“We need the shine for Lady Ghost. Otherwise the whole trip is a waste.”
“We won’t even make it to Lady Ghost if the law catches us. It’s hard enough avoiding them as it is without advertising our location like that.”
Aster crossed her arms. “Well, what would you have us do?”
“Not get killed, for a start,” he said tiredly. “I don’t know. I reckon you’re right. But it’s not just the law, Aster. It’s the raveners I’m most worried about. You don’t understand how dangerous they can be.”
“Don’t I?” Aster bristled at his arrogance. “You’re not the one who grew up being tortured by them, last I checked.”
Zee’s expression darkened. Aster took a step back, fear spiking through her blood. She knew all too well the way anger twisted a man’s face. Her skull buzzed as if with a swarm of hornets. Her throat tightened like a fist.
“You don’t know a damn thing about how I grew up,” Zee said, raising his voice and taking a step closer. “I know the raveners better than they know themselves.”
Aster stepped back from him, panic seizing her. She stumbled in her retreat. Nearly fell. Zee’s expression softened immediately, and he stepped back again.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“I’m not afraid of you.” Aster’s voice was strained, her heart kicking. I’m not afraid of any of you. I’ll kill you. I’ll strike you dead.
“Well, good. I promised I’d help you however I can, and I mean to,” Zee said, exhaling. “What kind of rangeman would I be if I went back on my word?”
“A shit one, I’d think.”
“Exactly.” Zee lowered his hands slowly. “So … how can I help?”
Aster’s eyes burned with tears. She blinked them away furiously. She hated when this happened to her.
“Aster—by the dead, I’m sorry, honest, let’s talk about it—”
“Follow me,” she muttered, starting back down the gully. “The others will need to hear the plan, too.”
* * *
It wasn’t as easy as it looked, rigging a trap.
The kind of snare you used to trap a squirrel wasn’t near strong enough to trap a grown man, Zee had explained. But they could improvise using the same basic principles: fashion a lassolike snare out of some rope, throw it over a sturdy tree branch, wait for the brag to step into the trap, then pull the rope tight and hoist him high by his ankles.
“A true snare is supposed to do all the work for you,” Zee said. They were gathered underneath the tree in question, walking through the plan. “You come back later and collect the game. But since you all aren’t going anywhere, you can do some of the work yourselves.”
“And collect immediately,” Mallow replied.
Zee grinned. “That’s right.”
The girls would lie in wait just outside the town of Whitethorn while Zee went to the welcome house to look for his sisters. Provided he didn’t find them there, it’d then be his job to lurk outside the front and catch a man on his way into the house.
“Tell the brag you’ve got girls back at your camp that they can roll with for half the price,” Aster instructed. “Then bring him back here.”
Zee frowned. “Won’t he know there’s a catch?”
“If he asks, just say we’re bad girls who got kicked out of the welcome house. They like that sort of thing.”
“I don’t know that I can lie that convincingly, Aster.”
“Why not? You had no trouble lying to us.” Aster still felt brittle after their tense exchange. Clementine shot her a dirty look, but Zee backed off.
“Fine. But what about the law? They’ll have a checkpoint at the edge of town, just like in Drywell.”
“Just walk with purpose. There’s no reason for the law to stop two men on their way out of town,” Violet said.
“I’m a dustblood,” Zee reminded her, looking at her pointedly. “People assume I’m a criminal the second they see I don’t have a shadow. It wouldn’t be the first time the law stopped me for no reason.”
“Oh, poor thing,” she said with a sneer.
“Violet.” Aster cut her off with a look, then turned back to Zee. “The brag you pick will be a fairblood. I doubt the law will give you too much trouble as long as you’re together.”
Zee’s hands were on his hips. He looked at the ground, his face obscured by the brim of his hat.
“It’s just, I’ve spent my whole life outrunning the idea that our people are criminals,” he said finally. “I’ve spent my whole life trying to prove I’m a good man.”
“You are a good man. You’re doing a good thing, helping us,” Aster replied. Just tell him whatever he needs to hear.
He nodded. Once, slowly, and then again, with more confidence.
“All right. All right, then. What kind of brag am I looking for?”
Aster and Violet taught him how to recognize the wealthiest brags. It wasn’t always obvious, since most welcome houses had a dress code and even poorer men looked the part. But there were subtle tells. You could look at a man’s hands to see if he worked with them, watch the way he walked to see if he expected folks to jump out of his way. Rich men liked to talk about the politicians they’d met or the business deals they’d struck. They had good teeth, too, and they always smelled sweet—too sweet, cloying, like overripe fruit.
Since Violet insisted she was too delicate to help them pull the rope, they used her as a stand-in for the brag instead. The undignified squawk she let out when they finally got the trap to work just about made up for her bullshit.
They ran several more practice runs until they were sure they had it down. Violet walked over stiffly to sit on a tree stump, “keeping a lookout,” while Aster, Clementine, and Mallow held the rope, ready to yank it taut as soon as the brag walked by. Tansy made some final adjustments to the snare to make sure it was well hidden under the leaves and free of snags.
Aster tried to steady her breathing as they waited. That rush was in her blood again—the same one she’d felt when she jumped out of the welcome house window, when she snuck into Killbank, when she stole the statesman’s shine and got away with it. Spots of color danced on the edges of her vision as she stared into the dark. The sounds of the vengeants’ cries ran together in her ears in a single high-pitched hum. Any moment now—
“I think I hear someone coming!” Mallow hissed.
Aster wet her lips, tightening her grip on the rope with slick hands.
“Remember, if this goes sideways, you and the others get out of here while Zee and I hold off the brag,” she murmured to Clementine, her heart racing.
“I’m not leaving you,” Clementine insisted.
Before Aster could argue, Zee’s voice drifted up from the distance.
“Watch your head, now, there’s a low branch here.”
And a reedy man’s voice Aster didn’t recognize: “The dead take you, you said they were nearby—”
“Well we can’t be right under the raveners’ noses, now, can we? Just a little further.”
“—gone and ruined my good shoes. These Luckers of yours better be worth it.”
“Get ready,” Aster whispered to the others. She recognized Zee’s easy stride, even in the dark. The gangly shadow behind him moved far less gracefully, cursing every other step. How heavy would a brag that tall be? Enough to snap the rope? Dammit, Zee, you should’ve found a flyweight.
Too late to do anything about it now. They were only a few feet away. Aster widened her stance. Dug her heels in. Zee slowed his pace. Held his lantern high.
“Perfect night, though, isn’t it…?” he said.
That was the signal. Aster and the others pulled with all their strength. The rope jumped. Tightened around the brag’s ankles. He let out a screech as his legs were wrenched out from under him. The girls worked quickly, pulling hand over hand, lifting him higher and higher until even his long arms couldn’t reach the ground. He hung upside down like a side of beef.
“What the ripp
ing hell!” he shouted. “Help! Somebody!”
Aster glanced back at the others to make sure they could hold him without her. Clementine gave her a single nod. Aster unsheathed her knife and walked over to the brag, her movements swift but steady. She crouched back on her haunches, held the blade to the brag’s heart.
“You’re gonna want to quiet down,” she said evenly.
The brag stopped his cries for help. The whites of his eyes shone. “Who the rip are you?” he demanded. His gaze flickered towards Zee, who stood back with his arms crossed. “Are you with her?”
“Don’t look at him. Look at me,” Aster ordered.
The brag said nothing, but recognition flickered across his face as his gaze fell on her favor.
“By the dead, you’re one of them girls who…”
“That’s right,” Aster went on, unable to help half a grin. “And if we dusted Baxter McClennon, we certainly won’t hesitate to dust you. So you just sit tight while my partner here cleans out your pockets, and this will go easy for you.”
She nodded at Zee, who went to work. Some of the brag’s belongings had fallen to the ground, but his coin purse was still buckled to his waist. Zee also helped himself to the brag’s pocket watch and revolver. The brag, as instructed, kept his eyes on Aster. They brimmed with hate.
“You’ll pay for this,” he promised. “McClennon’ll make sure of it.”
“What did I tell you?” Aster snarled.
He quieted, a scowl bristling beneath his moustache. Unlike the statesman, Aster had never seen this brag before. But she’d seen a hundred like him. He would be a small-time landmaster with a single mine to his name and a dozen or so dustblood families working it. Not theomite, or he’d have a ring like Baxter’s, but gold maybe, or silver. Some kind of money that grew from the ground. He was the type of brag who could afford to visit the welcome houses as often as he wanted, but he’d have to claw for attention from the more powerful men there. Then he’d take out his anger on the women, leaving them broken by morning.
It’d probably pleased this man, thinking he’d found a way to cheat the system for a night. Rich folks were always the most miserly. Zee had chosen well.
“All right, we’re done here,” Zee said, tucking the last of the haul into a sack.
“Good,” Aster said, still holding the brag’s stare.
“Done here, too,” Clementine echoed. She and the others emerged, having tied off the end of the rope to a tree trunk. It would give eventually, or the brag would work his way free, but not until they were long gone.
Aster was filled with a heady rush of triumph. She sheathed her knife and stood.
“If you call for help, I guarantee the vengeants will come running before any of the townsfolk do,” Zee said, slinging the sack over his shoulder. “Best just sit tight until morning. You’ll be fine.”
The brag turned his baleful stare towards Zee. “McClennon’ll see to you, too!” he promised. “All of you. Ripping degenerates. Sprung from cutthroats and thieves. The blood always tells. The blood always tells—”
Aster kicked him swiftly across the jaw, her heart pounding against her chest. He let out a loose moan but said no more. If he’d kept talking, she might’ve done worse. She exhaled sharply, looked up at the others. Zee, carefully neutral. Tansy, wincing instinctively. But Mallow, Clementine, and Violet—nodding. Aster smiled.
“Glory to the Reckoning,” she said, tipping her hat at the brag, and she and the others disappeared into the wailing dark.
11
The days wore on, each one blending into the next like fine desert sand. Condors climbed through blank blue skies and gathered in trees stripped bare by the wind. Lizards skittered through the grass and sunned themselves on sheets of rock. And every morning, the sun rose bloody over the mountains and Aster woke a little stronger. She’d worked past the soreness that came with riding and hiking for hours without end, and she’d worked past some of the fear, too, that came with life on the run. Life in the welcome house had been just as dangerous and unpredictable, in its way. A brag could turn violent at a moment’s notice. A ravener might decide to toy with you just because he was bored. Zee seemed surprised at how quickly they were adapting to living rough, but Aster wasn’t surprised a bit. They were all of them used to worse.
The exception, of course, as always, was Violet. Her withdrawal clearly was making her miserable, even if she’d never admit it, though she never missed an opportunity to complain about anything and everything else. Aster still rode with Clementine most days, but sometimes she found herself craving Violet’s company, prickly as it was. With everyone else, even Clem—especially Clem—Aster felt the need to be the strong one. But Violet had no patience for pretense, and she saw right through it anyway. Aster could let her hurts out in the open air to breathe.
One afternoon, the two of them were practicing their marksmanship together. Zee had suggested the group stop early for the day once they’d reached Annagold’s Falls. The landmark put them about halfway through the Scab and a quarter of the way to Northrock. Two weeks of travel so far with perhaps one week to go—once they were free of the Scab, Zee said, they’d be able to ride the rails the rest of the way to Northrock.
Until then, these falls would be the last source of fresh water for miles. Clementine, Zee, Tansy, and Mallow were all busy bathing in the massive lake, their whoops and laughter carrying across the sparkling water. Violet and Aster had decided to use the spare time to set up a makeshift shooting range on the shore opposite the campsite, both of them armed with revolvers they’d stolen from brags along the way. They’d robbed three more brags since Drywell, and they’d since learned that drawing a six-shooter was the surest way to get a man to cooperate. Aster didn’t want to waste this rare opportunity to practice her marksmanship—the roar of the waterfall would more than cover the sound of their gunshots.
Which was a blessing, because Aster couldn’t seem to hit this target to save her life.
“How is it I’m better at this than you?” Violet asked—not that she was much good, either. Her shots went wide of the stack of rocks they were both aiming for.
“I’m just letting you win like I did with Clem when we were little. She used to be a sore loser. You still are.”
“Bullshit. I might believe you’re not really trying, but it sure as the dead isn’t on account of me.”
A crack of gunfire, and an instant later, the stack of rocks was blown away. Violet let slip a smug grin, lowering her weapon. The petals of her favor twitched in the wind.
“Be a dear and go set them back up for me?”
Aster muttered some choice words but stalked off to do as she was told. In truth, Violet was right—Aster was holding back, and it wasn’t because she gave a rip about letting Violet win. It was because she hated the sudden shock of a loud gunshot, hated the way a revolver jumped in her hand like a living thing that might bite her. It only took a few minutes before she’d be sick with unease, cold sweat crawling down her neck and making a slippery mess of her hands. Her vision would blur in and out of focus, and her mind would go sideways, like a wheel jumped out of its rut. She couldn’t trust herself to shoot straight when she got like that. She could barely trust herself to breathe.
No matter how many times she held a gun, she still preferred the knife, steady in her hand.
Aster piled up the rocks, sighed, and returned to Violet’s side. Violet tilted her head at her curiously, her smug grin fading.
“What?” Aster asked, wary.
“Are you gun-shy? Is that the problem?”
Aster scowled. “I’m not any kind of shy, Violet.”
“No, I just mean … it’s a phrase folks use, to describe anyone who’s particularly jumpy. Because they have good reason to be, because they’ve seen too many ugly things in their time. It doesn’t have to be about guns at all—although it can be, apparently, I guess.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Listen, I’m
just saying, I get the same way sometimes. Gunfire doesn’t upset me much, but I can’t stand the smell of cigar smoke, because it reminds me of the brags. I can’t stand it when Zee touches me, even if it’s just to help me down from my horse.”
Aster’s heart began to race, as if it were a wild animal trapped in her chest. She pretended to busy herself with reloading her revolver. Violet had gotten more open lately, the fog of Sweet Thistle that’d always shrouded her beginning to clear as she weaned herself off the drug. Aster knew the clarity was a good thing—but she didn’t always like that it made it easier for Violet to see the rest of them, too.
“The raveners always had guns on them,” Violet went on. “Maybe you can’t help but think of them when you see one. Or did something happen with a brag once? He threatened you or something?”
No, he had loaded his gun with a single bullet, put the barrel in her mouth, spun the chamber and fired. A twisted game some brags apparently liked to play. Aster hadn’t dared fight back. Not a night went by that she didn’t feel powerless, but this … she could still remember the taste of metal on her tongue, the click of the wheel as it went around and around. Her whole body recoiling from the threat of death, her mind flashing back through her short and brutal life. Harsh words, rough hands, anger and fear and anger and shame and anger—
“By the Veil,” Aster swore at last, giving up any pretense of reloading her weapon. She holstered it heatedly. “Look, I’m just better with the knife, all right? Can we leave it at that?”
“Fine, fine. Hey, let’s head back to camp anyway. I’m getting peckish.”
Aster swallowed, relieved, though she tried not to show it. “It’ll be biscuits and beans again tonight. You’re not too good for that anymore?”
“Of course I am, but it can’t be helped.”
They walked in silence for a time, boots squelching in the mud as they traced the shoreline. The air off the lake had a clean, earthy smell to it, and the cool dampness it left on the back of Aster’s neck was a small mercy. She stared at her reflection in the water’s glassy surface. It might have been a stranger’s. Her hair, which she’d once carefully styled every week, was now brushed back into a fraying low bun and stuffed under a bandit hat. The softness of her face had sloughed away, leaving sharp cheekbones and a hard chin. But her eyes—her eyes were as dark and desperate as always. Old woman’s eyes. Seen too many ugly things in their time.
The Good Luck Girls Page 13