by Tim Marquitz
Free and clear. What did that mean? Nina couldn't remember ever being free and clear. They’d been on the trail almost her entire life, and donning her boyish appearance was like putting on a second skin, all for the benefit of the town folk, as she and Pa traded possibles, usually fur and ponche—the stuff whites called baccy—for hollow woods of firewater and, in recent years, guns. Pa used to refuse to arm the native folk, but he’d changed his mind of late and she knew not to push him for his reckoning. She wondered how folks would treat them if they knew. Nina never questioned things, not too much. She didn’t mind hiding what she was when she was younger. It was a game. But now she was a woman and it was harder to mask her womanliness, especially in the dry season or indoors when questions kept coming, and it stuck in her craw having to deny her breeding. Still, it was the safe thing to do, what with the Paiute and Snake People putting on black faces against the ongoing surge of settlers. Nina grinned. Hell, only good thing about this ado about the end of the world is they were all equals now purty much. Wouldn’t George and Mason bust a gear to think something like that?
Not surprising, yet still to her dismay, the enemy train shot from the granite gap in a blaze of smoke and fire. Just a mile distant now, its triumphant...woooooo...WOOO!... pierced Nina's ears and jolted her upright.
“Oh my God,” Jasmine whispered.
They all rushed to the railing, peering at the cinder glow of Liao Xu’s oncoming demon train. Up close, the sight of the flaming iron beast burned her brain. The sloping, smoke box door up front supported a ridged brow that curved back along the engine's sides. Two dirty red orbs glared down a jutting scoop of upturned, razor sharp teeth. The single light that was its nose, now muted and downturned.
It pulled along a series of passenger cars, drawing Nina’s gaze. Her heart beat a shallow tattoo at seeing them filled with the undead. Moaning heads stuck out the windows. Deadun arms waved in morbid greeting, swimming in cinders thrown up from the underbelly.
“God Almighty,” Pa said, his voice quavering at seeing the horde of deaduns crammed into the cars. “That's how Liao plans to do it. Transport the biters over the railway.”
“I see now, my old enemy.” Mathias rubbed his stubbly chin. “Splendidly vile, as usual.”
“You sound excited, Father,” Pa responded, a hint of fire in his voice.
Mathias shook his head. “No, Lincoln, just…” The priest sighed, weary eyes staring out at the monstrosity that rumbled toward them. “No. More struck by his tenacity, I suppose. Seems no matter what credit I give Liao, he manages to rise above even that considerable sum.”
George Daggett squeezed out onto the deck then, winded from moving back and forth between the engine, the tender, and the luxury car. He stopped cold when he saw Liao Xu’s hell-train. “Shit! Shit, shit, shee-it! But ya’ll said…”
Father Mathias struck a poignant pose, as if gauging his next impossible approach. “Fucking figures, wouldn't you say, Mister Daggett?”
Nina barely registered the priest using George’s favorite catchphrase. George himself didn’t even seem to notice; he just shook his head and fetched a heavy sigh, then curled his lip and slapped his hand against the door frame. “Guess I'll go back up front and tell the boys we gotta get this sonofabitch train a'peelin'.”
CHAPTER THREE
THEY RETREATED INSIDE THE ARMORED CAR so they wouldn't have to look at the damnable thing bearing down on them. Pa sat on a bunk and sighed. “I hate to shine a negative light on things, but you and Red Thunder were right. I reckon we're genuinely buggered.”
The corner of her mouth lifted in a wry smile, even though her stomach twisted in fear. “Since when ain't we been, Pa?”
Mathias began his pacing routine, from one side of the car to the other, thinking hard, burning off the excess energy so his brain didn't pop out of his skull, Nina imagined.
Jasmine backed across the cabin, bathed in red light and shadow, her eyes darted from Father Mathias to outside. She fell to her knees, put her hands together. “What do we do now? What now, Father?” Her voice lifted in octaves as fear consumed her. “Do we pray?”
Rachel Buell lingered near the door, her filthy dress blood red in that baleful light. “It's going to catch us.”
As if in response, the train bucked. The piston ping and clatter took on a sudden urgency, staccato bursts of steam and the blat of their own whistle filling their ears.
Pa cocked his ear, his hair sticking out in wild tufts. “Sounds like the boys up front got 'er goin'.” Then he looked at the devilish train still coming hard and frowned. “Probably don't matter how hard we push now...”
“You're right, Mister Weaver. Liao's monster will shortly be upon us. Which begs the question, what next?” A long silence ensued as Father Mathias went to the threshold. He put one hand against the car's door frame, the other running through his longish hair. Bathed in that demonic glow, he appeared to be weighing options, if they had any left. Nina was feeling none too optimistic.
Suddenly, the priest said, “I had hoped it would not come to this. We couldn't derail it by destroying the track, but the creature is made of fire, some elemental spirit Liao has mustered from the depths of Perdition, no doubt.” He turned and looked directly at Nina. “We must fight this hellish fire with fire of our own.”
Nina wasn’t sure what the Black Robe was getting at. And why the blazes he was looking only at her. “Got another fool’s errand for me?”
“Our friend Red Thunder says you've touched certain...entities.” Mathias inclined his head at a slipshod stack of crates, and Nina saw the Indian squatting there, hardly noticeable in the shadows. The priest looked back at her, his eyes imploring.
What was he asking her for? Nina had no idea how to actively touch anyone—or anything, for that matter. All she had was the promise of a dream and the possibility that she'd tapped into some latent power within herself. But to channel that, to put it to good use, that was a damned different story. Hell, she'd just now started believing in all this magic business anyhow.
She shot the Indian a look and crossed her arms over her chest. “One step back, Father. Why a train? Why can't the spirit just fly through the air if it can get over a ruined bridge?”
“The track is merely a guide, a path for the beast. Liao found it easier to manifest his evil in the shape of one of mankind's greatest corruptions; the iron horse. The train. It can navigate small breaks in the path, it seems, but it cannot take flight, far as I believe.”
“The train?” Pa snorted. “What's so corrupt about a train?”
Red Thunder stood. “What he says is true. The white man knows only consumption. He leaves behind ruin and calls it progress. He spreads for the sake of spreading, takes for taking, mines rock from the hills, and runs unheeding from his sins. Liao Xu will find it easier to work his magic wherever life is already poisoned, where death is in abundance. Nowhere does death abound more than wasichu’s metal serpent.”
Nina studied her father’s brooding face and knew he had nothing to counter with. The same sentiment in different words had come from his own lips.
“As wasichu gorges on the flesh of the hills and forests,” the Indian continued, “so Liao Xu is the retch of greed and gluttony.”
“Hold on.” Pa raised a hand. “Don’t be leashing that dog to all us just because of the tone of our skin.”
Nina shifted uncomfortably. “Sounds to me like you want Liao to win.”
Red Thunder shook his head. “ Liao Xu is the same as wasichu’s evil, he just wears a sorrier pelt. There are a few among the white man who offer hope for peace.” He glanced at Pa and gave a subtle nod. “With Liao, there is only damnation.”
Pa sighed. “Well, we can philosophize all day, but what's your plan, Father?”
Mathias took out his Bible, gripped it tightly against his chest. “At first I thought I could simply bless an object, like this bundle of coal Nina brought up, then roll it off and let it burn through that evil machine.” He m
ade a fire motion with his fingers. “But I'm not so sure. The coal is of this land. We need someone connected.”
“What about the key?” Pa asked.
Mathias shook his head. “I'm not confident in the key as a conduit, in this case. All the faith in the world could not be channeled through it, but perhaps there’s something Liao has not counted on.”
“What's that?”
“A champion of the native People.” Father Mathias extended his hand, gesturing for Nina to approach him.
She looked around at the others. Pa's nod bolstered her resolve. She went to the priest, her heart pounding in her chest. In her peripheral vision, outside, the light of the demon train had grown stronger, surging to consume them.
“You've heard the drums. The voices. You have a spiritual connection to the People and the Land.”
The blood rushed to Nina's face, although she couldn't say why. Was it because of her mixed heritage? Would she always feel inadequate because of that? “They're just dreams.”
“Do you believe in them? Have you borne witness to anything strange?”
Nina could hardly think. The demon train barreled toward them, just a quarter mile away now, unnerving her senses with its racket. Yes, she'd easily experienced her spirit brothers and sisters, and the boha gande, too. Not only in the dream, but while fighting Liao in the fort, in the tunnel, and most recently on top of the tender car as she brought back the bundle of coal. A few days ago she might have brushed those incidents off, but the fact she stood here now was testament to that power. There was absolutely no reason to doubt it now.
“I reckon, but I'm no champion. I ain’t no great leader.” She'd wanted her voice to sound strong and brave, but it came out raspy and unsure.
A gust of heat blew through the cabin door, tossing the priest's hair around. He gave that bemused grin of his that confused and irked her. “Only one way to find out,” Mathias said, then took Nina by the hand and led her out into the uncanny heat.
They stepped onto the deck, and Nina gulped, her mouth and throat dry, her soul parched. She shielded her eyes and gazed at the hellish, barrel-shaped engine as it glowed and stretched like a piece of anvil-sore lead, driving the stench of sulfur before it. The sound was almost unbearable; shaking, clanking, and chugging itself into a furious drone. Its upturned teeth vibrated with rail-song. Something ping-ping-pinged deep inside its iron shell, raw materials pushed beyond their breaking points.
It hated them, Nina knew. It hated them and would crush them to pieces, mind and body, in just another few minutes. The Magpie couldn't outrun it. Nina suspected nothing could. Whatever they were going to do, they needed to do it now.
She tore her gaze away from the beast and nodded to Father Mathias.
The priest stooped and untied the makeshift sack, picking out a single piece of coal. He held it up. The obsidian chunk seemed to absorb the ruddy light, but other than that, there was nothing special about it.
Nina pursed her lips, then shouted to be heard over the roar of their pursuer. “You want me to throw a durn rock at it?”
Mathias out-shouted the train's own fiery voice—and it was a voice, no mistake. A belching, horrible growl that chewed through every other sound. “No. I want you to bless it!”
“What?”
“Bless the coal, Nina, for it is the Land. Tree, leaf, and insect compressed over time into this one black stone.”
Nina wanted to knock it out of his hand, thinking he was playing a game with her. Teasing her. “You bluffing? This is your plan?”
“It's a perfect conduit.” Mathias held it out reverently, even as the demon train belted out an intrusive, ear-bending whoop.
“I thought you said I was the conduit? Whatever the hell that is.”
The train whooped again and Nina turned to the rail, her frustration boiling over. “Shut up! Just shut the fuck up! Leave us alone. We never asked for this...” But she was small, her voice sucked away.
The forest caught fire at the demon train’s passing. The hills and mountains were nothing but an afterthought, washed away in its wake. The hell train became everything.
A hand touched lightly on Nina's shoulder. “I will help you, sister. Close your eyes.”
Nina looked at Red Thunder, the imposing Nez Perce suddenly standing there with them, his long black hair billowing around his stark features. She felt like she could trust in him in a way she couldn’t trust anyone else, save for Pa. Nina closed her eyes and let the sulfuric heat wash across her face, let the locomotive sound storm into her ears. The rumble of the rail vibrated her aching muscles.
Red Thunder guided her hand to the rock, and all three of them held the bit of coal up. “Forget the beast. Forget Liao and the walking dead. Focus only on your dream, on your fallen Shoshone, and all the People.”
Nina’s lungs protested the hot, dry heat. In truth, her instincts told her to leap from the train, to throw herself from the beast's path, to get as far away as she could. But she gripped the rail even harder, determined to stand her ground. “It is...difficult. It burns. We're going to die.”
“Everyone journeys to the Shadow Lands in time,” Red answered. “But right now your mission is here in this world. Think of the boha gande's words.”
Nina remembered the boha gande speaking to her from the inner circle, surrounded by the People's life force. You must save the Land...a great poison runs through it, an infection that must be purged.
“It must be purged,” Nina whispered.
“That's right, Nina...” said Mathias, then the priest’s voice faded away.
Nina no more. Ninataku, Fire Eater...
Fire Eater.
She swallowed nervously, squeezed her eyes shut, and breathed deep. Her lungs were not burned away. The air, while warm, was no more harmful to her than a mild zephyr on a spring day, blowing down from the high cliffs.
Drums sounded, faintly at first, gathering volume as she allowed herself to sink deeper into Shadow. The darkness filled her with the gentle calm of a placid lake in the height of summer. It seeped through her soul, through her pores, a cool mystical power intruding upon the real world—just like Liao's demon train.
Someone gasped. Nina opened her eyes and glanced over her right shoulder. Jasmine stood in the cabin doorway, her eyes fixed on the tracks, tears moistening her coffee-and-cream skin and drying almost as quickly as they ran. Rachel hid behind her, peeking over Jasmine’s bare shoulder.
Pa slipped past the two females, stepped onto the deck, ignoring the behemoth on the tracks behind them. He looked Nina square in her eyes, seemed taken aback by something he saw, yet never wavered.
Pa nodded.
She looked at Father Mathias, then at the simple lump of coal held between them. The priest gripped the rail with his other hand, eyes closed, hair flying in the wind, lips moving in quiet prayer. He had faith; not only in his God, but in her.
From the corner of her eyes, Nina spied the encroaching beast. It flared viciously, brilliantly, spitting cinders that rained over them in ashen gray. It came on, fifty, forty, now thirty feet away.
Nina closed her eyes, hoping she could find something to say, some eloquent prayer to disarm the thing, to send it away. But she had no words, not in English nor her native tongue; she could hardly think straight, much less pray in a language she rarely spoke, but the drums beat on, their rhythm thrilling her heart to match their pace. The boha gande called her name. Feathers brushed against her cheeks.
Jasmine and Pa cried out. Rachel screamed from inside the armored car.
Nina's eyes flew open. The demon train reared, bloating in form, pushing a wave of searing heat over them, stirring the ash into a blizzard. Nina gazed into the undercarriage of the massive machine, tons of molten iron lifting completely off the tracks.
How in the blazes...?
Nina let go of the rail and raised her hand. She felt the intense heat against her palm, yet she didn’t burn. She absorbed it. Bright tendrils of firelight coalesced from
the searing belly of the beast down each of her fingers. The blistering hotness passed through her body, through the train deck, and into the land.
Fire Eater.
The name was a mantra, bounding through her skull, over and over again, demanding she accept its calling.
The demon train slammed down on the tracks. Steam poured through its whistle, its sharpened teeth gnashed. Nina didn't know if she could stop it.
But maybe...
“Keep time with me,” Nina shouted. She slapped her hand against the rail, making one of the patterns she'd heard so many times in her head. The pulse of the Goshute.
Bom-bom-tata-bom, bom-bom-tata-bom...
The sound should have been swept away in the chaos, but her strikes against the rail were like a distant thunder rolling over the mountains. They cleaved the air, bullets bound for the ears of those around her.
Father Mathias gave a strange look, then followed suit, his hand awkwardly mimicking the pattern against the rail. His rhythm was questionable, but the intent was there.
Red Thunder bent low, his worn leather moccasins kicking up ash and coal dust as he danced to her rhythm, adding his voice, chanting “Yo-Hey-Ohee” over and over. In Nina's mind, Shoshone feet shuffled along with her cadence, further channeling the earth force, which fed off the chaotic energy. She saw ghost images joining Red on the deck, even the rushing air beyond filled with the chanting, dancing tribes of Shoshone, and Paiute, even Washoah, and her mother’s people, the Goshute—braves, elders, women—all singing their war cries in unison.
Awash in this newfound power, Nina turned to the rail, stared down Liao's hellish beast. Her fear burned away in its heat, joining the ash that whirled about. She was hardly able to comprehend what they'd just done—what she’d just done.
The demon train slowed, hesitating, engine dimming, drawing back from them like a cuffed dog. Then its iron-warped nostrils flared, lantern eyes burning with malice. It seemed about to charge again when new sounds fought through the ruckus. Clacking metal against metal. Nina looked back to see Jasmine beating a rifle barrel against the side of the deck in time with her and Father Mathias. Jasmine stood precariously close to the edge of the deck. If the monstrosity came again, it would probably knock her off, but she didn't seem to care, fixing the beast with a glare and a snarl twisting her lips. “Come on!” she yelled.