Six Guns Straight From Hell - Tales Of Horror And Dark Fantasy From The Weird Weird West

by Jennifer Campbell-Hicks

  A low susurrus came from behind the ridge, growing from an indistinct mass of noise to voices, shouts of joy and glee and wonderment as figures topped the low ridge, women and children, all young and strong and with looks of ecstasy on their faces. The risen braves and women and children turned and began running towards the new mass, while the cavalrymen could only stare open-mouthed at it. The two groups met in a swirl of tears and embraces, turning toward another sound.

  O’Meara stopped his mount and watched. The shots from below fizzled out, as the combatants turned towards the sound, some in joy and some in terror.

  Now a low thunder from the north, a dark line on the horizon that resolved itself into shaggy four-legged masses pawing and snorting and kicking up sprays of snow and ice as it surged ahead, and then stopped outside the camp. From atop his mare, O’Meara looked out at a herd such as the early explorers and trappers had seen, millions of bison, the master of the Plains. A dark umber tide was washing over the land, the snow no longer visible.

  Beside him, the young cavalrymen could only stare goggle-eyed at the sight. “My God,” Himmel said. “Is it...”

  “It is,” O’Meara said. “The dead have come back, and so have the buffalo.”

  “Then they were right,” Himmel said as if in a trance. “I wonder if....” His voice trailed off.

  “I imagine it’s happening all over the country,” O’Meara said. “Unless you imagine the Sioux are God’s chosen. The Narragansetts and Pequods in Massachusetts are on the outskirts of Boston, the Huron are near Detroit, the Salinan and Esselen in California are bewildering the ‘49ers, who thought they had solved the land rights problem.”

  “Thousands–millions of them,” Himmel sputtered. “Where in the devil do we put them?”

  “Somehow,” O’Meara said, cocking his head, “I don’t think that’s going to be a problem.” He turned his mount towards the ridge again–out of the way. From horizon to horizon stood a line of ponies, each carrying a Sioux warrior. A pause, then a surge. From the throats of a thousand, ten thousand, a war whoop that cut through the soul and the thin blue line straight into the heart of a soon-to-be extinct civilization.

  Sam Kepfield is a writer who is forced to support himself by working as an attorney during the day. I graduated from Kansas State University in 1986 with a B.A. in History. After law school (Nebraska '89), I returned to school and got an MA in Great Plains history in 1994, and did doctoral work in the American West. I've also been a science fiction fan since age twelve, so Science Fiction Trails and its anthologies are a perfect match for my interests and talents.

  This story idea presented itself qute naturally a few years ago. Given that the whole purpose of speculative fiction, be it sci-fi or even horror, is to ask "what if?", it seemed logical to explore what might have been had the Ghost Dancers been onto something. The movement, as it developed, was a millenarian one, not so different in the end than any number of Christian revivals--and thus, in the end, doomed to fail or sputter out.

  But imbue it with the supernatural element and the history of our country could have been quite different.

  Justice

  by

  Nicole Givens Kurtz

  1901

  New Mexico Territory

  The grit of dirt and ash coated the hot New Mexico Territory. Dust crammed like a fist into Maria’s throat. She choked, coughed out a thick wad of reddish stained phlegm onto the burnt orange ground. Overhead, the velvety night sky was sprinkled with stars. It seemed romantic, even peaceful, but the growls of coyotes a few miles behind reminded her that no peace would be allowed this night.

  “Stop! Stop!” came a hoarse bark from the gloomy dark. “¡Vuelve aquí, malvada Bruja!”

  It spurred not only a new rash of goose flesh, but also a renewed jolt of fear in Maria. She stood up, wiped her blood soaked hands across her dress and ran. Yuccas, cacti and lizards stood idly by as she pushed her already weary and worn out body further down the dirt road. Ahead, seemingly pressed down by the evening’s full moon, sat an adobe building. A place the Diné called a Hogan. Its only door faced east, as the Dine required. Maria just cleared the wooden fence when the first swirls of gunfire streaked by her, lodging bullets in the building’s thick red oak.

  Maria didn’t wait or turn. Her sandals slid on the loose dirt, the earth sliced through her tanned flesh, taking some with it. It burned and Maria bit her lip to keep from crying out aloud. The best she could do was a low, closed-lip moan. Scrambling, her breathing rough and loud in her ears, she pushed herself to a crawl, and scrabbling, threw herself through the partially opened door.

  “Leave me alone!” she screamed in Spanish to the posse pursuing her. She pushed the door closed and used a heavy wooden bar to keep the evil outside from rushing in to claim her. If only she’d been able do so with her heart. If only…

  A huge thud shocked her away from the door. With her hands trembling, and her quivering belly trying to push its way up into her chest, Maria searched the room for anything—anything at all to protect herself. The blank walls, wooden table and chair, and blackened fire pit offered nothing—not even a cauldron for boiling or a knife for cutting—nothing at all.

  Except for the weathered woman staring at her.

  She was clad in the clothing of the Diné; knee-high moccasins, a desert-rose pleated skirt, a matching long-sleeve blouse and an ebony sash belt. Her large oval turquoise jewelry seemed too heavy for her to wear. Hunched over, as if battered by life, the wrinkled and shabby woman peered out from a thatch of silver floor-length hair. She pointed one crooked finger at Maria, moving her lined lips, nearly thin as two straps of leather, in wordless dialogue.

  “I, I, didn’t mean to...” Maria shouted, tears hot and fast leaked out of her eyes. Her heart hammered so fast and loud she thought it would explode--here, after all she’d been through this night. “I… forgive me.”

  The woman closed her eyes as if Maria’s request for forgiveness offended her.

  “Come out, you murderous bitch!” shouted another voice from the other side of the door. Slamming his fists against the weathered door, the man threatened to knock it from its hinges. The sheriff barked more angry words in Spanish, but Maria shut her ears to them. She’d heard them all night and she knew, with absolute certainty that the sheriff and his posse meant only one thing—to punish her for killing Enrique.

  Maria hiccupped in terror. She glanced over her shoulder to the door and then back to the elderly woman. Enrique had tried to take what he knew he should’ve paid for—no, no she couldn’t let that action go unanswered. Her womanhood ached and had finally stopped weeping blood. She gulped down the acid mix of terror and adrenaline from her tongue. “I, I didn’t mean to do…”

  But she did mean to—the very second he tried to pin her to the urine-stained mattress.

  “Usted lo mató. Enrique no merecía morir en sus manos falta!” yelled one of them.

  One of the posse. A group of the sheriff’s men, all carrying guns, carrying anger and fury at what she did to Enrique. Maria grimaced at that. Enrique did deserve to be punished for what he’d done to her, but then, she hadn’t expected her actions to go unaccounted for—no, not really. What terrified her was that knowledge that, because of Enrique’s actions, she now faced the hangman’s noose. She didn’t mourn Enrique, or what he’d tried to take from her by force—she fingered the violent rips in her dress, and the slivers of smeared dried blood staining the once floral patterns.

  Maria felt a cold hand on her arm and she yelped.

  The elderly woman’s claw-like hand lay on her forearm. Dry like rusty leaves, the hand’s grip tightened. With deep, liquid brown eyes, she guided Maria over to the far right wall, closest to the fire pit.

  “Don’t! Please! Don’t!” Maria whimpered. She couldn’t hold it back. Fear forced her words out. With hands trembling, she hugged herself against the approaching gloom filled night, and the group of horsemen waiting outside. Her heart inched up into her thro
at. “Please, don’t let them in. Don’t invite them in!”

  “Rest easy,” the old lady comforted; her voice like broken glass, shattered Maria’s panic. As she reached the front door, the Diné woman turned to look at her over the slump of her shoulder. Her eyes held a glint of knowledge, wisdom, and perhaps a deep knowing, that Maria had done something horrible, but she smiled at the frightened girl nonetheless.

  “He deserved it!” Maria muttered. “He, he DESERVED to die!”

  The Diné woman lifted the wooden bar and threw it to the floor without so much as glance back at Maria’s confession. Ripping the door open with a strength Maria didn’t know the woman had, the older woman stood against the rush of wind sweeping into the Hogan for just a brief moment, before vanishing into the whirlwind. In her place, the night swept in, screaming in intensity. With it came the sounds of hunger, rage, and revenge all twisted into one chorus.

  Maria tried to fade into the back, wooden walls of the Hogan. She couldn’t speak. Her voice had dried up like the desert in June. Nothing but a sharp squeak emerged. Her heart hammered fast in her chest, but no amount of pushing could take her away from here.

  Away from what she’d done.

  An apparition appeared in the doorway, scarlet eyes glowing in the gathering dark. From beneath the cowboy hat’s brim, the sheriff’s skeletal face flashed bone white from the shadows.

  “Murderer…” he sang.

  It raised the hair on Maria’s arms. “Please, I, I, he tried to take from me, take what he was supposed to pay…!”

  A stench, vile and thick, hung in the air like a curtain. Maria cringed, closing her eyes to the horror. The low, blood curdling chuckle forced her eyes open.

  And what she saw chilled her heart to ice.

  Just that face, the sheriff’s face sneered, barely inches from her own! Where his lips should have been, were only white patches of bone. What remained of the once human face had been gleaned away, as if by some sharp instrument.

  “Murderer…” he purred. He grabbed her neck, and with bony fingers squeezed.

  “L-l-leave me alone!” Maria pleaded between trembling lips. She lacked the strength to fight, to run, or to scream. Her terror had choked those out. She grabbed at his hand, but once she touched the smooth bone, she dropped them to her side.

  He didn’t choke her, but applied enough pressure to warn her that he could kill her. Why? Enrique deserved to die.

  “You ain’t gonna escape justice,” he said.

  Cold and ash pushed upward into her nostril, making her cough and gag.

  “H-he-he deserved it.”

  The lipless mouth opened, revealing the empty blackness within.

  “No one deserves to die unless Justice deems it so. You took a life. You have forsaken your own.”

  Icy fear thawed inside Maria. Forsake my life? NO! Dios, no!

  At once, she clawed at the skinless face, pushed against the skeletal chest, and hit the bones jutting out of the tattered shirt, but the sheriff didn’t move--or relinquish his grasp around her neck.

  “He, he tried to rape me,” Maria coughed out. The hand tightened around her throat as if he didn’t like that answer. The unyielding bone lessened a little when she spurted out, “Please!”

  “You lie!” came a strangely familiar voice from the opened door. “You were paid.”

  “No! No!” Maria thrashed against the fingers around her neck. “No! It can’t be!”

  Her heart squeezed tight, wringing the blood from her face. I stabbed him! Right through his heart! My own hands bleed and ache from the cuts I got from that damn knife slipping—so covered in your blood. I killed you! You can’t be alive!

  The sheriff’s hand relaxed, allowing her to look to the owner of that voice.

  Her brain couldn’t reconcile what she saw when he walked into the full moon’s light streaming through the window. The memory of what she’d done and what she now saw didn’t match up at all.

  Horror inked into her body, and she screamed. It pierced the gloomy night.

  Enrique stood tall—the dried and darkened blood from his fatal wound blossomed over his shirt like a flower.

  “You, you can’t--I, I killed you!” Maria pushed against the hand, against the reality, against everything she’d done.

  Enrique laughed—deep and hearty, full of life that Maria knew he shouldn’t even possess.

  He stalked toward her, his cowboy boots thick and loud on the Hogan’s floor.

  “You got paid for one night,” Enrique’s accented Spanish explained. “And you decided a little robbery would fatten your purse, while I went to get a few drinks.”

  “NO, no, I swear!” Tears welled in Maria’s eyes and spilled down her face.

  “And when I got back to the room, I caught ya. While I was only going to take it outta ya in terms of pleasure, you decided it’d be better to get rid of me all together.”

  He touched the wound, the spot the knife plunged deep into.

  Maria took several deep breaths in an effort to slow the beating of her heart.

  The sheriff peeled her from the wall, using nothing but the unnatural strength of his hand to maneuver her.

  “Release her,” came the rickety voice of someone in the darkness.

  The sheriff flinched, but released her. Those scarlet eyes hovered a few moments before turning into dust. Enrique behind him laughed before bursting into a gust of dirt.

  Maria’s lungs forced her to take deep breaths. From behind her, a cold breeze rustled against her flesh, raising goose flesh. Another presence was in the small eight-sided space; Maria turned slowly. Perhaps it was the old woman returning. Relief washed over Maria. The older woman was safe.

  “A dream,” Maria said to herself. “Yes, only a dream.”

  She swallowed and wiped her tear-stained face. Maria huffed out the remnants of her fear and tried to put the awful event behind her. Enrique had had it coming. For months, he’d visit the brothel, paid a pathetic price for her time, and then proceed to use her in every manner he saw fit. Yes, at first she enjoyed it, fell a little in love with him even, and looked forward to his arrival. But when she’d asked him to marry her tonight, to take her with him away from this horrid place, he’d laughed. Laughed! She made him pay for the violation of her hope. Nothing short of his death would do to ease the sharp stab of loss in her heart. She’d thank the elder woman and leave. If she started now, she might make it as far as the Rio Grande before tomorrow evening.

  Turning to face the elderly woman, Maria said, “Gracias.”

  But the warmth vanished as she met the elder woman’s eyes. Maria recoiled in horror, tumbling to the floor.

  The old Diné woman pointed at her and with eyes full of knowing said, “No one escapes justice, especially those who harm my grandson.”

  “Grandson?’ Maria inquired. Why would she call him her grandson? Was she insane?

  Before Maria could make sense of it, the elderly woman bent down, snatched up a handful of dirt that had once been the sheriff and then the remains of Enrique.

  “Si,” the elderly woman spat. “My son fell in love and married Enrique’s mother. Enrique was a beautiful boy. A good man. He always took care of his Dine’ people as well as his Mexican family. You will not escape my justice.”

  The elderly woman blew the New Mexican dirt from her opened palms, directly into Maria’s face. Maria shrieked as her flesh melted off her skeleton. Burning so fiercely, so wretchedly, all she could do was scream.

  Those screams echoed for hours, until the last of the light from the moon outside disappeared into the horizon.

  Now, if you're really scared, check out some of Nicole Givens Kurtz's less frightening, but equally entertaining works. Nicole Givens Kurtz is the author of several published novels. Her science fiction works have been named as finalists in the 2006 Fresh Voices in Science Fiction (Zephyr Unfolding), EPPIE Finalist in Science Fiction (Browne Candidate) and DREAM REALM Finalist in Science Fiction (Browne Candidate). H
er short stories have appeared in such noted publications as Tales of the Talisman, Orpheus Romance and Wild Child Press. Ready to dive into one of her many worlds? Visit http://www.nicolegivenskurtz.com/

  The Man from Turkey Creek Canyon

  by

  Lee Clark Zumpe

  The Bowery, New York City - 1880

  Two grim gentlemen lingered like impregnable shadows in a secluded alcove within the Tub of Blood saloon on 45th Street. A cloudy gray haze hung over the table, its borders expanding, fed by a steady stream of smoke from a slow-burning Turkish tobacco cigarette nestled between the fingers of one of the men. Its misty swirls and nebulous folds conjured up the ghosts of dead galaxies.

  “I counted 24 souls.” The two prospectors scratched marks upon tablets, recording their return on this lucrative concern.

  “A profitable return, then. You should be pleased.”

  Outside, as the first light of dawn grudgingly infiltrated the street of forgotten men, Skinner Meehan, Dutch Hen, Jack Cody and Sweeney the Boy examined the last victim of the night's massacre. The gruesome death of Hop Along Peter brought to mind the discovery of Brian Boru's corpse years earlier, his body half-devoured by dock rats where he fell outside the tavern in a drunken daze. In the Bowery, of course, death had become a pastime, a spectator sport. Should authorities bother to investigate, they would surmise the carnage had stemmed from some gang-related dispute.

  “I believe it is your turn.”

  Long Home, Arizona Territory - 1884

  “What brings you to Long Home, my lad?” A burly Irishman, Wasatch Wickham stood behind the bar scanning the Golgotha Saloon for troublemakers and outlaws. Aside from some rowdy cattlemen congregating around the faro table, the evening seemed to be mercifully calm and quiet.