The Captive Heart by Dale Cramer

getting to their feet as Domingo knelt over the unconscious bandit and took the revolver from his hand. Underneath the prone body he found another pistol and a knife.
    â€œIs everyone okay?”
    Kyra nodded. “Sí. We are unharmed.”
    Domingo handed the axe to Miriam. “Stay here until I call you. Tie his hands and keep your shovel close.” Then he wheeled about and raced downhill toward the wagons.

Chapter 7
    E l Pantera flung the bowl away and wiped his mouth on a sleeve. “I wonder what is keeping Gomez,” he said. “I should know better than to send an old man to do a young man’s—”
    He didn’t finish the sentence because he glanced up and saw Domingo. The native stood on the edge of the woods, twenty feet up the hill, leveling two pistols at the three bandits.
    El Pantera spread his arms and smiled as if he were greeting an old friend. “Finally, we meet the son of Ehekatl once again! How have you been, young one?”
    The smile remained on his face, but his hands drifted down, coming to rest on gun butts.
    â€œIf I were you, Señor Aguilar,” Domingo said calmly, “I would take those pistols out very slowly and put them on the ground. All of you.”
    El Pantera’s leering smile faded, and no one said anything for a long moment. His hands did not move. One of his compadres leaned close to him to whisper something, and all three bandits laughed.
    El Pantera pointed. “The guns you are holding, young one—they belong to Gomez, no? Perhaps you should know, before you throw away your life, that old Gomez was always deadly with a rifle, but he could not even hit the ground with those pistols. They don’t shoot straight.”
    Domingo shifted uneasily. “Perhaps it is not the weapon, but the man who holds it.”
    El Pantera shrugged. His hands had still not moved from his hips, and now the other two pulled their coattails back and spread their feet a little farther apart.
    â€œAh, well. It is a pity you cannot believe me, young one. So like your father, you are. You did not have to die this day, but I can see in your eyes that your mind is made up. Alas, you will get only one shot. You will miss, and then you will die. After you are gone we will take vengeance on your friends, and what will you have bought with your short life, eh?”
    Domingo said nothing, his eyes steady and his hands steadier. There was nothing left to be said. The air crackled like the stillness before a storm.
    El Pantera’s hands wrapped around the butts of his guns and his shoulders tensed, but in that moment the silence was broken by the double click of two shotgun hammers.
    All three bandits turned their heads in unison and looked over their shoulders to see Micah standing beside the wagon with a double-barrel shotgun pointed at them.
    Micah said nothing, his eyes hard.
    Domingo cleared his throat. “That twelve gauge shoots a very wide pattern, ladrón . I have seen it bring down three birds with one shot, and there are two barrels. Perhaps you would like to reconsider.”
    Caleb, Ira and John had been standing by the hack all this time, afraid to move. Now Caleb stepped forward, his hands out, his voice calm.
    â€œStop this,” he said. “No one has been hurt and no damage has been done. Why must anyone die? We are men. We can talk.”
    El Pantera looked at Caleb with vague amusement in his eyes. He seemed to relax as his hands moved away from his guns.
    â€œThe viejo is right,” he said to Domingo. “This is a difficult situation. So what will you do now, young one?”
    Domingo had not lowered his guns. “My father spoke of you often, Aguilar. He said you seldom give your word, but when you do, you keep it. Is this true?”
    El Pantera stroked his stubbly chin. “It seems a foolish question. If a man is a liar, he will say he is not. But your father was right: I do not give my word