by Hondo Jinx
They packed up her few belongings, Cotter watching them like a hawk to make sure no one stole any of his tools. The mechanical dog clanked back and forth, ready to attack.
Then Remi got onto her Harley, and Brawley and the other girls climbed aboard the RV.
Frankie drove.
As they started to pull out, Cotter shook his fist, sputtering and purple-faced with impotent rage.
Brawley gave Cotter a parting nod, and the miserable old Gearhead gave him a heartfelt double bird. “Fuck you, asshole!” Cotter shouted as they pulled away. “You ever come back here, you thieving son of a bitch, you’re dog food!”
The braided strand slammed to a stop, breaking Brawley’s hold. Once again, he hurtled into darkness.
Brawley jolted back into the real world. Again, he had ridden the thing all the way up to its tornado trick. But no matter what he tried, the damn thing threw him every time. Trying to ride it was like trying to cover a bucking bull with no rope.
That’s what he needed to best the spliced braid, he thought yet again, a damn bull rope.
Beside him purred Callie. She was curled up in a rumbling little knot of warm, colorful fur at his side.
Good idea, sleep. He wasn’t tired, but he did need to catch some shuteye in order to replenish his juice.
They were making great time. They’d been on the road for an hour and had already covered a hundred miles. But even at this speed, the RV sailed smoothly on down the highway, purring like Callie.
Frankie drove, all deep dimples and gleaming green eyes, obviously ecstatic to have escaped Cotter. She had her trucker hat on backwards and was tapping the wheel to the beat of the classic rock playing with perfect sound from the upgraded speakers.
Beside her sat Nina, who sang along beautifully, even catching some of Grace Slick’s surreal warble as she crooned “White Rabbit.”
It was a happy scene, the two women hitting it off so naturally, and Brawley was hit by a fresh wave of love for his first wife, who was so good at welcoming others.
He also felt another pulse of desire for his driver.
Maybe he and Frankie would get together, maybe they wouldn’t. Either way, he’d done the right thing, buying her freedom. And not just the right thing for Frankie.
It would be awesome, having a talented Gearhead to work on his stuff. The RV was just the beginning. Back in Texas, the ranch had been failing for years. A good chunk of their money problems and looming challenges had to do with old and broken equipment.
He couldn’t wait to get home. It would be awkward, explaining these women to his family, but he’d climb onto that bull when he entered the chute. For now, he was just looking forward to being back in God’s country.
They might break the state line by sunup unless they had trouble finding the item his parents had left him.
His gut chimed in then, assuring him that yes, there would be trouble. What sort of trouble, he had no idea. Nor did it matter. Whatever came at them, he would face it.
One more reason to quit training and catch some sleep.
Sage sat at the dinette bench in a lotus position, studying the strange little book Brawley’s parents had left him. She turned a page, squinted, and moved a slender finger back and forth, as if tracing lines of shifting text.
Looking up, she smiled, squinched her glasses up the bridge of her nose, and said, “Husband, I believe that the item you are presently seeking will help you to unlock this book. I am not convinced that the second item will grant full access to the book’s secrets, but I do have a strong sense of its unlocking a path toward your accessing the tome.”
“Sounds good, darlin,” he said, absentmindedly stroking the warm, soft fur of the sleeping cat beside him. The boney little feline rumbled happily without waking.
“I must confess, however,” Sage said, “that my search for truth is being impacted by the emanations of significant events at play in the world.”
“Such as?” Brawley felt a hint of what she was talking about. He had a vague sense of things coming together, of various factors hurtling toward an explosive climax. But his premonitions were imprecise, suggesting dread one moment, victory the next.
“I cannot say for sure,” Sage said, “but I am certain of one thing. Hazel has left Key West. She has been deeply cloaked since our departure but had been releasing little pings from time to time, likely in case I checked on her. Earlier today, she went completely dark. But she just released a tiny ping again. She has left the Keys and entered the mainland.”
“Is someone after her?” Brawley asked. He hoped not. He sure never meant to endanger the old woman.
“I do not believe so,” Sage said. “But Hazel must be worried about detection, because she has disconnected from the Latticework. I sense that she is searching for us.”
“Good luck with that,” Brawley said. “We’re cloaked deep, right?”
The pretty blonde nodded curtly. “Yes, husband. Hazel is very powerful, however, and as my mentor, she is rather attuned to my psionic signature. If she follows our path, she might be able to intuit certain things as she detects not us but elements of the world with which we have come into contact. Also, I do not believe that she is alone. I have no details, but I sense that she is traveling with more than one person, all of whom are searching for us.”
“Good people or bad people?” Brawley asked.
“I do not know, husband.”
Brawley nodded. His danger sense had prickled lightly as Sage talked, which suggested trouble, but by the faintness of that prickling, he suspected that he had more pressing trouble waiting for him before his path would coincide with Hazel and her companions.
“White Rabbit” ended.
Nina asked Frankie to play “Teenage Wasteland.”
“Baba O’Riley?” Frankie asked.
Nina looked at the dark-haired beauty like she might have a gear loose. “No, Teenage Wasteland. The Who.” She sang a few lines and shook her head with good-natured incredulity. “I thought you were a classic rock fan.”
Frankie laughed, and catchy synthesizer music started playing from the speakers, followed by a piano.
“Teenage Wasteland!” Nina chimed triumphantly and started singing about fighting for her meals.
Nina’s singing was muted for a second as a loud engine roared on the highway outside.
Remi had been scouting ahead on her new bike since they left the campground. She would thunder into the distance, do some recon, wait for them to catch up, and then go zooming past them again.
Now she was riding alongside the RV, ready to give her report.
Brawley pulled the curtain aside.
The gorgeous biker chick smiled up and gave him a thumbs-up. Then squeezed her breast with a wink and shot away on the Harley.
Brawley grinned. Yes, a storm was brewing on the horizon, but for now, all was right in the world. It was as good a time as any to sleep.
“What’s our ETA, Sage?”
Sage shrugged. “It is difficult to determine, husband. We are four hundred and twenty-four miles from the rest stop in Louisiana. At our average rate of travel, we could cover that distance in approximately four hours and twenty minutes. However, I suggest that we delay our arrival by stopping to eat.”
Internally, Brawley bristled at the suggestion. He was get ‘er done to the bone and wanted to grab the second item and head straight for Texas.
But he paused, realizing he was doing something he’d done countless times before. When he set his mind on something, whether mending a fence or riding a barrel, he never wanted to quit until the job was done; a lot of times, he even blocked out his appetite.
Considering this, he realized he was hungry now. Ravenously so. Which meant the girls were starving, too.
He nodded. “All right.”
“Excellent,” Sage said. “We will stop at Trucker’s Delight in approximately sixty-seven minutes.”
Brawley grinned at his gorgeous geek girl. Approximately. She had likely u
sed that qualifier not because she didn’t know the precise time or distance—she did—and not to avoid sounding like a nerd by drilling down to the exact time in seconds, but because announcing her calculation to that degree of specificity would be difficult to do with absolute accuracy, given the calibrations necessary for speaking time and the fact that they were in a moving vehicle.
“Why there, darlin?” Brawley asked.
“Trucker’s Paradise is just off the exit and will therefore minimize our delay. Additionally, the restaurant is known for good food, large portions, and outstanding value.”
“Sounds like the right spot.”
“And,” Sage added with a wise grin, “Trucker’s Paradise is famous for its signature item. They have the best pie in the state.”
Nina, who had been shaking her purple locks to a badass violin riff, thrust her fists overhead. “Yes! Pie! I love you, Sage!”
Brawley laughed and stretched out on the bed. Beside him, Callie stirred, blinked, and nuzzled into him again.
“Wake me when we get there,” he told Sage. “I’m going to recharge my juice.”
Like most desert men, Brawley could fall asleep at will. He did so now, sliding straight into slumber, where he was instantly sucked into a dream state.
And instantly found himself wobbling once more upon unsteady legs.
Four of them, the hooves punching through the cracked and crumbling plane he had visited during his last dream.
Hot winds scoured the burnt and blasted landscape, which sprawled mercilessly off in all directions. Overhead, the bruised purple sky churned like a dark portent taking shape. Lightning sizzled in the far distance, veining the edge of the world in fire.
Brawley struggled forward, fighting down the compulsion to blat for his mother. It was no easy thing, for terror was upon him now. The terror of a newborn beast lost in a harsh world.
A cry rose in his throat, but he fought down the urge, knowing his blat would call not his mother but the terrible predator stalking him.
He stumbled along until he found a crystalline red road that snaked across the land glittering like a river of rubies. Following this hardpacked lane, he traveled without fumbling.
Eventually, he entered a forest of tall, black spikes. High above, figures moaned, impaled upon points of the towering spears.
This grove of suffering struck a chord of fresh panic in Brawley’s heart. He broke into a clumsy run and didn’t slow until the macabre forest ended and he stood at the edge of a broad and crumbling ridge overlooking a vast bowl of red land studded with buttes and mesas and slender fingers of red stone pointing at the churning sky overhead.
A black river twisted like a great serpent across the center of this desolate valley. Upon its bank, where the red road crossed the black river, stood what Brawley instantly recognized intuitively as his destination: a small adobe building.
Into the valley he descended, fighting down his panic whenever he lost sight of the little building. Part of him, remembering past dreams, feared the landscape would change and swallow the small house in a cruel nightmare trick.
Stick to the road, he told himself. Stay on the path.
And each time he passed an obstructing cliff or boulder, the small adobe structure remained.
At last, he rounded a plateau of red stone and only a stretch of open badlands lay between him and his humble objective.
My haven, he thought.
Overhead, thunder boomed. Only it wasn’t thunder, he realized, quaking with fear. It was a roar.
Brawley’s gaze rolled skyward.
Cold, gray eyes glared down from the roiling clouds.
“Do not seek the second item,” the Tiger Mage’s voice thundered, shaking the world. “If you enter that place, I will come for you.”
Brawley snorted with terror and started toward the crumbling house.
“You think you know what you’re doing, but you don’t,” the Tiger Mage said, his voice rich with dark humor. “You tell yourself that you are willing to risk sacrificing yourself in order to achieve your destiny. You cling to the sweetest of lies, believing it’s all up to you and that, should you fail, the consequences will fall solely upon you and you alone. But with every step you take, you sacrifice others.”
An involuntary blat escaped Brawley, instantly magnifying the overwhelming terror in his heart.
“You’re no hero,” the Tiger Mage boomed. “You’re a villain. A villain who sacrifices others to reach his own goals. Look down, villain. Behold the gruesome materials with which you are paving your path to destruction.”
Brawley’s eyes rolled downward. He skidded to a halt and reared back in horror.
The road he had followed across this crumbling land was paved in the dead. They stared up from within the crimson crystal, like corpses trapped beneath the ice of a frozen river.
So many dead.
Brawley recognized most of them as types. Psi Mafia hitmen. FPI agents. Miami Carnals.
Others, he knew. Junior Dutchman and his Carnal friend, Marco. The FPI agents who had attacked him in Marathon. Colton Finn, square-jawed and scowling. The beautiful, black-haired Irina, and the even more lovely face of Bella, who had only the previous night offered to pledge her life to Brawley.
Brawley jerked his eyes from this terrible sight and scampered off the road into the crumbling soil, which clutched once more at his hooves. His heart hammered in his chest.
“Every action has consequences,” the Tiger Mage said. “Those people in Miami? You killed them. You could have ended this, could have surrendered yourself to me, but you valued your life over all of theirs, and therefore, they died. And for what? For nothing. More have died since, and more will soon die if you do not cease your infantile fumbling and surrender. You tell yourself that you can protect your women, but you can’t. You know that. You know how this all ends. Look, fool, look and behold the road ahead, the road you must travel if you continue your selfish quest.”
Brawley staggered forward and looked down at the final section of roadway that terminated at the dark door of the squat adobe building.
Everything he loved in this world stared back up at him from the strange red road.
Nina. Sage. Remi. Callie. Frankie.
And countless others.
His parents and cousins and friends. Bull riders he’d known and girls he’d courted. Neighbors and coworkers from different jobs he’d tried and quit, all of them so damned boring. Classmates from the by and by and folks he’d known only in passing, familiar faces from stores and bars and arenas out of his past.
Staring up at him was everyone who had made up his world, frozen in the throes of agony, all they ever were or did or wanted crushed to nothing to pave his pathway to uncertainty.
“Give up this foolish game,” the Tiger Mage commanded. “Don’t even bother returning to the waking world, where you might deceive yourself once more into believing you can escape fate. Open your mind now, power mage. Open your mind! Throw off your cowardly cloak and reveal yourself, and I will spare the others. I will descend like an angel of mercy and carry you off to meet your destiny, leaving them to live their lives. Do it now. Reveal yourself! Reveal yourself before it is too late!”
But then the world shook from horizon to horizon, slammed by an apocalyptic earthquake, and another voice filled the sky, drowning out the Tiger Mage’s demands.
19
“Brawley! Wake up, Brawley!”
Lines of fire burned down his side and Brawley snapped into wakefulness to find his wives gathered around him, staring down with worried faces.
Even Remi was among them. Which made no sense. Remi was out in front them, riding ahead on her Harley.
Then he realized the RV was no longer in motion. Somewhere outside he heard the whining sigh of a downshifting big rig’s air brakes.
“Husband,” Sage said, “you have awakened at last.”
Callie reached out to pat his arm tentatively. She was in her fused half-cat/half-woman fo
rm, and her big amber eyes were frightened. “I’m sorry for scratching you, Brawley, but you wouldn’t wake up.”
“You okay, handsome?” Remi asked.
Brawley sat up, nodding slowly, and felt the scratches in his side closing. “Yeah… I reckon I’m okay. Bad nightmare.”
“The Tiger Mage again?” Sage asked.
Brawley nodded. Then he told them about the dream, holding nothing back.
The women took it well, considering their roles in its grisly conclusion.
“He is trying to frighten you into revealing your position,” Sage said.
“Our position,” Nina corrected her. “That son of a bitch isn’t the sparing type. Besides, even if he was, we’d fight him to the death. If you go down, babe, we all go down. Right, girls?”
The women nodded without hesitation. Even Frankie, Brawley realized.
He let out a shuddering exhalation, still rattled by the dream. “Thanks, girls. And don’t you fret. I won’t ever lay down my pistols. I’ll fight to the end. But how did he know so much about me? And if he knows who I am, how come he can’t find me?”
“He doesn’t know as much about you as you are assuming, husband,” Sage said. “His magic didn’t script your dream experiences. Rather, he triggered an emotional response. Your personal fear of bringing harm to your loved ones filled in the details and gave imagery to his message. Even his message relied upon your fears.”
Sage squinched her glasses up her nose. “The Tiger Mage has no window on your visions. Nor can he know your actions in the dream or hear your words or thoughts… unless he tricks you into opening your mind to him. Then he will know our location and open a gate to attack us immediately.”
Brawley chewed on that for a second. He was not prey by nature. He was a hunter. And in that pensive moment, his predatory mind came to life, dismissing the lingering terror of the dream. “We play our cards right, we might be able to use that to our advantage,” he said. “Lure him to us.”
“Yeah,” Nina said, “well, let’s not go luring him to us just yet.”