The outlaw clutched a child’s doll, the small figurine of a lady, its body stuffed with cotton and garbed in a tattered plaid dress. The doll’s head was wooden, crudely carved the way Robby might have carved a toy for Patrick, the face painted on and badly chipped, the crown topped by a tiny red bonnet.
Bad Whiskey’s face quivered. “A doll?”
“I got a feeling that ain’t the Char Stone,” said Duck.
“A doll!” Bad Whiskey wailed. He threw the figurine to the ground.
The outlaw’s cry was so furious it seemed to kick a fierce wind across Bone Ridge. Then suddenly he hunched over, his arm clutched to his chest, his face cast down in darkness. His hat tumbled off his head.
Bad Whiskey’s body was racked with spasms.
“Um, fellas, what’s happening to him?” asked Duck.
“No clue, but I don’t like it,” said Nat.
A second gale ripped across the graveyard. Granite tombstones and wooden crosses shook; fieldstones along the wall crumbled. The black locust trees beyond the wall moaned and crackled. Cutter’s hand fell to his scabbard as if to draw his knife; Keech heard him curse under his breath when he realized the blade was gone.
The thralls’ makeshift torches flickered and many blew out. The muttering thralls chomped and gabbled nervously.
Bad Whiskey lifted his head. Keech was shocked to see that his eyes had changed. The clouded dead eye had cleared, and both of the eyes now brimmed a brilliant shade of green.
Both eyes could also see.
Bad Whiskey stood upon Erin Blackwood’s coffin. His stance was different, his chest thrust out, his boots planted wide on the edges of the wooden box. Keech wondered if the doll had been the Char Stone after all, and had somehow revitalized Whiskey’s crumbling body. But then the outlaw spoke.
“Jeffreys.”
The hissing voice crawled over Keech’s skin like a nest of hairy spiders. It was the worst voice he had ever heard, a voice capable of conjuring nightmares—and it did not belong to Bad Whiskey Nelson.
“He has been here. He took my Stone!”
There was no doubt the voice Keech heard belonged to the Reverend Rose. He was speaking through Bad Whiskey’s mouth, looking through his eyes.
Rose noticed Keech standing at the foot of the grave. A single word crawled from the thing’s lips: “Blackwood.”
Keech froze in terror.
“You’re worse than your double-crossing father.”
Before Keech’s paralysis could break, Rose leaped from the grave and landed in front of him. The figure loomed, its impossible eyes blazing down upon him.
“Without the amulet, you’re no more dangerous than a horsefly.”
The Reverend Rose pulled the outlaw’s Dragoon. Whiskey’s thumb moved to the hammer.
This is it, Sam, Keech thought. I’ll see you soon.
Before the trigger finger could pull, the head of a shovel slammed into the back of the thrall’s head. There was a loud Chok! and Rose careened forward. The Dragoon flew from his hand and landed with a dull crash down in the gravesite of Keech’s parents.
Gripping the shovel, a bloodied John Wesley shouted, “Eat dirt, you mush-head!”
“John!” Cutter called.
Dropping low, John Wesley kicked at a thrall that lurched in front of him. Two rotten creatures rattled after Duck, but Nat put them on the ground with two mighty punches. Keech tried to join the Embrys, but a pair of hands seized his throat. He threw a glance at his attacker. It was Pa Abner.
“Pa, no,” Keech said, his airway choked. “Turn me loose.”
The sound of two dozen crows cackling in fury pierced the night. Writhing in Pa’s grip, Keech saw the Reverend Rose push to his knees and slide over Erin Blackwood’s edge of the grave.
A spark of humanity flickered in Pa Abner’s eyes. His thick fingers relaxed around Keech’s neck, letting him pull free and gulp air. Pa gritted his teeth in pain.
Keech realized he should run. The others had already broken for the gate. He took a step after them, but his eyes remained on Pa. Waves of hope flooded his thoughts. If Bad Whiskey’s claim was true, that the Char Stone could restore his life and soul, then perhaps the Stone could return life—true life, not this obscene shambling imitation—to Pa Abner.
“Pa, come with me,” Keech panted.
Deep down, he knew this impossible hope was beyond foolish. Pa Abner had been explicit about the perils of the Stone. Forget you ever heard of it, the man had said. There could be no wielding it. There could be no touching it. Not without damnation to follow.
Perhaps there could be other ways. If Keech couldn’t use the Char Stone, perhaps there were other energies, other forms of magic.
“We’ll find a way to save you,” he told Pa. “Just come.”
The thrall shook his head. Crimson tears streamed from his eyes. He made a pair of fists and slammed them into his temples. He tried to speak, but the only sound he made was a tormented grunt.
“Keech, come on!” Nat called. He and the others were fighting through the Tsi’noo, but the sheer numbers threatened to overwhelm them all over again. Only John Wesley swinging his shovel cleared room for the group to advance.
A bullet zipped past Keech, slamming into a shambling corpse nearby. He glanced back and saw that the Reverend Rose had pulled himself over the lip of the gravesite and was firing Bad Whiskey’s Dragoon.
The Reverend’s voice slithered after him. “This ends now, Blackwood!”
His eyes hot with tears, Keech abandoned Pa Abner and ran after the others.
A snarling corpse jumped from behind a tombstone and blocked Keech’s path. He plowed into the creature shoulder-first. Black nails scratched at his face, scoring hot cuts across his cheek. He shoved the walking nightmare into an empty grave. “Back to your hole!” Keech screamed.
Another gunshot roared across the graveyard. This time the slug crashed into a nearby tombstone, showering Keech with granite. Glancing back, he saw that the Reverend Rose had gained a surprising amount of ground.
When Keech looked ahead, he noticed the other young riders had scattered from sight—except for John Wesley, who stood his ground and spun in slow circles, his shovel cutting through thralls with concentrated force.
“Back, you monsters,” the large boy cried. The shovel’s edge tore through a blackened corpse in a buckskin jacket. The buckskin snagged the iron spade head, throwing John Wesley off his feet. Within seconds, Bad Whiskey’s horde surrounded him.
“Hang on!” Keech yelled.
He barreled through the wave of bodies. He found John Wesley on his hands and knees, curled into a ball. “Get up!” He tugged at the boy’s arm.
John Wesley struggled to his feet. Through bleeding lips, he grinned and said to Keech, “I think I upset Bad Whiskey when I beaned him on the head.”
“That wasn’t Bad Whiskey,” Keech wheezed. “That was the Reverend Rose.”
“In the flesh,” a terrible voice hissed.
The horde of Tsi’noo parted, leaving Keech and John Wesley exposed. The Reverend Rose appeared in front of them. He held the Dragoon, cocked and ready. His voice burrowed like a worm into Keech’s ears.
“The sins of the fathers shall be visited on the heads of the children.”
“Now that’s hardly fair,” another voice called.
Nat Embry galloped up, astride Bad Whiskey’s stallion. When the animal saw the face of its longtime master, it reared like a mustang. The horse screamed in a way Keech had never heard from any animal before, but the anger of the steed couldn’t shake Nat. The horse kicked and spun, smashing into the thrall army. The rancher kept to the saddle.
“Filthy creature,” the Reverend Rose said, and turned Bad Whiskey’s Dragoon on the stallion. A crack of thunder smashed through Keech’s ears. The horse snorted with surprise. The stallion stumbled on one hoof and toppled forward, sending Nat flying.
“Nat!” Duck had followed her brother through a slew of thralls. Running beside her was Cutter, looking bruised and exhausted.
Keech released a howl and charged at the man wearing Bad Whiskey’s body. He expected to strike a figure of power. Instead, he felt like he was tackling a bag of pine straw. The dark exertions the Reverend Rose had wielded upon Whiskey’s body must have turned the outlaw into a desiccated husk. Keech dropped one knee on the figure’s chest.
“One day, Blackwood, we’ll meet, and then you’ll know true fear,” the monster inside Bad Whiskey promised.
“Looking forward to it,” Keech said. He raised his fist to crack it against the fiend’s rotten nose, but he paused the blow when he noticed the creature’s awful face changing. The left eye once again became a dead yellow; the right eye reeled about inside his skull. The Reverend Rose had withdrawn, leaving behind the mealy-mouthed rogue.
“Hello, Bad. I’m glad you’re back,” Keech growled. The outlaw struggled to raise the Dragoon, but Keech grabbed the barrel, twisted the gun from the thrall’s grip, and tossed it behind him. From the corner of his eye he saw John Wesley struggle to yank frantic thralls off Nat and Duck, but there was nothing Keech could do now but let them finish their battles. Bad Whiskey was at last where he wanted him.
The cursed outlaw kicked out and pain exploded in Keech’s back, allowing Whiskey to topple away. He fumbled on his knees to retrieve the Dragoon. Keech grabbed for him, but his fingers found only his tattered overcoat. He took hold of the skirt and tugged Whiskey back before he could seize the gun.
Screeching curses, the desperado dug his fingers into the earth. “Let me go!”
A glimmer of bright orange caught Keech’s eye. The amulets. They were peeking from a pocket in Bad Whiskey’s overcoat. Keech pulled with all his might.
The coat’s skirt tore loose with a loud rip, leaving Keech nothing but oilcloth in his hands. The outlaw’s fingers scrabbled forward and fell upon the Dragoon.
“Yer done for, pilgrim.”
“Think again.”
Cutter stood over Bad Whiskey, his eyes teeming with rage.
“This is for Bishop.” The boy slammed his boot against Bad Whiskey’s hand. With his other foot, he kicked the Dragoon out of reach.
Under the clouds, the Reverend’s crows flew closer and closer.
“In his coat!” Keech shouted at Cutter. “Let’s end this.”
Bad Whiskey bellowed as the boys dog-piled him and tore at his overcoat’s frail cloth. The outlaw struggled on his back. Around him, his thralls lingered, as if unsure of what to do. He released a woeful sound of frustration and defeat.
“Have mercy!” Bad Whiskey shrieked. “I just wanted peace!”
Keech put a hand on Cutter, pausing their attack. The words he spoke next were from Ezekiel 7:25. He spoke them calmly.
“Destruction cometh, Whiskey Nelson. ‘They shall seek peace, and there shall be none.’”
Then, with two strong tugs, Keech and Cutter ripped the remains of the overcoat off Bad Whiskey’s body.
The amulets tumbled from the outlaw’s pocket as the garment split into pieces, landing feet away from the outlaw. No sooner did they land than the Reverend’s crows released a mind-shredding noise, as if dozens of frantic clocks had suddenly bellowed a nightmarish hour. They descended upon Bad Whiskey like mad vultures.
“Boss, no!” Bad Whiskey screamed. He held up his single arm, a desperate attempt to ward off the giant birds. The crows feasted on their prey, attacking every inch of him, stripping away Whiskey’s flesh with their scythelike talons.
“The amulets!” Cutter shouted, as the mayhem of crows churned around them. “If we don’t get them, we’ll be torn apart!”
The boys dived under the cackling cloud. A pair of warped talons scrabbled for Keech’s neck. He rolled sideways, barely escaping them. When he looked up, he was face-to-face with a howling Bad Whiskey, engulfed by a whirlwind of black feathers.
The outlaw no longer resembled a human being. The crows had picked him down to nothing but bone. For Keech, time seemed to halt. The monster’s black skull gazed at him and grinned.
“With a row de dow,” the outlaw skeleton sang, “he pays all his debts with a roll of his drum.” And then Bad Whiskey’s song was buried by the cackling of the crows.
A bright orange illumination filled Keech’s vision. The amulets lay nearby. He reached and wrapped his hand around a freezing charm. A few feet away, Cutter had done the same and was retreating back to safety.
The boys held the charms aloft, two fists against the onslaught.
The baleful flock flapped wildly away from the charms, an explosion of fleeing birds.
Across Bone Ridge Cemetery, the Tsi’noo crumbled.
The rotted sinew and muscle Bad Whiskey’s dark magic had woven together turned to dust and blew away. Bones cracked and fell apart, bodies collapsed. The victims of the Withers returned to their eternal slumber.
Nearby, John Wesley and the Embrys staggered to their feet. They gazed around, surprised. Keech looked up and saw the Reverend’s birds continue their retreat into the dark October sky. In the place where the crows had descended, nothing remained of Bad Whiskey Nelson.
* * *
The young riders reunited, bleeding and bruised, at the center of the graveyard. The murder of crows continued to circle above them, but they kept their distance, watching.
“Why did they back off?” Duck asked, gazing at the sky.
Keech and Cutter held out their hands and showed her the shards. They were still glowing, but only faintly.
“The crows won’t come near them,” Keech said.
“But the crows tore Bad Whiskey apart. Why would Rose kill his own man?” John Wesley asked.
“I’m not so sure Whiskey was Rose’s man,” Keech replied. “He used to be a loyal member of the Gita-Skog. At least till the day he died. Till Screamin’ Bill—my real pa—killed him. But something changed. When Bad thought he’d found the Stone, he boasted he was gonna use its power to regain his life and soul and free himself from the Reverend.”
Nat shook his head. “So Bad Whiskey had planned to betray Rose?”
Keech shrugged. “I’m not sure he planned to use the Stone for his own purpose. Not till he realized he could use it to restore his own life.”
“That must have been the final straw,” Duck said.
Cutter scurried to the place where Bad Whiskey had perished. “My knife!” He picked up his lost blade and slipped it back into its sheath. “I thought it was gone for good.”
John Wesley frowned. “Now what?” Small cuts covered his face and neck from battling thralls, but all his normal color had returned.
Before Keech could answer, a lonely voice drifted across Bone Ridge.
“Keech.”
He couldn’t believe his ears. He spun around, in search of the voice.
With Bad Whiskey’s defeat, every thrall had keeled over, lifeless. The idea that one might somehow still be alive had never occurred to him.
The weakened voice called again. “My boy, I’m here.”