“Ling?” He called from the top step. “Can you open the door?”
“Jun!” She cried out urgently. Jun had never heard her so scared. “Come quick!”
Not knowing what to do with the clothes, he tossed them over the railing and rushed inside.
Ling sat on their bed, a scroll and an arrow lying on either side of her.
“This was on the door to the shop,” she explained.
A broken wax seal remained intact enough to see the insignia. He expected to see the crest of Ling’s husband or father, but it was not.
“From your brother?”
Ling nodded. “He says that our father has chosen to work on improving relationships with the Rìběn, but instead made things worse.”
That did not surprise Jun, at all. Everyone knew that war between his country and the one Westerners called Japan was only a matter of time.
“Brother says word reached Emperor Meiji that I had fled to America, and that he has sent his akuma to capture me, in hopes of weakening my father’s position.”
Just the sound of the word sent chills down Jun’s spine. The legends surrounding the Japanese Emperor’s secret assassins, known also as Shinobi, were terrifying. Their mystical powers were unrivaled.
If they had chosen Ling as their target, Jun did not know what to do. Ling’s brother had taken a great risk sending a messenger to warn her.
Jun knelt by his love. “I will get help from Sheriff Patrick. He will know what to do. He has faced many such demons. He will protect you, even if I can’t.”
Ling nodded.
As Jun got up to leave, he could not help but wonder how Ling’s brother had found her so easily, and were Meiji’s demon assassins close behind?
It didn’t take long for word to get out about the new tables at the Sagebrush, and though there were others in the area, the chance to meet and play against the infamous bounty hunter Hal Turk brought enough business to make a decent living.
At night, Turk and Diaz had a packed house, with many players waiting in the wings. During the day, Ed Muybridge set up his cameras and took photos of Turk dealing cards.
Turk did not think himself a handsome man, but the eye patch certainly helped him with the ladies. They sat spellbound as he spun his tales of how his eye had been lost, each time a different—and completely fabricated— yarn.
And yet, the thought of being in pictures—multiple pictures—moving pictures—made Turk nervous and a bit shy. He dressed up, got a shave and haircut, and even trimmed his thick mustache until he could see his smile in the mirror.
Turk didn’t like it. The smile.
He didn’t do it often enough for it to look natural on his face, despite the steady flow of money coming in. But a deal was a deal, and he would uphold his end.
Muybridge’s zoopraxiscope set-up was just like taking ten photographs at once. Muybridge positioned several cameras in a line and set them off in a succession using a control mechanism, capturing each of Turk’s movements. He had Turk deal slow, and then fast. The camera flashes blinded Turk, and he found himself blinking away stars from his eyes after each session.
During the exercises, the old man seemed happy, but at night, after he developed his prints, he came back down dejected.
“They are not coming out the way I hoped. I need a better angle to film from.”
Muybridge asked for, and got, permission from Owner to hang the cameras from the rafters, which turned out to be quite the endeavor. After each round, Muybridge asked Turk to deal faster, with the photographer adjusting his cameras to activate quicker. Finally, Muybridge seemed satisfied. He left the cameras hanging there as he rushed up the stairs.
“I’ll let you know if this worked after I develop them tonight. Maybe I’ll show everyone the finished moving pictures here on the stage.”
Owner thought that a fine idea, knowing it would bring in more customers than even the chance to play faro against Turk.
Later, in his room, Turk waited for Diaz to return from Chewy’s with their laundry. He turned as the door creaked open slowly.
“Hey, Diaz. That crazy old man might’ve finally—” His partner’s face stopped him short. “What’s up, Amigo?”
Diaz sat down on his bed. “It’s Chewy, Señor Turk. He’s dead.”
Chewy had been a good man. He and his family not only ran the laundry, but he stabled Turk’s horse, Armageddon. Chewy washed Armie’s saddle blanket without ever charging Turk, because he was honored to have such a fine horse in his stalls. Turk also knew Chewy must’ve been slipping Armie treats, because the warhorse had never taken to someone so fast. Even Diaz still got bitten occasionally.
“What happened?”
Diaz shook his head. “No one is certain. As he walked down Main Street, there was a sudden breeze, and next thing anyone knew, Chewy’s head lay on the ground next to his body.”
Turk thought Diaz might cry, and Turk would’ve joined him, were he not so angry. He raced downstairs, just as the buzz of the murder reached the Sagebrush.
Turk and Diaz had met Sheriff Theodore Patrick upon arriving in Drowned Horse. It was part of the town’s ordinance that all guns be surrendered during your stay. Normally, Turk would’ve turned them all in, but considering the job he’d just accepted, and the type of money he’d be carrying around, the good sheriff agreed to let him kept his sidearm.
Under normal circumstances, a one-armed lawman would be a risk to any he protected, especially against things that defied belief, but Turk’s instincts told him Sheriff Patrick wasn’t a person he should be on the wrong end of a gun from. Turk’s biggest surprise had been Patrick’s age, as most men to carry a badge didn’t live long past thirty. At the ripe old age of thirty-seven, Patrick’s reputation had gained legendary status even before he’d come to Drowned Horse.
When Turk arrived at the scene, the sheriff was squatted down near the two parts of Chewy’s body. Patrick raised an eyebrow and, with a touch of amusement in his voice despite the gruesome sight, said, “Figured you’d come. Still retired?”
“Depends. Know who killed him?”
“Not ‘who,’ but ‘what.’ And yeah, I do. You ain’t going to like it.”
Turk’s palms suddenly grew moist, and his heart thumped in his chest. It was time, he realized, for him to face one of Drowned Horse’s infamous curses.
Turk hadn’t felt like this since his first bounty.
Is this what I’ve been missing in my life? A dance with Death? Is that the only way I’ll ever be happy?
A scream tore Turk from his thoughts.
Ling, Chewy’s wife, raced down the street as fast as she could in her dress. Patrick moved faster, getting up and meeting her before she could get any closer to the body.
“Ling,” he said, taking her into a hug and turning her away from the scene. “You don’t want to see. I don’t want to see it either.”
She tried to get around him, but Patrick held her firm until she broke down in sobs.
Turk stood himself between them, trying to be another screen from the sight on the ground. But he knew there was too much blood creeping down the packed-hard street to soak into the dirt. No matter where you looked, Death made sure everyone knew it’d come to town.
After Ling had been taken to the town’s church by the pastor’s wife for comforting, which the sheriff said would also include communion wine to calm her nerves, Turk sat in Patrick’s office listening to the man recite a list of swear words even Turk didn’t use.
“Fond of him, were you?” Turk asked.
“No. I mean, yes. But I’m not cursing about that.” Patrick dropped into his chair. “I’d tried to stop this very thing from happening.”
“Do tell.”
“Chewy came to me a few days ago, saying that the Emperor of Japan had sent some sort of demons to kidnap Ling. ‘Shinobi,’ he said. Ling called them ‘akuma,’ which I guess means devil in Japanese.”
“Like this town didn’t have enough demons without having
to import them?”
Patrick glared at him, but then sighed. “That’s the risk everyone who lives here takes. The evils of the world are drawn to Drowned Horse, like bees to a flower. But we had warning this time. Ling had gotten a letter, and I did my best to keep an eye out for anything … well, demonlike. I asked every Oriental I could find between here and the mines what we were up against, only to discover that their bastards don’t act like good ol’ American demons, or even the ones the Indians worship. They’re practically invisible and good at killing without leaving a trace.”
While Turk was curious what ‘good ol’ American demons’ acted like, he knew that story was best told another day over drinks. For now, he wanted to move fast, while he was still riled.
“So, what then?”
Patrick pulled out some papers filled with notes and sketches.
“I found some Japanese miners who’d brought scrolls and such from their homeland. I copied what pictures I could find. Shinobis, or akumas, or whatever, usually work in the dark, blending in with the night. But when they do work during the day, they ain’t any easier to spot. They disguise themselves as any normal person. They also disappear in a puff of smoke, but it don’t smell like sulfur, though.”
“Hmmm.” Turk looked over the sketches. The expression each demon wore looked as though they smiled, or laughed. In Turk’s opinion, nothing was more effective at creating fear in prey than a laughing predator. Just ask any hyena.
Their horns were also longer than the Catholic version of the devil he’d been warned of back in the orphanage.
That had been the last place Turk had ever called home, and due to the way he had been treated there, he’d never wanted to lay down roots again. The people who ran the place were monsters of a different sort, promising hellfire and brimstone—and beatings—to keep Satan away.
The sketches also had the Shinobi carrying swords, knives, and …
“What are these things? The stars?”
Patrick shrugged. “That’s exactly how they were described to me. Little metal stars the demons shoot out of their hands with such force, they can stick in just about anything.”
“Or anyone.”
Turk’s instincts went off. Something about these drawings didn’t sit right, but he couldn’t say what.
“Right. But how’m I supposed to catch, let alone shoot, something I can’t see. Especially if it moves that fast? At least five people saw Chewy die, right there in the street, but no one saw how. One moment, he was looking around nervously. Next thing anyone knew, his head rolled down the road as his body sagged to the ground, blood gushing everywhere.”
The sight would have unnerved anyone, even the hearty people of Drowned Horse.
“Why’d they kill him? Didn’t you say they were after his wife?”
Patrick nodded. “Yup. Her father got mixed up in some Chinese-Japanese mess, and this Meiji guy sent his demons to take Ling back to Japan as leverage against her father.”
“So, why haven’t they taken her yet?”
Patrick thought on that. “Maybe that’s how they work. Distract the guards with some sort of—”
Both leapt from their seats and reached the church steps just as the sounds of chaos erupted within. Drawing their pieces—Turk just a hair slower than Patrick, he noticed—they busted through the front door.
Four smoke funnels rose up from various places in the room, and from each cloud, a demon jumped out. The Shinobi wore normal, everyday clothes. They were not scaly, or demonlike, at all.
No cloven hooves.
No forked tail.
But each had a face just as Patrick had drawn from people’s accounts of them. No two were alike, though, and yet, somehow, they all implied a primal fear instilled into every child. These were the demons that parents warned their brood about.
Ling and the preacher’s wife cowered, while the pastor bravely held up his bible, yelling words to cast out sin. Without any noticeable movement from the Shinobi, three metal stars embedded in the pastor’s good book. Luckily, it was wide and thick enough that none of the stars reached the reverend himself. He dove under a pew and prayed, loudly.
The demons each wore a blade at their side, which struck Turk as odd even on the sketches.
Why does a demon need a sword?
Before he could pose an answer, one of the four demons batted the preacher’s wife aside and grabbed Ling. The other three, having seen the new arrivals, turned and made motions with their hands. Turk pushed Patrick down just as several metal stars embedded in the wall behind where they’d just been.
Using the pew for cover, Turk and Patrick sat up and began shooting—the blast of their guns deafening in the normally tranquil room. Each shooter tracked a different Shinobi, but the demons moved so fast neither man hit what they aimed at.
The Shinobi drew their swords and leapt pew over pew towards the place Turk and Patrick had made their stand.
Suddenly, more voices came from outside. A group of heavily armed citizens of Drowned Horse flooded through the open doors, led by Owner.
Turk growled. “What about that ordinance? You told me I was an exception.”
Patrick sheepishly grinned. “It’s a cursed town. Think I’m gonna leave these folks unarmed?”
They shot the demon nearest Ling, catching it in the shoulder but not killing it. It let her drop to the floor before turning to see the whole room.
The Shinobi apparently didn’t like the odds, and more smoke funnels arose around them to cover their escape.
Sheriff Patrick quickly directed everyone to the Sagebrush. There, tending to the party’s superficial wounds, he swore again. “They move too fast. We caught them by surprise this time, but they’ll be ready next.”
Owner agreed. “If only there was a way to slow them down.”
At that moment, Muybridge, who had not been a part of the cavalry charge, shouted from the top steps, “Eureka! I did it! I managed to capture your lightning-fast hands on film, Mr. Turk!”
As everyone looked up at the old photographer in sudden awe, Muybridge squinted down at his gawking audience. “Did I miss something?”
Owner closed the Sagebrush and sent word around. This type of warning was all too common from Owner, and other towns knew that whatever Drowned Horse faced, it was best to stay away if you valued breathing.
The saloon remained as dark as night itself inside. And despite being secured, Turk suspected that whatever magic the demons had would not only get them inside, but allow them to see in the dark. That part of their legend seemed true of every person Patrick interviewed.
“You know what I would do?” Diaz whispered to his partner.
“Let me guess. Create another distraction?”
“Si, Señor Hunt—Turk. Draw everyone outside.”
Turk nodded, but then realized they sat in pitch black, so he said, “Yeah, we figured on that. That’s why most of the townsfolk are scattered around the town, laying low, while we’re the stupid ones inside with Ling.”
Ling Chew sat at a table in the middle of the room. All the other tables had been pushed to the sides, and used to barricade the windows and doors. A single candle remained lit in front of her.
Turk respected that, despite being scared, Ling remained defiant. She would see her husband’s killers fail at their mission and fall before her. Her chin held high, she waited, as did Turk, Diaz, Patrick, the reverend, Owner, and several of Drowned Horse’s finest men.
As is on cue, an alarm sounded outside.
“Fire! The livery’s on fire!”
Sheriff Patrick called out in a loud whisper, “Go!”
Several volunteers got up as one and pushed aside the tables blocking the front door. They ran out into the night, as planned, making it appear as if Ling would be left alone, or at least only weakly guarded.
Turk and Diaz moved quickly to push the doors closed and replaced the tables, but before they could, a breeze whooshed by them. Something faster than a falcon had rush
ed into the Sagebrush. Turk barely had time to turn around as shapes of four demons surrounded their bait.
Ling didn’t scream in fear. Instead, she stood and shouted, “Now!”
The room burst into full daylight as all of Muybridge’s cameras went off at the same time. The Shinobi stumbled backwards, blinded. They threw their hands over their eyes to block what must be the million after-flashes that Turk knew oh so well.
With that, Owner turned up all the gaslamps.
Ling drew a large knife from the back of her dress, and leapt onto the table. Her cry of rage echoed through the saloon as she launched herself into the air, both hands on the hilt and brought it down on the closest demon.
Even stunned and blinded, her Shinobi moved just in time to avoid a death blow.
Ling had cut through its face, though, which … fell into two pieces!
Behind it, a very stunned Oriental man shot panicked eyes around the room.
Sheriff Patrick called out, “They ain’t demons. They’re just men!”
The pastor cursed. “Dammit! I blessed all your weapons for nothing?”
Not wanting to waste their element of surprise, Turk shot the closest Shinobi, catching him between the shoulder blades. “They die like men, too. Sanctified bullets or not, padre!”
Patrick grazed the next “demon” in the leg as the assassin tried to escape upstairs. He was finished off by more of Patrick’s impromptu deputies, who’d been hiding in the second floor rooms.
Turk spotted motion above him. Muybridge jumped from rafter to rafter, belying his age, replacing powder in each of the camera’s flashes.
Two of their number gone, the remaining Shinobi did what Turk thought they would do. They pulled out the pellets that they used for making smoke, and threw them to the ground, creating a large, obscuring cloud.
Ling’s muffled cry reached Turk just as she was grabbed by one the demons.
“Ed? Anytime now!”
Muybridge replied, “Ready! Go!”
As they had before, each of Patrick’s men prepared for the flash by covering their eyes. Turk and Patrick, however, waited with wide open. When the multitude of flashes went off, they could clearly see the silhouettes of all three people in the smoke. Lawman and hunter both fired taking the two taller shapes down
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