That's a buyer. They watched from the rocks as the man in the coat finished his count, closed the ledger, and climbed up onto the wagon seat beside another man who'd been standing in shadow the whole time. a rifle resting easy across his knees. Guard probably or partner. Hard to tell which in country like this where the line between the two blurred fast and often. They're moving horses out already, Chaitton said low and furious.
Before the herds even reached wherever Crane means to sell the rest. This is a relay point, a place to break the herd into smaller groups so nobody tracking 200 horses ever finds 200 horses in one place again. Smart, Ezra admitted. Hated that he admitted it. Ugly, but smart.
The wagon rolled out slow, wheels creaking over rock, and the three of them stayed pressed low until the sound of it faded into the canyon dark. Only then did they move. The ledger was gone, taken with the man in the coat, but papers had spilled from a loose crate near the corral fence, and Ayanna was already crouched over them, sorting through by the last of the dying light. Bill of sale, she said, for 30 head. Signed.
Signed by who? She held the paper up, turned it so the fading light caught the signature at the bottom. Ezra read it twice because the first time his mind refused to believe what his eyes were telling him. Wade Harmon, the same Wade Harmon who'd stood on that wagon bed in Redstone Square not 2 days ago, laughing off a whole tribe suffering like it cost him nothing to be cruel. The same man who' called Ezra a fool for riding out here at all.
He was standing right there, Ezra said, voice gone quiet and strange in his own ears. right there in the square telling everyone it wasn't his problem. Telling everyone the trib's horses were none of his concern. And the whole time Ayanna finished. He's the one paying for them once they're stolen. He's not just refusing to help.
The realization landed heavy, sickening. He's profiting off it. The whole town thinks he's just some rancher too proud to get his boots dirty. He's the reason the boots need dirtying in the first place. Chaitton took the paper from his sister, studied it with the flat, cold focus of a man committing something to memory he intends to use later.
This changes what we're writing into, he said. How so? Because Crane is dangerous. Crane is a man with a rifle and a grudge, and men like that you can usually see coming. Chaitton folded the paper, tucked it inside his shirt.
But a man who wears a clean coat and sits on a town council and signs his name plain as day to stolen property. That man has friends. That man has protection. That man does not fear us the way Crane should. Ezra thought of Redstone.
Thought of the sheriff who'd stood silent while Harmon laughed off 200 lives freezing to death. Thought of how a town decides without ever voting on it whose suffering counts and whose doesn't. We need proof, he said. Real proof enough that even a town that doesn't want to listen has to. First, Ayanna said, already moving back toward the horses, voice sharpening back into focus.