Peacemaker (9780698140820) (8 page)

The hauler was just where they'd left it, though Warner and his vigilante mob were long gone. Caleb mounted up and turned the construct back toward Hope, barely kicking the thing into a walk. Ernst popped into view on the rump, settling himself with a sigh. “What do we do, Caleb? They're all going to be like this, you know. Every town we visit out here, every rancher, every homesteader.”

“I don't know, Ernst. I just don't know.”

He didn't belong out here. He knew that much. The borderlands required a harshness, a ruthlessness that just wasn't in Caleb's makeup. He simply could not see the world as black-and-white, but the sun that blazed down over the seemingly endless prairie offered no shades of gray.

He knew he'd been destined for the borderlands, though, even before the tragedy at the Little Bighorn. Though the fire in Chicago could not have been quelled by anyone, it had gone down as a black mark on all the Peacemakers who had tried and failed. His next assignment had been St. Louis, which would have lasted only until someone else needed the position. Then where would they have stuffed him? Kansas City maybe? Or straight into the borderlands then?

Even crippled as he was, his once-awesome talent stunted and limited, he was still too powerful for them to dismiss him outright. They needed him. Even if he was limited to control words and simple logic exercises like any grade school child.

“I wouldn't send you out there, Caleb, if I had anyone else.” Agent Chief Sheffield did manage to look sorrowful over the heavy oaken desk. “We're scrambling to cover those territories now. Thirty men . . .” He had to pause and swallow hard, the enormity of their loss still staggering, even a month later. “Dear God, thirty men lost.” For a long moment, he stared out the window, his watery eyes haunted by the ghosts of dead and scoured Peacemakers.

“You called me back to Washington to tell me you're demoting me to a borderland circuit.” Caleb kept a calm voice, but his jaw ached where he bit off his bitter words. His hands clenched into fists behind his back as he stood at attention, and he let his gaze fall on the other man in the room.

Graeme Tolliver had been his best friend since West Point, and though he didn't avoid Caleb's glance, there was unease in the set of his shoulders that spoke volumes. His familiar, Tan, in the form of a lean spotted cat, watched Caleb with unblinking green eyes, and Caleb wished that he'd brought Ernst. It would be nice to have someone present who was on his side. “Not a demotion, Caleb. A temporary reassignment. You know I'm hurting for agents in the borderlands after . . . what happened. Once we get some new recruits trained, I'll send you back east, I promise.”

“No, you won't. Don't lie to me, Graeme. I'm an embarrassment to the department.”

The agent chief at least tried to protest, but the color coming to his cheeks betrayed him. “You know we have always had the utmost faith in your abilities. Recovering after an injury like yours, you're fortunate to have any power at all, let alone to the degree that you've regained them. You should be proud.”

Caleb's smile felt chipped and brittle at the edges. “Of course. A grown man who can't even light a fire without mumbling incantations like a toddler. How proud I must be.”

“You could be scoured, Caleb,” Graeme reminded him.

“Maybe I'd have been happier that way. At least then I'd know my place.”

Sheffield stood up from his chair, bracing his hands on his desk. “Listen, Caleb. You're too well-known in your current circles. Your reputation has preceded you to every city I could possibly assign you to. Maybe . . . Maybe going out west will be beneficial to you. Find people who don't know about . . . your condition. Maybe you can find a nice girl, get married, settle down. . . .”

“A favor? Is that what you're doing? Granting me a favor?”

“It isn't intended to be a punishment.” The old man took his seat again, picking up a pen to sign off on the paperwork in his neat penmanship. “How you choose to see it is up to you.”

Even now, months later, Caleb winced at the memory. On Chief Sheffield's advice, he'd been trying to see it as a good thing, ever since he got off the stage at his first stop. But there were times when it was difficult. He kept telling himself that anything was better than being scoured, even the remedial abilities he'd been left with after Cold Harbor. He was still stronger than most men he'd meet on a daily basis out here in the back end of nowhere. “Except Abel Warner.”

“Hmm? What was that?”

“Nothing, Ernst. Nap a bit. I'm going to take the slow way back to town.” He flipped the catch on the accelerator lever and let the hauler lumber mindlessly in its current direction.

It was tempting to keep riding, leave Hope behind, hit the next town on his circuit. If he hadn't been on a rented mount, if his trunk hadn't been back in Hope, he might have done just that. Deep down, he knew that even then he wouldn't have, but he might have entertained the thought a little longer.
You're too damn honorable for your own good, Caleb.

With the hauler plodding along at its slowest pace, the sun was well past its zenith when Caleb happened to spot a familiar figure perched on a rock alongside the trail of flattened prairie grass. He brought his mount to a halt and couldn't help but smile as he looked down at Jimmy Welton. “Now, what in the world are you doing clear out here?”

The boy shrugged, banging his heels on the boulder he was sitting on. “Nothin'.”

“Nothing, hmm? You weren't trying to follow that posse, were you?”

Jimmy snorted. “If I was tryin' to follow them, I'da been home already. They passed this way hours ago.” He scratched idly at a scab on his elbow. “Why wasn' you with them?”

Inwardly, Caleb chuckled. The boy had been worried about him, obviously. “Just decided to ride back on my own. You want a ride back to town? I don't know about you, but I'm about dying of thirst.”

Jimmy made a show of thinking about it, then nodded and stood up on the boulder, allowing Caleb to maneuver the hauler close so he could scramble aboard. “Hey, Ernst.”

“Hey, Jimmy.” As broad as the transport was, there was more than enough room for the jackalope and boy. Jimmy sat cross-legged on the hauler's rump, and Ernst happily crawled into his lap, purring and sparking.

Caleb nudged the hauler into motion again, setting it at a smooth gait so it wouldn't dislodge the duo on the back. “So I hear you're taking lessons with Miss Sinclair, Jimmy.”

“Mmph. When I feel like it.”

“And how's that going?”

“She's real nice, I guess. Not sure about this stuff she's tryin' ta teach me, though.”

“Oh?” Caleb turned in the saddle to look at Jimmy. “Like what?”

“Like these words she keeps wanting me to say. ‘Fire.' ‘Wind.' ‘Spark.'” He snorted. “Never needed anything like that.”

Caleb chuckled. “You won't need to say them forever, Jimmy. It's just a way to get your mind to focus on what it needs to do. You say ‘fire,' and your mind goes through the steps to make fire appear. When that becomes second nature, you'll only have to think it, and your mind will respond.”
Well, usually anyway.

“I just feel stupid saying stuff like that.”

Caleb grinned a little. “You know you don't have to use normal words, right?”

“Hunh?” Jimmy narrowed his eyes suspiciously. “How do you mean?”

“I mean, if you wanted your word for fire to be ‘sarsaparilla,' you could do that. Just so long as when you say ‘sarsaparilla,' you think about making fire. Sometimes, using foolish words can make it a bit less boring.”

“You can?” He looked thoughtful. “So . . . what if I wanted to make it a different word? Like . . . ‘dammit'?”

“I'm guessing that won't go over so well with Miss Sinclair. And if you do it, don't you dare tell her I told you to.” Jimmy flashed him a wicked grin, and Caleb turned back to the front, chuckling.

For the rest of the ride, he could hear the boy murmuring soft words to Ernst, the pair of them deciding just what the proper command words should be for Jimmy's next lesson.

The town was bustling as they rode in, or at least as bustling as Caleb had ever seen it. Some of the people called greetings to him. Most did not. It was almost certain that the men from the posse had already related the tale of his perceived betrayal.

“Agent Marcus! Agent Marcus, a moment, please?”

Caleb turned around in his saddle to find a distinguished looking man trotting down the dusty street after him.

“Dr. Elm, yes?” Hector had pointed the town physician out the night before. “How can I help you?” With his back turned, Caleb almost missed Jimmy sliding down the other side of the hauler and making quick tracks into a nearby alley. The sight of the nimble urchin retreating made him chuckle. No doubt the good doctor had tried to corral Jimmy, too, in the past.

The wiry doctor frowned, pushing his spectacles back up on his nose as he craned his neck to look up at the mounted man. “Would you be willing to come look at one of the children with me? I would like the opinion of a person with more talent.”

Caleb exchanged a glance with Ernst, seeing that the jackalope was just as mystified as his human counterpart. “I don't have any medical training, Doctor, but if you think there is something I could help with . . . Let me leave my transport at the saloon, and I'll come to your office.”

“Thank you, sir.” The immense relief in the doctor's voice made Caleb frown. What in the world would a doctor need to consult with a Peacemaker on?

A few minutes later, Caleb found out.

The little girl sat on the examining table, hands clasped tightly in her lap. She couldn't have been more than eight, old enough to be displaying talent and learning how to control her budding abilities.

“She was learning real good; she got the fire starting real easy and wasn't having any problems controlling it.” The mother was nearly in tears as she tried to explain again to Caleb and Dr. Elm what had gone wrong. “Then she just . . . stopped. I didn't think she was using enough to get scoured, or I'd have stopped her. And now . . .” Her words were lost beneath choked tears.

The good doctor put an arm around the sobbing woman's shoulders. “I'm sure it was nothing you did wrong, Sarah. I'm going to have the Peacemaker and his familiar look at her, all right? Maybe they can see something that I can't.”

Ernst didn't wait for an invitation. He hopped onto the table and cuddled into the child's lap, starting up his little chirping purr. The little girl hugged him so tightly it was a wonder he could still breathe.

Caleb watched his familiar, but also expanded his senses to envelop the child, relaxing until he could see with his power, not his eyes.

Everyone in the room glimmered with their innate power. Dr. Elm was stronger than Caleb might have guessed, but it was to be expected of one in the medical profession. The mother, Sarah Emerson, had mediocre talent, but it was at least there. Ernst glowed like a beacon, nearly blinding in his brightness. Caleb shone as well, with light pulsing along the now-visible veins in his hands with every heartbeat.

Everyone glimmered, that is, but the girl. Little Emily Emerson was matte against a world gone glossy. Where Ernst touched her skin, the familiar's power tried to trickle into her, tiny threads reaching, searching, but fading out before they'd gotten centimeters into her body. Ernst continued to do his own brand of examination, but for all that Caleb could see, the girl was powerless and always had been. Barren.

The mother was watching him closely, and he was careful to keep his face neutral, his eyes on Ernst. Maybe, just maybe, the jackalope could sense something he could not.

Ernst was silent, save for his purring, for long, tense moments, and when he spoke, he did not even open his eyes. “She is not scoured.”

Sarah burst into more tears, and no one could speak again until Dr. Elm had calmed her.

“Then what's wrong with her?”

“I think she's been exposed to nullstone.” Ernst raised his head and nuzzled the child's cheek, carefully avoiding her with his antlers. “It seems pervasive.
In
her skin, rather than
on
it. If she is exposed to no more, it should work its way out of her system, and she may recover completely. Or . . . she may never be able to touch her power again.”

“They said it was in the water, but I didn't believe them. We get our water from the town well, like everybody. . . .” Sarah pressed both her hands to her mouth to stifle more sobs.

“Sarah, if it was in the water, we'd all be losing our talents.” Dr. Elm's voice was confident, but he cast a glance at Caleb for confirmation.

“Dr. Elm is right. I don't think it can be the communal water supply.” He patted little Emily on the head, and she gave him a shy smile. “And I don't think it can be the water at Warner's place, either, else he and his men would be showing signs.”

No, it couldn't be the water, but what else could be out there? Caleb didn't have a good grasp on how much land Warner actually claimed, but if there was a nullstone deposit somewhere there? Perhaps if the recent earthquakes had brought a vein to the surface?

The doctor frowned in thought. “Something that only the children get into, then?”

“How many children are affected like this, Doctor?”

He thought for a moment. “I've only seen four, but there are at least seven more. No one wants to admit their child is barren, so they don't bring them in to see me.”

Caleb crouched down so he had to look up to see little Emily. “Sweetheart, can you tell me any places that all of you like to go play? Maybe secret places the grown-ups don't know about? Especially around Mr. Warner's house?”