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Faraday met Sam Chisolm during a run of bad luck.
He wasn’t too worried about it, frankly. Gambling, as a profession, moved in cycles; like moving along the rim of a wagon wheel, some days he’d be up at the top of the world, and some days he’d find himself face-first in the mud. The only thing to do was stretch out the highs and ride out the lows. As it was, with the muck between his teeth, all he could think was at least he wasn’t using his own cards to play. With the shit hands he’d been getting, chances were that he’d break his favorite deck, just like a run of snake-eyes could break a pair of dice.
Still, it was a decent enough town, and the saloon where he was spending his time had plenty of players with loose wallets. Eventually his luck would straighten up. That was the way his world worked.
On this particular afternoon, he was having trouble believing it. It was almost a relief when something interesting happened, as across the bar, one of the boys suddenly snapped to attention and turned toward the door. Since this fellow had a nose for trouble better than most dogs, it caught a fair bit of notice; music and conversation ground to a halt, the boys turned toward the saloon entrance, and the girls went quietly for the exits.
The man who came through the doors didn’t honestly seem all that threatening. He was well-heeled, sure, and looked supremely confident in himself, but there was also a calm steadiness to him that suggested that even if he had a temper, he knew how and when to rein it in. The real problem was going to be Dan and his boys. Whatever the reason, they were looking mighty shifty, and that boded poorly for the peace in this little bar.
Quietly, Faraday put down his cards, checked his vest pocket for his own deck, and then reached for his hat.
When the newcomer moved, he moved with decisiveness, and Faraday found himself impressed with the speed and accuracy of the violence that followed. A few quick shots kept Dan’s friends to heel, and then it was just the hunter and his man, face-to-face over the counter. One of the boys at Faraday’s table thought about going for his gun, but Faraday put a quick stop to that. Even he knew what kind of man Dan was, though he hadn’t known the particulars.
Murder and rape. Theft and arson. Naughty, naughty Dan.
“I don’t burn anymore,” Dan said, staring down the man across the counter with barely a quiver. “Please. I have a family.”
Then things got strange. “You smell like wood smoke, Powder Dan,” the man said, tipping his head to the side and taking a deep breath, like he was scenting the air. “Like a campfire. No, I think you’re just the same as you ever were.” His voice went flat. “Your family is better off without you.”
Dan lunged for his shotgun, white-hot fire flickering to life along his arms, but it was already too late. Sam Chisolm always fired first.
* * *
Not everyone had a gift. In the cities, most people were perfectly normal, with no powers to speak of, and those few who did possess a gift didn’t tend toward anything major. The big city centers, like New York and Boston, had maybe one in twenty people develop into a gift; a little farther out, the average was something like one in ten. People mainly found they never got lost while in the big city, that their stitching was always straight, or that they could swim better than most—little things, that even those without a gift could master over time.
But something strange happened when people moved west, out into the wilder lands where the natives weren’t too keen on newcomers and even the geography seemed to be against folks. Gifts got more common, and powers got more powerful—there were those who could talk to beasts, or coax growth from dead dirt with their bare hands, or survive the most horrific wounds and come out perfectly intact. Rumor even had it that one day, a woman out in California had kicked off the ground and discovered she could fly.
Where life was tough, people got tough. One in four developed into a gift in the precarious settler communities across the west.
Faraday had learned a lot about this particular town in his short visit just by listening. Everyone knew Dan was a fire-starter, just like they knew that the boy in the bar could literally smell trouble coming. A few folk here had gifts with animals, a fair number had a knack for various growing things, and one was a respectable healer. The rest of the gifted, apparently, had more homely powers, but Faraday had heard about them regardless; the owner of the boardinghouse could speak any language he’d heard spoken before, the preacher’s wife could bake anything from raw flour to dirt into the best pie of a man’s life, and Bill over at the general store could repair anything that’d sit still long enough to be repaired.
Having a gift gave a person a bit of an edge. Out here, that edge could make all the difference between survival and an early death—as simple as that.
* * *
“Now, I knew Dan was a fire-starter. But what’s your power, Mr. Chisolm?” Faraday asked once the bar had emptied, checking the cards around the table and unable to hold back a wince. Still no good.
It was a tentative sort of question, since it was unspeakably rude to ask, but Chisolm had more than hinted at it and seemed inclined to indulge him anyway. “Enhanced senses,” he said, tapping his nose, his ear, and his eye, and then he left it at that.
Faraday didn’t press, just moved the conversation along, gathered up his new bottle of booze, and went for the exit. He could survive without understanding the mystery of Sam Chisolm.
* * *
It absolutely goddamn figured, he thought sourly, that he’d end the day with guns to his head. The fact that it was the Babbington brothers was just a blow to his pride on top of his already shitty luck; they were both dumb as a box of rocks and neither had a gift worth mentioning. It was embarrassing, that’s what it was. He was being held at gunpoint by a pair of idiots named Dickie and Earl, no less.
Good Lord.
Still, anyone with a little more between their ears would never have left him with a weapon, let alone give him the time and space to rope them into a card trick. His personal deck was comfortable and familiar in his hands, at that perfect sweet spot between soft and stiff, and untouched by his recent run of poor luck. He’d left it tucked away during the worst of his games just in case.
And the deck provided.
Stage magic and misdirection. Along his spine, there was a spark of something between nerves and adrenaline. A teasing hint—look at my hands, don’t look at my hands. The king of hearts slipped away up his sleeve.
His guns were a satisfying weight on his hips when he left the Babbington brothers behind.
* * *
He ran into a problem with the stable master back in town, but it was hardly going to stop him. Wild Jack wasn’t like most horses. He was stallion-mean with most folk, downright deadly when he wanted to be, but he’d been broken to the saddle by a man with a knack for horses. That man had a power with enough punch to make his mounts just an inch smarter than any horse had a right to be: in other words, Jack knew his own mind.
Most importantly, he had chosen Faraday, no matter how many games of dice his owner played with leprechauns while in his cups. He wouldn’t accept the bridle from anyone else. In the end, the standoff was unexpected, but unsurprising. And then Chisolm was there, and things actually got interesting.
“I’m looking for a few good men,” Chisolm said.
“It’s impossible,” Chisolm said.
“Two so far,” Chisolm said. “You and me.”
Jack danced with the hostlers while Faraday considered. He could use some cash, and here was a man offering just that and then some—adventure, a few firefights, even the peaceful return of his lost horse.
In the end, there was no need to flip a coin, not for a choice this simple.
Faraday accepted. Chisolm paid for horse and gear. And to the surprise of every witness, Wild Jack stayed still for the saddle, pretty as a picture, and damn near put his own head to bridle as soon as it was Faraday who had the gear in hand.
* * *
“Do you have a gift, Mr. Faraday?” said Emma Cullen-call-me-Mrs., once they were out on the road.
“That’s a bit of a personal question, isn’t it?” Faraday said, amused when she blushed an angry red. “Especially considering you haven’t offered to name me yours in return.”
Her face kept that embarrassed flush, but her posture went stiff. “That’s because I’m a necromancer, Mr. Faraday,” she said, tipping her chin up like a dare. “I try to keep it quiet, since most don’t take too kindly to it. Some think it’s unnatural.”
“Wait,” Faraday said, stunned. “You’re a dead-walker? I thought there were only three in all the States.”
“Necromancer,” she repeated firmly. “And I’m not registered.” Well, that was fair enough. Faraday wouldn’t want to register a thing like that either. “And you, Mr. Faraday?” Mrs. Cullen asked, a bit tartly, when Faraday didn’t immediately offer an answer of his own.
Faraday just shrugged, and let his hand settle just below where his deck of cards peeked out of his vest pocket. “I have my own skills,” he said vaguely. “A bit of this and that.”
There was quiet for a while, except for the sounds of the horses.
“Hold on a minute,” he said, after some thought. “I thought you were having trouble with folks in your town getting killed by some rich man’s army? What’s a dead—erm, necromancer—need from us for a thing like that?”
Mrs. Cullen’s face contorted oddly. “Bogue’s a Null,” Chisolm said, cutting in before their employer lost her cool. Nulls were the worst sort of gifted, or the best, depending on how you looked at it. Unlike Mirrors, who could copy or reflect a power in one way or another, or Lifts, who could build up another person’s power, Nulls shut powers off entirely and cut people off from their gifts. “And he’s a powerful one, too. Supposedly he can knock out powers for as long as he pleases, so long as he gets close enough to touch you. I’ve heard tell the only way he’ll give them back is if he’s dead.”
“He took my gift about a minute before my husband died.” Mrs. Cullen’s voice was stiff. She didn’t wait around for comments, either, just kicked her horse into a lazy canter and gave herself some space.
“Bogue slaughtered townsfolk in the street,” Teddy Q told them quietly, at Chisolm’s enquiring glance. “Then he let Emma and Doc fix them up, only to Null their gifts and turn around to shoot those same folks a second time. Even the women. Now, I ain’t got a power, so I can’t even begin to imagine what she felt like going through a thing like that, two times over.”
Finished with his speech, Teddy kicked his horse and pulled ahead, catching back up with Emma.
“Well,” Faraday said, finding himself at a loss for words. “Maybe I can see after all why she’d want to go gather guns.”
* * *
Riding into Volcano Springs, Teddy Q in tow, was plenty interesting. There was a low buzz of activity, a hint of excitement, that made him wish he could have more time in town to maybe play a few games, make a few bets. As it was, he followed the noise to find most of the menfolk in town gathered up for an alley fight; the air was practically humming with adrenaline, and he could never resist getting up close and personal to soak it in.
Billy Rocks was a sight, especially in this part of the world. Even before his opponent had hit the ground, Faraday had known he would win, known there was nothing to fear; Billy wasn’t just fearless, he was certain. His companion sitting on the fence was the same; he hadn’t so much as twitched when the threat had been made.
Overconfidence killed quicker than bullets, though in this case, not as quickly as pretty little hairpins. With his speed on the draw and his collection of knives, the locals had probably just learned not to antagonize Billy Rocks.
It certainly didn’t hurt that his watchful protector up on the fence post turned out to be Goodnight Robicheaux himself, mild as a house cat until the claws came out. Chisolm’s name got them an audience with the man, and then their story and the alcohol did the rest. Soon enough Robicheaux was spinning his tale, grandiose as any southern gentleman.
“Now, I’ve got no powers,” he said. “No gifts to speak of, save my good looks and God-given talents.” Faraday found himself impressed; most snipers had a little something extra for their aim. “But my friend Billy, here, he’s got something I like to call cockroach tendencies. It is nigh-on impossible to kill this man. Why, I once saw a man put a gun to the back of his head and pull the trigger, and Billy’s still here.”
“What happened?” Teddy asked, clearly not believing it.
Robicheaux waved a lazy hand in his direction. “Oh, the gun backfired. Damn near blew off the fool’s arm, and Billy didn’t so much as flinch.”
“I turned around and gutted the man, Goody,” Billy told him, dry as bone. “I’d call that more than a flinch.”
Faraday and Goodnight laughed; Teddy looked mildly ill. The kid would need to toughen his stomach if he wanted to see this thing through to the end.
“What about you boys?” Goodnight asked. “You gifted?”
Faraday, who had been lazily shuffling, dealing, and collecting his cards in front of him for a good half-hour, let the deck dance in his hands enough to catch everyone’s attention before he tucked it away. “I’m harmless,” he said with a grin. “And if I’m not mistaken, my friend Teddy Q…”
He paused, polite, so Teddy could speak for himself. “I’m not gifted either, Mr. Robicheaux. But there are gifted folks in town.”
“Our employer is a dead-walker,” Faraday told him and Billy both, arching an eyebrow.
Billy twitched. Goodnight whistled, clicked his tongue sharply against his teeth, and then finally laughed. “Well,” he said, “this ought to be interesting, at the very least.”
* * *
Vasquez had a mind-gift.
Faraday felt it the moment they rode into sight—a prickling sense of something not quite right, like a burr under his skin, and a sharp-edged wariness that wasn’t his own. He knew enough by now to be sure it wasn’t coming from anyone he knew, which left the newcomer as the source of the threat.
It died down, almost to nothing, as it became clear that Chisolm knew and was expecting them, but it didn’t entirely fade away.
They handled introductions—he was drunk, but not so drunk he couldn’t remember common courtesy—and then Chisolm got straight to the elephant in the room. “This here is Vasquez,” he told them, gesturing at the vaquero he had apparently picked up out in the wilds. “He’s what we call a projecting empath.”
“Meaning?” Goodnight said sharply. Faraday was glad to hear he wasn’t the only one who was a bit concerned.
“I can make people feel things,” Vasquez said. “I can tell what they feel, if I try.” He shrugged easily, and managed to make it sound like a statement of fact and not a threat. “If I touch them, I can take pain from others, or I can give it to them.”
So, not a full mind-reader, then. An emotion-reader, with a little something nasty tucked in at the end. Faraday could probably handle that, though maybe he should wait to make decisions until he’d sobered up.
At some point, the others seemed to have accepted this and moved on, which left him alone and staring at Vasquez. There was a flicker of that prickle-burr feeling again, foreign emotion scraping against him, only this time that wariness was tinged with a faint challenge.
His mouth opened before he could think better of it. “Oh, good,” he said at last, keeping back his instinctive flinch at the foreign emotions, “we’ve got ourselves a Mexican.” Drunk, it seemed like a good idea to offer that challenge-feeling right back.
Chisolm rolled his eyes and dragged Vasquez away before too much more could happen. Faraday would be worried, but Vasquez’s steady projection was briefly tinged with amusement before the foreign-feeling cut out entirely.
Oh, Faraday thought, drunkenly pleased, and reclassified the newcomer from potential threat to potential fun.
* * *
Jack Horne was a strange man, and it had only a little to do with the quick and brutal death of the two brothers who’d attacked him. There was a kind of oddness to him, something difficult to pin down, though if he had to describe it Faraday would say it was like he wasn’t quite sure where or when he was. It didn’t make him any less talented with throwing an axe, but it did give Faraday pause. Luckily, it didn’t seem Horne was much interested in working with them, or even interested in them at all, let alone any kind of sensible conversation.
“I do believe that bear was wearing people’s clothes,” Faraday said.
Chisolm watched Horne disappear into the distance. He looked a little sad, a little wistful. “Jack has the Sight,” he told them, which explained quite a bit. Most folks couldn’t live forever with seeing the future; it tended to drive them mad. “He can see potentials, the way things might turn out. It’d be a useful thing to have on our side.”
“That is a disappointment,” Goodnight said. Still, there was nothing they could do about it but what they’d done already, so they left Jack Horne and his addled mind to his future and set off on their own.
* * *
Camping out among the rocks and dirt wasn’t Faraday’s idea of a good night. Out in Indian territory, it became a downright gamble; they were all a little on edge, except for Vasquez, who rolled calm around himself like a blanket and dropped right off to sleep.
He traded Teddy Q some lessons in return for his whiskey, but he wasn’t sure what the kid had expected—he’d learn the same way everyone else did, in the moment, and he’d find out then if his luck would hold long enough to become skill. Being quick wasn’t everything, just like good aim wasn’t everything. A person had to have all that, and then know where to look and what to look for, as well as what to do once they found it. It was all a bit like a grand magic trick, when he thought about it like that.
“It was never about the cards,” he said.
Funny how nobody remembered that.
* * *
Faraday woke to the tap of Vasquez’s mind against his, brisk and polite as a knock on the door, leaving behind a lively buzz and a rush of wary adrenaline. He sat up, gun in hand and wide awake, in time for Chisolm to announce he could smell blood. The man’s head tipped to the side as he took in something the rest of them couldn’t sense. It was somehow less unexpected than it ought to be to see Jack Horne come scrambling over the rise a moment later.
“He’s been tracking us,” someone muttered, but Horne was already gesturing, laying out the problem ahead and giving them just enough time to be surprised as Red Harvest came into sight for the first time.
They all bristled. Goodnight was right; these folk didn’t often move alone, not without good reason. There was a deer over the back of his horse, which suggested he’d been out hunting, but it still didn’t explain why he’d decided to show himself to them when there was nobody from his tribe in sight.
“Don’t shoot,” Chisolm told them firmly. And then, to Vasquez, he added, “And pull back on that a little. We’re not threatening him unless we have to.”
Until it edged off, Faraday hadn’t even realized that the leery, watchful feeling wasn’t his own. If there was a threat in it, then it wasn’t directed toward him.
And then followed one of the more bizarre exchanges Faraday had ever had the pleasure of witnessing. Apparently, Chisolm spoke Comanche, and he passed his gun off to Vasquez before engaging in a quiet exchange that ended when the Indian dumped his kill right off his painted horse, got out a knife, and offered Chisolm the thing’s liver, still raw and steaming. Chisolm took a bite and handed the meat back.
Apparently that meant they were all friends.
“His name is Red Harvest,” Chisolm told them. “I think his gift’s got something to do with lightning.” He shook his head, and then sneezed sharply. “He smells pretty strongly of electricity.”
Behind them, there was a crackling sound. They all turned to see Red Harvest with bright trails of lightning sparking in his palms as he ran them over the meat in his hands. There was a smell like barbecue and something burnt, though the man himself seemed undeterred. He bit in with a relish, little crackling trails of light still dancing across his skin.
“Right,” Faraday said. “You know, Mr. Chisolm, I think so too.”
* * *
The ride back to Rose Creek wasn’t made in silence. Chisolm extracted everything he could from their employers, bringing up numbers and angles and sight lines until heads were spinning and they all had an idea what to expect. Teddy suggested that some Blackstone men were probably gifted, but couldn’t tell them what those gifts might be.
At the very least, they knew there was cause for caution.
Horne, who seemed a bit more together than he had at their first meeting, explained how his powers worked. “I see paths,” he told them in his inexplicably sweet voice. “When a choice is made, I can look at all the ways it might go right, and all the ways it might go wrong, and where I might fall between them.” He shrugged. “By the time I’m certain of any one thing, there’s practically no chance of changing it. That’s life, I suppose.”
Red Harvest, meanwhile, rattled off something in Comanche when Chisolm asked, and then seemed disinclined toward any further questioning.
“He calls himself a stormbringer,” Chisolm told them. “Says he won’t do much of that, since it puts off balance and order in the world. Hopefully he’ll still be willing to make a little lightning for us.”
Faraday found himself liking them all, almost despite himself. Chisolm was a man who was easy to respect. Goodnight had a sharp wryness to him that Faraday appreciated, and Billy was quietly competent with flashes of unexpected humor. Vasquez had let him draw them into an easy back-and-forth, a little ribbing that sounded borderline cruel but which was peppered with those little prickle-burr flashes of Vasquez’s amusement, as the man caught the edges of Faraday’s good humor and quietly echoed it back. As a bonus, the man didn’t mind a good card trick.
Faraday had decided that the mind-reading was fine by him.
Horne still had his moments of strangeness; he sometimes answered questions before they were even asked. Still, for a man who killed so viciously, he didn’t have an ounce of cruelty or malice in him. And Red Harvest was—balanced. He kept quiet, but he watched closely, and Faraday got the idea he understood more than he let on. He didn’t swing toward a fight like the others did, Faraday included; it turned out to be damn near impossible to start something with a man who wouldn’t either step up or back off.
The seven of them set up a plan, with input from Teddy and Mrs. Cullen. More than twenty men against seven weren’t just bad odds, they were terrible—and yet, somehow, Faraday looked around at their merry little band and thought they might just pull the whole thing off.
It certainly didn’t hurt that they had the opinion of a Seer to back them up. Horne listened silently as they put together their simple strategy. And then, once they’d finished, he nodded and said, “As the Bible says, I have pursued mine enemies, and destroyed them; and turned not again until I had consumed them.”
There was a pause, where they all looked at him and waited for something more. “Is that…good?” Billy asked at last.
“Oh, yes,” Horne said, nodding firmly. ”They should fall like dust in the wind.”
* * *
Later, Horne took him aside and leaned in close, like he was sharing a secret. “The gun—it isn’t jammed,” he said. “I’m not sure it’s even loaded.”
Faraday frowned, mystified. “What’s that mean?”
Horne shook his head. “You need to know,” he said, like it was all the explanation he could offer, or maybe just all of it that was sensible. “You’re not wrong.”
* * *
Chisolm was first into town, having trained his horse to move out of the way of trouble, and he took Billy with him as the only man who wouldn’t look unaccountably strange on foot. With the eyes of the Blackstone boys on them, it was easy to slip in and stay out of sight, Red Harvest going high while the rest slunk around back and down the alleyways. At Chisolm’s cue, they all emerged out of the woodwork.
Chisolm was mighty sneaky as a planner, almost as good with misdirection there as Faraday was with his cards. Look at my hands, don’t look at my hands—no one had seen them coming until they were already there. Out in the open, his excitement built, his nerves and reservations falling by the wayside in the face of a fight. A spark of something incandescent lit up at the base of his spine, and he couldn’t help the smile, the shift on his feet.
Oh, this was going to be good.
Across the way, Vasquez caught something of what he was feeling and went sharp, like a wild animal catching onto the scent of blood. In response, Faraday could feel the other man’s readiness like a sizzle in the back of his head, a spreading heat wave that shivered like a mirage and pushed his own high even higher. The Blackstone boys felt it too, but it didn’t look near as pleasant for them; they winced and scowled. The leader actually twitched back in surprise. Faraday noted that for later.
“Are you sure you don’t want my gun?” Chisolm asked, and it was a threat and a joke all at once, because no one there truly believed he meant to give up his weapons. Everyone squared off at the unspoken cue to be ready to move. Goodnight and Billy were still as stone; Horne was as casual and unthreatening as any bear of a man could be while carrying more than one axe. And Vasquez was still a sizzling and spitting fire in the background, his fingers twitching over his guns.
The leader of the Blackstone men whistled for his sniper, who didn’t respond. Chisolm called out in kind, and then there was a snapping sound and the Blackstone man fell, smoking gently. Red Harvest stepped up with lightning still crackling along his arms, drew back an arrow, and fired.
First blood in the street was theirs.
Come on, Faraday thought like a dare. Come on.
All at once, all hell broke loose, like a river breaking free of the dam. They rode the cresting wave while the others drowned.
Sam Chisolm shot first. Sam Chisolm always shot first, like it was a fundamental law of the universe. Four bullets hit four targets in the space of seconds.
At the same moment, Faraday went up, firing through the wooden deck above his head, relying on a bit of luck and faith to catch out the boys thinking they were safe up high on the balcony. Vasquez went out, bullets clipping into the street on the heels of a slamming wave of thought that Faraday felt-but-didn’t-feel, like a gust of wind passing him by. Everyone effected suddenly lurched in place; out of the corner of his eye, Faraday watched the head man for Blackstone swear and go stumbling out of the line of fire, like he’d been personally targeted. Horne, meanwhile, pressed in so that he and Chisolm boxed men in between them, and it was like catching them between a hammer blow and a razor-knife cut as each man scrambled to choose between wild fury and cool precision as a manner of death. Billy sent the rest scattering, knives and guns moving in swift and dirty flashes. He ducked under and around gunfire like it was nothing to him, like his body knew to move before his mind had even cottoned on to the danger, keeping him intact.
And up high, Red Harvest was easy to forget, until arrows came slicing down from the sky. Literal lightning wasn’t nearly so precise, and not always so deadly; the creak-hiss of his draw and fire was far quieter than thunder, practically silent under the racket of gunfire.
It was a bloodbath, a reaping, and Faraday knew instantly that they were holding all the cards. There was no real threat here. Bullets cracked around him, chipping at the wood storefront, whizzing by so close he could have leaned into them but missing him every time. The closer they came the better he became—his stance steadier, his aim truer.
Chisolm cocked his head, spun, and shot the man about to come up in Faraday’s blind spot before he had more than a chance to realize the man was there.
They moved on.
For a brief moment, he stood back to back with Vasquez in the street. Gunfire and powder smoke left a haze over the men still moving, the ones who still dared to take aim, and it was damn near pleasurable to take them out before they could take him in turn. Behind him, there was that sizzle-knock of Vasquez’s power again, a savage joy that hit him like a friendly clap on the back—look, see here, it said. Me too.
They moved on.
A few stragglers went for Goodnight, who was meant to be holding the back of the street. Goodnight Robicheaux, the man they called the Angel of Death—that man flinched, taking stuttering steps back as he held his rifle up and didn’t fire, didn’t fire, didn’t fire. Faraday cleaned them out for him, fast and simple, a few neat shots as he went striding up the street.
They moved on, though Faraday wasn’t especially pleased.
Thing was, the Blackstone men were cowards at heart, and most died easy even without the help of that seventh gun. But some were gifted, and those took a little more work to put down.
Jack Horne ran at a man who started to shriek like a banshee, his gift a screech loud enough to crack glass. It was a painful sound, enough to deafen anyone who listed for too long, and Horne faltered. The man advanced triumphantly and found himself regretting his mistake. Red Harvest, up on the rooftop, had the distance to collect himself and put an arrow in the man’s throat. No one could scream after a thing like that.
Billy Rocks dealt with a man who left a trail of dust behind him with the speed of his movements, though it seemed he had little control over it; his aim was sloppy, and Billy was ducking and diving out of the way of his attacks just in time. A stumble gave Billy the chance to put a little distance between them, and then it was a matter of boxing the man in with bullets before putting a knife into the only opening left. He fell, gurgling, with a blade in his lung.
A tall, gangly fellow with an impressive scowl lit up in a flash of light, until looking at him was about as painful as trying to look directly at the sun. Chisolm just sighed before closing his eyes and shooting twice. The light went out. Before the body had even hit the ground, Chisolm was moving on.
At the end of everything, Faraday found himself at Goodnight’s shoulder, watching the last rider escaping into the distance. “Take the shot,” he said, and then again when Goodnight trembled but didn’t fire. “Take the damn shot!”
And then the man was out of range, and Goodnight was lowering his rifle without a word. He handed it to Billy, who cleared the chamber with a jerk of his hands, pausing for a split second that felt like a year to Faraday. Billy’s face was more than blank, it was stone. “It’s jammed,” he said, short and sharp. He ushered Goodnight away without a word.
Faraday felt his mouth go dry. “Huh,” he said to himself, a chill sweeping over him as he remembered Horne’s warning. “I’m not sure it’s even loaded, Jack.”
* * *
Then there were seven left alive with the bodies littering the street: so much for Bogue’s deputies. They gathered up in the center of town, even Red Harvest, who came jumping down from roof to porch to ground like the height meant nothing to him.
“How’d we do?”
Faraday claimed six. Vasquez claimed the same.
“Seven. I got seven,” Faraday said quickly, and put up seven fingers.
Chisolm rolled his eyes. Vasquez just huffed out a laugh.
“Want to even the score, vaquero?” Faraday said, a little mean, still thrumming with the high of a big fight and a bigger win. He liked Vasquez, he did, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t like to know. Of the two of them, who would win, and who would die? Vasquez was quick and flashy, a great shot, sometimes two-handed and sometimes one, spinning those damn twin pistols like he was putting on a show. Faraday was all those things, too, quick and flashy and damn good, and curiosity could be such a bitch. Whose luck would hold, and who’d be too slow on the draw?
Vasquez smiled darkly, eyes glinting as he reflected Faraday’s fervor back at him. “Come on, guero. Let’s do it.”
Chisolm, as always, brought them back down to earth and back to their purpose. “Come on out of there,” he said, ignoring their squabbling in favor of squatting down and peering into the vacant darkness under a raised porch. “Yes, you,” he added, seemingly to the empty air. “I can see you, mister. I can smell the fear on you. You’re not fooling anyone.”
That empty patch of air rippled and took on the shape of the sheriff, liberally coated in dirt and sweat as he cowered in the mud.
“Look at that,” Faraday muttered, reluctantly impressed. Camouflage had to be a useful sort of gift, though apparently it was no match for Chisolm.
Chisolm’s message, when it came, was as straightforward as a man could want. Lincoln, like the president. Naming Bogue a coward. Offering up his name like it should mean something. Faraday was pretty damn sure that he could bet everything he had that Chisolm had some sort of personal stake in this whole matter, and still sleep soundly at night.
Finally, Teddy Q and Emma Cullen came riding and hollering up the street. Like magic, townsfolk came popping out of hiding. Sometimes literally: one pretty young woman snapped into being in a swirl of dust, traveling some unknown distance in the blink of an eye. Nobody seemed startled by it, which meant they’d all had the time to get used to living with a teleporter. The world was indeed a strange place.
Chisolm wasn’t much for motivational speeches, Faraday realized, holding in a laugh as the man fell back on that old and familiar habit of introduction before informing the terrified crowd that their destruction would be coming in less than a week. The others among the seven mostly just seemed glad they weren’t the one doing the speechifying. Vasquez in particular earned Faraday’s respect by resisting the urge to override that growing fear with a little forced calm, though if Faraday could practically taste it, then it must have been nigh-on unbearable for a man who could feel it all like it was his own. Instead, he projected his confidence like the rest of them did, with his stance and the set of his shoulders. Red Harvest, bless his heart, was the exception. He sat himself down on the porch steps, like he could diffuse some of the likely inescapable suspicion before it ever formed, just by making himself seem smaller than he was.
Some folks would leave. It wasn’t necessarily bad thinking to value life over anything else, even land, and even that sense of entitled ownership that any good settler needed in order to claw into the wild earth and survive. If they were very unlucky, many folks would come to their senses and leave, and it truly would be seven men alone against an army.
Faraday had met Sam Chisolm on a run of very bad luck. He just hoped that luck had turned.
* * *
“Tell us what you’ve got,” Chisolm said.
In a town this size, a fair number of the inhabitants had to have a power of some kind. With Bogue’s men dead or running, they might have an advantage: whoever Bogue could round up in a day or so of effort might not be the most powerful bunch. If they could use that, it could shift the balance of the fight. They needed to know who had what gift, and how likely they’d be to stick around.
Mrs. Cullen and Teddy traded looks.
“We have Doc,” she said. “He’s our healer, and a good one. And of course, there’s my gift. Between us, we can fix up most of what goes wrong, provided Bogue dies and frees us up.”
Goodnight pulled out a pencil stub and a paper scrap seemingly out of nowhere, and started taking notes.
“One of the women is a shield—her skin’s unbreakable. And Josiah, our schoolteacher, he can pick up anything so long as you show him how to do it once,” Teddy offered. “He can master anything in under a month.”
“Let’s see how he does in a week,” Goodnight muttered, but wrote it down.
“And his Anthony is the best I’ve ever seen with growing things,” Mrs. Cullen added, looking thoughtful and apparently ignoring Goodnight’s commentary. “I’ve seen him talk walnuts into saplings in a manner of hours.”
“I saw your teleporter out in the street earlier,” Faraday said.
Mrs. Cullen nodded. “That’s little Amy Packer,” she said. “She’s only fifteen, but she can move miles at a time, or take people and things along with her for shorter distances.” That could be useful. It was never a bad idea to have an escape plan.
“Oh, and then there’s Gavin,” Teddy said, grimacing. “He talks to insects.”
There were varying expressions of disgust around the table. “Which one’s Gavin?” Faraday asked, trying to imagine how a man might use that skill.
“He runs the local, er, brothel,” Teddy said, cutting a sideways glance at the widow Cullen and practically whispering the final word. She, in turn, looked utterly unimpressed.
The rest of the gifted had simpler knacks, like skills with growing, cooking, or the like. One could keep perfect time; another could hold his breath for hours underwater. Not particularly useful, at least for this—Faraday just hoped that some turned out to be decent shots as well, gifted or not.
“Not a great line-up,” Billy said quietly, looking over the list as Goodnight had laid it out in his neat copperplate handwriting.
Chisolm agreed. “But it could be worse,” he said. “More importantly, do we have any idea what Bogue might bring back with him?”
“Not to mention he’s a Null,” Faraday reminded them.
Goodnight shook his head. “He won’t use it, not while he has to get up close to do it,” he pointed out. “And if we take his best gifted out before it comes to that, we won’t have much of a worry if he Nulls us in turn. It just levels the playing field.”
“He’ll still bring gifts worth fearing.” In Horne’s soft voice, it came out a promise, not just a prediction.
Faraday leaned in. “Well, surely we know something about whoever he’s got left. Folks he took back to Sacramento with him, or those who ran back after we took this place over.”
“Sheriff Harp,” Mrs. Cullen said. “He can disappear.”
Billy snorted. Goodnight’s face twisted up into half a smile. “If he dares come back,” he added.
“There’s the one who escaped, the one who led the Blackstone men,” Vasquez said.
Teddy jumped back in. “McCann,” he said. “A weasel and a bastard—pardon my language, Miss Emma.”
“The son-of-a-bitch deserves worse,” she replied serenely, without so much as a twitch. “Yes, he’s got a gift, or so we think.”
Teddy twisted his hat around and around in his hands, a nervous tic he didn’t seem to notice. “Though nobody could ever say what it might be.”
Vasquez nodded absently, but it was clear he wasn’t really listening. “Yes, that’s the one,” he said. “That pendejo, he’s like me—empathy. But he’s weak. I hit him once, and he…” He waved a hand at his head, like he couldn’t find the words to explain.
“He folded like a faint-hearted man in a game of high-stakes poker,” Faraday finished, remembering the way the man had flinched in the street. “I felt you slam into them before the fight. Think he can manage something like that?”
“No, guero.” Vasquez seemed to find the idea laughable. “With a power like his—no. He couldn’t touch more than one mind at a time if they stood in line and waited for it. A man like that, a cobarde, probably distracts from the shadows and takes his advantage.”
“Can he get at you?” Goodnight asked.
Vasquez really did laugh at that. “Not me,” he said, supremely unconcerned. “And not your Billy, I think. He’s—slippery.”
Billy shrugged, like this was to be expected. “Gift,” he said.
Chisolm nodded decisively, making up his mind. “He’s yours, then,” he told Vasquez. “Anyone else runs into him, and they’ll funnel him toward you or Billy, whosever closest. What else?”
“There’s the Indian, Mr. Denali,” Teddy said. “Quiet man, damn frightening with a bow or a blade, and he’s not ashamed to attack women or children. He can turn himself to liquid, so it’s hard as hell to hit the man and make it stick.” He pointed with his chin toward where Red Harvest was watching the proceedings, eyes gleaming. “He reminds me a bit of your friend there. Not sure what we can do about him.”
Horne twitched, his eyes narrowing. “Flash forth your lightning and scatter them; send out your arrows and confuse them,” he said, distant. He focused in again suddenly. “Psalm 144.”
Faraday followed Horne’s eyes to Red Harvest, and thought about the electric flash of lightning spreading through water, about the sparks of electricity they’d seen running up Red Harvest’s arms. He couldn’t help the grin that spread across his face in turn. “I do believe you’ve hit upon the solution, Teddy. We have just the man.”
“Ah,” Chisolm said, apparently coming to the same realization. “Right.”
* * *
It was going to take a miracle to get this town ready for Bogue and his men. It was going to take a miracle to make themselves ready.
They only had seven days.
* * *
The problem was abundantly clear once Faraday got to watch marksmanship training with the men, their new little army: there was something wrong with Goodnight Robicheaux.
Oh, Faraday was sure the man could shoot well enough, or at least that he’d once been able to. Sam Chisolm wasn’t one to be taken in by stories and reputation alone, and he seemed pretty damn certain that Goodnight was once what he claimed to be. And Goody certainly understood the principle of the thing, how to shoot a gun and what it meant for these men to put a living thing in their sights and pull the trigger. But there was something fundamentally wrong with him, something hard to define, something waiting underneath the confident and capable exterior.
He wouldn’t touch a gun unless forced. At least he was subtle about it, never so obvious as to physically shy away from the things, but Faraday had practically had to jam one down the man’s throat before he’d take up a rifle. He steeled himself to hear the sound of gunfire, and not just because the noise was nigh-on deafening at close range. In their shoot-out in the street, he had stepped back from the oncoming threats, and he hadn’t once taken real aim.
Horne had been right: the rifle had not been jammed. And the dummy’s head dangling on the wood-post-neck proved that the aim was still there, as good as ever. It just seemed that Goodnight Robicheaux couldn’t fire at anything still breathing.
* * *
“Sam,” Faraday said and nothing more, serious for once as Goodnight dropped his gun and walked away. He marveled that any sniper could shoot so straight when his hands wouldn’t stop shaking, and wished he had a coin to flip or something of the sort to keep his own hands distracted from his nervous thoughts.
“I know,” Chisolm said, heavy. His eyes followed Goodnight as he retreated back to town, seeing something Faraday had no hope of seeing. “Trust me, I know.”
* * *
Daytime was for preparations, for training men to aim and measuring distances and sightlines. Daytime was for liberating the mine just outside the town, Chisolm’s eyesight a blessing when it came to picking off overseers so far out they had no chance of spotting their attackers, let alone firing back. It was a time for gathering their explosives and laying out a plan for placing them to their best effect. And it was a time for digging trenches, every able-bodied man in a line pushing down into soil that the schoolteacher’s boy had loosened for them with a handful of seeds and a few whispered words. It was an awe-inspiring thing to see thistle sprout and grow, roots digging deep to break up the dirt, and then wither away completely, a whole season speeding by in a manner of minutes.
Daylight was a constant reminder that with every passing moment, Bogue’s return moved just a little closer. They needed to be ready.
But after sunset was a different story. Rose Creek was hardly a town with a bustling nightlife, especially now that the whores had all fled, but there was something lively about the place after dark. If these people were going to die, they seemed to have decided it wouldn’t be accompanied with weeping and wailing.
The seven of them were in the middle of it all, Chisolm and Horne watching over like a couple of benevolent fathers allowing the children their fun. On this particular night, nearing the end of the week, the mayhem was particularly wild. Goody got a few folk drunk enough to sit still for some knife-throwing lessons and competition with Billy, though he couldn’t find anyone willing to bet against him. An old gentleman showed Vasquez how to blow smoke rings with his fat cigars, and in turn, Vasquez shot narrow darts of smoke through them as they passed. Red Harvest, who would have to ride out soon as their forward scout, had claimed a position at the bar and was steadily out-drinking even the most seasoned town drunks. It seemed to have endeared the locals to him, and they cheered as he dropped each empty glass back onto the bar. He was still steady as a rock, but little electric sparks were beginning to crackle along the line of his arms and down the cut of his spine, his powers betraying his slow loss of control.
And Faraday—well, he was holding court.
He roped some folks into a game of Find the Lady, and soon had a sizeable crowd gathering around his table. Even Teddy Q joined him, hovering over him with a sour expression that suggested he was still sore about the lessons Faraday had offered him earlier. Faraday mostly ignored him, and instead beckoned the others one at a time to a seat across from him at the table. They sat and listened through his patter, hands moving and cards dancing. Three cards down, two black jacks and a red queen, and all they had to do was turn up the right card—how hard could it be?
There was a slow-rising chorus of jeers and good-natured laughter as each man failed to turn up the queen of hearts. Eventually, even Red Harvest wandered over, drawn by the noise and the lack of entertainment at the bar, and leaned up nearby so he could watch.
It was a brilliant thing to be the center of attention in a game like this, with his sleeves rolled up and everyone watching his hands a little more closely than they might otherwise. Cards leapt back and forth; he found himself laughing as he held out his deck to be examined, held out his hands to show they were empty. And yet, again and again, the queen wasn’t where they looked.
“It has to be a trick,” Teddy finally said, exasperated, as the farmer in the hot seat turned up yet another jack.
“Well, of course it’s a trick, Teddy,” Faraday told him, with a casually raised eyebrow. His hands always in plain sight, he flicked over a different card, and the queen of hearts smiled up at them. “But that won’t do you much good, unless you can tell me what the trick might be.” He went to turn the cards back over.
“I don’t think there’s a queen at all,” Teddy said, rightfully suspicious. “I think you’re trading her out and in.”
Faraday feigned offense well enough that even he started to believe it. “Now, that would be against the spirit of the game, wouldn’t it?”
Before anyone could take that too seriously, he tipped them a wink.
Still, it got him some uncertain looks and a couple of slow nods. “How about this?” he said, handing his deck to Teddy and turning his three remaining cards face-up: two black jacks and the red queen, just as they should be. “Take a seat and I’ll prove it to you.”
He made a show out of holding out his open hands and waiting while Teddy counted out the remaining cards. Teddy, who remembered being bitten once before and was still mighty shy, waited for the trick, but the deck was intact.
Faraday smiled.
He turned his cards face-down and let them move with a little flair. Gradually, a spark of something electric built between his palms, the attention of his witnesses catching on them like they were drawn to a magnet. As it grew it seemed to flow over into the cards, like water overrunning a riverbed, moving faster than the eye could catch. At last, he slammed three cards into place, waited for Teddy to gesture at one, and then flipped up a different card to show the queen. “Again,” he said, still smiling, and moved again as that electric spark built once more.
Again Teddy picked a card. Again Faraday turned up the queen elsewhere.
Again, and again. He moved faster and faster every time, until his hands and the cards were a flickering blur, cards dancing between his hands, across his shoulders—he plucked them out of his pockets, out of Teddy’s ears, out of thin air.
Look at my hands. Don’t look at my hands.
The crowd went silent and intent, watching the show, Teddy’s scowl growing each time he failed. Finally, after he’d laid out his three but before he could flip up a card, Teddy slammed his hand down, pinning his chosen card to the table. He flipped up the other two.
Two black jacks.
“Looks like I found the queen,” he said, triumphant, and released the cards as he sat back in his seat. The witnesses cheered, hollering and clapping him on the back.
Faraday was still smiling. “Looks that way, doesn’t it?” he said. With one finger, he flicked the last card over.
Jack of hearts.
Teddy howled like he’d been stung.
Faraday made sure to wink as he shuffled the deck he’d stolen back out of Teddy’s pocket. When he raised a hand and snapped his fingers, the queen of hearts appeared out of the air like it’d always been there. “I told you, Teddy,” he said, all mock disappointment as their little crowd hooted and shouted louder than ever. ”It was never about the cards.”
* * *
Red Harvest went riding out.
They kept working, fixing up the church and the steeple, finishing their trenches and stringing up their dynamite. Funny how much there was to do, and funny how quick the time seemed to pass.
* * *
Setting up their explosives took time and careful concentration, especially when any wrong move could set off an early explosion.
Faraday lit a cigarette as he worked.
“You really want to light up around the dynamite?” Vasquez asked, his wry amusement sidling up against Faraday’s thoughts.
Vasquez was laughing at him, Faraday realized, and made sure to muster up as much petulance as he could and throw it at the damn vaquero along with his still-lit cigarette.
* * *
The bell was still partway up the steeple when Chisolm turned up the street, a look of intense concentration on his face. “I hear Red Harvest,” he said to Horne. “Dry lightning.”
Horne nodded, making a strange face as his eyes slipped out of focus and his powers kicked in. “Dawn.”
“What’s that?” Faraday asked, glancing from one to the other.
Chisolm looked somber, staring up the street. After a minute or so even Faraday could hear the hoof beats heading toward them. “Storm’s coming.”
* * *
As a gambler, Faraday wasn’t ashamed to admit to his superstitions. There were rules to these sorts of things—an order to the universe, in a way—and when he went up against odds as long as these, it never hurt to stack the deck in his favor.
Bogue would arrive at dawn. They could use every break they could get.
There were fifty-two cards in his lucky deck, the one that had been with him through all his biggest wins and closest escapes. If that luck was a physical thing—if success could soak out of him and into his deck like rainfall always found a way to trickle into his boots, then this particular set of cards was overflowing. Maybe he could spread a bit of that around.
With that thought in mind, he took the rest of the afternoon off. Chisolm didn’t seem particularly dismayed by it, though the sharp look he shot at Faraday strongly suggested he keep out of trouble.
Faraday reasoned that it wasn’t trouble, exactly, to practice a reverse pick-pocket on folks around town.
He chose each card and each mark with a bit of thought and a bit of that same superstition. Chisolm got the king of hearts, folded and tucked inside the brim of his hat. The new stitching on Horne’s vest kept Faraday from slipping the eight of diamonds inside the loose bottom seam; he settled for tucking it into the man’s vest pocket instead. Billy and Goody, joined at the hip, got a pair of twos: clubs for Goodnight and his demons, hearts for Billy’s unfailing loyalty, both tucked away between the leather pieces of Goody’s holsters. Faraday wasn’t quite willing to risk interfering in whatever powered Billy’s gift by leaving a card with the man directly.
Teddy Q, who was all heart, got the ten of hearts tucked into his boot. Emma Cullen’s queen of spades was folded up at the bottom of her ammo pouch, where he knew she’d find it when she joined the fight.
Vasquez was—tricky, though the actual drop went easy enough. He just nudged the man friendly-like on the shoulder as he walked past, and the ace of clubs settled quietly into his pocket. A moment later, though, there was the prickle-scrape of Vasquez’s power spreading out, faint enough to make him shiver, as Vasquez reacted to whatever it was he was feeling with a shiver of his own. That was unexpected, to say the least, but Faraday just ambled away as casually as he knew how before Vasquez managed to link whatever-it-was to him.
Red Harvest, newly returned, was last to get his card. He was also the first to catch Faraday at it, just as Faraday was about to slip the nine of diamonds down into his quiver.
“I know what you are,” he said, hand locked like a vice around Faraday’s wrist. He stared in apparent fascination at the card caught in Faraday’s grip. “My people, we call them—Tricksters.”
Faraday stared, boggled, momentarily distracted from what the man was saying by the fact he was saying it at all. “You speak English?”
Red Harvest made a dismissive sound, like it wasn’t a shock and a surprise to hear him casually conversing when he’d spent the last week using Chisolm as his personal interpreter. “Some,” he said.
Sneaky bastard, Faraday thought, with some admiration. “And I have no idea what you might mean,” he added after a beat.
Red Harvest made that same sound again. “I know what you are. I will keep the secret.” He plucked the card out of Faraday’s hand and then let Faraday go, examining the thing a moment longer before tucking it away into his vest. “Okay?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.
It took Faraday a second to realize he was looking for approval. “Okay,” he said slowly, caught between disbelief and bafflement.
Without another word, Red Harvest strolled casually away, leaving Faraday behind in the street to gape after him. “What the hell,” he said to himself after a minute or so.
At least he’d kept the card.
* * *
His own card he’d chosen carefully, and placed on the top of his remaining deck. The jack of spades would do nicely.
* * *
Goody left after nightfall, Chisolm’s disappointment following behind like a physical thing and a pair of twos still tucked away inside his gun belt. Faraday hoped they’d serve him well, wherever he ended up.
Billy started drinking like a fish out of water. Faraday also hoped his gift would keep him from the truly magnificent hangover that would surely follow in the morning.
The rest of them stayed, though Chisolm had offered up one last chance to save their skins. Faraday found he wasn’t much inclined to go, and it wasn’t because he truly believed Chisolm would make him leave his Wild Jack behind. It certainly wasn’t because he felt strongly for peace and justice among all mankind, though the sense of goodwill and righteousness in their cause didn’t hurt him any.
Maybe he really was just a gambler at heart: he wanted to see how the hand played out.
* * *
The next morning dawned bright and clear, a grim contrast to the anxiety and desperation that had settled in over the town like a fog. They’d prepared as best they could, but the people were just beginning to realize that the hardest part was yet to come.
For Faraday, who had known all along what the stakes were in this game, the waiting was probably the worst. Dread and anticipation warred in the pit of his stomach, until he thought he’d damn near vibrate out of his skin. But every once in a while, there was a little prickling brush against his mind, almost like Vasquez asking permission before he sent a little burst of his own excitement-nerves. The whole thing took on the tone of a casual check-up, almost like a back-and-forth private conversation, though Faraday was positioned too far out to hold a conversation with anybody and Vasquez had a crowd of terrified townsfolk to manage.
He was starting to find it familiar, to recognize Vasquez in his thoughts like he could recognize the man’s voice in a crowd, which should have been more disturbing than it was. He was also starting to find it comforting, and was pretending as much as he was able that he didn’t.
Somewhere off toward the center of town, Vasquez was carrying Faraday’s ace in his pocket, just like the others all carried their cards tucked away and hidden in their belongings. He tapped at the remainder of his deck in his vest pocket, his own jack of spades settled on top, and convinced himself it would be enough.
* * *
Spread out and hidden as they all were, there was no chance that they’d all be able to see Bogue and his army coming. The signal was the church bell, loud enough to carry even out to the miners hidden away in their tents. Even before that sound rang out, Faraday felt a change in the air, a pressure and a static that made the hair on the back of his arms stand on end. Red Harvest’s gift was subtle, an omen on the rising wind, bringing the news.
It was time.
* * *
Much as he hated to retreat, he could see the advantage in falling back a little at a time, drawing Bogue’s hired guns slowly toward their traps and kill-boxes. Chisolm’s plan called for strategic motion, for each man and station to move at a certain time toward a certain purpose, taking a few attackers with them every step of the way.
Faraday also appreciated that Chisolm took a man’s preferences into account. It was intensely satisfying to get to blow things up not once, but twice. It was a bit like an early Christmas, Faraday thought gleefully, as he took aim at the bottle of alcohol that served as ignition.
The earth shook with the force of the blast, and he whooped.
He knew it was hardly a pretty fight. Bullets cracked the air around him. Men and horses screamed as they fell, blood and dirt flying. Still, he’d be damned if he didn’t enjoy the high while it lasted.
He ran back toward the center of town, firing and dodging as he went. He’d taken out a good number, but that didn’t mean there weren’t plenty left to give chase, and he didn’t waste time as he cleared his way and moved forward. It was a familiar enough rhythm, turn and fire and dodge and turn again, loading when he had the chance for a breath and dropping spent shells behind him like spare coins. Everything felt easy and straightforward, so long as he didn’t run out of bullets. He was so close. He was going to make it.
“Hurry, guero!” he heard Vasquez shouting from the church. “Ándale!”
Just as he’d about reached the door, though, a strange feeling of cold overtook him, slowing him down. Something scraped along his nerves, like dragging a sharpened nail across his skin. For a wild second, he imagined he could feel his lucky jack heating up in his pocket in some kind of warning.
It wasn’t Vasquez, but it was like enough to that familiar empathy to take him by surprise, even as he recognized it. The feeling of cold spread, invasive and wrong, but he was unable to move or break free.
The gunshot didn’t hurt at first.
The force of it moved him, but he didn’t feel a thing even as he stumbled, even as his knees hit the ground. He made a wordless noise, and then the pain hit, agonizing even through the numbness holding him in place, the foreign mind still scraping away under his skin.
That damned Blackstone man must be nearby. Faraday couldn’t decide whether to be annoyed at being shot, or amused that even with a motionless target, the idiot had missed. He looked up in time to meet Vasquez’s eyes, still in the process of widening with surprise.
Vasquez shouted something, and then his gaze slid up and past Faraday, going livid in the space of a heartbeat. All at once a sizzling heat rushed through him—Vasquez’s gift this time, familiar and white-hot with righteous fury.
It pushed the other mind-gift out of his head, and suddenly he was free to claw himself to his feet. Vasquez strode past, a hurricane of guns and violence and animal savagery. Faraday stumbled for the dubious cover of the building; Vasquez shouted something Faraday had no hope of understanding and fired more times than seemed necessary. Spite and satisfaction seeped from him, enough to feel without looking.
“You okay, guero?” he called, and the prickle-burr of emotion that came with it reminded Faraday of a cat delivering a dead bird as a gift to a person’s doorstep, all self-consciousness mixed with pride.
Faraday, holding up the wall, managed not to break down into inappropriate laughter. He glanced down at his side and tried to take only shallow breaths, because it hurt like a son-of-a-bitch, but it probably wouldn’t kill him anytime soon. “So far, so good,” he called back.
They had already fallen off the roof. Now wasn’t the time to think about what happened when they hit the ground.
* * *
Everything after that felt like it came in flashes.
Horne ran past, blood-soaked and wild-eyed, reciting something as he swung his axes almost without looking, as if he knew where the enemy would be.
A swarming mass of insects rose up way off in the distance, their droning sound loud enough to carry as the whorehouse proprietor, Gavin, called on them for whatever reason. Faraday just hoped faintly that whatever he was doing, he’d called up something that could sting. These bastards deserved it.
Chisolm, down the street, fired blindly through walls and windows, relying on his nose and his ears where his eyes failed him.
One of Bogue’s men came through like something out of a nightmare, his arms and hands ridged with something sharp and his skin gleaming like steel; he hacked and slashed his way through several of the defenders as their bullets glanced harmlessly off his skin. Finally, one of the riflemen up in the buildings managed a lucky shot, and the man fell with a new hole through his eye.
Up high, Red Harvest had run out of arrows and was mixing bullets with lightning, gathering the stuff between his palms and throwing it down on the men below like a javelin. Every once in a while, the lightning chained together, jumping from man to man in a searing bolt of light that was followed by a quiet roll of thunder and the smell of roasted meat.
Billy somehow managed to get close enough to every gunman in his path to use his blades. It didn’t seem likely, since anyone at a distance had the advantage with a bullet, but Billy made it seem as natural as breathing.
A man at least nine feet tall came striding through one of the alleys, swinging a spiked club the size of a sapling and howling like a man possessed. Faraday shot him four times in the chest and neck before he could get too far, and felt himself grinning, sharp-edged and mean—only a fool brought a thing like that to a gunfight, gifted or not.
* * *
The call echoed, passed from man to man. “Keep shooting! Keep shooting!”
High up, he thought he could even hear the higher pitch of Emma Cullen’s voice, crying out the same.
Even Vasquez got in on it, shouting, “keep shooting, guerito!” when he paused to snatch up a loaded gun, his twin pistols flashing as they worked to clear an opening in the confusion of the street—a chaotic mess of bodies, living and dead, Bogue’s men bunched up and seething as the defenders tried to pick them off one by one.
* * *
Goody came galloping back into town like something out of a legend, rifle on his shoulder and shooting like a man possessed. Faraday took a moment to make sure he still had his belt, and presumably the pair of cards he’d hidden inside his holsters, before he processed what the man was saying.
“They’ve got a goddamned Gatling gun!” he shouted, wild-eyed, swinging off his horse and dragging them along in his wake. “Get inside! Inside! Inside!”
The gun roared, and they all flung themselves to the ground.
“Where the hell did they get a thing like that?” Faraday tried to shout over the unearthly noise, but nobody seemed to hear; like him, they were all too busy pressing themselves down as small as they could get, searching for cover that didn’t exist as the Gatling sliced through wood and flesh alike. Vasquez cried out. There was a sudden bloom of his surprise and pain, almost immediately cut off—Faraday felt something sharp turn over in his chest before he looked up and saw Vasquez clutching at his arm, eyes screwed shut but very much alive. And the bullets just kept coming, and coming. He grit his teeth and felt something settle in him, hot and heavy, even as he cowered against the floor.
This, out of everything, wasn’t going to be what killed them.
* * *
The Gatling gun fell silent, the clip finally running out, and it was like everyone left took a deep breath all at once. There was no time to appreciate it, though, because fire was already burning up the street. “The children,” he gasped, and dragged himself up, pushing forward despite the slow-burning torture in his side because the only other thing to do was to lie down and die, and he sure as hell wasn’t planning on that.
Outside, the street was a mess of blood and torn-up bodies, the living still picking their way out of the mountain of death. One of Bogue’s men was trying to struggle to his feet, his gift attempting to heal the mass of bullet wounds that had cut him nearly in half on a long diagonal across his torso. Bloody skin shifted and wavered like gelatin as bullet fragments came bubbling to the surface, gruesome and horrible, but it didn’t seem to be slowing the man down much. He raised his gun as Faraday went running past, so Faraday just shot him in the face and moved on.
He’d like to see him heal from that.
He and Chisolm got the kids, got them clear, before the rattle of the Gatling started up again.
“So far, so good,” Faraday said, and “Sam, we have got to do something about that gun.” He was panting for breath, and even he wasn’t sure if it was from fear or the pain, but he pushed his hand and arm down more firmly over the bloody hole in his side and hoped for the best.
Chisolm just looked at him, his expression painfully open for once. “Hey, you know what? We’re even, for the horse. You don’t owe me anything.”
Faraday might have laughed, but he knew better than to believe Sam still thought he was still doing this just for a damn horse. “Well, you owe me.”
Sam looked briefly, hilariously surprised. Faraday decided he’d appreciate that as long as he lived—or not, as the case might be. “What’s that?” he said.
“Cover.”
* * *
It was a damn stupid idea, and he’d known that going in. No single man was going to ride straight up at a Gatling gun and take it out unchallenged. There were too many variables, and too many men standing in the way. He was doomed from the start.
But for a moment, riding hell-bent toward the wagon on the rise, Goody and Billy clearing the field at his back, he’d been invincible.
* * *
Funny how reality kicked back in the moment he hit the ground.
* * *
Shit, he thought, barely coherent. Shit. Sorry, boys.
Was this it?
He refused to believe it. Gritting his teeth, he clawed his way up off the ground, took the fire in his chest and channeled it into the same damn stubbornness that had kept him alive so far. One foot in front of the other—he kept moving forward, kept shooting, and the men Bogue had stationed around that damn gun were looking spooked, like they couldn’t believe he wouldn’t just lie down and die. Even the shooter and his damn black eyepatch looked a little bit rattled.
A gunshot. He tumbled down, and this time he couldn’t quite manage to drag himself to his feet.
He had a chest full of lead and a blinding, all-consuming pain in his leg. The fact that he could sit up at all was, in his opinion, a minor miracle. The fact that, when he brushed his hands over his vest in search of a cigarette, he could still feel his deck of cards, still pristine and intact—his lucky card stacked on top—that was something beyond a miracle. That was betting everything he had, and lifting his hand to find a perfect royal flush.
On his knees in front of a Gatling gun, he had trouble suppressing a smile.
The others thought he wasn’t gifted, but in truth his gift simply wasn’t like theirs. It was impossible to define, impossible to see if he didn’t want it seen, if someone didn’t already know it was there. His gift was a bit of this and that, like he’d once told Chisolm and Mrs. Cullen—a little bit of trick, a little bit of luck, a little bit of sleight-of-hand. There was a gamble in it, always, because there was a chance something would go wrong every time he tried it: like saying look at my hands, don’t look at my hands, he had to hope they watched the cards and didn’t notice the gun behind his back.
His power was misdirection. His power was street magic, stage magic. His power was superstition and luck of the draw. It was card tricks and showmanship, was pulling a rabbit out of a hat. Truth be told, his power was not a power at all, most days.
And his power was real enough, just that tiniest bit, that when he folded over with a lit cigarette, with empty hands and empty pockets, he came back up with a stick of dynamite.
“I’ve always been lucky with one-eyed jacks,” he said, smiling. The jack of spades burned against his chest, and then everything else burned, too.
* * *
This new place was black nothingness, warm and still and quiet. If time existed there, it was meaningless.
* * *
Then—a voice, disturbing the quiet, called his name. A hand, disturbing the stillness, reached out and beckoned.
That way was cold. That way was noise and movement; that way was pain, more than any one man should bear. That way was life, which meant that this place was not. Staying here, then, meant dying, and just because he had meant to die didn’t mean he wanted to stay that way.
Oh, hell, he thought, and reached back. Why not?
* * *
Sound came back first thing, a riot of voices and shouting, bleeding together and overwhelming after the calm of the other place. Next was a strange tingling, the prickle of foreign power against his skin. It seeped over him, twisting and writhing, and pressed against the barrier of his lips. Someone dug their fingers into his jaw, pried his mouth open—the shouting briefly got louder—and then that power was being forced down into him on a breath of hot air not his own.
“Breathe,” said Emma Cullen’s voice somewhere overhead, too close and too vicious. “Live, damn you!”
There was another rush of power, another rush of air, and Faraday realized idly that he was still technically dead.
His heart beat once in his chest, and then stalled. “Breathe!” she snapped at him again.
Alright, alright, keep your skirts on, he thought. And then he was arching up against the hands that tried to hold him down, slamming back to himself as lungs and heart and life all kicked back into motion at the same time. Pain followed on their heels, sharp and unforgiving, and he used all that new air to try to scream.
A couple voices shouted his name, absently familiar, but that meant nothing against the fire under his skin, his flayed nerves, his building agony—
“Move!” a new voice snapped, and a weight he hadn’t noticed across his chest was tossed aside, and that was good, that was better, that hurt just that little bit less—made it easier to strangle the scream down to something that didn’t shred his throat. But the voice wasn’t done. “Cálmate,” it said, soft. Gentle. “I’ve got you.” Bare skin brushed against his jaw, and the agony ebbed a little, just a little, like the tide starting to go out. It was just enough for him to think again.
He caught his breath and went quiet, clenching his teeth around the new scream. Above him, someone else caught their breath, too, and a little more pain seeped out through that point of skin-on-skin contact.
It still hurt like nothing he’d felt before. “Shit,” he mumbled, and for the first time, managed to crack open his eyes. “Ow.”
His vision was a smear, colors blurred together into nonsense shades and shapes forced out of focus. “There you go,” the voice said, and Faraday blinked hard until the dimly-lit outline became something a little more familiar, until the white glint turned into teeth, a smile. Vasquez. Thank God. “It’s okay, guero. I’ve got you.”
“Faraday,” someone said, off to the side, and he tried to turn and look and immediately regretted it as his muscles seized up in protest. He let out a noise.
Vasquez made the exact same sound, punched-out and breathless, and something tugged under Faraday’s skin briefly before the pain slid away again. “Careful,” Vasquez said, only partially to him.
“Right,” the other man said, and then Chisolm slid into view, leaning down carefully over him with a frown. “Faraday, are you in there? You know who you are?”
Faraday blinked up at him. His eyelids were getting heavier, and harder to drag open again every time they shut.
“Hey, no,” Chisolm said. “Come on, Faraday, stay awake. Stay here.”
Not going anywhere, he thought, but his tongue was a stretch of desert sand and the words wouldn’t come out. It’s still me. He sighed, and this time his eyes stayed closed.
“Do it,” he heard distantly.
“But—”
“Do it. You know we have to make sure.” He wasn’t sure what that meant, but didn’t think he liked the tone.
And then the full force of that initial agony hit him again like a cattle prod to the gut, and he jerked back awake with a shout that sounded nothing at all like a sob. Not even a little.
“Lo siento,” Vasquez was saying, over and over, as he put his hands back against Faraday’s jaw, and everything settled down to a distant ache. “Lo siento, sorry, I’m sorry.”
“Bastard,” Faraday hissed between his teeth, but pried his eyes open again.
Chisolm, still leaning over him, looked relieved. “Come on,” he said. “Just a couple questions, and then you can sleep. Okay?”
Faraday made a sound that he hoped came across as agreement.
“You know where you are? Who we are?”
He made another affirmative sound, and when that didn’t seem like enough, found his voice. Hopefully Chisolm, at least, would be able to hear it. Super-hearing had to be so useful. “Rose Creek. Vasquez, Sam.” His hand flopped to the side.
“Good,” Chisolm said, and that too-serious expression on his face lightened just a little. Vasquez, on his other side, made a pleased little noise. “Now, you still know who you are?”
He tried his best to smile, feeling stretched thin and dizzy with it. Everything was spinning, slowly but surely, until it seemed like the warmth of Vasquez’s hands against his skin was the only sure thing left. “The world’s greatest lover,” he said, choking out a laugh, and this time when he passed out they let him.
* * *
More voices, movement, noise, pain. It was still so cold.
So about what he’d expected, then.
* * *
“Am I dead?”
Vasquez, hovering over him, looked as drawn and tight as he felt, and his hand was locked around Faraday’s shoulder like a vice. “No. Not anymore.”
Well. That didn’t seem right. “Fix that for me?”
Vasquez’s face did a strange, twisty thing, crumpling along its lines, and Faraday didn’t have the mental capacity to figure it out. His empathy was a soft brush against Faraday’s thoughts, the usual rough, prickling edge of it tamped down until it was almost too faint to feel. “Go back to sleep, guero.”
* * *
“Am I dead?”
It was Chisolm, this time, with Horne and Red a pair of sleepy-eyed shadows in the background. “No, Faraday. Not for lack of trying.”
* * *
Eventually there came a point where he was awake and conscious enough to recognize it.
The room was unfamiliar, but it was cool and dark and there was a bed, which met his basic standards and then some when it came to waking up in strange places. He blinked up at the ceiling for a bit, finding his bearings, and took the time to assess himself. It seemed he was alive, only in marginal amounts of pain, and somehow still intact. All in all, he figured he could mark this little venture down as a success. Mostly.
“Well, look at that,” someone said quietly. “Sleeping Beauty awakens.”
He rolled his head toward the sound, and found Goody leaning against the doorway, hat and belt missing and looking comfortably relaxed. Wherever they were, Goody didn’t see any threats. Billy appeared briefly over his shoulder, nodded once, and then vanished without a word.
“Did we win?” he mumbled.
Goody looked delighted to be asked, or maybe delighted to find him making some kind of sense. “We surely did,” he said, soft enough that Faraday wanted to lean in to catch the sound. “And all alive and intact, too, excepting yourself.”
Oh—shit. That was right, wasn’t it? He’d been dead. “Why’re we whispering?” Faraday asked, still a little groggy.
Goody grinned, and gestured sharply. Faraday turned to look, and there was Vasquez, propped up and asleep in a chair by the bed, hat over his face and head lolling. He had his boots on the bed, and his heel was pressed up lightly against Faraday’s hip. “He’s been awake for almost three days, keeping you from tearing your throat with all that screaming.” His grin faltered for a second. Faraday didn’t much remember screaming, but remembering how it felt coming back to life under a dead-walker’s hands, he found he could believe it. “Sam just got the stubborn bastard to sleep.”
Vasquez let out a quiet snore.
“He’s mighty pissed off,” Goody said, giving Faraday a minute to stare, “though I can’t say I blame him. Doc had to put you back together some before Miss Emma would even try dragging you back, and then it took him a couple days to finish fixing what could be fixed.” Faraday shifted a little in place, nervous, feeling a couple twinges in his leg and side but nothing that would kill him again. “Might I suggest you stay away from dynamite for a bit? And from suicide runs as well, if only for our nerves.”
“Oh, yeah, that hurt like hell,” Faraday said, managing a little shrug. He tried not to think on what little he could remember about dying and what came after—that was the sort of thing that drove a man crazy. “But I bet I looked damn good doing it.”
Goody stared blankly down at him until he finally started to laugh. It went on for a while, and he had to bite down on his own knuckles to keep from waking Vasquez. “Faraday, you crazy bastard,” Goody managed to get out. “Don’t ever change.”
* * *
Goody was wrong; Vasquez wasn’t pissed off. He was goddamn furious.
Faraday found himself smiling as Vasquez railed at him in Mexican, all sharp gestures and a mash of sounds he couldn’t understand. Those few words he could pick out weren’t particularly friendly. Still, it was hard to take offense, especially when Vasquez still had his boots propped up on the bed and purple-black shadows dug in under his eyes with lack of sleep. “You think this is funny, guero? You have something to say?”
Faraday kept grinning. “No, nothing in particular,” he said. “Just—thank you.”
Vasquez deflated like a stuck balloon, slumping back into his chair. “Idiota,” he said, but his heel was back to pressing against Faraday’s hip, a friendly weight. “Maldito bastardo. If you try that again, I’ll kill you myself.”
There was still a little anger in the prickle of Vasquez’s power that rushed over him, but mostly it was relief.
* * *
Plenty of folks had died, as it turned out, but none of them the ones Faraday cared about. With their powers returned, Doc and Miss Emma had even managed to fix up most of the townspeople with a bit of time and effort, though apparently there was a point where even a dead-walker couldn’t bring a body back—Matthew Cullen and those early victims stayed in the graveyard, but they were joined by far fewer folk from this fight than had been left on the ground at the end of the battle.
Bogue and his men were dead, and staying that way. Miss Emma had done in Bogue himself, though neither she nor Chisolm seemed inclined to discuss it. Vasquez had taken care of McCann; Red Harvest had sent enough lightning through Denali that the corpse was probably still twitching.
When he was good enough to walk, even if it was with a limp that’d probably never entirely leave, Faraday collected up his scattered cards. Horne had collected a couple arrows from Denali, enough to take him out of the fight but not to take him down entirely. His eight of diamonds had a long, thin tear down the middle, like something sharp had dragged across it. Chisolm’s king of hearts was mostly intact, as were Red’s nine of diamonds and Miss Emma’s queen of spades. Billy and Goody, who had barely escaped the church tower before the Gatling had turned on it, still had matching cards, both battered and worn in the same pattern. The only difference was a narrow tear in the top of the two of hearts; Billy had caught a bit of shrapnel across the side of his neck, which had bled like a stuck pig. He had a neat scar there, now. Teddy’s ten of hearts was completely soaked in blood. And the ace of clubs had a neat triangle-cut nick out of the side, a match to the graze on Vasquez’s arm.
The majority of his deck was miraculously still intact, with the exception of the jack of spades—his lucky one-eyed jack. That was just gone, like so much dust on the wind.
* * *
After about a week, Faraday was cleared to walk, run, and even ride a horse, should he choose. He celebrated his freedom by walking over to the saloon and then trying to pretend he was sitting on the front steps because he felt like it and not because his bum leg didn’t much want to carry him any further.
Sam, who must have heard him swearing from all the way up the street, joined him there after a few minutes, dropping to a seat beside him and pulling off his hat. “I hear you’re a free man again.”
Faraday shrugged. “So they tell me.”
“Well, good,” Sam said, a little more awkwardly than his usual. He fiddled with his hat for a moment before he seemed to come to a decision, and then set it down firmly on the steps between them. Turning, he looked Faraday in the eyes. “I’ve been talking with the others about sticking together, now that this whole thing is over,” he said.
Faraday kept his voice level. “Is that so?”
“It is.”
They stared each other down. Faraday broke first. “What’d they say?”
“Red and Vasquez are in,” Sam said. “Horne…he muttered something about justice to the fatherless, which I’m taking to mean he’ll come along.” Faraday snorted, and Sam shrugged. “And Goody seemed amenable. I just haven’t talked with Billy yet.”
Faraday lifted an eyebrow. “Sam, please,” he said, because they both knew that if Goody was going anywhere, then Billy was coming along.
“Alright, alright.”
They sat in silence for a bit.
Finally, Sam sighed, and asked the question Faraday had been waiting for all along. “And what about you? You willing to join in?”
Faraday slanted a look his way. “Oh, Mr. Chisolm,” he said, batting his eyelashes and making his voice as breathy as he could. “You really want little ole me to come along?”
Sam rolled his eyes. “Don’t try to play me, Joshua Faraday,” he said, reluctantly amused. “You coming or not?”
Faraday glanced away so that Sam wouldn’t see his mouth twitching up into a smile. “Yeah, might as well,” he said, aiming for nonchalant. “Got nothing better to do.”
Sam didn’t look fooled, but he didn’t say anything about it, just smiled. “That’s good to hear,” he said brightly, picking up his hat, brushing it off, and climbing to his feet. “Because if you hadn’t agreed, I would have given my horse to Teddy instead.”
It took a second for the implication to settle. “Damn it, Sam, you said we were even! He’s my horse!”
Sam’s laugh followed behind him as he walked away down the street.
* * *
In the end, they left Rose Creek the way they came in: quietly, when no one was looking, seven men on seven horses rode out into the rising sun.
* * *
“So, what now?” Vasquez asked after an hour of silence, glancing at Chisolm and then past, to where Faraday was flicking through his newly-replenished deck of cards. Wild Jack was moving smoother than ever, like he knew his rider wasn’t as inclined to rough riding as he’d once been; it meant Faraday had room to practice sleight-of-hand on horseback, where Jack’s gait would never have allowed it before. The lack of guidance on the reins didn’t mean much of anything, since he and Jack were both equally aware of who was really doing the steering in their partnership. To the surprise of nobody, it wasn’t Jack’s rider.
“I say we go find some trouble and shoot it in the face,” Faraday said brightly.
Vasquez laughed, his agreement a brief shining thing, excitement racing along all their nerves. But Horne still sighed loudly, a great gusting breath, and Sam fought hard not to roll his eyes.
“What? I feel it’s a skill we should nurture.”
Billy nodded solemnly. “I agree,” he said, “except I’d like a chance to stab it a few times as well.” He and Faraday exchanged a meaningful look around their companions—Billy with a stoic expression and a gleam in his eye, and Faraday with a grin like a fox.
“I suppose I’m just along to keep an eye on you, then,” Goody said, reaching over to nudge Billy on the shoulder.
Faraday suddenly felt at peace with the world as he saw it. “Vasquez can join in,” he said, a prediction as much as anything Horne had ever given. “We’ll get Red to loosen up a bit; see if we can’t get him to crack a joke or two.”
Red Harvest gave them his best flat look. “In your dreams,” he said.
“It’s starting already,” Faraday shot back, undeterred. “Then Horne here can give us disappointed looks,” and Horne offered him just that, though it broke down almost immediately into wry amusement. “And Sam can make sure we stay good and respectable while we do it.”
“That’ll be a task and a half,” Sam muttered, but they could all tell he didn’t really mean it.
In his hands, Faraday’s cards danced between his fingers like something electric, moving faster and higher than seemed likely, though never quite more than was possible. “Oh, come on, boys. Have a little fun,” he said like a challenge, like a dare. As he shuffled, somewhere in the deck, each of their cards brushed against the others, drawn by fate and luck and momentum just as surely as they all were. “I’ve got a good feeling about this.”