Western Nevada, June 1874

Nick watched over Heath like a worried mother during the bumpy carriage ride back to the prison camp. It was hot, and none of them had had any decent food or water since they started work a few hours before dawn. Heath had been running a fever since early morning and was clearly looking weaker and moving more slowly as the day wore on. Despite their best efforts, there'd really been no way to get any of his injuries clean. The charred burn on his right leg had become red, swollen, and angry. His back didn't look quite as bad, being not so much in the muck during the work day, but the physical labor kept the wounds open and weeping, growing red and covered with a layer of road dirt.

Heath winced as the cart jostled and caused his shirt to slide over the raw skin of his back. The burn that covered his right knee was festering, with a constant smoldering pain that flared alarmingly with any contact or movement. He felt dizzy and a bit sick to his stomach. He had to work to stay focused on the present. Memories pressed in on him that he had managed to keep out of his way on a short leash for many years. They cut loose yesterday, the moment the guards had lashed his wrists to that whipping post. His sleep last night had been full of nightmares and pain. He felt the memories now circling him like feral dogs, snapping and snarling, slavering in anticipation of his helplessness.

Heath had come to manhood in a place even worse than this camp, but it was cut from the same hellish cloth, and he knew the smell and the feel of it all too well. He should've known better than to mouth off to Captain Risely in front of his men, and call him out on his self-righteous delusions. Stupid. He had been tired, and in pain from his leg, not to mention worried that the burn hadn't been tended and was rapidly looking worse. Still, knowing why he had gone and put himself in the line of fire didn't make it any less stupid.

The stupidity became obvious when no fewer than four armed guards hustled him outside and strung him up on the scaffold in the prison yard. He heard Nick shout his name, and was grateful to the two inmates that held Nick back and got him to be quiet. Didn't need both of us being stupid right then, Heath thought. I was plenty stupid enough for both of us.

He gritted his teeth, shaking his head, forcing himself into the present moment. This is reality, there is my brother, we're in this together, just focus and we'll find a way out. He met Nick's eyes, saw the worry there. He gave him a smile and swore to himself that he was gonna find a way out of this before they could hurt his big brother the way he'd been hurt in the past.

Carterson Confederate prisoner-of-war camp, New Mexico, October 1864

"What's he done?"

"Caught him stealing eggs from the main house."

"Stealing. Again. You seem pretty damn skinny for a Yankee sewer rat who's been caught - for a third time now - stealing food from me and my staff. Why is that, boy?"

The prison camp commander was a lean, dark-haired Confederate officer named Jean Linceul. He spoke with a smooth, educated Louisiana accent. Linceul stepped from behind his desk and approached his prisoner, studying him with growing interest. He was a kid, fifteen or sixteen at most, probably blonde under the dirt and grime that covered his hair. He was painfully thin from starvation.

Linceul knew this soldier was a scout and a sniper, part of a Union sharpshooter unit that had been betrayed into capture and incarcerated a few months ago. That capture had been a rare coup for the Texas Confederate command. This unit had been deployed to devasting effect by the Union Army across the Trans-Mississippi Theater, since they had survived the battle at Chickamauga over a year ago. This soldier must have been maybe 14 during that carnage. Linceul assumed the boy had lied about his age to enlist in the first place, but he must have been a damn good soldier to have been assigned to that unit, and survived until now.

Heath saw no point in using what little energy he had to answer the commander's question. His silence was rewarded with a blow from a rifle stock that sent him to his knees.

"I said, why is that, boy? Are you stealing for someone else? Who might that be, and why? I'd be happy to keep you fed, boy, if you could share a little information in return."

He got no response. "If not, well, I'll just beat it out of you." He smiled pleasantly. "That will be a pleasure for me. You, I'm afraid, will not benefit in that scenario."

Heath met his eyes then, and saw that yes, this would be a pleasure for Linceul. He also saw that it was inevitable. Heath could no more collude with the officer to betray his unit, than could the officer let him go unpunished.

"Well, Yankee boy? Do we have a deal? What's your choice?"

No choice. Heath shook his head, not trusting his voice as fear tightened in his chest. He was pulled to his feet, and steered roughly out of the command tent and into the main courtyard of the compound. He did not struggle as the soldiers pulled off his shirt and began tying his wrists to a sturdy wooden scaffold at the edge of the yard. In peacetime the scaffold had been intended as a drying rack for a vast herb garden. This had been a lovely, fertile hacienda in its prime. That was before it was overrun by the Confederate Army, and its courtyards converted to a nightmarish, overcrowded death camp for captured Union soldiers.

Heath was trying to remain stoic, but he was young, and he was shaken by what he had seen in the commander's eyes. He thought of his mother, so beautiful, and warm, and gentle, and he longed to be away from here and back home in California. He heard the officer walk up very close behind him, but he was tied so tightly to the rack that Heath could not turn his head to look. He felt warm breath on his neck, and the Commander whispered by his ear, "I hope you don't break too quickly, Yankee. Though if you do, I'll just move on to your friends. Who are you protecting?"

Heath squeezed his eyes closed, but a few tears escaped. The commander reached to touch one, then licked his finger. "Mmm. Let's get started, shall we?"