Book Of Tongues (Hexslinger 1)

“A fine thing for me that they’re not, then.”

Yeah, too damn bad, Chess thought — then whipped his head ’round, as he heard almost the exact sentiment echoed from behind him.

“Too bad, yeah,” said Morrow. “But still — ”

Songbird looking up, at the same time, her mouth’s pain a spike through the tongue: What is that in your mind, gweilo?

“Still what, agent?” Pinkerton demanded, as Chess and Morrow locked gazes.

To which Morrow answered, slow but distinct, “Still, occurs to me . . . since you are a hex, Chess, with at least as much juice as Rook, if not more . . . just what the hell’s it matter, anyhow?”

Pinkerton opened up his jaws, drill-sergeant quick, like he was just about to bark at Morrow to shut his mouth — but it was too late. As though just giving the idea voice, however obliquely, had turned a key in Chess’s gut, filling him back up top-to-toe with a virulent force that suddenly made all things possible.

Chess grinned, wolfish. “Always did like you, Ed,” he said.

And cross-drew, fulfilling every outlaw’s dream in one fell swoop with two impossible shots — that of shooting Allan Pinkerton in the face — or close as made no never-mind, clipping the Scotsman ’cross one ear-top as he swerved and went down ass-backwards, biting his own tongue so badly Chess could see the glinting muscle — with no ammunition but a spell.

He heard Asbury cry out. Heard Songbird laugh, even through her own pain, in sheer delight.

The bedchamber door heaved and sprang from its hinges, and a flood of agents spilled in, all blazing-ready to defend their sire. Chess turned to meet them head on, automatic, his guns already up. Only to have Morrow grab him up under the arms and sling him headlong through the white-curtained window, bursting out onto the first-floor roof in a spray of glass. He rolled and fell to the dusty street below, turning mid-air to find his feet like a cat.

Following hot on his heels, Morrow landed far heavier, with a yelp and a curse — jerked up and started limp-loping down the street, yelling back over his shoulder: “Jesus Christ, Chess, they’ll be on us in a minute — you comin’, or what?”

Chess shook his head, but only to clear it. There’d be choice words ’tween him and Morrow later on, obviously regarding — various issues. For now, however . . . he turned, reholstering, to make better speed.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

That they ended up in a graveyard, after — a cramped stripe of yellowing grass and tilted Spanish-carved stones, fenced off by black iron from the surrounding alleys, shaded by a dilapidated church to the west and new-raised houses on every other side — couldn’t help but strike Morrow as entirely fitting. The new houses’ whitewashed pinyon walls, he noticed, were superstitiously free of windows facing the tombs. What few did exist had been boarded up. Chess leaned against the back of a worn and grey sepulchre, bent over and panting hard.

Morrow stood with his arms crossed, shivering, thinking: Everything I had . . . everything I am. I just sent it all up in fuckin’ smoke, and for what? For who? The son-of-a-whore who’s gonna kill me too, like as not, once he’s got his damn breath. And that’s a fact.

It would make sense to run, he supposed. Run, keep running, see how far he got. But his legs hurt — and frankly, given what he already knew Chess could do, he didn’t much see the point.

Chess straightened — made to spit, but then thought better of it and just wiped his mouth instead. “Tell you one thing,” he said finally, without looking up, “that was some shindig, back there.”

“Sure was.”

“Guess you’ll be in pretty bad odour with the big boss from now on, too, considering.”

Morrow nodded, face lodged where between grim and blank. “Yup. Don’t doubt it — ”

At last Chess turned to glance up at him, but immediately shied away, hand over his face as if to shade his eyes from the sun. “Uh,” he snarled. “Just . . . stop lookin’ at me!”

Too tired to argue, Morrow complied, fixing his eyes on a smallish headstone. Assumpta Francisca Xaviera Contesquio, it read. 17 abril 1832 – 20 enero 1839. His Spanish was rusty, but he thought the line beneath read something like, Her beauty would only have grown greater.

He thought of the Mexican woman whose body Ixchel wore. Wondered who she’d been, before the goddess-bitch took up residence — her life, her name. Did anyone still live who’d want to commemorate her with a stone recording their sorrow?

Christ knew, Morrow sure couldn’t think offhand of anyone who’d bother doing the same for him.

“Ain’t so bad, when you don’t look,” Chess said, unexpectedly. “I mean, I still feel it comin’ off you, like standin’ by an open window with a rainstorm outside.” His voice dropped. “But when you look, it’s like the wind changes, and it’s blowin’ right through me.”

For half a heartbeat, the chill in Chess’s voice touched Morrow to his bones, for all the Mexico sun continued to blaze down upon them.

“What’s ‘it,’ Chess?” he asked, not really wanting to know, but feeling he should, somehow.

Chess thought hard on that one, an uncommon long span of time. “Might be . . . what you’re thinking. What’s inside you. The past, the future — I get it all the time now, from every-damn-body. Even Songbird, and I couldn’t make out the half of what she had goin’ on, let alone . . .” Chess trailed off, then struck the sepulchre’s wall with one palm, flat and angry. “And it’s always there, always, and I just can’t get rid of it, can’t block it out. Might be you, might be some other fucker a half-mile back, but it’s so loud, and I can’t fuckin’ make it stop. Goddamn, if I ain’t gettin’ to wishing I’d let Pinkerton finish the job. And on a related note, just who the hell told you to help me back there, anyways?”

Morrow