Shadow Soldier (The Gunsmith Book 2)

by C. K. Crigger

  At one time I only witnessed the stories locked within the guns— stories that screamed at me, begging to be heard. The saga would appear, as if I were watching the action from a distance. When I’d been thirteen years old, I assure you that had been plenty close enough. As I got older, though, everything changed. The power that allowed me to touch a gun’s history grew exponentially, until I was actually there, until I became the person whose hand was upon the gun.

  And guns, as you might guess, often figure in exceedingly dramatic stories, all of them connected with heartbreak and death and blood. Don’t forget the blood. It had taken me years to figure out the spilling of blood was mandatory, whether it was mine or someone else’s. Anyone else’s.

  My body still shook with the aftermath of memory.

  Scott wasn’t kidding about wild-haired. When I get close to anything that radiates with power, my hair, short and naturally curly, puffs out like I’d been plugged into an electric socket. I imagined myself looking like an agitated hedgehog as drawn by Walt Disney.

  I passed my hand over the Colt, close, though careful not to accidentally come in contact with it. I felt a queer resonance. Jerky, without rhythm, feeling almost like a raw scar, the vibration touched my bones, setting in motion a jangled, erratic rush of energy.

  I turned my hand palm up and made a second pass, then another with both hands. Something wrong here, I thought. Something missing.

  “Oh, hell,” I said, looking up at Scott. My eyes must have looked like the bull’s eyes on a target, black in a white ring, for at my expression, he turned a little pale. My hair ballooned.

  “What’s the matter?” he said. “What’s wrong?”

  “No wonder the old guy wanted to drown it in the river. Its story isn’t finished. This gun isn’t safe to have around.”

  Scott’s expression quickly changed from near panic to something more like controlled alarm. “Don’t touch it, sis. You don’t need to let the voodoo out, do you? Leave it alone.”

  “I’m not touching anything,” I said, annoyed he thought he had to warn me—me, of all people—about the danger.

  “What are you worried about then? You’re the only one in the world who can plug into this kind of crap, aren’t you? So just keep your grubby mitts off the damn gun! “

  “I may not be,” I said. I made another pass over the pistol, shaking as a far away roll of dark power rose from what appeared to be nothing more than metal and bone. There was a stench, oily and smoky that seemed to eddy upward until my sinuses plugged.

  “May not be what?” Scott asked, stepping back. “What’s that gawdawful smell?”

  My head whipped up. “You smell something? You?”

  “Yes,” he said, with more apprehension than enthusiasm. “Your doing, I assume. Keep a lid on your damn voodoo, Boothenay. Don’t drag me in.”

  “I’m not dragging you in.”

  If he was smelling the same reek of old exploded gunpowder I was, then I had real cause to worry. He’d never admitted to sensing any of the mysteries the guns revealed to me—not in the fifteen years since I’d reached puberty and the magic began. How—why—had it suddenly become possible? What was different about this particular 1911.45 caliber Colt?

  The worry nagging at me burst into full flower. “From the moment that kid came through the door, I’ve been afraid of this. The power in this gun is incredibly strong. I’ve never seen or felt anything to compare it with. Good Lord, Scott, if you can be touched, then probably anyone can be touched.”

  “Throw the damned thing back in the river,” he advised. “It’s too dangerous.”

  In a half-baked way he was possibly right, but wrong at the same time. We faced each other, the Colt lying between us.

  “I don’t think I can do that,” I said. “Or I don’t dare. Consider this. Austin said the old man threw it in the river. Well, you know the river’s high. So how come the gun happens to float to shore? You and I both know guns don’t float. They don’t tumble and bounce or swim either.

  “And why were those kids there at that particular moment? How were they able to walk over and pick it up? How did they know to bring it to me? Ye olde corner pawn shop would’ve been a better bet for a quick buck.”

  Scott stared at me, then shrugged. “What are you trying to say, Boothenay? Do you think that thing can control people? Other people, I mean, besides you? We both know the merest whiff of voodoo is enough to get you going.”

  I hate the way he always calls my response to magic voodoo. I hate the way he assumed the gun’s magic would control me, rather than the other way around. In one thing he was dead right. The slightest trace of power intrigued me until I couldn’t rest for needing to learn its source.

  This time was no different. Just more fraught. I didn’t know enough to make good decisions where safety was concerned.

  A glance out the window showed the boys had finished counting their money. They’d slowly recounted it, split the proceeds and were only now mounting their bikes, ready to ride off.

  “Do something for me, will you, Scott? Put the Colt out of sight.” I dashed for the door.

  “Where are you going?”

  “I need to talk to those boys again. Maybe they can tell me where to find the old man.”

  CHAPTER 2

  The boys didn’t want to tell me about the man who’d thrown the gun away, or want me talking to him either. I suppose they were afraid he’d claim the money I’d paid for the Colt. Or maybe they were plain afraid of him. Although I promised, hope to die, that I wouldn’t give them away, in the end they didn’t have much information. What little they did have, I had to drag out of them.

  They didn’t know his name. Austin had apparently already forgotten what the man looked like. “Old,” he said, the total sum of his description.

  Fortunately, Jase was a little more observant, though not particularly forthcoming. “Tall,” he elaborated. “Skinny. I noticed he has really big hands. No glasses. Isn’t that something? I thought all old people wore glasses. He had on cowboy boots and jeans and a red-and-black jacket, and a red-and-black hat with earflaps.”

  “Ski jacket?”

  “No. Kind of woolly. The red and black are in squares. You know⏤plaid.” He said that as if he’d prefer not to confess he knew a plaid from a floral.

  Rightly or wrongly, I visualized a bright buffalo plaid.

  “I’ve seen him around before. You probably have, too,” Austin added, not to be left out. “He takes a walk almost every day about this time, and either comes down to the bridge here on Argonne or walks along the road out on Upriver Drive.”

  Oh, him, I thought, with an unconscious shiver. I’d seen him, all right, stumping along and looking dour.

  “What do you want to talk to him for, anyway?” Jase asked. “He didn’t want the gun. He probably doesn’t want to talk about it.”

  “Maybe he doesn’t want to talk,” I said, trying not to let my uneasiness show. “But I do. I like to find out everything I can about the older weapons I sell.”

  Providing something of a history lesson to the new owner is a nice value-added feature. And who, if possible, better to tell me than the previous owner? Not every gun is endowed with magic, by the way, only some exceptional guns.

  In any case, the meticulously researched provenance of the weapons I sold had given me a national—in some cases, international— reputation for excellence. I just never told anyone how easy it was for me to accomplish the research. All I had to do was tap into the weapon’s own power and let it speak for itself. Except this one had me real leery and I didn’t want to go off half-cocked.

  The boys made a face at the mention of history. Eventually, we struck a deal. After some hard bargaining, I wormed a promise out of them to come tell me the second they saw the old man again. In turn, I promised there’d be another ten bucks in it for them. These two were as canny a pair of shysters as I’ve ever seen.

  SCOTT HAD the Colt wrapped up in the towel when I got back i
nside. He shoved it into a foam-lined leather case while I watched. Luckily for me, my family, by this time, had learned these two ingredients, foam and leather, dampened the wild magic into something I could handle. I would put off working with the pistol until later, I decided. Sometime when I felt more comfortable with it, or I’d learned more of its history.

  I shivered, rubbing my chilled arms. The wind had blown my hair, which I had vowed to let grow, into mad, tangled curls; smoothed now, fortunately, from the electric frizz proximity to power always generated.

  “So?” Scott asked as he flipped down the latches on the case. He’d closed his side of the shop, ready to go home. “Discover anything interesting or helpful?”

  I shook my head. “They promised they’d tell me when they see him again. I thought I’d try going straight to the source, if I can catch up with him.”

  “Think the boys will?”

  “I told them I’d pay. What do you think?”

  Scott rolled his eyes, holding the gun case out to me. “I think you’re about to finance their first car—or maybe their college education.”

  He exaggerated as usual. I hoped.

  Nothing weird happened when I took the Colt from Scott. Deeming the encased gun safe enough for me to handle, I locked it in our fireproof vault, very much relieved when the curious feeling of apprehension the gun raised in me disappeared.

  I’ll own that I burned to learn the story within the old Colt. The gun virtually reeked with essence of power, much stronger than Caleb’s blunderbuss had done when, last winter, he and I first met. When I almost got him killed. Together, we’d experienced an adventure consisting of one barely averted disaster after another, all stemming from the residue of power I called from his gun.

  I wish I could bring myself to say magic, which is what this power is, but the word sounds so . . . so . . . crazy. That’s another thing. I’ve never heard of anyone possessing an ability like mine, able to project into another time, another life, another person. What are the chances of ever meeting someone with the same capability? Zero to absolutely impossible, I’d say. Yet on our trip back to 1811 England, I’d somehow managed to take Caleb Deane with me, and, more importantly, bring him back alive.

  Lately I’d seen signs in him, signs I recognized from when I first came into my power, and the suspicion was growing that, perhaps, I wasn’t the only one in the universe who had this talent. I’d begun to suspect Caleb might have played a major role himself in supplying the impetus for our jaunt back in time.

  This suspicion was why I hadn’t meant to say anything to Caleb about the Colt. Scott of course, being Scott and a blabbermouth par excellence, couldn’t keep his mouth shut.

  Caleb smelled of Georgio Armani’s Acqua di Gio when I opened the door to him; a scent so enticing I wanted to swarm over his body and nuzzle into his neck. Well, maybe that desire wasn’t all to do with the Armani, since I felt the same every time I got near him. He didn’t necessarily have to be freshly showered and shaved as he was tonight. Bullet holes and blood aren’t enough to put me off.

  We’d meant to go out. Our plan was dinner and a movie, but I knew he was tired the moment I heard his step on the stair. Caleb is a PA-C whose practice is at the Riverside Clinic in the roughest part of Spokane. Twelve-hour shifts are the norm in that outfit.

  “What are you trying to do? Work yourself to death?” After a quick look at him, I couldn’t help scolding.

  He blinked weary, emerald green eyes and said, “Hey, sugar. I’m glad to see you, too. You look pretty—good enough to eat.

  Well, if he was going to pay me compliments, maybe I didn’t want to scold him after all. Besides, I liked that he’d noticed I wore a flowered dress instead of my usual denims. “I’d rather be kissed.”

  He grinned, latching a finger under my chin until my mouth pointed in the right direction. “Okay.”

  Talk about taking the wind out of my sails. I love his butterfly kisses. All the other kinds, too, especially the ones that make me wish I lived alone instead of with my father.

  After a bit, I said severely, “But you do work too hard and too many hours. Look at you. If you had to fight your way out of a paper bag, you’d probably lose. I’ll give you odds that, if we go to a movie tonight, the lights won’t have a chance to dim before you’re snoring fit to raise the dead.”

  “Will not.” He ran his hand up under my hair, as if to feel how much it had grown in the week since I’d last seen him—an eternity— and drew me close. Very close. “I don’t snore.”

  “Hah!” Heart pounding, I leaned against him. Little pinpoints of energy seemed to spark my body where we touched. After a while I tore my mouth away from his and said, “See? You’re snoring now.”

  I’m a great one for playing it cool.

  His eyes remained closed. “No, ma’am. That’s just me breathing hard, what with my blood pressure going up.”

  “Well, you should know, since you’re the doctor guy. What does one do for a man in your condition?” I doubted his condition was any worse than mine, and I anticipated hearing his course of treatment.

  His smile had a wicked tinge to it. Managing to open his eyes finally, and with his breath drawn to answer, he was interrupted in this so interesting diagnosis by Dad peeking around the corner at us.

  “Doc,” Dad said, apparently blind to our cuddling. He very much approves of Caleb. “Glad to see you finally got an evening away from all those sunny-side-of-life folks.”

  Dad thinks he’s a great wit. This was his way of referring to Caleb’s patient list, which is made up mostly of hookers, pimps, drug addicts and alcoholics who I’m sure don’t have a clue about how much he does for them.

  “Hello, Sam.” Caleb, being the Southern gentleman he is, opened up a couple of inches between us.

  Dad peered closely into Caleb’s face. “I hate to mention this, son, but are you working too hard down at that clinic of yours?”

  Caleb glanced at me and raised an eyebrow. I wrinkled my nose, as though to say, “I told you so.”

  “Working a little overtime, Sam. That’s all. We’ve been shorthanded since Dane left.”

  “Dane left on New Year’s Day. More than four—count ’em—four months ago. You’d think they could’ve found a replacement by now.” I think this dilatory attitude irked me more than it did Caleb.

  He just shrugged. “No money in the budget.”

  I was always to regret this conversation. If we hadn’t stopped to yakety-yak... Well, we did stop, and we did talk. Which gave my brother time to drop in on his way to somewhere and put in his two cents.

  “Hey, doc.” He eyed Caleb. “You look like hell.”

  Caleb squared his shoulders. “What is this? A conspiracy? I felt fine until I met up with you folks.” He sounded angry, though I saw amusement sparkling in his eyes.

  “Go away,” I told Scott. But Scott, not content to mind his own business and in the act of making simple conversation, just had to bring up the details of my purchase of the Colt. Never mind that I wasn’t ready to work with or discuss the gun. I hadn’t decided what to do with it as yet. Away from its disturbing aura, my fears seemed frivolous, my desire for speech with the old man an imposition.

  “How about taking a look at this gun?” Caleb asked, his curiosity aroused as I’d known it would be.

  Quickly, I shook my head. “Not now. It’s locked in the vault. Some other time.” I hoped he’d forget. “Aren’t you ready for dinner? I’m starved.”

  “Don’t you go pokin’ around where you don’t belong when you’re by yourself.” Caleb ignored the mention of food. He knew me too well, having first-hand experience with the trouble I could get into. He’d appointed himself my guardian since then⏤the only trouble being that the guardian also needed guarding. So I promised I wouldn’t poke around by myself, never thinking promises go two ways.

  We ate prime rib at Black Angus before catching the movie. Bound he would prove something to me, Caleb dropped off to sleep at once,
thereupon confirming he didn’t snore.

  EARLY IN MAY, the weather finally took a turn for the better. Birds warbled an outrageous song of glory while refurbishing their homes in the blue spruce growing in a corner of the yard. Moss pulled from around our garden pond became their favorite building material.

  Tulips bloomed in every shade of the color spectrum, and lilacs perfumed the most obscure corners of town, masking the miasma of car exhaust. The sun shone for more than twenty minutes at a stretch, while snow melted in the mountains, adding to the volume of water spilling into the Spokane River.

  Spring fever hit me along with the birds. I closed shop early one afternoon, business being dead anyway, and went on my annual round of plant nurseries. I splurged on purple wave petunia hanging baskets, and a riot of colors for the whiskey barrel planters around the shop’s front door. Hanging plants filled the window boxes on the second story, yellow marigold, the ubiquitous petunias and some viney green stuff.

  I planted a small salad garden, too. Just tomatoes and mesclun lettuce mix, radishes, green onions and cukes. Gabe, Dad’s old hunting dog, helped, whacking the backs of my legs now and again with his rope-like tail.

  Gathering my tools and the empty plant pots into a box, I sighed with satisfaction over a job well done and stood up, pushing Gabe away from a tomato plant he was cozying up to. “Shoo.”

  Moving that dog could be like nudging a cement statue out of your way. I heard a titter of laughter, and looking up, discovered Jase peering over the side gate in the picket fence.

  “Hi, Jase,” I said. “Come on in.”

  He lifted the latch, but paused in the opening. “I came to ask if were you serious about paying another ten bucks if we saw that old dude?” His dark hair clung damply to his forehead, as if he’d peddled his bike hell bent for election to find me.

  I agreed I had, though I felt a decided lack of enthusiasm. I’d avoided looking at the Colt during these last few weeks to the point of leaving it permanently in the vault. In retrospect, I regretted the purchase, wondering why I’d felt such a sense of urgency. But I couldn’t deny I’d told the boys I’d pay for information, and a promise is a promise.