Creed said, “Whatever you’ve got, bring it here.”
Colt unfurled a dark blue flag that had been punched with bullet holes, and held it up to Creed, who ran his fingers across the large white star in its center.
“Bonnie Blue.”
“You don’t have to do this, sir. We can cut some branches.”
Creed said, “Burn them.”
His men heaped the battle colors and banners onto the cleared areas of frozen ground. Jugs of kerosene were tossed from a pack mule, and the fuel was poured over the piles of torn cloth. The air bent with the smell of the kerosene, and the men fought their hacks. A boy choked and spit. The last bit of fuel was dribbled onto the old flags, but the men said nothing as they looked to Creed for his reaction. Colt almost spoke, but held back.
Creed adjusted his glasses, pushing them up on a nose that had been deformed by frostbite, and finally said, “At your ready.” Colt lit a torch, then passed the flame to the others as they checked their weapons. A fat gut with a plaid kerchief, who’d always crowed that he was Creed’s cousin, pumped a shell into the chamber of a Winchester and took position to the side of the others. Ragtag almost danced in place, ready for Creed to give the signal.
Creed waited, his blind eyes fixed on a memory, and then he ran his hand across his grey beard, lightly tugging on his chin.
That was it. A torch was put to the fuel, the flames sputtering in the chill before catching and racing along the kerosene trail to each pile of flags. They burst into flames.
Fat Gut, his stomach sucked in, shouldered his rifle while the rest of Creed’s men stood as a firing squad, pistols aimed at the cave.
Creed said, “Bring him to me.”
Ragtag threw his head back with a wild howl, before charging the cave, a Navy Six in one hand and a torch in the other, screaming, “Welcome to Hell!”
Ragtag’s cry was cut dead short. Then, the echo of him from the cave died, and there was no sound from anywhere except for the sizzling of the kerosene pools.
Creed backed his tall horse a few steps, which was the cue for his men to move away from the flames, but to keep their guns aimed beyond them, into the cave’s mouth. Fat Gut let out his breath and then dropped to one knee, his Winchester steady on some shadowed movement.
Creed called out, “Dr. John Bishop, this is Captain Dupont Creed! Don’t come out? You’re going to roast alive! I don’t give a rat’s ass about the squaw. She can cook.”
* * *
Inside the cave, the growing flames kept John Bishop and White Fox low against the outcropping of rock that offered protection. Ragtag had hold of Bishop’s ankle and tried to speak without a jaw. His words were sloppy nothing, as he swallowed hot smoke and the blood that wasn’t pooling around him.
White Fox readied her second arrow.
Ragtag’s fingers opened slowly around Bishop’s ankle. Bishop reached down for him as if to help; it was a doctor’s instinct to give aid, even as Ragtag tried to aim his Navy Six at Bishop’s face, but couldn’t.
White Fox said, “Nâhtötse.”
Bishop knew the meaning and pulled back his feelings. Ragtag made a final sound with his tongue and his eyes stilled, as Bishop stepped over him and braced himself against a small rock shelf. He extended his right-arm rig toward the growing flames blocking the cave entrance.
The heat hard-slapped Bishop, but he found his first target behind the moving curtain of fire: It was the man with the double-action Colt, his dark shirt outlining him against the hot orange-white.
Bishop took aim, bringing his shoulders together to tighten the slack on the trigger line. It was a natural movement now, and the rig was feeling right to him. He glanced back at White Fox, who lowered her bow barely a quarter inch. Smoke from the burning flags sanded her eyes, but she would not blink.
Creed shouted, “John Bishop! It’s been twelve years, and you know goddamn well—”
Bishop pulled the trigger-line with his shoulders, blasting through the fire to the man with the Colt and knocking him back onto a mound of snow, where he lay holding his pouring stomach.
Creed’s men opened up.
The bullets screamed into the cave, sparking off the walls, spitting rock and ice with each hit. Their echo brought each ricochet back twenty times, piercing the ears.
A slug tore by White Fox’s face as she released her arrow steady, hitting one of Creed’s men in the throat, sending him spinning into a fire pile. The kerosene-soaked flags pasted themselves to his flesh, instantly swallowing his head and shoulders in flames, killing his cries for help.
Bishop swung the rig to the other side of the cave opening and fired again, blowing apart the shoulder of a crouching hired gun before White Fox’s arrow punctured his eye. Hired Gun flopped onto Fat Gut, who threw him aside, and racked off four rounds from his Winchester.
Fat Gut’s voice was a banshee’s scream, and louder than the shots he fired. A flaming arrow whipped into his leg just above the knee, opening a red geyser. His scream became a sob.
Creed shouted, “You’re gonna taste hell now or later, Bishop! Your choice!”
The layer of thickening smoke tied Bishop and White Fox to the cave floor, wet with blood and melting ice, even as she let fly another arrow at Creed’s men, splitting the flames.
In response, muzzle flashes could be seen through the heat and choking grey. Again, the slugs careened from stone wall to jagged ceiling, and back again. Bits of lead splintered into White Fox’s back and creased Bishop’s thigh. Neither cried out.
Bishop stayed on his back, cooling the shotgun barrels with a handful of snow, before breaching them. The smoke from the fires was heavier now, churning the air in the cave from grey to black, as Bishop fumbled for his twelve-gauge shells. He reloaded, his tears stinging him, then snapped the rig shut, his chest heaving. He fired both barrels toward the cave’s mouth.
There was no specific target, nothing Bishop could see. Someone cried out. Bishop’s eyes were lost to their whites as his throat seized, strangled by the heavy smoke.
White Fox scrambled to him, turning Bishop on his back and opening his mouth with her fingers, when the lasso dropped around her neck from behind, and was pulled tight.
White Fox spit, “Mé’anéka’êškóne!”
A yank on the rope silenced her.
CHAPTER SIX
Blood and Trust
Chaney could feel Lem Wright watching him from his spot a few paces behind him. They’d been riding all night, guided by a bright winter moon, and Lem had slowed his horse, letting Chaney get farther ahead but keeping steady behind him, like he was planning an ambush. Instead, Lem did nothing; even if he wasn’t going to make a move, Chaney hated his watching.
He’d tied his gun belt together with a small piece of rope, so at least his holster was back on his hip, but it kept slipping and this compromise to his draw edged his nerves. Chaney pushed on, trying not to ponder it, but he was the one who was supposed to have the winning hand, holding all the cards. Somewhere he’d lost his advantage.
Dawn broke in streaks of orange as the horses angled down the small, snowy grade to the road that led directly to the Overland Trail. Chaney looked over his shoulder to see Lem dozing in the saddle, his curtained eye locked open as he slept. The reins were slack in Lem’s hands, but his chestnut mare followed Chaney without prodding, while the eye did its job watching. Always watching.
The eye looked back at Chaney from behind its white film, darting on its own as Lem started to snore. Chaney turned away with a shudder, wishing he had a decent bottle to kill the queasy feeling. He swore like he was praying, getting up his nerve to try something, but brought his thoughts back to Major Beaudine’s letter and its life-changing promise.
Chaney thought, Hell, I know where to go; I don’t need that ugly son of a bitch at all.
Suddenly, Lem was riding beside him and yawning. “You could’ve shot me and left me in a drift. One good snow and they wouldn’t find me for three months.”
&n
bsp; “That’s not what was in my mind.”
“Sure it was, but you couldn’t tell if I was sleeping. I can’t see out of this damn thing, but it does have its uses.”
“You were snoring.”
“And you still didn’t make a move.”
Lem’s statement was just a fact, said in a flat way that hit Chaney in his guts. He was losing his bluff. Chaney brushed the snow from the rim of his bowler, and said, “I thought we were trying a partnership.”
“Oh, building trust so the other fella doesn’t know he’s being suckered.”
Chaney said, “I know you ain’t no sucker, Mr. Wright. You made that mighty clear.”
“Glad to hear it. So who’d you sucker to get that fine Denver saddle?”
Chaney straightened. “Barbed wire salesman from Jackson Hole. It never ceases to amaze me what folks will chance when they’re sure they have a winning hand.”
Lem shook the ice around in his canteen, considering something, before taking a drink to wake up. “And they never know you’re beating them until it’s too late?”
“That’s how I eat.”
“Not lately. I know broke when I see it.”
Chaney said, “Like most of the country. So why’d you come to that dog pile? To team up with Pardee, or kill him?”
“I hadn’t decided.”
“I was gonna blow his guts out, take his stake.”
“But the man with the shotgun got there first.”
Chaney tried a push, asking, “The man you know?”
Lem said, “He was just a fella Beaudine told us about.”
“Holding a chest full of Army gold?”
“You read the letter, you talked to Chester.”
Chaney said, “I surely did.”
Lem’s voice dropped. “Then what the hell you asking me for?”
“To see if Pardee was bluffing; he’d always try to bullshit his way out of a hand. So he was telling the truth about the gold.”
Lem gave Chaney a dose of his eye, “None of us will know a damn thing until we get to Cheyenne; that’s the point, ain’t it?”
Chaney flicked his tooth with this thumb, figuring the best way for the conversation to go. “There’s a pot on the table? I’ll try for it, but I know the odds of catching a bullet instead. Like I said, you made that real clear.”
This was good enough for Lem, who handed Chaney his canteen. The ice-cold metal numbed Chaney’s fingertips, but the water tasted good and clean going down. Chaney knew enough not to drink too much, or else he’d cramp up. He handed the canteen back to Lem, in case that was his plan.
Chaney said, “Tell me about Beaudine.”
Lem didn’t respond, so Chaney tried, “Did you meet in the war? That what happened to your eye?”
“My eye was lost during a conflict. I’ll let Beaudine tell ya the rest, if he’s of a mind.”
“Pardee said you all came together at the territorial prison on the Wyoming border. That nobody in Beaudine’s Raiders ever did no military service, ’cause you were all locked up.”
Lem pulled his horse to a near stop, and Chaney knew he’d overplayed his hand. “You ask questions you think you know the answers to; that’s clever, but not too smart.”
“You said Pardee was full of shit, but maybe not this time.”
“I know what I said.”
Lem put a period at the end of his statement, allowing that they’d ride in silence for a while. Lem kept his hand on his pistol the next few miles, forcing Chaney to do the same. Chaney’s fingers ached, and he jumped every time Lem made the slightest move, which is just what Deadeye wanted.
The road widened, and their horses stepped around the ruts left behind by a thousand wagons meeting the Overland. Ghosts of schooner canvas, bits of wagon tongues, and shattered wheels lay frozen in the blue-black ditch that ran beside the road these last miles into Wyoming. The pieces reminded Chaney of grave markers.
The two continued riding without speaking, although Chaney kept clearing his throat. Lem offered no more water.
After an hour, Lem noticed his first Wyoming cottonwood, standing bare against the grey sky, and said, “That man with the shotgun?”
Chaney coughed, and said, “What about him?”
“At Huckie’s, he let you go. But now you’re with me, so next time, he’s going to cut you in half, which’ll give me a chance. Thanks, partner.”
Chaney mumbled something. He’d bought into this game and now was wishing he was out of it. He should be someplace like Kansas City, holding a middling hand, bluffing his way to a small pot to cover his hotel and drinks. That was what he knew, what he liked. Not these stakes.
But there was still the chance at the treasure—more damn money than he’d ever know. Who could give that up?
Chaney couldn’t help himself, and glanced over his shoulder to see who might be riding up from behind, maybe with a shotgun sling on their saddle. Lem couldn’t help himself, and laughed like hell.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Brothers in Blood
White Fox twisted, angling her back to the flames as she was dragged through the burning kerosene pool, the rawhide lasso biting her throat. She tucked her muscular legs in, bending at the knee, and then sprung forward with all of her strength, pushing herself closer to the two cowboys who were pulling her, forcing their line to slack.
She could hear Creed’s voice above the shouts and cries of his men. “You’ve done well! Tend the wounded, then take a moment to enjoy victory.”
The rawhide loosened, and White Fox clawed, pulling it over her head as Creed’s men bulldogged her around the waist before tossing her into a small, slushy snow bank away from the cave’s mouth.
“You ain’t goin’ no place, nésé’kêhá’e !”
White Fox’s neck whipped against the frozen ground as she rolled into the snow, keeping her face away from Creed’s men. Her long black hair shielded her movement as she turned her head just enough to see everything in that moment when the shooting finally stops—pools of fire and blood, hired killers lying wounded, and others dead.
She wasn’t yet twenty-five, and couldn’t count how many like these she’d left bleeding.
Creed brought his horse a few steps closer to the cave’s mouth; smoke poured from it like a grey scream. His men kicked snow onto the still-burning flag piles while, feet away, another died with his buckshot-ripped stomach pouring through his fingers. Nobody gave their dead amigo a glance, even as they stepped over him.
Creed used his saddle as a pulpit, calling out to his flock, “You’ve earned your pay and my respect, but remember why we’re here!”
Someone said, “Long as we get ours.”
Creed adjusted his glasses and said to anyone close, “Did the dog-eater survive?”
The one with the lariat said, “Squirrelly as hell and took some of yours with her. Turn your head, you can spit in her face.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
White Fox raised her eyes, meeting Lariat, who thought he was clever misusing “bitch” in Cheyenne. Wobbly on his feet, he was coiling the rawhide, red spreading from the wound he’d gotten above the knee. His hands were shaking, and his smell stung her nose.
Creed said, “Where’s the prisoner? Where’s Dr. John Bishop?”
Lariat said, “Close.”
Lariat smiled toothlessly, cocking his head toward Bishop, who was lying in the snow beneath the Rocky Mountain birch where the painted and the bay had been tied.
White Fox saw that Bishop’s right arm was almost behind his head, with the double-barrels of the rig leveled naturally at his temple, so that if he moved his shoulders hardly an inch, the triggers would be pulled.
But he wasn’t moving, at all.
White Fox couldn’t help whispering, “Bi-shop.”
As if in response, Fat Gut bellowed, White Fox’s arrow still protruding from his leg. He grabbed his Winchester and aimed it at her, pumping off an empty chamber, and then bellowed some more, because she
refused to react.
Instead, White Fox kept her eyes on Bishop, waiting for him to stir, or speak. There was nothing. For a moment, she felt relief that the rig wouldn’t go off accidentally, and then fear that Bishop was still as death. Her hands stayed around her neck, massaging the feeling back into it, but ready to grab the next lariat they tried to slip over her or a knife from the boot of one of the mé’anéka’êškónes, if he got close enough. She counted how many of Creed’s “bastard sons” were left, and figured which ones to kill to get to Bishop and a horse.
Lariat checked the pockets of the dead for cash, pried guns from their hands, and inspected their boots, yanking off two pair that caught his fancy. He kicked at Bishop’s boots, waiting for White Fox’s reaction before throwing his head back in a Georgia howl.
That’s when Bishop’s left hand moved, barely making a fist. Barely.
White Fox saw his fingers closing, and drew herself in, muscles tightening. She thought Bishop had murmured something, his lips just parting, forming a word. She couldn’t hear him, but watched for another sign of life, while slipping both arms out of her buckskin jacket without notice. She sat up, arms out of the sleeves, palms flat against the ground, ready to spring.
Creed called, “Where’s the boy?”
The youngest of the bunch, all straw-white hair sprouting over a wide face, ran from the cave and dumped Bishop’s field medic kit, blanket, and some ammo onto the wet ground in front of Creed.
Smoke from the fire smeared him, and he coughed, “Right in front of you, sir.”
“Ragtag?”
“They really killed him, sir. I never seen worse.”
“What did you find?”
“There weren’t no gold, but I think I got the valuables you wanted.”
Creed looked down from his mount, sensing the boy’s expression. “You’re a good man, follow orders. You understand this is about a lot more than money.”
Lariat yelled, “What about this fancy gun rig?”
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