A Rope of Thorns (25 page)

Yancey described him, and watched Morrow’s face fall.

“Sounds like Kees Hosteen, to me,” he said. “He was in Rook’s gang; last man standing, really, after Mictlan-Xibalba. I sent him to get help, before we left, but we were gone when he got back. Died in Tampico, walkin’ into a bullet meant for—someone else.”

“Can your Reverend Rook raise the dead?”

Morrow snorted. “Don’t doubt he can, considerin’ how much there is of it in the Bible.”

They sat, ruminating on the concept. ’Til Geyer said, slowly, “If I’d been more attentive, I might’ve known what to expect later on at the Hoard, ’specially after noticing how the . . . remains . . . of Sheriff Love were gone from Bewelcome square. But I was so engaged in taking Asbury’s readings, it simply never occurred to me—not even when I saw tracks leading off into the desert, and that mystery light poor Mister Frewer described off in the far distance, moving faster than any human eye could follow.”

Love, travelling quick, as the dead tend to do.

Morrow frowned again. “Readings? He gave you the Manifold?”

“
A
Manifold, yes. To take the data he needed.”

“‘A’—hold the hell on, Frank. There’s more than one, now?”

And with that, they were off again, Geyer sinking back into a lengthy explication of Asbury’s various achievements: a whole tiny Manifold factory ensconced in one boxcar of Pinkerton’s king-train, churning out fifty of the things a day (Yancey caught a flash of the one Morrow’d once carried from his mind, spasming painful ’gainst his waistcoat pocket-seams as a heart attack in progress). Geyer drew it out, flipped it open with a thumb-tip, and they all admired the way its needles clicked immediately roof-ward, toward Chess—the single most magic-charged object to be found, doubtless, within several vicinities.

“Didn’t even guess you had that on you,” Morrow said, amazed. Geyer shrugged.

“Much good it’s done me, considering they let me go without any real instruction. But it’s like George Thiel said—now the die’s been cast, this machinery of the Professor’s
will
change the world as we know it, for better or for worse. There’s no stopping it.”

Like so much else,
Yancey thought, the cold feeling in her guts returning.

“Mister ‘Grey,’” she asked, “why was it your boss thought this Mister Thiel unreliable?”

Geyer’s eyes met hers yet again—this shock was softer, though still potent. Something he’d carried without examining, for longer than he’d had time to feel guilty over.

“A long story,” he said. “Suffice it to say . . . someone had, indeed, been
gravely
misinformed.”

“Pinkerton?” Morrow asked.

Geyer shook his head, sadly. “No,” he replied. “Me.”

After Geyer’d divested himself of the rest of his tale, laid out the full extent of his and Morrow’s mutual former employer’s perfidies in fine and horrid detail, he sat as though gutted. The fire burned down, reddening the darkness ’til everything around them hurt somewhat to contemplate—or perhaps that was just Morrow’s skull, which had begun to pound, erratic as that tooth old Doc Glossing had “painlessly” pulled, what now seemed like fifty years before.

“He’s a man of parts,” Morrow said, finally, of Pinkerton. “Well suited to make hard choices, as needs must. From what I’ve seen, though . . . can’t quite believe he’d be capable of all
that
.”

Geyer shook his head. “Nor I, Ed; nor I. And yet . . .” He winced, as though Morrow’s ache were catching.

The conversation ran dry once more, with little hope of revivification.

“I’m for bed,” Geyer said, finally, bolting the last of his drink. To Yancey: “Would you be willing to share with me, Mister . . . Kloves? I’d take the floor, of course, in practice.”

“That’d be right kind.”

“Then . . . should we both go up now, together?”

She hadn’t even been looking Geyer’s way previous to that, just contemplating middle-distance, but this last broke her free, and she made a regal little gesture of demurral. “Not just yet, sir; I need to speak with Mister Morrow awhile. Then he can escort me, later on.”

“Without makin’ it look like I
am
escorting her,” Morrow assured them both. “Us all being fellows together, like we are.”

“Yes,” Geyer agreed, and rose, stiffly. “Goodnight, then . . . gentlemen.”

Geyer climbed the stairs, leaving them alone but for Joe, who busied himself where he stood behind the bar with haphazardly polishing something below eye level. Once upon a time, Morrow might’ve feared it was a shotgun—but he was honestly tired enough from a day and night of hexacious combat plus magickal travel, followed by a bunch of secrets he’d frankly rather not know, that he could barely rouse himself to care, either way.

From the corner of his eye, he observed Missus Kloves run a nail up inside the sweaty band of her beaver. To distract her, he leaned forward and inquired, low: “So . . . how you like it so far? Bein’ took for a man, I mean.”

“It’s different. Not so bad, I suppose, apart from having to wear this.”

Morrow shrugged, touching his own hat’s brim. “You get used to it.”

“Do you? Well . . .” She shot a look over at Joe, who made sure to be staring elsewhere. “If it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll doff it.”

Joe’s canny, not blind,
Morrow felt like saying. But instead, he allowed: “Your call.”

She sighed. “Yes.”

A breath of a pause, which Morrow almost felt catch in his throat, and the decision was made—she lifted the offending headwear free, letting what was left of her marriage-day braids swing loose along with it, then dug in with both hands and unravelled them further, fluffing the solid mass out briskly. It fell to frame her face, two fistfuls deep, softening the pert lines of her jaw ’til her true sex was unmistakable—and Morrow took the thrum of it like a blow to the chest, Joe’s clear gasp echoing the one he feared to make.

Missus Kloves turned in her chair, lifting her eyes to Joe’s once more—and this time, he met them. “Ma’am,” he said, voice dry.

“Sir. Can I rely on your discretion?”

Joe considered this a second. Then: “Spring out for another bottle . . . real cash, this time . . . and it’s a deal.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Believe you’ll have to spot me, then,” she told Morrow.

“Guess I could stand another drink,” he said.

The “whiskey” was rotgut, which Morrow appreciated, since it meant Joe was letting them off cheap. Missus Kloves—
Yancey
, he reminded himself, God
damn
—took only the barest sip, visibly strained to withhold a coughing fit, then slid hers over.

“Your Mister Pargeter . . .” she began.

“He ain’t—” Too fast; he bit the words off, re-thought a bit. Carefully: “I got no real claim on Chess—we travel together, is all. He’s his own, if he’s anybody’s.”

“I truly meant no disrespect. Just that . . . people assume things, I’m sure.”

Pink touched up the apple of one cheek, shading to crimson; her eyes had already flicked away. More blushes all ’round, tonight, than at a church ladies’ sewing circle.

Deny it, right to her face,
his nethers suggested meanly,
and you still might have a chance. Chess won’t mind
—
ain’t like he’s Jesus, or you Peter. You don’t owe him
everything
.

Man’d been first to say it himself, after all:
I somewhat think you like that gal, Ed.
Like he was all but daring Morrow to do something about it.

“I can’t lie,” he said, finally. “I do count myself his friend, and we have been . . . friendly. But though I maintain there’s more things in him to admire than he’ll give himself credit for, I’m not his kind, which we both well know. So far, there’s been one man only for Chess in this whole world, that I’ve seen—and that man ain’t me.”

“So you
don’t
love him, then.” When Morrow didn’t answer, she went on, feeling her way: “Or . . . it’s a different sort of affection entirely, like me for Uther—for I
did
care, enough to honour my vows to the end, no matter what Mister Pargeter might think. Brotherly, perhaps?”

Morrow drained the extra glass fast, muttering, “Be a damn bad sort of brother, if it was.”

Giving thanks to Christ, at the same time he said it, that she’d never yet had occasion to touch
his
skin the way she had Geyer’s, much as part of him might want her to. Because that meant she wasn’t already privy to a whole host of chancy recollections, each with Chess’s name firmly attached: The flash of sweat between his freckled shoulder blades as Morrow hammered down hard into him, urged on by raucous cries; feel of his red beard’s slide in inconvenient places, mouth blazing a wet trail, as pleasure spilled over into pain. Or even the taste of last night’s breath mingling come morning, turning bad to good, fast as two pricks jerk upwards.

“He’s brave,” she allowed, obviously noting his continued embarrassment, yet blessedly unaware of the specifics. “That counts for something, I suppose.”

“Counts for a whole damn lot, in my book.”

“But is he trustworthy? That’s what I’m asking.”

“So long as
other people
are, around him . . . I’d have to say yes.” Morrow’s eyes sought hers, held them. “I mean—you’re trustworthy enough. I like to think I am.”

“Some would say you used to lie for a living, Mister Morrow.”

“Couldn’t’ve been too good at it, then. ’Cause I sure lost
that
job.”

At this, she gave a tiny grin followed by a snicker, and he paid her back in kind. Wondering if she saw anything at all whenever she happened to glance his way, ’sides from a fool twice her age, with unsteady morals and odd habits.

I’m an idiot,
Morrow thought.

Yancey sighed. “So he means well at heart, according to you, no matter how rudely he behaves,” she said, as to herself. “Very well: I’ll take that as wrote, if I must. But like I said, if he keeps on spendthrifting that extra hexation we gifted him with on trifles, tossing it ’round like Katy-bar-the-door, we’ll be trouble-bound long before Sheriff Love catches up with us.”

“Which you think he will.”

“Think?” Another smile—wider, and far more fixed. “Mister Morrow . . . I pray for such a meeting, devoutly. I
count
on it.”

Though he’d figured her for being able to take care of herself long before her wedding-rout, the look that came into her eyes as she said this near froze him to his seat. Her initial grief and shock had given way to something darker—a thing he only now realized he’d feared might happen, all along—and Morrow found himself somewhat pitying the next person who might get between her and the next opportunity to work vengeance on Sheriff Love’s salt-cured corpse.

Again, he tried to turn her thoughts in another direction. “We can just pray more power into him, I reckon, we have to . . . you being his high priestess, or what-have-you.”

“Is that what I am?” She considered the idea. “No, I doubt that: anyone’s shed blood would do just as well to feed him, from what we witnessed.”

“Not without you to pray over it, it wouldn’t.”

“But . . . you prayed too, Mister Morrow. So . . .”

“Might be it’s
both
of us that’s needed, to work that particular trick,” he finished, without thinking. And got another little kick in the ribs from how his heart leaped to see her string the truth together equal-swift, forehead knit in concentration, like somebody’d taken up an invisible stitch between her fine, dark brows and yanked, hard.

“It’s a puzzle, all right,” she said. “And we don’t have much time.”

Morrow cast his mind back to the Hoard, how he’d felt the sheer force of his and Yancey’s worship spin almighty-powerful Chess between ’em like a child’s whipped top. A double possession dragging alien words from both their lips—rendering centuries-old jabber-squawk to English, while the power they’d unwittingly harnessed went surging forth through the newly greened ground, fighting its way up into Chess like a flooded river spilling its dam. It was the sheer responsiveness of the tremendous energies they’d dallied with that scared the bejesus out of him, even now. Yet in the end, Morrow knew none of the power was his, or hers. It had been placed under their temporary command for one purpose only: to render it up to Chess, even as Chess fought it off with every last particle of bone and sinew.

A sick breath out of the dark, memory-borne stench of cold draft and wet rock walls: “English” Oona Pargeter’s raddled whore’s pan, opium-cooked from the inside-out, cured like meat. A woman reduced to nothing but need, just dead flesh still teetering upright, wrapped like Hell’s own candy in hate and poison.

The only thing Ed Morrow knew for sure Chess Pargeter feared, in life or death, was the thought that he might be likewise helpless one day before a similar hunger. So to find himself a hex, after all that—and not
just
a hex, either, but a damn blood-drunk god of hexes, power magnified beyond all comprehension alongside the clamouring jones for more, ever
more
.

If Oona had ever thought to put a curse on him, that’d’ve been a doozy, right there. And seeing how hexes bred hexes, who knew? Having met her the once, Morrow certainly wouldn’t have put it past her to try.

But now he blinked free of contemplation, realizing Yancey was repeating something. “I’m sorry?”

“I said, I’ve drunk my fill; looks to me like you have, too. Time to retire, for both of us.”

“Probably best, yes.”

Now even Joe was gone, leaving the whole place vacant. As they paused on the landing, poised to go their separate ways, he asked her (again without thinking, as seemed to be the pattern): “You’ll be all right?”

Fresh ridiculousness piled on top of a whole heap, enough to make him grit his teeth ’til they squeaked. But she didn’t even seem to notice.

“Don’t rightly know, Mister Morrow,” she replied. “I’ll have to, I expect.”

Then, quick as a fawn, she had already crossed over to her room—Geyer’s, rather—and clicked the door to, shutting him in the hall.

Inside “his” suite, meanwhile, nothing stirred, though Morrow doubted Chess was sleeping; he didn’t appear to need to, these days, no more than to eat or drink, dress himself, or keep track of his possessions. Whatever he wanted for, he could conjure—just like anything he
didn’t
want could be as easily disposed of, with even less warning.