There was no unexpected sound. No unexpected scent. No moving shadows. No sign that she wasn't alone.

"That's what's wrong," Janna whispered. "There's no sign at all!"

She went onto her hands and knees, but no matter how hard she examined the ground, the only traces of any passage over the dry stream course were those she herself had just left.

Zebra's head flew up in surprise when Janna hurtled back into the valley from the slot.

"Easy, girl. Easy," Janna said breathlessly.

She swung onto the mare. Within moments a rhythmic thunder was again rolling from beneath Zebra's hooves. When she galloped past Lucifer, he lifted his head for an instant, then resumed biting off succulent mouthfuls of grass, undisturbed by the pair racing by. In past summers, Zebra and Janna often had galloped around while he grazed.

"Well?" Ty demanded when the mare galloped into the campsite.

"He's still in the valley. You take the left side and I'll take the right."

Ty looked out over the meadow. "Waste of time. He's not here."

"That's impossible. There's not one mark in that little slot canyon that I didn't put there myself. He's still here."

"Then he's between us and Lucifer."

Janna looked to the place where the stallion grazed no more than a hundred feet away. There wasn't enough cover to hide a rabbit, much less a man.

"Why do you say that?" she asked.

"Wind is from that direction. Lucifer stopped testing the wind and settled down to graze about ten minutes ago."

Janna's urgency drained from her, leaving her deflated. If the stallion didn't scent Mad Jack it was because Mad Jack wasn't around to be scented.

Grimly Janna looked at the heavy saddlebags, an old man's legacy to a life he had abandoned years before. It was too heavy a burden-but it was theirs to bear. Her only consolation was that Ty's share, plus her own, should be enough to buy his dream. She didn't know how much silken ladies cost on the open market, but surely sixty pounds of gold would be enough.

Ty's expression as he looked at the saddlebags was every bit as grim as Janna's. His consolation, however, was different. He figured that Janna's thirty pounds of gold, plus his thirty, would be more than enough to ensure that she would never have to submit her soft body to any man in order to survive.

Lucifer's ears flattened and he screamed his displeasure, lashing out with his hind feet. Ty made no attempt to hold the mustang. He just ducked and ran for cover. The stallion exploded into wicked bucking as he tried to dislodge the surcingle Ty had cut from the buffalo robe in Janna's trunk. When bucking didn't work, the stallion tried outrunning the strap and the flapping rope stirrups.

By the time Lucifer realized that he couldn't outrun the contraption clinging to his back-and that he wasn't being attacked by whatever was on him-the stallion's neck and flanks were white with lather and he was breathing hard. Janna wasn't surprised at the horse's signs of exertion; Lucifer had been racing flat out around the valley for nearly half an hour.

"Lord, but that's one strong horse," she said.

Ty grunted. He wasn't looking forward to the next part of the stallion's education, the part when he felt a man's weight on his back for the first time. Ty approached the big mustang slowly, speaking in a low voice.

"Yeah, I know, it's a hell of a world when you can't outrun all of life's traps and entanglements. But it isn't as bad as it seems to you right now," Ty murmured, stroking the stallion. "Ask Zebra. She took to the surcingle and stirrups like the good-hearted lady she is."

Lucifer snorted and butted his head against Ty as though to draw the man's attention to the irritation caused by the unwanted straps.

"Sorry, son. I'll rub away the itches but I'm not taking off that surcingle. I had enough trouble getting the damned thing on you in the first place."

Janna had a hard time not saying a heartfelt "amen." Watching Ty risk his life under Lucifer's hooves in the process of getting the surcingle in place had been the most difficult thing she had ever done. She had both admired Ty's gentle persistence and regretted ever asking him not to use restraints on the powerful stallion.

Ty continued petting and talking to Lucifer until the horse calmed down. Gradually Ty's strokes became different. He leaned hard on his hands as he moved them over the horse, concentrating mainly on the portion of Lucifer's back just behind the withers, where a man would ride. At first the stallion moved away from the pressure. Ty followed, talking patiently, leaning gently and then with more force, trying to accustom the mustang to his weight.

Again, Janna watched the process with a combination of anxiety and admiration. Most of the men she had known would have snubbed Lucifer's nose to a post, twisted his ear in one hand and then climbed aboard in a rush. Once the rider was in the saddle, the horse would have been released and spurs would have begun raking tender hide. The bucking that would have followed was inevitable. So was the fact that some horses broken that way weren't trustworthy. They tended to wait until the rider was relaxed and then unload him with a few wicked twists of their body.

Yet Ty had to be able to trust Lucifer with his life, and he had promised Janna to treat the stallion as gently as possible and still get the job done.

Breath came in sharply and then stuck in Janna's throat while she watched Ty shift his weight until his boots no longer touched the ground. Lucifer moved nervously, turned around in a circle rapidly severjal times, then accepted the fact that Ty's soothing voice was coming from a new direction. After a few minutes the stallion began grazing rather irritably, ignoring the fact that Ty was draped belly down over his back.

By the time two more hours passed, Ty had gotten Lucifer to the point of not flinching or even particularly noticing when Ty's weight shifted from the ground to the horse's back. Janna had seen Ty creep into position, moving so slowly that every muscle stood out as he balanced against gravity and the mustang's wary, mincing steps. When Ty finally eased from his stomach to a rider's normal seat, Janna wanted to shout a cheer. All that kept her quiet was an even bigger desire not to spook the mustang.

For the stallion's part, Lucifer simply twitched his ears and kept grazing when Ty sat upright. The horse's whole stance proclaimed that the bizarre actions of his human companion no longer disturbed him.

Elation spread through Ty when he felt the calm strength of the stallion beneath him. More than ever, Ty was certain that Lucifer had been gently bred, raised by humans, and then had escaped from his owners to run free before any brand of ownership had been put on his shiny black hide.

"You're a beauty," Ty murmured, praising the stallion with voice and hands. "Does part of you know that you were born and bred to be a man's friend?"

Lucifer lipped grass casually, stopping every few minutes to sniff the wind. Ty made no attempt to guide the stallion with the hackamore. He simply sat and let the mustang graze in a normal manner. When Lucifer moved in the course of grazing, he walked a bit awkwardly at first, unaccustomed to the weight settled just behind his withers. But by the time the sun was tracing the last part of its downward arc in the west, Lucifer was moving with his former confidence, adjusting automatically to the presence of a rider. Occasionally he would turn and sniff Ty's boot as though to say, "What, are you still here? Well, never mind. You're not in the way."

Ty's answer was always the same, praise and a hand stroking sleek muscles. When Lucifer responded to a firm, steady pull on the hackamore by turning in that direction, the praise and the pats were redoubled. When the pulls were accompanied by gentle nudges with Ty's heels, Lucifer learned to move forward. When the pressure on the hackamore was a steady pull backward, the stallion learned to stop.