A Tree of Bones (Hexslinger 3)

MATERIAL UPDATES RECEIVED STOP REGRET IMPOSSIBLE TO PROVIDE ADDITIONAL STAFF SUPPORT AT PRESENT STOP REASON TO EXPECT LARGE PRESS CONTINGENT ARRIVING FROM TWO REPUBLICS NEWSPAPER WITHIN 24 HRS STOP OPERATIVES FROM LONE STAR GAZETTE DETACHED TO PROVIDE BALANCE STOP EXPECT THEIR ARRIVAL SAME TIMEFRAME STOP FACILITATE THEIR OPERATIONS HOWEVER POSSIBLE STOP REITERATE TO GREY IMPORTANCE OF ASSIGNMENT STOP GODSPEED FITZ STOP

Transcribed from the shorthand notes of Mister Fitz Hugh Ludlow, on the day of November 15th, 1867, at the site of New Aztectlan, New Mexico:

The cold light of a winter dawn creeps over the plain. Near half a mile south of where the Pinkerton forces and Captain Washford’s have assembled before the bloody stone forest of the ceiba trees, I stand upon this rocky knoll, at the southward edge of the plain; its altitude, and the telescope obtained from Quartermaster Voormeis, grant me God’s own view of this battle — a privilege of which your humble correspondent is most mindful! Yet dread grips me that before this day is out, I will wish I had never been afforded this opportunity. The most novel of human sciences stands opposed to the most ancient of un-Christian magics, and whatever the outcome of this conflict, it is a certainty that afterward, the world shall not be as it has been.

A path leads through the ceiba trees to New Aztectlan’s entrance, though with my own eyes I have seen that path vanish in a heartbeat, to leave its travellers prisoned, and presently vivisected, by those malevolent obsidian growths. It is open now, showing the closed gates at their far end; human shapes line Hex City’s walls above those gates. Toward the entrance to that pathway there marches a minuscule advance guard, less than a dozen people. But foolish is he who thinks this party is to be easily dismissed. For new-made “scientific” hex Mister Allan Pinkerton himself walks at its head, with the arcanistric genius Doctor Joachim Asbury at his right hand, supported by Agent Edward Morrow, once an undercover member of “Reverend” Asher Rook’s own bandit gang. But most overwhelming a presence of all is the entity named Huitzilopochtli, incarnate in sodomite pistoleer Chess Pargeter’s flesh, come to challenge his sister deity the Rainbow Lady Ixchel to a fateful, perhaps final, confrontation. With them they bring prisoners of war: trade offerings, warnings, or proofs of potency? We can only pray that the gambit is effective, whatever its reasoning.

The party has now stopped in the mouth of the pathway. The god-demon Huitzilopochtli advances now between those trees, and lifts his arms, green-clad in living vine — in God’s Name, even I can hear his declamation, and at this mighty distance!

Ed Morrow came to slowly, half-buried under what felt like a pile of corpses, many of ’em only partially intact, to the hellish accompaniment of screams and curses: Mexico City after the earthquake, this time writ even larger. Through half-slit eyes, he saw the parti-coloured sky above illuminated in obscure flashes, how the clouds above hung snarled and heavy as dye-soaked wool, green and grey and black — hinted-at sun just a bright, flat, colourless coin submerged inside that same darkening knot, while a moment later sheet lightning deformed the sky even as a genuine bolt ripped horizontally, thrashing uncoiled and light-bloody, a severed dragon’s tail caught in mid-fall.

How did we get here? he wondered, horrified.

Sending his mind back, then, scraping out memory’s bottom-most dregs. A mere half-hour before, the Enemy had stood in front of Hex City’s walls, vine-armour knotted like veins across its blue skin and Chess’s red curls standing up straight, a lightning-lifted crown. And called to its “sister” inside, in a voice both gentle yet impossible to ignore, so penetrative did its timbre seem to rumble for maybe a mile in every direction at once.

Ixchel, come out. Suicide Moon, Black Rainbow, Long Hair of Death; Filth-eater, Serpent-skirt, Lady of Ropes and Snares: arise, and face me as they did at Tollan. For now is the time of reckoning, my love . . . the time when this world we squat on must at last be saved or unmade, for good, and altogether . . .

Behind him, the aggregate mass of two armies stood clustered, poised at the ready: Washford’s Battalion and Pinkerton’s Agents, plus the ever-growing cadre of collared hex-handlers and their equal-collared hexes. To Morrow’s right was Carver, pistol in one hand, spun magnesium double-tailed leash in the other; Eulie Parr stood with drooping head on left, while Berta Schemerhorne glowered unbroken on his right, and it afforded Morrow some odd sort of comfort to note that Carver seemed to find his dominant position over the two girls far more embarrassing than victorious.

Back of Morrow’s left shoulder, meanwhile — ordered by Morrow himself, in a low voice, into that place of what little safety might be found — hunched Doctor Joachim Asbury, face sharp with full-sober misery and terror; Frank Geyer stood guard adjacent, in his James Grey guise, wearing what seemed to be one of Asbury’s hex-nullifier bracelets clasped ’round his wrist. This’d puzzled Morrow greatly when first he’d noted it — Geyer was no hex — but once he’d seen how Pinkerton’s power-addled gaze passed over Geyer as if he had never known him, he’d realized it might be more for disguise than restraint.

And ahead of them all, Pinkerton himself, standing only steps behind the Enemy, big hands knotting and unknotting as if already savouring the feel of Ixchel’s flesh beneath his fingers. He’d doffed his civilian garb for the rudiments of a uniform, including a blue jacket with colonel’s insignia, worn loose and open; the act had won him no affection from Washford’s soldiers, but he seemed beyond caring. The air outlining him shimmered with power, and Morrow wondered sickly how many captive hexes had been sucked dry like oranges to bring his employer to this horrendous apex.

“Takin’ her sweet time about it, isn’t she?” Pinkerton demanded, of his Trickster “companion.” Before adding, with an ostentatious guffaw: “Just like a woman!”

The Enemy shot him a black-on-black side-eye, unimpressed. I would conduct myself more quietly, Pinkerton-creature, were I you, it told him. For she comes, even now.

And oh, Jesus Christ Almighty, if she didn’t, at that.

Rising up over Hex City’s western walls, eddying high on that dragonfly cloak of hers, which seemed — denser than usual, a living veil, those faceted wings shielding what little could be glimpsed of a jade-scaled forehead, sunken eyes and tattooed cheeks, lips peeled back over vulpine teeth, the thorn-rope at her throat lying slack between those leathery horrors that had once been her vessel’s fine, firm breasts. Beneath two sub-swarms of dragonflies that drooped like sleeves, her hands, fingers and wrists alike could be seen, if you squinted, to gleam with bone, much like the exposed tips of her doubly bare toes. Only her black flower of hair seemed intact, stiff and queenly, fresh braids high-piled ’round a knot of sharp stone knives.

On her right and left, meanwhile, came two more figures, hanging from the air like Juno enchained. The Rev was one, of course, recognizable even at this range — though now Morrow came to consider on it a moment, he did look different, somehow: stretched thin for such a massive brute, as though he’d been hollowed and restuffed, a mere shell of his former self. And the other —

My God, I do believe that is the wreck of Hank Fennig’s last wife, just like her two “sisters” already said. Sorry for doubting you, ladies.

What sketchy breath he was able to draw at the sight of her seemed to burn like lye, or strangling mountaintop air. Like a mouthful of the same lime they’d thrown into the blood-pit, ’fore tossing the sandy earth it’d taken to carve it out back in and piling a bunch of rocks on top of that so she’d rest still, if not easy. The former Clodagh Killeen, shining skull-face set with corpse-lamp eyes and every other joint of

her body lit up too, a star map of hellish constellations . . . just riding the sky as though it were sea while the sound of a million swelling rattlesnake bells tumbled to earth beneath her, pocking the dust like hail.

Jesus, Morrow thought again, while also sending up a brief prayer to anybody else who might be currently out there, listening. And I thought the bitch who made her over this way was bad.

Inclining her head, Ixchel stared down, and seemed to smile. Brother. You are arrogant, as ever. I had expected you sooner.

A shrug. I needed time, to put things in place — and see what you have put in place, likewise.

“Things.” Like this . . . pretender you ally with, perhaps?

Pinkerton’s face darkened. “I’ll thank ye tae address me directly, ye high-nosed heathen hoor!” he called up, making fists yet harder, so’s his knuckles spat sparks.

Be silent, was all Ixchel told him, without even deigning to look his way. You are amongst your betters now, mud-toy. It does not behoove you to try and speak to me directly, any more so than it would a beetle to hold congress with jaguars.

“Hah! The day such as ‘Reverend’ Asher Rook stands my equal, let alone my better, will be a cold one in Hell indeed.”

But Hell is cold, Pinkerton-thing. As you would know, had you ever truly been there. She turned her eyes to him at last, so dark they almost seemed to cast their own negative light. Still, if — not trusting my testimony — you wish to confirm it for yourself, I believe I might be persuaded to assist you.

“I’d heard you rumoured beautiful, not so long ago,” Pinkerton replied, grinning. “Right now, though, Lady, I must admit — I’m disinclined tae believe it.”

I am not . . . at my best, no. But that will change.