Lex Nelson's Arc

Chapter 4 of 13

The camel carried her faster than her own legs could. By late afternoon the boot prints sharpened, and the dog's ears pricked forward. They crested a low ridge and the land opened into a green pocket — palms, a thatched hut, a thin run of water between rocks. The stranger stood at the water's edge, washing dust from his hands. He had not heard her come. Lex slid down with the rope already in her grip. The Malinois circled wide and low, teeth showing. The stranger turned, saw the rifle, and lifted both palms slow. He did not run. He did not reach for a weapon. He only said, calm as a banker, that she was making a mistake. She bound his wrists anyway and sat him against a palm. From his coat she pulled a heavy purse, gold thread sewn into the lining, the kind of money no drifter carried. Below that, a folded letter, the ink faded but the map inside marked in red — wells hidden across the flats, a route no slaver knew. He watched her read it and said the wagon was not going to the salt pan at all. The lead wagon, he told her, had turned south three nights back. The map she carried was already a lie. The woman under the wreck had been planted, the journal seeded. The caravan knew it was being followed and had peeled off its own tail. He had paid good coin for the real route, and he was riding it now because the auction was in two days, not five. Lex sat back on her heels. The dog pressed against her leg. South. Two days. Every mile she had ridden northeast had been a mile away from her sister. She felt the cold of it settle low in her chest, and then she folded the letter and tucked it inside her coat beside the others. She cut the rope from his wrists. She kept the purse and the map. She told him the camel was hers now, and so was his head start. He did not argue. By the time the sun touched the palms she was mounted again, the dog trotting south at her heel, and the oasis was already shrinking behind her.