Six Guns Straight From Hell - Tales Of Horror And Dark Fantasy From The Weird Weird West (20 page)

He led Jing-Wei through the alley, wary for the possibility of sappers and hoodlums that might leap from the shadows between tents. Indeed, he spotted several suspicious figures lurking in hiding, but when they saw Crow and assessed his carriage and demeanor they chose not to risk an encounter and sank back into hiding, waiting for easier prey.

Crow rapped on the gate of the Leaning Horseshoe and the proprietor, Jake Higgins, a man who covered his pock-marked face with a heavy beard, came through the door of his listing barn cradling a shotgun in his arms.

“
Aah, it's you, Crow. There's been some Sydney Ducks lurking about. I was worried that I might have some trouble.”

“
It's not the ducks I'm worried about, Jake,” said Crow as Higgins opened the gate and let the pair of them through. “I'm afraid I've crossed the Hop Sing Tong. We'll be leaving first thing in the morning. I don't want to draw any of their wrath in your direction.”

“
I'm sorry to hear that,” said Higgins. “It's been good having you.” Higgins paused when he saw Jing-Wei. Whether it was surprise at seeing Crow arrive with a strange woman or whether it was her beauty that caused his tongue to seize, Crow didn't know.

“
Who is this woman?”

“
She's the reason for the tong's wrath,” said Crow.

Wei-Jing extended her hand to Higgins and spoke in Chinese. Higgins only understood a few words of the language, which he'd picked up from his contact with the residents of Little China, but he seemed to comprehend her meaning.

“
Pleasure to meet you, also, ma'am.”

“
This is Jing-Wei. Maybe you can find a bit of extra straw for her and give her a spot in the loft,” suggested Crow.

Higgins scratched at his beard. “That shouldn't be a problem at all, and I'll have your horse ready to go in the morning. What of Reynolds? Have you picked up on his trail?”

“
An outfitter remembers him and his party coming through town, but once he headed for the gold fields , no one seems to have seen hide nor hair of him or his men.”

“
Good luck finding him. Men have a way of disappearing in the gold fields, never to be heard from again.”

Once Higgins had retreated into the barn, Crow led Wei-Jing into the yard behind the stable. He fired some kindling and began to prepare a stew of venison and carrots. He raised a bunch of the long orange vegetables. “A dollar a carrot, can you believe it? Everything sells for a fortune in San Francisco.”

Jing-Wei didn't respond. Instead she seemed lost in thought.

“
Why didn't you speak English to Higgins?” asked Crow.

She regarded him from beneath long lashes, her skirts gathered about her ankles as she sat on a log in front of the tent. “He understood me well enough. It's been many ages since I've eaten a fresh vegetable. Is dinner about ready?”

“
Just about,” said Crow. He stirred the broth and let the savoury aroma waft into the air. She consumed enough stew to satiate three famished men after a long day of sod-busting and Crow couldn't help but let an amused smile creep across his face.

Finally, she set aside her tin with a sigh of delight. “That was heavenly. However, next time I must prepare a meal for you. I promise you, I can prepare a meal so tasty that you will decide you should immediately make me your wife.”

Crow grinned. “Is that so?”

Her smile was intoxicating, but their light mood broke suddenly as a howl shattered the spreading dusk. It was a long guttural cry, more broken and bestial than that of a hound, and the sound of it froze Crow's marrow. Jing-Wei's smile turned to dismay. “They didn't dare!”

“
They didn't dare what?” asked Crow.

Jing-Wei rose. “We must leave now, before the tien kou is upon us!”

“
T'ien hou?” repeated Crow. “What are you talking about? What aren't you telling me?”

She gazed upon him with plaintiff eyes. “I'm afraid that there is much I haven't told you. I thought that we would have more time. I didn't think that they would dare release the devil hound. He'll be able to smell us out wherever we go.”

“
There are ways of defeating the hounds,” said Crow. “There's any number of streams or even rivers we could cross on our way out of San Francisco to confuse their scent. Are these hounds that Hop Sing owns?”

Jing-Wei seemed frantic. “You don't understand, but it is not your fault. I have not been completely honest with you. This hound, it was kept with me in the hold of the
Far Traveler
. It is an ancient evil thing drawn from the voids of space and bound to earth by my father. It is a thing that is pure evil and it cannot be slain by earthly weapons. If it
knows a man's scent it can track that man across all the deserts and oceans of the earth. My father sold it, and me, to Hop Sing at a great price―for dark secrets can be pried from the jaws of the t'ien kou if certain incantations are uttered.”

“
Then we unbind it from earth,” said Crow, who wasn't unfamiliar with the workings of the supernatural.

“
Only a great sorcerer could accomplish that,” said Wei-Jing. “The t'ien kou is the dark yin of the balance and to bind him my father tied him to a thing of great purity, something that the t'ien kou desires to violate and use for its own purposes.”

Crow shook himself, frustrated. “Then is there nothing that we can do to stop this t'ien kou? If it's flesh surely we can make it bleed...”

Jing-Wei shook her head mournfully. “I'm sorry to have brought this fate upon you. I didn't think that the Hop Sing would dare order its release.”

“
Why not?”

“
The T'ien Kou is not flesh and blood a we know it. Its skin and flesh is hardened, inured to the chill voids of the outer darknesses. It is an alien power, difficult to understand and command, even for a master of the Left Hand Way. It is ill omen incarnate and even to say its name has caused mortal men to lose their minds.”

A cold chill descended upon Crow as he listened to Jing-Wei's words, but he pushed away the dread fear that her they brought and whispered a prayer seeking the Holy Spirit that was his right and privilege, finding that when the prayer was uttered the unreasoning fear left him.

He stood and listened as the beast howled again, its ululating cry carrying a frosty brand of terror to every ear that heard it. Throughout San Francisco, grown men shrieked, falling in the gutter and clapping their hands over their ears. Gamblers lost their nerve and cast away winning hands, while others dropped dice from nerveless fingers. In brothels and bagnios through the city, harlots and their customers paused in their iniquity. Some ran naked and howling into the streets and other men went mad, murdering until they were brought down in a hail of gunfire or until they were wrested from their insanity by the light of the morning sun.

But the sun was many hours away and Crow looked upon Jing-Wei with clearer eyes that weren't befuddled by her celestial beauty. “There is much that you've neglected to tell me.”

“
I thought that there was more time,” she repeated. “I hoped that first you would fall completely under the spell of my charms, and once you were in love with me, I could reveal the sordid truths. For does not love overcome all?”

“
Perhaps,” mused Crow, “but not without the cost of blood. Tell me now, what is it that can defeat this fiend?”

Jing-Wei shook her lovely head, long lashes fluttering like the bird of her namesake, and her dark, dark tresses falling like black waters across her slender shoulders and spilling across the brocade

“
You're letting the fear take hold,” said Crow. “Think harder. Does the beast have any weakness at all that we might turn to our advantage?”

Again she regarded Crow with a sad smile. “It does not like the great waters. While in the hold of the Far Trader it howled like the damned souls of hell. The t'ien kou come from the far reaches of space where all moisture is ice. The vast seas are alien to the t'ien kou.”

“
Can we drown the beast?” snapped Crow.

“
It cannot die as you understand death. The t'ien kou is not mortal flesh.”

“
Fine, but at least water unnerves it. Even if that's all I can hope for then, we'll head to the bay.”

“
But it's coming from the bay!” objected Jien-Wei.

“
Then we'll lead it on a chase. Are you going to come with me or are you going to wait here for the beast to come take you?”

At Crow's urging, she rose swiftly from the log where she had been perched. “I'm with you unto the death, my love!”

Before Crow and Jing-Wei fled the Leaning Horseshoe Stables they warned Higgins that he should vacate the premises, interrupting him as he groomed a bay with a blaze on its snout.

“
But I can't leave,” he objected. “Thieves will break in and steal the horses if I leave them unattended.”

“
I'm sorry, but it appears that Jing-Wei has left a trail for the tong to follow. There will be more of them than you and I can handle with shotgun and rifle.” Crow laid a heavy pouch on the table.

“
What's that?” asked Higgins.

“
It's my split of the money we got for bringing in Shotgun Ferguson. If the tong does any damage it will be enough to replace and rebuild the Leaning Horseshoe.”

“
I'm not taking your money,” bristled Higgins. “If there's trouble I'll stand with you. You know I'm not a man of the gun, but I can hold my own when the fat is in the fire.”

“
If I were to lay odds, I'll be dead before sunrise,” said Crow. “Any one with me will suffer the same fate. Keep the money. At least you'll be alive to use it.”

“
What about the China girl? You're not taking her with you...”

“
It's Jing-Wei that they're after. The tong hatchet men are running a hound that's got her scent.”

Higgins shivered in spite of himself and the horses moved skittishly in their stalls. “Is that the unearthly howling I've been hearing? If so, I'll skedaddle just like you're telling me.”

“
May God go with you, Brother.”

“
See you on the other side, Crow.”

The moonlight spread its orange light across the natural horseshoe of San Francisco Bay. In the mad rush of gold fever, men had descended in droves upon the settlement of San Francisco and the site of Sutter's Mill, abandoning their ships and tearing the mill to the ground as they sought for speck and nugget of the yellow metal. Half a thousand ships lay abandoned in the harbor with no sailor to sail them, for all had tossed aside the ill-paying profession of seamen for the lure of easy money. It wasn't difficult for Crow and Jing-Wei to find an empty longboat pulled upon the shore. Crow threw his boots in the bottom of the boat and pushed it out into the chill waters. He leaped in alongside of Jing-Wei and again they heard the horrible howl that had been pursuing them through the maddened city streets. They looked and saw a great bear-like beast, with baleful eyes glowing purple and mangy, scabrous flesh that grew patches of wiry fur. Its great jaw hung slack and foam trailed from its flaccid lips as its eight powerful limbs propelled it forward in great leaps.