Claymore arched his back and wailed.
The pendant was so cold it was now burning Keech’s flesh.
“Let’s go,” Cutter said.
Claymore spoke then—but with a meaner, lower voice. When Keech heard it, he stiffened down to his boots. For the voice was all too familiar.
“Hello, pilgrim.”
Tommy Claymore leaned back against the tree. The bandit’s wrinkled mouth stretched into a vicious grin. Keech was horrified to see the left eye on the creature had glazed over a dull yellow.
“Bad Whiskey?” said Keech.
“You’ve been talkin’ to my thrall,” the bandit said, in Bad Whiskey’s voice.
“What do you mean ‘Bad Whiskey’?” Cutter hissed. “Are you telling me this is El Ojo?”
Bad Whiskey turned Claymore’s right eye toward Cutter. “Herrera! Good to see ya again! How’s life as a free man?”
Cutter’s mouth dropped into a bewildered O. He raised his knife, but for once he looked confused regarding what to do with it.
“You should be more careful about yer trailmates,” Bad Whiskey said to Keech. “Herrera will sink that knife in yer back soon as spit in yer face.”
Keech was still so bewildered that Bad Whiskey was using the bandit’s body to see and talk that few of the outlaw’s words even registered. But fury soon overpowered his shock and confusion. “This is how your thrall knew about my family’s murder!”
Bad Whiskey grinned. “We share a bond, my thralls and me. They slaughter the pig, I cook the bacon. This one here has proved useful, so ever’ now and then, I sneak a few peeks to see what he knows. Except he’s been tellin’ you pilgrims too much. Ol’ Tommy’s use, I’m afraid, has run out.”
Keech felt his face turn flame red. “It’s a fine trick, Bad Whiskey. But I heard what my pa said. You have no power of your own. You borrowed power from the Reverend Rose.”
Bad Whiskey shook Claymore’s head. “Arrogant boy. I was like you once. An orphan. Cast off, sunk in the mud. Believin’ I knew it all. Then the world showed me true wisdom. Showed me the magics that hide in the dark, the hollow places where men refuse to go, but where the best treasures lay hid, waitin’ for the right hand to seize ’em.”
Keech bared his teeth. “I’m gonna find you, Bad. I swear upon my family’s honor I’ll make you pay.”
Whiskey offered another black grin. “Fool toddler, I’ll have the Stone in hand before yer posse can find the first horse track.”
Keech recoiled at the monster’s words. “You know about the posse?”
“Like I told Raines, little pilgrim, I got me a thousand eyes.”
Through the forest canopy Keech spotted at least four of the dreadful crows under the dark thundercloud, circling, watching. They take what they see to dangerous places, he thought.
Cutter’s tongue at last thawed. “You killed my friend Bishop!”
Bad Whiskey paused to think. “Don’t recollect the name. Then again, I kill lots of folks.”
“You’ll recollect it when I find you,” Cutter said. “I know where you’re headed next.”
Bad Whiskey chortled. “You don’t know nothin’.” The thrall rose to his lone foot, his wooden leg stabbing the earth. Both boys took a fighting stance, but the outlaw didn’t attack. Instead he crooned, “You boys think this world is good. You think folks are worth protectin’. But even the good turn bad in the end.”
“What are you talking about?” Keech asked.
“Had me a little peek through Tommy’s eye, and I saw who yer ridin’ with. The children of a backstabbin’ double-crosser.”
Keech guessed he was talking about Nat and Duck. But what did he mean by double-crosser? “You don’t make any sense,” Keech said.
“Oh? Ever wonder how I found yer Home for Lost Causes?”
Keech narrowed his eyes.
Bad Whiskey sneered. “Bennett Coal gave up your so-called pa, pilgrim. Poor Raines put his trust in the wrong Enforcer.”
Keech was dumbstruck. “You’re lying!”
“When the Gita-Skog came callin’, Bennett Coal—or Noah Embry, or whatever name he was usin’—told us right where to look.”
Keech staggered back at Whiskey’s words. To think the very man Pa Abner had tried to warn had betrayed his location to the Gita-Skog.
He turned to Cutter. “Is that true? Did Nat and Duck’s father squeal on my pa?”
“No clue, Blackwood.”
Keech seized the boy’s coat by one sleeve. “Tell me!”
Cutter struggled in his grip. “I don’t know! Even if he did, I’m sure they don’t know. Now turn me loose!”
Keech released Cutter’s coat and spun back to the outlaw. “I don’t believe a word you’re saying.”
Bad Whiskey chuckled again. “You may think me a rattlesnake, little pilgrim, but I don’t spit corral dust.”
Shaking with uncontainable anger, Keech leaned in closer. He wanted so badly for the creature before him to be Bad Whiskey, but the one-eyed outlaw was across the countryside, stealing closer toward the Char Stone.
“You’ll regret the day you met me, Whiskey Nelson. I swear you will.”
“Strong lip for a pup! I am the Gita-Skog, boy, the Big Snake that consumes all. I regret nothin’.”
“You’re not the Gita-Skog. You’re nothing but a low worm.”
The outlaw considered the insult, then gazed deep into Keech’s eyes. He muttered five final words: “Yer all going to die.”
There was a brief silence, then Claymore’s left eye returned, only to roll back again to its cloudy white, along with his right one. Death spilled into his gaze, and the creature toppled to the ground in a heap. Two small tendrils of dark smoke rolled out of the thrall’s nostrils, reminding Keech of the black dust that had billowed from Cooper’s mouth after Pa vanquished him on the Home’s porch.
The boys waited, eyes focused on the lifeless form. But the creature lay still.
“What happened?” Cutter said.
“I think Bad Whiskey killed Claymore. For good.”
Somewhere to the north, the whimper of a loon filled the deep ravines and bottoms of Swift Hollow.
Then a deep commanding voice invaded the glade.
“Keech Blackwood!”
The boys spun to see Sheriff Turner, marching toward them through the clearing. His revolver was drawn but not aimed, and Deputy Ballard’s gun jutted from his belt. Nat and Duck and John Wesley stood in the distance, watching at the forest’s edge.
As Turner crossed the clearing, Keech whispered urgently to Cutter. “If he blames us for killing Claymore, no need for both of us to go to jail. I’ll take responsibility.”
“I don’t like you, Lost Cause,” Cutter said. “But I don’t reckon it’d be right to let you take a fall.”
The sheriff approached with a jangle of spurs. Keech braced himself for judgment, but none came. Instead the man put away his revolver and set a hand on Keech’s shoulder. “Thank goodness you kids are all right,” he said. His face was gray, his gun hand slightly trembling. “We heard the commotion across the hills and started running. We got here just in time to see what happened to this wretch.” He stretched one tall leg over, nudged the corpse’s wooden peg with a boot. “Looks to be all the way dead now.”
“Sheriff, I’ll explain everything soon,” Keech said. “But first you have to listen. I know where Bad Whiskey’s headed. Before he died, Claymore mentioned a ‘sullied place’ where Whiskey’s riding, a place where ‘all men wither.’”
Even as he spoke the words, the old childhood rhyme fluttered into Keech’s mind:
Should you be there in deepest night … in moon as dim as candlelight …
“Sullied place?” Turner said.
“We have to ride on west,” Keech said. “And we have to ride fast. Bad Whiskey is headed for the Withers graveyard, Sheriff. He’s headed for Bone Ridge.”
CHAPTER 15
WHAT HAPPENED AT WHISTLER
The day was slipp
ing to a cold, early darkness. Rounding the deep gully on the trail had stolen some time, but the posse galloped through the forest to make it up. Keech noticed a strange warmth, a heat that was far from comforting. It was the heat of cinder and flame, drifting like a dragon’s gasp over the land. He knew the feel of fire in the air too well.
The group soon emerged onto a flat valley, separated by a narrow river. Alongside its bank stretched a wide gravel road, choked on each side by runs of high thistle. Turner gazed up and down the road. “This path looks familiar, but it’s been a long time since I’ve been in these parts.”
“This road is called the Old Meriwether,” Keech explained. “Up ahead is the Whistler cutoff. We’ll have to cross the river, but the waters should be low enough.”
The sheriff steered the posse up the Old Meriwether till the forest dipped to the river. The broad trench created by the dip churned with muddy water. This was the opening to the river that would lead them to Whistler.
“Everyone hang on,” Turner said.
The posse drove their horses into the river. John Wesley sucked in a loud breath as icy water filled his boots. “I don’t like water none,” he said, but continued on. One by one they trudged across the channel, the horses whickering at the harsh bath.
“The settlers here nicknamed this river the ‘Little Wild Boy,’” Keech said, as the group navigated the channel. “It loops around the countryside and feeds into the Platte River.”
“That’s dandy,” said John Wesley. “But the Little Wild Boy’s freezing my gizzard.”
Moments later the horses made the opposite bank. As they slogged up the shore, Keech saw the first signs of billowing smoke, just over the western tree line.
“We’re too late,” he said.
Crackling thunder spoke of rain as they galloped into the settlement. Though their quarry was nowhere in sight, Sheriff Turner pulled his revolver and held it close to his side. “Stay alert,” he told the group. He tossed a pressing glance at Nat. “You’re the only one who can offer backup if I get into a gunfight. How fast are you at the reload?” He pointed to the Hawken in Nat’s hand.
“Fast enough,” Nat said.
Buildings blazed on each side of Whistler’s main thoroughfare, and behind the buildings, rows of beleaguered cabins and tents smoldered and sputtered. Only a couple of structures remained untouched: a decrepit tack-and-saddle shop and a leaning white gazebo standing in the middle of Main Street.
Beneath the gazebo, a dozen of the residents huddled together under blankets, watching the fires incinerate their village. It was a desolate sight. One of the settlers noticed the posse and cried out in terror. He exclaimed something in another language—German, Keech reckoned—and the townsfolk uttered a collective shriek. They bolted out of the gazebo and scattered to the hills.
Cutter’s eyes widened. “Why are they running?”
“They think we’re part of Whiskey’s gang,” Nat said.
Duck gazed at the village in disbelief. Reflection from the fires turned his small face into a wavering mask of sorrow. “Poor folks never knew what hit them.”
“What was Whiskey even doing here?” John Wesley asked.
Keech knew it was now time to divulge the rest of Pa Abner’s information. If he kept the rest of what he knew silent, it could end up getting someone hurt. Or worse.
“He’s hunting an object called the Char Stone,” he told them. “He wants it more than anything.”
John Wesley frowned. “What in heck’s a Char Stone?”
Cutter wiped grime off his face with the back of his hand. “That dead man with the wood leg spoke of it. Back in the clearing. He called it ‘life.’”
“You’ve heard your pa speak from dreams about Rose,” Keech told Nat. “Did you ever hear him mention the Char Stone?”
Nat and Duck exchanged a quick look, then Nat said, “Our pa never spoke about his past. He didn’t speak much at all.”
Never spoke much except to betray Pa Abner, Keech thought sullenly. Instead he said, “Whatever it is, my pa believed it to be cursed, a thing that shouldn’t be touched by man. Whiskey came here to sack graves for it. There was nothing to find, so he’s headed to the next graveyard up the trail.”
“Bone Ridge,” Turner said.
Keech nodded, but a skeptical look had returned to the lawman’s face. “This is all real, Sheriff,” Keech added. “My pa died protecting this thing’s location.”
“Magic stones and dead outlaws walking about.” Turner shook his head. “Let’s just look for wounded, shall we? There could be someone in need.”
Down the far end of Main Street stood a small white church, a building Keech had seen before, back when he and Pa had paid their visit. Heavy smoke billowed from the church’s busted-out windows.
“The church,” Keech said. “There’s a graveyard behind it. I’d wager Bad Whiskey aimed his search there for the Char Stone.”
“All right, let’s check it out,” Turner said.
The fire in the church had strengthened by the time they arrived. Keech skirted the property on the blaze’s windward side, watching for signs of a shift in the wind. Behind the church stood a crumbling fieldstone wall, no higher than a man’s thigh. The Whistler cemetery lay on the other side. Several yards beyond the cemetery snaked the Little Wild Boy, meandering off through the valley.
The posse dismounted. Leaving their horses untethered at the wall, they moved quietly into the graveyard. At least two dozen graves had been disturbed. Tall mounds of earth stood beside each hole, resembling tiny mountains all along the pitted ground. Stepping to a grave, Keech looked down. At the bottom of the hole rested a wooden casket, smashed open. The rotten corpse inside had been turned over, almost crushed to pieces. Horrific proof that Bad Whiskey knew no bounds of decency.
Standing over another pit, Duck shouted, “Nobody’s in this one!”
“Same goes here,” Cutter called, peering into a third grave.
Waiting at the boneyard’s entrance, John Wesley asked, “Why would some of the bodies be missing?”
Keech understood right away. Bad Whiskey had lost half his gang when Pa Abner faced them. Not only had he come to search for the Stone, he’d come to replenish his army.
“He turned them into thralls, like Claymore,” he said.
“Swell,” John Wesley mumbled.
Nat pointed to a stand of oak trees beyond the graveyard. “Look!”
An old man with a mess of shaggy white hair had emerged from behind the brush. He took slow, deliberate steps toward them, favoring his right foot from a slight limp. He wore a pair of ragged bib overalls, the kind with the apron sewn to his trouser waist. The right side of his head trickled blood.
“Hello, the graveyard!” the stranger called.
Turner raised his Colt. “That’s far enough, mister.”
The stranger held up his hands but didn’t stop walking. “Don’t shoot! I don’t mean no harm!”
“What were you doing out there in the trees?” Turner asked.
“Ran for cover when them others started shooting up the town,” the old man said. He stumbled over a small root. “I confess to having little pluck. I ain’t no gunfighter.”
“Your name?”
The stranger shuffled to the cemetery wall. Now that he was close, Keech could see the blood was running from a terrible gash across his hairline.
“Melvin Twiggs. I’m the mayor here. I gather y’all ain’t with that one-eyed feller?”
Turner lowered his revolver. “No, sir. My name’s Bose Turner, sheriff over to Big Timber. These are my”—he glanced around at the boys—“deputies. We’re here to bring the men responsible for this to justice.”
Mayor Twiggs shook his wounded head. “You’re a bit tardy, I’m afeared. Them long riders done already come and gone.”
“How long ago?” Nat asked.
The old man considered. “No more’n a half hour, I’d say.”
“We’re close!” Duck said.
Mayor Twiggs pointed across the river, to a deep, ominous-looking wilderness. Thunderclouds filled the dusky sky and cast dark shadows over the valley. The idea of riding into that horrid thicket under rain and lightning made Keech’s skin crawl.
The old man pulled a yellow kerchief out of his overalls. As if he had just realized he was cut, he began to wipe the blood off his brow. “You can’t mean to pursue ’em,” he said.
Turner nodded. “We do.”
“But your posse’s just kids and such!”
“We’re no more kids than you’re a mayor,” Cutter grumbled. He glanced back at John Wesley and chortled.
Turner glared at the boy. “Be cordial. He’s been hurt.”
Mayor Twiggs shrugged at Cutter. “Whatever ya say, kid. There’s a problem, anyhow. That forest where the gang rode…” An uncomfortable pause hung on the next word, as the old man drew a fear-soaked breath. “It’s known as Floodwood.” He sighed bitterly, as if the name explained everything.
“So?” Turner said.
“Ain’t you heard?” The old man flashed a single brown tooth. “Floodwood is cursed.”
The company swapped a mixture of concerned and confused looks. Cutter wagged his head. “Nuh-uh, no way I’m riding into a cursed forest. Bad enough I gotta follow walking, talking dead men.” He spun on his heel and stomped back to his horse.
“That’s the biggest load of codswallop I ever heard,” Turner said to the old man.
“No, sir, it’s true!” said Mayor Twiggs. Heaving with the effort, he lifted one leg and struggled over the fieldstone wall. Keech put a hand out to help him over. After gaining his breath, the old man continued. “Past ten years, nobody who’s rid into Floodwood has ever come back to Whistler.”
“What makes it so dangerous?” John Wesley asked.
“Yer guess is as good as mine,” Mayor Twiggs replied. “I’ve never stepped a toe in there. But some folk claim they’ve heard a monster’s roar come from the heart of that forest.”
A fat drop of rain plopped on Keech’s cheek. He looked up at the dark clouds. The rains would douse the remaining fires in Whistler, but the damage had been done. The village was now just a memory, a ghost story to be shared around a campfire.
Legends of the Lost Causes Page 12
