by R. G. Thomas
The land sloped up to the two-lane blacktop road, and they stopped in unison at the edge of the gravel shoulder. It was as if one of them had called a halt, but no words had been spoken.
“Iron Gulch,” Astrid read from the sign on the shoulder of the road. “One mile.”
“Doesn’t sound very welcoming,” Teofil noted.
“It’s a town that spends a majority of its day in the shadow of a mountain,” Thaddeus said. “We’d probably be a little edgy ourselves with that little daylight.”
“Let’s just hope they have some rooms available,” Miriam said, then made a shooing gesture with her hands. “Come on, let’s go. The sooner we’re there, the sooner we’re all resting.”
Nathan led the way and Thaddeus fell in behind his father. As they walked around the road sign, Thaddeus noticed a tangle of plants growing low to the ground around the post. The broad green leaves were coated in dust from the road, but the few blossoms sprouting from the greenery seemed to have escaped a similar coating. Thaddeus paused for just a moment to look at the flowers, surprised at the rich, dark color. They were nearly black, and he couldn’t remember ever seeing a plant with a black flower before.
“Thaddeus?” his father called from where the rest of the group stood a few yards ahead. “Everything all right?”
Thaddeus waved and jogged to catch up. “Yeah, everything’s fine.”
“Let’s get on into town, then, shall we?” his father said.
Thaddeus nodded and rested his hand once more on the canteen fastened to his belt as he followed his father toward town. The gravel scattered around the shoulder of the road sounded to him like the crunching of bones beneath their feet, and he shivered.
Chapter THREE
BANNERS AND bunting for Fourth of July activities still hung from the poles of streetlights, even though it was past the middle of August. The banners flapped in the breeze. It was dim enough for a few of the lights to have already buzzed to life.
“Not a lot of people out and about,” Astrid said, her voice just above a whisper.
Thaddeus couldn’t blame her for keeping her voice low; the empty street and vacant windows made Iron Gulch feel like a ghost town.
“Was it like this when you and Mom came here?” Thaddeus asked.
Nathan shook his head, his gaze moving from building to building as if searching for any sign of life. “No. It was much more active.”
“Maybe they’re all at work or some kind of summer school?” Thaddeus suggested. “I’ve lost track of what day of the week it is.”
“I think it’s Tuesday, but I’ve lost track myself,” Nathan said. “Let’s see if we can find a place to stay. We can explore a bit more after that.”
The lights were on in the buildings they passed, but they saw no people inside. Finally, after walking almost halfway into the business district, they saw a woman moving around inside a real estate office, and they stopped as a group to stare. She was full-figured, with red hair that clashed with the vibrant pink blazer she wore. Bright blue glasses kept sliding down her nose every few seconds, forcing her to push them back into place. It took the woman a few moments to realize she was being observed, but when she caught sight of them, she smiled and waved. They waved back as a group, and it must have looked funny because she tipped back her head to laugh and then stepped out onto the sidewalk.
“You look like you’ve all been hiking for days!” she said, her voice a luminous counterpoint to the shadow-strewn and seemingly uninhabited town.
“Well, we have,” Nathan said with a grin, then held out his hand. “I’m Nathan Cane.”
“Hi, Nathan, I’m Ruby Sandison.” Her smile widened, her teeth very white within a thick coat of pink lipstick that almost matched the jacket she wore. Now that she stood before him, Thaddeus could see the words Ruby’s Realty stitched across the breast pocket.
“This is my son, Thaddeus,” Nathan said.
Thaddeus smiled and nodded and watched as the others repeated the gesture when they were introduced. Ruby smiled at each of them, but her gaze lingered a bit longer on Dulindir.
“Such beautiful long blond hair.” Ruby gazed at Dulindir almost hungrily. “And such lovely facial features.”
“Ah, yes. Well, Dulindir is from Iceland,” Nathan said. “Exchange student.”
Ruby stared at Dulindir a moment longer, then returned her gaze to Nathan. She opened her arms wide and, with a big smile, said, “Welcome to Iron Gulch. It doesn’t look like much, but we’ve got a lot to offer. Unfortunately, we’ve had a great deal of bad luck when it comes to our mountain lately, so we haven’t had a lot of tourists or climbers.” She shook her head and clucked her tongue. “Shame, really. The local businesses depend on those climbing tourists so much, it’s going to be a tough winter, I’m afraid.”
“That’s too bad,” Nathan said. “So there should be room in the local motel?”
“Oh, yes, sure, of course.” Ruby clasped her hands in front of her and pressed her lips together as she looked up and down the empty street. Finally she leaned in a little closer and lowered her voice. “However, if you want a really good deal, you could stay at a bed and breakfast I know of that’s just off Main Street here.”
“Breakfast?” Astrid repeated, and looked up at Miriam with a smile.
“Oh, Hannah lays out the most wonderful spread: omelets, sausage links, sausage patties, hash browns, bacon, muffins, biscuits and gravy. Why, if you can think of it, she’s got it there and available.” She made a face and waved her hand dismissively as if shooing a fly. “You won’t find that kind of treatment at the Iron Gulch Motel, and it’s at least a mile outside of town.”
“Do you think the bed and breakfast would have enough rooms available for all of us?” Miriam asked.
“Why don’t I just go inside and ring Hannah up and find out?” Ruby turned and gestured for them to follow. “Come on inside and get out of the wind. I know it’s August, but it feels like October once the sun goes behind the mountain, doesn’t it?”
They followed Ruby into her office and crowded into a small waiting area. Ruby stepped behind a tall counter and up to her desk, where she picked up the phone and dialed a number. Thaddeus felt Teofil bump his hip and turned to give him a smile. Teofil tipped his head to the left, and Thaddeus looked over to see a poster of a couple soaking in a hot spring surrounded by flat rocks. The caption at the top of the poster read “Soak Your Cares Away… Iron Gulch Hot Springs!” While Ruby talked on the phone, Thaddeus followed Teofil over to the wall, and they stood looking at the poster.
“That would feel very good right now,” Teofil said, then grinned at Thaddeus. “And even better if I were able to be there with you.”
“That’s one of the hot springs I was telling you about,” Nathan said from just behind Thaddeus. “They’re heated by vents that run deep under the mountain.”
“And you can just walk up and soak in them?” Thaddeus asked.
“You can,” Nathan replied. “Probably want to test the water first, though, to make sure you don’t scald yourself.”
“Gnome soup,” Teofil whispered, and Thaddeus laughed with him.
Ruby hung up the phone and stood. “You all are in luck! The Iron Gulch Inn has rooms all made up and just waiting for you. She’s only got three bedrooms, though. I hope that will work for you?”
Nathan nodded. “That should be fine. We’ll figure out sleeping arrangements when we arrive.”
“Well, you won’t be sorry, it’s a beautiful inn. And the price is half what you’d pay at the hotel.” She grabbed a set of keys and herded them out onto the sidewalk, then turned to lock the door behind her. “I’ll show you where it’s located.”
“You don’t have to go to all that trouble,” Nathan said. “We can find it, I’m sure.”
Ruby waved his protest away. “Oh, fiddlesticks, it’s no trouble at all. It’s not like I’ve got people knocking down my door to look at houses or apartments. Come along now. It’s not far, jus
t down Main Street here.”
As Ruby led them through town, Thaddeus saw more people, which made him feel better about the place. They passed The Iron Gulch Diner, which was located in the space beneath the offices of the Iron Gulch Gazette. On the next block they walked by Heap’s General Store and a combination coffee and bake shop called The Gulch Gulp. People walked along the street carrying shopping bags or pushing strollers, and a few stood waiting in line at an ATM. Ruby greeted everyone by name, and Thaddeus realized they had been fortunate to meet her, as she apparently knew everyone in town and everything about it.
Ruby turned them down a street named Iron Ore Avenue, which intersected with Main Street at the far end of the business district. They were approaching the foot of Wraith Mountain now, and it loomed over them, tall and imposing. Thin clouds drifted past the jagged peaks, like ghostly wedding veils. The sun, completely out of sight behind the mountain, turned the undersides of the clouds a buttery hue.
“We usually get a lot of travelers,” Ruby explained, her hands in constant motion as she talked and walked down the sidewalk at a fast clip. “But this has been a bad season for climbing. First we had brush fires all along the base of the mountain. Awful things. Luckily we didn’t lose any buildings.” She looked around at them and wrinkled her nose. “The smell lingered for weeks, though. Weeks! After that we had some ridiculous storms, completely out of character for the area during this time of year—snow and ice storms midway up the mountain that clogged up the hiking trails and made it impossible for anyone to climb. I think ice even formed on the hot springs, if you can believe that. Probably El Niño or La Niña or one of those crazy weather things, I can never remember which is which. Anyway, since then, no one’s seemed to be interested in visiting us or climbing the mountain. With all that’s happened to our little town this year, it’s a wonder anyone’s left here at all, between the accident at the mine the end of last year, and then the crazy weather, you know?”
Thaddeus was about to ask what had happened at the mine, but before he could get the question out, Ruby turned up the walk of a large Victorian-style home. Thaddeus stopped a moment to take the place in. Despite the fact that it needed a new coat of paint and a few gutters repaired, it looked like a pleasant enough place. A hexagonal turret extended up three stories from the left front corner to a pointed roof that looked like a witch’s hat. Atop the turret, at the very tip of the roof’s peak, stood a weather vane that had been cut in the shape of a dragon. The front walk led to a set of steps just outside the turret that climbed the left side of a raised porch to the front door. A second-floor balcony above the porch provided cover. Above the balcony rose a prominent peak with a hexagonal window in the center. The shingled walls were a faded, dark red that had started to peel away. The texture of the walls reminded Thaddeus of lizard skin, or maybe dragon. That, coupled with the dragon-shaped weather vane, gave him a good feeling about the place.
A sign above the porch proclaimed this The Iron Gulch Inn.
“Oh my,” Miriam said as she stood and looked the house over. “It’s quite a beauty.”
Ruby smiled. “Isn’t it? Sure, it’s in need of a few fixer-upper projects, but it’s one of the town’s more intriguing homes. Hannah Woodhouse used her part of the settlement to buy this place from an elderly lady—sweet as the day is long, but getting on in years, you know. She spent the remainder of her days at the nursing home on the other side of town, God rest her soul.” Ruby put a hand over her mouth as she smiled. “I meant the previous house owner, not Hannah. Did you understand all that? Sometimes I just talk and talk and talk—been doing that all my life. Feel free to tell me to just shut my trap or else I’ll just rattle on and on. My husband used to tell me—”
She stopped herself and waved her hand, shooing away that invisible fly once again. “Well, never mind all that. Here we go. Let’s go on inside and meet Hannah.” She glanced down at their feet, then stopped and clutched her hands together before her. “You know, Hannah is pretty particular about the upkeep of her inn. You’ve been hiking for days, and, well, not to be rude, but your shoes are really quite dirty.”
“Oh,” Nathan said, and lifted a foot as he looked down at his mud-caked shoes. “Yes, of course. We could remove our shoes.” He kicked off his shoes and exposed filthy socks. “I guess that’s not much better, is it?”
Ruby made a face. “I’m afraid not. And I dare say that underneath that sock, your feet are probably more than a little dirty as well.” She let out a long breath and rolled her eyes as she contemplated the situation. Suddenly, her smile returned, big and bright as ever, and she jerked a thumb over her shoulder. “I’ve got just the idea. Follow me to the back.”
Thaddeus fell in line behind his father, with Teofil just behind him and the others bringing up the rear. Ruby led them around the turret and into a long, narrow backyard. She left them standing on a narrow walkway made from patio blocks and approached a hose lying in a tangle outside a door. Thaddeus looked around the yard while Ruby unraveled the hose. A few bushes grew along a black wrought-iron fence that showed patches of rust, but there were no flowers or other decorative plants.
“I like your yard better,” Thaddeus whispered to Teofil.
“It was nice, wasn’t it?” Teofil whispered back.
Thaddeus felt bad as he recalled the battle with the Bearagon in Leopold’s backyard. He and Teofil had torn up many of the plants Teofil had spent his life caring for to release his mother in dragon form. He wanted to apologize for his comment, but Ruby drew his attention as she approached where they all stood with a garden hose in her hand.
“This may sound extreme, but if you all remove your shoes and socks, I’ll hose off your feet and then we can go in through the back door.”
Thaddeus removed his mud-encrusted shoes and made a face at the sight of his dirty socks. He peeled them off and wriggled his toes as he inspected the dirt that coated his ankles and the tops and bottoms of his feet. He didn’t think he’d ever been this dirty before in his life. Well, at least not for as many days in a row.
“Come along now,” Ruby coaxed, “let’s get you washed off quick as a whip. One by one step closer.”
Thaddeus was closest to Ruby, and he moved to stand before her. She aimed the hose at his feet and turned the nozzle. Ice cold water sprayed him, and Thaddeus gasped and jumped away.
“That’s cold!” he said as he leaned down to rub his icy, tingling feet.
“Oh, forgive me,” Ruby said with a giggle. “I should have warned you. Sorry about that. This water comes directly from a reservoir beneath the mountain, so it’s quite cold. Refreshing to drink, of course, but without a water heater, not much fun to bathe in, I’m afraid.”
Thaddeus was still bent at the waist, rubbing dirt off and trying to work the feeling back into his feet. He felt someone touch the canteen fastened to his belt, and he pulled away quickly, his hand falling protectively on top of it. Ruby stood beside him, eyes wide and her hand hanging in the air.
“Don’t touch that,” Thaddeus said, his tone sharper than he’d intended.
“I’m so sorry.” Ruby dropped her hand and took a few steps back. “I was just going to say you could fill up your canteen with this fresh mountain spring water, and it would stay cold for days.”
“It’s already full enough, thanks,” Thaddeus said.
Ruby nodded and looked away to where Teofil stood waiting for his own foot bath. As Ruby sprayed off the others, Thaddeus inspected his feet to make sure they looked clean enough and wiped the dirt and water off his hands on his shirt. When he’d finished, he rested a hand on the canteen once again.
Teofil stepped up beside him and asked in a low voice, “Are you okay?”
Thaddeus nodded. “I am. I probably overreacted, but she startled me.”
“Well, if it makes you feel any better, you have very cute feet,” Teofil said with a wink.
The compliment helped Thaddeus relax a bit. A few minutes later, Ruby finished spraying o
ff Miriam’s feet, and she returned the hose to its place near the house. She looked them all over, avoiding Thaddeus’s gaze, and then nodded.
“Now you’re presentable. Come on.”
Ruby climbed the steps of the back porch and rapped on the door a few times before opening it and walking inside. Thaddeus stepped over the threshold and found himself inside a large kitchen. It was outfitted with appliances that gleamed in the weak afternoon light, even though they appeared to be at least thirty years old. Ruby walked through a doorway, then down a hall, and they all followed. They came to the front entryway, and Thaddeus stood next to Teofil, behind his father. A rack was positioned against a side wall, filled with brochures about the hot springs, the mountain trails, and other sites to see in the area. When they turned around, stairs directly across from the front door rose to a landing and turned to disappear out of sight to the second floor. A sitting room lay to the left, in the bottom of the hexagonal turret. It contained comfortable, overstuffed armchairs arranged in small groups around a fireplace and floor-to-ceiling shelves filled with books. An archway to the right led to a dining room taken up by a massive table made of heavy, dark wood.
“Hello.”
The woman startled a jump out of Thaddeus. She stood halfway down the steps, a heavy dark green cardigan hanging to just above her knees, the sleeves swallowing her hands. Her pale face was very plain, and her dark blonde hair lay limply down her back.
“Here she is,” Ruby said, her tone and loud voice a stark contrast to the other woman’s demeanor. “Hannah Woodhouse, owner and operator of the Iron Gulch Inn, meet Nathan Cane and his traveling band of merry men and women.” Ruby’s tinkling laugh sounded completely out of place within the shadowy house.
“Hello,” Nathan said as he lifted his hand in a wave. “We hear you have some rooms available?”
“We do.” Hannah glanced at their bare feet. They must have passed inspection, because Hannah motioned for them to follow and turned her back.
