Ghostcountry's Wrath (40 page)

But he didn't need to check to confirm that assessment; the last delay had made the crucial difference, for every visible bit of meadow was already so thick with black birds of every kind that he could barely see the grass. And even as he gaped, more dropped from the sky to join their fellows. But what really freaked him, what sent chills coursing along his spine, was the fact that, as soon as they landed, every one of those birds turned to face them. The only clear space was an area maybe four yards across, in the center of which they stood.

A glance skyward showed even more birds circling there, and a thin stream of them was still trickling in from the east, like beams of black light come to rival the setting sun's red. “Shit!” he growled. “We're fucked.”

“I doubt this'll be that much fun,” Sandy chuckled grimly.

“This…isn't natural, is it?” Don whispered, edging close to Calvin. When he did, the nearest birds moved into the resulting gap. Calvin felt his arm brush Okacha's, even as his hand fumbled for Sandy's.

“I guess running's not an option?” Brock gulped.

“Not if you value your eyes,” Calvin hissed back. “Those things'd trip you in a second. And once they got you down, if they didn't get you from the front, they'd just dig through from behind. These suckers mean business!”

“So does somebody else,” Okacha groaned. She'd evidently shaken whatever had afflicted her to some degree, though she still looked pale and drawn. “I don't think I need to tell you who—nor would it be wise.”

Calvin reached impulsively for the scale, nursing a vague notion of turning into some type of bird that could out-fly these others. Which of course was stupid; no way he'd be able to get back with help in time. Still…

But he had no more time for deliberation, for at that moment he noted a larger shape winging its way through the black-feathered ranks. The lesser birds avoided it, too, as if they knew themselves prey, and that they were only absolved from that role for this moment.

Closer and closer that shape came, and lower, gliding on wings dappled white and gray. And then flight feathers flared, the tail fanned, and it leaned back for landing—which it did, inside the acre-square mass of birds, a dozen yards in front of Calvin. Having no other weapon, his hand settled on the war club. It was a good weapon—except that it was all but useless here. Magic it might be, in origin. But so, surely, was what confronted him.

No longer an owl—but the shift was both too subtle and too abrupt to register. It was simply as if the air twitched where the owl was—and then there was a man.

A very
tall
man;
lean and muscular, with the black hair and ruddy-tanned skin of a Native American. He was also naked—save for a cloak of gray-and-white feathers that swept in soft folds from his shoulders to brush the tips of the grasses and the tops of black
feathered heads. He flipped it across his hips carelessly and spat out a derisive chuckle.

Calvin didn't want to look at his eyes—but did. And saw once again those eyes that were not the brown of his people, but a shocking yellow-green. Like a snake's.

“My mama said it was 'cause a rattler crawled into her bed while she was carryin' me,” Snakeeyes said in a low, mocking voice. And Calvin realized this was the first time he had heard the man speak.

“Myself,” Snakeeyes continued, as he ambled forward through the birds (Calvin preferred their thousand beady eyes to his), “I think it's 'cause of something I ate—or maybe 'cause of something that ate
me
!”

Calvin could only glare and try not to look afraid. And pray that Okacha kept her cool; that they all did.

“'Course it helps that I'm a twin,” Snakeeyes went on. “Younger twin, in fact. That is, it helps if you
want
to be a conjurer.

“Or,” he concluded, as he eased to a halt no more than a yard from the edge of the open place, “it could just be 'cause I
like
meanness. Actually, I think everybody does, they just don't let themselves admit it. Sure looks that way when you see a car wreck, though, don't it? And don't tell me those folks are there out of concern. Nosiree, they're there wantin' to see some guts, or eyeballs popped out, or something. Thing is with me, I just admit to it. I'm a predator, I guess you could say—and the prey is everybody who don't suspect they
are
prey. And sometimes you eat your prey, and sometimes you toy with it a spell first, and sometimes you just kill it flat out dead and leave it to rot. But I never know, myself. It's like fuckin': you never know if they'll pant and moan and beg for more, or if they'll scratch your back and scream. And you never know if you'll scream with 'em, or just knock the hell out of 'em to make 'em hush.”

Still no one spoke, though Calvin heard Okacha drag in a harsh breath.

Snakeeyes narrowed his gaze to stare straight at Calvin, and Calvin felt as if those eyes burned through his clothes and into his soul. “You think you're a big shot, don't you? Mr. Native American? Mr. Cherokee Indian? Mr. Ani-Yunwiya? You think that 'cause you've got a war name and an atasi and've seen a few things that you're special. But just let me
tell
you how special you are. You're special the way an animal in a zoo's special. You're special exactly as much as everybody lets you be special. You take what this woman gives you, and you're grateful; you learn a few secret things from somebody somewhere else, and you think you're Mr. Cool. Only that one ain't tellin' you no more'n he wants you to know, which ain't much—not against all there is
to
know.

“But take me, now: I
am
special—'cause nobody tells me what to do but me!”

“No,” Calvin replied coldly, distantly aware that he was surprised at himself for speaking, “you're just crazy. You're special the way a crazy man's special, and that's all.”

“Yeah,” Snakeeyes hissed back. “But I'm also
free—
and you're not! I'm not responsible to anybody, and you wanta be responsible for the whole goddamned world.”

“You're—” Calvin began, fingering the club, suddenly desperate to break this impasse at any price.

“I'm sick of shootin' the shit with the likes of you,” Snakeeyes broke in. “You've got some things I want, boy, and I'd thank you to give 'em to me; and if you do, I
might
let you live.”

“And if we don't?” Brock piped up.

Snakeeyes grinned at him, showing teeth that were far too sharp. “I'll get 'em anyway—only
you
won't know about it, not for no longer'n it takes a flock of crows to peck into your brain. 'Course it might hurt a little on the way, but you know something, little boy? Little would-be magician boy? There ain't never been a policeman in Georgia ever arrested a flock of birds for murder. And if there was, there sure ain't no jury would convict 'em—nor no jail to stick 'em in.”

Calvin swallowed, tried to catch his adversary's eyes, to challenge him silently.

“I want them things!”

“You want 'em, you've gotta name 'em!”

Snakeeyes vented something between a giggle, a snort, and a hiss—which probably passed for a laugh. “Okay, then, Little Wizard: I want that fine lookin' club you've got there, 'cause I 'spect there's no more'n one other like it in this world, and once I've got this 'un, I can get that 'un, no problem. I 'spect I could learn some powerful secrets from that thing, yessir. But I want that scale you've got, too: that thing you've got hid there under your shirt. Now that's a right fine thing, only you don't know how fine, and you're scared shitless to learn, 'cause you're afraid it'll hurt—or 'cause it might hurt somebody.

“Oh, yeah, I forgot,” Snakeeyes continued. “There's somebody near here's also got something mighty interestin': kind of a rock-stone thing. Shiny like. Some say it come from the head of a monster, but I don't much believe that, don't much believe in monsters at all, now; do you?”

“Only the one I'm lookin' at,” Calvin growled.

“The other thing I want's my woman.”

“I'm not yours,” Okacha spat. Calvin couldn't see her face, but if she looked as furious as she sounded—well, he wondered how even Snakeeyes withstood her.

“You're mine if and when and however I want you,”

Snakeeyes snorted, then shifted his gaze back to Calvin. “Now hand 'em over.”

Calvin didn't move, nor speak. None of them did. The sun dipped beneath the horizon. The world went black and gold and crimson.

“I can have them birds take you one at a time,” Snakeeyes drawled. “And I can have whoever I start with took a little at a time once they get goin'. I can have 'em start at the eyeballs, or end there. Or maybe start with one and finish with the other.”

Silence.

“That black-haired boy's got real pretty eyes.” Silence.

“They'd make a nice set with them blue 'uns that blond gal's got. She's your woman, ain't she, Little Wizard?”

“She's her own woman,” Calvin gritted.

“She's my woman if I want her to be!” Snakeeyes shot back. “I could fuck her right here, right in front of you. Shoot, I could fuck all of you, boys and girls both. I might even fuck
you
!”

“Not while I've got the scale, you won't!”

Snakeeyes laughed. “By the time you get anything done with that, I've got your woman—or my woman—or one of them boys. The birds get the rest.”

Silence.

“And if I get my woman, you really do lose—if you make me mad. Otherwise, you might still get to live. You might even get to keep all your parts. But the longer you wait, the less likely that is.”

Silence, still. But this time broken by a roll of not so distant thunder.

Calvin glanced at the sky. The birds fluffed and strutted and beat the air, as if nervous or agitated. A few rose aloft, then settled again. A soft rumbling thrummed up through Calvin's feet—legacy, probably, of a logging truck on the road a quarter-mile beyond the meadow. Or maybe it too was born of thunder.

“Stop that!” Snakeeyes shrilled.

“It's not me,” Calvin told him. “Which you knew. If I could command the weather, you wouldn't be here.” Snakeeyes only stared stonily.

“You can have the scale,” Calvin whispered.

“That's not what I asked for!”

Calvin squared his shoulders. “'Kacha's her own woman, just like Sandy,” he said quietly. “I can't make her stay, and I sure can't make her go. But I—I'll give you the scale
and
the club if you'll forget about her, and let her and Sandy and the boys alone.”

Snakeeyes's eyes flashed fire. “You deaf or
what
?”
he raged. “That
ain't
what I asked for!”

“You don't always
get
what you ask for!” Calvin yelled back, hoping by that sudden shift in demeanor to catch Snakeeyes off guard; but more, hoping against hope that what he suspected was true: that more sounds made that thunder than air covering for lightning's haste.

He hoped rightly—for seconds later, amid a rumble of tires, a swish of grass, and a deep growl of machinery, a vehicle erupted into the clearing from the thread of logging road that had been his destination all along. Its lights were off, but in the cloud-born gloom he could see that it was a black Ford Ranger—and that a camper shell covered the bed.

It was racing straight toward them, too: upsetting the birds as it tore along, bouncing over unseen ruts and bumps and hollows. Crows rose in a blur of wings where it passed; grackles shrieked and swore and swerved aside. Some never made it. They croaked and spat and died.

An instant later, the truck was beside them. Lights came on, from both grille and bumper: a dazzle of glare fixed straight on Snakeeyes. Calvin saw him blink and falter. But then a young male voice yelled, “Get the hell in here, Fargo! You wanta live forever?”

“D-Dave?” But already Calvin was stumbling that way, not caring if he trod on birds, or if they pecked him or flew at his face. He grabbed Brock by a shoulder and shoved him; saw Sandy do the same for Don. Okacha was taking care of herself.

“Jump in the back!” David yelled again, then powered up the window, even as he wheeled the vehicle straight at the still-bedazzled conjurer. The movement brought the back of the pickup even with Calvin. He jerked at the latch on the cover and flipped it up. Brock was over before Calvin could lay hands on him. Okacha followed. Sandy shoved Don up to her, then scrambled in herself. Calvin came last—and had to make a final reckless grab as the pickup spun around and roared back the way it had come. He had no idea where Snakeeyes was. All that mattered now was getting over the tailgate (he succeeded, even as he thought it) and slamming the camper latch closed.

He landed hard on the plastic liner and found himself thrust into gloom full of scooting bodies and flailing limbs, amid which a dozen or so birds still flopped. But he got the latch locked just in time.