“No, please, don’t hurt her anymore,” Brenda said, using Angelique’s voice. “I’ll meet you at the corner of Canal and Basin. Bring Angelique.”
“I sincerely hope you’re not going to try anything. I’d hate for you to experience the death of your cousin,” Mac said. He shoved Brenda out of her cousin’s mind.
“What’s wrong?” Sara asked. “Are you all right?”
“Come on,” she said, pulling Sara out of the bar.
As they walked to the meeting place, Brenda explained everything to Sara.
“I don’t need magic to know that he’s dangerous,” Sara said. “Do you really think he’ll just let us walk away after he gets the information from you?”
Brenda shook her head. “At the best, he’ll use his power to scramble our minds, which could probably turn a normal person into a vegetable. You know what the worst case is. Angelique and I could probably fight off some of his power together, but I don’t think we could protect you, too. In fact, you should go somewhere safe until this is over.”
“No can do, not while Angelique’s in danger. I’ve lived in New Orleans long enough to suspect there was something to magic, but I’m not sure I can believe all of this,” Sara said as they walked down the street.
“I understand your skepticism,” Brenda said. “If you won’t leave, then you have to do whatever I say, whether you believe or not.”
Sara nodded.
Brenda looked up at the entrance to St. Louis Cemetery Number 1.
“We’ll meet them inside.”
Sara hesitated. “Not that I’m afraid, but I don’t think cemeteries and magic are a good mix.”
“I’m hoping not.” Brenda said a quick chant asking for the blessings of the dead before they entered.
They walked past the rows of stone houses. The full moon made the white stone crypts and concrete ground glow. Brenda went to a brick wall of arches, burial holes for the poorer community. A couple of the arch fronts had crumbled, leaving gaping openings. She laid her hand on the front of each small arch until she felt the vibration she needed.
“Someone in here died angry and betrayed.”
“What are you doing?” Sara asked.
“Trying to get us out of the mess I got us into.” She put her finger to her lips to quiet Sara.
She pulled a piece of red yarn out of a small bag in her pocket. Holding the yarn against the sealed burial hole, she said:
“With this knot I seal this spell.
You will not rest, you will not tell.
Knots of red, knots times three,
Bringing chaos and forgetfulness
From the rage within to thee.
So mote it be.”
Each time she tied a knot, she said the spell, until she had tied three knots in the yarn. She bowed to the crypt, said a chant of thanks to the bones within and put the yarn in her pocket.
“Let’s go,” she said, running back to the cemetery entrance. They stopped within the borders of the grounds. “When they get here, I’ll take care of Mac. You keep your eye on the woman.”
A blue car pulled up slowly to the entrance. Mac got out with Angelique and the Asian woman. Mac walked with his arm around Angelique’s waist and one hand holding the laser knife against her side. Angelique held her wounded hand tucked under her arm. She stumbled at the edge of the sidewalk. The woman held a gun down at her side. They stopped outside the entrance.
“Are you all right?” Sara asked.
“Don’t worry, she’ll be fine,” Mac said. “A cemetery. Somewhat fitting, if you try to trick me.”
“The information is in a memory rod in here.” Brenda pointed into the cemetery.
“Then let’s get it, and finish this,” the Asian woman said.
“This way,” Brenda said, leading them back to the brick wall.
Sara tried to talk to Angelique, but the woman waved her ahead with the gun. They walked past the sealed burial arches to one that was open. The concrete entrance had collapsed inside the arch.
Brenda put her hand inside, pushing aside chunks of concrete. “How do I know you’ll let us go?”
“I didn’t think you’d argue with sharing a forgetfulness spell between the three of you.” Mac smiled.
“Okay.” Brenda glanced at Sara and Angelique quickly. Sara stood next to the woman with the gun. Mac lowered the knife toward the ground. Brenda grabbed a chunk of concrete from inside the arch and threw it at the woman’s head, hitting her in the face. As she fell backwards, the gun went off, the bullet grazing Brenda’s arm. Sara jumped on the woman and slammed her head into the ground until she passed out.
Angelique grabbed Mac’s wrist with her good hand and swung with all her weight, throwing him off balance. There was a crack as his wrist broke, making him scream and drop the knife. Brenda rushed in, and kicked him in the back of his knee. He crumbled to the ground. Sara grabbed the knife, sat on his back and held it to his neck.
“Don’t move, Mac, or I’ll activate the blade, and you won’t care if the wound is sealed,” she said.
Brenda pulled the knotted yarn out of her pocket and dragged the Asian woman next to Mac. She sat between them on the ground, placed her left hand on the woman’s forehead and grasped Angelique’s hand with her right along with the yarn. Angelique knew immediately what Brenda intended, and let the fingers of her injured right hand touch the back of Mac’s head. Brenda said:
“With this knot I seal this spell.
You will not rest, you will not tell.
Knots of red, knots times three,
Bringing chaos and forgetfulness
From the rage within to thee.
So mote it be.”
Electricity shot through the cousins into their captives. Mac’s body stiffened, as did the woman’s unconscious body. Brenda said it again. Mac moaned, “No.” The third time Brenda said it, Mac’s body went limp. The cousins closed their eyes.
They were falling in a dark sky. Thunder and lightning cut through the air. Four bodies tumbled in a circle, hands tightly clasped, as if fused together. The first word of Brenda’s spell echoed in a strange voice around them, like the sound of a car crash. The screech of metal became winged creatures, their long beaks and tails ending in razor-sharp edges. On the second word, the creatures swooped at them, using their beaks and tails to cut and whip at the woman and Mac.
Mac tried to pull away, but the more power he gathered, the bigger the creatures grew. The woman screamed uncontrollably.
The voice continued reciting each word of the spell with building rage and poisonous anger. Thick blood splashed on the cousins as the creatures tore and ripped away at Mac and the woman. On the last word, Brenda and Angelique released their hands and opened their eyes.
“You don’t have to hold the knife on him anymore,” Brenda said. She took the knife from Sara and helped Angelique stand up. Brenda’s upper arm stung and bled where the bullet had brushed it. She looked at her cousin’s missing fingertip. “Let’s get you to a doctor.”
Angelique laughed weakly. “You need to have that arm looked at, too.”
“So, we just walk out of here and leave them?” Sara asked.
“They won’t bother us again. Their memory is in pieces, ripped to shreds,” Brenda said.
“Where did you keep the information they were after?” Sara asked, putting her arm around Angelique’s waist.
Brenda turned, and smiled in the moonlight. She jangled the charm bracelet in the air. “Mac was right. I always carry the data with me. But tonight I downloaded it somewhere even safer.”
“Tonight?” Angelique asked, leaning against Sara. “You put it in Milez.”
Brenda smiled.
Black Frontiers
Maurice Broaddus
Kansas, 1887
Govie Ikard had a bad feeling about the job from the start.
She shoved a few drunken louts out of her way, cutting through the throng gathered in Old Man Stevens’ barn. Fists clutching tattered doll
ars waved in the air. Some men stood on wood crates for a better view, the air thick with the stink of exhaled alcohol.
The commotion centered around a cleared dirt space, where two men circled each other. Rumors had circulated about how one of them was afraid to face the other in a contest to see who had the best hands, rumors probably started by the same fools throwing their money around now. A big country boy with straw-colored hair clumped to his red face looked to trade punches with a Negro built like an oak. The Negro stood six-and-a-half feet if an inch, and was every bit the man that had been described to her.
“The Ninth marched out with splendid cheer,” the Negro sang to himself. His coal eyes radiated a disturbing acceptance, an unnerving calm. She knew from the moment she first set eyes on him that he was different. He stood straight and proud, with no hint of fear.
That country boy’s face hardened. No more than a backwoods brawler, he rushed in. The Negro, not moving to evade him, stepped in, smashing the boy’s nose. The blow landed like a clap of thunder. The boy grunted, a surprised look on his face, then walloped the Negro in the body. Years on the farm had given him hands like a slab of beef. Before long, they wrestled around, the spectators scrambling out of the way of their huge bodies. The dull-witted crowd roared with appreciation, but they didn’t see what Govie saw. The two seemed a fairly even match, but the Negro moved too well. He was toying with that country boy. They tussled in the dirt, each trying to get the better of the other. The Negro clubbed the boy’s gut so hard that even the crowd winced. The boy threw an off-balance blow to the Negro’s jaw. Shaking it off, and having taken the boy’s full measure, the Negro began to chop him down with powerful punches, any one of which would have sent any man in the crowd to sleep. The boy got an odd glint in his simple blue eyes, as if it occurred to him that he might lose this fight to a Negro. He picked up a wooden crate and crashed it across the Negro’s backside, sending him sprawling to the ground in a cloud of dust and straw. The crowd cheered again. The boy turned to greet his supporters, whose back-patting cries choked short. He caught sight of their faces staring behind him. He turned in time to kiss the Negro’s fist. He went flying past his supporters into the barn wall. He didn’t bother getting back up.
“Didn’t know you were that strong,” a man said, clapping the Negro on his back before counting his winnings.
“Never had to show it before,” the Negro said. He looked over at the country boy with something approaching pity. The boy’s friends helped him out the door without so much as a backwards glance. None of the men who had won from his labors stayed behind long or offered even to buy him a drink. He picked up his shirt from the hay and buttoned it. That was when he first noticed Govie.
“Well, ain’t you the fiercest buck I done seen in these parts,” Govie said.
“I reckon.” His thick lips barely moved when he spoke.
“Mind if I buy you a drink?”
“I don’t drink.”
“Then mind if you come watch me drink while I make you a business proposition?” she asked, the way that mothers did when they were telling their children what they were going to do. She cottoned to him mite fast. He had a swagger about him, almighty impressed with himself. The man was quite a sight. Pulling his suspenders over his hunting shirt, he clutched a dusty Union soldier’s jacket. Govie noticed a buffalo insignia on the jacket. Neither the shirt nor the jacket made a lick of sense with his buckskin leggings and cavalry boots with Mexican spurs.
She pulled her wool cap snugly over her head, and fastened her coat by just the top button. She stood an even six feet tall, and the blue skirt was the only thing that gave a clue that she was, in fact, a woman. She was not exactly sure of her birthday, but Andrew Jackson had been president. All her years of living made her mean as a tripped-over rattlesnake, but she figured that she had a good twenty years left in her. Too stubborn to die, she lit a huge cigar while she drank.
“What’s your name, son?” she asked only to be polite, since he’d already made quite a name for himself. A writer even spun a series of dime novels based on some of his misadventures.
“Bose Roberds.”
“I’m Govie Ikard, but most folks ’round here call me Stagecoach Govie.” She felt his eyes studying her, trying to make sense of her and gauge the legitimacy of any offer that she might make. He was a smart one, for sure.
“What’s the job?”
“Escort a stagecoach. Some sort of special cargo they want guarded. I already hired a scout. Now I’m looking for another hand.”
“Hand? You mean fist.”
“Something like that. Things may not even come to that, but I could use the company, and I bet you could use the job.”
“For who?”
“St. Peter’s Mission.”
Something in the air changed around him, like something left him. “We working for mission folks?”
“That gonna be a problem?”
“No man on a stick ever did anything for me. I make my own way.”
“Shut your fool mouth,” Govie said, half-offended, or leastways not wanting God to rain down any judgments on them. She wasn’t what anyone would call a religious woman, but she had respect for it. Except for the time she spent as a slave, she’d lived a life under the stars, in the mountains, in view of sunsets and sunrises. God’s creation taught her a religion of the heart. So she appealed to his practical side. “A job’s a job, unless this whole bare-knuckle fighting’s paying better than I think.”
Bose’s expression, which she assumed meant he was thinking, reminded her of a cow chewing its cud. The saloon doors opened to the murmurs of some customers. Govie cut a sideways glance before returning her eyes to Bose. He tracked the man approaching their table. She chomped on her cigar.
“Who’s he?” Bose locked eyes on the man, who paid him no mind. She recognized the mild look of confusion in Bose’s eyes. Few knew what to make of her traveling companion, whether he was Negro or Indian. The man took his place behind her, then crossed his arms.
“Daniel Gray Cloud, the scout I was telling you about. He doesn’t speak much.”
“Mute?”
“Naw. He knows English, Spanish and Seminole; maybe a couple others, but he won’t tell. He just don’t speak.”
“Ever?” Bose asked.
“Only when he has something to say.”
“That’s the most damn foolish thing I ever heard.”
“I wished more men had sense enough to shut up.”
Govie kicked an empty chair out for Gray Cloud, but the stubborn cuss remained standing. He was handsome, with features like a European gentleman and smooth skin on a fearless face, except for the scar over his left eye. How he got the scar was never mentioned, but it grayed his eye to uselessness. Bronzed to the hue of tree bark, he had black hair that grew long and straight to his broad shoulders. He dressed like a Union soldier, except for his moccasins and a handful of feathers in a hat whose brim had been folded back.
“They ready?” Govie turned to Gray Cloud. He nodded. She turned back around, finished another heavy draught of whiskey and slammed her glass to the table. “You in?”
“I reckon. Nothing better to do,” Bose said.
“Then. Let’s go.”
Cascade wasn’t quite a trail town, but it had its share of herders come through looking to blow off steam. It also served as a way station for Exodusters, freed slaves who moved into Kansas on their way to Cascade’s sister town, Nicodemus, one of thirty Negro communities in Kansas. Govie feared for Cascade. She’d never seen a prosperous town so lifeless. Gray dust swirled about the streets. Wind-battered frame buildings, with cracked paint and worn boards, greeted them. She watched the people of the town with their panic-stricken eyes grow pallid, ghostlike. They carried themselves like frightened children carrying a terrible secret. Her town was dying.
And that put her in a foul mood.
She spied the perfect person on whom to vent her frustration: a man who never paid her for his ride
to Cascade. He was a Boomer, one of the white settlers trying to settle the Unassigned Lands, lands not yet designated for a specific tribe. He and his companion were walking along the opposite side of the street, trying to act as if they didn’t see her.
“I thought I told you that I didn’t want to see you tinhorns in my town.”
“I don’t care what some nigger bitch says. Trying to charge a white man to ride her stage.”
“Uh, Bill, that’s—” his companion offered.
“I don’t give a right damn who that is.”
Govie spit at the ground, then stepped to the man. Bose moved to back her up, but Gray Cloud stopped him. Govie stared at the man, hard eyes unflinching. He didn’t have time to dodge. She knocked him flat.
“That’s the last time I deal with you Boomer trash. Consider your bill ‘settled’.”
The Boomer rubbed his jaw, looking like he’d been sprayed in the face by a skunk.
“Those are the kind of antics that caused your dismissal from our employ the first time,” a thin-chested, square-faced man with a bushy mustache and windswept black hair called to her. He carried a Bible the size of a small trunk by his side.
“As I recall, you fired me for defending myself in a gunfight.” Govie’s face drew down in hard lines, as if she had tasted some spoiled meat.
“Your assailant had already missed.”
“He made the quarrel. And I let him live. Just fired close enough to let him know that I was letting him live.”
“We don’t tolerate . . . gunslingers.”
“Yeah, unless you have a job too dirty for your pretty little church hands, Bishop.”
“He don’t look none too pleased to see you,” Bose whispered loud enough for him to hear.
“It takes a while for Bishop Early to warm up to a lady,” Govie said, then spat at his feet. The bishop, apparently not given to saying anything coarse, stood looking ugly, then hustled off with his back stiff, the way it got when he was mad. It was plain that he didn’t like a woman who talked up to him the way she did. Govie’s lips crinkled in a way that was meant to be a smile.
Voices From The Other Side Page 28
