Chapter 3 - The Trail North
Within the hour, the lonely ranch house was empty of life, its door barred against the wind. Emmett led his bay gelding out from the corral, his rifle scabbarded across the saddle, his heavy wool coat buttoned to his chin. Desta rode a sturdy roan pony provided by one of Chata’s sub-chiefs, while Ronnie, despite her pale complexion and the fresh stitches pulling at her side, insisted on riding her own mare rather than sitting in a travois.
The column of seven hundred people did not move like a standard military regiment or a scattered band of refugees. They flowed across the Wyoming landscape like water finding the path of least resistance—scouts miles ahead, flankers riding the high ridges, the main body of families, pack animals, and warriors moving in disciplined silence through the ravines and dry creek beds where the white man’s eye could not reach them.
Emmett rode near the front, alongside Chata and a lean, scarred scout named Red Hawk who hadn't spoken a single word since they broke camp.
“You move too straight,” Red Hawk muttered suddenly, breaking his silence as they crested a rocky ridge overlooking a broad, wind-swept valley.
Emmett reined in his bay. “What do you mean?”
“A white man walks like he owns the horizon,” Red Hawk said, pointing a leather-wrapped finger toward the valley floor far below. “He walks from point A to point B in a straight line because he thinks nothing can stop him. In this country, a straight line is a grave.”
Emmett followed the scout’s finger. Down in the valley, cutting a sharp, unnatural line through the sagebrush, ran the telegraph wire and the wagon ruts of the Overland Trail. Even from miles away, the glint of a distant army patrol could be seen moving sluggishly near a dry watering hole.
“I know how patrols operate,” Emmett said quietly. “They ride the water sources. They check the telegraph poles at dawn and dusk to make sure nobody’s cut the lines.”
“They have iron wagons that throw fire and smoke now,” Chata said, his voice low. “From the forts in the east. They do not just watch the water anymore. They hunt.”
“That’s why we aren't taking the valley floor,” Emmett said, shifting in his saddle. “We drop down into the cedar breaks three miles north, cross the creek under the cut-bank where the willows hide the tracks, and we use the afternoon wind to blow our dust into the draws. If the patrol at the watering hole looks up, they’ll think it’s alkali dust kicked up by a pronghorn herd.”
Chata studied Emmett for a long moment, his eyes scanning the terrain as he mentally tested the plan. A slow, grim approval touched the corners of the chief’s mouth.
“You have tracked men who knew how to hide,” Chata noted.
“I tracked men who didn't want to be found,” Emmett corrected. “There’s a difference.”
Behind them, Ronnie and Desta rode side by side among the pack string. Ronnie’s hand rested constantly near her side, her face tight with pain, but she refused to slow her pace. Desta watched her anxiously, leaning over to adjust the cinches on her sister's pack horse whenever the trail steepened.
During a brief halt near a frozen spring, Desta brought a skin of water over to Emmett where he was kneeling in the dirt, inspecting a set of fresh mule tracks near the creek bank.
“She is burning with fever again,” Desta said without preamble, handing him the water skin.
Emmett stood up, wiping the dirt from his hands. “The riding is pulling at the stitches. I told her she should have taken the travois.”
“You do not know my sister,” Desta said, her voice sharp with defensive pride. “A Biin Fiin does not ride in the dirt like a wounded animal while her people march. She would rather tear her flesh open entirely than show weakness before the council.”
“Pride is a poor substitute for a healed gut,” Emmett said bluntly, taking a swallow of water.
“It is not pride. It is duty.” Desta crossed her arms against the cold. “My uncle does not trust you, Mr. Cross. He brought you along because he needs a guide who understands the soldiers' minds, but the moment we reach the Sweetwater, he expects you to vanish.”
“That was the agreement,” Emmett said.
“Agreements made under the barrel of a rifle or the shadow of a war party do not always hold,” Desta said softly, her eyes searching his face. “When we reach the mountains, the soldiers will be waiting at the pass. My uncle thinks he can punch through them with numbers. He is wrong. If he tries to force that pass, half of our people will die in the snow.”
Emmett looked back toward the main column. Hundreds of women, children, and old men were leading pack animals through the freezing slush, their breath frosting in the air.
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“Then we’ll make sure he doesn't have to force it,” Emmett said.
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