The snake writhed and hissed as Hunter lifted it from the pallet. For a moment he held it aloft. Then he looked at Loretta. After what seemed an eternity, he pulled his knife, beheaded the rattler, and tossed it into the brush. Loretta knelt in the dirt, clutching her throat. The word bounced off the walls of her mind, shrill, echoing and reechoing. She had screamed... Disbelief swamped her. Surely her ears had deceived her. She couldn't have screamed, she just couldn't, not after seven years of silence. And to save a Comanche. Sheathing his knife, Hunter walked toward her hesitantly. Loretta stared at him--at his long hair, his fringed moccasins, his buckskin pants, his medallion, the gods on his wristband. A