Blaze of Lightning Roar of Thunder

by Helen A Rosburg

  The sheriff slapped at a fly on the back of his neck, dismayed to note the fat roll right above his collar seemed to have grown. He was already in a glum mood when he looked up, and when he saw who had entered his office, his dark mood intensified.

  “What’chou want?” he growled.

  Blaze stiffened her spine, angry she felt she had to do it. The sheriff was an overgrown worm. “I brought in a body,” she replied evenly.

  “A body?”

  “You heard me.”

  “An’ what’chou want me t’do with a body? You lookin’ for another bounty? You better show me the Wanted poster if’n you do.”

  “There’s no paper on him. But he’s raped and murdered. And worse.” “Says you.”

  The black premonition clenched hold of her stomach. She had to will her hands not to curl into fists.

  The sheriff couldn’t control the sneer that twisted his lips. Or the idea that lifted his heart and lightened his mood. “Like I said. Where’s the paper?”

  “And like I said, there isn’t any. You didn’t require paper when we brought in the last crew of murderers.”

  “They were well known ’round these parts. Who’s the poor devil whose body you claim you got?”

  It was all Blaze could do to keep from reaching for her gun. Hate was like bitter bile in the back of her throat. “I already told you that, too.”

  “What proof you got he done what you say?”

  “My word.”

  The sheriff choked and sputtered as he rose from his desk. Blaze had to steel herself against cringing. She knew she’d said the wrong thing the instant the words were out of her mouth.

  “You just like ’em dead, don’cha, girlie? What happened t’this one? You put a bullet in him?”

  “A bullet was too good for him. I was bringing him to stand trial.”

  “On what evidence?”

  How had their plan gone so horribly wrong? It felt like a hand had closed over her heart and squeezed. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Barely aware of it, her fingers went to the streak of white in her hair.

  “I was a child when he, and others like him, came to my village. They …” The hand moved from her heart to her throat. In her mind’s eye she saw fallen mothers cradling their lifeless children; Tomas dangling from the end of Jake’s rope. And the amused smile on the sheriff’s fat face.

  The same feeling that had flowed through her limbs when she started digging the mass grave coursed through her again.

  She had buried her people; honored them; shed her clothes and her childhood and walked into the mountains. Naked. Where she had been reborn.

  Her rebirth was the death of the murderer; the rapist; the maker of Bane and the killer of his mother. The circle was complete. She had completed it.

  “They murdered everyone,” she finally continued. “Mothers. Old men. Babies. Jake, the dead man, shot me and left me for dead.” Once again her fingers lifted to the lightning slash in her hair. She cared nothing about the sneer on the fat man’s face.

  But he cared about the expression on hers. Arrogant bitch, thinking she could kill a man and bald-faced lie to him about it. He stood up and slammed his palms on his desk. The holstered pistol almost seemed to jump into his hand.

  “How’d he die?” the sheriff demanded.

  Blaze kept her eye on the gun. Was he going to try to shoot her? The muscles in her legs tensed and her fingers flexed.

  “His horse flipped over. Crushed him.”

  “That sounds familiar. Herd o’ buffalo … horse …”

  The sheriff’s guffaw took Blaze completely by surprise.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  RING RODE UP TO CARRIE’S FRONT PORCH, THEN PAST it. No need to rush right in with bad news. No, not bad news. Devastating news. Swallowing something rising unpleasantly in the back of his throat, Ring dismounted and led his horse to one of the corrals. He took his time removing the tack and letting the animal loose in the paddock.

  The mare immediately buckled her legs and sank into the dust for a good roll. Ring paused a moment more to watch her. With dragging steps he finally turned and walked back to the neat and modest house he had come to call home.

  Carrie reached out and took one of Bane’s hands when she heard the familiar footsteps on the front porch. “More coffee?”

  Bane didn’t bother to answer. He couldn’t. His tongue was frozen to the roof of his mouth. He watched Ring saunter through the door.

  Though things had begun badly between them, the men had become friends. Such good friends, in fact, Bane didn’t need to hear the words. He saw the message in Ring’s expression.

  “Bane.”

  Bane rose, careful not to knock over his chair, and took Ring’s outstretched hand. The pressure of Ring’s grip was not comforting, but Bane drew a measure of strength from the reason for it. When Ring relaxed his grip, Bane dropped his hands to his sides and waited for the words that would drive the knife into his heart.

  “They … they put her on trial, Bane.”

  “Oh, no!” Carrie’s hands covered her mouth.

  Ring gave her an almost-imperceptible nod, and she forced her hands into her lap.

  “When?”

  Ring swallowed, Adam’s apple bobbing. He stroked a thumb along the edge of his jaw and tried to still the mad beating of his heart.

  “It’s … it’s over, Bane.”

  What seemed like a long, long time ago he had stood on a mountaintop with the woman who had become his mate and said, “There is no heaven for people like us. Only hell.”

  He had not fully realized the truth or scope of his prophetic words until this moment.

  “And …?”

  Bane could not finish the question, just as he knew Ring could not offer a response without prompting. He saw the tears in his friend’s eyes and knew he would see them on Carrie’s cheeks as well. He did not look at her when she again took his hand. Every fiber of his being was focused on remaining calm and strong. For Blaze.

  Ring really didn’t know if he could say the words or not. He didn’t know if he had the strength to restrain Bane. But, in the end, he knew he could not remain silent.

  “She … they …” Ring looked away and cleared his throat. With the greatest effort of will he had ever exercised, he turned back to Bane.

  “They condemned her to hang.”

  Carrie started to sob. She couldn’t help it. Nor could she prevent the agonized “Noooo,” which was wrung from the core of her soul. As long as she lived, she would never know how Bane restrained himself from running from the house, getting on a horse, and rushing to Blaze’s side. Disbelieving, lower lip caught in her teeth, tears pouring down her cheeks, she watched him stand straight and tall and silent.

  Until the veins in his neck suddenly corded, and he slammed a fist into the palm of his other hand.

  “Bane.” Ring grabbed his friend’s wrists. “We’ll do something. Sit down. Let’s talk.”

  Bane shook his head as if in denial. “She can’t hang. She can’t. I promised her. I promised.”

  The day her parents were murdered Carrie thought she had experienced the most emotional moment in her life. She’d been wrong.

  Bane forced himself to think of lifting his rifle and taking aim. He stilled both mind and body. Recalling the facts he had earlier garnered from Ring, he said, “There was no paper on the gang we brought in. Why—”

  “You know,” Ring replied heavily. “Don’t make me have to say the words.”

  No. Ring was correct. He would not speak the lie aloud. To speak it would only spread the venom and sickness of it.

  Never in his life had Bane felt, or given in to, a feeling of weakness. But never in his life had he been delivered such a blow. Pulling back the chair he had vacated, he sank into the seat. Ring sat across the table from him and reached out a hand. Bane took it.

  Ring briefly dropped his chin to his chest. Looking Bane in the eye again was the hardest thing he’d ever had to d
o.

  “Bane, I … I have a date. But I also have a plan.”

  There was nothing he could do. Not yet. Ring’s plan was a good one. Dangerous. Difficult. But their only hope.

  Nevertheless, he was unbearably restless. When he finally heard the regular sounds of deep breathing coming from the loft, Bane grabbed his bedroll and left the house.

  He didn’t go far. The moon and stars were obscured by clouds, and he was on foot. When he knew it wasn’t safe to go farther, he dropped his bedroll, spread it out and lay down.

  At least he was closer to her. He closed his eyes and breathed in the scent of her on the wind.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  HE HAD LEARNED TO HANDLE A KNIFE AS A VERY young boy. Growing older it became a part of him. Guns had come later, but he was no less skillful in their use. So why, now, did he doubt his ability?

  Bane knew, as surely as he knew his next breath would come whether he willed it or not. But he could not give the thought voice in his heart. He must risk nothing that might weaken him.

  The sun beat on his head and shoulders but the air was cold. A chill wind whipped a length of long, black hair in his eyes. Irritated, he pushed it behind an ear, but the breeze promptly loosed it again.

  Slowly, carefully, Bane set the rifle on its stock and leaned it against the side of the building where he stood vigil, then retied the rawhide strip around his gathered hair. He fingered the hilt of his knife, palmed it, and picked up the rifle.

  His post was three buildings down from the gallows. He sighted on the noose. Felt the weight of the knife in his hand.

  She must not hang. She would not. He had promised. One way or another, he would deliver her from the noose.

  The babble of voices reached Bane. Had they taken her from the jail? For the merest fraction of a second, he raised his gaze from the rope to the rooftop of another building on the far side of the gallows from him.

  Carrie’s hair, like his, lifted in the wind. He saw the soft, red-blond color of it and fastened his eyes back on the rope. He wondered if she, too, heard the voices and understood the meaning of them.

  When Bane was young, he had known the love of his mother and the people of his village. When he became a man, only the passion of revenge lived in his heart. He had been alone until he met one other who walked the same lonely road. She had awakened something in him he had not known remained alive. It would die forever if he failed in his mission.

  The fear of the death of his heart must not weaken him. In weakness he would fail. He banned the surge of debilitating warmth that flowed though his belly and tried to reach his arms and legs when he saw her at last. But he found he could not draw a deep breath until he saw Carrie raise her arm in signal to Ring.

  He increased his pressure on the trigger when she approached the steps to the gallows, the fat sheriff right behind her. And then the sound he heard was not the murmur of voices, but the thunder of hooves. The sheriff shook his head as if to clear away a sound he thought he really shouldn’t be hearing, slipped the hood over his prisoner’s head, and settled the noose around her neck. Tightened it. Gave the signal to open the trapdoor …

  Bane had to will himself not to look when the herd of horses pounded into town.

  The townspeople scattered, screaming.

  The trapdoor opened.

  Bane fired.

  Though he never planned for failure, he did plan for success. The knife was on its way to the target even as he started running.

  It was not the sheriff’s happiest day. He didn’t like the woman, but hanging her didn’t give him the pleasure he thought it would. And it was going to make him infamous. He hadn’t realized, until it was too late, how far her fame had spread. Her and her half-breed sidekick. So he merely grunted and turned away when the man appeared, as if out of nowhere, and cut down the body.

  Although it seemed someone had beat him to it. Vaguely puzzled, the sheriff scratched his head as he looked down through the open trapdoor and watched the Indian scoop the dead woman off the ground and into his arms.

  Then he turned to his next problem. Where in hell had all those damn horses come from, and what were they doing running wild through the town?

  Had he been swift enough? His aim had been true, but had it been in time? Had he broken his promise?

  Dodging the milling horses, Blaze cradled in his arms, Bane searched for Ring and Carrie. But it was Ring who first spotted Bane, and his gut twisted sickeningly when he saw Blaze’s apparently lifeless form. Had their elaborate plan all been for naught? When Ring saw the tears streaming down Bane’s face, he knew they had lost the race.

  EPILOGUE

  BANE WAS SURPRISED BY THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE WHO attended the funeral. According to Ring, their names had become legend. The lightning and the thunder, bounty hunters. Sympathy for Bane, by himself, had swelled the ranks of the mourners. His ride out of town after the hanging, with Blaze in his arms, had not gone unnoticed.

  It hadn’t taken Ring long to bang together a coffin. They had brought it into town, to the cemetery, in the back of a wagon. By the time they reached the graveyard gate, there was a long line of people behind them.

  Though Bane had not asked him, the local minister had taken pity on him and said a few words at the graveside. When he was done, he simply walked away, many of the mourners trailing behind him. Only Bane, Ring, and Carrie remained with the coffin as the cemetery’s caretaker halfheartedly shoveled dirt into the grave. The sheriff stood off to one side, hands shoved in his pockets. When Bane glanced in his direction, he had the grace to look chagrined.

  Answering Ring’s question, Bane raised his voice to make sure the sheriff overheard. With soul-deep satisfaction, Bane noticed the chagrined expression change to one of sympathy. When he concluded his story, Carrie, with tears in her eyes, put a gentle hand on his forearm. Ring tipped his hat back and wiped a tear from his own eye.

  “Thanks for the tellin’, Bane,” he said at length. “I’m just so sorry she never got the chance to tell me that story herself.”

  Bane walked a few steps away from the grave, then turned back to Ring and Carrie. “And now the story of her life is over, too.”

  The sheriff finally backed away, hat pulled down low over his eyes. Bane left the cemetery and mounted his black mare. Carrie caught up with him before he could ride away, however, and laid a hand on his leg.

  “Where are you going, Bane?” she asked softly. “What are you going to do now?”

  Bane remained still and silent while he watched the sheriff walk away from them.

  “You can always stay with us, you know,” Carrie added. “In fact, I wish you would. Take some time. Think on what you’re going to do next. We’d be proud to have you.”

  In response, Bane began backing his horse. Carrie’s hand slipped from his knee.

  “She didn’t hang,” Ring said suddenly, filling the uncomfortable silence. “At least she didn’t die hangin’. You did your best by her. You kept your promise, Bane. She didn’t die from hangin’.”

  Bane nodded once, briefly, and put his heels to the black mare’s sides. Ring and Carrie watched him, standing side by side and holding hands, until the only thing they could see was a vanishing trail of dust. Then they mounted their own horses and rode off in the opposite direction.

  The sun was setting, and the already-chill air was getting downright cold when Ring and Carrie pulled into the camp. Bane had a fire going, and they dismounted quickly to stand near its warmth.

  “No one trailed us, Bane. Don’t worry,” Ring said, rubbing his hands together briskly. “You’re safe. Both of ya, so long’s you never ride this way again. The sheriff, the whole town bought it.”

  Bane moved closer to Blaze and put a protective arm around her shoulder. With his free hand, he lightly touched the raw, red marks on her neck.

  “That was a mighty close call,” Ring said, and let out a long, slow breath of delayed relief.

  Blaze lifted a hand to cover Bane’s
fingers at her throat. His was a touch she had thought she would never feel again, and it was incredibly precious to her. And although she was reluctant to leave his side—ever again—an overwhelming rush of love compelled her.

  It seemed to Carrie she had been doing nothing for days except crying. It had started when she learned of Blaze’s fate and hadn’t stopped until she realized Blaze really was alive. Bane’s blade had severed the rope in the nick of time.

  The tears had flowed again at the “funeral” when she, along with Ring, heard Bane tell Blaze’s story from the beginning. And now she cried once more as she hugged the brave and amazing young woman she had come to call a friend.

  Would their paths ever cross again, she wondered? In the same moment she doubted it. As Ring had said, they would never be able to come this way again and risk the sheriff finding out Blaze wasn’t in that grave after all—only a weighted coffin. Stifling a sob, she hugged Blaze tighter. Only when she felt Ring’s comforting arm around her shoulders did she reluctantly release her friend.

  There were no words to tell Ring what was in her heart, so Blaze simply hugged him as she had Carrie. Besides, the lump in her throat was powerfully painful, and she probably couldn’t have spoken if she had managed to find adequate words.

  Ring looked equally at a loss. When Blaze finally eased away from him, however, he held out a hand and touched the streak in her hair.

  “Blaze,” he murmured. “It was a good name.”

  Her tears overflowed at last. Blaze pressed a hand over her heart and turned back to Bane. He had already saddled their horses, and she silently thanked him for his understanding.

  She did not look back even once as they rode away.

  The storm was over.

  A new, bright day had dawned.

  Neither of them would ever have to look back again.

  Helen A. Rosburg’s

  Call of the Crumpet