Beastly Bones (17 page)

Chapter Thirty

W
e climbed back up the hill. I had picked out a mountain-climbing axe, and held it to my chest with both hands as I walked. The tool had a sharp, if slightly chipped, edge on one side and a curved pick on the other. At the base of the short wooden handle was another steel point. I did not know what sort of confrontation to expect, or how well I would handle myself when the time came, but I was hoping the sheer number of sharp bits I wielded would increase my chances of success.

We neared the dig site, and my employer slowed. From the far side of the sagging canvas came the sound of labored breathing. Jackaby's hand caught me roughly by the shoulder, and I stopped midstride. He pointed downward. I was inches from planting my foot in a bear trap. A glimmer of hope played across Jackaby's eyes.

“Hudson?” he called.

A grunt came from within the site, and we picked our way quickly but cautiously over the barrier.

Hank Hudson was seated just inside the one remaining wall of the canvas. He was slumped forward, leaning his weight on his rifle for support. I understood why Jackaby had not found any more useful weapons at the trapper's cabin—the man had brought them all with him. A shotgun with a fat barrel lay beside him, and across his back was slung a bandolier loaded with rifle rounds and buckshot. His belt hung with glistening knives and wicked hooks, and over one shoulder was slung what looked to be a whaler's harpoon gun. He held his left arm against his chest, buried in the folds of his leathers, and he was pale and slick with sweat as he lifted his head to look at Jackaby.

“I'm real sorry, ol' buddy,” he grunted, his deep, booming voice reduced to a gruff whisper. “I'm a damn fool.”

“Good of you to realize it, old friend.” said Jackaby. “A bit late, though.”

“Hell of a way to go out, at least.” Hank struggled to smile, and then coughed.

“If it was your intention to arrange your own funeral, you might have had the decency to avoid arranging ours in the process.”

The man nodded solemnly and let his head sag. “That's th' truth. I do feel right terrible about that, an' I aim to make it right or die tryin'.”

“Mr. Hudson,” I said. “You're injured—what happened?”

“Oh, hey there, little lady.” He tilted his head toward me. “Yeah, he got me pretty good. I ain't done yet, though, and he'll have to come back around here soon enough.”

I looked across at the scattered bones. “Will one of you please explain to me why you're so certain the dragon is going to come back for more bones? Isn't it more likely to pick off cows and horses and things that have”—I swallowed—“meat?”

“Would you like to tell her, or shall I?” asked Jackaby.

The trapper grunted. “Shoulda guessed you'd figger it out. Go right ahead.”

Jackaby took a breath. “I told you I was not prepared to slay a dragon, Miss Rook, and I do not intend to. As I have insisted from the start, dragons have gone the way of
the dodo.
”

Jackaby paused, watching my expression and waiting for me to catch up.

“No,” I said as it sank in. “No, Mr. Hudson, you wouldn't . . .”

The trapper nodded, sadly. “'Fraid so.”

“That beast is as much a dragon as the ‘loathsome birds' in Darwin's dossier,” Jackaby continued. “The creature is only a mimic realizing its full potential.”

“You stole one of the kittens!” I said.

Hudson shrugged guiltily. “Couldn't let 'em
all
be skeeters.”

“So,” Jackaby went on, “after returning to the valley with his own chameleomorph—an orange tabby, judging by the molted fur in his cabin—Mr. Hudson couldn't resist trying a little experiment.”

“In my defense,” the trapper said, “I thought it was gonna be a dinosaur when I started.”

“Wait,” I interrupted.
“You
stole the first tooth? But that's impossible—you didn't even arrive in the valley until after it was in the newspapers!”

“I didn't steal it,” Hudson said. “I wasn't in the valley when I . . . when I didn't steal it.”

“Hudson . . . ,” Jackaby prompted sternly.

“I did kinda bump into a fella who might have,” he admitted. “I had just left your place up in New Fiddleham. I had the kitten with me and he saw it, only the guy seemed to know it wasn't no ordinary kitten. He said it was just a shame it wasn't
bigger
. He says it just like that, too, all meaningful like.
‘Bigger.'
And then he shows me the tooth.”

“Did you get a good look at him?” Jackaby asked. “Tell me, did he have a grim, mortiferous aura? Maybe accented by a faint lavender halo?”

“He was a funny-lookin' short guy,” said Hudson. “Dark clothes. Real washed-out face. He gave me the creeps at first, but he said he was a friend of Coyote Bill's, and he thought a guy like me might be able to make use of a real old bone. I figured I already knew why he wanted to get rid of it, now that it was in the papers as stolen. Bill got all nervous when I asked him about the fella later. Downright spooked. Shoulda told y'all then . . . Stupid of me. I just got the idea in my head, and I had to know if it would work . . .”

The pale man I had seen in New Fiddleham at the train station—he had taken the bone. Jackaby and I exchanged a glance. If he had seen fit to murder Madeleine Brisbee to get the fossil—then why give it to Hudson so easily? None of it made sense. Who was he? Why had he come? Why did those people have to die?

“You've had the fossil since then?” Jackaby said. “The whole time we were looking?”

The trapper nodded sheepishly.

“Okay. I take it you reduced it to shavings, then?” Jackaby continued. “You must have laced the creature's food and kept the food sources varied to ensure only one single ingredient was consistent. Something like that?”

Hudson nodded again. “Ground it ta powder. He changed a lot quicker than I expected.”

“ ‘Much of the essence of a living thing is distilled in its teeth,' ” I recalled.

Jackaby nodded. “Dragons—even dead ones, are powerful beasts. Dragon bones are potent, and a dragon's tooth doubly so—why do you think the remains are so rare? I can't imagine an alchemist or apothecary in all of antiquity who could resist adding some to his stores. Chameleomorphs alone are unpredictable—but you were mixing magics. You compounded the effects.”

“He grew real fast.” Hudson nodded. “Started sprouting little wings by the second day.”

“And if you had just stopped then,” said Jackaby, “he would not be growing larger still.”

“He got all tetchy if I didn't add the powder,” Hank said. “I was needin' bigger and bigger animals ta feed him. Like you said, I had to keep changin' it. He was my responsibility, an' I couldn't just let him go hungry, so I took him out a couple times to catch somethin' a little bigger. Heck of a thing to take a dragon for a walk. I didn't mean to let him eat Brisbee's kid, but it was just tied up in the woods, and once the dragon got close, he went nuts.”

“The goat was tied up in the forest?” I said. Hudson nodded.

“Not far from Brisbee's,” mused Jackaby. “I imagine the farmer had been hoping to add some authenticity to his claims about the footprints by
kid
napping one of his young goats. I doubt very much he had the stomach to kill the poor little thing, so he probably tried to just keep it safely out of the way instead. Bad luck for the kid.”

Hudson hung his head. “I could tell it was gettin' outta hand, so I stopped givin' him the powder at all, no matter how grumpy he got. He was a good fifteen feet already, and I knew I was gettin' in over my head. I didn't give him any yesterday, but by this morning he just went berserk. Broke through his bars and made off into the valley.”

“The Pendletons?” I asked.

Hudson nodded. “Got their blood on my hands. I was tracking him when I heard the gunshots. By the time I had gotten there, he had already stuffed himself on the sheep. I managed to drag him back to the cabin, but he snapped his chains and took off before I could get him penned.”

“And you didn't stay with him?” Jackaby asked.

“Oh, I did my very best.” The trapper groaned and straightened a bit, lifting his arm gingerly out of the folds of his leathers. “Stayed a little
too
much with him, so now there's a little bit of me left
inside
of him.” I gasped. The end of his arm was wrapped tightly in bandages that formed a thick bundle, but it was clear that the trapper's left hand was gone completely. Dark red-brown blood had soaked his clothes from the hide of his jacket down to the dark lining of his boots.

“You need to get to a doctor!” I said.

Jackaby grimaced at the injury and surveyed the trapper properly for the first time since we had arrived. “You
are
in a remarkable amount of pain, aren't you?” he said, squinting at the trapper. “It's just rolling off you. In fact—I do believe you're dying. Hudson, are you dying?”

The trapper gave a noncommittal shrug.

“Miss Rook is right. At the very least we need to get you indoors.”

Hudson gripped the rifle tightly with his remaining hand. “Not until I seen this through. I ain't so proud I won't welcome yer help, but I made this monster. One or the other of us is gonna see his end tonight. I set a few traps around the place, but I don't think they'll do more'n slow him down. Keep a weathered eye open. He's fifteen feet tall if he's an inch.”

“That was before he got back to the site for more bones,” said Jackaby heavily. “He was at least twenty by the time he went after the cows from Mr. Brisbee's barn. Let's just hope he needs another helping of dragon stock before he hits full size.” Jackaby gestured at the fossils that lay before us. The bones had been roughly scattered, but they still described a creature fifty feet tall from head to tail, with a wingspan twice as wide.

Chapter Thirty-One

T
he sun was beginning to dip toward the tips of the pine trees that lined the valley, and still there had been no sign of the beast. I risked a run to the farmhouse and back to fetch some water, which the trapper accepted gratefully, although he was having difficulty keeping his head up to drink it. The air was growing crisp and cool, so Jackaby started a small campfire with a few dry logs and the wooden markers that had once surrounded the find.

“Which way do you think it'll approach?” I whispered to my employer over the crackle of the wood. He scanned the horizon with a frown.

“Mimic or not, a chameleomorph becomes a fully realized corporeal incarnation of its quarry, aesthetically, anatomically, and biologically. A dragon of that magnitude must be producing enough incendiary enzymes to exceed containment.”

“What?”

“Smoke.” Jackaby's eyes panned from one end of the valley to the other. “There should be smoke. This valley should be alight with all the wildfires a dragon that size would produce. We should see crackling flames and burning branches. At the very least we should see trails of smoke.”

I glanced around us. The sky was beginning to redden as the evening grew older, but the only sign of any fire was our own.

“Do you think it's left the valley?” I whispered. It was difficult to decide if this was a dreadful notion or wishful thinking. I dared not imagine what destruction that beast's rampage could wreak on a populated city, but I was none too eager to see it for myself, either. I did not have long to ponder the possibility before my question was answered.

Jackaby froze, his eyes locked onto the forest across from Brisbee's field. I followed his gaze. Down the foothills, across the far side of the pasture, the tall trees shook and the earth trembled. A dark figure crested the treetops for just a moment and then thudded back to the ground. Jackaby drew his rusty machete, and I held tight to my climbing axe. The instrument grew smaller and feebler in my hands as I watched the shadowy form push through the wilderness. The valley fell silent for several impossibly long seconds, and then the dragon leapt into the sky.

There was no mistaking the figure as it lurched upward. The wings were enormous, leathery like a bat's and billowing slightly as they caught the wind. The hulking colossus caught the tops of a couple of pine trees roughly against its chest, and the crack of wood echoed across the valley like gunshots as the trees toppled. The blow cost the creature momentum, and it flapped awkwardly into the center of the field, kicking off into a shallow glide for a moment, and then landing again. It had more than doubled in size just since the attack on the barn, and as its feet touched the ground, I could see it was easily four stories tall. It loomed over the rooftop as it passed Brisbee's farmhouse.

Jackaby was muttering, mostly to himself. “The raw material from the latest bones seems to have accelerated the growth process. Fascinating, though—its instincts are clearly slower to manifest. See how it moves . . .” With another powerful leap, the dragon was suddenly airborne, the broad expanse of its wings blotting out the setting sun as it coasted directly toward us. Its movements may have been clumsy and imprecise, but it had enough control to direct its glide toward us, and Jackaby and I both leapt to the dirt as it dove, its talons clacking and whipping the air just over our heads.

The gargantuan beast was too slow to pull up before it hit the uneven terrain of the foothills, stumbling and slamming into the rocky ground. The earth shook, and I clambered to my feet, clutching my little axe as though it might have any effect at all against that mountain of teeth and claws.

The dragon righted itself and turned back toward us. I had seen artistic constructions of massive carnivores in the museum, big impressive dinosaurs with jaws stretched wide in predatory growls. They did not come close to the reality of this beautiful, hideous beast. The dragon was a lustrous blue green, but caked in dirt and mottled in pale yellows around its face. It had wide, wet, almost bovine nostrils, and a snout lined with bumps and ridges that grew thicker and sharper as they climbed up and over its brow, continuing down its back, like an alligator. Atop its head was a pair of horns, which curved backward like a ram's. Its scaly hide was stretched taut around its ribs.

The creature tilted its head and surveyed the three of us hungrily. Its stomach rumbled loudly, and it cringed, clenching its leathery eyelids shut. “I don't think a pile of dry bones will be enough to satisfy that thing,” I said.

The creature's eyes darted open, golden yellow orbs with jagged black slits for pupils. It took one purposeful step toward us, and then another. I tensed to run, panic flooding my veins. Across the hilltop, dust and fossils shifted with each thudding footstep. Among them I caught sight of another motion. In the dim light, atop the bones, a figure stood. Before I understood what I was seeing, the dig site erupted in a flash of brilliant whiteness. “Smile for the camera, handsome,” sang a familiar voice.

I blinked and the light was gone. The dragon shook its head and reeled on Nellie Fuller. She dropped the spent flash lamp and whipped the plate out of her camera, leaping aside as the dragon snapped its jaws. The camera and tripod splintered into scraps, and Nellie hit the ground in a hard roll. She was quick to recover, but the creature was quicker. In an instant it was looming over her again, those terrible teeth spreading wide.

“Peanut! No! Bad dragon!” Hudson's voice faltered on the last syllable, but he made up for it with the loud blast of a rifle shot. The heavy round glanced off the dragon's snout, and the creature furrowed its scaly brow.

“You named it?” Jackaby yelled.

“Told ya I was gonna,” grunted Hank, and another shot rang out.

The second round caught the dragon squarely in the center of its neck, just under its chin. Neither blow pierced the scaly hide, but they were enough to draw the creature's attention from the reporter. Nellie scrambled across the hill and into the long trench that Lamb's men had dug around the site. The dragon narrowed a pair of angry golden eyes on the trapper.

Hudson tossed the rifle aside and plucked up his shotgun. He shoved himself up to standing and swayed immediately. The dragon's jaws spread wide, and the trapper let loose a barrel of buckshot into the soft pink of its throat. The creature bellowed in alarm and whipped its thick head back and forth, staggering away a few paces and pawing at its face with its wings. Hudson collapsed to his knees. The shotgun clattered to the dirt as he caught himself with his one good hand.

The dragon rose to its full height, rearing up with its wings spread wide. They shrouded half the sky in a blanket of dark emerald. The dragon's pupils were razor slits, and its nostrils chuffed angrily. It puffed out its chest, and it began to make a guttural grunting noise.

“Fire!” Jackaby yelled. “Fire! Get down—now!”

He wrenched me off my feet, and the world spun for a moment as the two of us tumbled into Lamb's trench. My axe bounced out of my hands, and the cold earth and smell of loose soil filled my senses for several seconds as Jackaby pressed me into the dirt. From above us came a rumbling, belching noise, and then a muffled hacking cough. Jackaby's hold on my back lightened as he rose to peer over the edge of the deep furrow. I slid up tentatively to join him.

The monstrous dragon was spluttering and twisting wretchedly. Beneath it, Hank Hudson lay crumpled on the ground. “It can't ignite,” murmured Jackaby.

Nellie Fuller crept toward us through the trench with her head ducked low. “You're welcome,” she said, sliding down to sit with her back against the earthen wall. “But I think you might owe me a new camera.” In her hands was the slim tin case that housed her photographic plates. She clicked it shut and clutched it like a prize trophy.

“You shouldn't be here,” said Jackaby, still peering tensely over the edge.

“I couldn't leave without my picture,” she said, patting the little box triumphantly.

“We'll be lucky to leave with our lives,” I said.

“That didn't keep
you
away. I knew you weren't the
safe and happy
type, Abbie.” She gave me a wink. “So, what's our plan?”

“We need something more substantial than bullets and buckshot,” Jackaby said. “There. Hudson's harpoon.” The weapon lay beside the trapper, glinting in the soft light of the campfire. “I think that may be our best chance, but we'll need something to draw its attention before we can get—oh hell.”

The dragon had regained its focus. It hunched over Hudson and bared its fangs with a deep, echoing growl. My stomach lurched with a primal dread. “We have to do something!” I whispered frantically. “It's going to kill him!”

“Keep this safe for me, would ya?” Nellie passed the tin photo case to Jackaby and pushed herself up. She slid a silver canister out of the pocket of her dress. The stubby tube of flash powder was capped with a simple cork. She stood and peered over the ledge.

Jackaby grabbed her jacket. “What are you doing?”

“I'm in the newspaper business, sweetheart.” She pulled away and hopped out of the trench. “Drawing attention is what we do.” The little cork dropped to the ground as Nellie launched into a run.

The dragon regarded her as she approached. Its lips pulled back in a terrible toothy grin, as though her charge amused it. She barreled forward undeterred and let the canister fly. It hit the campfire dead-on, and she threw an arm over her eyes as the whole world went white.

The brilliant burst remained painted across my eyes even when the flash had died away, and I strained to see through the afterimage. The blast had sent charred, glowing logs rolling along across the dirt, and gradually the outline of the hulking beast gained definition above them. Its head was turning this way and that as it tried to shake off its own blindness. It took me another moment to find Nellie. She was at Hudson's side, straightening with the harpoon gun in her grasp. The weapon's stock was broad, its barrel like a bulky cannon, but she held it firmly and spun toward the colossus.

Nellie Fuller was the very picture of greatness, brave and unstoppable—until the beast's jaws closed around her.