The Warrior's Way

Oh, Sophia had to disagree. If she wasn’t bad, she lived in the same house with bad for most of her life.

“It’s lovely,” said Sophia.

And it was so much nicer than her childhood home on the Black Mountain rez had been.

“Well, you can’t beat the view of the river and the canyons across the way. You can’t see it now, but tomorrow, from the porch, it’s beautiful.”

The river again. It seemed to be taunting her now.

“Plumbing works. Hot water, too. Just no electric. You know how to light a kerosene lamp?”

Sophia was all too familiar with how to do so, but had hoped she would never have to use a lantern again.

She forced a smile. “Absolutely.”

“They brought your bag in. It’s by the bed.”

Sophia followed the direction Morgan indicated and found both her briefcase and the bag Luke suggested she pack “in case things run long.”

“Do you want me to wait for you and bring you back to the lodge?” asked Morgan.

“I can find my way.”

“Well, I’ll leave you to get settled.”

Sophia just wanted to slip into her yoga pants and a loose T-shirt and climb into bed. It had already been a long day.

“I’ll be over in a few minutes.”

“Bring a lamp,” said Morgan as she hesitated at the door. “We are so grateful to you for coming to help us. Luke told us all about you, and we are hopeful you can give us advice so we can protect ourselves. I don’t know if Jack told you but I lost my father to cancer. But before that I lost him to BEAR. It’s a dangerous group and none of us believe they are done. They still have the Lilac explosives. If this is their target, we are in terrible danger.”

Sophia did not have the first idea how to reply. Mostly she felt guilty for wanting nothing more than to get out of here. Being so close to the river now gave her the creeps. And she realized why. Because she believed her cousin and Morgan. BEAR was still out there. How would she feel if she could not pack up and leave in four days?

Had they planned all this, Luke and their shaman, Little Falcon? To show her the pastures that lined the river and the town and this gathering place, the very heart of the reservation, so she could see what would be lost? The problem that had been theoretical was now all too tangible.

Morgan hesitated, lingering. “I have a little girl. We live right in Piñon Forks. Her school is there, too.” Morgan’s hand went to her stomach and Sophia saw the definite bump she had not seen before. Morgan was expecting a child.

The two women stared across the silent cabin.

“I’ll do what I can,” said Sophia.

Morgan cast her a sad smile and left her with her troubled thoughts. For the first time in five days, the investigation was not the most important thing on Sophia’s mind.

Chapter Four (#u6ede9a92-864d-5dec-af38-7ed713e92d4d)

Sophia unpacked, then used the bathroom, checked her hair and reworked her ponytail before heading back across the open ground with the darn kerosene lamp held high to light her way.

She knocked and entered. The smell of fry bread made her mouth water and brought her back to some of her earliest memories. Meadow motioned her to a chair and the group sat to eat baked chicken with a tangy sauce, mashed potatoes, corn, three different types of casseroles, including one of a noodle pudding that was especially good, and the fry bread, golden brown and piping hot. Sophia knew how much trouble it was to turn the simple ingredients for fry bread into dough and appreciated the effort as much as the flavor.

After the meal, several newcomers arrived and both Morgan and Meadow were absent. Their shaman greeted her formally, as if they had not just shared a meal, his smile flanked with vertical lines. Then he motioned her forward to meet an older man, who wore his hair cut blunt at the shoulder. About his neck was a bolo of the tribe’s great shield inlayed with stone. The river, she noted, was a fine blue spiderweb turquoise.

“Sophia, this is our executive director, Zachery Gill.” The older man extended his hand as Kenshaw continued speaking. “Gill is the new leader of our tribal council. Zach, this is field agent and explosives expert Sophia Rivas.”

Gill had a fleshy tanned face and was dressed simply in a cotton shirt and jeans with no indication of his rank outside the ornate bolo.

“Welcome to Turquoise Canyon, Agent Rivas. Thank you for answering our call for help,” said Gill. He motioned a broad hand to the empty chair and she took a seat. Gill sat to her left as everyone took their seats. The circular dining table had transformed into a war room.

Each attendee introduced themselves by clan, family name and first name, and ended with their position. They were tribal law enforcement, tribal council and warriors of Tribal Thunder.

When Jack spoke her stomach fluttered and she mentally scolded herself for her very physical reaction to the man that was seated on the far side of the table, which she now realized resembled a medicine wheel with each section made from a different color of wood. Jack sat at one point and she at another of the four directions. Did he notice that the line bisecting the table seemed to connect them?

Finally the circle came back to their shaman. Kenshaw rose as he addressed the gathering. “Some of our tribe have been elected to protect the language, some care for and teach our young people, and still others guard our heritage. These men and women have one mission, the survival of our people, and each and every one is prepared to defend our tribe with their lives. They are at your service, Agent Rivas.”

“While I appreciate the offer, no one is going to die as a result of my visit. I’m just here to have a look at the reservoir system. I’ll report back to my field office if I see any gaps in their existing protective plan. I can assure you that no one is going to compromise the power grid.”

There was a general shifting of chairs and postures. You didn’t have to be a master at reading a room to know that the tribe members here disagreed.

Director Gill spoke to Sophia. “Jack was just telling us about your plan to create a makeshift dam with a series of controlled blasts at the narrow point of our canyon.”

Her eyes flashed to Jack’s and held. “That was not at all what I advised.”

Gill continued as if she had not made an objection.

“We feel, that should the Skeleton Cliff Dam fail, we would not have time to evacuate our people.”

“I can assure you, it is very safe, protected by our Bureau and the state highway patrol.”

“Yes, we know. We have seen them and our warriors have gotten past them. Back to my point—if the dam was to fail, how long would we have to evacuate?”

Gotten past them? That wasn’t good at all.

“That would depend on the scale of the breach.”

Gill lifted his thin brow at her. “Total breach.”

She drew a breath and released it. There was no way to deliver hard news but directly.

“Minutes,” she said.

* * *

JACK WATCHED SOPHIA’S face as she delivered the news that the two settlements along the river, Piñon Forks and Koun’nde, would not have enough warning to evacuate.

“But they could be moved to higher ground now. You have three towns. Those in the lower two could move to...” She lifted her gaze to the ceiling as she tried to retrieve the name of their third and smallest town.

“Turquoise Ridge,” Jack said.

She smiled at him and his stomach trembled in a way that he hadn’t experienced since middle school, when all his hormones had been popping in different directions. He grimaced. The woman was near desperate to be clear of them all. He knew that, but still he could not deny that, even knowing she couldn’t wait to be rid of him, he was still imagining what she’d look like out of that suit.