The Black Blade: A Huckster Novel

by Jeff Chapman

  I stepped backward again, bending into a crouch, all my muscles tensed like a watch wound too tight. Sweat dampened my palms. My breaths came in short gasps. I considered how best to take the next charge, how to grapple with the beast while keeping my neck clear of its jaws, but all my strategies came to naught. My heels caught on a log or a rock, and I tumbled over, squashing my backside on the hard ground. Out of the corner of my eye, as my arms flailed for balance, I caught a flash of movement. Isobel swung her staff down, her teeth gritted in fury. She was aiming for the back of the coyote’s head and would have knocked the beast cold or dead, but her efforts were as frustrated as mine. The coyote spun and leapt, a whirling tornado of fur and fangs meeting Isobel’s attack head on. The coyote twisted out of the stick’s path and then caught it in its jaws. When the beast landed, it gave the stick a vicious jerk, wrenching Isobel face-first into the ground. With a mighty crunch, the coyote bit the staff in two, easy as snapping a chicken bone.

  An animal wriggled beneath my ankles. My first thought was a snake. When I lifted my leg, the opossum wriggled out from under my boots. I should have expected them to work together. Isobel heaved with the wind knocked out of her. The opossum took advantage to clamber onto Isobel’s back and fasten its mouth round her neck, and an opossum boasts more teeth than a porcupine has quills.

  The coyote leapt onto me and pinned my shoulders with its forepaws. A bead of saliva hung by a glistening thread from its front teeth, and a growl rumbled in its throat. The coyote’s black nose quivered, tasting my scent to figure if I was fit to eat, I reckoned. The beast didn’t appear to be in any kind of hurry to rip my throat apart, which puzzled me. I tucked my chin to my chest, guarding my Adam’s apple. If I could get to my knife on my belt before the coyote got my throat, Isobel and I might stand a slim but fighting chance.

  I inched my right hand toward my belt, keeping my upper arm stiff so as not to give warning. The coyote bared its fangs.

  You are not the Dark One. The husky voice rang in my head like a bell. My eyes widened with surprise, and in answer the coyote nodded. A thought-talking coyote? As Isobel would say, this venture was growing mighty, mighty peculiar.

  “What?” I said, or maybe I was supposed to think it.

  Don’t smell like the Dark One, but I tasted his blood once and I tasted him on your key. How did you come by it?

  “Marzby, I believe. I don’t rightly know.” Was Marzby the Dark One? No one would call him the man of light.

  “Jimmy,” hissed Isobel. “Who in the blazes is you talkin’ to?”

  “The coyote.”

  “Are you plumb out of your mind?”

  More like the coyote was in my mind. “Hold on a minute. I think I can reason with it.”

  “Use your knife,” she said.

  The coyote turned his snout in Isobel’s direction and bared its teeth.

  “Keep quiet,” I said to Isobel. “You’re makin’ it mad and it’s my throat will suffer.” The coyote’s mood eye, which had faded to purple, was back to crimson. Fear begets violence and bravery begets peace, my grandma told me. Running was no longer an option so I gave bravery a try. I stared in the coyote’s eyes, and with as steady a voice as I could muster, I said “Who is this Dark One?”

  The one who came seeking to steal. The one who twists power.

  Twisting power brought to mind Marzby’s manipulation of the Pig-man. “This Dark One calls hisself Marzby, and he ain’t no friend of mine.” In a few words I summarized our dealings with Marzby. I now had a very strong suspicion why Marzby didn’t come get the knife himself.

  The coyote wagged his head. The Dark One shall not have the blade. Not have the blade for his evil will.

  “I kinda reckoned that. He seems to be all about evil. But I gotta help my friends and I can’t see no way round it.”

  The coyote studied me and lowered its head to sniff. Its mood eye faded to purple. I wasn’t terrified of the beast anymore. I reckoned if it wanted to kill me, it would’ve done so already. Its wet nose touched mine and then its slobbery pink tongue darted from its mouth and licked all the way across my face. The coyote’s breath reeked of two-day-old meat left out in the sun. I twisted my head from side to side, but with my back pinned to the ground, escape from the beast’s foul tongue eluded me.

  The Wise One will know what to do.

  “The Wise One?”

  The coyote stepped off of me and moved toward the hill. Isobel remained in the opossum’s grip, gritting her teeth and staring daggers at the beasts. The coyote placed one giant paw on the half of the stick Isobel held and growled something fierce.

  “They’re alright,” I said to Isobel. “They’re on our side. We can’t be too choosy with our allies.” Well, strictly speaking, they were enemies of Marzby, nothing more. It appeared Orville and me were caught in betwixt some war between Marzby and these fellers.

  Isobel grimaced as she let go of her stick. Surrender wasn’t in her nature. I wondered why the opossum or the coyote didn’t mind-talk to her. The opossum crawled off of Isobel to join the coyote at the rock. I pulled Isobel to her feet. She twisted her head from side to side and rubbed the back of her neck.

  “That no-good varmint left teeth marks.” She looked at her hand. “At least I’m not bleedin’.”

  “I don’t think we’re out of the woods yet. They say we gotta talk to somebody else. Somebody that lives in there.” I nodded toward the hill.

  “Can’t be no one living in there. I don’t trust these two.” She jutted her head toward the coyote and the opossum.

  I shrugged. Peculiar was no longer an adequate description.

  “If you tell my brothers that I got bested by an opossum, I swear I’ll fill your boots with honey and stingin’ ants.”

  “I ain’t tellin’ nobody nothin’. Come to think of it, this might be a good time for you to skedaddle on home.”

  “And leave you alone with the likes of them? I ain’t goin’ nowhere. You need me.”

  Arguing with a mule might have been more productive. The coyote and the opossum were watching us bicker. Maybe it was the glint in their eyes or the tilt of their heads, but I swear they were laughing.

  “Oh, alright. But I promised your mama that I’d send you home, and if anything happens to you...” I let my speech trail off. She’d turned her back on me, stepping toward the rock.

  “Come on, Jimmy. If you want to go with ’em. They’re waitin’.”

  Isobel and I stood behind the animals, who rose on their hind legs and pressed their forepaws against the rock. With a groan from the coyote and a squeak from the opossum, the pair pushed, and at the moment when I thought I should lend my shoulder to their hopeless endeavor, the stone moved. It shrieked and groaned as stone ground against stone, revealing a dark tunnel as far as I could see, which wasn’t all that far.

  A breeze festooned with a smoky odor gushed over our heads from inside the tunnel.

  Isobel wrinkled her nose. “Smells like burnt onions, it does.”

  “Can’t say, but it sure ain’t pleasant. We’ll be needin’ a torch or two.”

  When the stone would slide no more, the coyote sat on its haunches outside the opening with its tail curled round its paws, stony still, like a sentry outside a guardhouse. The opossum waited inside, watching us, but strangely, the shadows didn’t swallow the critter. They lingered at a distance, as if they feared to touch the little varmint.

  Come along. The Wise One waits. The thoughts had a high-pitched, squeaky tone, reminding me of a penny whistle. The opossum’s voice? Isobel mouth hung wide open, like she’d seen a cadaver climbing out of its box. I’d grown accustomed to such things.

  “So you heard it too?” I said.

  “This is somethin’ beyond peculiar.”

  “We need ourselves a new word.”

  “Are we goin’ in there?”

  “I reckon we oughta. The path to the blade goes through this Wise One.”

  “We don’t know the first thing abo
ut this so-called Wise One. And I ain’t never followed an opossum into a hole.”

  “They would’ve killed us already if they’d wanted. No one would think ill of you for headin’ home.” I stepped toward the cave, hoping without much conviction that Isobel would come to her senses and skedaddle. The coyote growled. Behind me, I saw Isobel reaching for her stick.

  “Mister opossum,” I said. “Looks mighty dark in there to my eyes. Don’t we need some torches?”

  I am your light and your guide. The opossum moved farther into the cave, but instead of the gloom swallowing it, the opossum seemed to get brighter, glowing like a full moon.

  Isobel’s shoulder brushed the back of my arm. “He’s our light and guide in one,” I said.

  “I heard.”

  We plunged into a dark hole in a hill, following a luminous opossum.

  Chapter Thirteen

  As we ventured into the cave, the smell worsened, but it wasn’t the stench of bat guano or damp rot as one might expect. It called to mind burnt onions and mushrooms. The inside of the tunnel ran straight as a rifle barrel, and the walls weren’t of stone neither. They appeared plastered with a smooth material, like adobe, and arched overhead. The gritty, earthen floor stretched ahead, flattened as a much-travelled footpath. Without enough light to see the walls proper, I couldn’t swear to it, but I suspected the tunnel had been built from the inside out.

  “Jimmy!” Isobel gripped my forearm, her eyes wide and mouth hanging slack. With her free hand, she pointed overhead.

  Empty sockets and grinning teeth greeted me. Embedded in the adobe at the top of the arch, bone glowed like snow in moonlight.

  “Skull Hill,” I said. I saw the skulls ahead, a neat chain of death fixed in the top of the arch. I took Isobel’s hand, slick with sweat. “They can’t hurt us. I reckon we should have expected as much.”

  We moved on, conscious of the hill watching us. If we walked close together in the center, we could walk upright through the passage with no worries of conking our heads. We splashed through puddles where water dripped. A few tree roots stuck out of the walls. They reminded me of skeleton arms aiming to grab us. My boot kicked a skull, sending the old head rolling ahead of us. A hole gaped in the arch overhead where the skull had come loose. We moved on, stepping over the fallen skull. The tunnel’s straightness eased my anxiety a bit. If our escape came to running, I figured we could sprint for the light at the opposite end.

  The opossum shed a silvery glow and illuminated our path like a walking moon. As a night animal, it made sense the opossum mimicked moonlight. I hoped he didn’t slip into his new-moon phase when we came to the darkest reaches of this tunnel.

  Ten yards ahead, an orange glow warmed the pale light of the opossum moon.

  “That where we’re goin’?” said Isobel. Her voice had yet to regain its defiance, and I missed the cocky confidence she inspired.

  “I reckon so. I dunno what we’re gonna see, but above all else, we’ve got to stick together. You hear me?”

  “I ain’t some stupid little girl,” she spat.

  If she was a bear trap, I’d stuck my foot plum in the middle of it.

  The opossum stopped on the opposite edge of the circle of light that grew from a small fire inside a cavern. A blackened pottery bowl about the size of a man’s head hung from three poles bound together to form a tripod. Steam rose from the bowl. Isobel wrinkled her nose at the source of the smell. A pile of buckskin clothes and a worn blanket lay in a heap against the wall. A curious-looking mask perched atop the clothes. Feathers adorned the top and then rows of shells. Fur covered the bottom. I’d never seen the likes of it.

  “Jimmy,” hissed Isobel. She tugged her hand out of mine and pointed to the far wall of the cavern where a black object lay on a white stone. The blade, the point of this crazy venture, the key to Orville’s freedom. Isobel raised her eyebrows. I shook my head. We might snatch it and outpace the opossum down the dark tunnel, but what about the coyote? Thievery was not among my sins, and I didn’t wish to add it.

  The Wise One. The opossum’s squeaky thought voice answered my unspoken question.

  We stepped into the cavern, but there was no one to be seen. A few clay pots nestled against the wall. The pots on either side of the knife held colored stones of red, green, blue, and rose.

  Isobel crept past me toward the mask and buckskin.

  “Where?” My frustration charged forth like a bronco breaking out of a corral.

  There. The opossum gazed at the mask and clothes.

  Isobel turned the mask to study it inside and outside. “Whoever used to be here done dried up to a pile of dust.”

  “The opossum thinks whoever is still there.”

  My grandma said, A man who picks up a bottle is a man bound to drink regardless of his intention. The rule applied to masks as well. Isobel brought it to her face and looked at me through the eyeholes.

  “Boo.” She laughed.

  I wanted to join her mirth, but with eyes and a mouth behind it, the mask took on a fierce expression, giving life to a diabolical, hideous combination. Eagle feathers, cowry shells, and badger fur didn’t belong together in any sort of living thing. I shuddered and then stepped around the fire to the blade.

  “Who tends the fire and fills that pot?” I said.

  “The Wise One,” answered Isobel. “You think this is his mask?”

  “I reckon so.” The opossum watched us but offered nary a word of guidance.

  Wasn’t much to the blade, a piece of glassy basalt hacked into the shape of a dagger with leather wrapping the handle. Something more powerful than a couple clever animals was guarding it. What did that sneaky little opossum know?

  “I think you’re right. We oughta take the blade and skedaddle. This place spooks me.” I wrapped three fingers around the cold, leather-bound hilt and considered what sort of deal I might make with the animals to borrow it for a few days.

  Isobel screamed. I snatched the knife as I spun to see Isobel reeling. She shook her head and clawed at the mask, digging her fingers at the mouth and eye holes. The evil thing molded around her face, stretching over the top of her head and to her ears. Her mouth and eyes no longer gave it life. They were part of it. The shells clicked together when she blinked and the fur contorted with every movement of her mouth.

  I rushed to her past the pile of buckskin. Holding her with one arm round her waist, I ran my fingers along the edge of the mask, searching for a raised edge to get my fingers beneath it. Isobel bucked and wriggled like a flapping fish out of water. She stomped on my boots and fought me as much as the mask.

  “I’m trying to help you!” I yelled.

  The edge of the mask was as smooth and flat as Isobel’s skin, no ridge at all for my fingers to find purchase. I should’ve never brought her here. What would I tell her mama?

  Her fists struck my back and chest, lashing out at whatever was near, I guessed. Her eyes had rolled back, whites in a sea of white shells. If not for her fierce struggles, I would have thought her dead. Her screams hit my ear at point-blank range, which was why I didn’t hear what was coming up behind me.

  A thickly muscled arm wrapped my neck and lifted me until only the toes of my boots scratched the ground, like a man hanged with too long a rope. Another hand crushed my wrist in a vice grip until I dropped the knife.

  Whoever had me in a stranglehold dragged me across the cavern away from Isobel. The mask hid the once proud girl’s face behind its hideous visage. She slumped against the wall and slid down until she rested on the floor. Isobel may have been out of fight, but I had plenty left. With my free hand, I clawed at the arm. I twisted my head sideways to get an angle where I could bite or squirm down out of its grasp. I kicked backward. Twice the heel of my boot connected with a shin and my foe grunted.

  As I struggled to pull the arm away, my fingers dug into thick hair on the back of my attacker’s arm, much too thick for any man or woman. My gaze shifted so I saw more of the arm. Fur, the gray fu
r of an opossum, a shapeshifter, and the coyote at the mouth of the tunnel was likely one too. Only the shifter’s stranglehold held back the scream welling from deep within me. As I’d suspected, these two held far more cards than cleverness and mind talking. Like my grandma said, Being right about the worst ain’t much of a comfort, but being wrong is far worse.

  Opossum-shifter hauled me to the far side of the cavern and wrapped a leg round my thrashing lower limbs, pinning them against the wall. When I looked back at Isobel, that buckskin shirt and leggings were standing in front of her. They were moving about like they had a body inside, but there weren’t no body. My breathing stopped, and my eyes strained to stay in their sockets. Mighty strange sights have danced before me since I commenced traveling with Orville, but this done beat everything. All the fight drained out of me, like a pitcher with a hole in the bottom.

  The buckskin ghost fell onto Isobel. My vision got all cloudy and wavy, like I was looking through the heat rising from a hardpan desert. Isobel, or what used to be Isobel, was wearing the buckskin.

  The buckskin figure stood on Isobel’s feet. Her hands stuck out of the sleeves. The mask rested on its shoulders. Its eyes—one yellow and one red—jerked from side to side. A long, red tongue snaked out of its mouth to lick the fur circling its lips, like a dog licking blood and greasy fat from its jowls. My knees weakened, and without Opossum-shifter’s arm holding me up, I would’ve been a heap of quivering flesh on the dirt floor.

  “The Wise One,” hissed a voice in my ear. Gone was the squeaky opossum, this was a husky, deep voice that shuddered with age as it resonated with strength.