Chapter Twelve

Bargain!

Jed launched himself at his little host with a view to throttling information out of him. But he found he couldn’t get near him. An invisible force field pushed Jed back. His shoulder hit the shimmering wall - the sensation of wetness soaked through his shirt but when he moved away, the fabric was dry. The blue light appeared as the sphere and hovered menacingly over Jed until Not-Wyatt waved it away.

“I think this shape has outworn its usefulness,” he said. “Now that I have your full attention, Jed.”

“I don’t care if you dress yourself up as the sugar plum fairy. What have you done with my Horse?”

Not-Wyatt didn’t respond. His legs and torso elongated, and the clothes along with them. Jed saw that they weren’t clothes; they were part of the being itself. The being’s arms sprouted like tree branches in a hurry. Its chest broadened and its head changed shape: the jaw became squarer, the forehead higher, the hair faded out of existence.

Jed’s mouth fell open. The being rippled like one of the walls. The skin tones whitened and then turned to ice. Or glass.

“Farkin!” Jed gasped to see the face of his old enemy. “Farkin Plisp!”

The colourless face contorted in smile, like a disturbance on a puddle.

“Not quite, Jed. The name’s Farkin, all right. Farkin Shish.”

“What? You two brothers or something?”

Farkin Shish waved a hand, like a dismissive ice sculpture. A faint blue light glowed in the centre of his head. Not his brain exactly, Jed knew, but the location of his mind and what humans call their heart when they mean their emotional impulses and not the muscle that pumps blood around their bodies.

“Those kind of relationship descriptors mean nothing to us. We are Farkin. He was Plisp; I am Shish.”

“You look so much like him. Folks must get you confused all the time.”

“Not so much,” said Shish. “I don’t get out much.”

Jed sneered. “That’s not what I heard. You been terrorising whole towns, taking their babies.”

Shish interrupted, scandalised. “One baby! One damned baby! That was all I wanted. And I let his parents keep him for ten years. Humans are always blowing things out of proportion.”

The blue light in his head flared red until his anger subsided.

“Why did you want him? And then, why did you give him back for ten years?”

“The time wasn’t right.” Shish was sulking. “And then when the time came, those people welshed on the deal. They ran away - can you believe that?”

“Sure can. The time for what?” Jed was keen to keep Shish on topic. Eyes like glass marbles regarded him, unblinking. The light in his head turned yellow.

“My, you are a nosey one, Jed. You’re my guest here and all you do is subject me to question after question after question.”

“Just trying to figure this all out. And what the hell it’s got to do with me and my Horse.”

“You killed my - what did you call him? - brother. We’ll call him that if it gives you some inkling of how close we were, how important he was to me.”

“I ain’t going to apologise.” Jed spat. The blue sphere rushed at Jed like a dog on the attack but Shish subdued it with a gesture. The sphere retreated and dissolved into mist but it remained hovering, giving Jed the impression of being watched.

“Quite so, Jed. My brother had gone bad. You did your world and mine a service. I should thank you, I suppose. Instead I am going to ask for your help.”

Jed was already shaking his head. There was no way he would help this - this glass head - with anything.

“Don’t be so negative, Jed; you don’t even know what I’m proposing.”

“I ain’t interested.”

“Not interested in getting your Horse back? I find that impossible to believe.”

“If it means helping you, I don’t care if I never see that critter again.”

Shish’s light flashed red. With a conscious effort, he calmed it to a tranquil green. “Don’t be a damned fool.” The voice was calm and contained but Jed could see Shish was as volatile as Plisp had been. “Would you like to see him, Jed? Would you like to see your Horsey-Worsey before you make any rash decisions?”

Jed stopped himself from answering right away. He would love to see his Horse again and Shish knew it.

“It won’t change my mind,” Jed shrugged. “So what’s the point?”

Shish emitted a sound that was half-grunt and half-sigh. The green light darkened. “Humans can be so... immutable. I think this will make you think again.”

He placed a hand on the wall. The surface shimmered and an image stretched from floor to ceiling until the entire wall was filled with a picture of Horse. Jed gasped. Horse was in some kind of stall. His legs were tethered and his neck was in a yoke. Thick cables stretched across his back. Horse was completely immobilised.

“You may have noticed he’s not been quite himself of late. He was merely answering my call. It was so easy to get him into the tunnel.”

Jed craned his neck, trying to see the whole wall at once. The point of view changed, homing in on Horse’s head. His mouth was slack around the bit between his teeth. His eyes were open and expressionless.

The top of his head was off.

“You scalped him?”

The wall filled with a view of Horse’s open skull. The brain was twitching with a slow, slow pulse.

“What the hell are you doing to him?” Jed roared in anger. He reached for Shish - perhaps violence would get some answers and put a stop to this horror. “Where is he? Take me to him!”

The blue mist became several smaller spheres. They circled Jed, forming a barrier between him and Shish.

“Cast your mind back, Jed. To the time of Horse’s making. He’s a cut above others of his kind, isn’t he? There are horses and there are Horses, but only one Horse like yours. And why’s that, Jed? What makes him so special, so gifted and powerful?”

Jed paled. He knew exactly what Shish was referring to. In his experiments on the young Farkin Plisp, old Doc Brandy had extracted something from the boy and used it to create Jed’s Horse.

Shish didn’t need to read Jed’s thoughts to see the gunslinger understood.

“That’s right, Jed; all this time you’ve been riding around on a piece of my brother. Your Horse is what he is because he’s part-Plisp. He’s part-Farkin.”

“That don’t mean you should cut him up,” said Jed. “Ain’t no need for cruelty - but then you Farkins are cold-hearted varmints.”

“We can swap insults until the cows come home,” Shish sounded bored, “or we can talk business. I want certain things and you want your Horse - don’t bother trying to deny it. Look at him, up there. Oh, he’s not in any pain - there are no nerve endings in the brain; did you know that? But his heart is broken, Jed. He wonders why you don’t come and save him. Isn’t that what you do, Jed? Save people? Save the day? Save your friend?”

Jed was grinding his teeth. The chain of little blue spheres circled him, keeping him at bay.

“What things?” he set his square jaw. “You said you want certain things.”

“Oh, good,” Farkin Shish smiled, baring teeth like ice cubes. The light in his head glowed like a sapphire in the sun. “You’re becoming more open to negotiations.”

“Just tell me!” Jed snapped. He couldn’t bear to see Horse in that position and kept his gaze averted.

“You’ll get your Horse back, minus the Plisp, of course - oh, you won’t tell the difference. He’ll be as good as new. Really; there’s no need to look so sceptical.”

“What,” Jed’s chest was tight and his fists were clenched, “do you want from me?”

Shish smiled. It was almost sweet. The wall clouded and changed. The horrifying images of Horse were replaced by a picture of Wyatt.