Buddy made a noncommittal sound muffled by the scarf.
I yanked it away from his face. “Buddy, I got a bellyful of pissed-off and I’m looking for somewhere to throw it up. It could be on your head just as easily as anywhere, so don’t give me a hard time.”
He turned white, which could’ve been just from the stench, and snatched the scarf back. “About half a mile down, there’s a cut that leads to a trail. It comes back along the top of the cliff up there. If you follow it, it’ll take you to a little shack. Only seen it from a distance, but… it’s theirs.”
I dug a coin from my pocket and gave it to him. He stared at it. “What’s this for?”
I nodded at the tools on his pony. “You got a shovel with you?”
“Yeah.”
I indicated Lola’s carcass. “Bury her.”
“The horse?”
“ Yes, the horse! ” I yelled.
He quickly pocketed the money. “Okay, fine. Sure thing. I’ll get right on it.”
“I’ll be back to check,” I assured him as I turned to mount Lola’s completely inadequate replacement.
FIVE
Buddy had told the truth: the cut hit the canyon at a right angle, provided an easy ascent and led to a trail that ran along the cliff top. Smooth as it was, the damn horse still balked at it, and I’d have made faster progress had I let the nag ride me. She picked her way up the cut like a barefoot spinster, then seemed determined to turn down the trail in the opposite direction from the one I wanted. After implying many things about her parentage under my breath, I got her pointed the right way, parallel with the edge of the cliff.
Eventually I reached the spot where I’d been tossed to my presumed death. Far below, Buddy dug lethargically at the grave. He looked up, saw me and waved, then returned to work. I had no delusions he’d do a good job.
The stony ground showed evidence of recent activity, but nothing more definite. I’d also crossed some sort of weather line, because up here the breeze was chilly on my sweat-damp skin. Out of nowhere the horse suddenly snorted and balked again, and a moment later the reason hit me: another out-of-place odor, this one very like lamp oil.
I looked around for the source. The hill rose above me to a forested crest, beyond which I glimpsed the top of higher hills. The soil here was rockier and less accommodating than it was even fifty feet below, and in many places bundles of boulders poked from the ground. I remembered what Bella Lou had told me, dismounted and knelt by the nearest one. The odor was incredibly strong, and when I put my hand down into a crevice-belatedly realizing that it might hold things like rattlesnakes, spiders or the odd displaced scorpion-I felt a slippery coating on the rocks down where the wind couldn’t dry them. My fingertips were damp when I pulled them out, and one sniff told me Bella Lou had been right. But why go around painting the insides of nooks and crannies with oil?
I wiped my hands on some leaves, climbed onto the horse and wrestled her back along the trail. She kept a ridiculous distance from the edge, ensuring the left side of my head was thwacked by every low-hanging branch. Eventually the trail turned away from the canyon and continued up the hillside through the forest.
I watched the sky for any sign of smoke. Here the trees were gnarled hawthorn, entwined with each other and studded with big spikes. There would be no traveling off the road in this neighborhood unless you were in armor. It occurred to me that perhaps Buddy had sent me after the mythical wild goose, which if true would earn him an ass-kicking not even Bella Lou could rival. But since I knew where he lived, it made no sense for him to trick me, unless he was sending me into a fatal trap. He seemed neither smart nor devious enough for that.
Then the damn horse began to fight me again. I perversely wished for some of the big, vicious cavalry spurs I’d used as a young man when I fought in the Trego marshes. The horse snorted and tried to turn, an almost impossible move on this narrow part of the trail. I ducked the spiked branches and cursed her to the best of my ex-soldier ability.
Finally I gave up, dismounted and threw the reins over a low branch. I drew my sword, once again resisted the urge to smack the animal and started up the trail. The horse let out a high, piercing whinny that must’ve carried for miles, and certainly alerted any of these mysterious dragon people that someone was coming.
The trail wound around rocky outcroppings that gradually displaced the stubborn hawthorns. I finally spotted a small stone-walled shack beneath a rock overhang, probably once used as shelter for people trying to mine gold or copper from the Black River Hills. Those veins had played out before I was born, but there was no reason a sturdily built structure couldn’t survive and be used for all sorts of disreputable things. As I got nearer, I saw that newer stones had been used to repair the damage from neglect, and the roof sported fresh wooden shingles.
I hid behind a boulder and watched for a long time, checking for any sign of occupation. By the time the shadow from the nearest tree crept far enough to mark twenty minutes, no floor-boards had creaked or silhouettes moved across the windows. I counted to three, rushed up the hill and flattened myself against the wall by the door. Once my heart settled down enough for me to again hear the outside world, I confirmed nothing seemed to be moving within. I tried the handle; it was unlocked. I pushed it open and went inside.
My eyes took a long moment to adjust to the dimness. The tiny one-room shack contained only a table with two chairs and an odd box on the floor near the fireplace. Three walls each sported curtainless windows, and the fourth boasted a crude fireplace and hearth. The breeze tickled thick cobwebs by the ceiling, and detritus accumulated in the corners. Nobody lived here, but it didn’t mean it was entirely abandoned. Someone had gone to the trouble of fixing the ravages of time, after all.
The furniture was simple and cheap, but the box got my attention. While it most resembled the kind of strongbox miners might use to hold their precious findings, it had leather padding along all the edges and big loop handles were attached to either end for a carrying staff to thread through. I could think of nothing small enough to fit in the box that would also need two or more people to lift it. Well, sure, gold, but there was no gold to be had in these mountains. Using my sword, I flipped the single latch and carefully opened the lid. It was empty. The inside, though, was lined entirely with thin sheets of lead. Gold wouldn’t need that.
The place gave me the creeps. The wind weaseled through tiny unpatched gaps in the stone and made soft, agonized sounds. The smell contained odors of dust, decayed wood and abandonment. Yet the box was so new its leather still reeked of tanning.
I checked the fireplace. It was summer, but this high the nights might require a little help. The ashes were cold, but they were also fresh. Then my eye fell on a stain on the floor in a shadowed corner. The way the light from the window reflected from it was unmistakable.
It was dried blood.
I looked directly above it. From a beam across the ceiling hung two manacles on very short chains. Someone suspended from it-say a short girl with blond hair-would dangle helplessly well above the floor.
I knelt by the stain. Tiny dark strips were matted into the dried liquid, and when I tapped them they did not crumble like ash. I realized they were small ribbons of human skin that had been peeled or cut from Laura Lesperitt.
Something little and cold went snap deep inside my chest. I should’ve been scared, but I wasn’t. Instead I was a hair’s breadth from full-on battle rage. I’d claimed I could help her, volunteered to help her, and yet in the end I’d done nothing. If she hadn’t met me on the road, she might’ve gotten clean away. Perhaps this blood on the floor should be on my hands.