by Joel Jenkins
Suddenly a decidedly unmasculine cackle broke from the lips of the rifleman upon the rooftop and casting a radiation of malignant energies, which Crow and Rockwell could see and feel, he strode into sight, casting off the rifle with disdain.
“The two of you should be dead,” mouthed the kurdaitcha through the bounty hunter’s lips. “You’ve been a most persistent nuisance, and because of you I’ve lost an effective host. This pitiful vessel that I inhabit now has no standing or wealth to help bring about my plans.”
Rockwell didn’t wait to find out just what the kurdaitcha’s plans were; instead he thumbed back the hammer of his Dragoon and fired. The kurdaitcha gestured and the bullet froze and broke into tiny fragments before it reached her, so that the bounty hunter she inhabited was pelted with a spray of lead dust.
She laughed. “Your mortal weapons cannot harm me, Porter Rockwell.”
“You know my name?” croaked Rockwell.
A dark angel formed from the unholy aura that radiated from the bounty hunter, and it was the form of a woman with flowing curves and spectral wings, whose visage alternated between one of great beauty and the aspect of a grinning skull. This body of demonic energies stayed above the bounty hunter, tethered to his physical presence. “I know you, because you were a thorn in Sam Brannan’s side, a threat to his wealth which I planned to turn to my own purposes.”
Seeing the manifestation of this supernatural entity, the remaining bounty hunters turned to flee down the umbra of the alleyways, but the dark angel waved a taloned hand and the blood in their veins began to ice, so that they stumbled to the ground. Even now, Crow could feel a chill growing in the air. Frost formed along the muddy street, creeping toward him and Rockwell. No talisman or coin would save them from being frozen this time, for the kurdaitcha had fixed her ill gaze upon the two of them and was intent on causing their utter destruction.
The chill seeped into Crow’s limbs and his renowned lightning speed was reduced to a sluggish rise of his gun barrel as he used every bit of concentration to marshal and employ the muscles in his gun-arm, which mightily resisted his best efforts. Finally the sights were lined up and Crow pulled the trigger of his blessed Colt Peacemaker. With disdain, the kurdaitcha waved a spectral hand at the bullet, but the bullet from the blessed gun was not affected and it sped true, finding the chest of the bounty hunter upon the roof.
Immediately, the bounty hunter’s knees buckled beneath him and he pitched over the parapet. He struck the ground face first, snapping his neck but still the life lingered in him and the kurdaitcha was not detached from the physical vessel of the bounty hunter to which she was tethered until the last pulse of the heart ceased. Great rage and demonic hatred emanated from the manifestation of the kurdaitcha and she howled in anger.
“As soon as he dies I will possess your body, Lone Crow and I will peer into your mind and hunt down and slay every one that you have ever loved!”
“Your mortal weapons cannot harm me, Porter Rockwell.”
“Every one I’ve ever loved is already dead,” replied Crow, but even as he said these words he realized that they were not entirely true, for there were a few he loved that yet lived.
“Then I’ll hunt down every one that has ever done you a kindness and they will die horribly … that I promise!” raged the kurdaitcha.
“Empty promises,” said Crow. “You’ve attempted to possess both my body and Rockwell’s body and been rebuffed. What makes you think that this time you will succeed?”
The dark manifestation raised a taloned hand and closed it into a fist. “Because my anger will give me strength to obliterate your accursed protections!”
Rockwell tore his eyes away from the horrible sight of the kurdaitcha who began cursing and howling. “We’re minutes away from the bay, Crow. We can drag the bounty hunter’s body out into the water, far enough away from any living human that she hasn’t the power to possess anyone. The roar of the ocean will help drown out sound, so she will not be able to travel far.”
Crow pondered this course of action for just a moment. “We won’t have the time. She’ll slay us with the cold before we can ever reach the bay.”
The air grew icy and heavy and the mud beneath their boots froze into ice. Crow could feel the chill seeping into his bones and he could see ice crystals forming in Rockwell’s thick beard. The earth began to tremble and shake, splitting the ice, which had just formed, asunder—the hollow sound of the rending echoing in their ears.
Crow knew of only one way to temporarily abate the power of the kurdaitcha and that was to slay her host. He steadied himself against the upturned buckboard and fired, putting a second bullet into the bounty hunter’s broken body. This bullet finished the bounty hunter’s tenuous hold upon life, breaking the kurdaitcha’s tether with the body, and the fuliginous apparition of the kurdaitcha rushed upon them yet again, buffeting and bruising their bodies and seeking to enter any crevice or weakness. Rockwell stumbled over Brannan’s body, falling heavily upon him as the assault continued, but when finally the kurdaitcha realized that she would not be able to gain entrance she rushed away, for her time was limited and she must find a physical form to inhabit or shortly be banished to the nether realms from which she had once been summoned.
Rockwell climbed from his knees, gasping, and Crow was in little better shape. His dark hair hung in lank strands and he felt utter exhaustion from the kurdaitcha’s attack. A bit of warmth was returning to the air and the ice beginning to melt, droplets of moisture appearing in Rockwell’s beard.
“Where did she go?” asked Rockwell.
“We’re in the middle of a city,” said Crow. “There are plenty of people within the sound of her scream, which might have been possessed.”
“So how do we find her?”
“We don’t,” said Crow. “We could knock on hundreds of doors and never encounter her.”
Rockwell crouched over Sam Brannan’s quiet form, the ice flaking off his body. “So at best we’ve set the kurdaitcha’s plans back a couple of years.”
“Maybe,” said Crow, “but I don’t think this kurdaitcha is one to lightly give up a grudge. We’ve made her very, very angry.”
“Nothing like a ticked off kurdaitcha riding your heels,” said Rockwell. “Maybe it’s time I get out of San Francisco and retreat to friendlier climes.”
“Perhaps we shouldn’t make ourselves so difficult to find,” suggested Crow.
“You courting death, Crow?” Rockwell put his fingers just above Brannan’s lips and felt the whisper of a breath. “Brannan’s breathing again. My fall on him must have restarted his heart.”
“Better to meet the kurdaitcha on our own terms than never knowing when she’ll catch up to us,” said Crow.
“I suppose,” said Rockwell, but he didn’t appear to be convinced. “How is meeting the kurdaitcha on our own terms do us any good if we’ve got nothing that can kill her? You’ve got your blessed gun that can kill her host body, but it didn’t do nothing to the spirit inside except maybe make her angry. And she turns my bullets to snow flakes before they hit her. What good can I do except get frozen into a dad-blasted snowman?”
“First she’ll use her powers of persuasion to bring humans against us,” said Crow, “and you and I can fight humans. If that fails she will attempt to use her mastery over the element of cold to destroy us, and when she does we will be ready.”
Rockwell shook his head. “So where are we going to set up our last stand?”
Crow didn’t deny that it might well indeed be their last stand. “The same place where I believe she was summoned into this world. It sits on a ley-line and much corrupt magic was performed there, so I believe she will be drawn to it.”
“Corrupt magic?” repeated Rockwell. “I don’t much like the sound of that.”
“Nor do I, but you’ve already been doing business in close proximity to Murderer’s Bar. Leave word around San Francisco that Brown is returning to tend his bar at Middle Fork. Our kurdaitcha s
hould have no difficulties picking up our trail.”
Sam Brannan’s eyes flickered open and he shivered, clutching at the melting frost that glittered on his arms. “I am so cold.”
Rockwell wasn’t too sympathetic. “You’re lucky to be alive at all you four-flushing sack of steer chips.”
“What happened to me?”
“You don’t remember any of it?” asked Rockwell.
“No. No … not really,” answered Brannan, but there was a furtive look in his eye.
“I think you remember it well enough,” said Crow. “Now, just what was you and what was done under the influence of the devil I don’t know.”
“She … she forced me to do horrible things,” said Brannan.
“Ah,” said Rockwell. “I see that your memory is returning. Maybe, now that I’ve got your attention, you can tell me what you did with that fifteen thousand dollars worth of tithing gold that you collected from the California saints.”
“M-most of its gone,” admitted Brannan. “I bought a piece of property in Saratoga; a vineyard, or it will be.”
Rockwell scowled. “Just how much of the tithing have you got left?”
“Just the gold dust and nuggets I’ve got left in the pouch in my jacket.”
Rockwell reached inside Brannan’s jacket and extricated a one-shot Derringer pistol scarcely as big as his palm, and then found the pouch to which Brannan was referring. He opened it up and in the misty moonlight he could see the golden glint of nuggets and dust within. He hefted it in his palm, judging its weight. “This is scarcely two-hundred dollars worth of gold, Brannan. A far cry from the fifteen thousand that you owe the Lord.”
“It’s all I’ve got,” protested Brannan. “Don’t take it from me. I’ll starve!”
“May the Lord have mercy on you Brother Brannan.” Rockwell drew the string of the pouch tight and dropped it into his pocket. “I’ll be returning this to Brother Brigham so that he can see it serves the saints and builds the temple. As for you Sam Brannan, I forgive you. Let the Lord do with you what He will.”
“I’ll go hungry!” cried Brannan.
“Retire to your vineyard,” said Rockwell as he and Crow started down the street. “Live off the fruit of the vine and remember if you cross me again that next time I won’t be so merciful.”
6
The American River roared past Murderer’s Bar as Crow and Rockwell hunkered down in the damp bunker which they had dug out of the sand and rock and framed with heavy logs they had dragged from the woods. A small fire gave them warmth at the center of the bunker, and they each had three loaded rifles or carbines leaned up against the corners of their shallow pit.
Rockwell roasted a hare over the fire, and despite the enticing scent of dinner, an unsettling foreboding niggled at the corner of his mind. “I don’t much like this place, Crow. I avoided it even when I was tending my bar just yonder.”
“Evil lingers here,” agreed Crow. “It has seeped into even the rock and tainted the river waters. See how even the weeds that spring from the sand are pale, twisted things.”
Rockwell stared down the river and at the darkness of the forest, past the trio of tar-soaked teepees that stood at the edges of Murderer’s Bar. “This is the third night that we’ve camped in this forsaken pit we’ve dug. Do you really think the kurdaitcha is coming for us?”
Crow sliced a strip of meat from the roasting hare and sampled it. “I think that we’ve made a vengeful spirit very angry and she doesn’t have the temperament to do anything but hunt us down and kill us. It’s only a matter of time, Porter.”
“I’m having a devil of a time trying to keep my feet dry in the mean time,” said Rockwell.
As if in response to his complaint a rifle shot cracked in the darkness, flaring from the forest beyond the river’s edge, and the bullet sinking into the log bordering the pit in which they crouched. Crow was leaning against the log and he could feel the tremor run through it.
He licked his fingers clean as he ducked down, wiped his hand on his trousers and reached for one of the already-loaded rifles leaning in the corner. “It seems as though we’re done waiting.”
“Finally,” said Rockwell, who plucked up a Sharps rifle, “a target that I can vent my spleen on.”
“If only we could actually see them,” said Crow.
Now, a number of muzzle flashes blossomed in the night, the reports of the enemies’ rifles scarcely heard over the roaring of the river.
“I’m counting seven gunmen,” said Rockwell. “What have you got?”
“I’ve got seven as well.” None of the rifle shots got any nearer than the first, but the bullets fairly skipped around their dug-out fortress, and they could hear the whine of their passing.
“Maybe we should extinguish the fire,” said Rockwell. “So they have less of a target.”
“We may need the fire later,” said Crow. “We’re going to have to risk it.”
Rockwell fired a shot into the forest, in the general direction of a muzzle flash. He didn’t give much for his chances of actually hitting one of the riflemen. “That’s just to let them know that we’re here, alive and kicking.”
Crow unleashed a shot as well, but thought it just as unlikely that he might strike one of the enemy. He crouched down and took his time reloading while the enemy bullets moaned overhead. “Let them spend their ammunition. Eventually, they’ll realize that they need to get closer. That’s when we’ll hit them.”
Rockwell peered from over the lip of their makeshift palisade. “Hmph, it looks as though they’re already getting impatient.”
Indeed, moon-dappled figures scrambled from the woods, counting on the covering fire of their compatriots to give them safety while they advanced on Murderer’s Bar. For a moment their faces lifted and Rockwell could see beneath the concealing brims of their hats. He recognized at least two of them. “It’s Mad Henry Mortenson and Bloody Luke Piles; two of the nastiest blokes of Sydney Town, if ever I knowed just one of ‘em.”
Crow nodded. He’d all too many experiences with Sydney Town and its residents or ducks as the locals called them. It was nothing more than a penal colony which had relocated from the shores of Australia. Some of the residents had been given Tickets of Leave by British Magistrates who were more than happy to rid themselves of the nuisance of habitual criminals and thieves. Others had left the land of aborigines and kangaroos without bothering with any of the legal niceties. Once, already, firebugs from Sydney Town had burned San Francisco to the ground, just for the pleasure of watching the conflagration and warming their hands upon the flames.
“It looks as though the kurdaitcha has gathered together every murderer and cutthroat she could find in Sydney Town.” Rockwell popped up, laid his rifle on the log and put a bullet through the crown of an Australian who was splashing across the shallows of the river, thinking to use the rise of the sand bar as cover. He hadn’t been ducking low enough however, and a gout of blood spurted from his skull as he pitched backward and was pulled into the heavy currents of the river.
“Not every cutthroat and murderer,” replied Crow. “Or we’d have hundreds coming for us.”
Bloody Luke Piles disappeared from sight and into the umbra-cloaked landscape and scrub brush, reappearing from behind a stunted pine that clung to the rock and sand of the bar. He fired his rifle from the hip and struck Rockwell in his hat, so that it spun around on his head, the bullet entering through the brim, traveling around the Mormon’s head, and exiting at the back of the hat.
Crow had no such invulnerability to bullets, but when Bloody Luke Piles took a shot at Rockwell it temporarily exposed him to the aim of the Indian gunslinger. Crow threw his carbine to his shoulder and fired off a quick shot that punched through Bloody Luke Piles sternum and dropped him like a sack of barley.
Rockwell righted his hat upon his head. “That’s two down.”
Before he finished speaking Mad Henry Mortenson came barreling out of the darkness, firing wildly with his
pistol. None of his shots found their mark, though dirt and gravel sprayed from the dint of the ricocheting bullets. This did not deter Mad Henry Mortenson, however, and he launched himself into the pit, at Crow, bringing the barrel down on Crow’s head.
The Indian felt the impact of the barrel as it crushed the crown of his hat, but it was a glancing blow and Crow reversed his grip on his carbine and shoved the maple wood stock into Mortenson’s jaw. Though Crow heard the jaw pop out of place this did not deter Mortenson in the slightest., He struck at Crow over and over, with more ferocity than skill. Rockwell was busy firing at another Sydney Town Duck who was attempting to ford the shallows of the river, and so Crow was on his own. He managed to fend off the majority of the falling blows by raising the barrel and stock of his carbine in front of him to absorb the strikes. As the barrel of the pistol clanged against the barrel of his carbine, Crow thrust hard to gain a little space between himself and his opponent, and let go of his carbine. He reached down with his right hand and swept his tomahawk out of its sheath and the upward stroke carried the blade into the joint of Mortenson’s throat where it met his dislocated jaw.
Mad Henry Mortenson fell back against the side of the pit, clutching vainly at the tomahawk lodged in his throat. He burbled out some unintelligible curses and collapsed, blood running down the front of his flannel shirt. Briefly, Crow was reminded of the desperate battles he had fought against the rebels in the Civil War. Most of those were good, if perhaps misguided men, and he had shed tears at their deaths. There was nothing good about Mad Henry Mortenson, and Crow shed no tears at his passing. Instead, he grabbed up his last loaded rifle.
“Crow!” Rockwell fired a bullet at a woman who was fording the stream and it shattered into crystalline fragments before it ever touched her body. Where her bared legs touched the water, for she had hoisted the hem of her skirt, ice floes formed, and as she rose from the river she walked upon the edges which froze solid beneath her sand-caked toes. “It’s the kurdaitcha! She’s inhabited the body of Eliza ‘cutthroat’ Feller!”
