could be seized for “public development.” Meridian planned to present a map showing the spring outside the community’s recognized boundary. If the judge accepted the map, armed deputies could clear the settlement before the people had time to appeal.
The chief placed a copy of the map on the table.
“This line is false,” he said.
“The original survey marked the spring as shared land, protected by an agreement with the territorial government. Daniel found the record, but he did not bring it back.”
Jack studied the map. The ink line crossed the valley at an angle that made no sense with the ridge or the old stone markers. He had worked cattle and property boundaries long enough to know that a map could be made to lie without changing a single written word. A surveyor only needed to choose the wrong landmark.
“Where did Daniel last see the record?” he asked.
“At the old mission archive,” Chief Samuel replied.
“A clerk named Elias Finch told him he could compare the original with Meridian’s copy. The archive burned two nights later.”
“Convenient.”
“Too convenient,” Naya said.
“Ruth Bell has been asking questions in town. She believes Finch survived the fire and fled east.”
Jack looked at Isabel.
“If we can find Finch, he may know where the original is.”
“Or Meridian may have already found him,” she said.
Chief Samuel’s expression was grave.
“We cannot send a large party without drawing attention. One rider can move faster. But if the company has watchers on the trails, one rider can be killed more easily.”
Jack volunteered before anyone could object.
“I’ll go to the mission and find Ruth. If Finch is alive, I’ll find him. Daniel trusted someone there, and that is the closest lead we have.”
Isabel’s face tightened.
“You have been here less than a day, and you are already offering to ride into danger.”
“I have spent three months chasing shadows. This is the first lead that might be real.”
“You are not the only person who has lost someone.” Her voice was low, but the room fell quiet.
“If you go, take Naya’s cousin Mateo. He knows the eastern trails. And do not mistake recklessness for courage. If you die, it will not make Daniel easier to find.”
Jack accepted the rebuke.
“I’ll take Mateo.”
The chief nodded. Then, with the elders watching, he addressed the room.
“Until this danger passes, Jack Mercer will be received as a guest and ally of the valley. No marriage has been agreed. No one will speak of Isabel as if she were a price offered for his help.”
Isabel’s shoulders relaxed. She looked at her father with gratitude, then at Jack.
“When you return, we will speak again.”
Jack understood that she had offered no promise beyond another conversation. Somehow, that felt more valuable than a forced vow. Before leaving, he paused at the gate and turned back. Isabel stood beside the spring, the silver star resting against her collarbone. He wanted to ask if she remembered the little boy who had once offered her a wooden horse carved by his father. He did not ask. Some memories needed to be invited, not demanded.
He rode east with Mateo beneath a sky growing bright and hard. Behind them, the valley woke to the work of ordinary life: children carrying water, women tending gardens, elders repairing a fence. Ahead lay a burned mission, a missing clerk, and a company determined to turn a living community into a blank space on a map. Jack knew now that the danger was not only to the people of Red Hollow. It was to the fragile truth that had brought them together, and to the possibility that two strangers could choose one another without being forced by the past.
The old mission stood on a rise east of Red Hollow, its adobe walls split by heat and age. Mateo led Jack along a dry wash that curved behind the building, avoiding the main trail where Meridian’s riders might be watching. By noon, the sun had bleached the land nearly white. The chapel roof had collapsed in the fire, leaving charred beams like ribs against the sky. A bell lay half buried in ash beside the doorway. Jack dismounted and walked through the ruin, feeling the brittle crunch of burnt paper under his boots.
“Finch lived here?” he asked.
“Worked here,” Mateo corrected.