“I think you’re too scared to pull the trigger when it counts.”
That hit him hard. Blaze opened his mouth, then shut it again. His jaw worked as if he were chewing gravel.
“I hit one of them,” Blaze said finally. “I didn’t miss.”
“You wounded him,” Marisol said. “You could’ve finished it, but you didn’t.”
“I didn’t need to,” Blaze replied. “He was down.”
“You think he’d spare you?” she asked. “You think Wilder’s men would hesitate to kill you if the tables were turned?”
Blaze’s hands trembled again, though he tried to hide it. “Killing ain’t the same thing as surviving.”
“Sometimes it is,” Marisol said. “And until you see that, you’ll keep getting in our way.”
“Enough,” Graycloud said. His tone was low, but it carried weight. “He is not one of them. Don’t treat him as if he is.”
When Marisol got to her feet, she began to pace. “You’re right,” she said, sighing. “He’s not one of them. But if we’re going to take Wilder down, he needs to start acting like someone who can shoot a man without blinking.”
“You ever kill your first man, Marisol?” Blaze asked.
She froze mid-step. “Don’t twist this.”
“I’m not,” Blaze said. “I’m asking.”
She turned toward him. “Yes. I did.”
“And did it come easy?” Blaze asked.
“No,” she replied, her face hardening. “But I didn’t let that stop me from doing what needed to be done.”
“Each life taken stays with you,” Graycloud spoke up from his spot. “Whether it’s your first or your fiftieth.”
“Don’t start with your riddles,” Marisol muttered.
“They are not riddles,” he said. “They are truths you’d rather not face.”
The fire popped. Outside, the wind scraped over the stones. The sound filled the silence that followed.
Blaze reached for his canteen and took a long drink. It hurt to swallow.
“You two have been doing this longer than me,” he said. “Hunting men. Fighting.”
Marisol sat back down, resting her elbows on her knees. “Long enough to know what it costs.”
He watched her in the firelight. He thought of the scar on Marisol’s jaw and the way her hands reddened when she reloaded...as if every pulled trigger had a name.
He thought of Graycloud’s quiet exterior and the way the tracker’s eyes went distant when he mentioned his uncle, as if he were walking that old trail again.
Both had given something that couldn’t be counted in coin: faces, names, mornings that would never come back. The thought steadied him and made the promise feel less like his alone and more like a debt shared between them.
“We will make sure he pays for it,” Blaze said.
He stared into the fire again, seeing Wilder’s face there: cold, smug, and laughing the day his father died.
“He will,” Blaze said. “I swear it.”
Graycloud leaned forward. “Then you must learn to kill with purpose. Not rage. Not fear. Purpose.”
