The Freedman and the Pharaoh's Staff (40 page)

“I said but an instant.”  A cavernous growl came from the
Geist Führer's
pallid lips. A death white hand clutched Jeb. He recoiled then jumped, horror running its ice cold touch through his veins. Jeb let out a piteous screech. Death rose before his eyes. “You cannot kill me, Freedman. I can live within many bodies—dead or alive." The
Geist Führer
cackled from the grave, pulling himself to his feet. He moved in a nightmarish fashion, like a marionette pulled by the strings of an untrained puppeteer. “Death, that dark spirit, will never find me." He lashed out at Jeb, grasping him again with a stiff hand. Its touch burned like arctic water.
 

Chunks of concrete broke free from the ceiling and crashed all around them. The force heaved Jeb free from the
Geist Führer's
grip. He thudded against a desk, the staff at his feet. This man whose name might as well have been Annihilation, crawled towards Jeb, face twisted and dead hands reaching. While carnage rained all around him. Time seemed to slow. Then it was over. One mighty cut was all it took. He swung. Struck the Pharaoh's Staff. It cracked in half, amidst a burst of blue glimmering light. As if drained of magic, its blue gaze paled, looking like common earthenware. As Jeb guessed, the ritual sword fell apart from the force of the blow. Its copper hilt buckled under the pressure of his grip.
Clang!
The blade broke free, springing off the ground into the rubble like a frightened toad.
 

A howl of rage erupted from the
Geist Führer
. “No!” It echoed through the room, almost mockingly. As if some other dark force pointed and sneered. At who? Jeb couldn't decide. In a single twisted, perverted bound the
Geist Führer
was on his feet. Scrambled across hillocks of concrete toward the staff.
 

Jeb snatched the splintered staff as the
Geist Führer
came clambering down at him. He heaved himself to his feet, eyes shifting between the portal closing and the dead-thing coming at him with evil as its guide.
 

This is it. I did it.
Annihilation was upon Jeb as was
Carnage. One good throw and he'd send the staff back through the portal. Back to Crispus. He'd destroy the staff. Jeb just needed to keep it away from the
Geist Führer.
Too late. Walls shattered, the ceiling tore itself apart, crushing everything beneath it. Carnage and darkness descended on everything.
 

Then Jeb was hurtling through the...air? Or maybe he was dead and this was the path to heaven. If there was one. No. There was that radiance. The portal! He was in it. That queer sensation returned. His body pulled into nothingness, yet he still heard the
Geist Führer
wail in Creole. Then another thunderous clatter of stone.
 

A sensation of being born anew came over Jeb. Darkness. Brief incomprehensible awareness. Then light. An opening. Warmth. Then more light. The barn ablaze. Flames had consumed most of the roof. Jeb lay sprawled on the floor in a maze of hellfire. Overhead the serene night sky smiled down on him. Though there were still no stars. A stench of death and cooking meat filtered into his nostrils. He gathered his strength, gripping the two halves of the staff and got on to his feet. Smoke choked his lungs, burning his eyes and congealing in his throat. More chaos. How could he get out? There was a labyrinth of fire between he and freedom. He scanned the barn.
There!
 

Hoping he'd found his path, Jeb rushed into the stacks. Dodged wildfires dropping from the heavens as hay tumbled down from the loft. He tripped and fumbled through the infernal landscape. The open barn door seemed always ahead, but never close. Then it was upon him, looming like one of the great mountains. Jeb threw himself through the flames. Another moment of spiraling in the air, and he landed in a sea of soft grass. Cool, dewy to the touch. His lungs were on fire. All he could do was stich up his eyelids, guard them from the smoke billowing out at him.
 

“Jeb!” came Crispus's voice.
Thank Jesus, he's alive!
Hands grasped Jeb, one swollen and deformed. They dragged him away from the inferno, through comforting grass.
Verdiss!
Jeb almost knocked whoever it was away, wanting to reach for whatever weapon he could. But then heard Crispus. “Are you okay? Did you get the staff?”
Only Crispus.
 

“Didn't—that—rattler bite—you?”

Crispus stopped, and dropped Jeb. “Hmmm. Must have been a dry bite. Now the staff. Where is it?”

 Still hacking on smoke, Jeb held up the two halves. “I got them.” The flames in his lungs smoldered away, and smoke crawled out of his throat. Jeb unknitted his eyes. Crispus stood over him. Those big goofy ears sent a smirk racing across his lips. “It's good to see your face.” Though Crispus grimaced, his eyes on the Pharaoh's Staff. “Had to be done. That devil almost got it. Then there'd be no hope.”

Crispus opened his mouth but didn't say anything.

With unfamiliar strength, Jeb hadn't felt in ages, he climbed to his feet. “I told you before—nothing can make everything all right. Even if it could, it wouldn't be real. Peace needs to come from the people, not from a stick.”

Crispus nodded. He seemed to understand. “What happened to Verdiss?” Though his attention went pass Jeb, flames from the barn dancing in his eyes. Jeb couldn't look back at the building collapsing into a fire-mound. Fallon was dead. Worse, he doubted Crispus thought to or could have retrieved his body. At least, he had a soldier's burial.

“Dead,” said Jeb after a long pause. “The
Geist Führer
was alive—or dead—or Verdiss took him over—maybe." Reasoning through what he'd witnessed wasn't worth the pain of doing so.
 

“Your wounds are healed.” Crispus caressed Jeb's shoulder, a queer expression on his face. “Perhaps going through the gateway?”

Another thing Jeb didn't want to think about. Hell if he could understand time travel—if that's what he did.

“Fallon's gone. The girl, Tempest, is alive, but may not make it.”

“Where's Keturah?! Bettina?! Where they at?” They had to be all right. If Crispus made it out, they must have too. “Where are they!”

“Don't worry, Keturah and Bettina are—”

Keturah shoved Crispus aside and leapt into Jeb's arms. Bettina sprinted behind her. She wrapped herself around his legs. Deep embraces, until it hurt. They toppled over into a pig pile.

“I love y'all both so much," was all Jeb could cry. Tears of joy.

“Jebidiah!” Keturah bawled. She held him, their bodies folded into each other.

“I thought I lost you, Papa!” Bettina sobbed, squeezing him.

“Me, too, girl! Me, too." He kissed her forehead. Another long moment of hugs, kisses, and crying.

“Now, y'all go and tend to Tempest." Jeb climbed to his feet, holding both of his girls in his arms. He pointed to the wounded girl lying nearby. “Uncle Crispus and I got to talk, okay?” After a passionate kiss from Keturah, Jeb watched his wife and daughter return to Tempest. The girl was blistered, burned, but unconscious.
She's not in pain, at least. Until she wakes up.
A smile wouldn't leave Jeb, his lips curled up. Even in this damnable aftermath. His family survived. Everything would be all right...for him.
Wait.
Jeb turned to Crispus nursing his engorged hand.
“Did you find the gem?”
 

Crispus shook his head. “No. What do you think happened to it?”

Stars blinking in the vast sea of the night sky caught Jeb's eye. A glance upward and it was as if God lit them just a moment ago. “I don't know...” Better yet, he'd try to convince himself the gem was destroyed with that madman. So Jeb could rest easy knowing the
Geist Führer's
soul was gone forever. “We have to send Fallon off right. He told us what Verdiss was up to. If it wasn't for him, we wouldn't have made it this far." He gave a sullen glance at the barn. It was an impromptu funeral pyre like a lighthouse's light shining off at sea.  
 

Crispus nodded. “Agreed—I only found his pistol though." Crispus held it up for him to see. Soot and dents marred the Starr revolver.

Sadness hefted its weight on Jeb. He narrowed his eyes on the gun. All that was left of the boy. “I was afraid of that. Maybe we should bring it to whatever family he's got in Virginia. Hymowitz can't be too hard of a name to track.”

Crispus nodded. Pain pulled on his face too. “We'll have to go our separate ways, as well. The two halves need to be destroyed.”

“Yeah...”
It's not over yet
.
 

As though thinking it over, Crispus held the Starr revolver out for Jeb. Then thought better of it and slid it into his belt. “I'll take Fallon's gun on my way to the Pacific. You take the other half to the Atlantic. Take Keturah and Bettina. It'll be an easier trip on you three.”

What?
Jeb realized he hadn't said the word. He stared at Crispus.
Is he joking?
 

“Don't thank me.” Crispus's face turned to rock. “You always took care of me. You saved my life.” There was a moment of silence as Jeb and Crispus stood under the night sky. Gusts of wind carried heat from the fiery barn, warming the chilled night air. Now, the towering inferno seemed like the flames of hope standing against a bleak future.

Words couldn't express his thanks, so Jeb didn't try. “You were right, you know," he said. “There can be peace. People can change and change is coming. Never believed it after what they did. After losing all them innocent boys in the war. But if this here boy, a boy in the Ku Klux Klan can change, can redeem himself and die for the cause, then I'm supposin' things can change."

Crispus took the bottom half of the staff and secured it in his satchel. “Funny. You've turned believer, and I've finally seen what you saw all along. The staff is broken. Not destroyed.” Crispus turned from Jeb and ambled toward the forlorn woods ahead. Back toward Yonkers.

“What—what do you mean?” Jeb heard the desperation in his own voice. He tried to hide it. Keep it from Keturah and Bettina who were only a few yards away.
It's over.
It has to be.
 

“Who knows what other dark forces will come out of the woodwork,” said Crispus as he disappeared, swallowed by the woods' gaping maw. A howl of a wind brought the echo of Crispus's words to Jeb as if to taunt him. Its voice sounded guttural. Malevolent. Was it the voice Fallon said he'd heard in that alleyway?

Then the realization slid its knife into Jeb's back like a skilled assassin. In one of Jeb's dreams Moses said it too, “
dark forces are coming for the staff. They'll never stop till it's destroyed.”
 

They'll never stop till it's destroyed.

 

 

The End

 

 

 

 

A Selected Glossary

 

Badji-
A
voodoo
temple or holy place where rituals are performed.
 

Bokor-
A
voodoo
worker who uses bad magic, often in dealing with the dead.
 

Bokò-
A
voodoo
worker who uses their magic to heal and harm others.  Neither good nor bad.
 

Copperhead
– A person from the North with Pro-Southern beliefs.
 

Forty Dead Men
– A full box of ammo.
 

Go Boil Your Shirt
– Equivalent to “get lost!”
 

Houngan-
A male
voodoo
priest.
 

Mambo-
A
voodoo
priestess.
 

Redeemers-
Conservative, pro-business democrats belonging to a Southern coalition determined to overthrow Reconstruction and the Federal government's presence in the South. They formed paramilitary groups, which were common throughout Louisiana.
 

Sawbones
– A field surgeon. Known as such due the common need to amputate the wounded's limbs.
 

Secesher
– An abbreviation of the term Secessionists, an insult toward Confederates and Southerners.
 

 

 

 

Reconstruction-era
Ku Klux Klan Terms
 

 

 

 

Den
- The Klan's basic organization, usually comprised of members from one or counties; a group of Klansmen.
 

 

Empire
- The whole of the Ku Klux Klan; the entire organization.
 

Ghoul
- The lowest ranking member in the Empire. Serve as assistants to Goblins.
 

 

Goblin
- The average ranked member of the Empire. They make up the majority of a den.
 

Grand Wizard
- Ruler of the Klan. Rank held by founder Nathan Bedford Forrest.
 

Grand Dragon
- Second-in-commands to the Grand Wizard. Rulers of one or more Realms.
 

Nighthawk
- Master of the Guard. Oversees the security detail of a den.