Keeper of the Books (Keeper of the Books, Book 1) (6 page)

Above and in clear view from his bed, was a tiny window that allowed only the slightest bit of light. Such a glimmer of hope was often meant to provide a prisoner with a sense of remorse and fear that he might never get to fully experience the sun again but for those few precious minutes as he walked to the hanging platform before life was strangled out of him.

Nate didn’t feel this fear. More than anything, he felt confused. For the life of him, he couldn’t figure out why he was here at all, or where
here
was.

His heart pounded in his chest and threatened to burst if he didn’t sit up straight. Almost in a panic, Nate shot to his rear and held on to the side of the bed with both of his hands. A trickle of sweat ran down his right cheek and he wiped it away hurriedly.

It was in this moment that he realized he still had his hat on. He reached for it and yanked it off to study it for a second without really having a good reason to do so. Then he looked past his hat to his waist. His belt was pressed firmly against his stomach, a line of cartridges bubbling out in perfect succession. Set on his right hip was his six-shooter.
 

He set his hat back on his head and felt for his chest and back, realizing that his Winchester was secure in its sheath. Somehow, Nate was inside a jail cell and fully armed.

This didn’t make much sense to him. First of all, he couldn’t remember being put in jail. Second, if someone had thrown him in jail, why would they leave him with his weapons? Nate knew he couldn’t have wandered in here drunk. Even when there was more alcohol in his veins than blood, he tried to keep his wits about him. Nate was never so drunk that he would waltz into a jail cell or allow himself to be captured. There was a chance that he’d passed out and was caught, but that didn’t quite explain why he had his guns with him.

His next thought was that this was some sort of joke that Joe might be trying to pull over him, but that thought spurred another: he and Joe had been in a cabin. There was a book.
 

Nate reached inside his shirt pocket and grabbed his flask. It was empty. Though that wasn’t something new unto itself, he did remember when he last ran out. Earlier. On his porch. Joe had been pacing back and forth telling Nate about…about…

The bank robbery… The book…

Memories flooded into Nate’s mind, one right after the other. They’d been hired to rob a safety deposit box to get something. That something turned out to be a book that had swallowed up Ralph and Stew. Joe brought it back. Nate then took Joe to meet with Tyler Montgomery to get the rest of the payment.
 

Nate stood now as nervousness crept into him. Montgomery had been spouting off some nonsense about a place called Galamore. Then he disappeared into thin air. All of them had been trying to get away from Levi Thompson.
 

Nate swore under his breath. He remembered everything. Tyler Montgomery had gone into the book first. Then Joe. But neither of them were anywhere to be seen.
 

Everything had gone black. That was the last thing Nate remembered. All of that seemed like it had been days ago. Weeks even. He recalled each word spoken, each image of the men’s faces as if it were a story of some distant past.

Considering he didn’t remember anything between opening the book and waking up in this cell, Nate had to assume that nothing had transpired between those two events. There had been times in Nate’s life where he had suffered from some acute memory loss, whether it be from too much alcohol or an injury, but this wasn’t the same thing. Nate was pretty sure he wasn’t suffering from memory loss at all. Montgomery had said something about magic. Something about a place called Galamore. It was all in the book.

Nate had to keep himself grounded, however. He didn’t believe in magic or anything like it. And he was probably the least superstitious person in the West, though that wasn’t saying a whole lot. Nate had met plenty of people out West who were superstitious. Those kind of people, especially those who lived alone and in the middle of nowhere, had lightning storms and the haunting melodies of coyotes from some undetermined distance to keep them company. It was easy to become superstitious.

Nate often wondered if people who could live in such a way were either crazy or extremely grounded. And given the fact that his desire was to travel all the way to Montana to set up a ranch with endless acreage caused him to question his own sanity once or twice. Crazy or not, being out there alone on a ranch was far better than rotting away in a jail cell.

Nate hoped that wasn’t his current predicament. He pulled out his Colt six-shooter and checked to make sure it was still loaded. He snapped the cylinder back into place and kept his gun in his hand. He stood from the bed cautiously and only then did he notice another jail cell across from him. Nate paused when he saw someone in there watching him. For some reason he felt scared. Frozen to the ground. He held his gun in front of him, his finger resting on the side of the trigger.

The person in the other cell stayed in the shadows and Nate couldn’t quite see the person’s face. To him, the figure was more like a shadow than anything when it moved just slightly. Then there was a voice.
 

“Where did you come from?” the voice asked just above a whisper.

Nate’s jaw tensed. He didn’t want a guard or the sheriff to come in after him, so he kept his voice low. “I’m not exactly sure what’s happening,” he answered truthfully.

“Why are you here?” the voice asked.
 

Again, Nate didn’t know the answer, but this time he didn’t say anything. Instead, he moved closer to the bars to get a better look at his surroundings. He found that he was in one of many different jail cells along a cold and dark hallway. To his left was the end of the hallway with three cells on either side. To his right were about five more on either side, all of them leading to a set of stairs at the end and a large wooden door that closed them off from the outside world. Nate could see the outline of daylight under the crack of the door and wondered where it led.

To his right, he could hear someone coughing, and to his left a man was singing quietly to himself. It seemed that most of these cells were occupied.

He looked back at the cell across from him. “I don’t know where I am,” he whispered.

“In jail,” the voice came back.
 

Nate wasn’t sure, but it seemed that the voice that answered him back was from a woman. Now, Nate had seen his fair share of jails in his time. Mostly it was when he had been disruptive in public, causing bar fights or firing his weapon in the air to stir up a ruckus while he was intoxicated. Whenever Nate was jailed in these instances, he was usually in some know-nothing town where no one had ever heard of him, or if they had they didn’t know what he looked like, thus they never bothered to try and collect his bounty. Nate was choosy about the towns he stayed in and the saloons he liked to frequent. He sometimes smiled when he wondered what some of those sheriffs or deputies might have thought if they had ever discovered that he was none other than Nathaniel Cole, bounty: $5,000.

Of all the times he’d been inside a jail cell, he never recollected there being a woman to keep him company, whether it be in the same cell or in an adjacent one. It was possible that Nate was talking to a younger boy, but that was almost as unlikely. This voice was too deep for a boy, but too feminine for a man.

“Why don’t you step into the light where I can see you?” Nate whispered.
 

“You realize you have a weapon, don’t you?”

“Yeah,” Nate said. “Two of them.”

“And you’re in a jail,” the voice said.
 

“Yep.”

The person let out a deep breath and stepped forward. When the light shined on her face, Nate felt his back stiffen. He wasn’t sure what to think. She was like no other creature he had ever seen. This was neither man nor a woman. But she wasn’t an animal either. Nate couldn’t help himself. “What in the world are you?”

“You really don’t know where you are, do you?” she said.
 

Nate looked her up and down. She was in sackcloth, dirty and stained all over. She wore shoes, but barely. They each had holes in them, some of her toes exposed and bare. Her skin was a pale gray color, almost white. Her features were sharp and slender. Nate regarded himself as a tall man, but she was taller than he was by a couple of inches at least.

Her jet black hair was pulled back into a ponytail which allowed her ears to show. These ears were long and came to a point behind her head as though two feathers had been fastened to the side of it.

Her eyes were the most striking of all her unfamiliar features. They were bright and purple, and they seemed to glow in the darkness like a cat’s might. This creature was altogether frightening and beautiful at the same time. It was a feeling Nate couldn’t seem to get his mind around.
     

“I’m sorry,” Nate said. “I just don’t know what’s happening.”

“My name is Marum,” she said. “I suppose you’ve never seen a gray elf before?”

“A what?”

“A gray elf.”

“Can’t say that I have,” Nate said.

“Most of your kind don’t like us,” she said.

Nate let the statement stand. He didn’t have an opinion on gray elves one way or another. He was starting to think that perhaps that last bit of whiskey he had must have been bad. He was either in some sort of terrible drunken nightmare or Tyler Montgomery hadn’t been lying about that book of his.

He desperately hoped he was drunk out of his mind.
 

“I’m sensing that my brother didn’t send you in here to free me,” she said. “Otherwise you would know who I am.”

“Your brother ain’t Tyler Montgomery, is he?”

Marum shook her head. “I don’t know that name.”

“That’s what I was afraid of,” Nate answered.

“Do you remember how you got in here?” she asked him.
 

Nate thought for a minute and wondered if it was such a good idea to start talking about Montgomery’s book. As far as Nate was concerned, he was still running from Levi Thompson. Now, he didn’t have a single clue where Levi might be, but he could have been in any one of the jail cells that Nate couldn’t quite see. Nate’s job was to get out of there and put as much distance between him and the bounty hunter as he could.

Nate shook his head. “I’m a bit confused on a lot of things, Miss.”

“Miss?” Marum said with a wry smile. “It’s been a long time since someone has called me
Miss.
”

“Well, if that’s what you prefer,” Nate said, glancing toward the exit, wondering how hard it might be to sneak out.

“It’s not,” she answered. “You can just call me by my name.”

“Listen, lady, I don’t plan to be calling you anything for long. I need to get out of here.”

“So do the rest of us,” she said. “You’re camped out on death row.”

Nate could feel his face drain of color. “Come again?”

“Everyone on this row is waiting to be executed,” she said. “And I’m up next.”

“Up next as in this week?”

She shook her head.

“Today?”

“In a few minutes,” she answered.

“You don’t seem too bothered by it,” Nate said.
 

“That’s because you showed up,” she said. “The Author has heard me. You are here to rescue me whether you like it or not.”

“I ain’t here to rescue anybody but myself,” he said. “And I’m still trying to figure that out.”

Marum glanced down and nodded. “Check the door,” she said.

Nate looked down. “What?”

“Push on the door.”

Nate reached a hand out and pushed lightly on the cell door in front of him. It opened without so much as a squeak. He could feel his jaw hanging open. He would have never suspected that it would be unlocked. Why would he be in an unlocked jail cell, fully armed, and with no memory of how he got there?

“You see? I told you. The Author has heard me. You’re here to get me out.”

“I still don’t know about that,” Nate said, stepping out into the hallway. “It’s not like I have a key.”

Almost in answer to his statement, the door at the end burst open and the sunlight flooded into the darkened hallway like the dawning of a new day. For some reason, Nate wasn’t sure why, he jumped back into his cell and pulled the door close to him. He could see three men descending the stairs. The first one wore a badge on his vest, his hands resting closely to his revolvers at his waist. He was clean shaven and seemed well put together. The two other men behind him carried rifles, both of them scruffy with dirt on their faces and hands. They made their way slowly down the hallway.
 

Marum kept her raspy voice low as she looked at Nate intently. “They are here to take me,” she said. “I’m about to be hanged for crimes I didn’t commit. You have the chance to help me. Do you want my blood on your hands?”

Nate didn’t really see it that way. Having just woken up in a strange cell, he felt he bore no responsibility for this gray elf named Marum. If she was here to die, she probably deserved it as much as Nate did. But there was something that stirred in his mind when she mentioned being innocent.
 

The book.

Nate remembered what he had been reading when Montgomery’s book had drawn him in. He had read about this gray elf. He had been reading it from her perspective. She had been crying. She was about to be killed.

Nate was no saint, but he also didn’t like the pit in his stomach when he thought about staying in the shadows and doing nothing until they took Marum away.
 

The sheriff and his two men stood in front of Marum’s jail cell. The sheriff’s voice was rough and deep. “Marum, it’s time. Now don’t you try nothing, you hear? My boys will shoot you down like a dog if you do.”

Nate had a gun. He had
two
guns. If what Montgomery had said was true, and this book was a way to get to another place, then that meant all this was real. And if Nate was in another place, he would need a guide. Anything to help him put some distance between him and Levi Thompson.