Violet Blackstone's Arc

Chapter 14 of 14

Two days after the healing, Colton came in from the north fence at a run. He had a smear of pitch on his sleeve and a folded paper in his hand. "Willow saw smoke," he said. "East ridge. Small fire. Someone camped where no one camps." Violet took the paper. Willow had sketched the ridge line and marked an X below the pines. Close. Half a day's walk from the gate. "The woman with the glow slept by the window last night," Colton said. "You can see her from the ridge if you know where to look." Violet lifted the seed box lid and set the journal aside. She took down the short knife and the coil of snare wire Nadia had taught her to spring. "Get Marcus," she said. Marcus came in from the garden with dirt on his knees. She showed him the sketch. "One man?" he asked. "Willow saw one set of tracks." "Trapper," Marcus said. "Following the light rumor. He'll want to see the house before he goes back to sell the location." "Then he doesn't go back." Marcus looked at her. He did not argue. "I go with you." "You stay. You watch the gate. If I'm not back by dark, you move the woman and the boy to the creek bed and you burn the cot she slept on." Colton opened his mouth. Violet cut him off. "You feed the flock and you keep Willow inside." She took one of the pale horses from the barn and rode east along the tree line, then tied it in a hollow and went the last mile on foot. She found his fire first. Cold. Then his pack against a stump. She circled downwind. He was belly-down on the ridge with a brass glass to his eye. A long beard. A curved skinning knife on his belt. Gregor Blackthorn. Rusty had named him at the post last winter as the one who set throat-height snares. She watched where he was watching. The farmhouse roof showed through the pines. The woman sat on the porch, faint silver at her ribs even in daylight. Violet drew the wire from her pocket and moved. He heard her at the last step and rolled. The knife came up. She caught his wrist with the wire and pulled. He went face down in the pine needles. She put her knee on his spine and drew the wire tight around his throat until his hands stopped. She sat back. Her arms shook. She had never killed a man. She took his glass, his knife, and the strip of leather from his pack where he had begun to sketch her gate. She burned the sketch in his own ashes. She dragged the body deep into the brush and covered it. Riding back, she counted what she had bought. One trapper silenced. But Gregor Blackthorn had partners at the post, and partners noticed when a man did not come home.