by Chris Miller
“Don’t be so sure, friend.”
Denarius’s face clouded with confusion as he accepted the firearm in cradling hands, holding the weapon as if it were a religious relic. His eyes darted all over it as he turned it over in his hands, marveling at the craftsmanship and what James assumed to be confoundment at the near alien nature of the thing.
“W-what is . . . ” Denarius started and then gulped, his throat clicking. “Just what in the blue hell is this?”
He held the revolver up between them.
James chuckled. “That there, my new friend, is a Smith & Wesson Performance Center Pro Series Model 686. Fires the .357 Magnum round. That’s one hell of a caliber. It screams like a shrieking demon and bucks like a mule. But if you aim it halfway decent, it’s a one and done kind of weapon.”
Denarius’s confusion only seemed to deepen.
“A three-fifty-seven?” Denarius exclaimed in confused astonishment. “I heard of plenty of calibers, but I ain’t never—”
“And you likely won’t,” James said, cutting him off and handing him a fistful of shells. Denarius held one up, his jaw dredging new depths beneath his face. “It hasn’t been invented yet. Hell, it’s a longer and meaner version of the .38 Special, and even that ain’t been invented yet. But never mind all that. All you need to know is it’s powerful as hell, and you need to hang on when you fire it. And fire it sparingly, as I said, I don’t have too many rounds for it.”
He fished around in his saddle bag and produced some more shells and handed them to Denarius, who shoved them into his pocket. Denarius fumbled with a lever on the side and the whole cylinder rolled out to one side, exposing six empty chambers.
“I’ll be a son of a gun,” Denarius was muttering, still in awe. But he was thumbing rounds into the chambers and when he had it full, he slammed the cylinder back into the housing of the gun. His hand flexed on it a few times, his fingers exploring the grip.
“Like the feel of it, do ya?” James asked as they began to make their way up the grade to a ridge overlooking Dust.
“Yes, suh, I sure do!” Denarius exclaimed.
James nodded. “Thought you might. It’s a fine weapon. It’s the one I carried as a lawman where I’m from. I’d carry it still if there were ammunition for it to come by. Ain’t none, though, and won’t be for a lot of years yet, I’m afraid.”
He trailed off as he hunched down, climbing the ridge, and realized Denarius was staring at him.
“What is it, Denarius?”
His new friend’s face parted in an astonished grin and his head shook.
“Mr. James, suh, you ain’t crazy a’tall, is ya?” Denarius asked.
James laughed and pulled his rifle from his back.
“Sometimes, Denarius, I wish I were.”
He chambered a round.
11
Dreary looked out over the landscape below. The gray light from the overcast sky shed a gloom over the town, though he believed the town of Dust would be a gloomy sight in any lighting. The dirt streets were a bland shade of maroon from the iron ore clay in the ground, and the buildings were sparse and in disrepair. At the end of the main street, which slinked arrow straight up the town’s center, stood a large building with a spire sporting some sort of coiling spiral symbol at its top jutting to the sky above its large double entry doors. Behind it lay a sprawling lake, one seemingly as hidden from public knowledge as the town itself. The gray light twinkled off the surface as a soft breeze created rippling waves across its shimmering top, which bordered three sides of the town.
The buildings between the one with the spire—was it a church?—were in far worse disrepair than it. Windows were missing entirely or reached out like claws in their frames, doors hung open, some at odd angles, others gone entirely. Not a single roof in all the town seemed sound enough to keep water out. In fact, the whole place looked like a ghost town, as though the whole of the people had packed up and left one day, eager to flee.
Yet, there were signs of life all the same. A stable near what Dreary assumed to be an old saloon held half a dozen horses which were grazing on piles of hay and slurping water from troughs. Behind the main street some distance there was a ranch house on the shore of the lake, smoke pluming from its chimney, and several cows grazing the field surrounding it, along with a pair of goats and a swath of chickens, their distant clucks reaching their ears like faint chokes.
But not a soul was on the streets. This wasn’t all that odd, he surmised. It was only just past dawn. Likely the town was still sleeping. Though, despite the few houses he could see at the outskirts and butting up against the lake, he wondered what kind of people would live in a town such as this, so cut off from the world and society. But he knew the answer to this and smiled broadly.
A town building the army of N’yea’thuul.
Dreary aimed his telescope to his left and down the ridge a way to where James Dee and his new friend were perched. James had his rifle out, the black man lying prone next to him. Both had their eyes pinned to the town, searching it over much as he’d been doing a moment ago. Surveying the territory. Dreary smiled once more as he collapsed his telescope and put it away. Then he patted Mr. Bonham on the shoulder. The big man turned and looked to him, a long-barreled repeater in his hands, not unlike the one James Dee was sporting.
Dreary leaned in and whispered so as not to send his words echoing in valley of the town.
“I believe our friend Mr. Dee has outlived his usefulness,” Dreary said, his eyes alight with anticipation. “See that he and the negro are dispatched without any fuss. Start with Dee.”
Bonham made the closest approximation to a grin the man was capable of and gave a nearly imperceptible nod. Then he crawled on his belly to the edge of a rock and cradled the rifle up to his shoulder. Dreary crept up beside him, lightning tingling in his fingertips. He wanted to watch James Dee’s head pop like a pulsating sore, to see the gray pus of his brains scatter the rocks beside the man. For years, he’d managed to stay just a step ahead of James Dee, the man on a mission to destroy the gods and snatch from Dreary his destiny of divinity. And now he had the drop on the man. He would savor the moment.
The hammer of Bonham’s repeater clicked as it was cocked into place, a satisfying ratcheting sound which sent pleasuring shivers up Dreary’s spine. Bonham exhaled slowly, resting his cheek on the butt of the weapon, squinting down the site with one eye.
Movement on the other side of James and his companion caused Dreary to nearly cry out as his hand shot down to the rifle and his thumb was pinched harshly as the hammer descended on it. Bonham had just pulled the trigger, but Dreary’s interference had stopped the weapon from firing and caused a nasty wound to begin bleeding from his hand.
“Goddamnit, Gear!” Bonham hissed, pulling the hammer back so Dreary could remove his thumb. “What in hell’d you do that for?”
Dreary stuck the side of his bleeding thumb into his mouth, sucking at the coppery sweetness of his blood, and pointed with his other hand.
“There.”
Bonham’s eyes followed Dreary’s directions and widened when they fell upon three men stepping out of the trees behind James and the black man.
“I’ll be dipped in shit,” Bonham said, almost gasping. “Where the hell did—”
“From the town,” Dreary said as he pulled his thumb from his mouth, now awash with his own blood, and began to wrap it in a cloth. “Men from the town. I dare not move on Dee with them right there. If one gets away before we can get into town, I might never get to my treasure. And . . . ”
Dreary trailed off, his face splitting into another maliciously broad smile.
“And what, Gear?” Quentin asked as he and Avery sidled up next to them.
Dreary’s piercing gaze bore into the scene unfolding below them, his teeth shimmering in the gray light.
“Mr. James Dee might just get served up to N’yea’thuul,” he said, a madness blazing in his eyes. “And, oh, what sweet irony that wou
ld be. These men are doing our job for us.”
They began making their way down the ridge toward Dust.
PART III:
Welcome To Dust
12
Denarius heard theshuck-shuck of the repeater a half-second before he saw the men stepping from the woods. His hand jerked toward the crazy weapon from the future in his waistband on instinct, but stopped short when he saw the barrel of the repeater trained on them. The other two men on either side of the repeater man had revolvers drawn, their faces dirty and coated in a week’s worth of whiskers.
He raised his hands as he got to his knees.
“The hell business you boys got here?” the one with the repeater asked, though his tone did not convey malice. Instead, it seemed almost defeated, as though he were being forced into a position he had no desire to be in. The look on his face, the deep ridges of concern and sorrow, bore this out.
The look on the other two men’s faces did not seem likewise afflicted.
“Gentlemen,” James said, raising his hands and leaving his repeater where it lay. “I believe you’ve found us in an awkward position here.”
Grunts from the two revolver men, a twitching eye and quivering lip from the man with the repeater.
“Perhaps so,” repeater man said. “But this town don’t take kindly to visitors. This here’s a private place, and we mean to keep it such. I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to come with us. The Proprietor will have to decide what’s to be done with ya.”
Denarius’s gaze flicked from the men to James for just a second, then back again.
“Forgive me, suh,” Denarius said, “but you said the Proprietor? Who is—”
“You best keep them blue gums shut, nigger!” the revolver man to the left of repeater said. “Ain’t no one said a goddamn thing to you!”
Denarius’s jaw clenched tight and he fought to hide a scowl of fury which threatened to tear across his face. He had been raised a slave and spent the last near decade and a half considered only three-fifths a man. He was accustomed to bigotry. It was as much a constant in his life as the need to piss. Wasn’t something he could get away from, nor did he expect to. He’d been called nigger and spook and coon more times now than there were calculable numbers. But it wasn’t the use of the slur that made him angry now. What infuriated him was the rudeness of the man’s behavior. Rudeness was uncalled for. He’d been called these same names and worse before, but without the coldly rude tone. Most men were ignorant. It was just a fact of life in these parts. It was a word. A descriptor. Derogatory, sure. But often used in ignorance, not malice. It didn’t make it okay, but he could look past ignorance. He could not, however, look past malice.
And this man was full of malice.
“I see those giant lips open one more time, you’ll have a fucking hole the size of my fist right in the middle of your black face, you hear me, boy?”
Denarius met the man’s gaze, glaring fiercely at him. But he said nothing. Merely nodded. Ignorant and cruel and malicious though the man may be, it didn’t make him any less dangerous.
“Apologize to the man,” James said flatly, his own hands still in the air to either side of his face.
The three men turned their gaze to James, and Denarius did likewise. At first, he wasn’t sure who James was referring to. Did he mean for Denarius to apologize to the man with the gun? Denarius didn’t take James to be like most men from these parts. He was a brutal man, but at the same time much more civilized in many respects. The idea that James would want Denarius to apologize to the malicious cowboy seemed ludicrous.
But soon Denarius realized James hadn’t been referring to him at all, for his fierce gaze bore directly into the man with the revolver who’d demeaned Denarius. The man with the gun seemed to blossom with rage, his face reddening to a deep crimson, his yellowed and browned teeth exposed as his lips raised in a snarl.
“The hell you say?” the man growled, turning his gun to James.
“Everybody just hold the hell on!” the repeater man shouted, raising one hand to stay the rest. “This ain’t how this is gonna go, you hear me? The Proprietor will handle this.”
The revolver man and his fraternal twin both turned to glare at the repeater man.
“The Proprietor ain’t here,” the second revolver man said.
“But I am, goddammit!” repeater said. “I say what’s—”
“You don’t say shit!” the first revolver man said, his gun turning toward repeater.
“I said apologize!” James spoke in a loud and forceful tone, pulling the three men from their argument. “I won’t ask a third time.”
The three men seemed to jolt when James spoke, and in unison they turned to him. To a one their eyes narrowed, mouths open in bemused awe. Finally, the first revolver man spoke.
“The hell do you think you’re doing, mister? We’re the ones with the guns. We’ll make the demands. And I ain’t never apologized to no black fella, nor will I! Now, let that be the end of it.”
James’s head began to shake.
“You’re about to not have your guns at all,” he said. “You’re being awfully rude to my friend here, and I don’t take kindly to my friends being treated rudely. Last chance.”
The revolver man began laughing then. It came in fits and starts at first, bewildered chuckles issued in short barks. Then it matured into full on guffaws of hilarity. Before long, he was doubling over and slapping at the side of his leg, his revolvered companion joining in the festivities. Only the repeater man didn’t laugh. Didn’t even smile. He only continued to stare at James with a confused expression.
James turned to Denarius, and Denarius could see the same coldness there he’d seen when this mysterious man of magic had blown the balls off of his kidnapper in the woods. A chill snaked down his spine.
“I warned them,” James said with a shrug.
James’s wrist twitched then, as though he were calling someone over with a gesture of his hand. Something scraped above and behind him, and the offending revolver man’s laughter caught in his throat for a moment. He spun quickly on his heels to look behind him, as though he expected to find yet another member of their party lying in wait.
When the boulder was five feet above his face, tumbling from a higher place on the ridge, the man spoke his final word.
“Shitfire.”
The repeater man and the other revolver man were showered with an obscene amount of blood and gore as the giant rock crunched their companion to a slushy mess. Meaty pulps spattered their faces and both turned, heaving and screaming. The remaining revolver man slipped on what might have been a length of intestine and fell to the ground, wincing as he made impact.
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!” the repeater man screamed, his eyes wide and darting around, a free hand absently swiping chunks of flesh and only God knew what else from his dripping face.
Denarius watched in stupefied awe as James then flicked both wrists and both the repeater man’s rifle and the other man’s revolver were torn from their hands by an invisible force and came clapping into James’s outstretched hands. He was on his feet then, and Denarius was a half second behind him, moving more out of confused terror than cognitive thought. He ripped the weapon from a time yet to come from his waist band and leveled it on the remaining men as James pointed their own weapons at them.
“Now,” James said, looking back and forth between the gore-soaked men, who were now trembling with shock and staring at the barrels of the guns that were trained on them. “You mentioned a Proprietor before. I think I’d like to meet this man.”
The two men looked to each other and then back at James and Denarius. The man formally known as repeater to Denarius and James spoke in a wavering voice, spitting errant droplets of blood and tissue between his words.
“He ain’t no man, mister.”
Denarius’s eyes narrowed as he glanced back at James, whom he was astonished to find was smiling.
“Well, then,” James said a
nd uttered a soft laugh, “all the more reason to make his acquaintance.”
13
Dreary had moved his men further down the ridge after the three men had come out of the woods on Dee and the black man. They were in the trees now, not ten feet from a street on the edge of Dust, quietly watching and appraising the situation. He’d half expected a few gunshots to echo off the rocky ridge and out over the lake beyond town, but none had come. Aside from what sounded like a falling rock off in the distance, there had been nothing.
“What’s the plan, Gear?” Quentin asked in a whisper, his eyes peeled wide and looking up and down the street. They saw no one.
“The plan is to get to that church across town, just in front of the lake,” Dreary said, indicating the direction with a nod of his head. “That’ll be where the marker is. If I’ve any luck on my side yet, I’ll find a suitable sacrifice between here and there.”
Quentin’s eyes narrowed a bit as he glanced to Dreary and then back to the street.
“What’s this about sacrifice?” he asked.
Dreary grinned, but shook his head.
“Never you mind, dear Quentin,” Dreary said. “You’re compensated well for your . . . companionship, are you not?”
Dreary turned and looked the man in the eye then. Quentin had been riding with him for years now, plundering as he saw fit when Dreary would lead them from what had seemed one wild goose chase after another. But that hadn’t mattered to Quentin. If the trail led to money or gold, he’d been welcome to it. If it led to guns and horses, he’d absconded with what he wanted. If it led to fresh, weeping widows, he had taken his fill.
They all had. Well, all but Bonham, that was. Bonham never took more than what he absolutely needed. Well, aside from lives, that was. He was Dreary’s own personal angel of death. While Quentin and Avery had raped and plundered, Bonham seemed satisfied with no more than the opportunity to open veins and rend flesh. It seemed these were the only times Quentin ever saw the man’s eyes come to life. When the big man wasn’t shedding blood, they were as blank and cold as a pair of rocks beneath the surface of a steady stream. But when he was . . .
