Lena Parrish had been shot. This was becoming less and less unusual these days. Once again, the bullet had failed to kill her. But laying out here in the cold snow, slowly freezing to death, she was beginning to wish it had.
As long as she was alive, however, Lena had a job to do. Right now, that job was to hunt down her former partner, Kathryn Hall. The owner of the bullet now snuggled up against one of Lena's ribs.
Maybe right now her job was to at least sit up.
Snow fell quietly amongst the trees. It fluttered down from the slate gray sky above, framed in Lena's vision by the evergreen points of conifers, to land gently on her face. Out on the plains, where Lena had just come from, the flakes would have been driven before a brutal wind. There, the flurries might have killed her before she could rouse herself, or it might have driven her to her feet faster. But here, she had time as her heart grew cooler, one beat after the next. Time to think, when thinking was what she didn't need.
This whole mess had begun with a telegram while Lena and Kathryn were back in the panhandle of Texas three weeks ago. It contained orders for them to investigate reports of a "most unsettling woman" passing through the area from Oklahoma. Civilians tended to go missing in the woman's vicinity and in this country of gods and monsters, it was suspected that she was not as human as she appeared to be. A typical life-or-death sort of job. All in an average day for Texas Rangers like them.
"'A most unsettlin' woman?'" Kathryn repeated incredulously as she read the telegram aloud. "Who put that in a report?"
Lena, standing watch at the telegraph office's front door, made no motion other than to stare out into the brittle December morning. She knew Kathryn was just making noise. Her bi-colored eyes roved the area, taking in the sunrise pink snow, the coating of frost on fence posts, ranchers blowing warmth onto their hands as they went to work. Most respected the Texas Ranger badge, but some didn't, and that was reason enough to keep an eye out. Lena had known too many Rangers to die of carelessness.
"Gotta be the most useless description," Kathryn grumbled as she puffed at her cigarette. "Doesn't even say what this lady looks like." She was from El Paso and had the accent to prove it, slow but clipped. She also had short, whispy blonde hair that pointed in unlikely directions, a wiry frame, and a smile built for mockery. She dressed just as messily as she had the day Lena had met her over a year ago, but she kept the rifle strapped to her back clean and bright.
There was a rustle of paper as Kathryn folded the telegram and dropped it into her shirt pocket. "Looks like we're headed t' Lubbock," she concluded.
Lena straightened from where she leaned against the doorjamb, gave the all-clear hand signal, and stepped outside, Kathryn right behind her. An almost inaudible sigh came from the direction of the telegraph operator back inside. Clearly not a sympathist, but Lena couldn't say she blamed him. Rangers tended to attract trouble wherever they went.
The two Texas Rangers mounted their mares—Kathryn's a pinto and Lena's a buckskin she'd named Cedar—and set off northwest. It was a brutally cold winter that year, with snow blanketing the ground from Wichita Falls to Dodge City like a frozen desert. Kathryn chattered the entire way, her voice the only sound across the snow muffled landscape. Lena had only to nod to keep her partner talking for hours. She wasn't sure where Kathryn got the energy—Lena hated the cold.
At some point, Kathryn sighed. "I gotta get shut of this life," she said. "Think I'm 'bout ready to retire."
Lena snorted behind the black bandanna around her face. She couldn't say what she was actually thinking, about how the Texas Rangers had recruited Kathryn in exchange for not throwing her in prison for theft and murder. She wasn't leaving until the Rangers said she could leave. But Kathryn knew all that. She also knew Lena couldn't comment, though, and easily dismissed her derision.
By the time they arrived in Lubbock three days later, Lena was an icicle. They rode into town mid-afternoon and made a beeline straight for the saloon: Kathryn to pick up leads from the local gossips and Lena to drink something warm and abusive. There were several saloons, but they chose one somewhere between the most respectable and the least reputable. They might not be welcome at either of the others.
Once inside, Lena's limbs began to thaw and feeling returned to her fingers. The place smelled like beer and human sweat, camaraderie and sorrow, but that was no surprise. It was mostly empty, with only a game of cards happening in one corner and a bit of socialization at another. Not a good place to start investigating, but Lena wasn't about to go back outside yet. She unwrapped the wool scarf from around her neck but left the black bandanna over her mouth as she walked up to the bar. Kathryn joined her and lounged back against the wood counter, surveying the room. She lit a cigarette and the clove scented smoke curled around Lena's shoulders.
The barkeep walked up with a rustle of clothes and an aggressively bald head. But instead of asking what they wanted, he raised a graying blonde eyebrow at Lena's bandanna.
Kathryn glanced over her shoulder and leveled the barkeep with her most bored and dismissive look, all long lashes lowered over baby blue eyes. "Beer for me," she said, "and whiskey for my friend here." She turned her attention back to the game of cards in the corner, done with him.
The man grumbled unintelligibly, but he fetched their drinks. As he reached under the bar for Lena's, she stopped him with a wave of her hand.
"Eh?" the man groused. "Whaddaya want?"
Lena pointed at the top shelf behind him. The man's gaze followed her finger.
He cocked an eyebrow at her again. Actually, Lena wasn't sure he'd ever lowered it. He said, "Y'good for it?"
Lena dropped two silver dollars onto the bar. Cackling gleefully, the barkeep swiped them up and got the bottle down. Lena was just about to take a drink of her high quality whiskey when Kathryn straightened up next to her and said, "Hot damn."
A sick feeling punched Lena in the gut. She doubled over and coughed. Had she been poisoned? No, she hadn't taken a drink. One hand dropped to the butt of her pistol as she thumped her chest with her other fist. The feeling didn't let up and her eyes began to water.
"Whatever is the matter with her?" a woman's voice said in a long, slow drawl behind Lena.
A wave of magnolia perfume washed over Lena, intensifying her queasiness. She held her breath and turned around.
Set against the backdrop of the gray-lit saloon stood a lady in emerald silk petticoats. She wore a deep red fur cloak of the sort more suited to the streets of Boston than to the wilds of Texas. A soft black collar nestled up against an elegant, diamond-shaped face. Chestnut brown curls peeked playfully from under a small green hat. Her lips were painted night black and her smile held tantalizing promises captive in the corners. A black strip of silk edged with tiny white pearls covered her eyes.
Kathryn nudged Lena roughly in the shoulder and laughed. "Oh, Lena just cain't hold her liquor, s'all." She tipped back her brown hat and smiled wide, offering her hand. "I'm Kathryn Hall," she said. "But you can call me Katie."
Despite her obvious blindness, the lady took Kathryn's hand without hesitation. "Alice Walker," she said with a gentle shake. "Charmed."
Yes, Kathryn definitely was charmed. Lena could see it in her partner's goofy grin. She always did like the fancy sorts. Lena, however, felt pretty damn certain that this sick feeling was coming from Alice Walker. At her side, she made the hand signal for danger outside of Alice's view, but Kathryn either didn't see it or willfully ignored her, because she didn't acknowledge the warning.
Alice turned to Lena, hand outstretched. Lena had to stop herself from taking a step back, her stomach on the edge of mutiny.
"And you are…?" Alice said, head cocked in perfect attentiveness. She looked right at Lena, even though she couldn't possibly see through that heavy blindfold.
"Oh, she's a mute, ma'am," Kathryn cut in. "Her name's Lena Parrish."
Lena stiffened. She had thought her partner more tactful about her condition by now, but it seemed sensibility went out the window in the presence of beautiful women. She gave Alice a nod and nothing more.
When Alice didn't receive Lena's shake, she let her hand drop, smiling tightly. "A pleasure," she said.
Lena drew a small notebook from her shirt pocket—its edges fuzzy with use—and an ink pen, a luxury unheard of in most parts. She scribbled a quick note, using as little space as possible. With a noise of ripping paper, she tore a strip off and shoved it at Kathryn. It read, FIND OUT WHAT YOU CAN FROM HER. I'LL BE AROUND.
Kathryn glanced at the note and then winked at Lena. She stuffed the paper into one pocket as she took Alice by her silk-clad elbow, guiding her toward a nearby table.
She said, "Why don'tcha lemme buy you a drink and…"
But Lena didn't hear the rest because she was already outside, the swinging doors creaking behind her. She stopped out on the wood porch and gulped several breaths of air, the cold scouring the sickness from her stomach.
Looking down the muddy street under a quickly darkening sky, Lena noticed a wide space of empty ground between this saloon and the nearest pedestrians. She planned to investigate the rest of the town in case their target was elsewhere after all, but she couldn't help but wonder if that might not be a pointless gesture. With an uneasy backward glance, Lena stepped off the porch into the street.
She spent the next two days seeking leads on their quarry in Lubbock. Alone. To say it was difficult to conduct an inquiry without Kathryn to verbalize her questions was an understatement. Sometime in the past year, Lena had gotten used to the convenience of having around someone who could talk. But Kathryn spent those two days in the saloon. With Alice. Whenever Lena passed the window, she often saw the two of them seated together in the empty common room, heads leaned conspiratorially close.
Lena had never been more irritated with Kathryn.
The silent Ranger made do without her partner. Yet no one in town had met a woman like the one described in the telegram. The townsfolk did, however, have a lot to say about people recently disappearing. This caught Lena's attention, but none of these leads panned out. She hated to have to direct these to the local marshal for follow-up, but vanishing people were not her job. Monster hunting was. Still, it gave her pause. Alice Walker, a stranger in town, at the same time as folks going missing?
Late at the end of the second day, Lena had exhausted all other possibilities and needed to get with Kathryn about her Alice Walker theory. She pushed her way through the double doors of the saloon, stomach braced. But the expected onslaught of nausea never came. The room was empty but for a lit metal stove struggling valiantly against the cold, and the grizzled old barkeep polishing glasses behind the bar nearby.
He looked up as Lena entered and said, "Oh, it's jus' you. Was afraid 'at awful woman'd come back."
Lena stepped up to the bar, making a quizzical expression at him.
The man caught her look and shrugged. "She seems nice enough. Jus' gives me th' creepy crawlies. Always feel sick 'round 'er, ya know? Seems t'be bad for business, too. 'Aven't 'ad a single customer since she showed up, 'ceptin' your Ranger friend."
Intrigued, Lena took out her notepad and smoothed it flat on the bar. The scritch of her pen filled the quiet. When she flipped the notepad around, it read: I KNOW WHAT YOU MEAN. ANY IDEA WHERE SHE'S GONE?
"Well, she an' 'at Ranger friend o' yours said they was gonna pick up supplies an' head south," he said. He peered at Lena, his bushy gray brows waggling above light blue eyes. "Figured ya knew they was leavin' town."
First of all, what the hell? Second of all, what the hell. Lena scribbled another note beneath the first: HOW LONG AGO?
The man thoughtfully scratched his chin through his scruffy gray beard. "Fifteen, maybe twenty minutes ago? Dunno where they're gonna get supplies right now, though. The general store's—"
Without waiting for him to finish, Lena whirled out into the night, her long black coat billowing behind her. From inside, she faintly heard the barkeep end with, "—closed."
That was right. Every shop in town had been closed for hours now and there was only one way to get supplies at this time of night. Lena thought she knew where she would find her partner and Alice Walker, but she fervently hoped she was wrong.
It turned out Lena was wrong, but only by a small margin. When she arrived at the general store, it was dark and quiet all around. A few blocks away, a dog barked, challenging the round moon overhead. A quick turn about the building found no broken windows or fresh tracks in the unbroken snow. When she returned to the front of the store, Lena stopped to consider and regroup.
From farther down the street, a sharp squeal of metal split the night. Lena's head snapped up. A moment or two later, windows and doors opened all around and sleepy heads poked out curiously. But when the townsfolk caught sight of the silent Texas Ranger striding down the wooden walk, coat open and loosening the Peacemakers in her holsters, most of them withdrew. The few onlookers that remained tried to ask Lena what was going on as she passed, but of course, she did not answer them. She kept her eyes trained down the street, in the direction of Lubbock's bank.
When Lena arrived, a damning scene spread before her. An open wagon hitched to two horses faced away from the front of the bank. Kathryn Hall sat in the driver's seat, urging the horses forward as quietly as she could, clucking and flicking the reins at them. They strained against their harnesses, their flanks glistening with sweat.
In the bed of the wagon, Alice Walker sat with her feet braced against the backboard. Two long, dark green tendrils, each as thick as a rope, grew down from her shoulders, twisting around her arms and her hands, their lengths ending wrapped about the metal bars of one of the bank's secured windows. Well, partially secured. One of the three bars had already been ripped out of its brick setting, broken stone and cement particles piled at the foot of the wall beneath. Alice hauled at the middle bar and another shriek of metal rang out as the top part busted free. Dust drifted away on the light breeze.
Kathryn, it seemed, had gone the way of the monsters.
From the shadows of the livery next door where she had stopped to watch, Lena stepped out into the moonlight, her boot heels echoing hollowly on the boardwalk planks. She was close enough to see guilt flash across Kathryn's face when she saw the silent Ranger. It might have been because of Lena's narrowed eyes. It might have been the pistol she had aimed at her soon-to-be former partner's head.
At Lena's approach, Alice ceased pulling at the window bars and got to her feet. She had successfully ripped the second bar out, but now she drew the tendrils close around herself. She was a fearsome sight beneath the moonlight, with her chin tilted high, not quite looking at Lena with her blindfolded eyes. Dark leaves and vines trailed through her loose brown hair and down her mussed muslin dress. Around her mouth, red rubbery spines sprouted through the edges of her lips. More, smaller ones grew through her eyebrows and around her eyes, peeking from beneath the edges of her blindfold.
Lena stopped her approach at the end of the walk, maybe twenty paces from the wagon. This close, sick nausea tickled the back of her throat. How had Kathryn been unaffected by it? Though Alice appeared unarmed, Lena felt a certain amount of concern over those whip-like tendrils. With a noise of leather against metal, she drew her other pistol and leveled it at Alice.
In spite of the gun barrel in her face, Alice smiled at Lena. The motion sent a trickle of blood down one corner where the red spines pierced her lip. "I know what you're thinking, silent one," she said, voice low and dark.
Lena cocked a disbelieving red eyebrow at the monster.
Alice's voice rose an octave. "Oh, poor Katie must be under a spell!" she mocked, folding her hands over her heart. "But I assure you, it's not a spell or a glamour or a hex."
"Sorry, Parrish," Kathryn said from the front of the wagon, face toward Lena. But she didn't sound repentant, nor did she look it, casually holding the reins of a bank robbery in-progress. Alice almost had it right: Lena had assumed Kathryn was playing along to get close to their quarry. But now she wondered. If this was a trick, it was a damn convincing one.
"You see, Lena, I am no seductress," Alice continued, smile widening. "Some people just love monsters."
Some people like Kathryn. Someone who, convicted by angels, might be willing to join the devils. Lena wanted to ask for an explanation, but of course, she couldn't. She wanted to believe this was all a clever ruse, but somehow, she didn't. In the end, it did not matter: Rangers couldn't afford the luxury of second guessing themselves. She had only her guts, and right now, her gut was telling her—
—to pull the trigger.
The pistol roared. But just as it did, Alice lashed out with both of those vine-like tendrils. The bullet leaving Lena's pistol cleaved right through one of the vines before burying itself in Alice's collarbone. She screamed and fell backward. As she did, however, the intact tendril slashed down Lena's torso, opening her up from ribs to hip. Lena spun and dropped, bright red blood spraying across the snow.
"Alice!" Kathryn yelled.
For a second, Lena's vision went white with the pain, but soon it cleared and she rolled up behind a rain barrel for cover. Snow caught in her collar, dripping ice down her spine, and adrenaline pounded through her veins. She sat with her back against the barrel, pistols at the ready, prepared for Kathryn to charge her.
"Alice?" Kathryn said plaintively. There was no response from Alice Walker. Lena heard Kathryn suck in a breath, then she slapped the reins and the horses charged forward into the road. "Parrish, you bitch!" Kathryn snarled as she drew her pistol. She fired several shots back in Lena's direction, but they all went wide, whining off the building next to the barrel. Lena wasted no bullets on returning fire.
The rattle of the wagon's wheels faded from Lena's ears as Kathryn and Alice left town. She hissed as she pressed her hand over the wound, warm blood soaking her gloved fingers. Her breath puffed white in the cold air as she breathed through the pain for several minutes. Only fury kept Lena from blacking out. Eventually, she groaned and dragged herself to her feet.
What a fucking night.
Lena's first step was to wire a telegram to the Texas Ranger Headquarters, detailing Kathryn's betrayal and her own sustained injuries. The telegraph operator, already woken by the sounds of fighting, sent Lena's message double quick as blood dribbled from her wound onto the floor and the toes of her boots. The response came back in no time as she was getting stitches from the local doctor.
The telegram contained three words: HUNT HER DOWN.
Lena was hardly in the right condition for a hunt. But rage burned hot in her chest and it only took the permission of her superiors for her to be on her horse and Kathryn's trail before dawn.
The sun rose against Lena's back as she followed the wagon's trail west. It turned the snowy landscape bloody and then, later in the day, blinding white. Lena couldn't ride as fast as she needed to, but she stuck to Kathryn's trail like a hound, even when it veered off onto lesser used roads. She spent one night on the open plains, the biting cold nibbling at her edges and burning her wound. The next day, she found the wagon.
Its wrecked hulk hunkered next to the trail, dark in the afternoon light, one dead horse still harnessed to it. Lena sat astride Cedar at a distance for several minutes, listening, watching. Only the sharp wind howled over the snow. When she noted no evidence of a trap, Lena dismounted and approached the wreckage. Splashes of blood littered the snow all around, browning with age now. Patches of torn up mud and messy footprints indicated a scuffle. Lena squatted on her heels to take a closer look at these: one human and a pack of dire coyotes—a species much bigger than regular coyotes with glowing green eyes. They had been appearing on the plains for several years now and no one was entirely certain they hadn't always been around. Lena found no coyote bodies nearby. The horse carcass had been stripped of flesh down to its bones, but when Lena looked inside the wagon, she found Alice Walker's corpse intact.
Mostly intact, anyway. No dire coyote had touched her; apparently monsters didn't always eat other monsters. But her human skin had begun to slough off, revealing some kind of bright yellow-green plant with a bulbous red head beneath. The head featured no eyes, only a wide, gaping mouth that stretched from one side to the other, lined with rubbery spines along its edges. A sickly sweet scent emanated from the corpse and Lena wrinkled her nose behind her bandanna. Somehow, despite the cold and the snow, flies buzzed around the maw and the frozen wound in Alice's chest, crawling in and out with impunity.
Lena's bullet had done its work.
The stitches in Lena's side ached as she carefully remounted Cedar. Kathryn's body wasn't nearby and the snow showed no marks to indicate she'd been dragged away, so Lena assumed her former partner was still alive. The tracks of the wagon's other horse—partially filled in with wind-blown snow—continued on westward. They were sunk deep enough for the horse to be carrying a person.
For the next several days, Lena trailed Kathryn. At the New Mexico line, the Ranger hesitated, though not for long. Kathryn had passed out of Lena's jurisdiction, but that wouldn't stop her. A traitor to the Texas Rangers could hide nowhere.
It was just as Lena entered the foothills of the Sacramento Mountains that Kathryn Hall shot her.
The report echoed off the mountains and Lena slid from her horse, crashing onto her back in the thick carpet of snow. The big cloudy sky wheeled above her and giant snowflakes piled on top of her. She knew she needed to staunch the bleeding but it felt like ages before she could find the strength to move. A lot of time had passed by the time Lena opened her eyes and the day was noticeably darker, nearly sunset. Lena wondered if Kathryn had the guts to come finish the job or if she had already run away again.
In the end, it was Lena's horse Cedar that got her up. The buckskin came nosing over, perhaps to see if her master was alive, perhaps to just devour her herself. But when that soft, bewhiskered muzzle came into view, Lena caught hold of the cheek strap on Cedar's bridle and used it to haul herself to her feet. She hung there for a moment, breathing through the pain.
"Damn, Parrish, I didn't think you were gonna get back up," said Kathryn from Cedar's other side.
Lena had her Peacemaker cocked and Kathryn in her sights over the back of Cedar's saddle before the other woman could twitch. Kathryn, for her part, stood not ten yards away with a Winchester rifle aimed at Lena's head.
For one breath, nothing happened. Lena took in her former partner's bedraggled appearance: dried blood a dull copper brown on her face, a red bandanna tied around a wound in her upper arm, torn clothes where the dire coyotes had attacked her. A line of skeletal, snow-covered trees framed her and the mountain towered above them both.
Then Kathryn's lopsided smile walked up one half of her face. "You laid there so long," she said, her voice amused or bitter, "figured you had t'be dead."
All of a sudden, Lena was more tired than she had ever been. She wanted this to be over. She didn't want to have to kill Kathryn. She wanted to drink an entire bottle of whiskey and then sleep for a week. Her hand holding the pistol wobbled and she let it rest on the saddle seat. Probably it was the blood loss. Probably she wouldn't even make it back to civilization alive after this. If she made it out alive at all.
Above her smile, Kathryn's blue eyes went cold as stone. "You killed Alice," she said. The bewildered smile vanished, replaced not with grief, but rage. "For that, I'm afraid I—"
Lena sighed and squeezed the trigger. Kathryn's head snapped back as the report roared through the trees and back up the mountainside. A flock of black birds flapped into the air, cawing with surprise. Below them, Kathryn hit her knees, a red hole gaping between her eyes. Then she slumped sideways, half buried in the gray snow.
All around, the forest was still and the oncoming night gripped the mountain with icy fingers. From somewhere close, death blew gently on Lena's face. The Ranger rested her forehead on Cedar's cold saddle. It was over. She could die now, she thought, or she could get that bottle of whiskey. Rousing herself, Lena pulled off her bandanna and used it to plug up the hole in her side. Then she hauled herself up into the saddle and pointed Cedar toward Roswell. With luck, she could beat the devil there.
Several days later, Lena stepped into the officer's tent back in Lubbock, one hand braced against her bandaged ribs and the other holding a full bottle of whiskey. Inside was barely warmer than outside, despite the wood burner in the corner. The tent's occupants—two women standing next to a table and one man seated on the other side—looked up at her entrance. Lena recognized Captain Garcia, but not the other two.
The captain gave Lena her full attention, peering at her keenly with dark eyes. She said, "Were you successful?"
The silent ranger just threw Kathryn's badge onto the table between them. It landed with a heavy, metallic clunk. The name HALL glinted at them in the lantern light.
The seated man made a noise of contempt. "Serves 'at bitch right," he drawled, checking the barrel of his pistol for dust. The badge on his shirt read Lieutenant Crawford. He was lanky with a badly trimmed mustache and long dark hair.
Before Crawford had a chance to look up, Lena closed the distance between them, her boot heels clomping against the packed dirt floor. She snatched up Kathryn's badge as she passed the table and slammed it against Crawford's chest, the sharp point of the pin stabbing into his skin.
Crawford tried to leap from his seat, but Lena held him down with one hand on his shoulder, his shirt collar bunched in her fist. She had his pistol hand pinned down with the other. Glass clinked against the dirt as the dropped whiskey bottle rolled away from them.
"Hey! What the hell!" Crawford yelled, struggling against her grip.
Lena leaned in close, gifting him with the full brunt of her bi-colored glare. She didn't need words to convey exactly how she felt now. She growled, deep in her chest, her lips curled back in a wild snarl. This man would understand the nature of his mistake.
"H-hey, now—" Crawford said, terror creeping into his voice now that he couldn't move. He stank of new sweat.
"Lieutenant Crawford," Captain Garcia said with an unconcerned air from the other side of the table, "that mouth of yours is gonna get you killed someday. Let 'im go, Parrish."
Lena released Crawford. Kathryn's badge slipped down into the lieutenant's lap, followed by a trickle of bright blood. He touched the wound in surprise, then gazed up at her, eyes wide, blood glistening on his fingertips. Ignoring his dazed expression, Lena stooped to retrieve the whiskey bottle from the floor. Using her teeth behind the bandanna, she wrenched the cork free with a jerk of her head. Then she spat it at Crawford's feet.
"Parrish," Captain Garcia warned.
Lena took a long pull of the whiskey, waving her hand in an "I was just leaving" gesture. Without waiting to be dismissed, she yanked the tent flap back and stepped out into the frozen Texas night. Her breath puffed in white clouds around her head and the slosh of the liquid against the glass echoed through the night empty streets.
Lena Parrish was alone.
She decided that she liked it that way.