Lightfall Four: Risk, Rise, Rebel (Lightfall, Book 4)

by Taylor, Jordan

  They purchase the newest papers they can find with Sam’s last nickel.

  As they step out, Rosalía tells Ivy where she saw letter sheets and envelopes for sale the day before. There is also the telegraph office in a separate building. Neither do any good when they have not a cent left between them.

  Sam looks up as a few mounted men trot past. Rosalía watches a hawk circle. Ivy gazes longingly at the window of the telegraph office.

  “Shall we return to the hotel and read?” Sam asks, glancing at the paper, then anxiously at Ivy.

  Ivy turns from the window. “At least until the Bank of Melchior will allow a withdrawal.”

  She starts down the street, gazing through another window when its glass explodes.

  Strange how fast she can move now. Beyond the freedom of her wardrobe, she seems to be reacting better to sudden bursts and bangs, grabs from behind and spooked horses and all manner of gunshots. She used to think Grip’s reaction time staggering. Now, she hopes he would be proud as she leaps around the corner of the chemist shop she faces, back hitting the timber frame, her Tinestel already in her hand.

  Shots blast from several places at once: cracks, bangs, a high-pitched clicking, a thud. Ivy looks back around her corner for Sam and Rosalía, derringer before her in both hands, only to be struck in the face by a wave of blue smoke.

  Coughing, choking, eyes streaming, she staggers backward. Again she hits the wall, but smoke envelops her so fast she cannot see boards an inch from her face. She ducks, runs along the wall, feeling with one elbow, her hands still locked on her gun, gagging on acrid fumes.

  Wham. Something immobile slams into her at knee-height and she pitches forward across splintery crates. Lying in dust, hat knocked from her head but still around her neck by the strap, face mostly below smoke, she tries to breathe as she releases the derringer with her right hand to rip sungoggles from her hat. She blows into them and drags them on, wishing she had the same for nose and mouth.

  All this time people shouting. Men and women calling in panic from Canyon Street behind, gunshots pounding. Earth shudders below her, hoofbeats at a canter. Someone calls her name, sounding like Sam, but far away, his voice torn by distance and commotion.

  With her bearings on the wall of the chemist shop and location of crates, Ivy takes a deep gasp of dust before standing in smoke and running, holding her breath.

  Smoke thins. Red dust seems kicked up everywhere. She tears past a bay horse, nearly colliding with the animal as it balks and rears.

  “Vin!” the rider bellows. “There!”

  Ivy tears across the back street, but ... no, do not keep going in a straight line. She makes a sharp right, runs down another dusty alley, and hears an explosion of shots. Puffs of dirt pop before her feet as bullets rip past her legs, one slicing through the flapping duster. Ivy takes a left around a corner, once more slamming her back to the wall, hands clutched together on her gun.

  Leaning around the corner just enough to see, she faces what follows, derringer first. Two horses thunder toward her, the bay and a bright sorrel the same color as flying dust. The man on this horse is twirling a rope. The one on the bay wields an upraised revolver. Both with bandanas pulled over mouths and noses to ward off dust and smoke.

  Ivy has half a second to take in details before she has fired for the man with the revolver. But the riders are moving at a gallop, far closer and far faster than she realized in her sliver of time. The bullet meant for the man’s arm strikes the bay horse in the neck.

  The animal shrieks, trying to stop, turn, and rear in mid-gallop, ending by flipping backward and sideways. It crashes to the road on its saddle with the rider scarcely pitching himself clear in time.

  Ivy has already switched her aim to the sorrel rider, this horse now sliding on its haunches as the rider drags back on reins, two feet from her turn. As she pulls the trigger, something that feels like an iron skillet smashes across her head from behind.

  She never sees if she hits with the second shot.

  Seventy-Fourth

  Shackles

  Bump, bump, bump ... another stage. After the train. Stage to Santa Fé. Uncle Charles and Aunt Abigail will be waiting for her. But why so much pain? And upside down. Surely she should not be ... upside ... down....

  Shod hooves crunch desert rock. Sun blazing across her, yet not so hot. Sharp air, cold of autumn. Awake again. Was she asleep?

  Bump, bump, bump ... why upside down? Why can she not think? She cannot think because she is in too much pain. Screaming, tearing, bleeding, exploding pain.

  A concussion. He has a concussion.

  But that was Melchior, not her. Don’t they know it’s not supposed to be her?

  She was just getting the hang of ... everything. And why is she upside down? Only her head? Her feet are down. Yet so is her head. Smell of horse and desert and sweat. Stiff saddle leather.

  Men talking, deep voices in two or three or four languages, blurring into a world of darkness and pain and ... gone.

  Ivy wakes. She lies in a heap on rocks hidden by one wool blanket. Someone is pulling something away from her. Something dark covering her face, lifting to reveal the last rays of a setting sun. She begins to shift her hands to feel for one of her guns, but her wrists are cuffed together by steel shackles. Her vision roams in and out of focus. Her head—God, her head must be split in two at the back.

  She remains motionless as someone steps away from her and she sees a stocky Mexican man gazing blandly down at her.

  “Está despierta,” he tells someone over his shoulder. She is awake.

  The closest voices hush, making Ivy realize men were talking around her. Cooking fire, coffee, horse, gun oil, tobacco, all familiar camp smells. Only the voices are unfamiliar. As well as this man, who would not look alarming if he did not have a bandoleer of half a dozen pocket guns and as many throwing knives across his chest.

  She digs one elbow into wool and props herself up as best she can. Moving her head sends such agony through her skull she must close her eyes for a moment, catching fast, shallow breaths.

  Footsteps shift red rock. Far off, an owl hoots. Someone is stepping up to her, a long shadow falling across her. Perhaps he will remain there and keep her bleeding eyes from taking on sun. Where are her goggles? Her hat? Her guns? Her horse? Her friends?

  Silence hangs over her like fog.

  Carefully, slowly, Ivy opens her eyes.

  A slender, darkly dressed man stands before her. As she blinks, he squats down on the pointed toes of his polished boots to be nearer her level. Not old, nor especially young, he is clean-shaven, fine-featured, handsome.

  His hair is dark below a tall hat for this part of the world. He wears black deerskin gloves in the same material as his waistcoat, his whole sleek attire in deep reds and blacks and golds. From shining boots to hat, he is adorned in as many devices as a maker’s window. Sungoggles on his hat, darts fixed to the outside top of one boot. In between are watch chains, handguns, oval objects which could be smoke bombs, a collapsed telescope, and more Ivy cannot name. Somehow the man, though slight and wiry, does not look overburdened: movements graceful, as if his accessories are part of him.

  A big, yellow cur pads up beside him as the man crouches down. The ugly dog watches him with unmistakable benevolence, even a slight wag to his lowered tail. Ivy must blink before forcing her mind to believe what sight tells her.

  The man’s smile is broad, revealing many even teeth as he removes his hat with an elegant flourish, bowing head and shoulders before her, momentarily blinding Ivy by light at his back.

  “Ivy Jerinson, a great pleasure to finally meet you.” His voice is silky, smooth and polished as his movements. “Vhalain, Everette Vhalain. Though most call me Lobo.”

  To Be Continued In

  Book Five

  Thank you for reading Lightfall Four: Risk, Rise, Rebel. If you enjoyed this book, please leave a quick review on Amazon to let others know! Your support makes independent authors a
nd series like Lightfall possible.

  Continue the journey with Lightfall Five: Book, Blood, Brother.

  About the Author

  Author of fiction from short stories to epics, designer of award-winning book covers, lover of travel and ice cream, Jordan wrote her first novel at age sixteen and has found it easier to write a book than remember to keep up a blog ever since.

  She lives near Seattle with two dogs and a vast array of people who speak in her head until she turns their voices into novels.

  Find more Lightfall titles, leave reviews, or get in touch on Jordan’s Amazon Author Page and at www.jordantaylorbooks.com.