Lost Vegas Series

by Lizzy Ford

  “These bracelets stopped a war and saved my people,” the chief did.

  “How?” Black Wolf demanded, growing impatient.

  “I will tell you, only if you agree to free my son from your agreement.”

  “You said there were two. Where’s the other?”

  “That, too, will be revealed when I have your word.”

  Black Wolf found himself wishing once more his guide was present to tell him if this was a trick or not. From what he had witnessed of the Hanover heir’s power, and knowing the girl’s father possessed the command over his magic that she did not, Black Wolf suspected he would need some sort of help to destroy the Hanover chief.

  But these bracelets?

  Like the Hanover siblings, the jewelry appeared too simple to be anything other than trinkets. He had been wrong about them.

  “The key to victory is in your hand,” the chief prodded.

  Black Wolf also recalled hearing how crafty the Diné could be, and he had seen firsthand the bravery of warriors like Diving Eagle. Was the chief trying to deceive him? Or did such a magical talisman really exist?

  If it did, he would want it to ensure his mission went through as planned.

  If not, he would free Diving Eagle from the agreement they made in exchange for a useless trinket. As this had been last official agreement, he was not entirely certain he would even have the chance to reveal his price to Diving Eagle before his death. But oftentimes, power was not about using it, but the potential to use it in order to influence an outcome. With Diving Eagle in his debt, he had an advantage in their relationship.

  Was such an advantage worth more than the potential secret the chief claimed he knew?

  Perhaps, for this reason, he considered the idea that magical jewelry might help him defeat the Hanover chief.

  “I will decide tomorrow,” he said and stood.

  “No, son, you will decide now, or I will withdraw this offer.”

  Black Wolf had never met someone harder to read than the old man with sharp eyes and wheezy breathing. He fingered the bracelet in his hand. The beads were cool to the touch. The emblem at his chest – signifying his skinwalker tribe – contained a trace of magic that became exhausted after the first time a skinwalker transformed. If the medallion could help a skinwalker transform the first time, then why could two simple bracelets not help him defeat the Hanover’s?

  If his spirit wolf were alive, she would know the answer. She had always advised him in situations when he was uncertain which decision to make. He glanced towards the basket of pups, but none of them were communicating with him.

  “My son hired you to stop the Hanover chief. You know of their power. I will give you the tool you need to succeed. How can you not be willing to release my son from his side of the agreement in exchange for payment in advance, and the chance you survive your encounter with the Hanover chief?”

  Black Wolf had never had a need to consider advanced payment before this, or how to better his own chances of survival. But he had seen the Hanover girl’s abilities and had to assume her father was just as strong, with many more years of experience using his power.

  “I release your son. Now where is the second bracelet?” he said after some thought. He glanced around the modest furnishings and possessions contained in the chief’s tent.

  “It is in the safest place it could possibly be.”

  Black Wolf was quiet. Where would a tool with the ability to stop the Hanover chief be safely kept?

  “With the girl,” he answered his own question aloud.

  “Yes.”

  “The girl is not in your possession,” he pointed out.

  “She will not be long missing from my possession,” the chief replied. “By morning, she will be returned to us.”

  “If so, I will be impressed,” Black Wolf replied. “Chases Deer knows the value of the girl, and the Hanover will not let me destroy the village to fetch her for you.”

  “The father of Chases Deer and I have been friends for many years. He does not yet understand what you and I do, that the girl will determine if we win our war. I will risk our friendship, and anything else, to finish what my ancestors started.”

  “Many men claim they would do whatever it takes, and then balk when they see the price,” Black Wolf said dismissively.

  “I am not one of those men. I am the Diné who will end this blood feud.”

  Black Wolf liked the elderly chief more than he thought he should. Few men truly meant what they said when they spoke to him, but this one did, a trait he had passed to his son.

  Black Wolf toyed with the bracelet. “The weapon you speak of. This holds no magic. How can it be used to defeat the Hanover’s?”

  The chief smiled. “A hundred years ago, a woman, a Hanover, the daughter of the city’s chief, stood between the forty survivors of my tribe and her father. She did not have the great power her father did, but she had the heart he did not,” he answered. “She helped my grandfather, a man she had never met, escape the Hanover chief, because she feared her father would lose his heart and soul if he wiped out an entire people.”

  Black Wolf listened.

  “She was too late to save him from the Hanover madness. She was not the Hanover heir, and her father slaughtered her where she stood and left her body to rot,” the chief finished. “These bracelets were hers. One of my predecessors insisted we keep them, and until recently, it was believed we did so as a reminder of how cruel the Hanover’s were to murder their own. But I believe now my predecessor may have had a vision, may have understood that another Hanover woman would someday once again stand against her father to save the lives of others. The weapon I speak of is her heart.”

  Black Wolf’s unique insight into the broken dynamics of the Hanover’s stemmed not only from his interactions with the siblings but from being hired by a man bearing the Hanover mark to kidnap another man, also bearing the Hanover mark. He was not surprised to hear of the family’s discord. Often, power and family were a lethal combination.

  “Whether or not this is true, heart will never overcome power. As long as a Hanover with such power exists, you cannot assume you will ever have peace,” he countered. “The Hanover’s of this generation may have good intentions but the next may not.”

  “Which is why I recommend, however you plan to execute the father, you also ensure the daughter never poses another threat,” the chief said.

  It struck Black Wolf then that he was neck deep in the Hanover family’s power struggle, without ever consciously being aware of entering it at all. Moreover, he was charged with winning a war on behalf of a tribe he had not known existed before several weeks ago. And there was no real weapon to speak of.

  The chief had bested him. Perhaps, after many decades, it was time someone did. Whether his acceptance of his inevitable death kept him from reacting to the deception, or the loss of his wolf tempered his emotion, Black Wolf could find no real anger inside of him.

  “You sent the half-breed into the city to murder the Hanover chief, and now you send me,” he mused. “What if we both fail? Who will you send next?”

  “Arthur is in the city as well. As long as one of you is there, failure is impossible.”

  “We are pawns.”

  “All of you,” the chief confirmed. “That bracelet has more power than you understand.”

  “It’s useless. A sentimental tool from a long-dead woman,” Black Wolf scoffed. He threw the bracelet to the chief’s feet.

  “I am sincere when I say this bracelet will determine whether or not you are victorious.” The chief stretched a gnarled hand for it. “This bracelet must be returned to the other. They are a set. Together, they represent the heart of the Hanover who saved us. Separated, they are only bracelets.”

  Growing irritated, Black Wolf snatched the basket full of pups and prepared to leave.

  “Son!” the chief called.

  The tent flap whipped open, as if Diving Eagle were hovering in case his father was
in danger.

  Black Wolf tensed, ready to tear them both apart if they tried to imprison him.

  “This will bring you luck. You must wear it until the battle is over,” the chief said and held out the bracelet.

  Diving Eagle glanced at Black Wolf and then strode forward to claim the bracelet. He said nothing, and his father motioned for him to leave again.

  When the tent entrance was closed again, the chief returned his attention to the skinwalker.

  “You asked me what I would do to destroy the Hanover’s and ensure peace. That is your answer.”

  Black Wolf studied him. Understanding bloomed within him. “You have had a vision.”

  “I did not need to. I understand human nature in a way you cannot.”

  “You would risk losing a war, and the lives of your people, on the heart of a Hanover?” Black Wolf asked, curious.

  “If I am wrong, I lose my son. But if I am right, I have given you the only knowledge that matters in what is to come.”

  The Hanover girl had claimed Black Wolf would ask her to help him fight her father. At the time, he was unable to think of a circumstance that would necessitate him needing help at all. The tool the Diné chief had given him was not a tool at all, but a form of insurance, a guarantee the Hanover girl would be where she needed to be in order to finish a war started long ago.

  To win, Black Wolf had to position her, and those she cared about, on the board in a place that would benefit him most. The Diné chief understood this and more importantly, knew whom exactly to use to incite her protective nature.

  “I meet few minds I admire,” Black Wolf said. “No one yet has been willing to use his own son as bait.”

  The chief’s face was unreadable.

  “When someone plays a game this risky, there’s always a price to pay,” Black Wolf added. “You will win, and you will lose.”

  “I am prepared,” was the soft response.

  For the first time in his life, Black Wolf believed someone when he claimed he was willing to pay the final price.

  All he had to do was wait and play the card at the right moment.

  Black Wolf picked up the basket of pups and left the stuffy tent. Only when he was outside did he take a deep breath and pause, gazing up at the drizzly afternoon sky.

  He had been manipulated – but he suspected his spirit wolf would have wanted it to be this way. If anything, this was another sign of the direction he was supposed to walk, of the fate awaiting him, and the nature of what was to come. The battle he faced was unlike any he had faced before. Which meant, he had to fight it differently.

  Black Wolf’s gaze settled on Diving Eagle, who waited a short distance away, his features stony.

  Black Wolf approached the solemn chief’s son. “Do you want my help retrieving the Hanover girl?” he asked.

  “My men can handle it,” Diving Eagle replied. “And we do not need to worry about her interfering, if it’s not you massacring Chases Deer’s village.”

  “To end this blood feud with the Hanover’s, she will have to die.” Black Wolf spoke the words and then waited to read Diving Eagle’s reaction.

  The Native’s jaw clenched, but his features did not otherwise betray him. “Then she will finally be free,” he said. Without another word, he breezed by Black Wolf and disappeared into his father’s tent.

  Black Wolf smiled.

  Perhaps the chief was taking less of a risk than the skinwalker initially thought.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Tiana snapped awake. The brindle pup on the pillow beside her head continued sleeping, but the flicker of a vision in Tiana’s mind left her no doubt as to the danger this night. She flung off the blankets and exited the bedroom for the living area. A warm fire blazed in the hearth in front of which Rocky was stretched out and snoring softly.

  “Rocky,” she said with a glance at the door.

  He awoke instantly and sat.

  Tiana knelt near him to prevent their guards from hearing. “We must go.”

  “I know. I’m working on it,” Rocky said and ran his hand through his hair.

  “Now.” Tiana rose and went to the couch. She gathered up his gear and dropped it on the ground beside him. “Hurry!” Not waiting for him to protest, she returned to her bedroom and dressed then gathered up her pup and placed it in a small pouch. The pup grunted and wriggled but stilled once more in sleep once it was nestled in the pouch.

  “Tiana, what’s wrong?” Rocky asked, leaning in the doorway of the bedroom.

  “Diving Eagle is coming,” she replied.

  “And?”

  “He’s going to wipe out the entire village if we don’t leave now.”

  “It’s called a rescue.”

  She looked at him. “Everyone will die, Rocky,” she said, concerned. “Chases Deer has been kind to us.”

  “Ah. Chases Deer dies, too?”

  She nodded.

  “All right. Let’s go.”

  Tiana hid a smile. She had thought Rocky had a soft spot for the warrior woman and was right for once. Her amusement faded when she thought about Warner, who lay unconscious in the clinic, and the prisoner in the cabin beside hers. Marshall might hate her, but he could at least walk away from the village of his own accord.

  But Warner?

  She tested her ability to levitate the pillow with the pup on top. Her power came more easily each time she summoned it. The invisible hand was steady and did not seem to drain her at all.

  “Rocky,” she said slowly. “Can you do something for me?”

  “Of course,” replied the assassin.

  “Marshall.” She stopped and cleared his throat. “I do not think he will come if I ask him. But we should take him with us.”

  Rocky’s expression softened, and he nodded. “I know you’re adverse to pointless violence. Do I take this as a sign you’re going to do the heavy lifting to get us out of here?”

  “More than you know,” she said with a smile. “I cannot bear the idea of more people suffering because of me, which is why we must take Marshall and Warner with us.”

  “Warner? The man who is dying in the clinic?”

  She nodded.

  “Bad idea, Tiana,” Rocky said firmly. “And not for the reason you think. I’d be happy to carry him out of here, but the problem isn’t getting him out. It’s how Diving Eagle will react when we do. The clinic here is nicer than any clinic in the inner city, and Chases Deer isn’t going to deprive him of care. From what I know, Diving Eagle is not eager to extend the same courtesy.”

  She listened, disturbed to find he was right. She was not thinking like her brother, a born leader, but like the deformed coward she was trying hard not to be.

  “I’ll leave the decision up to you, but I recommend the three of us leaving and then we’ll figure out what to do about Warner,” Rocky said.

  “You are right,” she said. “I did not think it through. But I do not wish to abandon him either.”

  “He is safe here and well taken care of. Diving Eagle will do whatever he must to guarantee the result he desires, without regard to anyone’s life, even ours. Chases Deer operates differently and believes she’ll claim a huge bounty for helping Warner,” Rocky said. “Let her believe that until we figure out a different plan.”

  Tiana sighed. “I understand. Sometimes, it is wise to act with logic rather than feeling.”

  “Sometimes. But only sometimes,” he said kindly with a smile. “Your instincts and concern for others are amazing. Don’t let the world make you hard. Stay sweet and strong. Aveline has learned to balance the two, and you will as well.”

  She smiled, touched by both his faith in her and the gentle words. “I would love to be like her or Chases Deer,” she admitted. “I would love to be strong.”

  “You are,” he assured her. “Now, we need to leave before everyone ends up dead. We’ll do this your way and slip out without hurting anyone. I recommend we keep this as quiet and isolated as possible. Can you incapa
citate the guards in front of our cabin and Marshall’s?”

  She nodded.

  “I can gag and tie them. With luck, we won’t encounter any additional resistance.”

  As he spoke, Tiana left her bedroom for the window beside the front door. She counted three guards in front of each cabin.

  “Give me a minute to make gags,” Rocky said. He began tearing strips from the spare clothing provided them by Chases Deer. When he was through, he nodded his head to the window.

  With no real insight into the extent of her capabilities, Tiana willed the men to be rendered silent and immobile. She felt energy leave her body in response to the commands and waited.

  None of the guards moved.

  “I think it worked,” she said to Rocky.

  He withdrew his knives and exited the cabin quietly. When no one charged to confront him, he trotted down the stairs to the ground, paused again, and then strode up to the guards. He replaced his weapons in their sheaths.

  Tiana followed him.

  The guards’ eyes were moving around wildly but they were otherwise statues.

  Rocky bound and gagged them all and then dragged them one by one into the cabin before moving on to those guards in front of Marshall’s.

  “You can stop,” he told her over his shoulder, when the last of Marshall’s guards was tied.

  Tiana willed the magic to release them and glanced into the cabin she had shared with Rocky. The guards were wriggling on the floor. Satisfied she had addressed their situation without hurting anyone, she waited nervously in a chilly drizzle for Rocky to exit Marshall’s cabin.

  The two emerged after a few minutes. Marshall refused to look her way and trailed Rocky, his eyes on the ground. He appeared pale and gaunt, as if he had not eaten in days. She doubted Chases Deer had forgotten to feed him and guessed he was too sad to eat, a state she understood well after all her time trapped in her room and forsaken by her father.

  Tiana did not dare speak. Rocky motioned her forward, and she walked ahead of him, troubled by Marshall’s condition and situation. She did not know how to help him or even if he would accept the help of a Hanover, if she could. Part of her believed the Hanover’s had done enough to his life, that he would heal only away from her family.