By the time the place had emptied, and Brady had stepped out onto the porch for the final time, dawn was tickling the rooftops with the promise of the new day.
Creed leaned on the corner of the bar with his hands wrapped around a warm mug of strong, bitter coffee. Every now and then he glanced out at the street, but he was pretty sure the threat had ended, for the moment at least. Still, his gnawing unease refused to fully quiet.
The door closed. Silas slammed the bolts into place, locking the place up for the precious little of the night that remained.
'You'd better get some rest,' Silas said, coming over to the bar. 'You look like hell.'
Creed glanced up, and then grinned at the bartender.
'I feel like hell,' he agreed. 'I guess you're right though. This all night vigil ain't doing either of us any favors. I don't reckon we'll see any more of those three ‘til sundown. Just a gut feelin' but they don't seem the type to come for high tea. Tonight's a different story; darkness has a whole different feel about it. So I'm thinking we want to sleep, rest up and expect the worst come sundown.'
Silas, who was polishing the last of the night's stains off his bar, nodded. 'Ain't you a cheerful soul? The bitch of the matter is I don't think you're wrong.'
Creed stood up and stretched. Every bone in his back cracked. Before he could turn, Silas leaned in closer.
'How'd they do that, Creed?' he asked. 'How in hell does a guy get shot to shit, throw himself out of a second story window, and God damned disappear? It doesn't make a lick of sense. Where'd the bastards go?'
'I wish I knew the answer to that, Silas,' Creed said.
He felt the feathers in his pocket scratching at him through the denim. The locket rested cool and smooth against his chest.
'Well, it gives me the fuckin' creeps, and I don't mind telling you,' Silas grunted, scowling at the sun as it caught in the window. 'Think I'll bed down for a couple hours, catch some shuteye myself. It's going to be busy with everyone getting ready for that damned revival. Between you and me, I'll be glad when it's over and that Deacon fella moves on. Things haven't been quite right here since he arrived, you know what I'm sayin'?'
'Still smarting over Colleen, eh?' Creed tried for a grin, but it fell short of humor.
'It's not just that,' Silas said. 'There's other whores, and sooner or later one will wander through town. Look around you, man. Everyone's all fired up, and I don't see it goin' anywhere good.'
'It'll be over soon,' Creed said. 'They'll roll out there tonight, sing a few hallelujahs, and be done with it for another ten years, until the next guy comes through. Can't blame them for being excited. Next to dust blowin' down the road and stray tumbleweeds, this is the only thing that's happened here in a long time.'
'I'd think you'd be about tired of things happening,' Silas grunted.
Creed laughed. 'When a man gets tired of things happening, he's tired of life, my friend. I ain't that far down the road just yet.'
He mounted the stairs and climbed slowly up to his room. He stopped outside his door, listening before he opened it. A part of him didn't trust those peculiar strangers to stay gone. Everything was as he'd left it. He checked out the floor where the tall one had stalked him. There was some sort of greenish gray substance on the stained wood, and more on the wall behind. What there wasn't, and what there really ought to have been plenty of, was blood.
He pulled the feathers from his pocket and laid them on the table. Then he gathered up the scattered remnants of the pack and its contents. Nothing of importance was missing, as far as he could tell. The three had obviously been after something, but he was fairly certain they hadn't gotten it.
He wondered if it was the journal. There was a lot of it he hadn't read, but he had the impression that only the last bits mattered. He thought about the Deacon, and what he'd witnessed a few nights back. He wondered if the man knew about his three visitors, or if they'd be paying the healer a visit next.
Creed went across to the window and made sure it was shut, the latch twisted into place. He could feel a draft where the wood didn't quite mate - but for all their weirdness his visitors hadn't been smoke ghosts, they couldn't simply drift in through the cracks in the walls. He pulled the curtain and then lay back on his bed.
He kept the pack tucked up under one arm where it couldn't be moved without disturbing him. He unholstered his six-guns, tucked one down along his leg with his hand resting on the butt and left the other one half-under his pillow. If they came back, they'd find him ready, for all the good the guns had done him earlier.
He thought about the revival. Everyone in the town would attend. He knew them well enough to know they couldn't allow a thing like this to pass and only learn of it from others. They'd all go, and they'd watch, and they'd sing hymns, and then they'd talk about the damned thing for the next two years, batting about every word that was said and every song that was sung as if it was the most interesting story in the world. It'd become a part of the not-so rich tapestry of life that was Rookwood. No one would want to be the one missing from all the stories.
No one except Creed.
He had no intention of going to the revival.
On the other hand, with the three strangers lurking somewhere and Brady being out of town, he sure as hell wasn't going to stay around here by himself either. He didn't want them adding to their story by telling how they came back to find that no-account cowboy Creed dead in his bed, covered in black feathers. No, he planned to clear out as soon as the last wagon-wheel hit the trail.
The problem of where he'd go was one he hadn't tackled. Before he could give it much thought, the night's excitement - and drink - caught up with him. As the town of Rookwood came to life and began to bustle as it hadn't done in years, Provender Creed tipped his hat down over his eyes to block the glare of the sun and dropped off into the deep, dreamless sleep of the damned.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Three whiskey bottles sat on a flat rock about twenty yards away. Mariah stared at them, waiting. Somewhere, she knew he was watching. She felt his eyes on her. She closed her eyes and sank deeper into the moment. She'd practiced this until her mind blurred with fatigue. Her feet were sore from standing too long on the hot sand. Her throat was parched.
Where was he?
A slight breeze brushed a stray hair across her cheek. She ignored it. Something else moved. She didn't hear it, exactly, rather, felt it and reacted.
Moving so quickly her hand blurred she gripped the hilt of one of the three knives on her belt with her left hand, drew it and flipped it so she caught the blade between thumb and forefinger. Whatever she had sensed was moving. She snapped back her wrist, and sent the blade slashing through the air. At the same moment she dropped her right hand to the butt of the revolver, flipped it up, and, working the hammer with her now empty left, fired three quick shots.
The bottles shattered one after the other in a spray of glittering glass.
She turned, gun still drawn, and dropped into a crouch.
Balthazar stood, smiling at her. He held the blade of her knife like it was some poisonous viper. He flipped it back at her and without thought she caught it, just before it would have struck her face. She spun it and slid it back into its sheath.
Only when she released the hilt did she start to shake. The pistol felt suddenly heavy in her grip, as though it had taken on the weight of all the lives it had and would one day claim, and she flipped it back into the holster. She turned away from Balthazar then, and stared at the shattered pile of glass that had been the whiskey bottles.
'That is it,' Balthazar said, walking over to stand beside her. 'That is what I have been trying to bring you to. It felt good, didn't it? Admit it girl, to yourself at least.'
'It didn't feel good, or bad.' She said. 'I didn't feel anything at all. I just...reacted.'
'That is the truth of battle. There is very little time for thinking, it comes from here,' Balthazar said, touching
