The Last Rune 4: Blood of Mystery

by Mark Anthony

  The woman picked up the book. She smiled and glanced up at Lirith. “Lily. Now that’s a pretty name for a pretty gal. And let’s see if I can guess these others right.” She pointed at Durge, Sareth, and Travis in turn. “That’s Dirk, that’s Samson, and that would have to be Travis.”

  The others shot Travis confused looks, but he simply shrugged and grinned. “That’s right.”

  “And what’s your name?” Lirith asked.

  The woman lifted a hand to her forehead. “Where have my wits gotten to?” She thrust out a hand. “Call me Maudie. That’s Maudie Carlyle. No matter what folks might tell you, I don’t go by Ladyspur anymore.”

  Ladyspur?

  She gave each of their hands a firm shake, and when she turned away, Travis glanced down and saw them just peeking out from beneath the hem of her dress: the brass wheels of a pair of spurs.

  Of course, Travis. This is Ladyspur. You know her story. She was a prostitute and later a madam, and once she won a fair gunfight in Elk Street. He glanced up and saw a pair of six-shooters mounted above the fireplace. After that, she gave up the profession and tried to become a proper lady in Castle City. Only none of the society ladies would have anything to do with her. And then not long after that—

  His heart skipped a beat in his chest. He noticed again the thinness of her hand that gripped the cane.

  —she died of some disease, like cholera or consumption.

  Maudie hardly seemed to use her cane as she moved back into the hallway. “You’ve missed dinner, but let me know if you need a biscuit to tide you ’til supper. We sit down at 6 P.M. Don’t be late.” She gave the men a stern look. “And be sure to wash up first. You’ll find your rooms on the third floor, first two doors on the left at the top of the stairs. The first one is for the lady.”

  “Two rooms?” Durge said. He looked at Travis. “Is that within our means?”

  “Of course it is!” Maudie said before Travis could answer.

  “The rate’s the same. And you don’t expect Lily here to share a room with a bunch of louts like you. She’s far too lovely for that.”

  Sareth grinned, his coppery eyes gleaming. “That she is.”

  Lirith lowered her head and started quickly up the stairs, but not before Travis saw the glow of her cheeks. The three men gave their thanks to Maudie, then followed Lirith.

  8.

  They spent most of the next three days in their rooms at the Bluebell, coming downstairs only to take meals or to use the attached outhouse in back, or to sit on the porch while a thunderstorm passed over the valley—as it did most afternoons— breathing moist, sage-sweet air, one of Maudie’s cats curled in each of their laps. Except for Durge. Somehow the somber knight always found a way to accommodate two or three of the purring felines.

  “It’s not that I fancy them, mind you,” Travis overheard Durge say to Lirith. “It’s simply that they’re frail, foolish creatures and cannot endure the elements. If one were to take ill, Lady Maudie would no doubt become distressed, and that would impair her ability to see to the needs of her guests, including ourselves. It’s quite practical, you see.”

  “Yes, I think I do see,” Lirith said, dark eyes gleaming, as Durge gently petted Miss Guenivere with a rough hand.

  Usually they gathered in the room Travis shared with Sareth and Durge, as it was a good deal larger than Lirith’s, if not nearly as comfortable. Lirith’s room was decorated in pinks and crimsons, with tassels and lace doilies adorning every available surface—all bespeaking Maudie’s personal touch. In contrast, the room the men shared was spartan and slightly drafty, occupying as it did the north half of the third-floor attic. The rafters were soot-stained and bare, and the only furnishings were four narrow beds, four rickety chairs, and a massive pine bureau with a chipped pitcher and basin for washing.

  All the same, the room was clean, and it bore a certain rustic charm that would not have been out of place in a manor house on Eldh. Nor did they need any more than the one bureau. None of them had a change of clothes, and Travis had just his few things to put in one of the drawers—his Malachorian stiletto, the rune of hope talisman, and the wire-rimmed spectacles Jack had given him. Durge’s greatsword wouldn’t fit in a drawer, so they tucked it, still wrapped in the mistcloak, up in the rafters.

  As Maudie had warned, meals were served at precise intervals. All of them were famished by suppertime that first night, and they devoured the ham, corn bread, wilted greens, and cherry cobbler Maudie and her sole helper at the boardinghouse—a young, quiet, sweet-faced woman named Liza—laid on the table. Even Lirith tucked away several helpings, although somehow the witch made the act of gorging look almost delicate.

  There were only a half dozen other guests at the boardinghouse at the moment. All were men, and none seemed interested in talking. Each was freshly scrubbed, their still-wet hair slicked back, and they wore clean white shirts and denim pants. However, no amount of scrubbing could have removed the black dirt embedded in the skin of their hands. They ate swiftly, and when they were done scraped their chairs back from the table, put on their hats, and left without a word.

  “Where do you think they’re going?” Sareth said.

  “To the poker and monte and faro tables,” Maudie said, as she and Liza cleared away plates. “It was payday at the mines today. They’ll all come back in the morning, heads aching and pockets empty.”

  After supper that first evening, Travis discovered a stack of newspapers—copies of the Castle City Clarion—in the front parlor. He asked Maudie if he could take some of them upstairs.

  She gave him a sharp look. “No fires in the rooms. Not after what happened before.”

  So that explained the sooty rafters. “No fires,” he promised. “I just want to read them.”

  “Well, then help yourself. None of the other men seem to have much of a care for reading. I suppose that would take time away from their gambling and drinking.”

  Travis picked up a stack of papers. Before he could head upstairs, Maudie placed a bundle tied in a cloth napkin atop the stack. A warm scent rose from the napkin: biscuits.

  “Take those up to Mr. Samson. He didn’t eat much at supper, and I don’t like the circles under his eyes. Has it been long since he lost his leg?”

  “A while,” Travis said. “I think it’s the altitude that’s bothering him.”

  “Well, that’s no surprise. It bothers everyone. Lately, it seems like the air’s so rarified up here I can hardly breathe.” Gripping her cane, she headed back to the kitchen, spurs jingling, and Travis bounded up the steps with his prizes.

  “I like Lady Maudie,” Durge said as he munched biscuits in their room.

  Sareth was too tired to eat, and had lain down on one of the beds after taking more of the salicylate of soda at Lirith’s prompting.

  “She’s sick,” Travis said.

  Lirith met his eyes. “I know. I saw it in her. Her lungs are wasting.”

  Durge stopped eating and stared, and Sareth propped himself up on an elbow, his coppery eyes thoughtful.

  “You know how long she’ll live, don’t you?” Lirith said. “You know it from the histories of your day.”

  Travis gave a reluctant nod. “There were still stories told about her. She was pretty famous in her time—in this time. They used to call her Ladyspur, just like she said. It was because she always wore boots and spurs while she danced.”

  “She danced?” Lirith said, her voice suddenly cool.

  “Yes, she was a variety hall girl. Well more than that, really...”

  “So she was a whore,” Sareth said. The words was not a condemnation, merely a statement.

  “And later a madam,” Travis said. “I’d guess Liza is one of her former girls. But she gave up her profession after winning a gunfight against a man who insulted her honor. After that, she decided to change her ways.”

  Durge finished the last biscuit. “I still like her.”

  Travis noticed that Lirith had turned away, hands pressed
to her stomach. Had the heavy supper disagreed with her after being so famished?

  “Lirith?”

  She turned around, her gaze stricken. “When,” she said quietly. “When does she die?”

  “I don’t know exactly. All I know is that she died of consumption a few years after she won the gunfight and turned her brothel into a boardinghouse.”

  “It’s already been a few years,” Sareth said. “She told me she’s been running the boardinghouse for three years now.”

  They were silent after that. Travis knew there was nothing they could do for Maudie. And he supposed he and the others were in danger of catching tuberculosis just staying there, although he didn’t know how contagious it was—he needed Grace for that. Anyway, that felt like the least of their worries.

  Travis turned his attention to the newspapers, and that evening—and over the next two days—he pored through the murkily printed sheets of newsprint, concentrating to keep the letters from doing a do-si-doe.

  Travis wasn’t exactly sure what he was hoping to find in the papers. Maybe, he reasoned, there would be something that might give him a hint about Jack—whether he had ever visited there, or when he might be coming. From everything Travis knew, Jack had always been a prominent figure in Castle City society. If anyone knew he was coming, surely the Clarion would have an article about it; there were stories about nearly every happening in town, from who had opened up a new shop to who had just robbed it.

  However, as Travis dug further and further back in the stack, he found no mention of Jack Graystone. All the same, there were countless fascinating articles that caught his attention— and which served to remind him just how different this world really was from the Castle City he remembered.

  Not surprisingly, much of the news was about the mines. Countless articles talked about the amount of ore each of the mines was producing, and how much silver was assayed to each ton of rock. One story quoted a geologist who warned that the veins of carbonate of lead were pinching out—although the editors of the Clarion were quick to reject this, denying all rumors that the boom was anywhere near over. Of course, Travis knew it was, but people were never so vehement as when defending their most beloved delusions.

  In addition to stories about the mines, there were frequent updates on the spur of the Denver & Pacific Railroad, which was inching its way toward town. And, to Travis’s morbid fascination, each issue included a column called “Morning Mayhem,” which reported the previous day’s crimes. They ranged from public drunkenness and fistfighting to robbery and murder.

  Before long, Travis began to notice a trend in “Morning Mayhem.” In the papers near the bottom of the stack, the crime report took up only a section of one page. But the column grew larger the higher up he went, so that by the middle of the stack it consumed a full page. However, after that, the column shrank again, and in the most recent editions it was smaller than ever. It looked as if, after a steady climb, crime was on the decline in Castle City.

  At least petty crime. While there were fewer crime reports in the more recent newspapers, the reports there were tended not to be about robbery and whiskey-related assaults, but more serious crimes—like horsethieving and murder. Only, strangely, the column seemed to have stopped reporting just how the victims were killed or who the main suspect was.

  Homer Tattinger, late out of North Carolina, read a typical report, was found dead on Saturday afternoon on the north bank of Granite Creek about a mile downstream from town. He was found by Sheri f Bartholomew Tanner and had been dead a good day or so. Mr. Tattinger was known as a ruffian and hard drinker, and was said by some to be a shootist, and thus it is little wonder for him to be found in such a grim state. The Editors must trust others of similar nature will take note.

  Travis wasn’t the only one who was interested in the newspapers. Durge seemed fascinated by them, although for different reasons than Travis.

  “These could not possibly have been penned by hand,” the knight pronounced the afternoon of their second day, setting down one of the newspapers. His hands were smudged with ink, and there were gray fingerprints on his craggy brow. “The letters are too small, and each is shaped precisely the same. I cannot fathom its nature, but I believe some sort of mechanical process was used to place the words on these sheaves.”

  For the next hour they sat in the parlor, drinking tea, while Travis explained what little he knew about the invention of movable type and the printing press.

  Durge’s brown eyes were thoughtful. “I have seen the peasants who dwell on my lands create pictures in a similar way, carving a shape on a block of wood, painting the block, and pressing it to cloth or sheepskin to make an image. This printing press you speak of is not so very different.”

  “No, it isn’t,” Travis said with a grin, wondering if he had just forever altered the march of technological progress on Eldh.

  Only if Durge ever gets back to Eldh, Travis.

  He sighed and kept reading.

  Sareth and Lirith were also curious about the newspapers, although they seemed more interested in the advertisements than the articles. Sareth constantly asked Travis about various items advertised for sale. However, Travis was hard-pressed to explain what some of them were for. Lirith, in turn, liked the pictures of ladies’ fashions. Although she seemed horrified once she grasped the concept of a corset.

  “Why, this would squeeze the life right out of you,” the witch said indignantly. Whatever had troubled Lirith their first night in the boardinghouse, she seemed to have set it aside. Although Travis noticed that Sareth cast frequent looks of concern at her—looks she seemed unwilling to return. “Only a man could have devised such a thing,” Lirith went on. “The women of this world ought to rebel against such torture.”

  “Actually,” Travis said, “they will. In fact, in about another eighty or ninety years, women will be burning their underwear in protest.”

  Durge glowered. “That sounds dangerous.”

  “I think he means after they’ve taken it off,” Sareth said with a grin.

  Sareth seemed to be doing better again—the shadows beneath his eyes were reduced, if not entirely vanished—and Travis hoped the Mournish man was getting accustomed to the altitude.

  Sareth flipped the page in the newspaper, and his smile faded. Travis glanced over his shoulder, and his heart sank. On the page was an advertisement filled with pen-and-ink drawings of prosthetic devices: wax hands and glass eyes. And wooden legs. Feel like a whole man again! proclaimed the advertisement. And, farther down, So lifelike, the ladies will never guess the truth! Sareth hesitated, then brushed a picture of the false leg.

  Durge was talking to Lirith about printing presses, and she listened with an attentive though slightly pained expression. She hadn’t seen what Sareth was looking at.

  By breakfast of their third day at the boardinghouse, as he counted out four more dollars into Maudie’s outstretched hand, Travis was finally forced to admit what he had known all along: They needed more money. They had only enough for two more days at the boardinghouse, and for all Travis knew it could be months until Jack came to town. What were they going to do for money in the meantime?

  Maudie must have noticed the worry on his face. “You’ll be wanting to find a job, I imagine.”

  He gave her a sheepish smile. “That obvious, is it?”

  She patted his stubbled cheek. “Do forgive me, my boy. But you don’t have the air of a silver baron about you. I’m afraid you look more like a workingman—not that there’s anything to be ashamed of in that.”

  “I suppose I could ask at one of the mines and—”

  “Not on your life!” Maudie shook a finger at him. “Those mines are pits of doom and despair, that’s what I say. I won’t have you or your boys working in them. Mr. Samson wouldn’t last a week in one of those holes.”

  Travis couldn’t disagree. But what else could he do?

  “Surely you’ve got some skill or trade,” Maudie said.

  T
ravis almost laughed. Would anyone in town want to hire a dyslexic runelord? “I used to be a saloonkeeper.”

  Maudie gave an approving nod. “Now that’s something that will earn you a dollar in this town. Go talk to Mr. Manypenny. I know he’s always on the lookout for a good bartender. They’re hard to keep hold of.”

  “Why is that?”

  Maudie winked. “I suppose they’re faster at pouring whiskey than they are at reloading shotguns.”

  Travis gulped; he wasn’t certain this proposal sounded any safer than mining. “Who’s Mr. Manypenny?”

  “He operates that Mine Shaft over on Elk Street. It’s one of the more respectable establishments in town. Arthur Manypenny is an old customer...that is, he’s an old acquaintance of mine. Let him know you’re staying here, and that I’ll vouch for you.”

  Travis stared, Maudie’s words buzzing in his ears. He operates the Mine Shaft...

  Before he knew what was happening, Maudie had sent him upstairs with a borrowed straight razor, strop, and shaving mug, along with orders to get cleaned up.

  An hour later, Travis stood on the boardwalk in front of the swinging doors that belonged to the Mine Shaft Saloon, as clean as he could get with a pitcher and basin. His head and cheeks were freshly shaved—without severe loss of blood, thanks to Sareth’s skilled hand. Travis watched a dozen men pass through the swinging doors of the saloon—more going in than out—but he couldn’t see past the screen that hid the interior.

  You can do this, Travis. After all, you’ve done it before. Or you will do it, anyway. If there’s anywhere in this town you belong, it’s here at the Mine Shaft.

  He drew a deep breath and stepped through the doors.

  It was like stepping forward in time. Of course, the differences were immediately apparent. Kerosene lamps hung on the walls rather than electric lights, and there were no neon beer signs behind the bar. The tables at the back of the saloon were covered in green felt and were obviously intended for gambling, although they were quiet at the moment.

  What was more shocking was what hadn’t changed. The pine floor strewn with sawdust, the deer and elk trophies on the walls, the player piano on the little stage, and the twenty-foot, brass-trimmed, glossy walnut bar imported from Chicago, with its diamond dust mirror behind—all of it looked just like Travis remembered, if a little newer and shinier.