“I think so,” said Grey slowly. “So if ghost rock was already down there in the Maze, and if some of it eroded, then…”
“Then traces of it are everywhere,” said Looks Away, nodding his approval. “Not chunks, not pieces you could easily spot.”
“Then so what? How’s that worth anything to anyone? I never heard of anyone panning for ghost rock and making much more than beer money off of it.”
“It’s not about money,” said Looks Away, although from the expression on Jenny’s face it was clear she didn’t entirely agree. “Doctor Saint developed a process to extract trace particles of the rock from sediment. It’s a time-consuming process, though, and still very much in the experimental stages.”
“Again — so what?”
“So, Doctor Saint was able to process enough of it to power some of his weapons.”
“Ah,” said Grey, nodding.
“Ah, indeed. When he returns here, Doctor Saint will continue his extraction process, and that will give us something more than fisticuffs, harsh language, and the odd bullet or two to help us in our campaign.”
“Campaign?” asked Jenny, Brother Joe, and Grey, all at the same time.
Looks Away’s lips curled into a thoroughly devious smile. Very nearly malicious.
“Oh yes, my friends,” he said. “Between Nolan Chesterfield and Aleksander Deray this little town is being squeezed dry and crushed flat. They are clearly willing to brutalize men of the cloth and innocent women to protect their property, and the property in question is water necessary for basic human survival. Is it really a debatable point that they’ve crossed a line in the sand? This is no longer about property. These men are trying to either drive us all out, or insure that everyone here dies. As a Sioux, I believe I understand that kind of thinking better than anyone else at this table. Before we formed our own nation my people were being driven to the edge of extinction. We fought back. We made a stand. Not because we think we’re better — though, I have my own thoughts on that subject — but because we believe that being born comes with certain rights. Your Declaration of Independence has, I believe, some verbiage to that effect. Inalienable rights. Life is notable among them. Chesterfield and Deray want to take that away from us. I do not believe they have that right. So, I think it is high time we stop bending our collective necks to the chopping block and make our own stand.”
There was a heavy, thoughtful silence following his speech. Brother Joe was the first to break it.
“I can’t agree to anything that involves killing. My vows—.”
“—are all very admirable, Brother,” said Looks Away. “We’re not asking you to do any actual fighting. You are skilled in medicine, I believe?”
“I’m not a doctor, but I know something about herbs and healing draughts.”
“Good enough. You can fix us if we get dented.”
“I’ll damn well fight,” declared Jenny Pearl, her eyes blazing. “Those bastards took everything I have, including my pa.”
They all looked at Grey.
“You already know where I stand,” he said. “But before we—.”
Whatever else he was going to say was cut off by a terrible high-pitched scream. It was not the spectral howl of the demon storm.
This was the scream of a child.
Human.
Close.
Screaming in fear and in pain.
Outside in the rain.
Chapter Thirty
Grey and Looks Away launched themselves from their chairs and ran through the house to the front door. Grey whipped it open but stinging rain struck his face, driving him back. Even though the storm had slackened, the raindrops still felt like acid.
“You can’t go out there!” cried Brother Joe, pushing past him to close the door.
“The Hell I can’t,” snapped Grey.
“The rain will kill you.”
That almost stopped Grey and in the space of one heartbeat the fear that was always simmering inside his chest nearly drowned the dented honor that used to define who he was. Maybe if it had been only Looks Away there with him he might have stayed, but Jenny looked too much like Annabelle, and he could not allow himself to be a coward in her eyes.
You’re a damn fool, he told himself.
And he mentally told that part of himself to go to hell.
“Here!” yelled Jenny as she dug an oilskin poncho from the closet and threw it to Grey. He snatched it out of the air and quickly pulled it on. It must have belonged to her father because it was too big for Grey, but that was fine. Larger meant more protection.
“Do you have another?” demanded Looks Away.
“Upstairs in the trunk,” said Jenny, starting for the stairs, but Looks Away dashed past her and took the steps two at a time.
A second scream tore the night. Higher and more terrible.
Without waiting for the Sioux, Grey opened the door and flung himself into the storm.
The wind was intensifying even though there was less rain. Great gusts swept up the street toward him, seeming to attack, to try and drive him away. Riding the wind came the howls of damned things. Grey bulled his way into it. Hitting the wind was like pushing against a wall, and the muddy ground tried to catch and hold his booted feet. Even with the poncho the rain found openings at wrist and ankle and below the brim of his hat and stung like a swarm of bees.
He tried to hear through the wailing wind to orient himself, but almost at once there was no need for that. A figure came racing up the street toward him. Small. A little girl of no more than seven or eight. Red hair streamed behind her like a horse’s mane and her face was as pale as a corpse.
Except where it was streaked with blood.
In the flashes of ghost lightning the blood looked as black as oil, but Grey knew what it was. The girl ran as hard as she could, but she was slowing, staggering, nearly gone. She would have stopped to rest if she could except for the thing that followed her.
It came more slowly than she ran, loping along like some great, pale ape.
Only it wasn’t an ape.
It was Deputy Jed Perkins.
He was nearly naked, his body covered only in torn streamers of what had been his clothes. His skin was white except for sunburned forearms and face. His hair hung in dripping rattails. His mouth was open, smiling. Laughing.
Laughing in all the wrong ways.
And his chest.
His chest.
The flesh of breast had been slashed to ribbons, the meat and muscle pulled back to expose his rib cage. And there, driven by some insane force into the very center of his sternum was a piece of polished stone. It was as black as the night except for a tracery of white lines that seemed to wriggle through it. The stone glowed from within but it was neither fire nor electric light. This was something far worse, something far stranger. Deep inside the chunk of ghost rock a cold, intensely bright blue light glowed with hellish ferocity. The deputy’s eyes glowed with the same weird light. Too bright, as if lit from within.
Grey nearly lost himself in that moment.
He had already seen the dead walk and encountered witches and monstrous storms, but this was something else. This was sorcery. This was the kind of dark magic he’d read about in old books, the kind they sing of in songs when they are not trying to lull you to sleep. This was what evil looked like.
This was something that broke the laws of nature. Perkins had to be dead and yet he ran howling after a child, his eyes filled with starlight, his hands reaching to tear and rend.
Scared as he was, Grey’s hand moved with practiced speed. The Colt seemed to appear in his hand, he saw and felt his thumb cock the hammer, felt his index finger squeeze the trigger. Heard the report. All of it happening as if he were witnessing someone else perform the familiar actions.