“Only you, Spinner,” Yiska assured her.
“Well, then.”
Chess scoffed. “Who was s’posed to tutor me in these skills of yours, exactly — Ash Rook? There’s your answer on that one: fucker tried to kill me and this’s the result, so everything I’ve learned since’s been on the run, like always.”
“Yes, and given how much damage you did while running, I would have expected you to know more, at the end of it. But it seems we are both fated to be disappointed.”
Songbird grimaced, but when she spoke, her voice was calmer than Chess’d ever heard it before — enough so he’d’ve rubbed his eyes, if he hadn’t somewhat feared that’d scrub ’em away like chalk marks. “This bickering is neither here nor there,” she said, “and beneath us as well, even him. What must we do?”
“Let me think,” Grandma growled.
“Yes, let us both,” Yiska agreed. “For I think you already know — ”
“Be quiet, granddaughter!”
“No.” Yiska stepped in front of Grandma. “The time for that is over, Spinner: decide, or do not. This is what you would tell me.”
The hulk stood there silent a long moment, looming over her, a landslide waiting to happen. “Very well, then, come here,” it said, at last. “Let us speak on it further.”
Their subsequent palaver — conducted quietly, in their own language — seemed to go on far longer than it had to. Luckily, Yancey’s shoulder was small but warm, surprisingly hard with new-grown muscle. What’d they had her doing out here? Chess’d have to remember to ask, whenever they next got time for impractical conversation.
Even as he thought this, however, he felt that same ripple of unreality sift those approximations he was using for bones, frighting him with the idea that he might fall through her supporting grip at any moment. So he spat, and eked out: “Didn’t mean to . . . horn in on your territory, gal. With Ed, and all.”
“What?” She blushed like the flower-faced innocent she’d been, not so long back. “Oh, I think we’re all three pretty equally entangled at this point, don’t you? What with him your priest and me your priestess, I mean.” Adding, lower: “Actually, I think might be that’s why you got such a longing for him, all of a sudden. You need us both, to shore you up, just like before.”
“By cuttin’ on yourselves, you mean? I don’t — ” He grabbed himself by the mental scruff and shook, hard. “There’s other ways,” he said, finally.
“Like what?”
Chess snorted. “Oh, hell if I know, woman! Just seems like there’s likely to be, and you’d know better’n me ’bout it anyhow, wouldn’t you? Like every-damn-body.”
Instead of snapping back in return, she smiled again. “Now, this is more like what I expected. That you’d roll out of Hell like you were getting out of bed, see me and scowl, and say: ‘Took you long enough.’”
Chess managed a half-grin of his own, and agreed. “’Cause you did, that’s for damn sure. But much as I couldn’t see nor hear you down there, I already know the whyfore of that.”
“In that Oona told you, you mean.”
His brows knit. “Saw that, too, huh? Well, ’course you did . . . sent her to me in the first place, whispered advice in her ear. Two of you must’ve had some deep discussions, knowin’ I couldn’t listen in.”
“We might’ve, at that. You jealous, Mister Pargeter?”
He suspected she was twitting him, and felt a strange stab of pride not only that he could identify such japery, but that it didn’t make him want to punch anyone, when he did.
“A little, Missus Kloves,” he said, at last. “But only that. She and me still ain’t friends, as such.”
Quite some change from the horned-up rake and ramblin’ boy who’d put a bottle upside Sadie Whoever’s head and left her to die on a dirty saloon floor, over the grand sin of flirting with “his” duplicitous hulk of a man. For a second, Chess almost wanted to slip back down into Hell and apologize to the poor little bitch, which rocked him back yet further, as though the “him” he’d always known was peeling away by degrees, shedding like skin. What could possibly be left underneath, after, when every bit of scar was finally gone?
“That’s a sad story,” Yancey told him, all humour suddenly gone from her voice. To which he shrugged, as best he could, and said: “It’s a sad world.”
Which, by God, they both well knew for nothing but truth.
But here were Grandma and that man-gal of hers stepping over now, finally done with their parlay. The rock-creature shook her massive-jawed head, with a noise like bones grinding, and told Yancey: “So, it is decided — you must bring your other half here, that soldier Morrow, if he yet lives. Then you and he will keep this one from losing sense of himself, until we get him to where he and the Smoking Mirror may confront each other.”
Yancey sighed. “After which?” ”
“They will fight, and this working will reach its end, one way or another.” Grandma looked down on Chess, haughty as a thing with no eyes to narrow or nose to sneer through could be. “I hope you prove worth all this effort, red boy.”
“Didn’t think so already, why’d you bother bringin’ me up at all?”
“Because we all have parts to play. I know it — and now, so do you. Do not fail.”
Chess scowled. “I don’t know you, woman. Might be you sure as hell don’t know me.”
“Ah, but I do, little killer. I have seen you through your man’s eyes, and often. Your white man with a Book, cause of all this trouble, supposedly on your behalf. Because he could stand neither to lose you nor give up his magic, desiring to . . . what is your bilagaana phrase? ‘Have his cake, and eat it’?”
“What’s she talkin’ ’bout?” Chess demanded, of Yiska.
She shrugged. “It is an old idea — that two Hataalii who wish to live together may do so, but only at the cost of their power. Rook might have done it before you ever had cause to know what you were, let alone what you might have been. But because he would not brook becoming less, he made you more . . . too much for Balance, unBalancing everything.”
“Yeah, well — I never asked him to do any of that, Goddamnit. That was all his idea . . . his, and hers.”
“Yes,” Yiska agreed. “And she would have just done something else, the Lady of Snares and Traps, even had your Reverend refused her; this too is true, though my Grandmother is loath to admit it.” Her eyes turned to Songbird, afloat and silk-shrouded, shimmering sweet in all her white-on-red finery, and Chess watched in surprise as a mere sight of that sharp-tongued harridan made Yiska’s lips curve — let alone how Songbird’s eyes dropped to see it, blanched cheekbones pinkening.
“Besides which,” Yiska continued, softer, “I can sympathize with him, foolish though Asher Rook may have been, in the moment. I think we all can, being drawn most fiercely to our kind, like any other animal.”
“Not to mention how we now know things were gonna change, no matter who did what,” Yancey put in, drawing a nod from Missus Love.
“Missus Kloves has it a’right,” Sophy Love said, considering her boy, who was amusing himself by sucking on one paw and making dust-mites dance like fireflies ’round his own head, hexaciously lit up in a hundred different colours. “This vow of yours, Christian as it sounds in theory, was overturned long since by the Hex City Oath — and given what we achieved last night, Miss Yu and Gabriel stand living proof. No point in harrying Mister Pargeter over things he couldn’t’ve known or things Rook claims he did to benefit him, rather than pursuing charges ’gainst him for all the bad he’s done outright.”
Which put her on his side, strangely enough, even after everything — or maybe not; hard to tell, even when they weren’t discussing stuff that’d probably happened while he was still pulling himself up through Hell’s asshole. The whole thing made Chess’s skull ache, notwithstanding, though that was good too, in a way: proved he still had one, at least.
“You ladies just go on a
n’ settle things amongst yourselves,” he heard himself say, shakily, once more fighting to keep upright. “Don’t . . . worry ’bout me. I’ll juss wait it . . . out . . .”
Then he plunged forward, this time into Grandma’s massive, lumpish arms, their sharp yet crumbly edges bruising him all over as she hoisted him. Telling him, inside his head: Hush, fool. Take some of my strength, while the dead-speaker does what she must, with White Shell Girl and the salt-man’s widow’s help.
Chess flopped in her grip like a fish, squirming ’til he fell back, betrayed by his own weakness — reduced to using harsh language, for lack of any better weapon. Aw, save your “fool” you damn squaw-monster, ’specially since you never do put yourself out to learn folks’ proper names, do ya? What is that, some sort’a Injun thing?
A curl of alien laughter licked through him, excoriating even as it soothed — part of the service, possibly, since he did almost immediately feel a touch better. You are a wonder, Grandma admitted, reluctantly, while she rifled his mind with equally impolite “fingers,” leaving nothing untouched. Insulted by everything, always ready to fight; you revel in it, a beast in constant heat. No wonder the Enemy chose your shape to make War in, after the Lady sent you sowing death-in-life all along the Crack’s length.
Hey now, bitch, keep outta there! That stuff’s private.
With a shoulder hitch, Grandma indicated the others, gathered back ’round that fire of theirs and raising a veritable storm of hexery as though they was spinning gold from straw in the old tale. Songbird and little Gabriel Love took centre place, with Yiska on one hand, Yancey the other, and everything going straight over into her like braided lightning. She was opening herself up, calling out to — Ed, he could only think, though he couldn’t catch the words ’emselves, and felt a quick, silly surge of jealousy at the way the very idea of seeing Morrow enfleshed was making her flush.
Resign yourself, red boy, for nothing can be hidden now, Grandma told him, not when you stand at the world’s very turning pivot, as we all do — but you in particular, you Trickster-spawned trickster, most unreliable Hataalii of all. We stand between things. One world ends, almost certainly; this does not mean another will — or must — begin. You have blundered through this world rutting and killing, living and dying — doing only as you pleased and never counting the cost, to anyone. But now Balance itself hangs in the balance, so you must put away childish things, forever. You must be what you claim you are — a man — and act it, before it grows too late to matter.
Something was gathering together while getting wider over there, even as they watched, bending the air like heat. Behind Yancey, or maybe in front of her — around her? Christ, but this shit was tricksy. His god-stints set aside, Chess truly didn’t ever expect to understand magic, no matter how long he lived to keep on using it.
Maybe it just ain’t in my nature, he thought, to which he “heard” Grandma snort.
And this is the worst of your folly, she replied. You have only to think on my granddaughter, to see. Two-spirited like you, a born child of Begochiddy — and like you, too, she craves to ride and kill, to go where her heart pleases to take her, to have her way. Yet still she does her duty, for she at least knows to reckon her actions’ cost to others. That you were raised without a tribe is a wound you did not ask to be given, but that you have never tried to heal that wound, or even wanted to try . . . this decision is yours to pay for or be repaid, in kind.
Let me ask you this, Red Hair. Do you think the gods love, simply because they make? Do you think they must love what they make?
Chess shook his head, muzzily; felt her stone chest rake the side of his face, those uneven lumps she was using for tits all but drawing blood. Not the gods I met. ’Sides which, love and me, we ain’t exactly on good terms. I don’t think nothin’ “has” to love nothin’, necessarily. And even if it does . . . that don’t mean it won’t hurt.
Hmmm. Then, uneducated though you may be, you are smarter than that bilagaana Reverend of yours, at least.
He ain’t my Reverend. Not anymore.
Yes, yes. Tell yourself that, if it helps.
Mutinous on his part, dismissive on hers — he felt like arguing it, but didn’t have the strength. So fucking tapped out, an empty keg stuffed with nothing but the all-sorts dregs of a thousand previous hoorahs and just about to crack, no matter how sharply he drew on Grandma’s bounty. Could feel how it was hurting her, too, but was frankly too exhausted to even enjoy it.
Is this it? he couldn’t help but wonder. This? Jesus. Stupid Goddamn way to die . . . again.
Here something popped far off in the distance, mirrored by an ordnance-like boom in the foreground that made dust spray up ’tween him and Grandma and all the rest, a gigantic huff, like the entire world’d gasped for breath. And when it cleared, there was Ed Morrow’s broad back with a darkie bluebelly and yet two more barefoot gals (hexes too, he could smell it on ’em) tight-arrayed all ’round, his long duster bloody and mud-smeared and tore down the back like ill-cut tails, so high you could see his suspenders.
By unintentional miracle, Ed himself had fetched up straight in front of Yancey, who was staring at him and grinning fit to bust, as though she’d gotten her Christmas present early. And Chess couldn’t help but think he must be grinning back, since the next thing both of ’em did was to grab the other tight and go for each other mouth-first, so well-timed it was like they’d decided on it together as the best of all possible courses of action.
Well, that’s that, Chess thought, feeling a touch grimmer than he’d expected to over the idea that whatever he’d had with Ed must be good and done with, given the evidence. At least ’til Ed pulled away at last, with reluctance, and looked around — for as their eyes met, the big Pinkerton man’s all but gave out a flash of relief that would’ve been strong enough to knock Chess back a step, had he been standing.
“So you are here,” Morrow said, grin not slackening a whit.
“Sure am,” Chess answered, blinking a strange mist from his eyes. And levered himself up as Grandma let go, sliding to re-take his feet — only to be shocked when Morrow crossed the space between ’em with two long strides, caught him under both arms as though his weight was nothing (which, Christ knew, it might be) and swung Chess ’round child-high before planting a kiss almost as good as the one he’d given Yancey on him after all, all teeth and tongue, hugging him so hard he thought his chest might crack.
Once more, that scrim between them slid back, letting Morrow’s ideas into Chess’s head. You Goddamned little creature, he heard Ed think, incredulous. Whoever would’ve thought I’d’ve missed you so much, so badly?
Not me, I must admit, Chess thought back. But I’m glad you did, all the same.
Plucked and humming, Chess pushed back into it, determined to make the most of what was probably their last time together, even if Yancey was watching. But from the corner of his eye he saw her look on not too much appalled, if not exactly approving, while the two new hex-women and that black boy all kept their own eyes carefully elsewhere. Songbird studied her nail-sheaths, Sophy Love the skies; Yiska crossed her arms, and grinned too.
And Grandma simply waited it out, counting time. “If you are done with your greetings, soldier,” she broke in, at last, “then there is work yet to be done. The red boy needs you, and your woman too. She will counsel you on your part, while the rest of us prepare.”
Prepare for what? Chess wanted to ask, but that slump hit him one final time and he folded, this time onto Ed and Yancey, together. They knit their hands in his, hoisting in tandem to keep him at least half-aloft, and he was happy enough to let ’em.
“. . . yes ma’am,” he managed, finally, probably meaning it sarcastically, though the tone of his voice made it hard to tell. “Don’t mind me.” And slipped away.
Almost literally slipped away, he learned later on, after resurfacing.
“You came apart — dissolved, like sugar in water,” Yancey tol
d him, shuddering. “Just for a minute, thank God, ’fore Songbird and Grandma stepped in and — gathered you up, I s’pose, stuck you back together somehow, or what-have-you. But I swear, long as it lasted, it was like you were half inside us . . . me, anyways.”
“No, me too,” Morrow put in, with a shudder. “Goddamn disconcerting, I’ll tell you what.”
Chess squeezed his eyes tight, head still spinning. “Huh, don’t say. Then I guess there was somethin’ good about it, at least.”
Which was worth it just to see Morrow get all pink around the ears, then grimace a bit in pain, squeezing his cut wrist into a pottery bowl Yiska’d scared up. On the other side, Yancey was doing much the same, stirring the result up with a murmur of nahuatl and a practical snap and flourish Chess didn’t recall from the last couple of times he’d seen her do this same routine. Spilling blood in his name to root him to this world and trigger the power he drew from it, back at Bewelcome, back at Hoffstedt’s Hoard — not that he wanted to think on that latter one too closely, even now.
“You’re turned quite the little hexess now,” he told her, hoping that counted as a compliment. And apparently it did, since she shrugged, but smiled doing it.
“Never that,” she said. “Wouldn’t get all too much if you fed off me, ’less you’re doing it this way, remember? I’m just your priestess, like Ed here’s your priest . . . and he won’t be that for all too long either, probably, after we get that body of yours un-divinified again.”
So crazed to be having this conversation, throwing ’round words like “god” in reference to himself, even after everything he’d already seen, or done: Chess Pargeter, whoreson and trigger-man, worth (on a good day) about as much as it cost to stock his gun or fill another man’s bed. But then another thing struck him, odder yet, and cooled him to the core.
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