A Rope of Thorns (Hexslinger 2)

Yes, Yancey breathed back to that never-too-far phantom instructor, as the saloon’s ruckus slowed to a drone—the very pocket of time she sat in popping forth like a cog, and slipping between ticks of the Pinkerton’s pocket-watch, an oiled key in a sprung lock.

And then, with truly frightening ease, she was there, abruptly. As him.

Male from head to toe, the centre of her gravity abruptly upward-shifted, and baking in the railcar’s too-close air; she felt sweat drip down the runnel of “her” spine, soaking a patch at the waistband of “her” trousers so vehemently, she could only hope “her” belt was wide enough to cover it. The place was kitted out with all sorts of unfamiliar fripperies, reeking of ether and alcohol over not-faint-enough blood-stink, same as any more immobile sickroom. Chinese lacquer screens set up everywhere narrowed perspective ’til the fine gas sconces themselves seemed scarlet-tinged, while velveteen-print paper muffled the rhythmic clatter vibrating up through the floor, and unseen vistas rolling by outside the curtained windows played l

ight off shade in ever-changing patterns.

Three figures occupied what space was left open, besides Geyer himself. A mild-faced old man with wandering eyes—Asbury, presumably; a frail girl wrapped in stiff brocade propped on a throne-chair twice her size, her half-blind porcelain face a malign doll’s, veiled under the same deep red as her shot-silk draperies—Songbird, they call her, the voice put in, little caged queen, maimed and poison-full since birth.

And there in the back, someone Geyer knew well enough his heart leapt to greet him, for all he no longer looked a bit like his old self: Mister Allan Pinkerton, first of all Agents, looming massive even in repose, the ill effects of too much good food and too little activity swelling his already large form to cartoonish proportions.

A veritable twin for those infamous lithographs of Tweed, “she” thought, without recognizing whose face passed through Geyer’s mind, all bloat. My good God, boss—how could you ruin yourself this way?

Even as the idea formed, however, it was derailed, horrifically. Pinkerton moved forward into what passed for the light, allowing “her” to see what now passed for his face.

“I’m main glad ye could come, Frank,” this object said, its voice one thunderous beehive snore—Scots accent rendered parodic, r’s rolling like cannonballs. “Yuir rate of travel did ye no damage, I trust?”

Geyer swallowed his shock, with a dry click.

“No sir,” he said. “Haven’t been out of Chi-Town for some time now, as you know. It was . . . restful.”

The gaping tear laying Pinkerton’s jawbone almost open showed a high, wet rim of teeth through his cheek’s fine-flayed meat, a fascinatingly awful image. Was it creeping from his lip’s furled, necrotic sneer, or toward it? And that knot of sickness pulsing at its apex, half bruise, half tumour—had that once been his ear?

“Ye’ll wonder how I manage tae keep mysel’ shaved, I suppose,” Pinkerton said, noting Geyer’s attempt to not react with dry humour. “Well . . . no’ very well at all, as ye can see.”

Yancey felt something hot on “her” own face—more sweat, if she were feeling kindly. Or simply an understandable response to the startling notion that Pinkerton’s unkempt tangle of mutton-chops, beard and moustache might hide further damage still.

“What happened?” Geyer asked, at last.

To which Songbird gave a vicious little smile, and replied, “Chess Pargeter happened. Did he not, Mister Pinkerton?”

“Shut your foul mouth, ye Chink-eyed hooer,” Pinkerton ordered her, without rancour.

Doctor Asbury shuddered, hastening to try and mediate. “Miss Songbird, Mister Pinkerton—please! A modicum of sympathy might be accounted an amiable gesture, between allies.”

Songbird snorted. “He deserves none.”

“Don’t I, madam? That wretched invert shot me in my face—”

“As you all but dared him to. Call yourself a general? You are unfit, on every level.”

As if conjured, a gun appeared in Pinkerton’s hand (probably dropped from a spring-loaded sleeve-rig; Geyer had seen such back in Chicago, amongst the gambling set). “It’s a prerogative of generals,” he rasped, “to execute traitors—or incompetents. Was your witchery simply too feeble to match Pargeter’s, or did ye let him loose on me a-purpose?” To Songbird’s disdainful raised eyebrow: “Oh, I’ve seen ye stop shots before. But bear in mind my . . . condition—and the rate of Dr. Asbury’s progress. Are ye so sure we’ve no surprises for ye?”

Songbird sniffed. “Mechanical niou-se,” she replied, dismissively. “My arts are not to be encompassed by such trifles. You may test his tricks against mine, at your convenience.”

Geyer cleared his throat. “Gents, lady—this all strikes me a mite counterproductive. Surely, Pargeter’s threat enough we should probably deal with him first before settling private scores, let alone moving on to Reverend Rook and his . . . whatever she is, after.”

A moment passed, and Pinkerton re-holstered; Songbird looked away, petulant rather than angry, danger dissipated, leaving Asbury to cast Geyer a grateful look.

“This ‘Weed’ the dispatches tell of,” Geyer asked him. “Some natural plant augmented, pure hexation only, some hybrid of the two? And how does it play out, exactly, in this game?”

Flipping his black-covered notebook open, Asbury showed Geyer a sample stuck beneath waxed paper: dried reddish-brown oval leaves and long trumpet-shaped flowers affixed to a corded vine, the whole gone a green-beige colour, like mouldy parchment.

“As it manifests within Mister Pargeter’s vicinity,” Asbury began, “the Weed appears a heavily mutant version of Datura inoxia, a species of the family Solanaceae—known locally as thorn-apple, moonflower, Indian-root, nacazcul, toloatzin, or tolguache, and so on.” He used a cunning little pair of tongs to pluck one leaf from the page, holding it up so the hair-like tendrils covering it, fine as down, shone in a greyish halo.

“In its natural state,” Asbury continued, “it contains a number of powerful hallucinogens, explaining the near-universal reports of visions on encounter of its hexaciously altered form; many savage tribes used this plant to engender religious deliriums, in order to enter their so-called ‘spirit realm.’” Asbury replaced the leaf once more, disquietingly careful. “Expert herbalistic skill was required to ensure safe dosage, since its variable potency easily induces coma, or even death. But the Red Weed itself has not directly killed anyone, that we can verify—neither through exposure, nor even ingestion.”

Songbird made a sound in her throat, possibly risible, or merely exasperated. “As always, gweilo, you study much to say little. We workers know that plant for what it is: a casting line fishing for deeper prey, death for any of our kind to remain within its reach too long.”