Spellslinger--Legends of the Wild, Weird West Read online

  Spellslinger

  Legends of the Wild, Weird West

  Joseph J. Bailey

  Contents

  Author’s Note

  The Earth’s Anvil

  The Hills Have No Eyes

  Hang ’Em High, Bury ’Em Low

  Before

  A Brief Aside

  On Wicked Wings

  On the Range

  To Sky’s End

  Where There’s a Will

  Lueffa

  Another Day on the Trail

  Heart’s Fire

  Reconnaissance

  A Man and His Bullets

  Ducking and Weaving

  Retreat

  An Unwelcome Return

  One in the Crowd

  Off on the Left Foot

  At Home on the Range

  Up in Smoke

  Riding Off into the Sunrise

  Leave-Taking

  One Man, Two Guns

  First Camp

  Art and Artifice

  Illusions Shattered

  The Gun and Only the Gun

  Havoc

  More Desolate than the Desert

  Emptiness Inside and Out

  A Life Between Worlds

  Onward but Not Upward

  Word and Deed

  What Next?

  A Lifetime in the Desert

  Words Without Saying

  A Party Divided

  A Man and His Guns

  Things That Go Bang in the Night

  Hellfire Before the Range

  A Snake in the Grass

  Almost the End

  An Eye for an Eye

  Ascent

  Dragon’s Den

  A Final Surprise

  Bound and Determined

  Return

  Ahead an Ending

  Kiersaegian’s Ghost

  Childhood’s End

  Reunited

  To Take Arms

  On the Horizon

  Also by Joseph J. Bailey

  Help Spread the Word!

  Glossary of Terms - People, Places, and Things

  About the Author

  Synopsis

  Author’s Note

  This is a work of fiction.

  * * *

  Your life is a work of fact.

  Do justice to life’s adventure.

  The Earth’s Anvil

  I woke to the buzzing of flies.

  The sound reverberated through my head like echoes from another world.

  * * *

  I could not open my eyes.

  * * *

  Where was I?

  Why was I here?

  Why couldn’t I move?

  Where were my guns?

  * * *

  My head felt heavy and leaden, stuffed with gauze.

  My tongue was swollen and unresponsive, like it belonged to someone else.

  I hurt all over.

  My brain felt loose, severed from its moorings. I worried that, if I moved too quickly, it might detach.

  My lips were parched, scabbed, cracked, and bound. The metallic taste of blood-soaked fabric filled my mouth as I struggled to move them.

  The sun was a hammer above, beating down relentlessly.

  The earth was an anvil taking the sun’s blows.

  I was caught in the middle.

  My skin was unbearably hot, burning from exposure from my scalp to my chin.

  Insects crawled all over my head, the tingling of many tiny legs sending pulses of unwelcome sensations that I could not scratch. Others bit, leaving bright lancets of pain that I could not dislodge or shake off.

  Lowering my cheeks and raising my brow, I finally managed to open my eyes.

  * * *

  I was buried up to my neck in dirt.

  And I couldn’t remember how I’d gotten here.

  The Hills Have No Eyes

  I was alone.

  There was no one as far as I could see.

  At least in front of me.

  If there was someone behind me, they were doing an excellent job of being silent.

  Having spent much of my career being silent, and ferreting out those who were, I knew no one was that good without the help of magic.

  And even then, people generally had better things to do than waste their Craft watching a man buried alive slowly dying in the desert.

  Few men were patient enough to wait in silence long enough to watch a man die from exposure.

  Even ’slingers.

  Also, they must have spent the last few weeks rolling in dirt, because I couldn’t smell ’em.

  In the desert, not being able to smell a man was a surefire indication that he was more than he seemed.

  And more was seldom better.

  * * *

  Desolate hills stretched as far as I could see.

  Rugged mesas resisted the harsh wind and the sun perched atop a few of the higher hills, their cracked ochre faces decorated in the swirling lines and cathedral buttressing of entrada sandstone.

  Ruddy orange earth pocked with the occasional struggling bit of vegetation or the shimmering facets of crystalline aeryavores filled in the gaps.

  Rather like I filled in the gaps inside this hole.

  Hang ’Em High, Bury ’Em Low

  The cretins who’d put me here had done a pretty good job.

  I’d give ’em that.

  The earth was packed tightly up to my neck.

  I couldn’t move my fingers, my hands, or my arms.

  They’d taken their time digging the hole, putting me in, and filling in the dirt.

  But they hadn’t transmuted the earth to rock.

  I wasn’t maimed, poisoned, bleeding out, or being watched by someone ready to snuff me out.

  They hadn’t finished the job.

  They hadn’t killed me when they had the chance.

  Their mistake was my reward.

  And I would be theirs.

  * * *

  I could breathe.

  Each breath brought me life and a bit more room to breathe.

  Slowly lifting my shoulders, I felt the ground’s weight all around me, and the parched earth cracked as dirt spilled down in small piles that would embarrass the lowliest of ants.

  Not being an ant, I wasn’t embarrassed.

  Just furious.

  Gaining a little space, I began to rock back and forth.

  I had nothing but time and the opportunity to use it.

  Unless I died of thirst or was eaten first.

  * * *

  For once, being entirely unwholesome had probably saved my life.

  There wasn’t much in the desert that licked its chops at the sight of old, worn shoe leather…much less a desiccated pile of dried-out leather that looked more like a misshapen old stone than a delicate morsel of human flesh.

  My survival was a testament to how entirely unpalatable life in the saddle could make a man.

  Not even the vultures would have me.

  Before

  The swinging doors of the saloon rocked shut behind me, the beat of the wood against its worn partner providing a counterpoint to my boots on the scarred and pitted floor as I approached the bar.

  Though the bar was crowded, only a few eyes glanced toward me.

  The place was full of the usuals out on the Skaelyrian Wastes—corded cerulean therans, their massive frames far too large to be crammed into the childish stalls within which they hunched, engaged in animated conversations; luminous cuythia, their crystalline facets putting off more light than the wisplights scattered liberally around the bar’s periphery; fey woden, accompanied by clouds of spirits, as out of place her
e as trees upon the desert plains; and ghostly xyeres, spectral clouds resembling something like the shadow of a thunderstorm that had yet to burst, but could at any moment, among many others.

  All were heavily armed.

  Almost all were just as heavily armored.

  Ghost’s Gulch was not exactly the most welcoming of towns.

  Situated between craggy twin mesas that funneled the majority of hapless travelers insane enough to venture out into the Wastes from the almost as uninhabitable Periphery, Ghost’s Gulch was about as attractive as a pile of dusty dragon scat.

  Or whatever grew out of dusty dragon scat.

  I made my way to the bar, my gait easy and loose.

  There was no tension in my mind.

  There was no tension in my body.

  There was no tension around me.

  I put everyone at ease.

  There would be no violence because none was in me.

  I found an unoccupied spot at the bar, the stool having seen better days. I reckoned it had supported far too many therans in its time and was ready to be put out to pasture. Thankfully, I was not even a quarter the size of the average theran, so the stool’s protests were only minor as I took a seat.

  “What’ll ya have?”

  The barkeep wasted no time seeking my business.

  As quickly as people came and went here, often not coming back, he was keen on getting his coin while he could.

  “A drogma. Chilled if you have it.”

  “Only steamed, I’m afeared.”

  I gave a short nod, the wide brim of my hat doing my talking for me.

  I set two bits on the burnished counter in anticipation of his return.

  After bustling behind the bar for a few moments, he came back with a steaming thick mug overtopped with greenish golden foam.

  Setting the tankard down with a hearty thunk, he asked, “Anythin’ else?”

  I lifted the mug and took a deep pull, savoring the rich mixture of tastes and smells, the always surprising vibrancy in the draft.

  I gave a short nod.

  The barkeep leaned over, eager for more coin.

  But I wasn’t paying.

  At least not for drinks.

  I set two more bits down on the burnished counter.

  “Can ya tell me where ta find Talen D’uene?”

  The barkeep paused for a moment, an instant too long, and smiled affably, his face split by a ready, if false, grin. “Last I heard, he was out at the Sky’s End Ranch.”

  Something was wrong.

  I knew when to trust my hunches.

  They were often all that kept me from lying face-down in the dirt.

  He wasn’t telling the whole story…or at least, not all he knew of it.

  “Talen didn’t come here too much, truth be told.”

  That, at least, was the truth.

  I touched the tip of the brim of my hat with two fingers and gave a slight nod. “Thankee.”

  The bartender saw the emerging hardness in my eyes and quickly bustled away, ready to please patrons more inclined to being pleased.

  I sipped my drink.

  Tomorrow I would head to the ranch.

  A Brief Aside

  There was no reason for me to stay at the bar.

  There were only two things I would find by tarrying—trouble, and more of it.

  The mood in the saloon had changed.

  I sensed it like a shift in the weather, the bursts of whipping winds before a storm, the drop in temperature before the skies darkened, the feeling of mounting pressure.

  Wiping my lips with the back of my hand, I stood to go.

  I followed the barkeep’s eyes to one of the local castoffs, a monster in need of violent release.

  Half again my height, the androsian was, as much as anything, a semi-intelligent pile of animated rock looking for something to grind to dust.

  How many times had this scene played out before?

  What percentage did the barkeep get of the take?

  Apparently I’d asked the wrong question…

  Or I was just to be a sacrifice to the local deities of rage and fury.

  Not in the mood for a service, or to have my pockets emptied, I nodded toward the local welcoming committee and gave a genuine smile.

  I showed all my teeth.

  They were nice and white.

  Pure…like my conscience.

  “Howdy.”

  I gave a slight nod in recognition.

  The androsian wanted none of my welcome.

  His friends were equally antsy to see a show.

  My initial arrival must have been witness to the evening’s prelude, calm anticipation before a show, a random victim chosen for the mob’s enjoyment.

  I’d drawn the short straw.

  I was to be the evening’s star.

  * * *

  There are many ways to dispel violence.

  You can anticipate its release and avoid it.

  You can offer superior force and overcome it.

  You can redirect it against its source.

  You can dissipate it with skill or words.

  Or you can cut it off at the root.

  I chose the latter.

  Mostly as a warning.

  But also because I could.

  There was a lesson to be had here.

  And I was the one doing the teaching.

  You don’t have to shoot a man to fell him.

  You don’t have to blast him with magic to break his resolve.

  Sometimes the sharpest knife is the full expression of your intent.

  Sometimes the most effective gun is the one you don't have to use.

  When the androsian cracked its mighty knuckles and continued stomping toward me, the bar’s floor shaking with its ponderous advance, I let everyone in the bar know one thing.

  Not to fool with me.

  Gathering my will, the depthless oden’el, and releasing it in a seething tumult, I bore into the androsian’s eyes with the ferocity of a hurricane, my glance cutting like knives, hardened steel slicing into his mind’s eye.

  The androsian fell to the floor with a thunderous shudder, a plume of dust rising from its fall.

  It was too big for me to step over, so I walked around his corpse without looking back.

  No one followed.

  On Wicked Wings

  I decided against staying in town.

  Some lessons are truly never learned.

  Where one weed is cut down, another will grow.

  If I stayed and got lucky, what passed for law in this forlorn outpost would crawl out from under whatever rock they were using for shelter and seek me out.

  They wouldn’t try to put me in jail; they’d ask for my help.

  By my honor as a ja’lel, I’d have to oblige.

  Not wishing to be honorable and follow the dictates of the ja’tet, I chose to leave.

  If I stayed and got unlucky, more of the local rabble would seek me out to try themselves against me.

  I didn’t want to have to kill them as well.

  The only ones happy then would be the law.

  Until more of their ilk came seeking even more trouble.

  What was best for everyone was me leaving.

  The town had achieved a relatively precarious equilibrium.

  The local ruffians had their fun with a few unfortunates but otherwise remained in check.

  If I came in and stirred up the hornet’s nest, the only ones hurt would be innocents.

  So I left.

  At least for now.

  * * *

  The swinging doors of the Lone Pine Saloon quickly rocked to stillness behind me as I stood on the saloon’s shaded front stoop with the entirety of Ghost’s Gulch spread before me.

  Taking a deep breath, I took in the glorious view. From Lazo’s Feed & Fixins to the Great Salt Flats Bank, the town was nothing more than two rows of storefronts meeting at a random point in the desert where a mining trail happened to cross a cattle
run. The opposing shops glared at one another across an open expanse of packed dirt like two worn armies not yet engaged.

  Ghost’s Gulch was a joyous union of cattle offal and mine tailings that only the Wastes can produce.

  Adding motion to the buildings’ stillness, horses, bots, beasts, and assorted unnamed contraptions were either tethered in front of shops or making their way down the dusty lane.

  Few strollers braved the evening or the heat.

  I brought my fingers to my lips and let out a shrill whistle, most of its timbre lost to human ears.

  Then I waited.

  * * *

  The sky above wavered and shimmered in the heat, too bright to look at for long.

  I did not care to stare into its depths. I spent enough of my time squinting at the desert’s fiery cauldron. I only looked if necessary.

  My last brief glance had told me that a small speck had detached from the heavens and was growing rapidly, approaching in a spiraling loop—a tiny burning ember resembling nothing more than a piece of the sun’s own unquenchable fire come to Ilaeria.