Animal (Chapter 8 - Part 2)

The pitch black metal of Prince’s revolver offers no reflection to the eyes of the prostitute as she turns them over in her delicate hands.
“So what exactly do you do?” she asks.
“I hunt men.”
“Like a bounty hunter?”
“Like a Rider.”
The girl raises her brow and shrugs. Prince smiles.
“You’re never heard of us?” he asks.
“I try not to concern myself with the petty events of the world.”
“Petty?” Prince asks.
“Petty in the sense that it doesn’t pertain to me. So what happened with your eyes?”
Prince rubs a grain of sand and yawns. His lanky arms stretch down the length of the bed.
“I don’t talk about it to people whose company I find tolerable.”
“Tolerable?”
“We just met.”
“Right. And why is that?”
Prince’s eyes follow the sound of her soft skin against steel, the whistle of still air through a moving barrel.
“Because I tend to kill the people I tell my story to.”
The girl nods. She catches the pistol in hand. Her finger touches the trigger. The barrel angles up towards her customer as a mischievous grin makes its way across her lips.
“So what’s to stop me from delivering a little lead buddy into your brain?”
Prince shifts just a bit. A lengthened mound pushes into the girl’s abdomen.
“That what I think it is?” she asks.
“It’s the partner of the gun you’re holding,” Prince replies, “The one you forgot to keep an eye on.”
The girl leans in close. Her lips almost touch Prince’s ear
“Say we both pull? I know you won’t be breathing no more. Can you say the same about me?”
“This close, there’s not a doubt in my mind.”
The girl lets out a squeal of laughter and drops Prince’s weapon, leaning in for a kiss that the Rider reciprocates.
“So you hunting someone now or you just stop in to sample the wares?”
“Hunting a man. He took the train my master rides.”
“He dangerous?”
“In a way.”
“Criminal?”
“Not exactly.”
“So why you here with me at present moment?”
Prince shifts against his pillow and sighs.
“Cause I’m no good tracking tired,” he says, “Even the wicked need their rest.”
“You call yourself wicked?”
“Best word for me.”
Prince clicks the latch and lets the revolver’s chamber slide open. He studies the bullets for some time before finally snapping the cylinder back into place. The girl’s eyes ignore his motions. They remain set upon the Rider’s ruined eyes.
“How do you know which guns are which?” the girl asks, “How you know I won’t switch ‘em when you sleep?”
It’s Prince’s turn to laugh. His finger traces the form of the wolf emblazoned on the weapon’s handle.
“‘Cause this right here’s a one of a kind. And I never forget the smell of my guns. The smell of every gun is unique. Same goes for the smell of every woman.”
“That a fact?”
“It is.”
The girl rises from her bed and begins to dress. The torn stockings slide over her legs with soft scruffs. She wraps the corset next around her slim waist and studies herself in the mirror, straightening her hair as much as possible.
“Well then you won’t forget me.”
“Couldn’t if I wanted to.”
The girl’s smile remains even as she steps into the entryway of Prince’s room.
“Night, Stranger.”
Prince closes his eyes to the sound of a closing door.

* * *

The fire has begun to dwindle. With Mal gone, Cyrus was soon to follow. Only Selina and Alexander, Michael and Harrison, remain. Selina sleeps against her husband’s shoulder while her brother sits across from them, leaned back and staring up at the stars. Michael sits alone, poking the weakened fire with a tiny stick like a young child torturing a dying animal. Thick lines of gauze and cloth loop around his wound, cleaned and dressed.
He speaks. “Who’s Rose, John?”
“Someone you won’t ever know.”
Michael kicks out, striking a log within the fire and sending up a roar of embers. Selina wakes with a fright. Harrison’s well-earned bliss is snatched away. Alexander simply holds his wife close and reassures her no danger exists.
“That’s enough! Enough damn mystery! Enough tricks and shadows. Harrison almost lost his sister, Alexander his wife. Who knows who else might’ve been hurt. Now I don’t care what Boss says, I’m not letting you put the people I care about in harm’s way. I need to know that there won’t be repercussions for what happened tonight. Men like that aren’t known to forgive and forget.
“Now I don’t know the story behind those guns you carry, but I know enough to recognize that wolf on both your guns. You and that man had history, and judging by your reaction I’d say it was one of blood.”
The carnie turns to his partner.
“We deserve an answer. Right, Harrison?”
Harrison shrugs. “He saved Selina, Michael. Isn’t that enough?”
Michael scoffs his friend’s words.
“I’m not asking for much, but I need to know that when you set out of here there won’t be men come looking for us. Understand?”
John leans back and draws his revolver from its holster. Michael takes a step back. The muscles in Harrison’s shoulders tense. John turns the revolver in his hand, allowing the sign of the Riders to become clear.
“See this mark? It’s the mark of the Riders. The old Riders. Dead men who hunted men now dead. But one of them is still alive. He’s why Rose is gone. He’s the man I’m after, and his men are after me. So I don’t know if more won’t come but they won’t be coming on account of the men we killed, that I can promise you.”
John leans back against his log and covers his eyes with his hat.
“We’re done talking.”

* * *

John lies alone near the fire, sight shielded by the Stetson he dons. Filtered light trickles through cracks in the brim. He sighs with the warmth of the flames. With the bustle of the carnival finally faded, he basks in much needed peace.
As always, such peace rarely lasts.
“John.”
John lowers the Stetson and screams.
His brother kneels beside him.
John rises up from his seat, rolling away and scrambling around to the other side of the fire. He trains his revolver on the specter, the being that has yet to rise.
“Who are you?” John asks. His hands shake. Cold sweat rises, “What the hell are you?”
“Don’t you recognize me?”
“I recognize who you’re pretending to be.”
His brother chuckles. “You were always more of a skeptic than you let on.”
Samuel beats a thin line of dust from his vest. His hands come away wet with the blood that stains his shirt, spread from several ragged holes that dot his body. He raises his red hand and groans.
“One thing or another,” he mutters, patting the space beside him. His hands leave imprints in the dirt, “Pop a squat, John. We need to have a little chat.”
“Thank you but I prefer to stand.”
John returns the revolver to its holster and crosses his arms. The figure that takes his brother’s form grabs the abandoned Stetson from the ground and places it atop its own head. He pinches the tip with two fingers and runs them across the brim.
“Nice hat you got here,” Samuel remarks.
“Just got it.”
A gust travels through the camp. The fire quells to nothing without warning like the head of a fickle match. The lights around the camp fade one by one, smote by the sudden wind, robbed of life.
John raises his head and listens to the wind’s soft call. His untended hair shifts with it. The light of the bloated moon shines down.
“What do you want?” he asks, “You want me to stop this madness, call off the hunt before I get myself killed?”
Samuel bows his head. His brow casts a shadow in the moonlight obscuring his features.
“No. I wouldn’t ask you to do that; wouldn’t do me any good. I’m not here to ask you to stop chasing Varlyn. I won’t ask you to let us go. I just want to do whatever I can to convince you to stop blaming yourself. That’s all. Now I don’t have long, it tends to be a sort of one-time deal. For me, at least.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Samuel’s teeth shine in the light, a knowing grin.
“I won’t be the last.”
“You and your secrets.”
“Always did love ‘em.”
John’s eyes water as the two of them share a laugh, so much like before. He stops suddenly on the realization of where he is. He wipes the nearly-tears away.
“You aren’t real.”
Samuel shrugs. “Maybe I’m not, John. Maybe I’m just a shadow of your mind, some past you cling to and can’t let go. But does it really matter? I, Samuel, your brother, would want you to move on regardless. That’s all that really matters, isn’t it?”
John nods and takes a seat at last beside his brother. The two of them stare up at the moon above, the only source of light in the darkness. No one calls around them. No horses whiny. No fires rekindle.
“You were a good brother, John.”
“You too.”
Samuel nudges his brother’s shoulder and points up at the moon. He raises his hand, fingers curved inward slightly. The light slopes in his hand. The world to their right plunges into dark. John stutters in disbelief. Samuel turns to his brother and raises one eyebrow.
“And for my next trick…”
He pulls his fingers in, tightening into a fist and taking the moon with them, leaving nothing but black.

* * *

John wakes to the shake of a hand upon his shoulder. Alexander leans over him. The fire lies as ash.
“Fire’s dead. You can take the back room of my tent where my wears are if you like.”
John shakes his head and rubs his eyes.
“What’s going on?” he asks, still lost in the chaos of sleep.
“You were just dreaming, John.”
“I was?”

* * *

The Tall Man stares down at the corpse of his former guard. The blood that once spilled freely from his ruined skull now cakes along the floor. The darkness that plagues the compartment reveals little more than a shapeless mass to the Rider’s eyes, yet he knows all that is there.
“You probably hate me for what I did,” The Tall Man whispers, staring into the black, “Probably can’t understand why I did it, why I robbed you of your life at your prime. Probably figured you had so much you could give me, so much you could offer us, and now it’s all wasted.”
The Tall Man turns to the side and lies back in his booth. His eyes lock upon the stars that remain seemingly motionless above the plants and life that whip past.
“You probably envy me for the time I have left here on this earth while you’re pushed to the other side so quick. But you’re wrong. You don’t see the truth I do. I took you from this hell before it turned you like it did me.”
He shuts his eyes to one sight and embraces a far more familiar one.
“You were lucky.”