Bloodstone

'Eleven wagons,' Crane told him. 'Perhaps thirty people. They must be destroyed. Utterly destroyed!'

Still on the dais, Padlock Wheeler saw the door at the back of the hall open, and a tall man step inside.

Dressed in a dust-stained black coat, patched on the left arm, he wore two long guns.

'Where are the lawmakers of this community?' he said — his voice, though not loud, cutting through the conversation at the centre of the hall.

Crane saw him and screamed. 'It's him! It's the Devil!' Backing away, the white-haired Oath Taker ducked down behind a line of benches.

This is a house of the Lord,' said Padlock Wheeler. 'What do you want here?'

'Justice,' answered the man. 'You are sheltering a murderer, a killer of women and children.'

'He tells it differently,' said Padlock. 'He claims you are demon-possessed.'

The newcomer shook his head. Twenty miles from here they are burying a woman named Clara. She was pregnant; half her head was shot away. They will bury one of her daughters beside her. The man Crane rode up to the wagons yesterday and demanded to hear Psalm 22. I gave him to understand that I knew it. As indeed I do. But he is an evil man, and was determined upon murder. So tell me this: How will you judge him?'

Padlock looked down at where Crane was cowering. The minister felt exultant. All along he had believed Crane to be a dangerous man, and this was the opportunity to bring him down. He would ask Seth for an inquiry, and he had no doubt that the Oath Taker would be shown to be a lawbreaker. But just as he was about to speak he saw Crane draw a pistol from his belt and cock it.

Within a heartbeat all was chaos and confusion. 'You lie!' screamed Crane, rearing up and pointing his pistol. The shot splintered the wood of the door by the stranger's head. The gathered men dived for cover, but the stranger calmly drew one of his pistols and fired once. Crane's head exploded.

The Oath Taker's body stood for a moment, his black coat drenched in blood and brain. Then it crumpled to the floor.

'I am the Jerusalem Man,' said the stranger, 'and I do not lie.'

Sheathing his pistol, he left the hall.

One by one the watching men rose and moved back to view the body. Padlock Wheeler, his legs unsteady, climbed down from the dais. His brother Seth stood by the corpse and shook his head.

'What happens now?' asked Padlock.

'We'll send a message to Unity,' said Seth. 'They'll have to send another Oath Taker.'

Padlock took his brother's arm and led him away from the other men. 'He claimed to be Jon Shannow.'

'I heard him. That was blasphemy! I'll take some men to the Wanderers tomorrow. We'll speak to them, find out what really happened.'

'Crane was a wretch! I'll shed no tears for him. Why not let them go their way?'

Seth shook his head. 'He claimed to be the Jerusalem Man. He took the saint's name in vain. Everyone heard it; he's got to answer for that.'

'I don't want to see anyone else die for the sake of Crane's evil. Not even a blasphemer.'

Seth smiled thinly. 'I am a Crusader, Pad. What do you expect me to do?'

'Walk warily, brother. You saw him shoot. He was under fire, but he calmly aimed and blew Crane's soul to Hell. And if what the wretch said was true — and I don't doubt it was — he shot down a number of other armed men.'

'I've no choice, Pad. I'll try to take him alive.'

CHAPTER THREE

In a small section of the garden a tiny weed spoke to the blooms that grew there. 'Why,' he asked, 'does the gardener seek to kill me? Do I not have a right to life? Are my leaves not green, as yours are? Is it too much to ask that I be allowed to grow and see the sun?' The blooms pondered on this, and decided to ask the gardener to spare the weed. He did so. Day by day the weed grew, stronger and stronger, taller and taller, its leaves covering the other plants, its roots spreading. One by one the flowers died, until only a rose was left. It gazed up at the enormous weed and asked: 'Why do you seek to kill me? Do I not have a right to life? Are my leaves not green, as yours? Is it too much to ask that I be allowed to grow and see the sun?'

'Yes, it is too much to ask,' said the weed.

The Wisdom of the Deacon Chapter VII

* * *

They had buried Clara and her daughter by the time Shannow returned to the wagons. Jeremiah was in bed in his wagon, his chest bandaged, his face grey with sorrow and pain. Shannow climbed in to sit beside the old man. 'You killed him?' asked Jeremiah.

‘I did. I would have had it otherwise, but he fired upon me.'

‘That will not end it, Mr Shannow. Though I do not blame you. You did not inspire the evil. But you must go.'

'They will come again and you will need me.'

'No. I spoke to the men you captured before I let them go. Crane was the instigator.' Jeremiah sighed.

'There will always be men like Crane. Thankfully there will also always be men like Meredith, and men like you. It is a balance, Mr Shannow. God's balance, if you will.'

Shannow nodded. 'Evil will always thrive if men do not oppose it.'

'Evil thrives anyway. Greed, desire, jealousy. We all carry the seeds of evil. Some are stronger than others and can resist it, but men like Crane will feed the seed.' Jeremiah leaned back against his pillow, his eyes resting on Shannow's lean face. 'You are not evil, my boy. Go with God!'

'I am sorry, old man,' said Shannow, rising.

Back in the open he saw Isis coming towards him, carrying a bundle. 'I gathered some ammunition from the dead, and there is a little food here,' she said. He thanked her and turned away. 'Wait!' She handed him a small pouch. 'There are twelve Bartas here. You will need money.'

Jeremiah heard the creak of saddle leather as Shannow mounted, then the steady clopping of hooves as he headed away from the wagons. The pain from his wound was strong, but the old man flowed with it.

He felt sick, and weaker than sin.

Isis brought him a herbal tisane, which settled his stomach. 'I am happier with him gone,' she said, 'though I liked him.'

They sat in companionable silence for a while, then Meredith joined them. 'Riders coming,' he said. 'Look like Crusaders.'

'Make them welcome, and bring the leader here,' said Jeremiah. Within minutes a tall, round-shouldered man with a long, dour face climbed into the wagon. 'Welcome to my home,' said Jeremiah. The man nodded, removed his wide-brimmed grey hat and sat alongside the bed.

‘I’m Captain Seth Wheeler,' said the newcomer. 'I understand you have a man with you who calls himself Jon Shannow?'

'Will you not ask, sir, why there are fresh-dug graves outside, and why I am lying here with a bullet in my chest?'

'I know why,' muttered Wheeler, looking away. 'But that was not my doing, Meneer. Nor do I condone it. But there have been deaths on both sides, and the man who instigated them is among the dead.'

'Then why hunt Jon Shannow?'

'He is a blasphemer and a heretic. The Jerusalem Man — of blessed memory — left this earth twenty years ago, taken up by God like Elijah before him in a chariot of fire.'

'If God can lift him, which of course he can,' said Jeremiah carefully, 'then he can also bring him back.'

‘I’ll not argue that point with you, Meneer. What I will say is this, if the good Lord did choose to bring back the Jerusalem Man, I don't think he'd arrive with singed hair and a patched coat. However, enough of this — which direction did he take?'

'I cannot help you sir. I was in my wagon when he rode away. You will have to ask one of my people.'

Wheeler rose and moved to the door, then he turned. 'I have already said that I do not condone what happened here,' he said softly. 'But know this, Mover, I share Crane's view about the likes of you. You are a stain upon God's land. As the Deacon says, There is no place for the scavenger among us.. Only those who build the cities of the Lord are welcome. Be gone from the lands of Purity by tomorrow night.'