Dead Iron

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Cedar Hunt was halfway back to Mae Lindson’s house, having made his way to the Madders’ mine. He’d found the brothers gone, his clothes and guns wrapped up tidy as a parcel near their front door. Didn’t know where his horse was, either somewhere in the brothers’ mountain or maybe set loose. Didn’t take the time to track it down.

He’d promised Mae Lindson they would face the Strange together, but more than once he’d found himself blacking out in the saddle on his way back to her house, the wound stealing his strength and his senses away. Now he was on foot, pacing, waiting for the curse, the change, to slip over him.

The deep-belly warmth of the wolf stirring in him eased the pain in his side some. Maybe, he thought as he unbuttoned his shirt and folded it atop the mule’s saddle, the change would heal the wound. It would help; he was sure of that.

The moon, shaded to the waning, pushed up at the horizon’s edge as Cedar pulled off his boots, pants, and belt. He secured his clothing alongside the borrowed clothes and weapons, then drank down the last of the water from the canteen and secured it too.

He rubbed the mule’s muzzle, then pointed her in the direction of Mae’s house, and sent her on her way.

Moonlight, silver and pure, burnished the dry, golden land. And Cedar Hunt’s fingers found first the tuning fork, then the crescent moon and arrow chain still around his neck. He hoped the chain would help him keep his reason and wits one more time, so that he could find Elbert, find his brother, and hunt down Mr. Shunt.

He arched his back, bathing in the moonlight, no longer feeling the pain of his injury, no longer feeling any worries, any cares. If he couldn’t kill Mr. Shunt as a man, he’d sure as hell find a way to kill him as a wolf.

Cedar gave in to the change, relished the warmth and the thick haze of sensation that stretched and remade him. And then he lost himself, drowned himself in the killing needs of the wolf. And ran, toward town, toward Mae Lindson.

Rose Small considered not returning to her home. But there were things stashed there she might need, things that might help her save Mae. She ran up the porch stairs and through the main room to the stairs that led up to her bedroom tucked against the rafters. As she ran, her mind sorted options.

She didn’t have much time. If Mr. Shard LeFel had a few minutes more, she was sure the entire town would be marching out to burn Mae’s house down. Speed was the best she could do. Reach Mae before the town reached her. Warn her to run.

But if that didn’t work, they’d need weapons.

Rose pulled out a knapsack. The canvas was stiff, the buckles old, but strong. Into the bag she stuffed her spare dress, underthings, shoes, and sweater. She added the leather-wrapped tools Mr. Gregor had given her on the sly, and which she kept stashed beneath her bed, out of her parents’ sight.

She hesitated over the bits of brass and gears in the box under her bed. She had gathered all of it over the years, things she used to make things, fix things, devise things. She didn’t want to leave so much behind, but didn’t see how the weight of it, nor the bits themselves, would be of practical application tonight.

Instead, she packed bullets for her Remington and derringer.

Rose pulled on her overcoat. She’d added pockets on the inside of the coat, and into those she stashed bullets.

Rose found the messenger satchel, which she’d fashioned out of oiled leather. She tucked into it a sheaf of paper, pen and ink, her three books, and a thin but sturdy wool blanket.

Lastly, she drew her heartiest bonnet and a tool belt out from under her bed. She buckled the belt around her waist, holstering both guns into it, then put on the hat.

She took a moment to look around her room, at the only home she had known. Even though she wasn’t wanted, she would miss it. But it was time to move on. She’d known it for years. And now there was no denying it anymore.

Just as she turned toward the door, she saw one last thing. A palm-sized china doll that had been wrapped up in the blanket with her when she’d been abandoned on the doorstep. Impractical to take along now. She’d need room in her packs for other things. Like food.

Rose picked up the doll and hugged her tight to her chest. She had whispered all her hopes and fears to that doll, had held her and pretended she was a gift from her real mother, an admission that her mother left her behind out of love, not hate or shame.

“No place for you now,” Rose whispered to the doll. She placed her on the window, facing the street below and the horizon beyond, so she could look out at the world.

Then Rose left her room, her home. She closed the door behind her and did not look back.

The grumble and growl of the crowd spilling out from the church, the racket of horses and wagons being mounted, lined up, and loaded, pricked fear into her heart. Rose ran down the street, taking the shadows, taking the less-traveled ways. She might yet be able to steal up a horse at the livery and ride hard out to Mae’s. She might yet get there before the town had even started their hunt.

The edge of town was coming up quick. The livery just a few yards off. She could smell the wet straw and stink of the horses inside. Almost there now.

Hands grabbed her arms and waist, lifted her, and pressed her against the wall of the livery outbuilding.

Rose struggled, and worked to get at her gun in her pocket. “Let me go, Henry Dunken!”

“Hold on, now,” a voice said. Not Henry.

Rose blinked, and realized it wasn’t Henry who had hold of her wrists. It was the Madder brothers. All three of them, hair wild, eyes wilder, and their smiles looking half-crazed.

“We hope you’ll excuse us our sudden detainment of you,” Alun said, “but time is ticking down.”

“Let me go,” Rose demanded.

The brothers, Bryn and Cadoc, who held her on either side, let go of her. Rose hadn’t expected that.

“This is a matter of grave importance, Rose Small,” Alun said. “Otherways we would not have snatched you down in the middle of your flight.”

“I have matters of my own to attend and no time for any other grave things, Mr. Madder,” Rose said with her chin tipped up.

Alun’s grin appeared in his beard. He nodded. “Aye. Then tell us this and we’ll let you about your way. What did you see in that boy back at the church?”

“Why do you care?” Rose replied. “It may as well have been nothing for all the good it did.”

“Enough of nothing that you’re running, pockets full and foot-fast, out of the town you’ve been raised in,” he noted.

“They won’t believe me,” Rose said. “I thank you for standing up to Mr. LeFel back there on my behalf. But that doesn’t make us beholden to each other.”

Alun glanced over at Bryn, who shrugged his heavy shoulders.

Cadoc, the youngest brother, spoke. “Please forgive our crude manners,” he said. “We’ve been long, too long, unto these lands, and the heat of our concern tempers our actions.” Here he gave Alun a look. Alun shook his head and stared up at the sky, shoving his hands in his pockets as if awaiting a late train.

“What we wonder, Miss Small,” Cadoc continued, “is if you see the Strange.”

Rose caught her breath. What should she say to these drunken miners? She’d barely spoken to them in the time they’d been in town, and she had no reason to trust them not to do her harm. Except for that they had stood up for her back in the church.

“I don’t know that I understand your meaning,” she hedged. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to go now.”

“Rose,” Alun said softly in the tone she’d always thought best suited a father. “Miss Rose,” he corrected. “We mean you no harm, lass. But if you can see the Strange, it would make a difference to us, and to what we can do to help you save your friend Mae Lindson.”

Rose blinked and tried to swallow that all down. “Help me? Why?”

Alun grinned and it was a wicked thing. “If for no other reason than to make that whoreson LeFel squirm.”

“I don’t throw my lots in with strangers,” Rose said.

“We give you our word.” Alun extended his hand.

“Our word and honor,” Bryn added, placing his hand alongside Alun’s.

“Word, honor, and protection,” Cadoc said, leaning in to add his hand to the brothers’, so that their hands were offered, palm to back to palm, toward her.

Rose supposed it wasn’t a safe thing to accept the promise of men who were likely mad. But then, folk thought the same thing about her, and they were wrong. “You’ll help me save Mrs. Lindson?” she asked.

“Aye, girl,” Alun said. “That and more.”

“And what will you expect me to pay?”

Alun nodded approvingly. “Your answer to our question. And a favor.”

The sound of the town rising up and making ready made Rose glance over her shoulder. She half expected to see men riding with torches and guns. No more time to think this through. She had made her decision.

Rose shook their hands. “Done.”

“Can you?” Cadoc asked.

“Can I what?” Rose said.

“See the Strange?”

Rose looked into his eyes. He was patient, waiting, as if he had all of time for her answer.

“Yes,” she said in a rush. “I can. Mostly. But that doesn’t matter now. I need to warn Mae Lindson.”

“No horse, no mount, no wings,” Bryn mused. “You’ll not get there fast enough with those feet of yours.” He gave her a sly look. “You weren’t figuring to procure a horse from the livery, were you?”

Rose felt the blush fire her cheeks. “There’s no other way I can get to her place fast enough.”

“We’ve ways,” Alun said. “Come this way, lass. We’ve a shortcut.”

Alun rambled off into the dark, moonlight sliding over him and setting him to burnish as if he were made of steel. He waved his hand over his shoulder. “Now, girl. There’s not much time.”

Rose started off after Alun, his brothers following behind her. This was madness, following three crazy devisers into the brush, alone, in the night. “This shortcut will take us to Mae Lindson’s house?” she asked.

“Yes,” Alun’s voice floated back to her through shadows cast by trees and the stretch of chimneys and walls of the town. “But first, we’ll need weapons.”

He stopped by a large boulder and Rose stopped behind him. They were on the edge of the town where scrub rolled up and away across the rocky hill. Alun looked over at her. “We trust you’ll keep this secret minded,” he said.

“Is that the favor I owe you?”

Alun’s eyebrows shot up, and then he laughed, loud and bellyfull. “You’ve got wit, for sure. No, that’s not the favor proper. That favor we’ll come to terms on after we take care of your friend. But I have your word?”

“Yes.” Rose was about willing to promise anything if the brothers would hurry this up. She was losing far more time than she was gaining.

“Good.” Alun pulled a lever, cleverly hidden at the base of the boulder, and the boulder itself rolled aside, clunking and grinding as if unused, dragged on pulleys beneath the ground.

Cadoc and Bryn struck flint and steel to candles they produced from within the voluminous pockets of their coats, and Alun did the same. In the wan candlelight, Rose could see a wooden ladder leading down deep into the earth.

Alun walked to the edge of the hole and started down. “Hurry on, girl. These tunnels will take us quickly to your friend’s side.”

Rose looked away from the fall of his candlelight sinking deeper and deeper, looked instead at the brothers Bryn and Cadoc.

Bryn said, “We have supplies hidden in the tunnels. And have mapped a route that will take us to the Lindsons’ farm. You’ll see no harm at our hands, Miss Small.” He gestured toward the mouth of the tunnel. “After you.”

Rose took one last deep breath of clean air and nodded. Then she started down the stairs into the heart of the world.