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the summit.”
    Travis looked west to where the hills were almost mountain height. One stood out, purple in the night. “Maybe none of us will ever climb the mountain.” He and his siblings had all grown up on the legend. The Apache believed that when a man slept on the summit of Whispering Mountain, he’d dream his future.
    “Father did,” Sage reminded Travis. “Right after he brought mother here, he climbed the mountain one night.”
    “He dreamed his death,” Travis whispered into the evening shadows, wondering what it must have been like for his father, newly married and not yet eighteen, to have dreamed that he would die before he turned thirty and leave his family behind.
    Sage slipped her arm through her brother’s and stared at the mountain. “The dream saved us,” she said, as if she’d been old enough to remember. “If he hadn’t dreamed, he wouldn’t have prepared. If he hadn’t left Teagen all the detailed plans, the three of you wouldn’t have been able to save the ranch.”
    Travis closed his eyes, wondering how long he’d have to live before the memories would fade. His father had gone to fight for Texas Independence. He’d left them alone as he headed for a mission called Goliad. Andrew McMurray had lined his sons up on the porch and hugged each one. Travis remembered thinking his father might crush his ribs with his hold. Then he told them to look in his desk for instructions if something happened to him. “Don’t forget,” he’d said as he rode off to join the fight for Texas.
    Three months later they got word that he’d been killed with hundreds of other Texans at a little mission. That night, the boys had gathered round their father’s desk and opened the bottom drawer. His letter began, “If you are reading this, I’m not coming back.” The writing was bold, direct, just as their father had always been. “Take care of your mother, and no matter what, hold the ranch.”
    The letter explained how Autumn, being Apache and a woman, could never claim the land as hers. But if the boys could keep everyone away until Teagen turned eighteen, then he could claim the ranch.
    The last words written to Teagen, eleven, Travis, ten, and Tobin, just barely six, were simple: “Today, my sons, you have to become men.”
    Sage pulled Travis back to the present. “I wish I’d been there to help,” she whispered as she rubbed her cheek against his shoulder.
    “No, you don’t. It was bad. He’d taught us to shoot and to ride. He’d built his ranch so that no one could come near the center. But there was nothing he could have done to prepare us for the men who came to take our land by force. As soon as word circulated that he was dead, there were those who thought they could step on the land and take all we owned.”
    Travis finished his cigar and said good night. He knew he wouldn’t sleep, but he needed to be alone. The memories of those early days were too thick in his head to allow him to be good company. Sage seemed to understand.
    Tomorrow he’d take her to the dance and try to make the best of it, but tonight he’d walk the boundary of Whispering Mountain Ranch with a rifle in his hand. He’d long since grown taller than his weapon, but memories would keep him company tonight. A part of the little boy who’d had to grow up at ten years old still haunted the man.

CHAPTER 2
     
    TRAVIS SPENT THE NEXT MORNING TRYING TO AVOID Sage. Kid sisters were no fun when they turned into women. She pestered Martha, and then him, with worries over her hair, the length of her dress, and what ribbon to wear at her throat. Martha didn’t seem to mind the talk, but Travis escaped to the little study where the family kept their library of books. He pretended to be lost in a book every time she passed. He would have ridden the ranch, but a fine mist started before dawn and, according to Sage, hung around just to frustrate her.
    Travis found refuge in the library. He loved the book-lined room almost