by Mark Eller
Aaron watched Sarah check Ernest one last time, loving the maternal in her, and he felt his heart swell when Ernest smiled sleepily. After tucking the baby's blanket in tighter around him, Sarah hurried over to Aaron. Her hug was warm.
"Aaron, you are wonderful. Did I ever tell you that? This is what, the fifth Turner House? These places are costing us a fortune, but you don't seem to care, and neither do I."
Turning his thoughts away from those who were not there, Aaron gave his attention to his wife.
"You apparently don't check our accounts all that closely," he said dryly. "Every House is supported by one or more local business so we fork out almost no money after the initial start-up costs. In fact, sometimes I even get extra money sent to me because the associated businesses are bringing in more than enough to cover the costs. Besides, have you seen any of my mail from Miss Bivins?"
"No," Sarah admitted.
"We have more than twenty-seven thousand silver on account in N'Ark. I'm telling you, that young lady has gouged every penny she could out of everyone using other world ideas, and it's only going to get bigger from here on."
"My husband," Sarah crooned into his ear. "Mister Rich Tycoon. Are you planning on moving to the big city?"
With a slight shudder of distaste, Aaron shook his head. "No thanks, I like being an average little town Storeman. Besides, we won't be so rich for long because I've asked Miss Bivins to open half a dozen more Houses. N'Ark is big." He pushed her gently away. "I have a floor to sweep, woman."
"You have a lot of things to do," she playfully replied. "Do you realize that you've yet to make it to a town meeting despite every pressure we've put on you?"
"Creative avoidance," Aaron explained.
"Right," Sarah chuckled, and then she started when her eyes focused towards the door. They grew huge, shot to Ernest, and suddenly became warrior hard. Without a word she blurred into motion, leaped behind the counter, and flashed back to his side before Aaron had time to finish turning around.
Rack Rack
"Mister Beech," she said grimly, "it is time for you to leave." Her shotgun pointed unwaveringly.
Protective shield glimmering faintly around him, Beech stood in the doorway. Appearing nonchalantly smooth despite his rough appearance, he ignored Sarah; ignored the shotgun. Sarah's steel sword hung at his side.
"Hello, Storeman," Beech said. "I bet you thought I was finished with you. Sorrrry, but I just can't leave you alone. You see, Storeman, you owe me. If not for you and those damn noise sticks and all the Stones you gave the guard, I could have been a king. But thanks to you, the Guard went and killed off all my best officers."
He scowled and raised his hands expansively. "How am I supposed to run a war with no officers?" His frown grew deeper. "I can't. Without officers, all my nice bloodthirsty savages were only good for running around in disorganized groups and getting themselves killed. You owe me an empire, Storeman. I came to collect."
Aaron wished he still carried his pistol. "What do you want?" Should he break his word and transport over to the other world with Sarah and the baby? If ever there was any justification to do so, it was now. Then again, it was likely that if he did transfer over he would not live ten seconds since he still had a small charge of C4 in his back, and the Jefferson government probably still transmitted its firing signal. After all, an electronic signal was a very easy and inexpensive thing to run.
"Money," Beech said simply. "I understand you have a good deal of it. I need a few tens of pounds of silver." He paused and then smiled expansively. "Oh yes, I almost forgot. I could use some of the Talent Stones you have left. In fact, I could use all of them. Given to the right men, I can still have my little Empire. In a few years I can even own Isabella."
"There are no more Stones," Aaron lied. "The government took all I had left."
Beech shook his head. "Tsk, Tsk. I don't believe you. Tell you what. Since I'm a fair man I'll give you a choice. You can die slow before you show me where they are, or you can die quickly afterwards." He glanced at Sarah. "Stop waving that thing around, Mistress Turner. It can do me no harm."
"We'll find out," Sarah said. Her voice was cold and hard, and Aaron felt that aura of confined terror pour off her. She was suddenly her old self, death and mayhem and justice waiting to be released. "Aaron, there's another shotgun beside the back room's door. Get it?" Her voice held no inflection at all.
"I think not," Beech said. After drawing his sword, he started to raise it.
Sarah fired.
Multiple flashes lighting up his shield, Beech's face twisted with shock. He staggered backward, lifting his sword toward Sarah.
Moving unnaturally fast, she was gone before his move was finished. She moved Talent fast.
Rack Rack BOOM Rack Rack BOOM Rack Rack BOOM
Running full out, Aaron threw open the back room door just as Beech splintered six shelves with his power. Boxes tore apart and cans burst with a spray of smashed vegetables and pulped fruit. Aaron jerked his head around to see Beech rolling across the floor, trying to line the tip of the sword up with Sarah's elusive shape. Beech's shield wavered, became more visible to the eye and cracks showed on its surface. Its transparent hue became a translucent muddy green. Growling, Beech sprang to his feet.
BOOM
Rack Rack
BOOM
Aaron's first shot followed close behind Sarah's last. Beech, his face twisted with hate, fell to his knees. His eyes tried to focus on Sarah as she grabbed a box of shells from the behind the counter. Back in his bassinette, Ernest screamed.
On his knees, Beech laughed hysterically while blood broke through his skin. His sword jerked around, and his laughter took on a note of satisfied cruelty.
"Damn if they don't hurt me after all," he crowed. "The hell with you then." He laughed again and his sword lined up, pointing at Ernst.
"Nooooo!"
Aaron fired off his last shots, knocking the sword wielding arm aside just before Beech released his energy. The connecting wall between the store and the Emporium blew out, filling the air with a thick cloud of splinters and wood dust that choked his lungs. He could barely see.
BOOMBOOMBOOMBOOMBOOM
Screaming defiance and fear, Sarah fired again and again. The shield surrounding Beech flared and crackled, spitting out jagged shards of almost solid light. Beech screeched when the force of multiple explosions against his shield sent him to the floor and rolled him out the doorway to land on the boardwalk. Sarah quickly shoved more shells into her shotgun.
And then she fired again.
Beech fell back into the street. The sword pointed toward--
Sarah fired twice more.
Knocked to the side, the sword's aim changed. Searing flames shot up from the street's dust and mud while two arrows reflected off the thinning shield. The sword's aim moved to the doorway in a quick jerk of Beech's wrist. It swept further. Its tip pointed at Aaron's eyes, and then it moved further until it pointed at the store's interior where a small shocked bundle screamed out its tiny lungs.
"Waaah--ah--ah--ahhhh."
"Gods--" Aaron reflexively jerked the trigger even though he could barely see through the wood dusted haze.
Beech's shield flared in only two places. The sword did not waver. His eyes squinted in concentration.
"Ernest!" Sarah screeched. She leaped behind the burning counter in a blur of movement, stooping and reaching. Shotgun falling from her warrior hands, her face twisted in anguished fear.
Aaron dove through the fog of sawdust to land in the doorway so he could make his body a shield against any direct attack Beech could throw.
"Kill me then!" he screamed. "Take me!
"No," Beech said conversationally, "I still need you." Blood ran down his face, leaked from his nose and his eyes and his ears. More blood, thin and watery, seeped from the pores of his skin. Surrounding him, the shield was a morass of cracked imperfections. Another arrow hit the shield. It stuck there, seeming to stand still in
midair.
With a quick curse, Beech tipped the point of his sword up and released a stream of energy. Fire streaked over Aaron's shoulder, entered the store, and was met by a wall of drifting wood dust.
BAAAROOOMP
Aaron flew forward as flames erupted around him while Ernest screeched mortal agony. Aaron landed on Beech, bounced across his shield, and then desperately twisted to look at his fire engulfed store just in time to see Sarah burst out of the flames. Talent fast, she blurred into the street with the blackened form of Ernest clutched to her chest. Hungry flames rose from her hair and clothes and skin. Oxygen starved, the fire inside the store blew itself out in a billow of smoke. Gasping, burning, Sarah fell to her knees in the dusty street.
"Oh no," Aaron whispered.
Horrified, he watched Sarah's one remaining eye fasten on the remnants of her child. Her charred lungs fought to draw in air. Her head lifted. Hate and fury and anguish shot from her single eye to land on Beech. After trying to draw in one more breath, she changed her single eyed gaze to Aaron. Her eyelid closed. Her lips moved faintly, paused.
"Noooo! Noooo!"
Ernest still clutched tightly in her arms, smoke rising from her clothes and hair, Sarah leaned forward, fell, and then lay still.
"Gods--oh Gods--no--"
Unbelieving, Aaron stumbled forward, fell to his knees, landed in the dusty street, and then his hands were in the dirt, and he scrambled and crawled and knelt next to her blackened and still smoking body. Gently lifting Sarah, he drew her into his arms while tears dripped from his face, fell on her, giving her his salt, his moisture, his grief, because that was all he had to give. Sarah's arms loosened, opened, and the charred remains of Ernest fell from her dead hands. A voice wailed. His voice. Scrambling, sobbing, he tried to pull both his dead wife and his dead child to him. Sarah's seared face glistened wet from his falling tears.
Beech laughed shrilly.
Turned his grieving eyes toward the monster, Aaron saw that Beech's shield flickered and bled, saw that it was on the verge of failing, but that truth had no meaning. Nothing had meaning.
Beech pointed a finger at Aaron. "Now that was a handy revenge. Killed by the sword you gave her. I'll let you live with this memory, Storeman. The next time I come around, you might be more willing to obey my orders." Beech tried to smile, failed. "One more wife, three children." Lowering his finger, he grasped the sword handle with both hands.
A gun bellowed.
Beech's shield flickered and flared. Eye-searing light burst where the bullet hit…and then the shield died.
Like an inexorable, harbinger of doom, the gun fired twice more.
Cursing, Beech fell back with blood spurting from his arm. His face twisted in a sick semblance of concentration, and then his shield flared weakly back to life.
New shots sounded. One. Two. Three. Cathy stood in the street. Eyes wild, .38 gripped firmly in two hands, she fired her revolver again and again.
Light roared off the shield with each shot. Beech tried to raise the sword with both hands. Failed. Releasing his hold with one hand, he pointed a finger and gestured.
Cathy screamed and dropped her revolver.
Aaron looked up, his eyes blurred with tears, and then he stood erect with Sarah in his arms, their dead child at his feet. His anguished soul bled around him.
Arrows struck at Beech, and the shield showed signs of failing once more. Staggering to his feet, Beech saluted Aaron as Aaron let Sarah tumble brokenly to the ground. Crying, sobbing, Aaron stumbled toward Beech for one step, two, and then he gathered himself and ran while hate and rage and grief boiled inside him. Beech sheathed his sword. Aaron's hands grabbed.
"Goodbye, Storeman."
Beech closed his eyes while Aaron clutched uselessly at his shield. Arrows struck. One glanced and cut a line along Aaron's shoulder. Beech weakly smiled through a mask of blood, briefly pointed a shaking finger towards Aaron, and then teleported away.
Flicker
* * *
The store was a ruin though the fire brigade did arrive in time to douse the building flames before they spread. Their quick action saved the lower levels of the store but they could do little for the upper floor. The back room was still intact but all Aaron's stock was broken and ruined. Next door, Cathy's Emporium suffered from smoke and water damage. It had some charring on one wall where fires had tried to start and then died in the thick, oxygen poor smoke. Somewhat fortunately, most of Cathy's books had not been stored on that wall. Even so, over half of all the books were ruined.
But Cathy lived.
The town consensus was that Beech must have been weak and conserving his energy when he struck at Cathy because she suffered nothing more serious than a badly burned face. While holding Sarah's stiffening fingers Aaron heard Doc promise that Cathy would not show a single scar.
When the immediate crisis was over, and Aaron had no busy work to do, he did the one thing he most desired. He collapsed.
Three days went by. Three nights passed. At the end of those days he stood by while they buried the charred remains of his wife and child. Sarah's father and mothers stood by. Crying shamelessly, Aaron fought not to fall apart while Mister Turnbull gave last rites to Sarah and Ernest. He was not the only one who wept because almost the entire town was there.
That night, Aaron lay down in his empty bed in his empty house and, once again, could not sleep. His belly rumbled, demanding food he would not give it, and his soul felt empty.
Somebody knocked on his door while he lay in bed, but he ignored it. The knocking became insistent. Aaron blinked once and then again.
Creee-squunc
With a crack of splintering wood the front door broke open. Footsteps approached, and then Kit entered the bedroom, strode quietly over to him, and lowered herself to lie down beside his stiff body.
"I'm thinking," Aaron said. Nodding quietly, she cried while he held her close.
Later that night he finally slept, and he dreamed of a blood covered, laughing face that sneered at him while he held Sarah in his arms. Her ash caught in the wind and blew away until he held nothing but her one remaining eye in the palm of his hand. Within its depths he could see the dead charred bones of Ernest playing.
He woke from the nightmare hours later, cursing the betrayal of his mind and swearing he would never sleep again. Holding Kit close, he continued thinking. There had to be a way.
* * *
Perk arranged to have the store emptied. Everything except for the guns and ammo, the knives, the little remaining silver and the buried packages of Talent Stones were moved into a warehouse. The rest of the goods were moved into Aaron's home where Kit and Perk stood guard over them twenty-four hours a day.
The store was torn apart from the roof to the ground, but because dozens of townspeople lent their labor the building was rebuilt in less than a week. Within a few days Cathy reappeared, her face covered with new, shining skin, compliments of Doc's Talent Stone. She reclaimed her gun and begged more ammunition off Kit. After accepting ten boxes of ammo she cried on Aaron, clinging to him and kissing him half a dozen times before she left.
Ten days after the funeral Aaron's eyes opened with the barest hints of reasoned sanity reflecting within them. He looked to Kit when she came to him, and pressed his lips into a hard straight line.
"Are you done thinking?" Kit asked.
Aaron nodded. "We have a job to do."
She nodded. "I know." She got up to leave. "I need to see Doc."
"Why?"
"Aaron, you may die doing this. I want more of you left behind. I won't lie to you. I don't love you, won't even pretend that I love you, but that doesn't matter. Something in you is part of Sarah. I want that. I want more children to remind me of her."
He thought the matter over and decided that the issue had no weight with him. Yes, Kit did not love him, but there was no pain in that because he had no love for her. He had never loved her, and he could no longer feel love for his children by
her. At this moment, at this time, he had no love or liking or care for anyone alive. He had no room for anything but hate and hurt and an intense desire for revenge. Admittedly, he might not be sane, but he did not care because no sane man ever tried to kill a Talent Master.
"Okay," he said emptily. "Just hurry it up. We have things to do."
Beech was out there somewhere. He was out there.
"I'm coming for you," Aaron whispered.
Chapter 31
Jorrin's hammer was silent when Aaron slipped into his workshop. This unusual condition was explained when Aaron found him busy filing a new edge onto a saw. Watching him for a while, Aaron felt envious of the peace in the man's soul. Aaron's life had been peaceful once. Only two weeks back it had been filled with peace and contentment, filled with the love of a wife and children.
No more. That time was over.
Jorrin finished a section, looked up, and spoke carefully, almost as if he were afraid of shattering something infinitely fragile and precious. "Aaron."
Aaron thought about telling Jorrin there was no reason to worry because Aaron was not brittle. He was not the man he had once been. No, that time was over. Disappeared. This was Aaron's time of rock. He felt granite cold and granite hard.
"Do something for me." Aaron's voice, flat and unemotional, sounded cold and empty. It matched the way he felt inside. He was dead and empty and cold and hard.
Without waiting for an answer, he held out four steel knives. "Melt these down. Make small round pellets out of them."
Jorrin gave the knives a doubtful look. "I'm not really sure how to do that."
"Make it hot. Make it really hot, until they melt. Let drops of molten metal fall into a barrel of cold water."
Jorrin took the knives. "I'll do what I can. I won't make no promises. This here is a metal I've never dealt with before." He gave Aaron a close look. "Are you going to be all right?"
Turning abruptly, Aaron left without answering because he did not want to lie to Jorrin. Some part of honor, some part of integrity still remained.