The Wolf Tree

by John Claude Bemis

  Ray moved down the hill. He had to find Sally before those Bowlers did.

  The rougarou scattered, moving around and away from the steamcoach, making it difficult for the Bowlers to focus their attack. Rifles cracked. Bullets whined. The area around the steamcoach looked like a fireworks display, brilliant flashes within a growing cloud of gunsmoke.

  A rougarou howled a high piercing note, and the entire pack descended upon the Bowlers, using the smoke as an opportunity to strike. Agents ran in every direction, guns blazing. The men on horseback had trouble keeping their horses from panicking. The scene grew frenzied as the battle began to spread. Men and rougarou ran this way and that. Muggeridge had lost control over his men and was desperately defending himself against a dark-furred rougarou.

  Then Ray saw men hiding at the back of the steamcoach. No, they weren’t hiding. A tingling formed at Ray’s fingertips. The agents opened the door, and when it swung wide, a shape emerged from the depths. Pale white against the dark. With slow, creeping steps it lurched down onto the plains, swinging its jaws around menacingly.

  A Hoarhound!

  Ray again noticed the odd tingling in his fingers, and as he brought his hand up, there was a tug, a strange pull toward the Gog’s Hound.

  He had no time to wonder on it. B’hoy returned but had not found Redfeather and Marisol. It was too dark and chaotic. “Thanks, B’hoy. You should stay clear of the battle. I don’t want a stray bullet to get you. But if you see a girl … Sally is out there!” And he shooed the crow into the air.

  Ray ran closer to the battle. He reached a dry gully. The walls hid him from the fight, and he moved nearer, looking for Sally or Redfeather or Marisol. With the other horses and the darkness and the smoke and the turmoil, Ray could not tell if any of the horses were Atsila. But there was an arrow perched in the earth. Redfeather had been here. Where were they?

  Several rougarou leaped on the Hoarhound. It shook them away, its terrible jaws locking upon a rougarou’s back. With a whine of pain, the rougarou was flung by the Hoarhound and fell limply at the edge of the gully several dozen yards ahead.

  Ray started toward it, but the agent De Courcy bounded into the gully between him and the dead rougarou. He began reloading his rifle, his breath coming loudly and his fingers fumbling with the cartridges. He swung the rifle up, steadied his elbows on the top of the gully, and began firing.

  As De Courcy ducked back into the gully, he saw Ray. He snarled and brought the rifle around. Ray clutched tight to the ball of bluestone. He squeezed his eyes shut as the rifle erupted. When he opened them again, he saw the agent staring dumbfounded at Ray.

  A rougarou charged, and De Courcy scrambled out of the gully, running for his life. The attacking rougarou leaped over the gap, a shadow and a blur, and pursued the man.

  Ray crept over to the dead rougarou. It was enormous. Much larger than he had imagined, even from the paw prints he had seen days ago. Its blank open eyes were pale blue, so like a human eye and yet so otherworldly. Then the rougarou transformed into a woman—unlike any woman he had ever seen. Her hair was dark red, and her skin seemed filled with moonlight. The light slowly faded, leaving the rougarou’s lifeless human form.

  More gunfire erupted nearby, and Ray ran farther down the gully. When he reached a safer spot, he looked back at the plains. A rougarou was chasing a horseman, who was trying to fire backward. His horse was not swift enough and the rougarou leaped, catching the man in his jaws and tearing him from the horse’s back. The Hoarhound, nearly twice the size of the biggest rougarou, was surrounded by at least five of the pack.

  Sally was nowhere to be seen. Was she hiding at that campfire?

  Ray looked for a way out of the battlefield. If he continued following the gully, he would only wind up in a more conspicuous spot. So he climbed out onto the prairie again and ran toward the campfire. A stray bullet slapped against his head and he dropped to the ground. He touched his temple, which stung, but no more than if he had been pelted by a stone.

  On the moonlit earth before him, he saw a footprint. No, a pair of footprints. Sally had been traveling with another child. Had they passed here, sneaking away to escape the Bowlers? Ray had to look closely to tell which direction the prints were going. And there, the dirt was pulled up where the toes would have caught if she was running.

  She was going west.

  A rougarou roared not more than fifty feet away, its jaws clamping onto the shoulder of a Bowler. The man screamed, fired his rifle, but missed. The man fell, and the rougarou leaped away.

  Ray followed the prints, pausing occasionally when the tracks grew faint. After searching, he found them again. He was close. He knew it. He would find her and he would help her escape. Why had she come out here? Why had she put herself and the rabbit’s foot in such danger?

  He followed the footprints to the mouth of a canyon. In the soft earth, the prints were clearer. How strange that one of the two travelers was barefoot. He jogged silently into the shadowed canyon.

  Ray was glad to be moving away from the battle now. The canyon wound back and forth, and then the prints stopped at one of the sides. The wall of the canyon was sloped, and the dirt was broken in places where they had climbed up.

  When he reached the top, he saw that the prairie continued flat and endless to the horizon. It appeared empty. Where was she? He looked back. Below, the battle was clearly displayed.

  The dark shadows of bodies—men, horses, rougarou—were strewn across the plains. Several rougarou butted against the steamcoach, shaking its wheels from the ground. There were only a handful of agents left to defend the vehicle, and they fired from the windows of the locomotive. Over a ways, the Hoarhound was lunging like an enraged bear at the rougarou surrounding it. When the Hound swung one way, a rougarou would strike from behind, tearing at the frost-hardened flesh covering its clockwork, trying to wear it down like a cornered prey. But Ray knew there was no exhausting the Hoarhound. It would fight mercilessly until it was destroyed completely.

  Ray heard a noise behind him. He turned, peering across the moonlit expanse. He saw nothing. But then a moment later, he spied a horse, riderless and grazing. Redfeather’s horse? Ray moved closer. He wanted to call out, and he almost did, until he saw the horse more clearly. It was not Atsila. It was a dark quarter horse. One of the Bowlers’ horses.

  Where was the rider?

  A voice whispered and another shushed it. Crouching low, Ray moved with silent steps, his knife drawn. Ahead was a taller tuft of grass, and he knew the land well enough to guess that behind that tuft was a deer wallow. The perfect hiding place on this vast openness.

  Ray opened his hand to check the ball of bluestone in the moonlight. The rock was now a ruddy orange. If he were to take the pennies from his boots, he knew they would now be blue. The protective spell had faded.

  Ray cast the bluestone aside and kept low to the ground, moving as slowly as he would when hunting. He circled the wallow, his eyes trained on the spot. There was movement, shadowy figures. He could see the faint profile of faces, looking in the other direction. They had not seen him.

  He could leap into the wallow. If it was Sally, he would only startle her. But if they were Bowlers, he’d have a moment to attack with surprise on his side and then escape again.

  Ray drew closer. He steadied his breathing until even a rabbit could not have known he was there.

  Now.

  He propelled himself forward and jumped, landing behind the two figures in the wallow.

  There was a gasp and a cry. And one of the figures circled with a knife. Ray grabbed the wrist and knocked the knife away.

  “Ray?”

  All the air rushed from Ray’s lungs. He let go of her wrist.

  “Jolie?”

  A year. So many times on his travels, he had half-expected to find her at some river or marsh. Each time he didn’t, it was like reopening an old wound. Over the months, he had come to believe that she was gone for good, and that he would never see
her again.

  But here she was. The last place he would ever expect to find her.

  They stared at one another. He soaked in her visage like a cold stone gathering warm sunlight. She looked different, or maybe he was seeing her as he hadn’t seen her before. No, she was different: fuller, stronger, healthier, and lovelier.

  Jolie clasped his arms and shook him. “Ray. Ray. What are you doing here?” No words came to his lips. She wrapped her arms around him, trembling, whispering, “You must have thought I abandoned you in the river.”

  “No,” Ray said, nearly into her ear. “No, I knew you didn’t.”

  She released him, and he laughed when their eyes met. “What did happen to you? Where did you go?”

  There was a cough. Ray turned to see the other person. It was a girl in tattered clothes, probably Sally’s age or maybe younger. She looked warily at Ray as she spoke. “Reckon y’all can catch up later? We best keep moving.”

  “I’m sorry,” Ray said, embarrassed by his display with Jolie, and that he had ignored the girl until this moment. “I’m Ray Cobb.”

  “I know. I’m Hethy.” The name sounded vaguely familiar. Before Ray could ask anything, the girl turned to Jolie. “Suspect we should get.”

  Jolie looked around. “There is a horse nearby. I have not seen his rider, but I found this knife in the grass. He may be about.”

  Ray had been shaken by finding Jolie, but he gathered his wits again and looked around. “No. I think he’d still be on him if he were. The Bowler probably fell in the fight, and the horse is trying to escape to safety.”

  “So they are Bowlers?” Jolie asked, her eyes narrowing. “I thought the Gog was dead.”

  “I thought so too. I’m not so sure anymore. There’s so much to explain. But first there’s Sally—”

  “We were looking for her,” Jolie said. “She has the rabbit’s foot, Ray.”

  “I know.” Ray nodded. “And those Bowlers are after it. She’s probably trying to bring it to me for some—”

  “No she ain’t,” Hethy said sharply.

  “What do you mean?” Ray snapped. Hethy drew closer to Jolie, her mouth sealed.

  “Hethy has been traveling with Sally,” Jolie explained. “Sally is trying to find your father.”

  “He’s dead,” Ray said matter-of-factly.

  Jolie exchanged a look with Hethy.

  “What?” Ray asked.

  “Sally learned something from Mother Salagi. Your father is alive. He is trapped in the Gloaming.”

  Ray felt dazed, sick.

  “She is following the rabbit’s foot’s pull,” Jolie added. “It is leading her to Little Bill.”

  Ray could not believe this. The lodestone had been able to guide him to his father. But once it became the rabbit’s foot, that power had been lost. And his father! He was alive? After all that had happened, the knowledge felt cold and abstract.

  “If those Bowlers escape the battle, they’ll continue after her….” He shook his head to clear his welling panic. “Follow me.”

  Ray crept back to the edge of the butte, Jolie and Hethy behind him. The battle still raged. The remaining pack of rougarou—Ray counted seven—surrounded the Hoarhound. Most of the rougarou were limping. But the Hoarhound was weakening too. The skin was ripped from its side, exposing the black machinery beneath. Part of its jaw looked crushed.

  What the pack had not noticed, and what Ray could see from his vantage point, was that the half dozen or more remaining Bowlers were using the Hoarhound as a diversion. Muggeridge was loading the men back aboard the steamcoach. One man remained on horseback, keeping between the Bowlers and the rougarou. After a few moments, the steamcoach began driving away toward the west. Some of the rougarou saw this and tried to pursue. But the Hoarhound was between them—its teeth flashing, its powerful shoulder bashing them away. The horseman fired, keeping the other rougarou back.

  Hethy coughed and put a hand to her mouth to stifle it. “Sorry—” she began to say, but broke into another cough.

  Ray looked from the girl back to the plains below. “They’re going to get away,” Ray said.

  He held up his hand, feeling again the strange sensation of the Hoarhound’s presence.

  Jolie asked, “What is it you sense?”

  Before he could answer, Hethy’s coughing deepened. Jolie put her arms around her. “Are you all right?”

  The girl doubled over, her eyes streaming with tears as the violent fit wracked her body.

  “What’s wrong with her?” Ray asked.

  “I do not know.”

  Hethy collapsed in Jolie’s arms, and Ray sprang forward to help lower her to the ground. He crouched over her, trying to see her in the pale moonlight. “Hethy? Are you all right?”

  The girl was lying on her back, beginning to choke from the brutal coughing. Her eyes rolled back and her lips were speckled with blood.

  Even in the thin light, Ray saw it. Her blood was black. It was oil. He had trouble telling, but he was certain her skin was ashen gray.

  Hethy gasped for air, the coughs suddenly stilled. Ray pulled the girl’s head to his lap, looking her in the face. “Hethy? Can you hear me, Hethy?”

  The girl’s mouth opened and closed and then she uttered, “Granny Sip … Granny Sip …”

  “What is she saying?” Jolie asked Ray.

  Ray realized who she was calling out for. Granny Sip. The old woman hanged in Omphalosa as a witch. Gigi had said her granddaughter had escaped.

  Ray looked at Jolie desperately. “This girl’s come from the Darkness! She’s dying.”

  “No!” Jolie cried. “No, Hethy!” She began scrambling, looking around frantically. “The well’s water! Where is it?”

  “What are you looking for?” Ray asked.

  “I had skins of water. Healing water from Élodie’s Spring. I … I must have left them with—”

  A rifle cocked, and Ray turned.

  An agent stood over them, shadowed against the night sky. A sheen of moonlight glowed from his rifle barrel.

  “I knew we’d catch you,” Sokal gloated. “Yeah, De Courcy said you were nearby. And I got you. Don’t move.”

  Struggling in Ray’s lap, Hethy choked on the oil filling her lungs. Then her eyes rolled back and she grew limp.

  Soft, eerie singing began. Ray had heard it before. Sokal’s eyes widened and darted to Jolie. He backed up a step, turning the rifle on her. But Jolie kept singing her wordless, dark music. Sokal stared, transfixed by Jolie’s spell.

  Singing all the while, Jolie walked slowly toward him, her face a mask of hatred. She took the rifle from his hands and threw it aside. Then she reached a hand to her lower back. What was she doing? With slow movements, she took out her knife, never stopping her song.

  “No,” Ray whispered, laying Hethy on the ground to stand.

  Jolie ignored him, stepping closer.

  Ray grabbed her arm. “Will he do whatever we say?”

  Jolie nodded again, still singing.

  “Can he speak?”

  She nodded, and Ray turned to Sokal. “Where is Grevol taking the Machine?”

  Sokal’s eyes flickered. “Chicago,” he muttered.

  “What’s he going to do with his Machine?”

  Sokal struggled, gritting his teeth as the words came out. “He’s … setting it up … at the Expo.”

  “Why does Grevol want the rabbit’s foot?”

  Sokal squeezed his eyes shut. “Don’t … know.”

  Then his eyes opened, and a smile struggled to his lips. “You’ll all … be killed. Mister Grevol, he knows … about the others….”

  “What others?” Ray shouted.

  “Muggeridge said … Mister Grevol … sending men to …”

  “To where!”

  “Shuckstack—”

  An arrow sank into Sokal’s chest with a heavy thud. Jolie stopped singing and turned. Stunned, Ray stared helplessly as another arrow struck Sokal just below the collarbone. He toppled backwar
d.

  “No!” Ray shouted, leaping for Sokal. He grasped the man’s sodden shirt, pulling at him desperately. “How does he know? How does he know about Shuckstack?”

  Sokal opened his eyes. His lips parted, his teeth darkened with blood. The grim smile froze on his face as he died.

  “No!” Ray cried over and over, shaking Sokal.

  “Ray. Are you all right?”

  Redfeather had his bow notched with another arrow. Marisol stood behind him, looking wide-eyed from the dead Bowler to Jolie to the girl lying on the ground.

  “You killed him, Redfeather,” Ray said, his voice cracking.

  “He’s a Bowler. I thought you were in trouble.”

  “No.” Ray dropped his gaze. He felt dizzy. “Shuckstack. Grevol knows where Nel is.”

  “What?” Marisol cried. “What about the children? We have to warn Nel!”

  “How?” Ray asked, shaking his head and going back over to Hethy. He put his ear to her chest. He could hear the faint beat of her heart and the wet drawing of breath. She was still alive, but only barely. Ray lifted her in his arms.

  Redfeather came forward. “Jolie … what are you doing here?”

  Jolie looked at Redfeather and then at Marisol. “I came out with Conker.”

  Ray spun around. “Conker! He’s alive?”

  “I did not have time to tell you. That is where I have been. I found Conker, after the Gog’s train exploded. I took him to a siren well to heal him.”

  Marisol stammered, “I—I can’t believe he survived. We thought … all this time we thought …”

  “He was wearing your necklace, Redfeather,” Jolie said. “The copper. It saved his life. And listen! We found the Nine Pound Hammer in the Mississippi. The handle was broken. We came to get help from the rougarou and their Wolf Tree—”

  “Those wolves … they’re the rougarou, aren’t they?” Redfeather gasped. He gazed around at the dark plains. “The … the Wolf Tree. It’s been found?”