Long-press a paragraph to send danmaku
"Mei!" Amy's running at me, blonde braids flying. "Did you hear? Mr. Garrett's dead!"
I set the buckets down. Slow. Luke Hardee's at the Donovan wagon twenty feet behind her, hat off, talking low to Mrs. Donovan. She's wringing her apron and nodding toward my wagon.
He's already asking questions.
"Dead?" I manage.
"No blood left in him, Pa said." Amy drops her voice to a whisper. "Just like something *hunted* him."
Spiders don't take two gallons from a grown man.
I don't say that.
"Very sad," I say. My English is still garbage. Three months on this trail and I sound like I'm chewing rocks. "We pray."
"Pa says it wasn't no animal." Amy's eyes are huge. She's ten, maybe eleven. Her mother died of fever two weeks in. Now she follows me around like a shadow. "He says something drained him dry."
Luke's looking our way now.
I pick up the buckets. "Go to your father, Mei-mei."
"You called me little sister again." Amy grins. Then she sees my face. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing. Go."
She goes.
I'm setting the buckets down when Luke comes over. He's tall. Maybe forty. Leather vest, two guns, a knife I can see and probably three I can't. His face is sun-scorched and his eyes are the color of dirty ice.
"Ma'am." He tips his head. Polite. "Luke Hardee. I'm helping the captain look into last night."
I nod. Keep my face down. Respectful. Confused. Scared, even.
"You understand English, ma'am?"
"Small. Little bit."
"You sleep in this wagon?"
"Yes."
"Alone?"
I nod.
"All night?"
Another nod.
His eyes move over me. Not like a man looking at a woman. Like a man looking at a track in the mud.
"Mind if I take a look inside?"
My throat's on fire. It's been two days since I fed. The rabbit I caught last night barely took the edge off. And this morning I woke up to shouting, to the smell of Garrett's body being carried past, to the iron-sweet stink of old blood that made my teeth ache.
I climbed out and saw it. A smear on the wagon's sideboards. Dark. Rust-brown.
I wiped it off with my sleeve before anyone else looked.
I thought I got it all.
"Okay," I say. "Look."
I step aside.
Luke climbs in. I hear him moving things. My blanket. The trunk. The loose board where I hid the note Edith left me.
I don't breathe. I don't need to. But I make my chest move anyway.
Amy's watching from her family's wagon. Her pa, Mr. Tucker, is talking to the captain near the fire. Three other men are standing guard, rifles out.
Everyone's scared.
Good. Scared people don't think straight.
Luke climbs back out.
"You go anywhere last night, ma'am?"
I shake my head.
"Hear anything?"
"No."
"See anyone walking around?"
"No. I sleep."
He studies me. Then he pulls a small notebook from his vest. Flips it open.
"Garrett was killed maybe two hours before dawn," he says. "Something tore into his neck. Drank him dry."
I don't react.
"You know what does that, ma'am?"
I meet his eyes. Just for a second. "Animal?"
"Maybe." He taps the notebook. "Or maybe something that *used* to be a person."
My hands are steady. My face is blank.
"I don't understand," I say.
Luke smiles. It doesn't reach his eyes.
"Sure you don't."
He's turning to go when Amy comes running up.
"Mr. Hardee!" She's breathless. "Mei was with me last night!"
Everything stops.
Luke looks at her. Then at me.
"That right?"
"I had a nightmare," Amy says. She grabs my hand. Her palm's sweaty and small. "About Ma. I was crying and Mei heard me and she came and stayed till I fell asleep. She was there the whole time."
No.
No, I wasn't.
I was half a mile into the hills, draining a jackrabbit and trying not to think about how thin it tasted, how much I wanted to walk back and find someone soft and warm and *full*.
Amy's lying.
This kid is lying for me.
"That true, ma'am?" Luke's voice is soft.
I should say no. I should tell the truth. Let them figure it out. Let them kill me.
I died once already. What's one more time?
But Amy's squeezing my hand.
"Yes," I hear myself say.
Luke's eyes narrow. "You were in the Tucker wagon all night?"
"Not all. I go back before morning."
"What time?"
I don't know. I don't track time like I used to. The night feels different now. Longer. Sweeter.
"I don't know," I say. "Still dark."
Amy nods hard. "She tucked me in and then she left. But that was way before anyone was walking around. I woke up and it was still real quiet."
Luke looks between us.
Then he writes something in his notebook.
"All right," he says. "Thank you, ladies."
He walks off.
Amy lets go of my hand.
I should say something. *Thank you* would be normal. *Why did you do that* would be honest.
I don't say anything.
"You're welcome," Amy whispers.
Then she runs back to her wagon.
I stand there.
The sun's climbing. It doesn't burn me like the stories say. It just makes me tired. Like I'm moving through water.
I go back to my wagon and sit in the shade.
My hands are shaking for real now.
That kid lied for me. Looked a bounty hunter in the face and lied. She's ten years old and she just made herself an accessory to murder.
I didn't ask her to.
I didn't want her to.
But she did.
I close my eyes. Try to think.
Edith said *If you don't learn control you'll kill the whole train.*
She didn't say what happens if someone else kills for me first.
Footsteps.
I open my eyes.
Luke's back.
He's holding something between his thumb and forefinger.
A button.
Small. Brass. Shaped like a lily.
There's a brown stain on one of the petals.
"Found this near Garrett's body," Luke says. He's not looking at me. He's looking at the button. "Fancy work. Custom, probably. You seen anything like it?"
I shake my head.
"Hm." He turns it over. The back is engraved. I can't read it from here but I know what it says.
*E.C.*
Edith Crowe.
"Funny thing," Luke says. He's still smiling that dead smile. "I've seen this mark before."
He looks at me.
"Three years ago. Nevada territory. They found a camp, fifteen men dead. All of 'em drained dry. And in the biggest tent, right in the middle of all that blood, there was a woman's jacket. Silk. Real fine."
He holds the button up.
"Missing one button."
My throat's burning.
"The woman who owned that jacket," Luke says, "she killed a lot of people. And then she disappeared."
He tucks the button back into his vest.
"If she's back," he says, "I aim to find her."
He tips his hat.
"You have a good day, ma'am."
He walks away.
I sit there.
Edith was here.
Edith killed Garrett.
And now Luke Hardee's hunting her.
Which means he's hunting