Chapter 3

Something loud pounded at Caleb’s skull, drawing him out of a fitful sleep. His usual nightmares faded slowly, and the sound of church bells mingled with the remembered bellow of cannon fire for long confusing moments.

“Caleb? Caleb! I think you ought to wake up.” Ernst’s voice prodded him fully awake finally, and he opened his eyes to find the jackalope perched on the bedside table, staring out the single window. “Something’s happening. Everyone’s running to the church, and the bell is pealing.”

“It’s not Sunday. . . .” Caleb pushed himself upright, reaching for his shirt. He made a mental note to find out if there was a laundry in town. This shirt was on its last legs, and the one stuffed in his saddlebags was worse.

Dressed and armed with both gun and staff, Caleb followed the last of the townsfolk to their church, where a small crowd surrounded a rather shaken-looking family of five. The two little girls clung to their mother’s skirts, and the boy, barely ten, did his best to stand next to his father and look manly. There was no mistaking the pallor of his cheeks or the shock in his wide eyes, though.

Abel Warner was also present, giving orders from the back of his sleek transport, calling for townsfolk to fetch food and water for the new arrivals, sending someone after the doctor, who had yet to appear. Standing at strategic intervals, their hands resting idly on their guns, his armed thugs kept wary eyes out.

Caleb slid into the crowd next to Hector, keeping his voice low. “What’s going on?”

“Anderson family. They’ve got a homestead up in the foothills, and the reds hit them last night. They hid until first light, then made their way in on foot. Took them more’n three hours of walking to get here.”

“Anyone hurt?”

“Doesn’t look like it. Just scared them to death. Don’t know what’s left of their place, though.” Hector shook his head, his eyes grim. “Third homestead hit this month.”

Caleb clapped the shopkeeper on the shoulder and edged his way through the crowd. As he got closer, he saw Ernst already clasped tightly in the smallest child’s arms, the jackalope’s antlers visibly vibrating with his soothing purr. The children, at least, were enchanted with the furry creature enough to forget about their harrowing experience. That was the purpose of Ernst’s small, furry forms. When he was cute and nonthreatening, people would embrace him easily, and he was able to soothe distress with simple contact. With the children taken care of, Caleb could focus on the adults.

Warner had dismounted and stood talking to the father. “I’ll take my boys out to your place, Allen, and we’ll see what damage was done and what we can recover. Until you get back on your feet again, you know you’re more than welcome to stay out at my place. I’ve got plenty of room.”

“Thank you, Abel. I . . . Thank God no one was hurt, but . . . I just don’t know what we’re going to do. They took the cows, and there’s no time to plant new crops before winter, and . . .” Allen Anderson had the bleak look of a man who could only stare up at the cliff he’d just been pushed off. Rescue was far enough away to seem merely an illusion.

Warner’s glance landed on Caleb as he reached the front of the throng. “Ah, Peacemaker! There you are. I’m taking a bunch of the lads out to Anderson’s place. We could use a man of your skills, if you’d like to come along.”

“Thank you, Mr. Warner. I think I’ll do that.” He transferred his staff to his left hand to shake Anderson’s. “Mr. Anderson, I’m Caleb Marcus, the new Peacemaker for the region. I’m very glad your family wasn’t harmed.”

“Thank you, sir. So am I.” Power flickered between the two men where their hands touched. Anderson’s fear was augmenting what would normally be a mediocre ability at best into something spiky and unpredictable. Spurred by the man’s highly emotional state, it was nearing dangerously overloaded levels. Anderson would have no idea how to control that much power.

Caleb narrowed his eyes in concentration, feeding back along the channels to smooth the jagged edges in the other man’s power, bleeding off the excess energy through Caleb’s own body. The last thing they needed was the homesteader exploding out of sheer nerves.

Tension went out of the other man’s shoulders, and he gulped air like he’d been running for miles. His grip tightened on Caleb’s, squeezing hard. “Thank you,” he whispered, glancing toward his wife and children. “I don’t know how much longer I could have held on. The children are in the same state, and I couldn’t . . .”

The Peacemaker nodded, patting him on the shoulder. “It’s all right. That’s why I have Ernst.”

The jackalope flicked a glance toward Caleb at the sound of his name, but never stopped his chirpy little purr. They’d done this before, the pair of them, and Ernst knew just what needed to be done for the children during such a tragedy. The sparks of bled-off power were visible at the ends of his fur, dissipating in tiny snaps of static electricity. The longer the children stroked his silky coat, the calmer they became, their fear and agitation channeled away through the body of Caleb’s familiar.

“I’ll get my transport, Mr. Warner, and I’ll meet you back here.” He paused long enough to speak to Mrs. Anderson and give smiles to the little ones. The presence of the jackalope seemed to have bolstered them, and some life came back to their wide, staring eyes. “Ernst, are you coming with me or staying here?”

“I’ll stay with the children if that’s all right.”

Caleb hesitated, mentally mapping out the distance he intended to cover that day. If his bond with Ernst had a limit, they had yet to find it, but he still felt uneasy about being too far apart from his familiar for long. Still, the children needed all the comfort they could get, and he would be able to feel the connection to the little jackalope even at great distance. It would be nothing for him to simply pop to Caleb’s side if necessary. “I’ll call you if I need you.”

The hauler-turned-transport raised some eyebrows among Warner’s men, but Caleb just shrugged. “My transport is being repaired. This was what was available for rent.”

Warner frowned at that. “Isby? You’re having Isby repair your transport?”

“He is the smith.”

“The man is scoured, Agent Marcus. Surely you realized that. You can’t be an arcanosmith without power.” The rancher sidled his transport closer to Caleb’s. “You bring your transport out to my ranch. I have my own arcanosmith there.”

“Thank you, sir, but if Mr. Isby says he can repair it, then I believe him.”

Warner’s lips thinned. “Suit yourself.”

With a bit more organizing, the scouting party was off. Caleb found himself surrounded by at least fifteen of Warner’s men, all of whom looked like they would just as soon knife someone in a dark alley as not. A handful of the townsmen also rode out with them, giving Caleb the comfort of additional witnesses, but he regretted Ernst’s absence. An extra pair of loyal eyes would have been welcome.

He paid special attention to a slender man on a gleaming new transport who caught up to the group about a mile outside of town. Though it was hard to tell with the man mounted, he looked to be a good foot shorter than Caleb and as rail thin as a youth. Beneath the wide brim of his hat, his face was smooth and soft like a boy’s, and even shadowed, his eyes were so pale as to be almost colorless. The cold, empty gaze flickered across Caleb for no more than a heartbeat and dismissed him just as quickly, but that brief encounter gave the Peacemaker shivers despite the early morning heat. Even without the buffalo rifle strapped to his saddle, there would no mistaking Kaspar Schmidt. The man fell in at Warner’s side, and the group never slowed their pace.

The ride would have been long even if Caleb had been on a proper transport. As it was, the hauler’s girth was exceedingly uncomfortable, and when they’d progressed into the foothills after an hour, the thing’s cumbersome bulk made travel over the rocks and hills more difficult than it would have been with a lighter mount. At least it was cooler in the hills, with the searing heat of the prairie left behind them for the moment.

The purple mountains loomed over them like giants who had just noticed the insects crawling around their feet. As Caleb carefully navigated his mount through the brush and branches, he had the distinct feeling that they were being watched, and that the watcher did not approve of their presence. He took a tighter grip on his staff, resting the butt of it in his stirrup.

He was not the only one unnerved. Most of the men loosened their guns in their holsters, flickers of blue light dancing over the bullets in their cylinders. More than a few murmured under their breath, their eyes searching the thickening undergrowth for hostile natives.

The wildlife scattered ahead of the wheeze and gasp of the arcane-fueled gears and the incessant tromping noise of their transports’ metal hooves. They deserted their perches and hiding places in flocks and droves, fleeing from the band of invaders. Even the wind stilled until the only sound was the steady snap and crackle of mashed branches and twigs. Anyone could have been there in the shadows, and it would have been impossible to tell. Caleb resisted the urge to send a seeking surge out through the trees, not certain he truly wanted the answer.

Whatever watched them—be it red Indians, brave and curious wildlife, or the mountains themselves—it left them alone. They followed a barely visible wagon track into the trees, climbing steadily upward for another forty-five minutes before they came upon the Andersons’ homestead.

The house itself still stood. That much was a blessing. Perhaps even the Indians were loath to burn the place in the tinder-dry forest.

“Higgins, Randolph, take watch. I don’t want anyone sneaking up on us.” Warner dismissed two of his men, who circled wide around the cleared area, presumably taking up watch posts. Schmidt dismounted, collecting his rifle, and surveyed the trees that towered over them. There was no mistaking the calculating look in his cold eyes as he also chose a place to perch and watch.

Caleb swung down off his mount, his muscles complaining loudly about their mistreatment, but he was careful not to grimace or limp. Maintaining any sort of authority was going to be tough enough around Warner, who was obviously used to being obeyed without question.

The Anderson family had a small house, obviously made out of logs hewn from the very spot on which it stood. There was a little outbuilding to the north, surrounded by a fence, where presumably they had kept their cows. The fence itself had been largely destroyed, with lengthy sections of wood splintered into nothing and posts yanked out of the ground entirely.

Their garden to the south had likewise been trampled. It had taken painstaking work to cut fertile ground out of the rocky soil, and there was a clear path to a nearby stream where they had run metal piping to bring water to the parched plants in an effort to help them survive. All of that was in vain now, and the food plants were mashed into the dirt clods beneath. Mangled bits of metal, the remains of an arcane-powered water pump, were scattered across the garden. It was impossible to tell what the family had even intended to produce.

“Arrows here!” One of the men plucked a few shafts from the side of the house like errant porcupine quills. Several more were located, buried in the fence posts or broken underfoot in the melee.

“Let’s gather some clothes for them before the reds come back.” Several men disappeared into the house, while more took up positions of wariness, fingering their guns nervously.

Caleb crouched at the edge of the garden, planting his staff in the loose soil and leaning on it idly. There was another arrow at his feet, and he picked it up, rolling it between his fingers. The head was knapped from stone, precise slivers taken from each surface to give it a razor-sharp edge that shone almost like it was oiled. The shaft was straight, and Caleb let it rest on the tip of one finger, finding it perfectly balanced. The feathers and head had been bound on with cotton thread.

Frowning, the Peacemaker looked at the garden again. The tracks of the panicked cows were obvious among the slaughtered vegetables. The terrified bovines had been stampeded through the garden multiple times. But nowhere did he see the spoor of any horses. Transport tracks were visible where they’d ridden in moments before, but those were heavier marks, perfectly round. Horses left more oval-shaped tracks, uneven and chipped where their hooves had worn away. He rose and walked the full length of the garden to be sure, then went to inspect the corral, too.

Evidence of the cows was everywhere, from their dung to their tracks, but there was nothing to show that the Indians had ridden through. Only their arrows, and one lonely tomahawk found embedded in the side of the Andersons’ wagon.

They came in on foot. Approached silently in the dead of the night. It was possible. Though everything Caleb had learned of the local natives—the militant Dog Soldiers of the Cheyenne—indicated that they were a formidable cavalry. Why would they give up their mounts for this raid? It would sow so much more confusion having the big animals galloping around, trumpeting their shrill cries.

Investigating more of the recovered arrows showed that each of them bore the same fletching. They’re supposed to be unique, a different style for every brave. And they were tied with cotton thread, not sinew. They could have stolen it from anywhere. One of the other raided homesteads.

And where were the Andersons’ transports? They had a wagon; they had to at least have one hauler. Indians wouldn’t touch the transports, from what he’d been told; they were as cautious with the entrapped energies as any other sane people. On the west side of the little homestead, he found plate-sized hauler tracks and followed them south until they were lost in the rocks. There were smudges in the soil and underbrush, evidence that someone had walked along with the construct, leading it presumably, but Caleb was no tracker and could tell no more than that.

If they could find the construct, they could prove ownership by matching up the registration marks, but until that time, it was well and truly lost.

He debated for a long moment on summoning Ernst, and finally decided to leave his familiar where he was. He’d never seen an Indian raid site before, and perhaps the information he’d been given in the east was faulty. It wouldn’t have been the first time.

A bird called somewhere above him, the first sound of forest life he’d heard since entering the trees. Another answered it, directly to the south. It dawned on Caleb that he’d left the homestead behind in his search, so much that he could no longer hear the men’s voices behind him. The bird called again, to his right this time. Two careful notes, low then high, as if the creature were questioning.

And he knew, suddenly, that it was questioning. It was a signal, asking what to do about him, the stupid white man all on his own in the wilderness. Caleb froze, waiting for the answer. The forest was eerily silent and seemed to hold its breath along with him.

They were watching him. He could feel their eyes on him, imagined he could hear the hum of bowstrings held taut. From the south, the bird called again, the same two notes. “Low-high?” The nearer one answered with a cheery trill: “High-low-high!”

The runes on his staff flared to life as he channeled into it, markings of blue glowing against the dark wood. They provided a path, forcing the chaotic power into patterns, logical forms that could be used with exquisitely fine control. “Schild.”

Like the tumblers of a lock clicking into place, the air around him solidified into a shield, crystal clear and impenetrable. Only the sight of a few bushes curling their branches against an unseen surface indicated where the boundaries of his bubble were. His breath sounded tinny, as if his head were inside a large jar, and he knew he had a limited amount of time before his air ran out. Impenetrable meant that nothing got in, not even air.

Something moved to his left, and he snapped his head in that direction.

She sat not ten yards distant on the back of a painted horse, the animal’s brown and white markings seeming to be a pattern cast by the leaf-dappled sunshine. The large beast snorted softly, its nostrils fluttering as it tossed its head. Caleb saw that it had one blue eye and one brown, and it eyed him with the same mild curiosity as its rider. The Indian woman’s raven hair was twined into twin braids, hanging forward on each side of her neck, and her garments were clearly of tanned hides, decorated in subtle patterns with yellow and green quills. Her black eyes held no animosity as she stared at him, her head tilted slightly to one side.

Caleb stared at her, the first native he’d ever seen in person. He could see her tanned legs, bare between her high moccasins and the hem of her dress, muscled and strong. No white woman he’d ever seen would ride astride, much less with her skirts hiked up above her knees, but it seemed natural here in this wild place. Her hands were clenched in the horse’s mane, and the animal’s ears were perked forward, obviously waiting for some command from its rider. Where the sun touched her face, her skin glowed like warm honey.

They gazed at each other for long silent moments, two worlds touching for perhaps the first time. She didn’t seem angry, or even afraid, merely cautious. And the longer he looked, the more a glint of humor crept into her dark eyes. She found him amusing.

Abruptly, her head jerked up, and she stared over Caleb’s head in the direction of the Anderson homestead. A heartbeat later, he heard the voices, too.

“Peacemaker?”

“Agent Marcus?”

They had come looking for him, finally.

The southern bird called again, the question taking on an imperative tone. “Low-high?”

The Indian woman hesitated for one moment, glancing between Caleb and his would-be rescuers, and something in Caleb’s chest clenched. Go! Don’t let them find you here! Almost as if she heard him, she pursed her lips, whistling an answer. “High-low-low.” Nudging the horse with her knees, she backed it into the underbrush and disappeared.

Almost belatedly, Caleb remembered to dismiss his shield, letting the power trickle through the length of his staff into the ground beneath him. He could feel the spits and sparks of it die out abruptly, snuffed to nothing somewhere in the soil. There was nullstone in the mountains then, the chalky rock that could absorb and still any amount of power. It was far enough from the surface that it hadn’t hampered his abilities, but it was there nonetheless.

“Agent Marcus? Can you hear us?” They were getting closer. Caleb could hear several men crashing through the bushes, no doubt obliterating the tracks he’d so carefully followed to this spot.

“Yes! I’m here!” He glanced one last time to the tree where the Indian woman had sat watching him, but there was nothing to show she’d ever been there. Turning, he began the climb back up the hill.

They were townsfolk, not Warner’s men. Jack and Peter were very happy to see him, both of them eyeing the trees around as if they expected an entire tribe of Dog Soldiers to come barreling down on them at any moment.

“You shouldn’t wander off like that, Agent Marcus, not alone. The reds are all over this territory. I heard they can call down rockslides and flash floods to knock you clear off the mountain if they want.”

Caleb allowed them to herd him back toward the homestead and the safety of numbers, but his mind was on the woman and the simple curiosity in her dark eyes. He had the distinct feeling that he’d been weighed and measured somehow. Had he passed whatever test she’d imposed on him? Oh, Ernst, how I wish you’d have seen her.

“Ah, there you are Agent Marcus!” Warner and his men were already mounted, and Caleb was certain they’d have gladly left without him if not for the townsfolk’s insistence. “We were starting to get worried.”

“No worries. I was just doing a little scouting of my own.” He pointed in the vague direction he’d taken, hoping that no one would investigate. “I think they took the hauler toward the south, but I lost the trail in the rocks.”

Warner smirked. “Then let us hope they blow themselves to kingdom come with it. It’s no less than they deserve for terrorizing good and decent people like this.” He walked his transport to the head of the column that had formed, and Caleb found his own mount now hitched to the Andersons’ wagon. “I hope you don’t mind, but since we had a hauler, I thought we could take more of their belongings if we used the wagon.”

“No, not at all. I’d have suggested the same.” He clambered into the wagon, settling his staff in the seat beside him. Driving the contraption was far preferable to riding the huge hauler. “Back to town?”

“The Andersons were going to be taken to my place, and I’ve offered to feed the men lunch for their efforts today, as well.” Warner smiled, smoothing his mustache. “That includes you, of course.”

“A meal would be much appreciated. Thank you.” And he could get a look at the nearly fabled Warner ranch.

As they slowly made their way back down to the plains, Caleb almost felt guilty for taking such an instant dislike to Abel Warner without just cause. The man obviously went out of his way to help the people of Hope in their dire straits. But the tiny voice in the back of Caleb’s mind warned him to listen to his instincts and Ernst’s. Something was not as it seemed.

A cool breeze followed them out of the mountains, as if the land itself breathed a sigh of relief at their departure.