The Incorruptibles (22 page)

I exhaled through my mouth, frozen breath rising up in front of my eyes. I forced the tension to ease out of my arm, my shoulders, my legs, and I replaced the knife in my sleeve.

He stood there looking at me avidly, his jaw working in and out as if he’d spent a night chewing kokoa leaves.

‘Hey, pard, you remember that time we ran into Mack Lentilius out near Breentown? That mean bull auroch had him treed?’

Fisk’s face fell; he looked axe-struck. He stared off into the trees, and his mouth hung open, slack.

‘Uh, yeah.’ He rubbed his hands on his coat. ‘He was hollerin’ for us like a scalded baby.’

‘That’s right. And when we came into the clearing, that big ole bull just blew air through its nose and then pushed off into the brush. You remember that?’

He nodded. ‘Shoe, I’m—’

I turned and walked around him. ‘We’ve had our share of good times, haven’t we?’ I flipped back the tarp covering Agrippina’s handless arm, rolled back the wool blankets, and started working on her. ‘Remember that furlough in Harbor Town? Don’t think I’ve worked off the hangover yet, you know?’

Fisk brought his hands in front of his face, looked at them hard, as though trying to discern their intention or deeper meaning.

I stopped. ‘You got a terrible burden, pard. And I’m sorry you took it up.’

He nodded.

‘Think it might be best if you watch yourself around the ladies.’

Again, a single nod.

‘You don’t sleep anyway, do you? You can’t, not with that thing.’

‘No. I don’t sleep. When I close my eyes—’

‘Right,’ I said. ‘So maybe you should do some roving at night. Around camp, but not in it.’ I looked at him closely. ‘Scouting, right?’

He didn’t respond. He walked over to the big black that stood steaming among the horses and ponies, withdrew his carbine from its long leather holster, and walked away, out of the circle of light thrown by the fire, into the trees and beyond.

When I looked down at Agrippina, she was smiling.

TWENTY-FOUR

We pushed hard north early the next day. Fisk seemed even more agitated and desperate to move. Livia did what she could to console and soothe him, but the
daemon
drove Fisk unmercifully.

At rests, when the horses took water or had their nosebags full, Fisk would smoke handrolled cigarettes and stare at us and the horses with narrowed eyes, spitting into the snow or cursing under his breath. When we rode, he seemed to unclench and his expression would lose its pained look, his shoulders would unkink, and we could pretend, for a short while, that our dour but steadfast leader, friend, partner, or lover was back. But we had to keep moving.

Two days later, we came out of the foothills and onto a high plain. In places, the land smoked and spewed great billows of steam and sulphurous stink. We’d find livid green and orange pools of standing water, liquid even in the freezing air and very hot to the touch.

One afternoon, we passed a rocky field that spewed boiling water into the air, creating strange icy formations jutting up from the snowcover. It was a strange and otherworldly landscape.

Then a single rider approached, trailing a small pack mule. Bess brayed and chucked her head as he neared.

Fisk held up his hand for the company to halt.

When the rider drew closer, Fisk hollered, ‘Howdy, sir! Where you riding to?’

The horseman stopped and unwrapped a heavy scarf that kept his face from the cold. He was a middle-sized man, burly, with a thick black beard and merry eyes.

‘Ain’t riding to anywhere. Just riding away.’

‘Away? Is there trouble behind you?’

The man began to laugh, and I watched as Fisk’s face clouded and his eyes became mean.

‘Trouble?’ The man said, jerking a thumb at his backtrail, ‘Damn, mister,
Hell
ain’t a half-mile yonder.’

Fisk’s hand shot to his pistol. The man’s laugh died, and his horse turned in place and champed.

The rider cocked his head at Fisk, and he narrowed his eyes. But the man still smiled. ‘My apologies, mister. I’m riding from Hot Springs, where a whore stole my heart and a cardsharp stole my money.’

Manius and Titus laughed, and even Livia smiled.

Fisk sat stock-still in the saddle, hand hovering by his six-gun. I couldn’t see his face from my position, but I feared he was grinning a crimson smile.

I pushed Bess forward. ‘Well met, mister. I can’t tell you how sorry I am to hear your story. Cardsharps cheat, it’s true, but whores win in the fairest way possible.’

The man shifted his gaze to me, but not before noticing the
daemon
hand hanging from Fisk’s neck. ‘You have a point,’ he said, his mirth drying up like a watering hole in the midst of the Hardscrabble Territories at high-summer. ‘Ride straight, you’ll hit a gametrail that you can see even under snow. Follow it to the crick. Follow that upstream, and soon you’ll either see or smell Hot Springs. Stinks like a rotten egg.’ He looked at the bright sun and sniffed, raising his reins. ‘Hell, just follow my backtrail.’ He touched the brim of his hat in farewell. ‘Pleasure, gents and gentlewomen. I best be on my way.’

‘Half-mile distant, then? Over yonder rise?’

The rider looked at Fisk for a long while. Fisk sat unmoved in his saddle, his hand hovering over his Hellfire.

The rider nodded, and kicked his horse into movement. He didn’t look back.

‘Looks like we’re all going to Hell, then,’ I said, trying to put some lightness into it. ‘Either that or Hot Springs.’

It was an affluent if muddy silver-mining town perched halfway up the skirt of a peak they called Brujateton and ringed in smoking hot pools of sulphurous water. Despite its obvious Medieran heritage, Hot Springs, or Ria Kalla as it was called by the elder denizens, was a lawless town under neither Ruman nor Medieran protection or rule.

That did not mean it was unprotected.

We rode into town, Fisk in the lead, Livia close by his side. She had taken to remaining with him at all times, except during those hours we camped. The
daemon
hand would not let him rest at all then. And it ate at my heart that my friend, my partner, the most reliable man I knew, could be corrupted in such a way. But there it was. The Crimson Man was like a high mountain stream that flooded and washed over its shores, wearing away at the earth. Fisk was becoming possessed.

Great woolly beasts of men stood guarding the road leading to Hot Springs. They were dressed in makeshift uniforms emblazoned with the letter C over their bulging chests. As we rode in they stared at us, unsmiling, and fingered the grips of Hellfire pistols. Bully boys, every one. Many wore gladii or oversized longknives. A dour, unsmiling bunch to a man.

We were riding down the main thoroughfare, the snow-mulched mud sucking at our horse’s hooves with sloppy sounds, when one of the men – a big blond-headed giant who looked like two Reeves had been fused to create one gargantuan Reeve – stepped out in front of us.

He tipped his hat to us, just a formality. ‘Welcome to Hot Springs,’ he said, looking at each of us in turn. ‘Hotel and saloon at the far end of the street. Livery stables behind them, right near that bristle of aspen tips. If you would, I’d ask you to direct your attention to yon building there.’ He pointed a thick finger, bristling with coarse hair, at a white brick building nested between two wooden ones. A sign hung above two more bully boys lounging on the wooden-slatted porch. It read, ‘Croesus Mining Company, William T. Croesus, Proprietor.’

The big burly man said, ‘Mr Croesus welcomes all travellers to Hot Springs but bids us admonish you to shed no blood nor prevent the pursuit of industry. Otherwise …’ He turned and looked down the length of the main street toward the slope of Brujateton and the wooden platform erected beneath the weight of the mountain.

A gallows.

‘My thanks, travellers. Spend freely and keep yourselves indoors during the night, for there are stretchers on the move. Although we guard this settlement, we can make no guarantees regarding your safety. But you are free to enjoy all Hot Springs has to offer.’ He turned and walked to the front of the Mining Company building, took the steps up to the porch. He sat on a bench and watched us until we rode off.

I drew Bess close to Livia. She had a tight, worried expression on her face. She watched Fisk cautiously.

‘A word, Miss Livia?’

She nodded and stopped her horse. She was cold, pale. Her eyes were wide and worried.

‘You and Samantha should room together tonight, instead of …’

She gave a terse jerk of her head and said, ‘Yes. He’s becoming uncontrollable. That
thing
around his neck is seeping into him.’

‘Right. I’ll have him bunk with me in the stables.’

She looked surprised. ‘Why the stables?’

I cocked my head at the wagon and Manius. ‘Agrippina. She’ll want watching, and I don’t think it would do to have these brutes discover our cargo.’ I looked at Livia closely. ‘The
hand
won’t do well indoors, I don’t think.’

For a long moment she looked at Fisk, riding ahead between Titus and Manius driving the wagon. She turned back to me, and for the first time I truly saw her desperation. It was all bound up with love and heartache and sorrow. A beautiful woman, Livia. And now afflicted by her love.

‘I—’ She stopped. ‘I love him and don’t know what to do about it. I’ve … never felt this way before. Both of us—’ Her eyes grew luminous and moist but she blinked and swallowed hard. ‘Both of us are so
compromised
. And there’s nothing we can do about it.’

I bowed my head.

She nodded. ‘I will tell him the arrangements.’

‘Maybe I should be there, too.’

We kicked our mounts forward and caught up to Fisk. Livia, her horse very close to his, reached out and softly touched his arm.

‘Baby …’ she said, hushed and low.

His head pivoted, reminding me for a moment of the long necks of the
vaettir
, their inhuman, predatory grace. He fixed his eyes on her, and then me. They were cold, distant, and cruel.

‘My love,’ she said and his expression shifted, like a man waking from a nightmare. I was glad to see he still had that scrap of humanity left him.

Livia said, ‘I will make arrangements for the rest of the company at the hotel, since I carry the purse.’ She paused. ‘Tonight, I think I should room with Samantha.’

Fisk looked at me and raised his eyebrow.

‘I need your help, pard, watching after Agrippina. Without her, we won’t be able to ransom Isabelle. I need you to
remember
Isabelle. Tonight we share a bed of hay.’

He looked at us, his face as blank as the surface of Big Rill when it hits the plains, wide and smooth and untroubled. Placid on the surface, but underneath currents deadly and terrible. After a long while Fisk tried to smile, and it looked almost genuine. Almost.

Before he took up the
daemon
hand, he had been guarded – stingy, even – with his emotions. Now he was seemingly so much freer with them, but it all meant nothing in the end.

‘Right. I’ll miss you, my heart,’ he said. He took Livia’s hand and kissed it.

I think maybe a little of her died then. Or maybe that infinitesimal part of her that was her soul alone grew larger. Expanded.

Hellfire and damnation. I don’t know.

We took the horses to the stables, passing the Croesus Hotel and Saloon, where our company was to lodge. The stables were a new construction, a large, half-empty affair with two towheaded boys attending to all the travellers’ mounts. The massive building was a long way away from the main street, and connected by a wooden walkway. It still smelled strongly of raw rough-cut pine lumber, half-sweet and half-rotten. Livia paid for the horses with a handful of sestertii and a wan smile. The company dispersed.

I drew Fisk aside.

‘Might be you should outride a bit on one of the fresh ponies, check out our front trail.’

He looked at me, his face devoid of any expression. ‘No.’

‘Fisk, it’s a terrible weight you bear and it will only get—’

He bowed his head, and when he raised it again his jaw was clenched, but he didn’t have a murderous air about him. Maybe the Crimson Man was there, maybe not. Fisk’s mouth didn’t fill with flame, his eyes didn’t ignite with hatred. Maybe he had whupped the
daemon
, at least for the moment.

‘If I outride, I’ll never turn back.
He
won’t let me.’ He stopped. ‘You got some cacique?’

‘’Course.’

He held out his hand.

I went to Bess and retrieved the bottle in which I keep my supply. I handed it to him.

‘You told me there was water in this.’

‘Huh? Might’ve. It’s expensive. Gotta ride west of Harbor Town to get it.’

He pulled the cork with his teeth and spat it at me. It bounced off my forehead and rolled into the hay.

He put the bottle to his mouth and drank, long pulls, his throat working up and down painfully. When he was done he went to a rough pine bench, sat, and rolled a cigarette on his knee.

‘I’ll keep this here with me, pard.’ Then he tucked his tobacco pouch back in his vest and popped the cigarette in his mouth. He dug in his shirt pocket for a match.

I waited, watching him.

‘Do I need to hobble you?’ I was only partially joking.

He laughed, patting the bottle. Cigarette smoke curled around his head. ‘You already have.’

‘Keep an eye on the stretcher, will you?’

He nodded and hefted the bottle again.

I went in search of dinner for the both of us and some charcoal for the farrier’s brazier. It was going to be a cold night.

The Croesus Hotel and Saloon was a nice place – done up in the Hellenic style with columns everywhere – with crystal chandeliers and a polished mahogany bar that spanned twenty feet if it spanned an inch. A wide-open room with tables where men and women, gentlefolk and labourers, all mingled together without strife or umbrage. The open area mirrored the bar. Grand stairs, at the rear of the building, led up toward what I could only assume were the lodging rooms. Liveried clerks and baggage boys – all bearing the Croesus crest – scampered to and fro, offering patrons assistance. Two bully boys stood to either side of the front door.

The hotel smelled of roasted meat and beer and good tobacco.

I had purchased a wheel of cheese and some bread at the bar and was sorely tempted to draw out my time with a small libation, yet I resisted. I was saddened by the fact I wouldn’t be sleeping there on clean sheets and drinking whiskey in the warmth of the saloon.

I left there with great reluctance. My time on the
Cornelian
had clearly softened me.

Along the main thoroughfare, I found the general mercantile – also owned by Croesus and Company – and bought some withered apples for Bess and a sooty gunnysack full of charcoal.

It was full dark and freezing when I returned to the stables. Fisk was dead drunk, insensible in the hay. So I broke off some cheese and bread, wrapped them in cloth, and placed them by him, should he awake in the night. I filled the brazier with coals and lit it, enjoying the heat radiating off the metal. After I had warmed my extremities and eaten, I went to the wagon, removed the bag of stones, and placed them in the coals to heat.

After a moment of consideration, I walked over to Fisk and gingerly removed the bottle from the crook of his arm. He had consumed enough for four men to become drunk. There was enough left for me to take a swig or two to fend off the cold.

I felt content and as happy as possible as I placed the warm rocks on Agrippina, massaged her arms and legs, and then wrapped myself in coarse woollen blankets and fell asleep in the hay.

I’m sound asleep and snoring when he rises on silent legs. He stands over me for a long time, looking down at my small form wrapped in grey blankets. Had I been awake, I would have worried. He leans over me and the
daemon
hand turns on its hasp, catching on its obsidian surface the thin, sharp light seeping into the stables from the blue stars. When I shift in my sleep, he grins a terrible smile and walks out into the night, coatless, his hand on his six-gun. Still grinning.