Bladestay, p.12
Bladestay, page 12
The electricity in the air changed. They looked around as if just now remembering their dire placement.
“We have to keep moving,” Theo said.
“Yep,” Brody said.
They continued their trek through the woods. Brody sent constant looks over his shoulder at Theo. Untrusting. Wary.
By the time the early morning sun had turned the eastern mountains into silhouettes, Brody slowed, then stopped.
Theo halted, and Brody turned around to face her.
She took a step back from that look in his eye, the same accusatory one that he’d had at Blacksmith’s camp when he saw her embrace his enemy.
Her family.
She took another step back.
“Brody—”
He shook his head and held a hand to his forehead as if he felt stupid for not putting it together earlier. “You’re the other Creed sister, ain’t you?”
She shook her head, but not in denial.
“Those boys with Haas were your brothers?” The next look on his face was something Theo couldn’t identify. Like he was disgusted. “You brought your own sister out of hiding?” The lines in his forehead deepened as he looked her up and down. “Why?”
“It . . . she . . .” But Theo’s throat was too thick with anguish to say anything else. She only shook her head.
Then Brody’s face softened. “The rest of your family.”
Theo watched him angrily.
“You did it to save them.”
She said nothing.
“Didn’t you?” he asked.
“Yes.”
He took a step toward her and although Theo had the urge to take another back to keep the distance, she didn’t. Brody scrubbed his fingers along his jaw. Neither of them said anything for a stretch.
Above them in the trees, the birds rejoiced at the start of a new day. The pines smelled wet with dew. Theo’s chest ached in its restraint. Theo registered these things, but they were distant. All she could think was how what happened next hinged on what happened now.
“When I first met August . . .” Brody said quietly, so quietly that Theo could hardly make out the words.
Theo held her breath, an anticipation so sharp it was excruciating.
A crack.
Brody’s hand went to his hip reflexively. He pivoted toward the sound. He flexed his hand when he found nothing to grip, holding out the other in caution to Theo as he searched the woods. He took a careful step backward, toward her, as he pulled out her straight razor, flipped it open, and held it in front of him. He took another step back to her, quietly rolling on the balls of his feet. He was close enough now to touch her, but his hand out to her was still one of caution to keep still and silent.
A melodic, two-whistle chirp almost blended in with the cheerful birdsong, and Theo may not have picked it out of the noises of the morning had it not been for Brody’s reaction.
His shoulders relaxed. He dropped his hand and folded the razor shut. He stood straighter.
Before anyone came into view, Brody handed her the straight razor. She took it, her fingers touching his. He held on to it for a moment, letting their fingers press together. He said in a voice just loud enough for the two of them, “I’ve got your back.”
Why? She wanted to ask again. What did he possibly have to gain from keeping her secret? From taking her side? But the comfort and heat she felt throughout her whole body when their fingers were simply touching was—
“I—” She was about to make a similar promise when Brody quickly withdrew his hand and two of Gaines’s men came into view.
CHAPTER 21
“He’s lying,” Jester hissed.
In their new camp farther up the mountain, August studied Theo carefully. He twitched a scowl. He took off his hat and looked briefly at the sky, a dark blue of midmorning. He went back to studying Theo. Theo only took her eyes off August once, and that was to check on Brody, who was cleaning a pistol with an intensity as if his life depended on it.
“Why would I do that?” Theo asked. She stood in the center, the gang loosely gathered around her.
“Yeah, why would you?” Spartan said, insinuating.
When Theo told them the lie she’d crafted, she figured it might be difficult for them to wrap their heads around this. Ten years of chasing come down to this? She could understand how that might be disappointing. She could understand how their egos might take a minute to warm up to this.
“Tell us again how you did it,” Flea said, shoving his hat back on.
“How many times you gonna make him tell it?” Brody snapped. He shoved his overly polished revolver back against his hip and pushed off the tree.
“You saw him?” Pathfinder asked Brody. “You saw Haas’s body?”
“Like I said, I was blindfolded,” Brody said. “And by the time Pine cut me loose, it was full dark.”
“So Haas coulda been sleeping?” Flea asked.
“And not dead?” Spartan added.
“I cut myself loose, I cut the bastard’s throat, I got Sixer free, we took off.” Theo snarled the fear away. “What is so damn unbelievable about that?”
“Haas woulda checked you for weapons,” Pathfinder said.
“He did,” Theo said. “He missed it.”
“Bullshit!” Spartan yelled.
“No way you pulled this off, you little runt!” Flea said.
“We should turn back, August,” Spartan said, “turn back and check for this supposed body and catch this little bastard in his lies and then show ’im what we do to liars—”
August held up a hand.
They fell silent.
Theo had to try very hard not to smile. Instead, she marched up to August, ripped something out of her pocket, and slapped it against August’s huge chest.
He frowned down at her and slowly placed his hand over hers and the gift that was held there.
“I thought I was your family.” She held his eyes for a moment. Just a moment. But it was long enough to see just how much that stung him. Then she ripped her hand away, shoved her forearm across her face as if she might be on the verge of tears, and bumped into Flea on her way past him and away from them all.
“Youngblood.” August’s voice rumbled after her. She knew better than to keep walking. This moment was everything. She stopped but didn’t turn around yet.
“I believe you,” August said.
Theo slowly turned back around. She desperately wanted to take Brody out of her peripheral, but she had to stay focused.
August was looking down at the gold in his hand. Then he closed his hand into a fist around it and closed the distance between them. “I believed you before you showed me this. I don’t think I wanted to, but I did. And I know that ain’t meanin’ a whole lot now that you’ve handed this over, but . . .” He looked around at his men before back to her. “Well. This all just feels a little . . .”
“Innocuous,” Pathfinder said.
“Innocuous,” August agreed.
“Haas was going to kill us,” Brody said. Everyone looked at Brody, but Brody was only looking at one person. “For sport,” he said as if directly to Theo and only Theo. “I was inches away when he drove a knife into John’s temple.” Brody rammed a finger against the side of his head. “That was after he beat him. I was up next.” He swept a hand through his hair. “If it weren’t for Pine, I’d be dead.”
“You know as well as us that this just ain’t about innocuous,” Flea said. “Haas was the only person who knew—”
“Watch your mouth,” August said. His tone chilled Theo, made her feel brittle.
Theo pretended to be entirely uninterested, but all she could think was: The only person. The only person. The only person who knew what?
August stepped over to her and Theo looked up at him.
“Forgive us,” he asked.
When she saw the pain etched all over him, there wasn’t a single part of her that felt like she was playing a role, not in that moment, not when she had the overwhelming urge to hug him and confess everything, that whatever Haas knew, August still had a chance to find out, that Haas hadn’t taken it to his grave, hadn’t taken anything to his grave, not yet, that August still had a chance at Haas, a chance at peace—
“Always,” she said, softening her face.
He smiled kindly.
August held his fist up to put it between the two of them and let the gold drop. Blacksmith’s chain swayed from his fist, two gold wedding bands dangling just below her chin. There was blood smeared across the rings and the chain, now dried. At the time that Blacksmith had handed this over to her, Theo had thought that was a nice touch, but now, looking up at August’s sorrowful, grateful face—
“I can’t take that,” Theo said.
August spread the chain and put it over her head and let it rest around her neck. “You’ve earned it.” The two bloodied bands landed just below her breast. He gave her a pained half grin. Then he placed his hand on her shoulder, gave it a single squeeze, and walked back through his men. Theo expected him to shout or do something provocative, but August once again surprised her. He simply nodded at them, said, “It’s over.” He retrieved a bottle from his saddle pack and uncorked it.
“We camp here tonight,” August said.
“Yes, sir,” Flea muttered.
Funny how none of them could really look her in the eye right now.
“We drink here tonight,” August said, a little livelier.
“Yes, sir,” Flea and Spartan said.
“It’s over,” August said again, nodding. He spun slowly. “We celebrate here tonight,” he said, louder.
“Hear, hear,” everyone replied. Everyone except Brody.
August came over and handed Theo the bottle. She smiled, took a drink, and handed it back. He held it up at her then took a drink of his own. It was a deep, long pull, and when he took it off his lips, there was no more sorrow in his smile.
When August passed it to Spartan, Spartan hesitated, but then lifted the bottle in her direction, tipped his hat, and took a swig. Spartan passed it to Flea, who did the same thing, who passed it to Pathfinder, who took the longest hesitation before he, too, finally gave in and held the bottle up to her. He passed it to Rook who gave it to Jester, until finally it ended up with Brody. He came up to stand alongside her. The men proceeded to set up camp as Brody took his time holding the bottle.
“You owe me an explanation,” Theo said.
Brody looked confused. “On what?” He put the bottle to his lips and tipped it back but Theo doubted that he drank.
“Your loyalty.”
Brody scoffed, slight surprise.
“Why are you going along with this?” she asked.
“You’re the most obtuse genius I’ve ever met,” he muttered. Before she could ask what he meant by that, he said, “You really think this is about loyalty? And here I was, thinking we wanted the same thing.”
“What’s that?” Theo asked.
“Things that were taken from us.”
Theo scowled up at him.
Haas was the only person. He was the only person who knew.
“What was it?” Theo asked softly. “Whatever Haas took I can help you get it back.” It felt like a riddle: What was a thing that could make loyalty obsolete and a man betray a brotherhood?
But Brody just shook his head. He scoffed again, this time as if she was no longer worth his time. “Jesus, Pine.”
She flinched at the way he said her fake name. “Just tell me, Brody. You owe me. You owe me the truth. What was Flea going to say?”
“You’re right. I do owe you that.” Brody returned the bottle to his lips and, from the looks of the way he bared his teeth after, drank. “So here it is: Haas will act with no prejudice when he comes for August.”
“Just because Blacksmith’s Haas, that doesn’t mean—” Theo paused abruptly, frustrated. “He would never hurt me. My brothers too.”
“You want the truth? The one that we’re really dealing with? We’re talking about blood, lots of it, not a drop of it good. And then there’s the other thing. The thing you think will give you answers? Truth is—” he sent a wary glance at the men. “The truth is,” he repeated, quieter, “you find out what that is and it’s liable turn you into a monster, same as the rest of us.” He gave her a look of warning. “There’s no such thing as loyalty out here.”
CHAPTER 22
August knelt at the edge of the riverbank, his bare back to Theo as she approached. The cuffs of his trousers were rolled up and his shirt was folded neatly on a nearby rock.
The water gurgled pleasantly, but August clocked her approach first with a mild annoyance at being bothered, then modified to a warm smile when he realized who it was doing the bothering.
“Do you mind?” Theo asked. She approached, her arms full of canteens and waterskins. If Brody wasn’t going to give her the answers she wanted, she was going to get them another way.
Haas was the only one who knew.
Brody’s warning should have extinguished her curiosity, inciting self-preservation, but it begged the opposite.
“Not at all, Youngblood.” His neck was lathered with soap and his hair slicked back from a recent wash. He pointed with the tip of his knife to the river’s access point next to him, upstream.
She set the canteens down, unscrewed the first one, and dipped it into the cold, heavy current.
August lifted his chin, leaning over the water, and scraped the edge of his blade against the hair on his neck. He winced as he did.
Theo screwed the canteen shut and started on the next.
“I’m sorry, August.”
He sent her a sideways glance. “What for?”
“I took something away from you. For what Haas did to you . . . it should have been you. You should’ve been the one to bleed him dry. I didn’t realize that until just then.”
August rinsed the sudsy blade. “I have one rule, Youngblood. It’s a simple one.” He made another pass at his soaped neckline, inhaled sharply in pain. “Goddammit.” He touched his neck and checked it for blood.
Theo pulled out the straight razor and held it out to him. “This thing has a wicked edge.”
August considered the razor, then got up off the bank to sit atop his neatly folded shirt. He lifted his chin in her direction and put his palms on his knees.
Theo froze. Was he inviting her to put a blade to his throat?
“Would you?” he asked.
She kept her hand outstretched for a moment, Bram Blacksmith’s straight razor offered there, unable to process the two thoughts that entered her mind:
It can’t be this easy.
He trusts me.
She felt resistant to the first thought, humbly softened by the second.
Theo got to her feet and unhinged the razor. She put August’s chin in her thumb and forefinger and tilted his head back farther. He watched her carefully as she placed the edge of the straight razor against his neck. She ran it upward, leaving smooth skin in its wake.
She bent down, rinsed it, and placed the blade back against his throat.
One swift slice was all it would take.
She couldn’t think of a single reason she shouldn’t do it. She could hide after she opened his neck, wait for her backup to arrive come sundown.
She smoothed another portion of his throat.
“Can I ask you something?” Theo asked.
“Always,” August said.
Theo paused on that response.
“Why haven’t you told me what Lucas Haas took from you?”
August gave her his half grin. “We’ve had this conversation.”
She slowly scraped up to his jawline. “Have we?” She rinsed the blade again. “You told me a story, but that was before you trusted me to run a blade against your throat,” she said as she did just that. “I would think we’re beyond pretenses now, Mr. Gaines.”
He leaned back slightly. “You think I was lyin’?”
“Not all pretenses are false.” She tilted his head to the side and made another pass. “This ain’t only about revenge, is it?”
“Not much escapes you, do it, kid?”
Theo changed her approach.
She touched the side of his head, at his temple where sprouts of gray had emerged. “Do you ever think, Mr. Gaines . . .”
He narrowed his eyes at her.
“Do you ever think what it would be like, to have a single moment of quiet up here?”
He swallowed. “All the time.”
She dropped her hand back to his chin and nodded sadly. She scraped the last strip of scruff on his neck. Then she kept it pressed there, in the crook of his jawline, slightly more pressure than necessary to raze hair.
He calmly held her gaze.
“Does is it ever get easier?” She made her whisper sound like a plea, the knife against his throat as if this were the information she was extracting from him.
“In a manner.” He made no move to withdraw her hand, no effort to take the blade from vulnerability. “You learn to find purpose in it.”
She withdrew the blade.
He made no reaction, as if she had never pressed the blade there to begin with.
“Those demons that plague you?” he said. “You learn how to harness them. You learn how to use them as a weapon.” August sighed wearily. “I’m not sure that makes it easier. But I believe it makes it worthwhile.”
Theo stepped out of his personal space and swiped at her face. She shook her head. “What’s the rule?”
August frowned. “What rule?”
“You said you had one rule.”
“Ah.” He slid off the rock and knelt back at the water’s edge. “You don’t apologize.” He splashed the remainder of the soap from his neck and chin. Then he looked up at her and said, “Not when it comes to the choices made in order to survive.”
As August redressed, Theo finished replenishing the waters.
“Thank you, Mr. Gaines,” she said.
He pressed the white hat onto his clean hair. “Nah, it’s me who owes that to you, Youngblood.” August held his hand out and Theo handed him the filled waters. “But what’re you thankin’ me for?”
