“Has Raúl been treating you all right, Abby?” Hettie asked as they followed the path through the farm.
Her sister nodded. “He teaches me fun things, like that fire trick.”
“It’s not a game, Abby. Don’t go lighting things on fire, you hear?”
“I know,” she replied tartly. Hettie was startled. Her sister’s lip was getting more impertinent by the day.
In carefully tended plots, peppers, tomatoes, and other fruits and vegetables gleamed like ripe jewels. Farther along they found fat hens pecking and scraping by a coop. A regal-looking black-and-white spotted rooster strutted among them, ruffling its feathers as Abby pointed at him and cooed at how pretty he was. Enormous sows with litters of pink-and-brown piglets slept soundly in the shade in one pen, and goats basked in the dry heat in another. Hettie and Abby admired how healthy the specimens were before moving on—the family farm in Montana had never seen a bounty like this.
“Mis hermanas.” Julia emerged from a flowerbed like a startled rabbit, a basket laden with herbs and limes resting against her hip. She smiled hugely, as if greeting long-lost friends, but exhaustion hung about her like a fine cloak. “What are you doing out here?”
“Abby needed a break from her lessons with Raúl,” Hettie said, studying the young woman for any clues as to how Walker was doing.
“Is my cousin boring you, little one?” she teased Abby.
“I like him,” she said almost defensively. Her sister rarely shared her opinions on anything.
“How is Walker?” Hettie asked. “I was hoping to visit him soon.”
Julia shook her head and sighed. “It’s not a good idea. He’s still very ill and…” She bit her lip.
“And what?”
Julia hesitated. “He doesn’t want to see you. He told me to make sure you did not go anywhere near him.” She lowered her chin. “I’m sorry, I must get back to the house.” She hurried away.
“She’s pretty,” Abby said quietly. “You think Walker likes her?”
“I don’t speculate on what ain’t my business.” Hettie urged her on. “C’mon. Time to eat.”
They found a private area in the shade of some trees. Hettie pushed her back up against the trunk while Abby fed. Despite her assertions her thoughts kept circling back to Walker and Julia. The young woman was beautiful, kind, and charming and obviously had a history with the bounty hunter. And she clearly had Beatrice’s favor.
What if she was lying about Walker? What if she was just trying to keep him to herself?
Hettie stomped out the ugly jealousy rising inside her. She had far more important things to worry about.
Still, as they made their way back into the village, Hettie found herself taking the long route, passing by the Woodroffe home.
The windows were shuttered. It must have been stifling in the scorching heat. Beatrice sat on the veranda, her face gray. She raised her head as Hettie and Abby approached.
“What are you doing here?” Her voice rose in alarm.
“I was just passing by. Thought I’d say hello.” Hettie tasted the foolish lie beneath her weak words. Evidently Beatrice could see right through her excuse, too.
“You have to leave.” She got up as if to shoo her away. “It’s not safe for you here.”
“But I thought—”
“It’s worse than I imagined. Go, before he hears you.”
And then there came a low, guttural moan. Beatrice shot Hettie one last pleading look before hastening inside, shutting the door firmly behind her. Seconds later there came a shout, a sharp cry, and a crash.
Diablo leaped into Hettie’s hand. “Abby, stay here.” If Walker was hurting his mother—
“Don’t go in there.” Abby’s voice had gone diamond-hard. Her violet eyes were wide, and her jaw was set, as if she were an animal poised to defend its lair.
The door burst open, hinges cracking the thick wood frame.
A hulking mass of muscle, clothed only below the waist, stumbled into the sunlight. Hettie scrambled back, keeping herself between the attacker and Abby.
Slowly the man unfurled, and Hettie’s stomach pitched at the thing Walker had become. His overgrown stubble curled around his cheeks and jaw like the sooty wood shavings left in a fire pit. His complexion was gray and waxen. His hollow, bloodshot eyes brought to mind a starving bear, mindless with hunger. His chest was broad and muscled and puckered with many scars, but it was sunken too, as if his flesh were straining against his ribcage, drawn in by the inner pull of the void.
“Hettie.” His low, rough voice sent something like fear chasing down her spine.
“Walker.” She fought to keep her voice steady, pleasant, as if she were approaching an injured stallion. She slipped Diablo back in her pocket, and Walker’s unblinking stare followed it. “You don’t look so great. Maybe you should go back to bed.”
“I’ve missed you.”
She broke into a cold sweat. The razor-sharp edge of his hunger scraped along her senses like little teeth ready to sink into her. He staggered closer, and Hettie inched backward. “I never saw it before, Hettie. You … you glow.”
Beatrice ran onto the porch. “Walker. Come back here this instant.”
He didn’t respond. His hazy gaze was fixed on Hettie. “I did it for you, you know.”
“I know.” She’d agree to whatever nonsense he spouted to get him back into the house. “Why don’t we go in and have a cup of coffee?”
He snatched her right hand up and pulled her closer. The reek of sour sweat burned her nostrils. She tried to pry herself away, but he pinched her bloody trigger finger hard. “I did it for you. I did it for us. You understand, don’t you? I need you now, Hettie. I need you and Diablo. I need you to help me stop this…”
He squeezed her hand so hard she gasped. “Walker—”
“Give me Diablo and you’ll be safe forever. I can handle it, Hettie. I’ll take it far away, where no one will ever hurt you again.”
Her heart hammered. Diablo resolved in her free left hand, and she shoved it back into her pocket. Walker’s mouth pressed closer. His breath reeked of herbs and smoke. “You know I’d do anything for you, Hettie.”
She gasped as he crushed her fingers. “You’re hurting me.”
Suddenly he released her. The bounty hunter stared in shock, staggering back. “Hettie … I … I’m sorry…”
Then he spotted Abby. The hungry desperation returned. His stance shifted, and the next moment played in Hettie’s mind’s eye like a reflection in the rippled pool of Diablo’s power.
Walker lunged. Abby didn’t scream, but the fear was clear in her face. Defending herself against the madman, she lashed out, and a wave of pure power bashed him back, snapping his neck midair. He dropped to the ground, dead.
Hettie stifled a scream. It hadn’t happened yet. When her time bubble dissolved, she didn’t hesitate.
She pointed Diablo at Walker’s feet and pulled the trigger. Green fire poured from the muzzle and splashed against the ground, leaving a puddle of molten rock. He stumbled backward, and she tackled him, knocking him onto his back. She straddled his chest.
“Stop it, Walker!” she cried. “You gonna hurt my sister? You gonna hurt Abby?” Her fear was replaced by fury at the creature her friend had become. Diablo resolved in her hand. She would coldcock him—
Walker grabbed her wrist and twisted it around, and Hettie dropped the gun. He threw her off so she landed in the dust a few feet away. He reached for Diablo, but Hettie recalled it before he could touch it. In his state he probably wouldn’t care that the mage gun would burn his hand off.
The bounty hunter rushed at her, spittle dripping from the corners of his mouth like a mad dog. Still lying on her back, Hettie raised her knees and slammed her booted feet into his stomach, but instead of stumbling back breathless, he dove on top of her. S
he struggled beneath his sour-smelling body, the air crushed from her lungs, kicking and batting his face, fighting tears that blinded her.
He grabbed her wrists and pinned them above her head.
“No … no, Walker, no!” Hettie screamed. Diablo’s muzzle tracked toward his head. “Stop!”
“Walker!”
His name came on a crack of thunder. Walker reared back like a startled colt. Hettie scrambled away, gasping for breath.
At first she thought she was seeing some kind of ghost, all silvery white-gray robes and hair rustling in the wind. The figure spoke a single word, hand raised, and a pulse of power sang through the earth.
Walker’s eyes rolled up. He collapsed onto the ground.
The ghostly visage lowered his hand and stooped. He gave a phlegmy cough.
Javier Punta was finally awake.
I don’t know if you’re stupid or if you enjoy disobeying orders.” Raúl paced the main room in the Woodroffe home. Several villagers had carried Walker back into his room while Raúl brought his father inside.
“It wasn’t her fault,” Beatrice said evenly. She was tending to Julia, who sported a nasty bruise on her shoulder. Walker had apparently pushed her down in his struggle to get to Hettie and Diablo. Guilt gnawed on Hettie’s conscience.
“I explicitly told you to stay away from my brother while he recovers.” Raúl shook an accusing finger at her. “Diablo’s power is too much temptation for even Walker to handle.”
“Do not blame her.” Javier’s deep, gravelly voice rumbled through the room. The old sorcerer sat hunched in a cushioned wicker chair with his eyes closed. “El Diablo is my responsibility. She cannot control its allure.”
“You shouldn’t have left your bed, Father,” Raúl said a little more gently but no less critically. “You’re not strong enough yet.”
He opened his silvery eyes and glared at Raúl. “Had I known Diablo had returned, I would have wished to see Miss Alabama much sooner.”
Hettie stared in shock. Beatrice stood.
“Raúl, how could you not tell him? Javier’s waited more than a century to take Diablo back.”
“I did it for his sake,” the younger sorcerer said defensively. “He’s too weak to go through with the ceremony.”
“You do not need to worry about my weakness.” Javier smiled. “Taking Diablo out of the world will be my final act.”
Raúl shot him a disdainful look. “That is a stupid, selfish thing to say, Father.”
“Raúl!” Beatrice exclaimed, scandalized. “Show some respect.”
“You are not my mother, Señora Woodroffe.” He pointed at her angrily. “Do not address me as though you are.”
“Have a care with your words, Raúl.” Javier Punta’s rumbled warning seemed to make the ground tremble beneath their feet. “You are talking to my wife.”
Raúl threw himself into a chair opposite his father and glowered. Beatrice bit her lip as if regretting coming between father and son.
The sorcerer beckoned for Hettie. “Come here, child.”
Hettie felt very small approaching the centuries-old sorcerer. His silvery gaze was otherworldly, full of endless wonder and anguish all at once. The lines on his face suggested he wasn’t much older than Uncle, but there were more stories in those wrinkles than ridges in the mountains.
He peered at her with half-closed eyes and tilted his chin up. “You’ve bonded with Diablo.”
“Yes, sir.” She found she couldn’t address him as anything other than sir.
He held out a hand. “May I?”
Reluctantly she drew the gun from her pocket and turned it to him grip first. It didn’t seem right, somehow, to conjure it in front of the mage gun’s creator.
He clasped her hands in his. It felt as though her hand was being buried in gravel pulled from a riverbed—smooth, soft, and cool all at once. Punta’s low incantation filled her head with soothing nonsense words. She relaxed, and he slipped the revolver from her hand.
He held Diablo on the flats of his palms, staring down at it reverently. Tears gathered in the corners of his eyes. “It has been too long, old friend.”
Hettie was filled with a sense of peace. This felt right and true. Like a father being reunited with his long-lost child—
Suddenly, Punta’s face blanched. He dumped the gun from his hold, and it landed on the plank floor with a dull thud.
Raúl was instantly on his feet. “Father, what is it? What’s wrong?”
The sorcerer looked up wide-eyed into Hettie’s face. Angry red marks striped his palms.
“El Diablo … She … she has rejected me.” He stared down at his trembling hands, bewildered and forlorn. He closed his fingers tight. When he opened them again, the burns were gone. Tears filled his eyes. “Perhaps she has forgotten me. Or perhaps she remembers how I betrayed her. Either way, she is no longer mine to wield.”
Hettie stared. “What do you mean? Diablo’s yours.” She held the revolver out to him.
He stared at the mage gun in her hand. “You conjured it.”
She hadn’t meant to—she’d simply wanted it in her hands and hadn’t thought to bend down to pick it up … “Yes. We … bonded accidentally.”
He sat back, his face going gray. “Diablo does not come willingly to anyone. Not even me.” He said it as if to himself, and clasped his shaking hands. “This is about more than just blood bonds or magic: she has chosen you over me.” He glanced up. “The intimacy between you transcends blood. El Diablo knows your mind and heart. She does not want to be unmade.”
“But … you’re its maker. You’re supposed to take it back.” Panic seized her. All that struggle and travel, everything she’d come here to achieve … “I can’t keep it. There are people after it—after us.” Tears of desperation burned in her throat. “You have to take it. You have to help me undo … this!” She gestured at herself, the extra years, the unwanted burden.
Punta shook his head bleakly. “I’m sorry. There’s nothing I can do for you.”
Hettie lay in bed that evening with her eyes wide open, trying to unhear Punta’s decree, trying to erase the feel of Walker’s weight on her, the manic hunger in his eyes and the reek of his clammy skin. When the revolver jumped into her trembling fingers for the third time that night, she grudgingly accepted its cold comfort and slipped it under her pillow. It seemed no matter how little interest she had in the mage gun, it was bent on sticking with her like a loyal, mangy, flea-bitten hound.
She suppressed a sob. She never thought she’d miss Cymon so much.
A leaden sense of defeat welled inside her. Punta said he could do nothing to lift Diablo’s curse—which meant they’d come all this way for nothing. She would never get her years back. Never be able to hold another weapon. What was she supposed to do now? Raúl had insisted he and Abby try their spell on the solstice, but hoping for the best seemed futile.
Troubled as she was, her thoughts drifted, and soon she found herself floating, anchorless in a dark dream void. Hettie looked around, unable to distinguish up from down. All she knew was that she had to go. What her destination was, she wasn’t certain. But the impulse was undeniable, and she struggled to pump her legs so that she began a steady march.
She suddenly collapsed against a hard surface, sliding down against cool, smooth wood. The world came into focus as she blinked dark stars out of her vision. Before her sat a plain door. Had she been sleepwalking? She pinched herself to make sure she wasn’t dreaming now. The door swung open soundlessly, and slowly she got to her feet and entered.
The sharp smell of herbal remedies assailed her. Candles by the bedside illuminated the figure lying in the bed.
“I’m sorry to have disturbed your sleep,” Javier Punta rumbled, “but I didn’t know how else to call for you.”
Hettie hesitated. “How did you—?”
/> “Dream interpolation. It’s a spell that allows me to communicate with people in their sleep. Not always effective, but your mind is … open to such influence.”
She didn’t much appreciate people influencing her, especially if all she was wearing was a nightgown. She folded her arms over her chest. “What do you want?” Wariness overtook her need to be polite.
Javier smiled. “I’d hoped you’d come and talk with me.”
“It couldn’t have waited until morning?”
“I didn’t want Raúl to know you were here.”
She frowned. “This family sure keeps a lot of secrets.”
He gave a rheumy sigh. “Do not think me deceitful. My son is young and misguided and loyal to a fault, but his heart has always been in the right place. He often has the best of intentions, but they sometimes lead him astray.”
“Like when he kept us two apart?” She gritted her teeth, knowing she was being rude. She huffed. “I suppose it wouldn’t have made a difference in the end.” She pulled up the chair next to the bed. “There’s really nothing you can do to break Diablo’s curse?”
His silver eyes flickered over her. “Had I been able to take El Diablo from you, I might’ve coaxed back the years you’ve lost. But she—well, he—is completely bonded to you now, loyal to you and you alone. Perhaps he senses I mean to undo him. Perhaps he simply does not wish to be parted from you.”
“You talk about it like it’s a person.”
“I’m surprised you do not. I thought with your bond, he might have … spoken to you by now.”
Hettie wasn’t about to admit she had heard it speak in her mind. She’d rather believe she’d made it up than treat the mage gun as a living thing.
Javier seemed to read her thoughts and smiled. “There is much about Diablo you will need to learn if you are to become his caretaker.”
Hettie sucked in a breath. “Caretaker? But … I can’t. I have to … to destroy it.” She hesitated over the words. It felt as if she’d just proposed she deface a work of art or a religious artifact. She’d accepted that she would relinquish the weapon to its maker, but she hadn’t thought of it as destroying the Devil’s Revolver. She shook her head. “There are people after it. People who’ll kill me and everyone I know to get it.”
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