“We’re never going to speak, joke or reference this again? Can I make myself any clearer?!”
Cassie gave up her post and charged over to her three sisters on the hearth. “Get going now. You are the only one who can do this.” Her voiced cracked with urgency and Lijuan nodded. Earlier Cassandra had recalled a time she was trapped in a room and considered trying the fireplace as an escape route but knew she was too big. At the time, she thought only Lijuan would have had any chance of climbing out a chimney.
She had done a quick survey of Jim's chimney, and it would be tight, but it looked as if Lijuan could make it. It had been Honor's addition to the plan for them to lubricate their Asian sister in hopes that would make the tight squeeze go a little smoother.
Lijuan crouched down and looked up the chimney and heard Catalina chuckle, “Let’s hope them boobs of yours don’t put an end to this here escape attempt before it gets started!”
Lijuan leaned back about from the fireplace. "They're not going to make it any easier, and I might have the same curve of my hips as you three, but at least mine will fit. You'd never- "
"Go!" Cassandra hissed in as loud a voice as she dared. Lijuan needed no further urging as she placed her hands over her head and began to feel for the best handholds on the mortared together rocks that made up the inside of the chimney. At last finding some she started to pull herself up. The other watched as she disappeared from view. Inside she managed to find some purchase with her small feet.
The confines of the chimney would have been the ultimate nightmare for anyone terrified of small places, Lijuan knew. She was fortunate that she didn't have that fear, but that did little to alleviate the horridness she was enduring. The inside of the chimney was about as unpleasant a place as she had ever encountered. Heat assaulted her, and she could feel the ash sticking all over her body to the lard. Her chest rose and fell in labored breathing as she inched her way up.
The collection of scrapes and cuts on her body she knew would be considerable and that extended to her large breasts that unfortunately scraped against the walls as well. Sweating profusely, Lijuan looked up at the blue rectangle that was the sky beyond the opening of the top of the chimney. It was so close, but it seemed like a million miles away.
Lijuan gritted her teeth and continued, the girls were counting on her, and their very lives depended on escaping before they fell into the hands of the Omegas. She had no plan for what she was going to do once she got to the ground but the only thing for certain was she was going to have to take out Bull Stevens somehow.
When she was only a child her father had hired a pair of Chinese immigrants, Mr. and Mrs. Chow to be the handyman and the cook, but their primary purpose was to teach Whip's little Beautiful and Graceful one all about her Chinese heritage. It had been Mr. Chow who instructed her on the mysterious fighting skills of the Far East that had intrigued Whip so much when he had seen Lijuan’s mother put them to deadly use during their brief time together.
Well, Lijuan thought if she had to use those skills to attempt to beat the man to death with her bare hands she would. All the mattered was saving the lives of those she held so dear. Suddenly her hands found the lip of chimney top and with a stifled grunt; she pulled herself above the rim of the chimney. She was fond of rolling her eyes at others, but this time she rolled them at herself. How ridiculous she would have looked to anyone popping out of the top of a chimney bare-chested, blackened by ash darker than any of those minstrels she loathed for their insulting portrayal of her sister's people. Wriggling herself free she found herself on all fours to keep low. Patrolling as close the building as he was he wouldn't be able to see her, but if for some reason he ventured far enough away from the side of the house, and she was standing up he would spot her. It wasn't a chance she was going to take.
Lijuan looked around wildly. Her eyes took it all in. From up here, she could see the gully where the buckboard rested was actually one of two gullies, side by side to each other with a rocky strip of forested land separating the two. The second gully to the right, however, was much higher and it lead to the beaver pond and the totem rock that Cassie had described back when this was a still a fun-filled family vacation and not a fight for survival. Her eyes traveled the bed of the rushing stream as it zigzagged down the rock gully before it took on a straight path to the edge of the plateau. Looking above her, she saw the summit of Topaz Peak. Scanning away from that her eyes once again fixated on the buckboard with its now dead team. They would pay for that she swore.
Not wishing to look at the grim scene any longer her eyes returned to her immediate surroundings. The cabin wasn't very high, so she knew she could leap down without fear of injury, but she had to do it when the criminal was on the opposite side. Her best bet appeared to be to drop off the roof by the back of the cabin.
She started to make her way across the roof when she came to the stylish weathervane with its bronze rooster crowing at an eternal dawn. To steady herself she grabbed the shaft of the arrow serving as a pointer when she was startled to find that it moved in her hand. Curious she gave it a twist in one direction and then reversed the direction, and it became immobile. At that moment, she had no way of knowing that for shipping purposes its manufacturers in England had made it so that it could be taken apart, shipped on a windjammer to "the colonies" as some at the company still referred to America and then reassembled, just as Jim and Cassie had done during her previous visit.
Lijuan, her mind sharp as a tack, immediately saw the possibilities. Ignoring the other end that held the sculpted "feathers" of the arrow she focused on unthreading the end with the arrow out from the central vertical shaft of the weathervane. It wasn't her hammer, but she felt good to have what amounted to a two-foot spear in her hands. Now she would at least have a weapon when she took on Bull Stevens.
She began making her way down the sloping roof intent to drop behind the back of the cabin as she planned but she suddenly froze when she saw smoke curling up from below. The bastard had stopped to smoke a cigarette, and he had done it at the back of the cabin. Annoyed but undaunted she scrambled her way back up to the peak of the roof and began to make her way down the other side intent on getting off the roof in the front of the cabin now.
Unknown to her Bull had decided that finishing his second smoke of the hour was less important than the pleasure he was going to get taking the Mexican Wilde sister. He took two seconds to stomp out the smoke he dropped to the ground and hurried around the side of the building. He was just about to unlock the door when he decided to take one last look out into the valley to make sure there was no sign of any advancing cavalrymen from the distant fort. He was going to be busy for the next few minutes, very busy he thought as a tingling coursed through him at the thought of the Hispanic woman's nude body under his.
Bull raced to the edge and looked out and still saw nothing. With a grin on his face, he turned and began to dash back towards the cabin shouting, "Get ready you Mexican bitch! You're all mi- ‘His eyes bulged wide as he looked up and standing on the edge of the roof, just above the door was the Asian. His mouth gaped open as he saw she was nude and covered from head to toe in dark ash.
"Damn! Looks like we surprised each other!" he heard her shout just before his mind processed she had some type of weapon in her hands. Welcoming a chance to use his two new armaments both of his hands went for the ill-gotten pistols shoved into the waistband of his jeans, ignoring his regular gun in its holster, but he was too late. Lijuan was already in the air.
A primal scream burst from the big man's throat for a split second before it became choked with blood and his vision filled with the angry face of the oriental woman. His eyes drooped down to see her giving a mighty thrust of the spear like thing she already had buried in his chest. He could not know how strong her arms were from all the years wielding her hammer and in the slender slice of time before his consciousness blinked out as the spear separated his heart, destroying it, he experienced complete astonishment.
Lijuan watched as he crumpled to the ground taking the weathervane turned weapon with him. With cold eyes and a mouth little more than a slit, she said in her familiar dry voice. "That was for our team, Salt, and Pepper." She looked down at him with his out flung arms and his unseeing eyes staring up into infinity. Lijuan seized the end of the rod and yanked it out, briefly looking at the bloody mess hooked on the barbs of the arrow and then threw it down on the ground. "Guaranteed that's one heart no one is going to be eating."
Only then did she remember her sisters and spun around to see them all pressed against the window. They had been shouting at her, but she had been so in her zone that their cries hadn't penetrated. Lijuan crouched down and fished through the man's pockets. She pulled out his rolled cigarettes and box of matches and discarded them. Her search ended as she found the key to the cabin and hurried to the door and quickly released her sisters.
The three other women streamed out immediately. As Cassie went to retrieve her guns, as well a Bull's original pistol he still had in his holster. Honor Elizabeth squeezed one of Lijuan's shoulders.
“Well, done Lannie! Well done!”
"I'm glad you approve," Lijuan answered wryly as Catalina shielded her eyes and looked at the criminal's corpse staining the rocks red as his life's blood continued to spill out of him.
“You sure as sugar did a number on him! No one is gonna be eatin’ that jasper’s heart!”
Lijuan crossed her arms and grinned, "I already said that!" suddenly she reached out and grabbed Catalina's hand and began dragging her towards the stream that flowed towards the edge of the cliff. "C'mon, I need your help. We all know you're the strongest one of us."
Catalina didn't know what Lijuan had in mind until her sister commanded her to hold her hands, so she wouldn't accidentally get carried over the edge of the waterfall. Both sisters dropped to the ground, and Lijuan crawled backward into the stream. Catalina gripped her hands as told, as Lijuan let the swiftly flowing water wash the ash off her body. As soon as she ducked her head under and came up, she ordered Catalina to pull her back in. Effortlessly Cattie yanked her sister back out of the steam.
"Thanks!" Lijuan smiled as she dashed back into the cabin to get her clothes. By the time she was dressed and back out front, the others were huddled in a group discussing precisely what was on her mind.
"So now what? We don't know how far away the Omegas are. They could be here at any minute or any second!" she asked as the others turned their heads to Cassandra. As the oldest, she had always been their unofficial leader, and it was scarce they didn't defer to her.
"I'm considering our options," Cassie responded as she bit her lip and looked around at the expectant faces. Honor Elizabeth was the next to speak.
"Would I be understating the obvious that we need to put as much distance between our enemies and us as possible?"
"I know that seems like the logical thing to do, but it's not going to work. Even if we split up, and we know that is not going to happen." She said, and all four sisters looked at one another. It would be the smart thing to do in a pursuit, spreading the forces after them out, but they all knew they could never bring themselves to separate and possibly leave one at the mercy of the enemy. If death were coming, they would meet it together rather than spend the rest of their lives mourning the loss of one of their own. They were bound by blood and by love, and it was all for one and one for all.
“Then what can we do?” Catalina asked curling her arm over her head.
“Fight!” Lijuan barked, pushing her shoulders back.
Honor showed her palms as her eyes blinked rapidly, "Wait! With what? Our armament is limited I might remind you. We have Cassie's guns and the one from this dead owlhoot," she paused long enough to stare across the distance and could just barely make out their weapons lying by the buckboard, "my knife, Catalina's bullwhip and your hammer and as useful as they are, up against those desperados and the Omegas…we may as well not have them!"
“I wish we had a gun to go with that case of shells Cassie bought.” Catalina murmured as Honor bobbed her head. “As do I but the reality is we do not.” She looked at her sisters and then her face fell somewhat. “Apologies for being so negative. It does not help our situation.”
Cassie hugged her and stepped back. "Don't you apologize a bit. None of us are going to be too proud to not admit we’re scared. We'd be a fool not to be. We all know those Omegas. They've got it for the Wildes as they do for no one else."
“And there is nothing in the cabin that can help us?” Lijuan asked hopefully.
"No, we scoured it again while you were up on the roof. Anything that might have, like any guns Jim might have had here were either nonexistent or found and removed. I hate to say it, but we may have no choice but to try and cut and run after all. There's a trail at the far end of the beaver pond. It will take us down the mount- "
Before she continued their bodies tensed at the whiny of a horse. Were they too late? Were the Omegas upon them? Catalina who had the best hearing of the four suddenly smiled.
"It's not them…I can tell it's comin' from the direction of the ravine…beyond the rocks, they filled it up with. Must be Cord's horse. Maybe he didn't run off too far after all!"
They all thought the same thing but kept it to themselves. At best, the horse could carry two of them down the mountain, but that would be leaving the other two to die. Also, even if one of them were willing to leave the others behind to ride for help down in Clayton's Hollow, it would be too late by the time they returned with help.
“Forget about it! C’mon…up the gully we go to the old beaver pond. We’ve probably lingered around her longer than we should have!”
There was no more discussion between them. They paused only long enough to retrieve their signature weapons and Cassie scooped up her empty discarded gun belt and slipped it around her waist. She gave Bull's gun to Lijuan, and they dashed to the rocky gully and began making their way up along the same zigzagging course of the stream.
As they proceeded upward, Lijuan climbed next to Cassie, "All those times we got the bad guys on the run, and now the tables have been turned!"
“Preferable to the alternative!” the pair heard Honor who was ahead of them, shoot back over her shoulder.
“If there was just some way we could wipe them all out at once!” Lijuan hissed baring her teeth.
"What I wouldn't give for a Gatling gun right about now!" Cassandra agreed as they neared the top of the gully. A moment later they came to a stop, and their eyes took in the beaver dam and the pond that lay behind it. Cassie found her attention drawn to the old dam itself. It was different than before. On her previous visit, the lip of the dam rose a half foot above the surface of the pond, but the recent rains had caused the level to rise enough that it was spilling over the top of the damn like a waterfall. Truly the long-dead beavers had built their structure to last.
“We rest for a moment. It’s going to be hell bushwhacking our way through the forest around the pond. It’s thicker than any I’ve ever seen at Cedar Ledge. That’s why Jim used to fish atop the totem rock because there were no good spots along the edge of the pond with the trees growing right to the water’s edge!”
She looked on as Lijuan leaned against the totem rock with one hand and caught her breath. Cassandra was proud of her sister for getting them out of the cabin, and if they lived to tell about it, she was going to treat the woman to a nice steak dinner in Tucson.
Lijuan called out to her, "Yeah that Gatling gun really would be nice. Putting one at the top of this gully would cut them to ribbons; they'd have to come up it if they were after us! We really could wipe them out all at once!"
Cassie’s green eyes clouded for a moment as Lijuan’s words echoed through her head. Wipe them out all at once. Slowly she tilted her head to look down at the beaver dam and then upward at the tallness of the totem rock as it thrust into the sky. She was standing in its shadow and gazed as the rays of the sun shot from ei
ther side from behind the rock.
Deep from within her, another voice replaced Lijuan's. So many years ago, when she was a child back in Philadelphia, she had lived with her Aunt and Uncle while Whip had sailed off on his fateful journey to China that ultimately gave the family Lijuan. Her aunt couldn't be bothered with her and her younger brother Dutch, so they had truly been raised by the nanny Whip had helped gain employment with his brother. Miss Lizzie, who would one day, be Honor's mother.
Now Miss Lizzie's voice was comforting her as Philly was being ravaged by the remnant of a hurricane that had lessened into a tropical storm as it lost its power moving inland. It had been a frightening experience for young Cassandra, but Miss Lizzie had calmed her by telling her that nature gives, and it takes, and she was sure it was just about through taking all it was going to take, and they would be safe. A few hours later the winds ceased, and the rains stopped, followed by a dazzling sun and Miss Lizzie had squeezed Cassie hand, and the little girl gushed and hugged her for having been so right.
See that sunshine child? That’s nature giving back!
"Nature gives, and it takes." She said aloud, and the others turned to look at her.
“Cass?” Catalina asked, her brow furrowed and concern evident on her face.
Cassandra was grinning now. "Nature is going to give us a way out of this, and it's going to take out our enemies!"
CHAPTER 11
As Dixon DeVries triumphantly led his hired men followed by the band of Indians towards the edge of the gully where he had earlier trapped the Wilde sisters he was completely oblivious to the fact of how silently the Omegas traveled. It wasn't just that they practiced an economy of words, but their passage over the land was one of marked silence. Where the outlaws on horseback trod over fallen branches, snapping them as they went, but under the warrior's guidance, the footfalls of Yavapai horses could not be heard at all. They were masters at stealth, and that had managed to extend Black Hawk's campaign to cleanse Arizona well beyond any other Indian uprisings in the territory.
Renegades And Revenge: Daughters 0f HBH (Half Breed Haven Book 8) Page 11