Blood Ties (3 page)

Quinn stalked towards him, preparing for the end game.

Jake pulled the hammer of his Peacemaker back with a loud
click
and aimed between his boots.

Quinn snorted. “Bullets can’t kill
me
, you imbecile,” he growled.

Jake wondered. “I ain’t much to take a stranger’s word for anything. I guess I better find out, shouldn’t I?”

The hammer came down. The runes of Jake’s pistol flashed bright emerald, and a single shot rang out. The muzzle flash evaporated the shadows for a split-second.

Jake waited.

Quinn froze in his tracks, his eye slowly dropping to the neat hole in the center of his chest. He raised a clawed finger to the wound, surprised to see wisps of smoke drifting through the black fabric.

The door to the stables slid open and Cole stood in the doorway, his pistol drawn. He took in the scene, and his eyes fixed upon the figure of Quinn frozen at the back of the barn.

“What the hell is going on in here?” he shouted.

Jake remained silent, his eyes riveted to Quinn.

In a voice suddenly human, Quinn gasped, “Im … possi—”

The flesh at Quinn’s neck and wrists turned ash white and then a dark gray, his skin crackling and crumbling like a burning cigar. It spread quickly until all of his exposed flesh was gray. In a puff of ash that filled the air around him, Quinn’s body collapsed. His clothing and armor folded in on itself and crumpled in a heap on the ground.

“Hunh …” Jake said, a bit bewildered. “Never seen it do that before.”

“Jake, you mind telling me what just happened?” Cole asked from the doorway.

Without a word, Jake holstered his pistol and slowly got back to his feet. Massaging his throat, he turned to Cole and took his first full, deep breath since the fight began. He bent over and put his hands on his knees while he tried to recover.

“Jake?” Cole asked, worry now filling his voice. He spotted the row of claw-holes in the shoulder of Jake’s shirt and the blood stains seeping through. “Jake, you okay?”

Jake, still trying to catch his breath, rose and took a few steps towards Cole with an
It’s about time
look on his face.

“Yeah,” he finally grumbled. “I’m fine. What took you so long?”

Cole’s eyes went wide and his hand darted to his pistol. The weapon flew free, aimed at Jake.

For a fleeting instant Jake thought Cole was going to shoot him cold. He only had time to think
What the hell?
before a shot rang out. Jake flinched. He looked at Cole with a surprised look on his face.

A body dropped to the dusty ground behind him.

Cole
tsked
a few times and shook his head. “You forgot one, amigo.” He pointed past Jake. “That’s just plain sloppy. And now that’s
three
you owe me.”

Jake gave Cole an irritated scowl. He looked behind him at the flanker lying on the ground. The man’s right arm looked shattered from Lumpy’s kick, bent at an unnatural angle just below the shoulder. Jake’s Officer’s Colt was clutched in the man’s good hand, but the bullet hole in his forehead indicated he would never kill again.

“Sloppy?” Jake asked, sounding offended. “I was tired and there were
four
of them. Besides, that’s only two I owe you. That guy in Pueblo don’t count.”

Cole rolled his eyes and chuckled. They both heard people gathering in the street, and someone was hollering for Marshal Sisty.

“So, you wanna tell me why that guy back there belongs in an ashtray now?”

“I don’t think he was human,” Jake said.

“No shit,” Cole replied dryly. After a long pause he said, “I pieced that together on my own,
amigo
. But what the hell was he?”

Jake shook his head. “I have no idea.” He pulled his Peacemaker and stared at it. “It made that werewolf back in Sedalia go up in blue flames, and it turned what they told me was a demon into a tornado of red lights and smoke. But … that? Your guess is as good as mine.”

“Great,” Cole sighed, holstering his own pistol.

Jake walked over to the gunshot flanker and grabbed his Officer’s Colt, returning it to his right hip. With a rough yank, he pulled the goggles off the corpse. “Aw, hell.…” he grumbled.

“Who is it?” Cole asked.

“Take a look,” Jake replied as he walked over to what was left of Quinn. Wincing at the pain in his shoulder, he gingerly rummaged through the dead assassin’s clothes, trying to keep his fingers out of the ash. He finally found what he was after and pulled out a billfold.

“You know this guy?” Cole asked, staring down at the flanker at his feet. He’d never seen the man before, but he was obviously Chinese.

Jake opened Quinn’s billfold, extracted the cash inside as well as four ticket stubs. The money disappeared quickly into his pocket.
Payment for my shirt,
he thought. His shoulders slumped as he read the tickets. “God damn it.” Jake shook his head, and the knot of fear returned, tightening in his guts.

“What the hell is going on?” Cole asked, frustrated as he pulled the goggles off another corpse to discover another Chinese assassin.

Jake held up the ticket stubs. “Central Pacific Line,” he said. “Zeppelin stubs … and they were purchased in
San Francisco
.”

Cole pieced it together instantly. “Oh, no,” he moaned.

Jake walked back to Lumpy’s stall as if the weight of the world pressed down on his shoulders. He grabbed his hat, dusted it off, and set it on his head. Grabbing Lumpy’s bridle, he backed the massive bull out into the middle of the stable.

As Jake pulled himself up into the saddle, Marshal Sisty stepped into the barn and looked at the bodies lying around. A confused frown spread slowly across her face. Billie Sisty was not what most would call an impressive looking woman. She was a bit shorter than average, thick around the middle, with stocky arms and legs. She kept her hair pulled back tight and usually hidden under a black, short-brimmed hat with a silver band. Rumor had it she used to wrestle steers on the Chisholm Trail. She was more politician than Jake cared for, but Jake respected the hell out of her as a damn fine marshal. She was tough, fair, and knew more than a thing or two about what to do when the shooting started.

“You boys mind telling me what in tarnation happened here?” she asked in an accent that was pure Texas and downright pissed off. She crossed her arms over her belly.

Cole moved past Lumpy’s bulk, dodging under the bull’s massive horns, and led his horse Koto out of its stall. With a smooth motion, he slid up into the saddle.

“Sore losers, Billie,” Jake said tiredly, gently rubbing his wounded shoulder. He didn’t want to get into who his attackers really were. He was tired, grumpy, and the information would be of no use to the marshal. “The four of ’em jumped me on account of this.” Jake pulled out the bag in his vest and dangled it in front of her, the shreds of his shirt falling away from the gleaming, heavily scored brass and dark runes of his clockwork left arm. “It seems they wanted what I won fair and square. You can ask anyone who was in the brewery, if you like.”

“I’ll do that,” Billie said. It wasn’t suspicion. It was her job, and she took it seriously. “I may need to talk to you boys about this at some point, but I trust you enough to take your word for it, Jake.”

“Much obliged, Billie.” Jake tipped his hat. “You know where we live, and we’ll be back in town in the next couple of days. I’m heading home, though. I’m beat to hell, bleeding, and I need some sleep.”

“You want the Doc to look at your shoulder?” Billie asked.

“Naw … I’ll be fine.”

Billie slid the stable doors open all the way and let both Jake and Cole ride out. A crowd stood in front of the Colorado Brewery and there were hushed whispers about murder and thieves.

When they were past the crowd, Cole finally spoke up. “You figure them boys were sent by the Tong, don’t you.”

Jake nodded. “It looks like they finally decided to get even for us killing Hang Ah.” He let out a long sigh. “I need to sleep on this one,
amigo
. I just hope I’m tired enough to not dream tonight.”

Chapter Four – This Can’t Last

“I’ve been livin’ on borrowed time ever since that Reb cannon took me apart.”

~ Jake Lasater

The dull thump of an explosion woke Jake from the all-too-familiar nightmare. Bits and pieces of war memories visited him nightly, but he’d learned to live with it. The thump, originating from Skeeter’s workshop behind the house, was chased by a high-pitched whistle of steam that faded quickly.

Jake sighed in the darkness and rolled over, his muscles and bandaged shoulder screaming. He pulled the pillow over his head and swore into the mattress, pondering the likelihood that he might be able to get back to sleep.
Long odds,
he thought. Such detonations weren’t at all uncommon, but he decided to gamble a little and closed his eyes. As he prepared to go back to sleep—hopefully avoiding another nightmare—Cole’s frantic hollering and cursing from the workshop spurred his ass out of bed.

He stood up slowly, his brass heels thudding along the hard wood floor while the clockwork of his arm and legs whined faintly. Throwing a nightshirt over his naked body, he grabbed his ocular off the dresser and, with an easy motion, slipped the leather strap over his head. He twisted a gear on the side of the ocular, closing out the light.

Mid-morning sunlight washed over him as he pulled thick drapes back from the window. There, staring at him from the windowsill, stood a crow with bright yellow eyes. Jake stared at it, and it stared straight back at him. Seconds ticked by like distant hammer falls.

Jake got the message and winked his good eye at it. It nodded its head once and cawed—a quiet, grumbly sound like a farewell to an old friend. Then it leapt off the ledge, spread its wings, and beat a steady rhythm into a spotless blue sky.

In the distance, foothills traced a line half a mile behind the house. The Rocky Mountains stretched away to the south toward Pueblo, broken only by a blossom of black smoke rising from the wide-open double doors of Skeeter’s workshop behind the house. The view—of the mountains, not the workshop—was why Jake had chosen that particular bedroom, but his thoughts drifted to the crow and then beyond.

His memory flickered to the hills of Missouri, tossing up the grizzled, weather-beaten face of Bhuvana, whose name meant Earth. Jake’s parents had protested loudly whenever he stole away on warm summer nights to visit the old Cherokee shaman. But Jake didn’t care, didn’t listen. His older brother Benjamin had just left for the Virginia Military Institute. At ten years old he needed something to fill the vacuum of his brother’s absence. Jake found Bhuvana, and as a result, he learned about life, the Land, and Bhuvana’s People. Indian life appealed to the young boy far more than his father’s brewery business or his mother’s bent knees and Christian prayers.

Bhuvana had taught him about totems—the spirit guides of the People—and listening with a better ear than most whites were willing to lend. One of his first lessons had been about the crow. Crow was the keeper of the sacred laws, a harbinger of both change and power. Jake had learned early on that when he saw crows, there were usually powerful changes headed his way.

He pondered the yellow eyes of the crow and then considered the events of the previous evening. He saw Quinn’s ghost-white eyes looking back at him. He had to wonder where he was headed next. Did he stay home and wait for another attack from the Tong, or should he hop a zeppelin to San Fran and square off with a gang of Chinese assassins?

The thought of facing down the entire Tong, with or without Cole, didn’t appeal to his sense of easy living. That many killers might just be able to get the drop on him. He nodded to the shrinking black wings and stared down to see Cole running towards Skeeter’s workshop with a bucket of water. Another screech of escaping steam erupted from inside the workshop. Jake sighed, wondering what he’d been thinking when he took Skeeter in as his charge.

She was a feisty, headstrong sixteen-year-old prone to swearing, but she knew more than most tinkers four times her age. Skeeter had modified damn near everything in the house. They had hot water on tap, electricity ran the lights and stove, and the windows and closets were all steam driven.

Jake pulled a lever attached to the windowsill. The window slowly slid upward, the small, steam-driven piston hissing quietly. Skeeter had run copper pipes all over the house, and a huge, aether-heated boiler in her workshop provided the pressure. She’d attached valves, fittings, brackets, and pistons to anything that might need moving.

When the window thumped open, Jake leaned out into a warm, August morning. He stared at the open workshop doors for a bit, unable to understand the muffled voices coming from inside. A small puff of white smoke followed the black one rising into the sky. The voices went quiet, and Cole stepped out into the sunlight.

“Everything okay, Cole?” Jake asked, a mildly worried tone edging in as he rubbed the sleep out of his good eye. Cole’s bright blue eyes fixed on Jake, and his mulatto skin went a little pale. He quickly closed the doors behind him.

“Oh! Hey, Jake.” Cole tried to sound casual but failed miserably. His Free Territories accent came through loud and clear, a cross between the twang of Texas and smooth drawl of Colorado. There was also a hint of his time spent as a Buffalo Soldier riding both with and against the Apache, but there was no missing his nervousness. Cole’s glance darted back towards the closed doors then returned to Jake. This time he looked as innocent as a preacher on Sunday. “Everything’s fine. Why do you ask?”

Jake cocked his head to the left and let his gaze follow the two clouds of smoke rising into the sky. He watched them drift for a few seconds as they dissipated on a light breeze. He tapped the brass fingers of his left hand patiently on the windowsill.

Skeeter’s up to something again,
Jake thought.
And this time Cole’s in on it.
Eyeing Cole he said, “Oh … no reason in particular, I s’pose.” He added a suspicious smile, wondering what they might be keeping from him. He’d just have to wait and see how this one played out. “Is there any coffee?” There was little point in forcing things before he got a cup of coffee down his neck.

Cole pulled off his hat and ran a hand through long, dark hair, looking a bit embarrassed. “Naw … I didn’t make any yet. Been … preoccupied.”

Jake nodded his head, certain now that something was up. They both knew damn well Cole needed coffee in the morning almost as much as Jake did. “You sure everything’s okay?” he asked again, smiling like he’d just beaten a full house with a straight flush.

“Sure, Jake. Couldn’t be better.” Cole looked around the yard and scratched the back of his head. To Jake it looked like Cole was searching for gopher holes in a cobblestone street. Cole looked up and said, “Go on down and make us some. I’ll be in shortly.”

“All right,” Jake agreed as slow as honey. He’d have more energy to press the matter once the coffee kicked in.

One of the advantages of being a natural-born card player is that patience came to Jake like swimming does to a fish. Jake closed the window, pulled the covers over the bed, and walked to the door, his heels thudding across the floor of Horace Tabor’s house.

Jake was sort of on retainer for Tabor—long story—and the house came with the deal. Horace had given him a few houses to choose from, of course, but Jake liked the location. Ten miles southwest of Denver, it was both close and far enough away from what had rapidly turned into a bustling city—by Rocky Mountain standards anyway.

Wearing only a long nightshirt, morning sunlight reflected off his clockwork legs and the exposed hand of his clockwork left arm. The polished brass glinted like flame around the room. The hacks and scratches from Quinn’s attack were already gone thanks to the magic imbued into his artificial limbs. He briefly considered getting dressed but was still groggy enough to be more interested in a cup of coffee than propriety. Besides, no one came out to visit them, and it was unlikely Marshal Sisty would show up over the Quinn affair. That was an open and shut case of self-defense. He decided to go downstairs as he was.

Tousling his hair to get rid of a bad case of bed-head, he opened the door and thudded down the stairs, running his hand over the controls for the steam-powered lift as he went down. Another of Skeeter’s creations, the lift could carry three full-grown men between floors, but Jake wasn’t lazy enough to use the damned thing unless he had to move something heavy … or if he was drunk.

Once in the kitchen, he grabbed the tin coffee pot off the counter, poured what was left of last night’s brew down the sink, and set it under the spigot of what he considered one of Skeeter’s greatest inventions. She called it the steamolator.

The contraption had a small copper line running into one side from Skeeter’s boiler. It was a simple device, from what little Jake understood of the thing. It had a cylinder with a hand crank, a brass hopper with a swinging lid, and a spigot. To him it looked like an assortment of junk bolted and welded together, but it was a stairway to heaven. He twisted a lever, swung the cover open, and grabbed the copper mesh bowl from inside. The dark, gritty contents went out the window, and the bowl went back inside.

Jake didn’t really care how the thing worked. All he knew was that it did what he needed it to. Two handfuls of dark beans went into the hopper. Closing the cover, he cranked the handle for about a minute, then turned a knob on the side. A fierce hiss of steam put a smile on his face. Coffee dripped and then poured out of the spigot, causing Jake to inhale deeply.

When the pot was full, he turned off the steam and waited for the last few drops. Grabbing the pot and two cups, he turned on his heel and made his way out to the wide, covered front porch. He plopped down into one of the rocking chairs, set an empty cup on the deck, and filled his own.

The pot went beside the cup on the porch, and he leaned back, rocking slowly as he contemplated the fight with Quinn. He
really
didn’t want to go to San Francisco and face down the Tong. But he also didn’t want to spend the rest of his life waiting for a blade to show up between his shoulder blades. He’d played the waiting game a few times before, having concluded in the aftermath of each occurrence that it’s a pain in the ass—in one case, quite literally.

The front door opened with a bang. A painter’s easel and a large blank canvas frame passed by with a pair of sturdy legs pumping underneath.

“Hey, Sam,” Jake offered. “Off to do some more painting?”

“Hmmm?” a man’s voice replied as he stepped off the porch. He turned and faced Jake. Sam Morse was a short, thin man with unkempt gray hair and a scraggly beard that stuck out in every direction. A battered, paint-stained grimwig—what some folks called a newsboy cap—covered his head, and he wore a tan wool suit with a white paisley vest underneath. His weathered boots, looking as if they’d walked thousands of miles, were sturdy but well broken in. Sam had shown up at the house two days prior with a letter from Horace Tabor himself, asking that Jake put Sam up in one of the rooms and give him the run of the place … even help him if he could.

“Oh, yes,” Sam said. “I thought I might do my best to capture those cottonwoods down by the creek south of here. What did you call it?”

“Deer Creek,” Jake offered. “I made some coffee. You want some?”

Sam shook his head. “No, thank you very kindly, Mr. Lasater. I’m looking forward to exploiting today’s opportunity to the utmost in this magnificent morning sunshine.”

“Fair enough,” Jake replied, glancing at the morning sky. “I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”

“And what might your query be, sir?” the little painter asked, adjusting his grip on the canvas.

“What made you decide to take up painting? Seems out of character for a man with your … background.”

“I felt compelled to discover what I had …
inflicted
 … upon the natural beauty of this great land of ours.”

“Come again?” Jake took a sip from his coffee, a puzzled look crimping his face.

“Well, as you are no doubt aware, Morse code made possible an exploitation of the West in ways I couldn’t possibly have foreseen.”

Jake nodded. “Yeah, I reckon it did. Folks can talk from New York all the way to San Fran. Businesses are growing as a result of that little wonder. Made a hell of a difference in the war too, till them talkies came along and replaced it.”

“Well, I had only a vague notion—at a mostly unconscious level, mind you—of what would happen to the Americas, even the world, when I presented Morse code to Congress, and I didn’t pick that first message at random.”

“‘What hath God wrought?’” Jake quoted.

“Precisely,” Sam replied, nodding his head. “This land was still mostly untouched, untainted, if you will excuse the rather presumptuous value-judgment. At least in part because of my code, this land is rapidly being changed into something else, something …
worse
based upon my relatively meager observations.”

“I see what you mean,” Jake said, nodding.

“Well, I intend to record as much of it as I am able—for posterity, of course—before it has been consumed by greed and what many consider progress.”

“I think I understand.” Jake grinned knowingly. He wasn’t fond of big cities, and even Denver was getting more metropolitan than he could swallow. “Well, good luck.” He raised his coffee cup in salute to the small inventor-turned-painter. “I think you’ve got a great eye,” he added, referring to the two paintings he’d seen Sam arrive with.

Sam smiled. “You honor me, sir. I appreciate your kindness.” He nodded, and without another word walked around the edge of the house, marching off toward Deer Creek.

Jake sipped at his coffee, looked up again at a clear blue sky dotted with puffy clouds, thinking that all was right with the world. Then he remembered Quinn … and the crow.

“Better enjoy this while I still can,” he said aloud to himself, sighing as the chair creaked pleasantly beneath him.

“Enjoy what?” Cole asked as he stepped around the corner of the house.

“A perfect morning full of nothing but peace and quiet,” Jake sighed, still gazing into the sky. He eyed Cole, adding, “Except for the odd explosion or two.” His eyebrow went up to punctuate the statement.