Aunt Kate had known Haskell Witches all her life. No, she wouldn't miss that.
"Silver birdshot, like those bullets she gave you. Sea salt crystals. Pellets carved from an orca's teeth. Wood flechettes soaked in fugu toxin, apple wood from our orchard trees. Herbs." Caroline shivered at a thought, cross-cultural thing from her studies. "I don't think she puts any bone beads in them. Human bone. Anyway, she loads a different mix in each shell, along with enough double-ought buckshot to rip a man's heart to hamburger. She wears surgical gloves and a mask when she's reloading."
Aunt Alice usually wrote a personal message on the top wad while she was at it. She could be damned nasty when she felt it was needful.
Or damned nice. Holding one of the shells felt . . . comforting. As if Aunt Alice stood behind her, supporting hand on her shoulder, offering advice and strength. The House's blessing went with the shotgun and with whoever handled those shells. Caroline hoped that extended to Kate and the .44 Mag reloads.
Weapons loaded, Caroline pulled out the Hunter's satchel and they shut the truck doors. The dusk and shadows settled around them, and they stood for a few minutes letting their eyes adapt.
Something glowed, green and orange, on the left collar bone of Aunt Kate's shirt. Caroline stared. A rowan branch with berries, a brooch she'd never seen before. It made her eyes prickle, just to look at it, and she felt the hair stand up on the back of her hands like she was about to grab hold of a live wire.
Kate noticed her stare, even in the gloom, as if she'd suddenly grown owl eyes. "Grandmother Rowley used to wear it. It hasn't been out here in a generation. Seems grateful."
They walked up the road, feet crunching gravel, ears twitching at the evening noises rustling dry leaves in the forest to either side, road turning into a gray streak under the trees as her eyes adapted and caught the last of the twilight. An orange glow lit the horizon, off to the village. No, left of the village, east, out on Pratts Neck.
Kate grunted. "Fire, Pratt guesthouse. Arson, fierce as hell and some toxics burning, ammo popping. The chief backed the boys off. They're just trying to keep it from spreading to the woods. Plus explosions underground and a hell of a lot of smoke venting from some strange places. The Cop radio is hopping off the shelf, but I haven't answered. Off duty. Don't want to get called out there."
Morgans, twenty to one bet. Or hundred to one, maybe, and no takers. Why does Gary get all the fun stuff?
They turned into the high field, stars showing, there was the Dipper with its pointer stars; the ridge ran east-west and she was facing due north. And the sky mirrored the fire down in the village, curtains and rays, sheets, apocalyptic clouds of red and green. Aurora. Sunspots, coronal mass ejection reported on the news, the FEMA boys were worried about the power grid and satellites and aircraft radios. A green shaft seemed to stand up from the ridge in front of them, almost like a spotlight, pierced by the glow of Polaris.
Kate grunted again, shaking her head. "I could do fine without the dramatic lighting. That's right over the altar stone."
Now the heather matched the sky, soft green-edged red glow of the autumn blueberry and raspberry leaves, faint yellow tinge to the bracken clumps, orange on the circle of rowans that echoed Kate's brooch. Patches of exposed ledge took on a sheen of blue washed with silver where water flowed thin from under the moss and lichen. The field buzzed, like it was alive with bumblebees. Caroline wondered if any civilians would see it, hear it, or just Earth Goddess priestesses and witches.
Witches. Goddesses. If the Hunter was going to fit into this scheme somehow, Caroline had better bring Her out, give Her a chance to get used to the static charge building up around them. The air smelled of flint sparks and every hair on Caroline's body stood up — even her pubic hair, and she felt heat and moisture in her crotch, and tightness in her nipples that remided her of some of the raunchier Earth Goddess legends.
And now she was going to die. Didn't want to admit it, but that was where she stood. Kate had just barely found her place, her power, never had a chance to grow into it, never had a teacher. The brujo, now, he'd had centuries. He knew what he was doing. Even Aunt Alice hadn't actually defeated him. They were going to lose.
And the Hunter simply wouldn't care. Caroline could hear that voice already: "Whiteskin corpses? Whiteskin problem. Has he killed any People yet? Didn't Grandmother Walks teach you anything?"
All She wanted out of this was a free plane ride back to the Arizona deserts. Back to Her people, who didn't even get along all that well with their First People neighbors. Like Hopi with the Navajo and Apache. Bet She's never met any Pan Indian activists.
But Caroline knew she had to try. She set the shotgun down on a low mattress of blueberry bushes, muzzle pointed safely out into darkness, and reached for the zipper of her satchel and pulled it open.
She looked up at Kate. "With the lights and engine noise, you might as well have tooted the horn when we pulled up. Damn sure the brujo knows we're here. And if we cut loose with all this firepower, I think we're going to face a few questions from Tom Wheeler or the other wardens. You got a good excuse for night-hunting?"
Kate shook her head, turning slowly, watching the edge of darkness around them. "Tom's a Stonefort boy. There's no way he's going to poke his nose into a shooting up on this ridge, full moon at Samhain."
Samhain. Kate's voice sounded funny. Caroline stopped
