Crossroad (The Gunsmith Book 3)

by C. K. Crigger

  “Begin icing your ankle,” he commanded as he pawed through the first-aid kit. “I want to get the outlaw taken care of before he comes to.”

  I must say I found no fault in this.

  He found an object that looked a lot like the inhaler I use when my allergies are kicking up in the fall, and pulled the top off of it. With a tiny measuring syringe, he drew up a few drops of the drug he’d gotten from the outlaw I’d shot and injected a barrelful into the saline-filled inhaler. He swirled the contents, and with a wry shrug, added more of the drug.

  “This will hold him,” he said. “Bound to.”

  Bad as it may sound, I really didn’t care if the drug killed the deranged lunatic. I’d had all I could take of him. I activated the chemical-filled ice pack, watching through the open bunkhouse door as Teagun grabbed the unconscious outlaw by his bound hands and dragged him into the sliver of shade cast by the shed’s offside.

  He squirted what must have been a triple dose of the drug into the man’s nose, until the hog-tied captive began with a two-toned whistling snore. The racket did wonders to soothe my nerves.

  And then it was my turn for Teagun’s tender—or not— ministrations.

  “This is getting to be a habit,” I said, wincing as he probed the nooks and crannies of my ankle. I’d already found it wasn’t as bad as I’d first thought, but phooey! He wasn’t getting off that easy. Let him worry a little. He’d already drawn the edges of the oscillator cut together with an antibiotic glue he said would heal me in no time.

  “Guaranteed not to leave a scar,” he’d assured me.

  “I don’t think I believe in your guarantees anymore,” I retorted. Actually, with the pain in my face brought down to a dull roar, my ankle was demanding all the attention. But this, too, faded; not because it quit hurting—although I took some kind of magic pill—but because on one of Teagun’s trips back and forth across the bunkhouse for supplies, he’d opened the door to a bathroom. I forgot the ankle, for the present anyway.

  Hallelujah, sinner! Shining in white porcelain splendor, the toilet lined up between a shower stall, size small, and a perfectly ordinary, faux marble sink attached to the wall. There wasn’t a thing exotic about it, except that it wasn’t exotic. Not at all what I expected in 2120. Where were the ultra-sonic cleaners I’d read about? The step-in-fully- clothed-and-come-out-clean units, no water required? I admit to a touch of disappointment, since the unit on display had been around, unchanged in form, for close to 300 hundred years. But, oh, the perfect temperature of the water, the sensation of the pulsating spray on my skin, the sluicing of dirt and grime and old blood down the drain. I didn’t try to stop myself from rhapsodizing.

  “What did you expect?” Teagun grumped. “We do know about bathing here in the Great Empty.”

  “Humph,” I said, reveling in another outfit of Petra Dill’s clean clothes. These were dark blue. She must have a penchant for dark-colored clothing.

  The existence of this bathroom is the reason, when Clive Hawkinson showed up a little later, I was prepared to meet him with a measure of self-respect. I think it also explains why, as I waited for his arrival in a newly relaxed state, I went to sleep and immediately began to dream of Caleb.

  IN MY DREAM, Caleb and Scott were together in the gunshop. McDuff and Juno, the two black Briards, purled around Caleb’s legs until he moved only slowly, and it was with this seemingly random impediment that he pushed his way in the general direction of my work area. A “closed” sign hung on the double doors separating the sales floor from my gunsmithing realm. The doors, which usually stood open, were pulled shut. Scott, busy with a customer in the store, looked as though he wanted to prevent Caleb from going into my part of the shop, and I knew Caleb had planned things to happen this way in order to take advantage of my brother’s preoccupation.

  With some amusement, I heard Scott trying to get Caleb to come back. “There’s no gun,” he said. “I looked. I’m telling you all there is, is a bunch of junk left over from a job she did early last Saturday morning.”

  The scope, I realized. He was talking about Teagun’s ruined scope. I hadn’t done anything about disposing of the pieces and evidently Scott, with a sort of superstitious awe, hadn’t either.

  Caleb held up a detaining hand, smiling wryly at my brother. “You go right ahead with your business, Scott. Don’t worry about me poking around in Boothenay’s things.”

  Scott came over anyway, leaving his customer standing in front of an unlocked case—an unheard of lapse. He looked quite haggard, though not as haggard as Caleb.

  “Well, I do worry. What if you were to disappear, too, Caleb? What would we do then? It’s been eight days for Boothenay, dammit. And all Dad does is lay around trying to read those incomprehensible grimoires of B’s for clues as to what might bring her home. When he isn’t consulting some freaking psychic. That’s where he is right now, talking to Madame Full-of-Bull on the phone.”

  “What does Madame tell your dad?

  “She says Boothenay’s been kidnapped, for God’s sake, when we both know that damn voodoo of hers has taken her.”

  Score one for Madame Not-So-Full-of-Bull.

  “The two do have definite similarities,” Caleb murmured. He had an arrested expression on his face, as if Scott’s news had given him something fresh to think about.

  Yes, I tried to tell him. I have been kidnapped. Truly. Though for the life of me, I didn’t know what he could do about it.

  The workbench looked the same as I’d left it, including the exceedingly stale Rocket Bakery cup my lunchtime latte had come in. The B & L scope with its shattered lens lay in plain sight. From inside my dream, I was aware of shimmering facets of power glinting from the discarded jumble of metal and glass. Not much power. Too little, really, to pin my hopes on. I saw one of Caleb’s sun-browned hands, strong and fine, reach out to touch the scope. My heart froze.

  Scott said, “Don’t!” on a sharp note of dismay.

  Caleb paused. His green eyes were red-veined and tired, as if he hadn’t slept for a week. “Did this belong to him?”

  “Him?” Scott echoed.

  “The magician,” Caleb said.

  “Oh,” Scott said, defeated. “Yes.”

  I woke up. Tears were streaming down my face, and Teagun had that

  angry/threatened/disbelieving look, so I knew he’d been able to see into the dream.

  “Caleb,” he said, as though he’d been introduced.

  “Yes.” Eight days. I felt muzzy, trying to perceive the significance of that number. What had Scott meant, when he said eight days? Unable to think, or to clearly remember the dream, I got up, immediately wrapping my ankle to keep it immobile in case of sudden action.

  TEAGUN HAD GLOMMED down a third sandwich, proving he did eat heartily when he could, before we heard the thrum of rotors flying low overhead. I’d finished my food and lay in the bunk with my foot elevated on a couple of pillows, a glass of water in one hand, and one of the books from the cupboard in the other. I must say I found the book utterly fascinating. I was loathe to put it aside. A history of the state of Washington, it had been published in 2076, at the start of the United States’s fourth century.

  “Oh, ho,” I’d kept saying, both to myself, and out loud to Teagun. “So that’s what happened.”

  Teagun jumped to his feet at the sound of company, and stood listening intently.

  “Don’t forget to put the burnoose on, hood up, before you come outside,” he said, leaving me mystified.

  Rushing out of the bunkhouse, he headed toward a square of glassy-surfaced concrete I’d seen earlier and wondered about. A landing pad, I now surmised, as the craft floated toward it. Remembering what he’d said about the burnoose, I donned it as instructed, and limped outside in time to watch the flying machine descend.

  I say “flying machine” because I couldn’t quite decide if the vehicle was a hover car, a helicopter, or an airplane. It bore elements of all three. What I noticed particularly we
re the words on the craft’s side, “Northwest Border Police.” That was an agency new to me, but at least it looked official.

  Hobbling slowly toward the landing pad, I passed the shed where the outlaw sat, awake now, in its shade. He watched me as I skirted around him, his eyes dull with dope and empty of emotion.

  Two more sets of eyes studied my approach. That I’d been the—or at least, a—subject under discussion by Teagun and his pal from the border police seemed obvious. I did hear part of what they said, but as when Teagun had been talking with the outlaw, the language only partly made sense. But that didn’t matter to me now. They fell silent as I neared.

  Straightening my shoulders and pulling in my belly, I sauntered over to them. Wind from the craft’s rotor blades whipped under the burnoose hood, exposing my face. Curly black strands of my freshly washed hair tossed about my face and into my mouth.

  I caught the look of surprise on the lawman’s face, the sudden rise of color under his dark skin. He questioned Teagun, harsh and piercing. His hand went to the weapon riding on his hip.

  I drew in a sharp breath, glancing in alarm at Teagun.

  Teagun talked quickly, halting the lawman before the weapon left the holster. He replied to the man’s questions, added something of his own.

  Now what was there about this scene to bother me? Aside from the gun and the obviously distressed cop, that is. Then I had it. Though his face appeared quite stern and immobile, Teagun’s dimple was dancing alongside his mouth; the corners of his eyes quivered. I sensed a tension in him. Doggone his hide! He was pulling a kind of devious trickery again. Aimed at me? Or at the cop?

  I squinted upward, the better to see him. Only marginally aware of the cop’s consternation, I said, “What are you laughing at, Teagun Dill? What’s the joke?”

  He didn’t look at me. He was watching the cop who continued to gawk at me. Nevertheless, he put his arm around my shoulders and drew me close to him. I supposed it was a protective gesture of sorts. Now I could feel the mirth rising in him. Standing rigidly under the weight of his arm, I tried to understand the language they spoke to one another, and when that failed, to read their expressions. That, too, was mostly to no avail, except I believed the cop had relaxed his fire-when-ready stance.

  I elbowed Teagun in the ribs. “What’s going on?”

  “...uja, Teagun? The Weatherby?” the cop asked. All I could do was pick out the few words that sounded familiar to me. Except for the names, they sounded Spanish. And all sentences ended with a question mark.

  I don’t mean to imply they were speaking Spanish because they weren’t, although those were the only words besides a little English, I understood. I heard the sounds and cadences of French and a few other languages in there, as well.

  Teagun went into another long-winded, rapid-fire explanation, while the cop’s eyes never left me.

  There was beginning to be a new pattern in relation to my travels to other times I saw, not with any pleasure. Last time out during WWI, it had been the German and French languages I’d had to contend with. Now, who knew? I surely didn’t.

  “What are you two talking about, Teagun?” I elbowed him again. “Is it about me?”

  “Ouch,” he said. “Be quiet, Boothenay. I’m occupied.”

  “But, why,” the other man asked, frowning deeply and speaking in English, “is her skin so pale? Is she ill? Where did you find her, Teagun? You told me I was here to pick up an outlaw, not a mutant.”

  My mouth dropped. He spoke English with the same accent as Teagun, and he’d called me a mutant. And Teagun had told me to shut up—again.

  “She can answer for herself, buster,” I began, “and she is not a mut—”

  Teagun’s arm tightened around my shoulders. With seeming effortless strength he spun me around to face him. His black eyes loomed so close they made mine cross, so I closed them, not knowing what else to do. His mouth descended, covering my lips. “Mutant,” became indecipherably muffled.

  Well, it wasn’t as if I could kick and struggle. Not since I was already precariously off balance, with my sore ankle leaving me only one leg to stand on. Besides, he smelled clean, his arms felt strong, and he kissed very nicely, his lips warm and curiously gentle considering all he wanted to do is shut me up. I think that’s all. I know I enjoyed the interlude, until I heard the cop clearing his throat and saying, “Ahem.” The old-fashioned word resounded like a buzzer going off in my head—one that screeched “Caleb.”

  That kind of turned things off, although Teagun gave me a smile I found difficult to read as we drew apart. Mocking was the word for it. But was he mocking himself or me? Or both of us?

  “Not her, Clive,” he said. “And have you never heard of anachronistic costuming?”

  “Oh,” the cop said, disapproving. “One of those. I’m surprised at you. “ He stopped and started over. “Are you going to introduce us?”

  I was still bemused enough to keep my mouth shut at his comment, from which I gathered “costuming,” especially anachronistic costuming, whatever that was, lacked respectability. I may be hot-tempered and quick off the mark, but even I could see there must be a method to Teagun’s machinations. I suspected he was under the same kind of pressure as I, which is to say, the need to keep secret the strange power we tapped into. He hadn’t wanted me to spill the beans.

  “Boothenay Irons,” Teagun said, looking a little uncomfortable at the formality, “this is Captain Clive Hawkinson. He is going to take our prisoner in charge and get him off our hands.”

  Well, duh.

  “I’m happy to meet you, Captain Hawkinson,” I said. “You have no idea how that guy has been bothering me. He’s been looking at me like I’m some kind of freak.” So had Captain Hawkinson who hadn’t covered his reaction one whit better. At least he appeared to be recovering from whatever shock I’d given him.

  Testing him, I offered the cop my hand. After only the slightest hesitation, he took it with the overly delicate grip a strong man often uses with a woman. Of course, he might have been afraid to latch on too hard, for fear he couldn’t shake me loose.

  “We don’t often see your kind, here in the Great Empty,” Hawkinson said.

  “My kind?” I wasn’t cutting him any slack.

  “Your coloring.” The cop tried to explain. “Light skin, black hair, the way you speak. We forget there are drugs you can take and ways to costume for the old times look.”

  I bit my lip. “At least my appearance has served some purpose.” The cop stared at me blankly

  “With the outlaw thinking me a mutant,” I explained. “Or a witch. What an ignoramus.

  The cop colored again. “Teagun says the man is afraid of you.”

  “Not afraid enough, I guess. He attacked me a while ago and tried to kill me. He caught me off balance; banged up my ankle.”

  His eyes narrowed. “And cut you on the chin?”

  “No. I can’t blame him for that one.” He had keen eyes. Teagun had glued the sides together so carefully I’d believed the wound nearly invisible. “The cut is a present from one of the others.”

  “Others?” He turned to Teagun, his attention focusing on the big Weatherby pistol, the grip handy above Teagun’s shoulder. “What others? You didn’t mention others. Where is Petra? I expected to see her today. Why isn’t she with you?”

  He shifted into the other language, leaving me to wonder what all they discussed in their rapid exchange of information. Captain Clive Hawkinson certainly was concerned for Teagun’s mother, I reflected. I heard him say her name twice, then a couple times more on a note of blunt command. He drew a line along his own jaw, which followed along the same line as the cut on mine.

  Teagun scowled, bent down and scratched circles and zigzags and straight lines—a map—in the dirt, as the cop stood back and watched. Uninformed though I might be, I identified the map as showing the route to where we’d caved the bank in over the other outlaw’s body.

  I bent close to Teagun’s ear to whispe
r above the beat of the Border Police vehicle’s rotors the cop had left running. “Am I in trouble?”

  “No.” So he said, but I had an idea he was lying.

  Captain Hawkinson was able to take a verbal deposition as to the circumstances of the arrest. Just as well a verbal, to my way of thinking, for I didn’t plan on hanging around long enough to show up in any court. Anyway, I couldn’t show up in a court of law. How on earth could I establish my identity and residence?

  The cop, as long as he was on scene, did a monetary exchange via a credit card computer, paying Teagun the bounty on the outlaw. I found the technology interesting, and although in my opinion the balance in Teagun’s account changed upward in a satisfactory manner, he merely shrugged the transaction aside.

  “This one is a nobody. A hanger-on. Only a small warrant pays for him. If he hadn’t fallen to us, I’d never have gone after him. Not worth my time.”

  A kind of hoity-toity attitude in my opinion.

  Captain Hawkinson’s paddy wagon soared into the eastern sky and soon became lost to sight as he bore the prisoner off to the pokey. An uncomfortable quiet fell between Teagun and me. I couldn’t think of the proper way to handle this new situation between us. Should I broach the subject of that kiss—tell him never to do such a thing again—or not? I should probably ignore that it had ever happened, and yet... I didn’t think I could.

  Teagun, too, was without a word to say. He became quieter and more withdrawn than ever, an accomplishment I’d have thought impossible for he was normally rather stern. He, too, must have had a lot to think over.

  As if we didn’t have anything else to do, we remained by the lake, watching waves breaking upon the shore. The movement of the water must have been fascinating, since we couldn’t seem to look away from the sight. He didn’t want to speak of that kiss? Fine. Neither did I.

  At last I sighed and glanced up at him. I would put the interlude out of my mind, I decided. Totally forget it had ever happened. Simpler that way. “So? What’s next?”

  With a hitch of his shoulders, Teagun got down to business. “I go back to the hotel and make another tag, that’s what. And another, and another, until the outlaws are all taken.”