Rachel pulled the sword from the last damsel's attacker and felt the blade bend against bone. The edge came away dull and notched. The man dropped, but her hand shook around a hilt she no longer trusted. She helped the woman onto the wolf's back and walked her home through the pines, promising herself the next rescue would not depend on this crude iron. She kept that promise at the forge. The cabin behind her held a fire she stoked before dawn, an anvil scarred from her first bad pours, and a rack of tools she was still learning to name. She lived here with Randall, her boyfriend and forge partner, in the one building that served as both home and workshop. Beyond the door, the wilds around Donnellila kept sending her women with torn sleeves and bloodied mouths. She had promised herself she would answer every one. She needed a sword that would not fail her mid-swing. Randall came in with a bucket of charcoal and set it by the hearth. He looked at the broken sword on her bench. "That's the third this month," he said. "I know." "You're folding the steel wrong. You're rushing the quench." She wanted to argue. She had taught herself everything so far, and it had been enough to keep women alive. But the notched blade on the bench said otherwise. She pushed it toward him. "Show me." He rolled up his sleeves. He was shorter than her and half her weight, but his hands moved on the tongs like he had been born holding them. He heated a fresh billet until it glowed straw yellow, then folded it, hammered it flat, folded it again. He worked in silence. Rachel watched the layers form. When it was her turn, he stood at her shoulder and corrected her grip. He tapped her wrist when she lifted the hammer too high. He counted the seconds before she pulled the steel from the coals. "Now the quench," he said. "Slow. Straight down. Don't stir it." She lowered the blade into the oil. Steam climbed her arms. She held it there until he nodded. They ground the edge together at the wheel. Sparks jumped onto her apron. When she finally lifted the finished sword, it was lighter than her old work, and the edge caught lamplight in a clean line. She struck it against a bar of scrap iron. The bar dented. The edge held. Randall wiped his hands on his apron. "That one won't break on you." She set it on the bench and stepped back. Outside, a dog was barking hard toward the tree line, the sharp bark he used for strangers on the path. Rachel picked up the new sword. The hilt sat right in her palm this time. She went to the door to see who was coming for help.

The man at the door was a stranger. He had blood down one sleeve and no weapon. He said his sister had been taken two nights ago by three men who rode east. He did not know where. He had walked the woods until his boots split, and then he had walked to Rachel's forge because people in town said she went after women no one else would. Rachel held the new sword at her side. Two nights was a long time. She asked him what the men wore. He said rough coats and a red band on the arm. She asked which road east. He said he lost their track at the creek. "Then we start in town," Rachel said. "Someone saw them ride through." She whistled for the dog. Pepper came around the cabin at a heavy trot, shoulders level with her hip now, big enough to carry two. She swung the stranger up behind her and pointed Pepper toward the road. They reached the settlement by midmorning. Rachel tied Pepper outside the big hall at the center of town, the one with the bright tower where the market crowded on trade days. Farmers were unloading crates. She went bench to bench and asked about three riders with red arm bands. A woman selling jars shook her head. A boy selling rope had seen them but only their backs. Rachel was losing time. She could feel it in her jaw. She crossed to the paired storage sheds behind the hall, where the town kept its tools in one and its food in the other. An old man sat on the step of the tool shed oiling a hinge. He looked up when Rachel described the riders. "Red bands," he said. "They took a sack of oats from me on Tuesday. Didn't pay. Rode out past the plow fields, north side, toward the old logging cut. There's a cabin up there nobody uses." Rachel thanked him. She ran back to Pepper. The stranger climbed on behind her again. They cut past the plowed fields on the north edge of town, where two men were setting new blades into a frame, and then up the logging track into the pines. Pepper found the cabin before Rachel saw it. Smoke, one horse tied, no lookout. Rachel dismounted. She told the stranger to hold the dog. She kicked the door in. One man at the table reached for a knife. She cut him down before he cleared the sheath. A second came from the back room and swung wild. She took his arm off at the elbow. The new sword did not bend. The woman was tied in the corner. Alive. Bruised, one eye swollen shut, but breathing. Rachel cut the ropes. "Your brother's outside." The woman started to cry. Rachel wiped the sword on the dead man's coat. Two men down. The third had not been in the cabin. Somewhere on the road, he was still riding.

The woman could not stand on her own. Rachel got her out of the cabin and onto Pepper's back, but the woman slumped forward and her breath came shallow. Blood had dried black on her side under the torn dress. When Rachel lifted the cloth to look, the wound was deep and the edges had gone red and hot. Rachel had bandaged cuts before. This was past her. "She needs the doctor," Rachel told the brother. "Now. Not my cabin. Town." She put the brother up behind his sister to hold her steady. Rachel walked at Pepper's head and kept the pace slow so the woman would not slide. The ride to the settlement took the rest of the afternoon. Twice the woman moaned and Rachel stopped to check her breath. Once she did not moan, and Rachel had to shake her shoulder before she stirred. They came into town at dusk. Rachel meant to go straight to the medical building. But the doctor's windows were dark, and a boy on the step said Dr. Richard had ridden out that morning to a birth on a far farm and was not back. Rachel stood in the road with a dying woman on her dog and no doctor. Down the lane the chapel windows were lit. She had passed it a hundred times without going in. Tonight the bell tower stood over the only lamps still burning on the street. She led Pepper to the chapel porch. She banged the door with the flat of her hand. Pastor Jeff opened it in shirtsleeves. He looked at the woman on the dog and did not ask questions. "Bring her inside. Lay her on the front bench." Rachel and the brother carried the woman in. Pastor Jeff pulled the lamps close and cut the dress away from the wound himself. His hands were steady. "I served four years with a field surgeon before I took orders," he said. "Boil water. There's a kettle in the back. And I need clean linen. The altar cloth will do." Rachel did what he told her. He cleaned the wound, cut away the bad flesh, and stitched it with thread from his own coat. The woman screamed once and then fainted. Pastor Jeff kept working. When he was done he bound the side tight and felt her forehead. "Fever's already up," he said. "She'll need watching three or four days. She can't be moved." "I'll pay for her keep," Rachel said. "Pay the doctor when he's back. She stays here till then." The brother sat on the floor by the bench and put his head in his hands. Rachel stepped out to the porch. Pepper was waiting. Rachel wiped her palms on her trousers and found them shaking. One rider was still out there. He knew her face now. He knew where she lived. And she had just told half the town where the woman he wanted was sleeping.