This Calder Range (Calder Saga 1)

Shots were being exchanged opposite Benteen’s position. It was the side closest to the herd, which meant the men were firing at the raiders and being fired on. The first rush of the horses had passed, leaving gaps that would allow him to cross to the fight.

Stampeding the remuda had been a diversionary tactic to create chaos in the camp while the cattle were run off. Benteen sent one glance at Lorna, huddled tightly against a wagon wheel. Her gaze was frantically searching the confusion for Webb and Arthur. He was saying a silent prayer for them himself, but he knew his men. They would have put the boys’ safety over their own lives.

“They got the boys out of the way. Don’t w about them!” he shouted to Lorna. “Just stay w you are.”

Waving his hat at an oncoming horse, Benteen dodged forward when it shied. He managed to run through the tangle of bedrolls and saddles, trying to keep one eye on the loose horses and the other on the fight in progress.

“Grab some of those horses!” he shouted to Vince Garvey. They couldn’t let all the horses scatter, or they wouldn’t be able to mount a pursuit.

The camp was crossed. Benteen reached the four cowboys, returning the gunfire of a fleeing band of Indians. He was conscious of the weight of the pistol in his hand without being aware he’d drawn it. The hat was back on his head. The air was tainted with the smell of gunsmoke. He had time to snap off two shots before the raiders were out of range.

Automatically he reached for more bullets to reload. “Start throwin’ saddles on those horses!” He threw the order at the camp, but a half-dozen cowboys were already doing that very thing. Benteen glanced to see who was with him as he pushed new bullets into the empty chambers. Barnie was nearest him. Both turned simultaneously, heading for the horses at a running trot. “What about the boys? Do you know if they’re okay?” Benteen asked as he shoved his pistol back in its holster.

“Saw Zeke scoop up Webb. I think Rusty grabbed the little tyke,” Barnie answered. “One of them raiders with the Injuns had a beard and a buffalo coat.”

Benteen cursed himself for exposing Lorna and the boys to this kind of danger, only there hadn’t been any reason to suspect the Indians would raid a manned herd. It had seemed logical to believe his family would be safer in the company of twenty armed cowboys than left alone at the cabin. But he hadn’t counted on the Indian raids being instigated by a white renegade, either.

Only eight of the horses from the scattered remuda had been caught. No time was wasted sorting out saddles and owners. Zeke handed Benteen the reins to a big Roman-nosed chestnut the instant he entered the camp.

“Where’s Webb?” Benteen stepped a foot into the stirrup.

“Just returned him to his mamma,” Zeke answered.

Benteen’s gaze swept the camp, a jumble of men on foot and on horseback. He was briefly torn by a desire to make certain his family was unharmed, yet each minute’s delay meant the cattle were being driven that much farther. If he wanted to recapture the bulk of his herd, immediate pursuit was imperative. It was halfdark now.

The decision was made before his boot found the other stirrup. “Let’s go.” He gave the order, but it was his action the men followed, letting him take the lead on the big chestnut.

When Benteen made that mad dash between horses to the other side of camp, Lorna scrambled to her feet and pressed herself flat against the chuck wagon. There was so much running, shouting, and shooting going on that she couldn’t separate it all.

The worst of it was over in a flurry of moments that seemed eternally long. The confusion went on as cowboys snared the stragglers from the remuda and began swinging the big, heavy saddles like they were pillows.

Lorna pushed into the chaos, frantic to find Webb and Arthur. Shoving the bunched haunches of nervous horses out of the way and ducking the tossing heads of others, she forced her way to the place where she had last seen the boys. Everyone was running, moving in and out of her vision. She was breathing in panicked breaths and struggling to control it.

“Here, ma’am,” a voice said.

She hardly had time to recognize Zeke before he was thrusting Webb into her arms. It was relief that collapsed her knees rather than the four-and-a-half-year-old’s weight. Her fingers gripped his arm while her hand trembled over his face and hair. He had a stunned, wide-eyed look at all this commotion of horses, riders, and gunshots.

“Are you okay?” Her voice trembled, although she tried to appear very calm. There was a lump in her throat and the dampness of tears in her eyes. She kept them open wide.

“Yeah.” He nodded. “I wasn’t scared, Mom. Honest.”

“Of course you weren’t.” Her smile quivered.

“Were you?” he wondered.

“A little,” she admitted, and hugged him with a mother’s fierceness, then forced herself to draw back. “Where’s your brother? Do you know?”

He shook his head. “I dropped my rope. Zeke said I could find it later.”

“Yes, later.” Lorna nodded and began looking around. “First we have to find your brother.”

The stampeding horses had scattered the campfire, taking away the light it would have afforded. Behind her, there was the digging of hooves, and Lorna glanced over her shoulder to see eight riders gallop into the graying night. She guessed Benteen was with them, although she couldn’t distinguish the riders.

Their departure left a degree of quiet in the camp as the remaining cowboys attempted to restore some kind of order and search for horses that might have lingered nearby. Lorna gripped Webb’s hand tightly as she stood up. She took a step, not certain where to look first for Arthur.

When she saw Rusty moving woodenly toward her carrying the child in his arms, a second wave of relief flooded through her. As he came closer, she sensed something wasn’t right. Rusty’s face was nearly as white as his whiskers. There was a sunken, hollow grief in his eyes. A pounding fear began to beat in her, growing louder and louder with each step that brought him nearer.

Her glance fell to the boy-child lying so motionless in his arms. His eyes were closed, his face innocent with sleep, but he didn’t have his finger in his mouth. She tried to smile—tried to say his name and wake him up.