Clash of Mountains

by Chloe Garner

  “Everybody here is here ‘cause they chose it,” Sarah said. “Different question.”

  He nodded, and she looked at his face again.

  “I wouldn’t have made it, if I’d tried to enlist. They try to wave off the ones what wouldn’t make it, ahead, so they don’t get stuck, renouncin’ without bein’ able to enlist.”

  “So they told you not to try it,” he said, and she nodded.

  “No hurt feelin’s. I ain’t the kind of person they want on that crew, though they know me and I know them, and I respect why and how they do what they do. They got protocols and priorities and means ‘a makin’ decisions you and I’d choke on. Some of the graduates comin’ back are just workin’ the rules, but the most of ‘em are goin’ up with a clear need and an argument what supports it. And you ain’t wrong. Little towns out here been dyin’ for a lot ‘a years coulda been made better with the right three, four satellites.”

  “My sources say three, but I thought I would just try for one and get the coverage we could.”

  She nodded.

  “Right call. Gonna take at least two pods to get up all the gear you need to get a satellite runnin’, and one is hard enough to reprioritize. I’ll get a copy of the rules when we get there and make out my argument. Done it before, for class. Depends on how clear a proposal you got waitin’ for me, there - prove you know what you’re doin’, gettin’ the thing built down here - and what else they got goin’.”

  “You don’t just go on a list, of you are important enough to do some day but not today?”

  She shook her head.

  “No. That’s how you get a backlog what can’t be moved around when they need to. Either you go up this month or you come back and ask next month.”

  He nodded slowly.

  “I don’t want you just hanging out, there, waiting.”

  She shook her head.

  “Take us most of three weeks, round trip, as it is. Could go to four, dependin’.”

  He nodded.

  “And you could come back to a flood that you can’t get through.”

  “You mind Granger, he won’t steer you wrong,” Sarah said. “Sunny and I won’t hang ‘round Intec past gettin’ an answer. Pythagoras’ll have the list of requests, same as all the big players. He’ll know we’re around.”

  “How secure are the individual passenger lists?” Jimmy asked.

  “Life ain’t got guarantees, but the LaVelle considers themselves sovereign, and they ain’t got much use for money, outside ‘a sendin’ kids to college and the like. Hard to buy off. Wouldn’t be surprised if Pythagoras ain’t got a few sendin’ him some of the more interestin’ tidbits, but…” She shook her head. “You don’t risk it, when you ain’t got a home to go to, you get caught.”

  “Pyathagoras would just set them up with their own mansion, if he wanted to,” Jimmy said. Sarah shook her head.

  “Ain’t no place to extradite ‘em. You ain’t military, you ain’t citizen. And you can’t just sneak off. They lock you up there on the ship and you spend the rest of your life there.”

  “So he’d need leverage,” Jimmy said. “Not impossible to get.”

  Sarah shook her head.

  “Not impossible. Could be a trap waitin’ for us. But I don’t reckon, Jimmy. The LaVelle don’t take that kindly. And he’s got bigger interests in usin’ their resources than crushin’ us. No way he don’t.”

  Jimmy nodded.

  “I trust you.”

  She was goin’ back.

  Never reckoned she’d see the inside of that ship again.

  “Maxim will be on the train tomorrow, unless they blow it up again,” Jimmy said. “We’ll go up to see his claims and then you and Sunny will go north. Get me that satellite, Sarah. I know you don’t think it’s a one-sided win, but I do. The things I could do, with the ability to talk to someone, even just for a couple hours a day, who’s in Preston or Intec.” He shook his head. “Get me that satellite.”

  “Ain’t got a promise for you but that I’ll try,” she said.

  He nodded, rollin’ his head to look up at the ceilin’ again.

  “I imagine you want your bed,” he said. “You’ve had a long day.”

  She nodded as he looked at her out of the corner of his eye, just watchin’ her, quiet. He had a striking profile.

  “You been ridin’ Flower the whole time I was gone?”

  “He seemed like he wanted to get out,” Jimmy answered. “It’s a lot of energy to pen up in a stall for days at a time.”

  “Suits you,” she said. He grinned.

  “No. He suits you. I’m the one who should be on the dark horse.”

  “Gremlin suits me just fine,” she said. “Better a horse I know than one at random from the stable.”

  “Was that permission?” he asked, his grin fading to simple humor.

  “No,” she said. “Just me seein’ what is.”

  He licked his lips and rolled his head, droppin’ his shoulder ‘gainst the back of the couch to look at her.

  “Tell me what is,” he said.

  “You’re tired,” she said, just seein’ it, the shape of his face under his eyes, the blinks, fast, frantic. Funny, just seein’ that now, when she’d spent the whole night at study of his face. “You need a solid night’s sleep.”

  He grinned, just a little manic.

  “It’s funny,” he said. “I don’t seem to be able to sleep without you around, anymore.”

  “That so?” Sarah asked. He nodded.

  “I sleep with a gun under my pillow, anyway, but I just spent the whole night watching the door.”

  “I slept fine,” she said, and he laughed quietly, takin’ her hand from her knee and puttin’ it to his lips.

  “Which is why I sleep better with you here.”

  She shook her head.

  “Don’t like the sound of it, Jimmy.”

  “Up in the mountains,” he said, rollin’ his head back once more, slouched to the point his head only just reached the top of the couch. “Up in the mountains, the air is so clear, I can think. Down here, it’s all dust and sand and heat… I sweat so much, I go through a glass of water every hour, at my desk, but my shirts are always dry. But up in the mountains, in the cool, with the air so thin it’s like it isn’t even there…”

  Sarah put her hand to his forehead, findin’ a fever there.

  “Jimmy,” she said, and he looked over at her. She stood. “Jimmy, you’re goin’ up and gettin’ in the tub. Set the water like you like, but expect it’s gonna be cool to the touch. I’ll be up in a few minutes to see to you.”

  He stood, lookin’ at the ceiling with eyes rolled up high in his head.

  “My brain is over-cooked, trying to make it all fit together. There’s a path. I can feel it. They aren’t invulnerable. Neither one of them. I just need a few more days to make it all work.”

  “You need to drop the reservoir,” Sarah said, and he shook his head.

  “You don’t understand how important it is,” he answered. He was still sharp. Still himself. Just runnin’ too fast. She made a flickin’ motion with her hand.

  “Get,” she said. “I’ll be up in a few minutes.”

  He started up the stairs, not movin’ quite like hisself, but no so far off anyone but Sarah would ‘a noticed. She went to the kitchen, movin’ staff out of the way as she got to the pantry and gathered supplies, then went back to her bedroom, gettin’ the rest of it.

  She’d pulled oozies out of his back, days up in the mountains, bad hygiene. They’d been keepin’ clean, but shouldn’t have needed to. Better to keep the clean in and the dirty out than try to split ‘em up, up there. She could do it. Didn’t know if he had the knack.

  She went up to find him in the tub, towel under his head, eyes closed.

  “You awake?” she asked.

  “Yes,” he answered. “What happened?”

  “Caught yourself a fever,” she said. “Shoulda told me when you weren’t feelin’ right.”r />
  “Can you talk to me like a person, tonight?” he asked. “I have a hard time taking you seriously like that.”

  “You don’t reckon I can get you patched, on account of a drawl you heard me with every day you known me?” Sarah asked.

  “Not every day,” Jimmy answered, and she blew air through her lips.

  “Doc talks like this,” she said.

  “And I imported Sid,” he said.

  “Fine,” she breathed, dropping the accent. Took thought to keep it out, but he relaxed a fraction, the motion of his eyes under his eyelids easing.

  She put her hand to his forehead again. Temperature was still up, but not as high.

  “Are you ever unwell?” Jimmy asked as she put her hands down his arms to his elbows, feeling with her fingers the skin she couldn’t see.

  “Every time you’re not around,” she answered. “Went through hell, when you left.”

  “If I ever go again, I’m taking you with me,” he said. “I’ll just drug you. You’ll wake up in Preston.”

  “Like that would keep me from leaving you to come back here,” Sarah said.

  “Is it worth it?” he asked. “Lawrence?”

  “That’s like asking me if my skin is worth it,” she said. “Lawrence is a part of who I am.”

  She checked the insides of his thighs and he shifted, trying to get away from her as she got more personal yet.

  “You aren’t anything special,” she said. “I’ve checked a hundred cows for parasites before.”

  “That’s exactly why I’m concerned,” he said.

  “It isn’t a bug,” she said. “When did you start feeling abnormal?”

  “Yesterday morning, when I woke up,” he said.

  “Before I left,” she said, mixing herbs into a steeping ball and dropping it into a cup of hot water.

  “I don’t tell you every time I’ve got indigestion,” he said.

  “You’ve had indigestion?” she asked, pausing.

  “No,” he said. “I’m just saying. It wasn’t bad enough to mention.”

  She continued bouncing the steeping ball in the water, then tapped the metal ball on the edge of the tub to get his attention. He opened his eyes, and she lifted the tea cup to where he could see it. He brought his hands up out of the water and accepted it.

  “Sip or gulp?” he asked.

  “It’ll bring your fever down and give you a jump on beating the bugs that are making you sick,” she said. “Don’t need to be prim about it.”

  He drank the whole thing in two open-throated swallows, then handed it back, wrinkling his nose.

  “I remember this,” he said. She nodded.

  “Mountain fever,” she said. “We all had it as kids. I don’t even know if I can get it, anymore. Thor and Apex will be dealing with it up at the mine…” She paused. “We need to tell the out-of-towners to keep supplies with them, or else this could take some of them out.”

  He nodded, squeezing his eyes and relaxing again.

  “I’ll have Thomas do a round…” He shook his head. “Sometime.”

  “Thomas can’t find them all on his own,” she said. “Not yet.”

  He twitched the corner of his mouth.

  “What was in that?” he asked.

  “Like I said,” she told him, and he shook his head.

  “No. I need to get out. If I don’t, I’m going to drown.”

  She smiled.

  “Nothing so powerful that I feel like I need to apologize, but you will sleep tonight.”

  “You should tell me before you do something like that to me,” he muttered. “I have… important things…”

  He slipped and she reached over the edge of the tub, catching him by the armpit and holding him above water. He’d reacted even faster to the lilla than she’d expected. Doc didn’t use the stuff, but frontier medicine used what it had in quantity. Not having the benefits of clinical science meant taking some risks with potency.

  She let him sit for another ten minutes, feeling his core temperature come down gradually, then she hauled him out of the tub and toweled him dry enough to keep him from getting cold - the Lawson house was air conditioned - and she put him to bed naked.

  Just too much trouble to force him into pajamas that weren’t going to do him any good. He could feel however he liked about it in the morning.

  She went back downstairs and changed into her own night clothes, hearing the staff talking in the kitchen as she went back up the stairs and to Jimmy’s bedroom, getting into the bed next to him and digging the gun out from under his pillow. If he woke delirious, she didn’t want him doing anything foolish with it.

  He stirred as she settled in next to him and he rolled over onto his side.

  “Don’t tell,” he muttered, and she nodded.

  “No. I won’t. Rest.”

  He was already asleep again.

  --------

  She went to meet Maxim at the station by herself. Brought the little mare and the buckboard, ‘cause she had no intent of puttin’ Maxim on horseback ‘till she had to. Reckoned, too, he’d ‘a brought way too much luggage for a trek up into the mountains, and she’d have to drop the excess with Thomas and Rhoda. She had no intent of bringin’ him up to the Lawson house ‘till the back end of the trek, when Jimmy’d be up on his feet and seemin’ normal again to other eyes.

  Maxim got off the train wearin’ a black suit and with a young man behind him draggin’ a stack of luggage.

  “What the hell, Maxim?” she asked. “You think we got a hotel up there for you to stay at?”

  He stopped in front of her, eyein’ her up and down like he did, and she pursed her lips, waitin’ for his eyes to get back to her face. She raised an eyebrow.

  “I didn’t think Jimmy would ever make the mistake of leaving you alone with me,” Maxim said.

  “He ain’t made a mistake,” Sarah said. “But you might guess he’s a bit busy for wanderin’ up and down hills for you to look at the trees.”

  “So it’s just you and me, then,” he said.

  Sarah let her eyebrow inch a bit higher as she looked at the young man in city dress standin’ next to Maxim like he’d rather be invisible.

  “Oh, and Toby.”

  “Oh and Toby,” Sarah said. “That warrants a bit more, you reckon?”

  “This is my nephew,” Maxim said. “Toby, this is Sarah Todd. Jimmy’s wife.”

  The kid dipped his head in greetin’ and Sarah turned a skeptical eye to Maxim.

  “You bring ‘im to carry your bags up the mountain?” she asked. “We got mules that’ll do it a lot faster and ain’t so like to fall off a cliff just for bein’ there.”

  “My sister wants him to be in business, like me,” Maxim said. “So he’s going to move to Lawrence and oversee my absenta operation.”

  Sarah’s head snapped to look at the kid once more.

  He looked like a tree what grew up in too much wind, stretched and all funny angles.

  “Do you not like your sister?” she asked, still lookin’ at Toby. He and Sid looked like they belonged in the same school uniform.

  “Lawrence’ll toughen him up,” Maxim said, clappin’ the kid on the shoulder and nearly knockin’ him to the boards.

  “Lawrence is gonna eat him alive and decline to send home the bones,” Sarah said. Toby looked at her through his eyebrows, and she shook her head. “You both need hats.”

  “I’ve got one,” Maxim said, excited. He dug through the top bag for a minute and brought out a black suede hat what only just barely got the sense of why a man might wear one. He grinned.

  “You like it?”

  Sarah took it in for one more moment, then turned, going back to climb up into the buckboard and wait for Maxim and Toby to figure out how to get the bags off the platform and onto the buckboard.

  Maxim came to sit next to her while Toby rode in the back, his arms draped over the luggage like it were gonna sprout legs and make a go of fleein’.

  Sarah went w
ide ‘round town, passin’ up the shantytown at the end of Main Street and takin’ Second Street across, instead. She pulled the mare up out front of Rhoda’s house and vaulted down. Rhoda were out on her swing out front, and she stood.

  “Rhoda, b’lieve you met Maxim?” Sarah asked. Rhoda smiled, comin’ to shake his hand.

  “You’re the one with Thomas?” Maxim asked.

  “Yes,” Rhoda said. Maxim looked her up and down, nodding.

  “He did have the best taste in the family in everything.”

  “That’s kind of you to say,” Rhoda said. She didn’t bat an eye. Sarah was markin’ out the ribs on Maxim’s back what were coverin’ lungs. ‘Tween any two of ‘em, you got a fatal hit, so long as you got the knife in far enough.

  “I’m taking Maxim and his nephew up to see his claims,” Sarah said. “You think Thomas might have a couple hats spare he wouldn’t miss for three-four days?”

  “I expect I can find something,” Rhoda said. “Would you like to take a seat while I go look?”

  “You’re also gonna be holdin’ whatever nonsense Maxim saw fit to pack for the trip,” Sarah said. “I got rations and gear packed for two back at the house, and I know none of that’s gonna be worth packin’ all the way out and all the way back in.”

  Rhoda tipped her head to look at the luggage in the back of the buckboard, then smiled again.

  “That’s not a problem.”

  “I’ve been sitting for days,” Maxim said. “I’m going to stretch my legs some.”

  “Don’t wander far,” Sarah said. “Easy to run low on water out here.”

  “It’s a desert,” Maxim said. “Stay with the bags, Toby.”

  The kid went and stood next to the horse, lookin’ at the mare like he’d never seen a live animal before. Mare looked at him back like she ain’t never seen a scared kid in city duds before.

  Rhoda weren’t gone but a couple minutes, bringin’ back a pair ‘a hats and Thomas, who helped Toby put the bags away in the house.

  Rhoda stood with Sarah.

  “Not long, now,” she said, lookin’ at the house. “Jimmy told me he was going to try to make the new house a wedding gift.”

  Sarah glanced at her.

  “Ain’t said as much to me.”

  Rhoda grinned.