Treasure, Darkly (Treasure Chronicles Book 1)

by Jordan Elizabeth

  Clark eased around the cycles toward the indicated shelf. Leather bags to attach to the sides of the cycles, leather gloves to protect the rider’s hands…four brass helmets. “Bravo.” Clark dropped his saddle bags and grabbed the stepladder the Bromi slave had used. Stepping on it, Clark reached the first helmet. “This is a lot lighter than a regular helmet.” It couldn’t have been heavier than a pair of strong denim pants.

  Pale yellow silk adorned the cushioned interior of the helmet. When he set it on his head and pulled the visor down, lights flashed across the glass.

  “That’s not glass,” Eric said as though he’d sensed Clark’s thoughts. “It’s a substance I designed myself. It won’t shatter, so you’ll be safer. It can crack, but pieces will never fly off to stab you.”

  “Awesome.” His voice sounded muffled from the piece of material that went over his mouth. A normal helmet only covered the top of the rider’s head or, on the more expensive models, used a glass visor to keep dust and bugs from the rider’s eyes.

  Clark pulled off the helmet and fitted it into the bag. Taking down another helmet, he squeezed it in beside the first and buckled the bag’s flap into place. He filled the other bag, turned off the gas lamp, and set the stepladder back.

  “The Bromi is coming,” Eric said.

  Clark dropped to his knees beside the nearest cycle and rubbed his chin as if pondering. The Bromi woman’s shadow danced across the floor.

  “You need me get one of the Horan boys?” she asked. “Master Horan out in the back fields, but the boys closer.”

  The last thing he needed were one of them. “I’m fine. Each cycle is different. I need to find which wires need tweaking. Sometimes they loosen when the cycle is ridden over rough terrain.” More information than necessary might make her retire to her plants.

  “Last time someone from your shop come, he need Mr. Horan to start the cycle to hear it.”

  Brass glass, of course. Clark hadn’t planned to stay that long, but it would look suspicious if he didn’t hear the problem. “Sometimes I can tell by looking at it.”

  The Bromi woman tugged on her apron. “Don’t want Master Horan mad if his cycle ain’t fixed right.”

  Clark stood and brushed off his pants. Brass glass, the slave had to be good and fearful. “I’ll go get them if you tell me where they are.”

  “It ain’t trouble. You work and I go. The boys are out by the watering hole.”

  “Thank you.” The watering hole would be out in a field for the cattle to drink. It would take her a while to fetch them while he broke away.

  Clark watched from the shed’s doorway until the Bromi woman disappeared around the barn. His hands resting on his bags and a whistle on his lips, Clark headed across the yard toward the horse pasture. He kept his steps deliberate, unhurried, as if he belonged.

  The bags weighed on his shoulders, but at least the helmets weren’t heavy. Clark checked to make sure no one looked before he hopped the fence. The horses glanced at him before they resumed eating. A black mare cantered away. Clark continued up the field, whistling. They would find the shed abandoned, the helmets gone. The Bromi slaves would describe him as coming from town. Horan would check with the cycle shop, and the owner wouldn’t know who he was.

  Clark reached the top fence and sighed. “I made it.”

  “Good job, son,” Eric said.

  Clark laughed as he dropped the bags over the fence and hopped onto the other side. “That was fun.” Eric had called him “son.” His father, his real father, felt pride for him.

  “How come I don’t get any fun?” Amethyst’s voice drifted from the orchard. Clark froze, his hand clenching on the top bar of the wooden fence.

  She stepped out from behind an apple tree and sauntered toward him, swinging her hips. “I like fun.” She wore her dark brown riding suit, the pant legs wide enough to look like a skirt. She’d buttoned the tight bodice so that it revealed a glimpse of her white lace camisole.

  “Brass glass.” Clark shut his eyes. She would tell Garth. The Treasures would question why he’d been on Jacob Horan’s land. “You followed me?”

  “I didn’t walk through the orchard because I’m addicted to apples. Apple flavored liquor…now that I do love.” She’d painted her lips with fresh crimson rouge, as bright as any fresh apple. Clark dragged his gaze up to her kohl-lined eyes.

  “Why would you follow me?” Her answer would gain him time. “Your parents trust me to go off on my own.” They were way too trusting.

  She laughed, plucking a leaf off the tree. “Of course I trust you. I’m bored. This is a horrible area. There’s nothing to do.” She tore a section of the leaf off the vein. “You’re just so interesting.”

  Clark crouched to rest his hands on his fallen bags. If she demanded to see inside, what could he tell her? She would recognize the buffalo symbol painted on the sides as belonging to Horan. “We can go for a cycle ride.”

  “Really?” She blew the leaf off her palm.

  He coughed. “Would your parents let you?” Girls he’d run with had owned cycles, but they hadn’t been heiresses. Irritating Garth and Georgette wouldn’t help him.

  “Your parents too.” She sashayed over to him and tapped his head. “I’m sure they would agree as long as we were careful.”

  “Hey!” A man’s bark seared through the pasture behind him and horse hooves pounded the dirt. Clark’s blood seemed to freeze in his veins. Leaving the bags, he rose and turned, lifting his arms to block Amethyst.

  He could grab her hand and they could run through the orchard, but men on horseback could jump the fence and chase them down.

  Two young men drew their horses to a stop on the other side of the fence, glaring down at Clark.

  They’d discovered his trickery. Clark lowered his hands to rest them at the pistols hanging from his belt.

  “Hello. I’m Amethyst.” She bounced forward to lean against the fence, the sunlight reflecting in her blue eyes.

  The man atop the brown horse with a white star on its forehead tipped his leather hat. “I’m Adam Horan, ma’am. This here’s one of my brothers, Jeff.”

  “You’re mighty pretty for a Treasure.” Jeff whistled. They both had dark hair that curled beneath their hats. Clark guessed they were in their mid-twenties. Adam appeared older, with a few lines around his gray eyes. The front and cuffs of his white shirt laced, the collar undone to reveal a tanned chest and tight black curls. A green cloth scarf looped around his neck.

  “I’m mighty pretty for a lot of things.” She winked, adopting their western drawl.

  Clark rested his hand on her arm. “We’d best get back for that ride.”

  “Here’s the thing.” Adam pulled a pistol from his belt and aimed the barrel at the sky. “I sure hate Treasures near my land. You recognize what I mean?” Sunlight glinted off the goggles snapped to his brown cowboy hat.

  Clark closed his fingers around Amethyst. “We’re not on your land. This is Garth’s orchard.”

  “Be our fence, though.” Adam shifted the gun toward Amethyst. She gulped, sliding her hands off and stepping backward into Clark. An honorable man should know better than to threaten a woman, especially a lady.

  “We ain’t never liked us a Treasure.” Jeff snickered. Sweat stained the armpits of his blue and white striped shirt. “You hear?”

  “We hear,” Clark said. Jeremiah would defend the Treasure honor—Clark could tell that from talking to Jeremiah for ten minutes. It was the time to get away, not fight. Good thing he wasn’t there, or maybe he’d learned to avoid the Horan sons. “Come on, Amethyst.”

  “I can go where I want.” She puckered her lips. “It might be your fence, but this is my father’s orchard. It’s praised across the territory. Mother wrote to say when the queen herself passed through, she stopped to eat with my parents and praised the apple pie. I’ve never heard anyone praise something that came from your ranch.”

  “Bitch.” Adam pulled the trigger. The gun fired with a bo
om and Amethyst jerked. She took a step back into Clark and slumped forward.

  “Amethyst!” He caught her under the arms and lowered her as her eyes rolled back in her head, jaw slackened. Crimson soaked across the front of her bodice.

  hat’d you do?” Jeff slapped his brother’s arm. “You think Treasure will let this go?”

  “Self-defense,” Adam growled. “The fellow here attacked us first. He shoved the girl forward.” Adam waved the pistol at Clark.

  They didn’t recognize him. They probably thought he was an orchard worker. Workers held no say with the ranch owner once a wealthy woman died.

  “You shot the Treasure girl,” Jeff rasped. His skin paled beneath his sunburned cheeks and dark tan. The red bandana around his neck matched the color soaking across Amethyst.

  “Weren’t us.” Adam cocked his pistol at Clark’s face. “You tell Garth who did it and we’ll blow your brains out. We’ll hunt you down. We can. Our uncle is Senator Horan. You won’t smear our name with your shit.”

  Heartless bastards. Clark set his jaw and nodded.

  He would kill them himself.

  The sons turned their horses away and charged across the pasture.

  Clark pressed his two fingers against Amethyst’s throat. Although he wore leather gloves, he couldn’t feel a pulse. Her chest didn’t stir with breath and she stared without seeing at the cloudless sky above.

  “Blooming gears,” Clark muttered. The bullet must’ve hit her heart or lungs, most likely her heart since she’d died so fast. Painless.

  Death was better. She might’ve died slowly in a doctor’s care. He could fix this.

  Clark bit the fingertip of his glove to pull it off, cradling her head with his other arm. He spit the glove into the dirt and pressed his bare hand over her mouth.

  The orchard flashed to the desert of death. An orange sun glowed in a sky as crimson as Amethyst’s blood. She stood in the black sand, circling, her arms waving, naked but for a white glow that blurred her features.

  “Amethyst.” Clark stepped toward her, lifting his hand. He could pretend she’d blacked out. The gunshot had only grazed her. She would heal after he brought her back.

  “Clark?” Her voice wavered. “Where am I?”

  “Dreaming.” He took her glowing hand. “I’ll lead you back.”

  She shimmered as he concentrated on life, but then she pulled back. The glow around her solidified, taking her farther from life. “He shot me!”

  “I’ll take care of you.” He grabbed her hand and interlaced their fingers. She felt like nothing, no more than a wisp. Life. They needed life.

  The orchard reappeared and Amethyst jerked in his arms. She gasped, arching her back, and flailed her arms. He clamped his hands over her shoulders.

  “I’m dead,” she shrieked.

  “You’re fine, I swear!”

  “I felt the pain. I died.” The ashen pallor clung to her face. “I can’t be alive right now.”

  He helped her sit up and turned her to face him, pulling her close until their noses almost touched. “Shh, you’re fine. It was a mistake. The bullet hit….” What could he say it hit that would result in so much blood? “The bullet hit the horse. That’s where all this blood comes from.”

  Amethyst panted, her breath hot against his mouth and scented with peppermint tea. Usually the risen smelled of spoiled eggs. “No, no, no. It was me.”

  “You blocked it out.”

  “Then where’s the horse?” She knotted her hands in his jacket.

  “They walked it off to tend to the wounded flank. It was a graze, but must’ve hit a vein.” He didn’t know too much about horses, but that had to sound plausible.

  She leaned her forehead against his shoulder as her body shook. “Tell me the truth, Clark. I know I died. I felt the pain. There was happiness, whiteness. My grandfather welcomed me. Then I was in the desert. You pulled me back.” She drew a deep breath that rattled in her lungs. “My grandfather is quite dead, Clark.”

  He closed his eyes and draped his arms over her back. Brass glass—he tightened his grip on her. He’d saved her. She should be grateful enough for that. “I…brought you back.”

  “How?” she whispered into his leather jacket.

  “I have no idea.” He chuckled, but the false humor tightened in his throat. She wouldn’t let it go, she would keep pestering. She might go to anyone for answers and the questions would lead smack into him. “Years ago, I lived in Tangled Wire.”

  She nodded.

  Did he dare trust her with the truth? “A general in the army…visited…my mother. Sometimes I would….” Bloody stools. “We were very poor so I would go through the customer’s pockets.”

  She nodded again. Rich little Amethyst must’ve never stolen in her life.

  “I hated doing it,” he added. Sure, he felt guilty every time he took something, but he’d never wanted to prove himself honorable before. Her opinion mattered somehow, like how he still wanted to make his mother proud.

  “Some of my friends in the city steal from stores. Just for fun.” She turned her face into his neck and he felt tears dampen his skin.

  He held her so tight he hoped she didn’t still hurt. Her injuries would be healed within a few minutes. “They must have money that they wouldn’t have to steal.” He’d loathed every second of it, and his mother had too, judging by the hollow look she’d get when they reviewed his spoils.

  “What happened after that?” She pressed her nose into his neck and breathed inward, as if she loved his scent.

  His groin tightened. Bugger it. She’d just died. He shouldn’t imagine sleeping with her, their flesh pressed together, her mouth on him in a kiss.

  “I took a vial. The liquid was green, so I figured it was the general’s absinthe. My mother didn’t let me touch the real stuff. I swigged it down and went to work. The stuff really had mechanical micro bodies in it. They mixed with the hertum in the air.”

  “Why was hertum there?”

  “I worked in a hertum mine.” He’d never gone to another mine. No telling what the micro bodies would do if he got near more hertum.

  “Aren’t those dangerous?” She looped her arms around his waist and settled into his lap.

  He stroked her hair. “Sure, but it was all I could do. The micro bodies had been designed to work with hertum to change the user’s body. I can touch someone who’s dead and bring them back to life. I have to touch someone else, and they’ll die, or that will go away.”

  “I’ve never heard of that.”

  “It’s a government secret. I overheard the army discussing it.” Clark squeezed his eyes shut as his heartbeat sped up. The general discussing hertum with a fellow soldier, irritated that Judy was dead and he still didn’t have the vial; Clark had heard it as he dashed from the mine.

  “Got to find whoever took it,” the general had said. “Them at the brothel reckon it was her bastard. Didn’t know she had a whelp.”

  Clark shuddered. “When they find me, they’ll use me for experiments. I’ll become a weapon.” They’d never found him under the shed back in Tangled Wire. They would never find him if he could manage it.

  “They can’t force you,” said the girl whose brother idolized the army.

  Clark stiffened. “They can. I’m a nobody.” In her sheltered world, she would have no idea what those in power could force others into—and him explaining it wouldn’t help.

  “You’re a Treasure…”

  “That’s why I finally came here. I’d hoped the family name would protect me.”

  “We’ll tell Father and—”

  “No!” Clark pushed her away to stare into her eyes. “This is my secret. I saved your life.” He hated to lord that over her, but if he had to, so be it. “Do me this favor.”

  Amethyst narrowed her eyes. “Thank you, then. I won’t tell anyone.”

  “Can I trust you?” She might be loud and flighty, a troublemaker, but he’d never caught her in a lie. She’d admitted that
the wealthy in the city stole when he hadn’t even asked.

  “Always. Do you save a lot of people?”

  “Whoever I can. I have to use this as a gift. Otherwise, it’s a curse.”

  She glanced over her shoulder. “What were you doing at the Horan Ranch?”

  Of course Amethyst would go from death to curiosity. Anyone else might have still been shaken.

  “I have to have something to do.” Eric had vanished. Where was he with his advice? That was what fathers were supposed to do. His mother would’ve had an earful for him.

  She pulled away and grabbed one of the bags. “With luggage?”

  He seized the strap. “I don’t go through your things. Respect my privacy.”

  “Sisters always poke around brothers’ things.” Grinning, she pulled back a corner of the flap. The smile slipped from her lips. “A helmet?”

  “To go riding later.” He yanked the strap until the bag ripped away from her.

  She frowned. “The Horan buffalo is on top. You stole a helmet. I thought you disapproved of stealing.” Ice tinged her voice.

  Clark groaned. She could already have him arrested for the first part—he was wanted by the army—so why not the second? “After I got here, a ghost approached me.”

  “You can see ghosts, too.” She pawed at the bag, so he slapped it behind him. Darn it—he smiled at her dramatic gestations.

  “If they want me to help them. Most of the time I can’t, but this ghost told me about his inventions.” Clark exhaled through his nose. “The ghost is my father.”

  “Father isn’t dead.” She rubbed at her blood-soaked shirt.

  Clark stood to help her up. “I need to take these bags back to my room. I’ll tell you along the way.”

  methyst pressed the heels of her slippers into the plush, maroon carpet. Ugly yellow triangles decorated the edges. The city would have consumed something that hideous, but it fit the western atmosphere of empty spaces and dry dirt.

  She rested her elbows on the table in the back eating nook overlooking her mother’s garden and smiled at Clark. “Your real father was quite rich.”