Chapter 5 - The Dutch Creek Convergence
The wind howling through the Dutch Creek pass carried the bitter scent of pine sap and impending snow. It was late afternoon by the time Jedediah, Nuna, and old Miller reached the isolated stone relay station perched on the high ridge.
The station was darker and larger than the one at Station Four, built from thick granite blocks with iron-shuttered windows designed to withstand Apache raids from the early territorial days. But as they approached the heavy wooden gate, Jedediah raised a hand, bringing Samson to a sudden stop.
Fresh hoofprints scarred the muddy path leading up to the stable. Three horses, heavily laden and recently ridden, stood tied to the hitching rail.
“They’re already here,” Jedediah whispered, his hand sliding over the lever of his rifle.
Nuna slipped silently off to the side of the stone wall, her fingers wrapping around the iron-headed hammer she had carried all the way from the lower valley. Her face was set in lines of absolute granite. “Enapay didn't just come to check the telegraph logs. He knew we’d try to use the direct line to Santa Fe. This is where he laid the trap.”
Jedediah weighed his options in a fraction of a second. They couldn't turn back—the mountain trail behind them was too exposed, and Miller couldn't survive another night in the open freezing air.
“Stay behind the stone wall,” Jedediah told Nuna, his voice low and uncompromising. “If I don’t come out of that station in ten minutes, you take Miller and ride hard down the east ridge toward the cavalry outpost.”
“I’m not leaving you here, Jedediah,” she said fiercely, her hand catching his sleeve. “I’m done running from my brother, and I’m done hiding behind other people’s doors.”
Before Jedediah could argue, the heavy oak door of the Dutch Creek station swung wide open.
Enapay stepped out onto the stone threshold, holding a sheet of yellow telegraph paper in one hand and a heavy Colt revolver in the other. Behind him stood two white men in tailored suits, their faces slick with mountain sweat and nervous tension—the mining syndicate agents.
“I knew you’d head for the high wire, Vance,” Enapay called out, his voice echoing off the stone walls of the canyon. “You white men always think the law is a shield. But out here, there’s only the land—and the people who know how to survive on it.”
Jedediah didn’t flinch. He stepped out from behind the boulder, his Winchester held steadily at his hip, perfectly balanced. “You sold out your own band for a handful of mining coin, Enapay. And you’re using your sister’s life to cover the tracks of men who would poison your people’s children without a second thought.”
The two mining agents behind Enapay exchanged nervous glances, their hands hovering near their pockets.
Enapay’s eyes narrowed into slits of pure venom. He raised the Colt, leveling it squarely at Jedediah’s chest. “She brought a curse. The water turned black because of her. And you’re just a lonely fool trying to play savior to a ghost.”
“She’s no ghost,” a voice rang out sharply from the side of the stone wall.
Enapay’s head jerked toward the sound just as Nuna stepped out from the shadow of the granite buttress, her shoulders squared, her chin held high, holding the iron hammer with both hands like a weapon ready to strike.
“Look at me, Enapay,” she said, her voice ringing clear and steady above the howling mountain wind. “I’m not cursed. I’m the only one left who isn't afraid of what you and your buyers did to the river.”
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For a second, Enapay’s hand hesitated, his finger tightening on the trigger as his eyes locked onto his sister—not as a helpless outcast begging for scraps, but as an equal standing in the open, ready to tear his whole world down.
Jedediah didn’t wait for the hesitation to end. With a sudden, explosive motion, he whipped his rifle up, fired a warning shot that shattered the wooden lintel an inch above Enapay’s hat, and lunged forward across the clearing, bridging the distance between them before the syndicate agents could even draw their iron.
