Peacemaker (The Flash Gold Chronicles, #3) (4 page)

Kali scowled. As she’d suspected, that
scalawag had been chumming up to her for a reason.

“
I’m going to have to
avoid him somehow and catch Cudgel as soon as I can,” Cedar
said.

“
Have you…” Kali paused,
not certain she should put the idea in his head. “Have you
considered—”

Jane appeared, her arms laden with plates of
rolls and caribou steaks. That forced another long pause while she
laid everything out.

“
Have you considered
making the detective disappear?” Kali asked when the server left.
She never would have thought up such a notion a few months earlier,
and it concerned her that it popped so easily into her head now,
but she didn’t want to see Cedar get hurt, and that’s what might
happen if he wouldn’t fight back against the man. “If he’s alone
out here, a thousand miles or more from his nearest office…who
would know what happened if he never returned?”

Cedar sighed. “I figure
that your thinking that way means I’ve been a bad influence on you.
I
have
considered
it. Sometimes it’s so frustrating to be hunted for something you
didn’t do—”

“
No need to point that out
to me,” Kali said.

“
Yes, of course, you
know.” He smiled and took her hand over the table. “I can’t cross
that line. He’s a lawman, not a cutthroat with a bounty on his
head, and…I think he’s got a family back home, a wife and little
girl.”

Kali hid her relieved exhale. As upset as
she had been when she stumbled across Cedar relieving a ship full
of pirates of their heads…it was his job, and she’d come to accept
that. He only killed hardened criminals, men and women who were
wanted dead by the authorities.

“
Maybe I can lead him
astray,” Kali said, “or tell him that you didn’t do it. Do you have
any proof that—”

“
Kali, I don’t want you—”
He stopped himself and took a breath. “I know you can take care of
yourself, but I don’t
think
you should get into trouble on my behalf. You
have enough problems of your own. If he believes you’re abetting
me, he might have the power to get the law after you too. And…it’ll
be dangerous for you if you get caught between us.”

“
He’s fixing to talk to me
regardless of what you or I want. If you tell me everything that
happened down there, at least I can try to argue your side of
things. If he could be convinced that you didn’t do it…. Does he
know about Cudgel? Maybe we could turn him into an ally against
the
real
criminal.”

“
That’s not going to
happen.” Cedar set his jaw mulishly.

Kali rolled her eyes. Why were men always
convinced things could only be sorted out with bloodshed? Why would
Cedar believe the idea of peace so impossible?

“
Let’s get out of town for
a couple of days,” Cedar said. “If he can’t find you, he can’t
bother you.”

“
Out of town?” she asked.
“Like up to my cave to work on building my airship? With those big
muscles of yours, I’m sure you could saw a lot of wood in a couple
of days. I’m certain you once mentioned that you’d help me, on
account of me offering to fly you around the Yukon, hunting your
nemesis once the ship is done.”

Cedar smiled faintly. “It sounds like
Lockhart knows where that cave is. I had something else in mind. I
was thinking of a visit to your mother’s people.” Cedar prodded the
talisman again. “You said a medicine man could tell me more about
this.”

“
Oh.” Kali sank back
against the seat. Not only did he want her to abandon her airship
project, but he wanted her to go back to a place where she would
always feel like an outcast. She had very few good memories of her
childhood, and most of the ones she did have involved being off
alone in the forest, building things.

“
Once we figure out who’s
killing these girls and put a stop to it, I’ll help you finish the
hull,” Cedar said. “Even if Lockhart is standing there watching
us.”

“
That a
promise?”

“
Yes, ma’am.”

Kali could not stir any enthusiasm for
visiting the local Hän camp. But having Cedar’s undivided
attention—and strong hands wielding a saw—for a week or two could
get her past the tedious work and on to what she wanted to do:
installing the engine. Also, maybe if she got Cedar out alone in
the woods for a while, she could get him to reveal more details
about the San Francisco murder. She couldn’t talk this Pinkerton
fellow out of hunting Cedar if she didn’t know the whole truth.

“
Do you know where they’d
be this time of year?” Cedar asked.

“
The Hän? Yes. King salmon
are running, so they’ll be in their river camp. Er, I guess that’s
a town now. Moosehide.”

Cedar’s brow furrowed.

“
The government put them
there, seeing as how Dawson grew up on top of the tribe’s old
summer camp. I know it seems strange when you look around and see
all these buildings and people from all over the world, but there
was nothing permanent here when I was growing up. Except mud. And
moose. Mostly mud.”

“
You speak so fondly of
it,” Cedar said.

“
You haven’t been stuck
here for an entire winter yet. You’ll see. It
won’t
grow on you.” Kali wanted to
finish her airship and escape before winter came again so badly
that an aching lump formed in her throat at times.

“
Moosehide, then,” Cedar
said. “I don’t reckon I’d be able to talk to them without you. Are
you willing to go?”

“
That depends. Are you
willing to share your fancy blanket again?”

A smile softened his face.
“Well, it did need a
lot
of attention from a seamstress after the last
time you slept in it. Did no one ever educate you on proper things
to do in bed? Setting off explosives isn’t one of them.”

“
My upbringing wasn’t
terribly proper. Besides, I dropped the smoke nuts
outside
the bag. I can’t
be held responsible for stray shrapnel.”

Cedar’s smile broadened. “I see.”

Low clouds hung over the Yukon River as
Kali’s self-automated bicycle—SAB for short—rumbled along the muddy
road, heading toward Moosehide. The fat, reinforced wheels
navigated over and around roots, puddles, and horse droppings
littering the trail. Kali curled a lip at the latter, not wanting
excrement smashed into her treads.

Cedar sat behind her, and behind him smoke
from the stack rose into the air, mingling with a morning fog that
hugged the banks. Summer was still in hiding, but at least it had
stopped raining. That meant a lot of prospectors were boating along
the river, to and from Dawson. All of those people gaped at the
strange bicycle when it passed.

Kali barely noticed. Her mind was focused
inward, dwelling on the upcoming meeting with people she hadn’t
talked to in eight years. Though she didn’t expect a physical
confrontation at the camp, she’d brought a vial with a couple of
her precious flash gold flakes anyway. They had proven useful to
have on hand in the past, when she’d made numerous tools and
gadgets, using the alchemical ore as an easy energy source.

Cedar touched her shoulder and pointed to a
rowboat aground ahead of them. A few shards of wood floated nearby
in the river. Nobody stood near the boat, but the grass and foliage
along the riverbank obscured the view.

“
Problem?” Kali peered up
and down the river. At the moment, no other boats were
visible.

“
Perhaps. Perhaps
not.”

Figuring he wanted to investigate, Kali
slowed the bicycle. Cedar hopped off and jogged through the
undergrowth to the boat. He stared down at something inside for a
moment and then slung his Winchester off his back.

“
Problem,” Kali
confirmed.

She veered off the trail and set her machine
to idle. Over its rumble, she almost missed the fact that Cedar was
talking to someone. She jogged over to join him and found him
crouching to help an older man lying in the bottom of the boat.
Blood streaked his weathered face, and a bulbous lump rose from the
crown of his bald head.

“
Don’t need no help!” The
man pushed Cedar away when he tried to help and clambered out of
the boat by himself. “That boodle of mother-kissing lickfinger
pirates got all my cussed gold. Shot my partner and knocked him
into the river. Lowdown, thieving cutthroats.” The man clenched a
fist and snatched a shotgun out of his boat. “Let them come back
out of the clouds, and I’ll fix them. Pirates!” He spat, barely
missing Cedar’s boot. “Got me wrathier than a treed
coon.”

The old man took a step and tilted sideways,
like he might topple back into the boat. When Cedar reached out a
hand to steady him, he growled, “Don’t need no help,” again.

“
Out of the clouds?” Kali
asked.

“
Air pirates,” Cedar said.
“Must be a new ship. The Mounties said they shot down the last
outfit preying on successful miners.”

This was the first Kali
had heard about it, but it was hardly surprising. Not all of
Dawson’s swelling population could strike it rich legitimately. She
gazed skyward. Though pirates might know about the reward for her
capture, and could be a lot of trouble, she found herself wishing
to glimpse the airship. A completed,
working
airship. They were so rare
in the Yukon. The last one Kali had seen, she and Cedar had been
forced to destroy, and she’d never gotten a chance to view the
engines up close.

“
It’s not appropriate to
look wistful right now,” Cedar murmured to her.

Kali blushed. The old man was still stomping
about, cursing over his losses. The missing gold seemed to be
upsetting him more than the dead partner.

“
I’m not wistful,” she
said. “I’m just being observant…checking to see if it’s still out
there. That’s all.”

“
Uh huh.” Cedar raised his
voice for the old man’s sake. “Are you sure there’s nothing we can
do to help you, sir?”

“
Don’t need no help,” the
man repeated.

Cedar shrugged and waved
for Kali to lead the way back to the SAB. As they walked back, she
gave the skies one last glance—and, yes, maybe it
was
a wistful glance.
She didn’t expect to see anything, but a dark shape stirred the
clouds. Kali froze, mid-step. She blinked and the disturbance was
gone. Her imagination? Or simply an unusually shaped storm cloud?
No, it had been too angular to be a natural part of the
sky.

“
I saw it,” Cedar said
with another nudge for her back. “Let’s get out of here before they
decide your contraption is something they’d like to
steal.”

“
Good idea,” Kali
murmured, hopping on. Though she and Cedar had taken down a ship
before, it had been luck that they’d had the right supplies. She
hadn’t brought any kerosene for the trip to the Hän camp, although
she did have her weapons, including a couple of—

“
Go,” Cedar urged. He
pointed toward the clouds.

The craft had come into view again, its
shape distinguishable this time. Like a marine vessel, it had an
open deck, but instead of having sails above that deck, a vast
oblong balloon hovered overhead, dwarfing the ship with its size.
At either end of the deck, enclosed weapons platforms rose like
castle turrets poised over a moat. Open cannon ports ran along the
wooden sides of the ship. Its size promised room for a crew of
thirty or forty with plenty of room to spare for cargo—or stolen
goods.

“
Going is good,” Kali
said. She shoved the lever that controlled acceleration, and the
SAB surged forward. Cedar hung onto her with one arm around her
waist, while he held his Winchester with his free hand, his torso
twisted to watch the sky.

The airship was heading downriver, while
Kali and Cedar were heading upriver. If it didn’t change its
course, they had nothing to worry about.

“
It’s coming about,” Cedar
said.

“
Figures.” Kali yanked her
driving goggles over her eyes and pushed the engine to full speed,
with a vague notion that they’d be safe if they reached the tents
and cabins of Moosehide. At the least, the Hän would have weapons
to help fight off intruders.

The wheels churned, slinging mud in every
direction. She could get twenty miles an hour out of the engine on
flat, even ground, but the Yukon River shoreline rose and fell,
with the glacial rock beneath the dirt making navigation a
challenge. The trail never ran more than ten meters without turning
around a boulder or tree. Fog still hovering over the hallows added
to the challenge.

“
Are they after us?” Kali
called over the breeze whistling past.

A boom cracked the air, and something
slammed into the earth five meters ahead of them. Dirt and rock
flew, and Kali jammed her heel against the brake lever to keep from
careening into a newly formed crater.

“
Yes,” Cedar
said.

“
Thanks, I got
that.”

He fired a shot, though Kali was focused on
steering the SAB around the ditch and did not see if it did any
good. The river flowed past fifteen feet below, and they tilted and
wobbled as she maneuvered past the crater. A big, black cannonball
lay in the bottom.