He stared at the house, and he remembered how, after their home had burned down, they had been given a new one, a bigger one, one built especially for them by two of the tribe's contractors.
Given?
Since when had the tribe given houses away?
He turned toward Lone Cloud. "After ..." He cleared his throat. "After what happened to your father, you moved, didn't you?"
Lone Cloud nodded. "They were tearing down our old house to build the gas station."
"And they gave you a bigger house?"
Lone Cloud nodded, puzzled. "Yes."
"Payoff," Full Moon said. "They sacrificed our fathers and paid us off."
Lone Cloud shook his head. "What the fuck are you talking about?"
"You don't see it?"
"See what?"
"Why did they let our fathers come here alone? Why didn't they get a posse together? They knew what the Row was like. They knew what happened here. Why didn't they come with our fathers? Or try to stop them?"
"What could they do?"
"Why did they let us come here? Why didn't they want us to bring guns?"
Lone Cloud blinked. He stared down the street. "Black Hawk," he said slowly.
Full Moon nodded.
"He was council leader when our fathers were killed."
"And he was old even then." Full Moon licked his lips. "How long do you think he's been head of the council?"
"You know the tribe's history."
"No, I don't. You tell me."
Lone Cloud thought for a moment. "I don't either," he admitted.
"How old do you think he is?" Full Moon asked. Lone Cloud did not answer, and the only sound on the silent street was their overloud breathing. You are the one.
Damn right, Full Moon thought. He took a deep breath. "Let's do it," he said.
They strode forward. The fear was still there, but it had been shunted aside by anger, and Full Moon was grateful for that. He walked into the black doorway of the house his father built, Lone Cloud a step behind.
Only it wasn't the house his father built.
The outside was exactly the same, down to the chipped white paint on the right upper edge of the doorframe, but there was no coat closet entryway leading into the living room. There was only a long, narrow, black-floored, black-walled, black-ceilinged hallway that stretched forward to what looked like a blood-red room.
Where someone was screaming.
His father.
Full Moon ran down the hallway, not noticing if Lone Cloud was following him, not caring. He heard only the screams, and he remembered clearly, though he had forgotten it until now, how his father had screamed when they'd killed him, how the screams had continued long past the point when his father should have been dead, how he'd heard them clearly even as he drove away in the truck.
He reached the doorway at the end of the hall.
His father stood alone in the center of the windowless room, screaming. There were no pauses for breath, only one long continuous cry. He had heard that scream before, in the soundtrack to his nightmares, a hellish variation on the original death screams he had head on the Row.
His father was skinned and scalped, and though it had been years—decades—ago that it had occurred, the blood was still flowing, still fresh. It oozed from exposed musculature, droplets forming into drops, drops into rivulets, the rivulets cascading down skinless flesh, puddling on the floor, dark crimson against the lighter rose.
"Father!" Full Moon cried.
His voice was lost amidst the screams, and the frozen muscles of his father's face did not even twitch as Full Moon yelled, the white staring eyes not budging from their focus on nothing.
Instinctively, without making a conscious decision to do so, he raised the rifle to his shoulder and shot his father in the face.
The screams died instantly as his father's head exploded, his skinned body falling in a heap. There was a jerking spasm, then a shifting and shrinking of the form on the floor as it compressed itself into a fetal position and began to melt, the now liquefied substance of his father soaking into the floor.
The walls and ceiling of the room darkened almost imperceptibly, and then the room was empty, the floor dry, and it was as if his father had never been there.
Full Moon was shaking, breathing heavily, the air harsh in his throat and lungs. He turned, but Lone Cloud was not behind him, and he hurried back down the hall toward the front of the building, reloading as he ran. He saw another red room off to his right, and he stopped, grabbing the doorframe.
He watched Lone Cloud shoot his screaming father in the face.
He watched Lone Cloud's father melt into the floor.
"Come on!" Full Moon yelled.
The two of them ran outside.
Death Row was no longer silent. A hot wind was blowing, and it carried with it screams. The screams of men, women, and children, pitched at different tones and volumes, all sounding without pause. The street still appeared to be empty, but it felt as though it wasn't, and the two of them looked through the swirling sand for a sign of movement.
A black cowboy-hatted figure walked toward them through the dust from the far end of the street.
Full Moon raised his rifle. Lone Cloud took the .45 from his belt and aimed it.
"What's going to happen if we kill them?" Lone Cloud asked.
Full Moon shook his head. "I don't know."
"You think anyone's ever tried this before?"
"I don't know."
The figure walking toward them was carrying a hatchet, and as he drew closer, Full Moon could see that it was the man with the beard. The one who had cut off the top of his father's head.
Full Moon raised the .22, sighted the man, and shot him in the chest. The man's head jerked back at the same time that his chest exploded, dark liquid spewing out from behind, and though he hadn't heard the report, Full Moon knew that Lone Cloud had shot the man as well.
"Behind you!" Lone Cloud yelled.
Full Moon swiveled as he heard the thunderous sound of Lone Cloud's gun. He saw, for a second, the man with the mustache, arm raised, a knife clutched in his fist, but then the man was gone, disappearing instantly, appearing seconds later far off to the left. Lone Cloud shot again, this time hitting the man in the arm. The man dropped the knife, and Lone Cloud shot once more, hitting the man in the gut. Mustache doubled over and fell, unmoving, onto the dirt.
The wind had died down by this time, and the temperature had dropped. Full Moon tried to reload his rifle, but his hands were shaking and he dropped a shell. He took another one from his pocket and inserted it in the chamber.
"Two down," Lone Cloud said. "One to go."
"I give up!"
They looked to their left at the sound of the voice. Patch-Eye emerged from the sheriff's office, arms raised in surrender. He began walking toward them, and there was something about the lack of hesitation in his movements, his obvious lack of fear, that made Full Moon uneasy.
Full Moon raised his rifle. "Stop right there!" he ordered.
The man continued walking.
Lone Cloud gripped his .45, straightened his arm.
"Wait," Full Moon said. "Don't shoot him. Let's hear what he has to say."
"Halt!" Lone Cloud yelled.
Patch-Eye moved toward them, arms still raised. This close, Full Moon could see that his skin was not all skin. Most of it was, but it was so old that it was cracked and split, and the fissures were filled with what looked like painted hair. It was as though the form they were looking at was a mask, a hastily repaired costume that hid the real creature within.