Widdershins (60 page)

“You need to step aside, old man,” Minisino finally said.

Walker glared at him. “I will not allow you to do this in Anwatan’s name.”

“Perhaps you haven’t noticed: you are only one and we are many.”

“You have no right to take my vengeance,” Walker told him. “It is mine to take. Mine to decide the when and the where and the how.”

“Of course,” Minisino said. “But this is not for Anwatan, though we could certainly include her vengeance in ours. We do this for all the cerva the aganesha have butchered. The time of reckoning has finally come.”

“This is wrong. When one of the herd breaks a leg in a prairie dog’s hole, do you declare war on all prairie dogs?”

Minisino shook his head. “Except these aganesha are not innocent. Have you forgotten so quickly how they butchered your daughter?”

Walker had to take a breath to steady himself, but it was still hard to keep his sorrow and his own anger in check.

“Bogans killed Anwatan,” he said finally. “A handful of them. You declare war on all fairies.”

“I repeat: they are none of them innocent. Those who haven’t raised a hand against us have still stood aside while the damage was done. They treat us like vermin in our own land. I say again, a reckoning is long overdue.”

“I won’t allow it.”

Minisino nodded.

“Except standing there alone as you are,” he said, “there’s not a damn thing you can do to stop us.”

“Do you want me to beg you?” Walker said. “Is that what it will take?”

“No,” Minisino said. “I want you to—”

But he was cut off by a stranger’s voice before he could finish.

“Or maybe you want me to beg,” the newcomer said.

They had appeared out of nowhere, the two men who approached them now.

No, not men, Walker realized. But cousins. The collective surprise of the gathered buffalo echoed in his own chest when he realized who the larger of the two was.

Ayabe, the moose lord.

And with him . . .

An instinctual nervousness tracked up his spine when he saw the coyote in Ayabe’s companion—a cerva’s natural response to a predator—and he immediately looked for the rest of the pack. But the two were alone and Walker made himself relax. What could one canid do in such a gathering of cerva? And after all, he was in Ayabe’s company.

Ayabe.

Walker could count on one hand the times he’d seen the elusive cerva lord. There were always stories of his carousing in far-off places, of week-long poker games and story sessions that went on longer still. But the only glimpses Walker had ever had were from a distance, the proud moose lord ghosting through the cedar woods, or spied in the shallows of a lake, high in the mountains, seen one moment, gone the next. Walker couldn’t
ever
remember hearing of Ayabe involving himself in a situation such as this. By winter fires, when the stories were told, if a hero went to Ayabe for aid, he was told that whatever trouble you got yourself into, it was up to you to extract yourself from it.

Walker turned his attention back to Minisino. The buffalo war chief had already recovered from his own surprise.

“An admirable show of concern,” he told Ayabe, “for one who, by all accounts, otherwise expresses so little interest in the welfare of his people.”

Ayabe frowned. “You are not my people. I rule no one.”

“Yet here you are, expecting us to forget hundreds of years of murder and death, because your views differ from ours.”

“You have no idea why I am here,” Ayabe told him. “I have yet to speak.”

“I think it’s quite clear. You expect us to defer to—”

“I am an individual,” Ayabe broke in, “just as we are all individuals, though you seem to forget that, or why would a herd mentality have you all following the foolishness of whoever has the loudest voice?”

“You—”

“I don’t agree with this war and I am here to explain why. But I don’t rule you. Each of you must make up your own mind as to why you are willing to go to war.”

“We have concerns—”

“Everyone has concerns,” yet another new voice said, “though most of us don’t express them in war.”

If Ayabe’s appearance was a surprise, Raven’s was a complete shock. Walker couldn’t remember the last time he’d heard of Raven leaving the neighbourhood of his roost, little say involving himself in the business of others. He came with one corbae for a companion, but he didn’t need a show of force to command attention. He had such an imposing authority that even Ayabe was overshadowed by his presence.

Walker looked from one to the other and couldn’t understand how two of the most powerful of the cousins, two known to distance themselves from the troubles of the world, had been brought together in this place, at this time. Then yet another group appeared on the plain—a handful of humans led by a cousin, part dog, part crow—and Walker began to get an inkling.

Joseph Crazy Dog.

He knew those crazy clown eyes. Everybody did. The stories surrounding this crow dog cousin were endless—mostly tall tales, Walker had always assumed. Now he wasn’t so sure, because this was just like one of those improbable stories told late at night around a campfire. Who else but Crazy Dog would find a way to bring both Ayabe and Raven here? And while this was unlike either of them, it was classic Crazy Dog, considering how each story told of him began with his involving himself in everybody’s and anybody’s business. At least, he did so if he thought there was a wrong that needed to be set right.

So it had to be Crazy Dog’s doing. And if Walker needed more confirmation . . . while he didn’t know Raven’s companion, he now recognized the canid that had come with Ayabe: Whiskey Jack, a well-known companion of Crazy Dog’s.

But power didn’t always equate control. One look at Minisino’s face told Walker that neither the presence of the two great cousins nor the potential threat they represented would be enough to stop him.

They would have to physically move against him.

They would have to spill his blood.

And if it came to that, the buffalo army would not stand idly by.

If these were all the game pieces Crazy Dog had to bring to the board, they were no closer to ending this problem than they had been before their arrival. In fact, by bringing Ayabe and Raven to argue his case, Crazy Dog might have made things worse.

There were few as stubborn as Minisino. With such great cousins standing against him, he would only be all the more determined to see this through in his own way.

Joe

Joe was in an excellent mood
. Just before he led Cassie and the remaining members of Knotted Cord into the between to confront the buffalo army, he’d suddenly lifted his head and a big smile creased his features. That earned him a puzzled look from Cassie.

“I know they call you Crazy Dog,” she said, “but what can you possibly find to smile about right now? And if you give me that old ‘it’s a good day to die’ line, I’ll whack you so hard you’ll wish you were dead.”

He turned and kissed her, then said, “Honey came through. She got Jilly out of that damned place. Can’t you feel it?”

As soon as he spoke the words, he could see that she did and her smile matched his own.

“What about Lizzie?” Siobhan asked. “Is she okay?”

Joe turned to look at the fiddler with her arm in a sling and her eyes full of hope.

“I’m sorry,” he said, “but I don’t know her well enough to be able to sense if she’s with them. But someone’s there, and I know she’s female.”

“It’s got to be Lizzie, right?”

“We can hope,” Joe told her. “But we’ve got other business right now.”

With that he stepped into the between, the others following on his heels. He’d expected that they’d be alone with Walker—just the handful of them facing off against the buffalo army—but when he got there, he grinned again. Good old Jack. He and Grey had brought in the big guns.

Maybe this was going to work out after all. Maybe nobody had to get hurt.

“Well, what do you know?” he said as he strolled over to Walker. “The gang’s all here.”

He heard an unhappy sigh come from where Lucius was standing, but he ignored the old corbae doing his Buddha thing, just as he did the impressive moose lord, standing tall on his right. He gave Walker a friendly nod, then met Minisino’s glare with his crazy clown gaze. Knowing Jilly was safe, all his worries were channelled into so much energy he felt like grabbing a drum from one of those buffalo soldiers and doing his own dance. But while he couldn’t crank down the mad light in his eyes, he managed to stand still and keep his voice calm.

“So, what do you say, Minisino?” he asked. “Can I take up a moment of your time?”

He rolled a cigarette as he spoke, had it made and lit in less time than it would take someone else to shake a Lucky Strike out of its pack. He blew a wreath of blue-grey smoke and offered it to the buffalo war chief.

What’s the situation, Jack?
he asked, speaking mind to mind and narrowing the focus of his thoughts so that only Jack could hear him.

Pretty much a mess
, Jack replied.
This thing’s like a powder keg that’s about to explode. Minisino’s got a stick up his ass the size of a redwood, and he’s not interested in listening to anybody
—
not even the powerhouses we’ve got lined up here.

Got it
, Joe sent back.

Minisino made no move to take the proffered cigarette.

“There will be no peace smoke between us, mongrel,” he said.

“It’s not a peace smoke,” Joe told him. “Just an offer of respect before we start in on this thing. I mean, you’ve got to know a whole lot of people are unhappy about how it’s playing out.”

“What happens here today is cerva business,” Minisino said, his voice flat. “It concerns no one else.”

The war chief gave Raven a pointed look before letting the dark anger of his gaze settle on Joe once more.

“Yeah, see that’s the thing,” Joe said. “If it was only you and the bogans going at each other, I’d agree with you. But you’re setting a whole other thing in motion here, something that’s going to affect everybody for a long time to come. So all of a sudden, it’s other people’s business.”

“Will someone remove this mongrel from my sight,” Minisino said, “or must I do it myself?”

“That’s twice,” Joe told him before anybody could move.

The buffalo soldiers who’d been about to move forward held their place, waiting for their war chief’s response.

“Twice what?” Minisino asked.

“Twice you’ve insulted me. Why would you want to go and do that?” Minisino shook his head. “I speak only the truth—how can that be an insult? You’re a half-breed. Canid and crow.
Neither
of whom have any business here.”

Careful, Joe
, Jack said.

I hear you
, Joe sent back.
I’m cool.

But after taking another drag on his cigarette, he flicked the butt at the war chief’s feet.

“I guess we’re done being polite,” he said.

He heard Lucius growl a warning, “Joe,” to him, but he never let his gaze stray from Minisino’s. He understood everybody’s concern, but he wasn’t being jackass prideful here. It was all a matter of respect. If Minisino didn’t offer him some respect, then the war chief wasn’t going to listen to him. And if he didn’t listen, then this whole situation was going to come crashing down like crow boys playing football with a bird’s nest.

So it had to come down to them going at it one-on-one. Joe had no idea if he could take the war chief or not, but that wasn’t the point. The point was that he was going stand his ground and, whether he liked it or not, Minisino would have to respect that.

The war chief ground out the butt with a hoof. The faintest trace of a smile touched his lips.

“I’m going to enjoy this,” he said, stepping forward.

Well, I won’t, Joe thought, but he couldn’t back off now.

He’d fought big men before. The main trick to it was to not get yourself killed. You didn’t let them connect a solid blow, and you for sure didn’t let them get a hold of you. The only weakness you could find with a trained warrior like Minisino—sometimes, if you were lucky—was that they were so sure of their own ability, and so disdainful of yours, that they came into the fight feeling cocky.

Minisino was going to come in hard and fast, that was a given. His eyes gave away the first lightning fast blow. Joe was able to duck under it and land two of his own on the war chief’s broad chest. It was like pounding his fists against a stone wall. Minisino batted a big hand—the way you might an insect flying up into your face—and caught Joe a glancing blow that sent him sprawling back in the dirt.

The war chief came in quickly, following up on his advantage, but before he could land a real blow, before Joe could get up, an apparition took shape in the air between them. Minisino dodged to one side so as not to knock her down, his eyes widening. For the moment, Joe was forgotten. Joe himself froze in the act of getting back on his feet before he slowly stood up. His gaze, like everybody else’s, was on the spirit of the dead woman who now stood between him and the buffalo war chief. In this place she had the same solid substance to her as did the spirits of the buffalo dead in Minisino’s army.