by David Boop
“You are sweet,” Marcus whispered in Tommy’s ear, imitating Veronika’s accent.
Tommy punched him in the arm and followed Veronika.
“Grab your bags, boys!” Baron Avram’s bellow startled them both. He strutted back from the front of the train with a big grin on his face and his men in tow. “We stay and feast!”
* * *
At least twenty men more than the baron’s contingent chose to stay and make camp, which surprised Tommy. It would be nearly five days before the train would return to pick them up, and most, like Tommy and Marcus, had little more than the clothes on their backs. Fortunately, Baron Avram had enough supplies to go around.
His men unloaded horses, supplies, rifles, and ammunition with the thought the baron would hunt a buffalo from horseback and take the trophy back to be mounted. Riggs unloaded a stack of wooden crates to be broken down into firewood, while others cleared away grass to make camp and prevent a prairie fire.
While Avram and a couple of men began quartering a large cow, his soldiers set up their tents in neat rows, and Veronika directed Tommy and Marcus in setting up a large, round tent she called a yurta.
“Buffalo cider?” Baron Avram’s voice carried across the makeshift camp. “Ha! Is joke!”
“What is cider?” Veronika asked as she fastened ties to a pole Marcus and Tommy held overhead.
“Fermented apple juice,” Tommy answered.
“Apples?” Veronika wrinkled her nose. “Buffalo apples? Like horse apples?”
Tommy realized she thought buffalo cider was liquid from buffalo droppings and laughed. “No. Almost as bad, but no. It’s water in a buffalo’s stomach.”
“It can save your life out here where there’s no other water,” Marcus added.
“If you can stomach it.” Tommy’s face mirrored the disgust on Veronika’s as she nearly came nose to nose with him while tying the next cord.
She stopped, arms overhead with fingers lightly touching his hand as he held the pole up, and met his gaze.
Tommy’s gut tightened and his breath caught. Looking into her brown eyes, inches from his own, he felt a need to protect her, care for her, unlike anything he had ever experienced before. He wanted to sweep her up into his arms and—
A sputtering, choking sound, followed by raucous laughter, filled the camp.
“I think the baron must have tried the cider,” Marcus said.
Veronika smiled, her face wavering close to Tommy’s, then she pulled away and began working the next tie. “That would be Papa.”
* * *
The grassland took on a fuzzy amber halo as the sun neared the horizon. The rich smell of meat cooked with sage filled the air. Baron Avram supplied vodka. Men, stuffed with meat and heady with liquor, laughed and broke into groups around smaller campfires. Some took up singing while others started a shooting contest, aiming for a distant mound of prairie dogs.
Tommy was careful not to drink enough vodka to cloud his head. He tried to warn Marcus to do the same, but Riggs egged Marcus on until he had to run off and make friends with a sagebrush, which the baron’s men found exceptionally funny.
Surveying the camp, Tommy made sure he knew who Veronika was talking to. Satisfied she was all right, he walked behind the yurta to relieve himself.
“You are good boy.” Avram startled Tommy as he approached from the other side of the round structure. “I have been watching. You are good boy. You keeping good eye on my daughter. I thank you.” The baron stood next to him and began to make water.
Tommy nodded awkwardly and looked out at the plains until he finished. Buttoning up, he turned back to camp.
“Wait,” Avram said.
Hesitating, Tommy looked back to the horizon and waited.
“I see way my daughter looks at you.” The baron buttoned up and faced Tommy. “Is good, but is bad at same time. I always want to see her happy, but she is…”—he waved his hand as he stumbled over the word—“betrothed.”
Avram took in a deep breath through his nose and sighed. “I want you take this.” He held out a small leather coin purse.
Tommy reached out and took it. It was deceptively heavy.
“Hide it. Show no one. Is gold. Is payment. You watch my daughter, protect her like I see you want to, but protect her from you, too, eh?” Avram winked. “You are good boy. Many men here. Many maybe not so good as you.” He patted Tommy on the shoulder and walked back around the yurta to the camp.
* * *
The smell of burnt coffee roused Tommy. Next to him, curled up like a pill bug, Marcus snored lightly.
Tommy punched him in the arm.
“What?” Marcus sat up, looking around wild-eyed.
“Thought you was going to stay awake.”
Rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, Marcus winced. “Yeah. Me too.”
Commotion at the edge of the camp caught their attention, and they both rose to see. Men were gathering and pointing south, their voices growing louder with excitement. Stepping around the yurta, Tommy and Marcus peered out into the grasslands gilded by the morning light.
Distant shapes moved on the horizon.
“Indians.” The word floated over from the crowd of gawkers just as Tommy realized he was looking at five men on horseback.
The watching men chattered nervously.
“That’s the Smokey Hill Trail, ain’t it?” one of them asked.
“I heard they attacked a stage out there. Killed all the menfolk in the middle of the night,” a thin man with bloodshot eyes said. Tommy thought he looked to still be drunk.
“Reckon they on the warpath again?” someone else asked.
“I say we go give ’em a what-for!” the thin man hollered, stepping up to the front of the group, rifle in hand.
A couple began fidgeting with their rifles. The Russian soldiers, curious about the Indians, joined the group.
“Settle down, Martin!” Riggs shooed the drunken man back with his hat. “They ain’t no threat. I recognize the tribe. Them’s Shawnee. They just followin’ the buffaler.”
“Oughtta goddamned get back on their reservation!” Martin said, waving a fist at the distant silhouettes.
There were grunts of agreement, but as the dark shapes disappeared behind the slope of the prairie, the grumbling men broke up. After the night’s revelries, no one but Martin seemed to feel much like a fight anyway.
“What is all the excitement?” Veronika came out of the yurta wearing the same clothes as the day before, but somehow looking as though she had just bathed and had handmaidens put up her hair.
“Indians,” Marcus answered while Tommy gawked at her.
“The native peoples?” She stepped forward to see, but there was no one left in sight.
Marcus shrugged.
Veronika turned and met Tommy’s gaze. He realized he was staring and swallowed hard. Feeling the heat on his cheeks, the gold Baron Avram had given him suddenly weighed heavily in his pocket.
“Good morning.” Veronika smiled warmly at him.
“Ma’am.” Tommy awkwardly half-bowed as he tried to tip his hat.
The distant popping of gunfire reached their ears and the whole encampment turned to look in the direction the Indians had been spotted.
“They are hunting, no?” Baron Avram, coming out of the yurta, called out to Riggs. “We go before they chase buffalo away, yes?”
Tommy had never seen anything quite as tangled and wild as the baron’s raised questioning eyebrows.
* * *
A breeze with the scent of greenery and fresh water from the nearby Smoky Hill River momentarily pushed the oppressive stench of death away, and Tommy took advantage of it, breathing deeply before the smell came back. The bloody scene they had ridden up on was unlike anything Tommy had ever heard of. Bodies, and parts of bodies, Indian and horse alike, were strewn everywhere. Shredded and ripped to pieces. The carnage was obviously not the work of men.
Looking down from the saddles of their horses, not a si
ngle one of the fifteen riders said a word. Only circling flies and nervous horses disturbed the silence.
Veronika coughed into a white-gloved hand, choking on the thick reek that seemed to pool around them.
“I should take you back to camp,” Tommy said, but she waved him off. He looked to Avram for guidance, but the baron was already dismounting and looking at the ground.
“Ya’kwahe…” a pained, breathy voice called out, startling everyone.
“Here!” Riggs hopped down from his saddle and rushed to an Indian lying crushed under the corpse of a horse with its head torn off.
“Ya’kwahe.” The Indian grabbed Riggs’s wrist, then mumbled words Tommy couldn’t hear.
“Throw me a canteen,” Riggs said looking up to the men on horseback around him. Marcus was the first to respond.
Tommy dismounted as Riggs dribbled water into the dying man’s mouth. “Let’s get the horse off him,” Tommy said, trying to decide how to reach around the stump of a neck.
“Don’t bother.” Riggs reached out his fingers and closed the dead Indian’s eyes.
“Many men ask for water when dying,” Avram said looking down at the man. “Apparently is thirsty work.”
“He weren’t askin’ for water.” Martin, who had come along to “see what the Injuns was up to,” turned his horse sideways so he could watch the nearby tree line. “He was warnin’ us about somethin’. You speak his language, Riggs. What’s that thing he was talkin’ about?”
Riggs stood and brushed off his knees. “An old legend. A giant stiff-legged bear. A fiercely territorial man-eater.”
“Bears ain’t territorial…” Tommy frowned at Riggs.
“Grizzly done this?” Martin interrupted, laughing nervously and spinning his horse to see behind himself again. “Goddamn big griz.…”
One of the Russian soldiers said something and pointed to the ground. Baron Avram hurried over and whistled low.
“This not bear. I know bear, and this not bear. More like…elephant. With claws.”
Tommy hurried over to see a round track in the dirt, big enough to put both hands and feet inside.
“Elephant?” Martin cursed. “I didn’t head out here with no expectation of seein’ the elephant! I’m heading back!” He turned back toward camp and flicked the reins of his horse.
“There are elephants in America?” Veronika asked.
“No,” Tommy stepped away from the giant track. “That’s just an expression. It means getting into trouble.”
A horse scream made them all turn.
At the tree line, Martin was on the ground, rolling away from a furred monster the size of a house.
Bear-like, the creature reared up on hind legs big as tree trunks, but leaned back on a tail just as thick. It scooped the horse up into the air with scythe-like claws then fumbled the equine, like a toddling child dropping a doll.
The horse’s scream cut short as six-inch claws shredded it from throat to belly, spilling viscera everywhere.
Tommy’s riderless horse bolted, followed by the baron’s. Everyone started shouting at once. Avram barked orders at his soldiers in Russian, and Riggs remounted, following after the other men spurring their horses to flee.
“Get the baron out of here!” Tommy shouted at Marcus while running to Veronika’s horse.
The giant beast dropped to all fours and, despite a strange, stilted gait, moved with amazing speed to capture the fleeing Martin. With a swipe of a paw bigger than Martin’s chest, the creature sent the man flying toward Tommy, covering twenty yards in the air before landing and rolling floppily.
Tommy climbed up behind Veronika as the Russian soldiers fired at the charging behemoth. “Go!” he shouted. The other men were already far ahead, racing back to camp.
“Not without Papa!” Veronika fought him for control of the horse, turning back toward the beast.
The volley of fire didn’t slow the creature as it charged the group of mounted men that, all together, barely matched its size.
Marcus reined his horse next to Avram and offered a hand. The baron took it just as the soldiers’ horses, wild with fear, scattered, tossing men to the ground as the monster arrived.
“Go now!” Avram yelled, dropping back to the ground. He ripped off his shirt and began pulling off his pants. “Go!” He slapped the horse, giving it all the excuse it needed to run away despite Marcus’s best efforts.
“Papa, no!” Veronika cried out as she tried to force the horse to her father.
Tommy, forgetting he was trying to take control of Veronika’s horse, gaped as Baron Avram pulled a long furry belt from his satchel and wrapped it around his naked waist.
In a heartbeat, the largest brown bear Tommy had ever seen stood in his stead. With a mighty roar, the bear dropped to all fours and charged the giant beast, attacking from the side, distracting it from the men on the ground.
Veronika shoved backward at Tommy, forcing him to give her room, and then she was off the horse and running toward the battle.
“Veronika!” Tommy tried to go after her, but the horse had had enough and fought to follow all the other fleeing animals. In desperation, Tommy jumped off and, stumbling over part of one of the dead Indians, chased after her on foot.
Peeling her clothes off as her father had, Veronika tripped pulling her pants around her ankles and fell just long enough for Tommy to catch up.
Grabbing her naked arm, he pulled her to her feet. “What the hell are you—?”
“Run away!” Veronika yelled at him as she wrapped a fur belt similar to her father’s around her naked body. “Run now!”
Under his hand, her muscles bulged and fur grew. In an instant, Tommy was pushed backward by her bulk and found himself staring up into the eyes of another bear. It roared in his face, teeth grazing his nose, and then it was gone to join the fray.
Stunned, Tommy watched the second, smaller, lighter-colored bear run past two Russian soldiers trying to reload their guns while dodging giant swipes of the monster’s claws. The other three soldiers were nowhere to be seen. The two bears bit and slashed at the massive beast, pulling back out of reach and then attacking again, worrying at it like hounds.
Then one giant paw caught the smaller bear and sent it rolling through the grass.
“No!” Tommy drew his gun and was running to get to the bear’s side before he could think what he was doing. The six shots he fired from his pistol went quick as he tried to distract the monster, but they had no effect. It turned its attention back to the larger bear. Tommy’s heart leaped as he saw the smaller bear get back up. He grimaced when it ran back to the fight instead of fleeing.
Knowing it would take too long to reload and prime his black-powder pistol, he dropped it and scooped up one of the soldier’s rifles. Searching for cartridges, he found two and looked up again just in time to see the tip of an enormous claw gut the last soldier.
Tommy loaded the rifle, fired blindly at the beast, reloaded and fired again. Neither shot seemed to do any damage, but the two bears had managed to carve long, bloody rents in the monster’s fur. Frantically searching for more unspent cartridges, he began turning over mutilated soldiers and checking pockets.
Something giant and heavy landed next to him. It was the larger brown bear, apparently thrown. It began changing back to the unmistakable pink of a human form.
And the behemoth, now only dealing with one adversary, had its full attention on the smaller bear.
The baron was unconscious, or dead. The furred belt, unbound, lay under him. A squeal of pain from the smaller bear made up Tommy’s mind.
Pulling off his shirt, Tommy rolled the baron off the belt and tied it around himself. Instantly, excruciating pain wracked his body. His legs wouldn’t work and he fell to the ground in a terrible agony. Then a tearing, a ripping, and he was free. Powerful. Strong.
He roared with a pure pleasure of strength. Smells overwhelmed him. Blood. Horse. Man. Fear. And Other.
The beast.
&
nbsp; Veronika.
He turned to look for her, tripping over the shredded pants clinging to his furred legs. He bit them off easily and charged the monster as it turned in circles to swipe at the light brown bear.
Tommy felt his claws dig into the dirt, giving him traction as he ran. The smell of blood threatened to overwhelm his senses. This combined with his fear for Veronika’s safety, sending him into a rage unlike any he had ever known. He was on the beast’s back, using his claws to climb the massive monster.
It swatted at him, but Tommy grabbed a mouthful of fur with his powerful jaws and held on like a dog. He caught a good grip and pulled himself higher, nearly reaching the giant neck, and bit again, deeper this time. Blood flowed into his mouth, hot and salty, and with a shake of his powerful head, Tommy tore a giant chunk out.
The monster roared and twisted, trying to dislodge him, but Veronika kept it off balance, attacked its legs, biting at hamstrings. It stumbled, falling to the ground with an earthshaking thump and a thunderous bellow of pain.
Tommy let go and raced away on all fours to avoid being crushed as the beast rolled over to right itself.
With an anguished roar, the creature turned its back to them and ran toward the tree line.
Veronika, racing back to the still form of her father, seemed content to let it go. Knowing he couldn’t finish the beast himself, Tommy exhaustedly dropped into a sitting position on his wide haunches and watched it go.
* * *
“You are good boy. Very good boy. I like very much.” Baron Avram slapped Tommy on the back.
Tommy winced at the sturdy blow that would have hurt even had he not been covered in contusions. He went back to wrapping a clean bandage around the baron’s leg. Veronika had helped Tommy scrounge supplies from the saddle bags scattered around, and was currently sewing together a pair of replacement pants for him.
“That was not a bear,” she said without looking up.
“You think I do not know this?” the baron chuckled.
“Do you remember, in Madrid, the giant skeleton at the Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales? That was a giant sloth.” Veronika used her teeth to break a thread.
The baron nodded. “I think you are correct.”
