“I’m almost halfway!” Duck called. To Keech’s astonishment, she had already made it to the hunchback, the vast plump stone bulging midway up the pile. “I think I can make the top. Wait there and I’ll scout the rest of the mountain.”
“No, you will not!” Nat yelled. “I don’t want you out of my sight!” He turned to Keech again, his face now a world of worry. “If the forest leads her off somewhere strange, I might not ever find her.”
It was a valid fear, but when they looked up again, Keech saw it was too late to remind Duck of the curse. She scrambled over the top ledge, the final hurdle. Bits of granite chunked off the shelf and peppered the slope, but the ledge was firm enough to let Duck gain her feet.
As she stood on the crest, which appeared to be level ground again, she wiped her hands on her trousers and waved her big hat at them. “I’ll be back in two shakes!” She turned and ran.
After she had disappeared, Nat stood rigid on the path and stared up at the ledge. He tapped two fingers nervously on the grip of Turner’s pistol.
“Don’t worry, Nat, she’ll be back,” John Wesley said.
The rancher shook his head. “You don’t understand. She’s all I got. If something happened to her, I’d never forgive myself.”
A cooing noise, like a mourning dove, echoed in the distance. Keech cocked his head. “Did y’all hear that?”
The sound came again: coo-COO. coo-COO.
John Wesley pointed back to the northern side of the mountain. “I’d know that signal anywhere. It’s Cutter!”
“We have to go back,” Keech said. “He could be in danger.”
“Not without Duck,” Nat said.
But when the cooing noise came a third time, John Wesley started back down the critter path. Keech followed, then paused when he saw Nat tarry at the mound.
“Go ahead, Blackwood. I ain’t leaving Duck.”
“John Wesley’s right,” Keech said. “She’ll be okay.”
“I ain’t leaving her. Go. I’ll keep a lookout for the crows.”
“All right.” Keech hurried after John Wesley.
When the boys reached the embankment, they saw Cutter stretched out on his stomach and squinting down the long slope. Trouble had surely found them again.
“We got company,” Cutter said, his voice muted.
Keech and John Wesley joined him on the ground and peered down the hill.
At the bottom stood a lean figure cloaked in black. A flock of roughly thirty dead men encircled him. The outlaw’s dark overcoat rippled in the wind, and he was clutching his Colt Dragoon. A team of five horses, loaded with gear, waited behind the thralls.
Bad Whiskey knelt to inspect the still corpse of his thrall Scurvy.
As soon as Keech had seen Whiskey’s dead men, the amulet shard inside his shirt reacted. A pulse of cold went seeping through the cloth and seared upon his chest.
“We can’t linger here,” he whispered. “Those thralls will feel the charm. They might sense Duck’s, too.”
“I ain’t running,” Cutter hissed. “Not when I’m this close to El Ojo.” Without warning he raised up on both elbows.
John Wesley shoved him back to the ground. “Watch out! He’ll gun you down!”
Cutter scowled. “Look at him. He looks sick. My knife can drop him easy.”
Even from this distance, Keech could see that Bad Whiskey did look dreadful. His yellowed skin had wrinkled and begun to crack like rotting leather, and his cheeks looked sunken around the bones. Truth told, he looked like one of his own walking corpses.
A bullet spark of memory slammed through Keech’s mind. Something Pa Abner had told the outlaw back at the Home, when they had first confronted each other:
Your standing here tells me the Reverend’s woken …
Keech’s breath hitched in his lungs.
“What’s wrong?” asked John Wesley.
Keech finished Pa’s words aloud: “‘Some devils just don’t know when to stay down.’”
The other boys looked bewildered.
Pa Abner had almost revealed the secret in the study. The outlaw looked like a corpse because he was one.
“Bad Whiskey Nelson is not a man,” Keech said. “He’s a thrall.”
Cutter’s eyes darkened. “You mean he’s already dead?”
No wonder Bad Whiskey had panicked when Pa held the shard near. He was as vulnerable to the charm’s power as his rotting goons were.
Cutter scowled with clear disappointment. “No matter. I can end him twice, I reckon.”
John Wesley pointed. “Fellas, we’re found!”
All three boys flattened on their bellies, but it was too late. Bad Whiskey’s horde was staring up the embankment, directly at them.
“Hello, the hill!” the outlaw bellowed. He then hollered a command and the dead army started up the muddy slope. At least a dozen thralls yanked revolvers as they climbed. The ground was loose and rugged, but within minutes they would be close enough to fling lead.
“We have to get out of here!” said John Wesley.
“No, we have to kill them,” Cutter said. He stood rebelliously and flicked his knife back and forth.
Bad Whiskey shouted to his goons. “No need to be friendly, boys! Take ’em down!”
A few gunshots crackled up the embankment. The bullets came nowhere close, but Cutter dropped back to his stomach anyway.
“We can’t stop them,” John Wesley said.
A sour wind swirled up from below, carrying the scent of the dead, while high above, a pair of crows orbited the mountain in chaotic loops.
Keech thought about the stony climb Duck had just accomplished, the thousands of rocks and boulders that speckled the perilous incline.
“There’s only one option,” he said. “Follow me.”
Keech leaped to his feet and took off running.
CHAPTER 20
THE DOORWAY
Nat was already scaling the giant rock pile when Keech came sprinting around the bend.
“I heard the commotion,” Nat said, tossing a swift glance down at him. “I have to find Duck.” His face burned bright red with concentration, but he had made reasonable progress up the slope.
“Right behind you,” Keech said. He vaulted to the pile and began to climb. Cutter and John Wesley came stomping up the footpath a moment later. Both boys froze at the weedy base, as if the sight of Nat ascending the mound had shocked their bones out of movement.
“C’mon, fellas, pronto,” Keech said.
“You want us to climb this?” Cutter asked.
“I done told y’all I can’t do that!” John Wesley muttered.
“We climb or die,” Keech said. As far as he could see, there was no other way up the side of the mountain.
“We’ll likely do both!” Cutter spat.
“Just don’t look down. Test each rock before you put your full weight on.”
The young riders fell into a silence as their climb began in earnest. Keech focused on the motion of his hands, the shift of his boots, the feel of the damp stones whenever he grabbed for a handhold. He wasn’t very high yet, but if one finger slipped or one loose rock fell—if his clumsy body betrayed him in the slightest—he would easily break a leg or even his neck. How Duck had managed to travel so quickly up two hundred feet of slippery, razor-sharp rock was a feat that baffled Keech.
Below him, John Wesley cursed at Cutter, as mossy rocks tore free from Cutter’s grasp and tumbled past the larger boy. Keech worried fiercely about John. He was bulky and tiresome, loved to complain, and didn’t seem to understand or appreciate his own strength. If anyone got them into trouble, it would be John Wesley.
Keech had climbed nearly to the big rounded boulder—the massive formation he thought of as the hunchback—when he saw a dark stone the size of a ham fly at his face. He recoiled and the rock skimmed his cheek. He tasted chalky dust and sputtered.
“Sorry!” Nat called down. As soon as he said it, the rancher slipped over the bow of the
hunchback, which meant he was halfway to the top. Keech felt a flash of envy for the boy’s progress. He glanced down momentarily to check on Cutter and John Wesley … and saw the thralls.
The quickest of them had reached the mound and were beginning to climb. The rest of Bad Whiskey’s army was shuffling up the critter path, accumulating at the foot of the mound, shoving one another, clawing at their turn to ascend.
“John Wesley, heads up!” Keech shouted.
Properly startled, the large boy looked down. Rotting thralls grinned up at him and raised their revolvers. Keech caught a glimpse of leather. It was Rance, leading the pack.
Floodwood once again came alive with gunfire.
“Go faster, Cut!” John Wesley yelled, as ammunition zinged around them. The boy quickened his pace up the rock face. A riotous grunt issued from Cutter’s throat as he grabbed for boulders and heaved.
They were sitting ducks on the mound, all of them, a feast of targets. Except for Nat. Since climbing over the hunchback, he was no longer visible. If Keech and the others could only make it to that point, they could gain some momentary cover.
Putrid wind pummeled Keech’s face, threatening to rip the hat off his head. He shoved it down tight. He could hear Rance’s voice below: “Get ’em, you worms! Don’t lose ’em again! All of you, climb!” Grimacing, Keech reached up and touched an inviting stone, only to find that the jagged rock tilted under the lightest touch. He shifted his grip. One wrong move could bring the entire slope down on the heads of Cutter and John Wesley.
Which gave Keech an idea.
A slug whizzed by his ear, so close he felt the wind of it flutter his hat brim. The shot demolished a small stone near his face and he tasted more grit. He heard Pa’s faithful voice in his head whisper, Stay calm. If he panicked, he would choose the wrong handhold and go slipping off to death.
Nat’s voice echoed from above. “I’m at the top!”
Clamping his teeth, Keech at last made the hunchback. It was a tricky endeavor to climb over the big boulder’s slippery arch, but he found the holds he needed to lug himself up.
He grabbed a quick breath and rubbed his burning arm. His position didn’t allow him to see the other two boys, so he dropped to his stomach and peeked over the drop. His heart thumped when he saw that Bad Whiskey’s thralls were slinking closer to John Wesley. One dead man dressed in ragged sheepskin risked drawing his pistol. The mere act of bringing his weapon upward shifted his weight enough that the stone beneath his boot slipped loose. The rock tumble snowballed into a miniature cascade and the thrall was gone in an instant, taking with him another decaying cohort.
“You foolish maggots!”
Bad Whiskey’s voice. The one-eyed fiend was now at the mound.
“Mind yer steps!”
A duo of dead men climbed within reach of John Wesley’s legs and clawed at the boy’s trousers. He screamed and struggled to clutch a piece of shale that crumbled in his grasp. Cutter saw what was happening and stretched down a hand. John Wesley’s fingers landed on his wrist and Cutter pulled. The thralls’ grip on John Wesley’s trousers tore free, and the boy hurried up the next rock.
Keech studied the pile from peak to base. By his estimation, five or six large tumbling stones could cause the whole mound to crumble.
He recalled the nuggets of rock and grit that Duck had shaken loose when climbing over the rocky hat brim. The mantel had been strong enough to support her small frame, and Nat hadn’t been heavy enough to collapse the shelf either. But John Wesley was as husky as a horse.
The world below the hunchback was a discord of shouts and curses and thundering revolvers. Soon Keech saw Cutter’s head float into view, and he reached down and grabbed the boy’s hand. Working together, they boosted him onto the boulder. Needles of broken rock had slashed Cutter’s nose, but he grinned anyway, a feral look that both surprised and exhilarated Keech.
“Hey, Lost Cause.”
“Hey yourself. I’ve got a plan. Be ready.”
“It better be a dandy.”
A second later John Wesley appeared, his face pasty with fear.
“I made it,” he moaned.
“We’re not out of the woods yet,” Keech said. He and Cutter helped John Wesley over the hump, and Keech pointed up to the top of the pile. Nat was nowhere to be seen—no doubt he was searching for his sister.
“I know you’re dog-tired, John, but keep climbing,” Keech said. “I need you to reach that ledge.” He pointed up to the hat brim.
Below, Bad Whiskey called out, “Yer dead meat, little pilgrims!”
John Wesley nodded as if he already understood Keech’s plan. He began to scale again, humming a nervous tune as he worked.
A thrall’s leathery face appeared like a nightmare over the hunchback. “Found ya!” the dead man muttered. His moldy fingers clawed the stone for purchase.
Before Keech could pull the freezing pendant from his shirt and kill the thing, a dull gleam of steel flashed in Cutter’s grip. Blackened fingers went flying off the thrall’s hands, and shock exploded on the dead man’s face as he dropped away.
“Adios,” Cutter said, and sheathed his knife.
More thralls began to scratch at the underside of the hunchback. They would be over the hump in no time. Keech tapped Cutter on the shoulder. “We have to go now.”
The boys began to climb after John Wesley, who had apparently found one last reserve of energy. He had already made a good distance, and had only a few more feet to go before reaching the top mantel.
“He’s gonna do it!” Cutter said.
“Let’s just make sure—” Keech began, but a fresh eruption of gunfire clipped the rest of his words. Two dead men had clambered over the hunchback and were firing up at them. Invisible pellets pinged and thudded against the granite.
“Go suck an egg!” shouted a high-pitched voice, and before Keech could register what was happening, a storm of rocks battered the pistols right out of the thralls’ hands.
Keech glanced up. Duck was standing on the ledge, side by side with her brother, lobbing stones at Whiskey’s goons. Nat was aiming Sheriff Turner’s Colt, and fired off two measured rounds. The thralls on the hunchback went tumbling backward off the boulder.
Somewhere below, Bad Whiskey roared in frustration.
“Much obliged!” Keech called to the Embrys.
John Wesley reached the mantel, but when he tried to climb over the lip, his last helping of strength seemed to fail. “I can’t make it!” he said, and stretched one hand up to Nat and Duck.
The siblings dropped to their bellies and reached, but the boy was too low even for Nat’s long arms.
“We have to help John,” Keech said to Cutter.
They climbed as fast as they could. Cutter found a route up the rocks that put him nearly neck and neck with Keech. By the time they reached John Wesley, the stones beneath the boy’s feet were clattering, on the verge of tearing out of the mountainside.
Whooshing out a loud breath, John Wesley gripped the edge of the mantel and tried to pull himself up again, but to no avail. The boy was strong, but his own weight worked against him at this angle.
“We’re here,” Keech told the boy, steadying himself beneath him. “We’ll help you up.”
“Th-thanks,” John Wesley stammered.
The terrible noise of the dead infiltrated the cold air. Keech didn’t have to look down to know that Whiskey’s thralls were now swarming the hunchback and the final stretch of mound.
Another hail of stones rained on the dead men. Duck and Nat stood on the precipice and launched rocks together, their perfect aim sending more thralls careening down the pile. They would only get back up, of course, but it was a worthy effort to buy John Wesley more time.
Keech stretched up one hand and pushed on John Wesley’s left boot to give him a platform. At the same time Cutter fumbled to help him from the other side, scrabbling for a hold on John’s right leg.
Steeling himself for one final push, Kee
ch tucked his shoulder under John Wesley’s rump. “Hey, watch it!” the boy muttered, but Keech ignored him and shoved.
Just before Keech had spent the end of his strength, John Wesley mercifully lifted. Keech and Cutter shoved him over the edge of the mantel. A terrible noise rumbled above. The hanging shelf wobbled underneath the large boy’s weight. Just as Keech had hoped.
“It’s coming down on our heads! Move it!” Cutter screamed.
They skittered over the top edge. For one second Keech felt the world go topsy-turvy beneath him, like a tottering tree. He felt the ground slip away and knew that he would tumble along with the heavy stone. He was too slow and would be crushed beneath the slide.
But then John Wesley grabbed his wrist and dragged him over the edge and back to solid ground. Beside him, Nat and Duck were holding on to Cutter.
A devastating crash cracked the air like a thunderbolt.
“Get back,” Keech called. “Away from the edge!”
The young riders hurried on hands and knees over tall weeds and burs, away from the precipice. A second later—as a cluster of thralls peeked over the edge—the splitting overhang tilted. The heavy mantel separated from the rest of the mountainside. A look of shock crossed the decayed faces.
The shelf stones barreled down the slope and shoved the hunchback out of its decades-old cavity, loosening the giant boulder like a bad tooth. And when the hunchback began to roll free, the entire mound collapsed. Every remaining thrall careened down the ruined slope inside a tempest of stone and moss and roots and dirt. It may have been his imagination, but Keech thought he heard Bad Whiskey scream as the rubble buried the critter path.
Sweaty and exhausted, the young riders bellowed in victory.
“Leave it to John Wesley to knock down a whole mountain!” Cutter cackled.
Resting on their hands and knees, both Nat and Duck laughed.
“Shut your mouth,” John Wesley said. But he was also grinning, and before long he broke into his own fit of laughter.
Lying on his back in the weeds, Keech allowed himself to join in the merriment. But only for a moment. A mile of Floodwood rubble had just entombed a small army of Bad Whiskey’s thralls—and most likely Whiskey himself—but their fight was hardly over. And the Reverend’s crows were still prowling the cursed clouds.
Legends of the Lost Causes Page 16
