by Brenda, Lady
Devlin inhaled her musky perfume. As he held her delicate hand he could feel the blood that coursed strongly through her veins. He needed blood and she would suit his purpose just fine. He nodded to Ligea who averted her eyes and then left the room. Devlin took Dalia’s hand in his.
“Show me to your room, little dove,” he said.
Dahlia looked up at him. A faint pink flush made her pale face glow and she trembled slightly. She led him out of the parlor and up the stairs to her bedroom. In the yellow glow lamplight he undressed her then removed the scarlet ribbon around her neck. He unbuckled his gun belt and hung it on the bed post then removed his own clothes. Dahlia lay passively on the lacy sheets when he joined her. Devlin set his teeth upon her slender pale neck and drank deeply. The girl, Dahlia sighed and clutched him close. He caressed the silken skin of her small girlish breasts then parted her thighs beneath him. Her hot slick feminine core welcomed his thrusts and his powerful release.
When Devlin had fully and truly satiated his hunger he left Dahlia where she lay. She sprawled across the sheets, pale as dawn and as hollow as a donor should be. Her eyes fluttered open as he dressed to leave.
“Will I see you again mister?
He thought he saw desolation in her eyes.
Without a word he tied the scarlet ribbon around her neck again. He buckled his gun belt and jammed his hat on his head.
“Be careful of what you wish for, these encounters, you must know, will surely have consequences.”
He placed two gold coins on her bedside table and then left the room. On his way out Ligea met him at the bottom of the stairs, a silent communication passed between them, and he placed a hefty gratuity in her pale hands.
Once outside he mounted his waiting horse. The taste of Dahlia briefly lingered on his lips but he was far from satisfied. His hunger no longer clawed at his insides but he felt that he was no less damned than before. For a brief moment in time with her, the woman who haunted his dreams and who might very well be right here in Virginia City at this moment, he had begun to think that mortality was possible. In the end those hopes had turned to ashes. Once again he found himself on an endless wheel like the stars of the zodiac forever turning, never sleeping, never dying. His curse and his purpose lay before him once again this time in a new, more sinister form than before. This time he sensed that his battle would be with an even greater evil. An evil even more hideous, more sinister, and one that would show him many faces.
Devlin nudged his stallion into a canter. The moonlight cast his shadow across the dirt street. Up ahead he could hear the sound of a scuffle, cursing and a grunt of pain. As he neared the source of the sound a faint glow of a lamp shone hard on a bundle of human rags struggling in the dark of the alleyway. The ragged, dusty wretch looked strangely familiar to him. He rode closer to investigate.
Walking Ghost lay in the filth of the D Street alley wrapped in a tattered flea ridden blanket with a half full whisky bottle cradled in his arms like a baby. He dreamed of the old witch Spider Woman and her warm cozy shack and the bubbling cauldron of rabbit stew. A searing jolt of pain brought him back to reality as a hard boot made contact with his side.
“Filthy Paiute son of a bitch!”
Walking Ghost curled into a fetal position protecting his precious bottle as the hard blows rained all over his body. Despite his leaden arms and legs he tried to scuttle away. The blows suddenly ended with the distinct click of a pistol. He opened one eye. A dark shadow passed between him and his tormentors.
“Back off!”
He heard the voice of a dead man. It was one that he thought he would never hear again. He opened his bloodshot eyes to see his red-faced tormentors backed up on their heels. Devlin, the dead man, followed after them the long barrel of his gun leading the way.
“This ain’t none o’ yer bizniss mister!” The man with the red face sneered.
“I am making it my business,” Devlin countered.
“He’s jus a filthy injun, a murderin’ Paiute.”
Devlin lifted his pistol. In a flash he fired at the miner’s feet.
“Sheet-it!” They shouted jumping away.
“Run, you rabid dogs. The next one will put a period to your miserable existence.” The miners scuttled backwards and disappeared.
Devlin knelt down and held out his hand.
“Walking Ghost? You’re a sorry mess, my friend.”
Walking Ghost blinked. “I saw you die.”
Devlin smiled. “I live again.”
“But how?”
Devlin laughed. “That is quite a tale. One that would be best told over breakfast. Come; let’s get you out of here”
It was midnight and Esmeralda, a dark cloak covering her head and Jamie with his cap pulled low, walked north down the boardwalk. The gas streetlamps illuminated their journey past the open doors of the saloons and the stares of drunken patrons who lounged in the doorways. At the corner of Union and C Street they turned right down the hill towards Chinatown. The night was clear. A large lemon yellow moon hung over a town that came alive at night and rang with the frantic sounds of excess. Sounds, like the whine of the hurdy gurdies, the player pianos and the raucous revelers that by day conveyed an aura of fun, bonhomie and mischief. By night those same sounds changed into bacchanalian babble, full of anger and desperation.
They walked past places where at any given night fortunes were won and lost at the faro and card tables. By 1877 one hundred and fifty saloons had sprouted like poisonous mushrooms from C Street and beyond. The evil twin of its predecessor, the Barbary Coast of San Francisco, Virginia City’s own Barbary Coast district surpassed it in pure unadulterated wickedness fueled by rotgut whiskey, gold dust and opium. Located on the southernmost stretch of C Street it was lined with red light districts and bawdy houses, a place where fancy women could be seen by daylight so inebriated they literally crawled through the alleyways between C and D Street.
Esmeralda and Jamie continued down the boardwalk. Beyond this on the streets of G and H lay their destination - the Chinese shops and shanties of Chinatown. They picked their way down the crooked streets. Streets, which became narrower and darker, as they neared the Herbalist Shop of Grandfather Woo. A vast beehive of rough-hewn shacks and shanties spread out lit by colorful lanterns and kerosene lamps. Esmeralda picked up the scent of smoke from wood fires, and the aroma of tempting exotic foods hung in the air. Through open doorways and tents she could see busy Chinese faces still bent to their tasks or at rest lounging about smoking pipes. She felt hesitation from Jamie but ignored it and pressed on until they came upon a bare wood shanty painted in red Chinese characters and hung with paper lanterns.
A bell tinkled as Esmeralda opened the door. Inside the Herbalist Shop were shelves full of jars and bundles of dried herbs, sweet incense floated in the air. At the very end of the tiny shop a counter, made up of a plank of wood over two barrels, stood.
A dim light glowed behind a beaded curtain.
Through this curtain came an ancient Chinese man with a long, gray beard and ponytail. He squinted at them while smoking a clay pipe. “What you do here, Missy?” he said.
Esmeralda stepped forward. “I am looking for the herbalist Grandfather Woo.”
“I am he. What you want? This place no good for white woman.”
Esmeralda reached into her reticule and pulled out the purple flask and handed it to him. “This tincture, I must have more of it.” Grandfather Woo removed the stopper and sniffed the contents. His dark gaze pierced hers. “You sick, you go away. Grandfather Woo cannot help you.”
Esmeralda took out a roll of thick bills and put them on the counter. There were only a few drops left in the flask a few drops of the tincture that stood between her and a horrible hunger. “Please, I need your help.”
Grandfather Woo shook his head and waved his hands. “You go, I no help you.”
Esmeralda reached into her reticule again and pulled out a thick dark coil, a braid of human hair and flung it d
own on the counter. “Remember Hop Woo? Your son? Give me the tincture and I will tell you how he died.”
Grandfather Woo stared at the braid. Then with a gnarled hand he reached out and stroked it. Over his shoulder he shouted in Chinese to someone beyond the curtain. A diminutive Chinese woman with an ageless, doll like face and dressed in dark silk came forward. They spoke rapidly in Chinese. The woman shook her head over and over clutching the braid to her breast. Tears filled her eyes and she fled behind the curtain again.
“Tell me how my son died and Grandmother will make you medicine.”
Esmeralda took a deep breath. Terrible images crawled through her mind. She saw the pale bloated face of Hop Woo staring up at her from the bottom of the pond. “Your son was the slave of an undead demon, one who walked upon this earth in the guise of a man. I found his body at the bottom of the pond on my farm. He is buried next to my father near the town of Red Bluff.”
“And the demon? Where is he?”
“I saw him die, burned to ashes.”
For a long moment Grandfather Woo just stared at Esmeralda puffing on his pipe. She could feel his thoughts piercing her aura like razors.
“Come, Grandmother make you cure.” He gestured towards the curtain.
Jamie’s eyes went wide. “I don’t reckon you should go in there, Miss.”
“Don’t worry, Jamie. Wait for me out here I will be right back.”
Esmeralda followed Grandfather Woo through the curtain and down some dark stone steps. The steps led to a dank cavern filled with incense and opium smoke. Padded benches lined the walls were the shadowy figures of men and women alike lay smoking pipes in a euphoric haze. A door at the end of the cavern opened into a small treatment room with a cot in the middle. Grandfather Woo gestured for her to lie down on the cot. Out of the shadows Grandmother materialized with a leather bundle. They whispered in Chinese and repeated the word “Jaing Shi.” Grandfather Woo opened the bundle to reveal a handful of long fine needles. Grandmother began to grind some herbs in a brass pestle.
Esmeralda tried to relax as Grandfather stuck the needles in various places in her hands neck and face. With a stick of burning herbs he heated the ends of the needles. The pain in her bones started to drift away. She began to dream.
She floated back to the night she had her very first vision. She remembered sneaking out of her bed in the middle of the night and walking through the house in the dark. She always loved the dark for it was soothing and mysterious full of night sounds. Barefoot and clothed in a long white nightgown she unlatched the door and went outside to the well behind the barn. Owls hooted and the farm animals stirred restlessly. The well drew her to it like a magnet its circular stones gleamed white in the moonlight. When she reached it she leaned over and peered into the black water. The pale moon and a sprinkling of stars shone back at her. Frowning, she stared as the water trembled and rippled and the face of the moon disintegrated like smoke. She saw her mother with panic in her face. She was driving their buckboard with her hands pulling frantically at the reins. The buckboard swerved and hit a bump then careened out of control. Her mother screamed as the wagon went airborne then flipped over. Terrified at what she had seen she ran into the house.
“ Mommy! Mommy!”
She yelled as she ran into her parent’s bedroom.
The Gilded Bird mine was indeed rich. A bloated mound of dirt saturated with golden bounty. It was also well and truly cursed. A sweltering hellhole who’s steaming depths had taken the lives of many unfortunate miners. Miners, who because of the extreme heat with temperatures that rose to as high as 145 degrees, could only work in shifts of fifteen minutes at a time. These conditions were normal for many of the Virginia City mines.
However, in addition to the miserable conditions the Gilded Bird was plagued by mysterious cave-ins, strange sulfurous odors and freezing cold spots that even rats would not venture into. Truth be told, John Anderson thanked the Almighty Lord he was rid of her. He poured himself a shot of whiskey and looked around his clapboard shack. For six years he had sweated like a mule to take what he could from the mine. He’d hung on stubbornly, lived a bachelor’s life, deprived of the sweet wife he’d left behind in Ohio. In the past three months he had been dogged relentlessly by Big Jim Diamond to sell him the mine. But he had held out. The happenings in the mine were far more disturbing than anyone knew. He did not consider himself a religious man but ever since he began to bring serious amounts of ore from her depths he had slept with the Lords bible next to his bed.
The year before a miner, an Irishman from County Kildare, had heard voices coming from the inside shaft, calling his name drawing him deeper and deeper into the mine when suddenly a steaming sulfurous crevice opened up. He claimed that the Devil spoke to him and demanded he do unspeakable things. The Irishman fled the mine. He spent seven days in a shanty on D Street drinking rotgut whiskey and smoking opium. On the eighth day, in the freezing November snow, he finally succumbed to madness and roamed the streets. He was arrested for kidnapping a prostitute and eating her.
John Anderson lay down on his narrow bed with the open bible propped on his chest. He tried to close his eyes but horrible images flitted through his brain. Images of bodies, dead and bloody, strewn across a misty field like broken dolls. The smell of rotted flesh filled his nostrils. The distant sound of cannon fire combined with the drone of flies filled his ears. He was so weary; he felt he did not deserve to live. The image of his wife’s pale face floated before him but he dared not reach out for fear he’d pollute her with his guilty stain. His wife Rebecca was a god-fearing woman who had married one such as he: a man prone to drunkenness, dark moods and gambling. A fragile southern flower she had wilted under his thoughtless behavior. After the war she had fled to her mother’s family leaving John alone.
The mine had been his penance. He had held the voices at bay along with their evil suggestions. But no more, he took a deep breath to try to still the hammering of his heart. All he had wanted was a stake; one last win to take him away from this accursed town. It was not to be. Now the fate of the mine and what lurked in its depths rested in the hands of a dark gambler. His hand trembled as he pressed a gun against his temple. A distant knocking sounded at the door but he ignored it and closed his eyes tight. The shot, which obliterated his tormented life, blended seamlessly and unnoticed by the night.
After her trip to Chinatown, Esmeralda felt almost human again. The acupuncture and herbal tincture she had received from Grandfather Woo had revived her. When Jamie led her back to her room a little before daylight she drew the curtains and slept. Tomorrow she would look for a house to settle in and begin her plans.
As Esmeralda slept she dreamt of Annie. More than ever she needed her guidance. When Esmeralda’s mother had died when she was twelve years old Annie from Witch Creek had taken her under her wing and taught her the ways of roots and folk magic. In her dream she could hear the sound of Annie’s rocker, see her in the corner of the room, and smell the tobacco smoke from her corncob pipe.
Esmeralda tossed and turned restlessly in her bed. She felt herself lifting up and drifting above the town, whisking through the night air to a dark, safe place; a place where a warm fire burned on the hearth and fragrant herbs scented the air.
“Oh Annie, I am going to need your help I can feel the evil in this town. Underneath the evil, good is masked by greed. You have taught me to purify and consecrate. That is not enough. I will need to purge the demons from them by any means possible, physical, emotional and mental.”
Annie did not directly answer but a sudden gust of wind blew through the window. A chill passed like lightning through her and she heard Annie’s voice in her head. “Yore up agin’ it again Gal, this time but I’ll be watchin from th’ other side. Just give ol’ Annie a holler.”
She awoke with a start, staring into the predawn light. The nausea and pain of the sickness receded. A surge of new energy filled her. The raucous sounds of the town floated up through her windo
w. They were the sounds built upon layers of greed and avarice, the fertile ground for demons, possession and lost souls. She closed her eyes briefly. There was work to be done here in Virginia City work that would test her talents of both a seer and exorcist. Talents she had honed since Red Bluff for she was determined to never be at a disadvantage with evil again.
Or be seduced by it either.
Chapter Four
Reunion
The place that Devlin called home while he was in Virginia City took the form of two custom built railroad cars that were parked at the train depot off E Street. A private elegantly appointed space, a cocoon of polished wood, crystal chandeliers and Turkish carpets worthy of a sultan.
It was to here that he brought his friend the Indian, Walking Ghost. Devlin settled him down at a table beside the wood stove where cup after cup of black coffee and a large plate of food was served to Walking Ghost by a silent uniformed Chinese manservant.
When Walking Ghost had eaten his fill and pushed away from the table, Devlin spoke. “The fates have brought us together once more, my friend, I can’t believe it to be a coincidence”.
Walking Ghost paused before answering. “If you live again then this thing has not ended and if you live again, does not that demon Horace live also?
Devlin smiled. “Horace has been returned to the hell from whence he had come from, burned to ashes in Red Bluff. My work here in Virginia City however has taken on a new twist, a new enemy and one that could potentially open the gates for all manner of Demons even the gates of Hell itself.”
“Who is he, this enemy?” Walking Ghost inquired.
“His name is Big Jim Diamond, the owner of the Diamond J mining company, a man cut from the same cloth as Horace but with a sheen of sophistication. Nevertheless, he is surrounded by the same murderous scum as before.”
“And what of the souls of your enemies? And your pact with the Dark Ones?” Walking Ghost asked.