by Alex Bledsoe
I looked around for the source. The hill rose above me to a forested crest, beyond which I glimpsed the top of higher hills. The soil here was rockier and less accommodating than it was even fifty feet below, and in many places bundles of boulders poked from the ground. I remembered what Bella Lou had told me, dismounted and knelt by the nearest one. The odor was incredibly strong, and when I put my hand down into a crevice-belatedly realizing that it might hold things like rattlesnakes, spiders or the odd displaced scorpion-I felt a slippery coating on the rocks down where the wind couldn’t dry them. My fingertips were damp when I pulled them out, and one sniff told me Bella Lou had been right. But why go around painting the insides of nooks and crannies with oil?
I wiped my hands on some leaves, climbed onto the horse and wrestled her back along the trail. She kept a ridiculous distance from the edge, ensuring the left side of my head was thwacked by every low-hanging branch. Eventually the trail turned away from the canyon and continued up the hillside through the forest.
I watched the sky for any sign of smoke. Here the trees were gnarled hawthorn, entwined with each other and studded with big spikes. There would be no traveling off the road in this neighborhood unless you were in armor. It occurred to me that perhaps Buddy had sent me after the mythical wild goose, which if true would earn him an ass-kicking not even Bella Lou could rival. But since I knew where he lived, it made no sense for him to trick me, unless he was sending me into a fatal trap. He seemed neither smart nor devious enough for that.
Then the damn horse began to fight me again. I perversely wished for some of the big, vicious cavalry spurs I’d used as a young man when I fought in the Trego marshes. The horse snorted and tried to turn, an almost impossible move on this narrow part of the trail. I ducked the spiked branches and cursed her to the best of my ex-soldier ability.
Finally I gave up, dismounted and threw the reins over a low branch. I drew my sword, once again resisted the urge to smack the animal and started up the trail. The horse let out a high, piercing whinny that must’ve carried for miles, and certainly alerted any of these mysterious dragon people that someone was coming.
The trail wound around rocky outcroppings that gradually displaced the stubborn hawthorns. I finally spotted a small stone-walled shack beneath a rock overhang, probably once used as shelter for people trying to mine gold or copper from the Black River Hills. Those veins had played out before I was born, but there was no reason a sturdily built structure couldn’t survive and be used for all sorts of disreputable things. As I got nearer, I saw that newer stones had been used to repair the damage from neglect, and the roof sported fresh wooden shingles.
I hid behind a boulder and watched for a long time, checking for any sign of occupation. By the time the shadow from the nearest tree crept far enough to mark twenty minutes, no floor-boards had creaked or silhouettes moved across the windows. I counted to three, rushed up the hill and flattened myself against the wall by the door. Once my heart settled down enough for me to again hear the outside world, I confirmed nothing seemed to be moving within. I tried the handle; it was unlocked. I pushed it open and went inside.
My eyes took a long moment to adjust to the dimness. The tiny one-room shack contained only a table with two chairs and an odd box on the floor near the fireplace. Three walls each sported curtainless windows, and the fourth boasted a crude fireplace and hearth. The breeze tickled thick cobwebs by the ceiling, and detritus accumulated in the corners. Nobody lived here, but it didn’t mean it was entirely abandoned. Someone had gone to the trouble of fixing the ravages of time, after all.
The furniture was simple and cheap, but the box got my attention. While it most resembled the kind of strongbox miners might use to hold their precious findings, it had leather padding along all the edges and big loop handles were attached to either end for a carrying staff to thread through. I could think of nothing small enough to fit in the box that would also need two or more people to lift it. Well, sure, gold, but there was no gold to be had in these mountains. Using my sword, I flipped the single latch and carefully opened the lid. It was empty. The inside, though, was lined entirely with thin sheets of lead. Gold wouldn’t need that.
The place gave me the creeps. The wind weaseled through tiny unpatched gaps in the stone and made soft, agonized sounds. The smell contained odors of dust, decayed wood and abandonment. Yet the box was so new its leather still reeked of tanning.
I checked the fireplace. It was summer, but this high the nights might require a little help. The ashes were cold, but they were also fresh. Then my eye fell on a stain on the floor in a shadowed corner. The way the light from the window reflected from it was unmistakable.
It was dried blood.
I looked directly above it. From a beam across the ceiling hung two manacles on very short chains. Someone suspended from it-say a short girl with blond hair-would dangle helplessly well above the floor.
I knelt by the stain. Tiny dark strips were matted into the dried liquid, and when I tapped them they did not crumble like ash. I realized they were small ribbons of human skin that had been peeled or cut from Laura Lesperitt.
Something little and cold went snap deep inside my chest. I should’ve been scared, but I wasn’t. Instead I was a hair’s breadth from full-on battle rage. I’d claimed I could help her, volunteered to help her, and yet in the end I’d done nothing. If she hadn’t met me on the road, she might’ve gotten clean away. Perhaps this blood on the floor should be on my hands.
And then that damn horse let out another loud, self-pitying neigh.
I really wanted to split her equine skull with one blow, but I stuck with my training. I scooted to the wall beside the window and peered around the edge. Another horse, this one dark brown, appeared around the boulder. Its rider was hidden beneath a hooded cloak designed to blend in with the forest greenery below, less useful here among the scraggly mountain flora. Behind him came my horse, led by the reins far more complacently than she’d have let me do it. It made me hate her that much more.
I ducked out of sight and heard the man dismount. He did not walk away from his horse, though. I’d made no effort to hide my tracks, so if he was halfway observant he’d spot my boot prints in the dirt outside the door. I listened more closely, trying to separate stealthy human noises from the sighing wind and my own thundering heart. Was that the sound of a sword being drawn, expertly and quietly, from its scabbard? Did I hear a stealthy foot crunch very slightly on the rough ground outside the door?
The man kicked the door open, and it slammed back against the wall with a loud crash. Sunlight shot through the opening and would’ve blinded anyone who didn’t expect it. He’d removed his cloak and, when he rushed in, he threw it to one side to confuse potential ambushers.
He didn’t see me against the wall beside the door. I stepped forward and kicked him hard in the small of the back. It knocked him across the room into the table. He spun around, his sword slashing at the air behind him. Nothing wrong with his reflexes, that’s for sure.
I blocked his next backhand with my sword, locked our blades together and stepped too close for either of us to do anything. “This doesn’t have to get messy,” I said. “I just want some answers.”
The man said nothing. He was under thirty, with short black hair and a thin ribbon of beard and mustache. His eyes were wide and dark, with no visible feeling. A young hotshot thug, on the way up.
He tried to muscle his sword past me, but I had them wedged together in a way that took little effort to maintain. Surprise flicked across his face as he realized it.
“What do you say?” I said. “Shall we put these down and talk? There’s money in it for you.”
His jaw muscles trembled with the effort to wrench his weapon free, but he made no sound. Then suddenly he quit struggling entirely, and I fell for it. He yanked his sword away and rolled around the edge of the table, putting the furniture between us. The ceiling was so low he couldn’t manage a vertical killing blow at my e
xposed neck, but I barely got my sword up to block his horizontal slice. My parry drove the edge of his blade into the table’s wood, where it bit solid. In the moment it took him to twist it loose I’d dropped my own sword, scrambled over the table and hit him hard right between the eyes.
I felt the impact into my shoulder and down my spine, and the sensation of finally having someone to actually punch overwhelmed me. As he staggered from the first blow, I grabbed the front of his tunic with my left hand and punched him again, across the jaw. When I released him he stumbled back into the wall but kept to his feet. I jabbed my left fist into his kidneys. He grunted, the first noise he’d made, and fell to one knee. Either I’d lost my touch or this guy was really, really tough. I got my answer when he suddenly drove a punch that felt like an anvil into my stomach.
If he’d connected with my sternum it might’ve knocked the wind from me, but as it was I stumbled across the room, off-balance but not really hurt. I fell over one of the spindly chairs and when I looked up he was leaping over it, boots aimed at my face. I rolled aside and he hit the floor with a thud that made me glad I wasn’t under it.
I picked up the fallen chair and used it to drive him back against the wall. While I tried to pin him with my weight, I punched him again in the face. It had no real effect except to make my hand hurt. “Will you stop it?” I yelled, my voice tight from his gut punch. “I just want to talk to you!”
He braced against the wall and easily shoved me back. He grabbed the chair away from me and threw it out a window. Blood ran from his nose, the only real sign I’d had that he was a human being. He swung at me, but I dodged it and backed away. He kept after me, breath hissing through his teeth and spraying out bloody spittle.
I skidded in the dregs of tacky blood beneath the manacles. The sudden recollection that it belonged to Laura refreshed my temper, and I ducked under his next swing to drive a punch with all my weight, strength and fury into his side. I felt something solid give way and heard a wet, muffled snap. He made an “ Oof! ” sound and fell to his knees.
I stayed out of arm’s reach as he cradled his side and gasped. When he looked at me, his eyes showed his agony. I punched him again in the temple. My knuckles would hate me tomorrow, but for the moment I felt completely righteous. I hit him again, but it was wasted because he was already out from the last one. All this one did was knock him over.
As soon as he hit the floor my own head spun, and I grabbed for the nearest wall. The back of my skull throbbed anew, and pain wrenched at my ribs. If he woke up now, I was a goner, but he didn’t move. I waited until my vision cleared, the agony faded and I could again think straight. Guess I wasn’t as recovered as I thought.
I checked out his boots. They were expensive, but sported no designs. I quickly went through his pockets, making sure he had no hidden weapons. Then I stumbled over to the remaining chair and heavily sat down. I didn’t think I was high enough for the air to be really thin, but the only other option was that I was getting older, and I knew it couldn’t be that. I gulped big lungfuls and wondered just what I’d do with the unconscious man on the floor. I couldn’t take him back to Gary Bunson in town; it wasn’t his jurisdiction, and as far as he knew the guy had committed no crime. Hell, I was the one trespassing.
Then I remembered the manacles.
SIX
I slapped him lightly across the face until he whimpered like a whiny child and opened his eyes. Then I stepped back and let him figure it out for himself.
He tried to move, realized his arms were pinned above his head and that his feet only barely touched the ground. He struggled slowly, his body pivoting on his wrists as his boots scraped the floor. As he awoke more he fought harder, gasping at the pain from his ribs. Then he comprehended, and froze. He dangled from the manacles that once held Laura Lesperitt, and looked slowly around until he saw me seated nonchalantly on the windowsill opposite him.
“Welcome back, tough guy,” I said.
He said nothing. The only sound was the beam above him creaking from his weight. Wind blew through the windows and ruffled his hair.
“Don’t know if you remember me,” I said, “but I lay on the floor here while you and your buddies tortured a girl to death right where you’re hanging. Don’t bother denying it; I know it was you.” I held up the knife I’d gotten from Bella Lou. “One of you had this same design on your boots.”
He said nothing, but the hate in his glare was a little diminished by fear.
I turned the knife like I was unfamiliar with how to handle it. “Now the thing is, I want to know some things, and I’m not real picky about how I find them out. Given the way you treated that girl, I’m sure you can appreciate that. But I’m a fair guy, so I’m going to give you a chance here. Who are you, and what did you want to find out from her that was so important?”
He said nothing. His face was red from pain, except for the white around his lips from gritting his teeth.
I shrugged. “Okay, then. I suppose I’ll just have to have a little target practice until you become chattier.” I grinned and turned the knife so the blade caught the light. “Always meant to learn how to throw one of these,” I said, then threw it expertly right at him.
Because I’m an expert, I knew I’d miss him by a mile and stick the knife in the wall behind him. He yelped as it swished past his left underarm, then glared at me as I walked across the room and twisted the knife loose.
“Wow,” I said as I returned to my spot across the room, “there must be a trick to this. Let me try again.”
This time I deliberately nicked his right side. It was little more than a glorified shaving cut, but it also stung like one and made him howl and writhe. He kicked at me as I walked around him to get the knife, and by the time I returned to face him, blood had soaked the side of his shirt.
“Wow,” I said, mock impressed with my own skill. “Would you look at that? Does it hurt?”
He glared.
I shrugged, backed up and threw again. This time it stuck in the big muscle of his thigh. I didn’t use enough force to go very deep, so it only remained for a moment before its own weight and his spasm of pain knocked it free. He jerked like a hooked fish and whined through his teeth.
I retrieved the knife and he followed me with wide, frantic eyes. I said apologetically, “I’m sorry, but you really have no one to blame but yourself.” I held the knife ready to throw and watched him expectantly. “What were you guys trying to find out from that girl?”
He opened his mouth as if to speak, then mustered his resolve and clamped it shut again.
I sighed, said, “I’ll be great at this before much longer,” and threw the knife again. This time I aimed higher, closer to his groin. This one finally got his attention. He howled as the point jabbed the soft skin at the crease of his thigh and hip, and thrashed madly until he shook the knife free. It clattered to the floor and he turned wide, panicked eyes on me.
“You son of a bitch!” he cried, his voice high.
“Don’t talk about my mother,” I said patiently. “And what should concern you is that I was aiming at your heart. So are you ready to talk?”
“ Yes! ” he snarled.
“What did you want to find out from the girl you peeled the skin off of a week and a half ago?”
He shook his head frantically. “Uh-uh, man, not me. That was Frankie. He’s into that. I was just the lookout.”
“Good for you. What were you trying to find out?”
He looked up at the manacles as if he hoped they’d magically open and free him. When they didn’t he sighed, looked down and said, “Lumina. We’re trying to find Lumina.”
“Who is Lumina?”
I heard the distant twang, followed by a much closer snick, at about the same time I registered his sudden, wide-eyed look of surprise. An arrowhead appeared just above his navel, poking out through his shirt. He tried to say something; then another snick-twang combo preceded the solid thunk of a second arrow into his back. This one
didn’t come out the other side.
By the time the second one struck, I’d flung myself to the floor and scrambled over beneath the window. I drew my sword and held it up so I could use a specially polished part of the blade as a mirror. Outside, a man on horseback untied both my horse and the dead man’s, then smacked them with the flat of his sword and sent them off down the trail. He watched the house for another moment, then, apparently happy with his handiwork, spurred his own horse after the others.
Crap, I thought.
I snatched up the dragon knife and rushed out the door, scabbarding my sword as I went. I ran down the trail, but no way was I going to catch a guy on horseback. I skidded to a stop, out of breath and furious. Then I had a terrible idea.
If he left by the same cliff-top trail I’d used, there was a chance I could cut through the woods and head him off. He’d have no reason to hurry once he got out of sight, since he knew I was now on foot. But most of the trees were hawthorns, and they were woven together like the lies a king’s chamberlain tells to hide the queen’s dalliances. They’d shred me to pieces before I’d gone fifty feet. Still, I’d get no answers standing there wheezing. So I pulled my jacket sleeves down to protect my hands, put up my arms to shield my face, cursed the various fates that brought me to this point and headed into the gauntlet.
It was as bad as I feared. A couple of times I dodged around rocky outcroppings and caught another whiff of lamp oil. Finally I emerged on the trail where it ran closest to the cliff’s edge, my arms slashed from protecting my head and my shins cut from pushing their way through the branches. Exhausted, I sat down on a fallen tree beside the path to catch my breath. I tried to read the ground to see if my man had already passed, but it was too rocky, and the traces I saw could easily have been my own from earlier that day. Sweat from the exertion trickled into the various cuts and scratches, and the stinging made me even angrier. I was sure I’d missed him, that my frantic race to intercept the bastard had been for nothing. Then, from up the trail, I heard the distinctive neighing of my own borrowed horse as she came toward me.
