"Trust me, every drifter knows about the Lions and their human torch. Stories like that tend to get around pretty damn fast." Jace's voice was calm and emotionless. Being burned alive was a pretty horrifying idea, but what happened to some other drifter wasn't any of his concern. And even if being reminded exactly what it meant to be on the wrong side of the Mountain Lions sent a shiver down his spine as well, he wasn't about to show any sort of fear in front of Wolf. Jace knew that the Mountain Lions were no joke. That hadn't stopped him from wanting to mess with them, and god help him he still wanted to, but he did take them seriously. Now more than ever.
He didn't say anything about the tribe leader's 'do as I say' comment, merely nodded and did his best to keep a straight face when Bishop pulled out her calm and reasonable officer of the law act. They weren't in any position to argue with Wolf about it, but he didn't see any reason to lie to the man. Either they'd both know he was lying, which wouldn't be ideal, or Wolf would believe him, in which case the man was a whole lot less savvy then he'd given him credit for. He would smile and nod politely, but Jace was going to do exactly as Wolf said for exactly as long as it suited Jace to do so, and not a minute longer. When that time came, well, that would an interesting day.
"We didn't do anything to them," Jace said defensively, somehow managing to keep his temper in check. It didn't bother him so much that everyone assumed they'd done something to tick off the Lions, what pissed him off was that they were getting the blame without actually having gotten to do something to deserve it. Well, not much at least. He listed off their minor crimes in an attempt to prove that he wasn't hiding anything. "Like she said, Bishop beat up their red-headed soldier-girl, but it was in a fair fight which they'd organized themselves. I picked a couple pockets at that same cage match, but nothing special and not from anyone important. Sending out five guards two days later on a cold morning hardly seems like a reasonable response to any of that, even by that tribe's standards."
He and Bishop hadn't talked about why they'd been attacked. Ever since she asked him why he'd come back for her, they'd talked about anything but what had happened. He caught her eye for just a second, exchanging glances before he starting spinning his story. Jace had been trying to figure out for himself just why the Lions were on their case. He'd only come up with two possible reasons, and he was going to give them both to Wolf. One would mean they were just the victims of some very bad luck. The other one he didn't like at all, but it made a whole lot of sense. "Either they think we did something that we didn't," he suggested with a shrug, "Or the they were lookin' to rob us." It was the only thing he could think of that explained why the Mountain Lions had showed up the way they had. If they had somehow found out what he and Bishop were trading, it would make sense that they would want it for themselves. And based on the tribe's reputation, they'd be even more eager to make sure that none of the other tribes got their hands on it.
"We rolled into town with more than cigarettes and stale candy bars to trade. Between us we had an impressive cache of weapons. Guns, ammo, a few other things. Lots of ammo. Trading with individuals is all well and good, but I wanted to cut a deal with one of the tribes for all of it. I'm thinking the Mountain Lions heard about that and decided that instead of playing fair, they'd rather just take it." The explanation also gave him a chance to let Wolf know that they might not be coming here empty handed. All they had to bargain with were themselves and the possibility that they still had a hidden cache out there. It wasn't much, but if all he had was that possibility, then Jace was going to use it to whatever advantage he could. "We aren't quite dumb enough to just leave that sort of thing just laying around though. Nearly all of it was hidden, and I don't know if they found it or not. If they searched the area really well, they might have. If not... then I think your tribe is about to be a lot better protected than it used to be."