A Fistful of Dreams Page 10

  He didn’t need tracks to follow, the locus of misery, loneliness, and grief called as loudly as a scream. Loosening the saddle, Kid reached into a saddlebag and pulled out some grain. Wiping snow off a rock, he spread a good portion of the grain and left the horse to graze while he climbed.

  Gloves protected his hands from the cold and the sting of frozen rock, but his boots skittered against the slick surface. He didn’t slow his pace, following the blazing trail of unhappiness to the top. Curled between two rocks in a puddle of sunlight, the young cougar stared at him. The animal didn’t object to Kid pulling himself up. Settling on the edge, Kid let out a harsh breath. “Hell of a place to climb to, Ben—and a good hiding place.”

  The vantage point offered a wide view of the surrounding landscape. The cat had to have seen him as soon as he exited the trees on the hill a few hundred yards away. He had plenty of time to take off.

  “So, Jo told me about the fight this morning and how you left.” He’d ridden down with Micah to the schoolhouse. They kept the kids divided amongst the adults; some days spent training their gifts, other days working on their education. The oldest had jobs on the ranch. Unfortunately they needed the help, and kids like Ben helped out where they could. But an argument with another boy over whose chore it was to sweep the schoolhouse erupted into a full-fledged fight and Ben shifted.

  “Jose will be fine. I thought you might want to know. He’s with Noah and most of the scratches have been closed.” Micah left with the boy immediately, riding all out for the Morning Star cabin.

  The cat lifted his head and his long tail twitched. Guilt bubbled to the surface, cresting the top of the loneliness.

  “It can be hard, these gifts. Gifts.” Kid shook his head. “Yes, not my favorite word for it either. But we can look at them as gifts or curses. I prefer gift most of the time.” Pulling the hat off his head, Kid turned his face up to the sun. It really was quite warm up on top of the rock—well, warmer—compared to the temperature closer to the ground. The stone reflected some of the heat back up. “And you know, we all fight. It happens. When I was seven, I got into a scuffle with Micah because I thought I should have more pie than he. I mean, I helped Miss Annabeth make it, but Micah, he had been working down at the barn and he was really hungry. He thought the extra slice—the last slice—should go to him. He was bigger than me and he laughed when he held me off with one arm and ate every bite. It didn’t seem to matter that I was hitting him, I couldn’t budge him.”

  Micah seemed like a giant then, nearly five years older and so much bigger. “But I didn’t give up and I was really mad. So when he finished eating it, he offered me the plate with the crumbs on it…” Glancing over his shoulder, he found the cat staring at him, ears flicked forward. “So I hit him with the plate.”

  The shattering noise and Micah’s yelp echoed in Kid’s ears. Their Pa gave Kid a good hiding with the strap, three swats. One for fighting with his brother, one for breaking his mother’s plate, and one to remind him of it later. His bottom stung for a week. The only satisfaction he got out of it was Micah got twice as many, for all the same reasons and more because he was the older brother and it was his job to look after Kid.

  “Yes, I’m not proud of it. But it was awfully funny to see how stunned Micah was when I did that. Jose’s bigger than you and I know he tried to use his size to his advantage. It’s pretty normal.” Didn’t make it right. Didn’t make it easier to swallow. The cat dropped his head back down to his paws. “I know you didn’t mean to hurt him so bad when you shifted. You were mad and a little scared and probably missing your parents, like everyone else.”

  A wall of grief crashed into him and he bowed his head to the pressure of it. The cat was a tightly wound ball of utter desolation. Suffocating under the unbearable pressure, Kid opened up to it and pulled. Pain crackled along his spine, his stomach twisted, and tears filled his eyes. He fought them all back, letting the burst of emotion fill him up. Like lancing a wound, he bled off the worst of Ben’s agony. “Come here, Ben.” He slid sideways and turned to face the cougar.

  The cat rose up and padded toward him, head down and ears flat. Defeat, guilt, sadness, and loneliness hunched the animal’s spine. He let the cat rub his whiskers against his hand before pulling the seventy-pound animal toward him. Ignoring any latent danger, Kid hugged him. Burrowing his head against Kid’s shoulder, the cat sagged and let out a low yowling sound. The keening noise wrecked his soul, but Kid didn’t let him go. Running a hand along his back, he focused on gathering up the shredded grief and relieving the boy of it.

  He would need a reason to change back, to come home, and he wasn’t alone. “I’m right here,” he murmured to him. “Let it all out.” No one could return the boy’s parents or the innocence he lost the first time the change ripped through him. Hell, the poor thing couldn’t even get close to the two people who understood his change best. Kid might be a poor substitute for all of the above, but he could take away the worst of the pain.

  Soaking it up, Kid ignored the stars bursting in his mind and hard choking sensation in his throat. He could handle the pain. In this, if nothing else, at least he had a choice the fever had stolen from Ben.

  Jimmy and Cody worked in quiet, steady silence. They offloaded the lumber from the wagon. The quartermaster checked something on his clipboard and hurried over to give them a hand. “I appreciate it. We’re behind on construction.”

  “Not a problem.” Jimmy kept an agreeable tone. The wolf said nothing. He really didn’t like being at the site of the new fort. The Army was making serious progress. They already had the walls erected and two rough buildings framed out and enclosed. The snow only seemed to spur them on.

  The three men working together emptied the wagon of its burden of fresh lumber and cut boards. With the sawmill being one of the buildings burned down in the town, the Flying K’s supply of fresh boards was limited. Jed Kane asked them to deliver a load, which comprised about a third of their stores, to circumvent any of the officers riding out to request it and to spur the unit into handling future shipments from further south.

  Swiping a hand across his sweaty brow, the quartermaster handed them a receipt. “If you could give that to Mr. Kane, we’ll see he receives reimbursement for the lumber. Any chance you have more out there we could purchase?”

  “No.” Cody shook his head. “This was what we had stored. We’ll be using what’s left to patch fences.” It amused Jimmy how easily Cody lied to strangers. His very low tolerance for dishonesty didn’t extend beyond the family.

  “If we find any more, we’ll send word.” Jimmy shook the man’s hand. Cody was already on the wagon, the wolf in him ready to leave.

  “Appreciate it.” The man waved them off and returned to his stacks of crates and paperwork. Studying the other uniformed men working steadily, Jimmy admired the efforts of the men to transform the snowy plain into an armed fortress. Work on rebuilding the town was on hold during the inclement weather. They needed to shore up the ranch and the small town forming around Jo’s schoolhouse. Ranch survivors migrated, slowly but surely, to the schoolhouse—slapping new houses together and committing to each other, at least those survivors who had stayed. Of those who didn’t fall ill to the fever, more stayed than left.

  Jo dubbed the schoolhouse area Haven. By unspoken consent, two towns would occupy an area where only one existed before. They wouldn’t rebuild Dorado on the scorched landscape where the original town stood. Instead, they’d begun blocking out the area across the river, just beyond the Flying K’s borders. Those unwelcomed Fevered who arrived would be limited by the boundaries protecting the ranch and those who already lived there would be safe.

  It wasn’t a perfect solution.

  But it was a solution.

  “Jimmy?” Cody grunted. His brother wanted out of the erecting fortress. Adjusting his hat, he climbed up on the wagon and Cody snapped the reins before his ass was even on the seat. The horses picked up speed and they trotted out past the
sentries with their rifles and watchful expressions.

  Neither brother spoke until they were a good distance away. Adjusting his jacket collar against the chill, Jimmy eyed the blue sky. “You still think it’s going to storm?”

  “It’s in the air. I can smell it.” Cody rolled his head from side to side; neck cracking. “This is an odd winter.”

  “Yes, didn’t snow like this last year.” He didn’t mind the white, most of them didn’t. Winter on the mountain meant hunkering down for a lot of repairs, reading, and storytelling around the fire. By the time spring came, the only thing keeping their urges to kill each other in check was Wyatt. “But according to Micah, this isn’t unheard of either.”

  “I think it’s one of the kids.”

  The bland observation jerked Jimmy around. “Why?”

  “Because there was no snow in the air the day this started. Now it’s all I can smell. It’s deeper than what is typical and why not? We have no idea the extent of what they can do—why is weather affecting so different from Scarlett lighting things up?” Cody shrugged. “And too many don’t know what they can do yet.”

  Eye twitching, Jimmy stretched a leg out and braced his foot against the front board. “It’s a dangerous gift.”

  “They’re all dangerous. We tell ourselves some are more controllable than others.” His unruffled tone spoke volumes. Most of their siblings possessed very active, very aggressive abilities—Jimmy’s included.

  “Well, if it is one of the kids, we need to find a way to identify it.”

  Cody snorted. “You have any suggestions? Weather has a scent depending on the weather, but if it’s associated with any of them, I’m not getting it.”

  So far, only two of the Fevered children proved problematic, but ways had been found to control them—or at least get them to control themselves. Shane’s strength fed his temper and created problems. He broke four of Cody’s ribs during an outburst and only Scarlett’s fire gave the boy pause—even as it seemed to double his strength. Billy’s earthshaking, on the other hand, scared the hell out of all of them. Thankfully, Kid had been quick on his feet and calmed the boy down before he’d done more than collapse the framework on the house they’d been building.

  “Maybe Kid can tell—”

  “How? Stay with all of them until the weather shifts and see who is being pissy in that moment?” The wolf had a point. Pinpointing gifts wasn’t the easiest of tasks.

  “Maybe we’ll get lucky. Maybe one of them will be a Fevered diviner.” Only half joking, Jimmy smothered a yawn. “Where are we headed now?”

  “Back.”

  “Yes, I figured.” He crossed his arms and tucked his hat lower over his eyes to block the sun’s too bright glare off the snow. “Since we got the short straw today, I meant what was our next chore?”

  “Sweeping the southern cabins. Most of the families that didn’t leave moved closer in to the main house. We’re going to make sure we don’t have any unwelcome visitors.” Nothing made Cody happier than protecting his family—except maybe having Mariska with him. His wife, however, worked with the kids more and more. She had a way with them and Jimmy had to wonder if she wanted young of her own. Neither wolf mentioned it to him though.

  “Taking the wagon or riding?”

  “You want to sleep?”

  His brother knew him too well. “Yes.”

  “Wagon, then.” Cody fell silent and Jimmy tucked his chin down to his chest. He was asleep in seconds.

  Chapter 9

  Three days of observing training sessions brought Delilah no closer to discovering what Jason and Buck planned to use to train her in control. Her mood vacillated between curious and frustrated like a horse whipping itself into a frenzy in a paddock it wanted free of—or maybe a prisoner. The latter charge wasn’t terribly fair to her hosts. Cate sat next to her on the hay bale. It snowed outside their barn, but the fireplaces on opposite ends of their work hallway kept the chill at bay.

  “You’re sad.” The little girl leaned against Delilah’s side, combing her fingers through a doll’s hair. Delilah found the doll at the house and, with Scarlett and Miss Annabeth’s blessing she presented it to Cate. The child’s utter delight made the frustrating hand signals and awkward communication to get the doll down to the big barn worth it.

  Shane worked with Cody, the blond wolf she met at Fort Courage. Having seen so little of him since arriving at the ranch, she tried to assess what he and Shane were doing. They struck blows to each other, but strain flaked around the edges of Shane’s expression. A combination of lunges, blows, and circling resembled a violent dance, although neither seemed truly upset. On the fourth pass, the younger man caught the wolf with a hard flattened palm blow to his chest. Cody sailed backwards and landed on his ass in the sawdust.

  Cate gave a little jerk next to her. No one else reacted to the pseudo-battle, but Buck slanted a look toward them as did Jason. Shane moved forward and offered his hand to the wolf, a contrite expression on his face.

  Laughing, Cody took it and let the boy pull him up.

  “Sorry about that. I’m trying to pull them when I hit, but it gets hard after a few blows.”

  “It’s okay.” Surprisingly, the wolf wasn’t angry, if anything he seemed amused. “It took longer that time.” Despite his words, he moved slowly and braced a hand against his chest. “So now, you need to walk it off.”

  “He’s very red.” Cate told her doll and mimed the doll nodding her head. Her voice changed a little, as though giving the doll its own voice. “I know, but when he calms down, he’ll be blue again. Blue and sparkly. We like the sparkly better.”

  Curious, Delilah tapped her arm and gave her a questioning look. A heart-stopping sweet smile transformed Cate’s expression. As surreptitiously as she could manage, she pointed to the two men.

  “He’s red.” Cate sat up and swung around so she could face her. “He gets red when he gets upset or too strong.”

  Despite the child’s certainty, Delilah didn’t see it and frowned.

  “I can see him here.” Cate tapped her forehead and sat the doll between them. Wiggling her fingers over it, she mimed waves. “When he’s not mad, it’s all blue and sparkly. Like everyone else, although not everyone is blue. You’re all the colors—like Mr. Kid. Shane is blue. Mr. Cody is gold, and so is Ms. Mariska. Mr. Micah isn’t too sparkly, but he’s a very bright green. It’s funny, Ms. Jo, she’s green, too—kind of green and blue, but sparkly. Not everyone sparkles.”

  Sparkles. Micah didn’t sparkle, but everyone else did. Delilah nibbled the inside of her lip. Motioning to the other working groups, Delilah raised her eyebrows questioningly.

  “Yes. Everyone. Some people are really bright, but not everyone. Sage gets brighter the closer to the others she sits, but if she’s all by herself it’s really dim. Billy, he’s orange and red—kind of like Miss Scarlett, only brown, too. She has no brown. Mr. Buck is dark, but not black—kind of starry. I kind of like his sparkles…other colors are there, but I can’t quite see them.”

  Delilah studied the others. She didn’t see colors or sparkles. So what was Cate seeing? The five year-old possessed one of the unidentified gifts. Not all gifts were active or aggressive, maybe hers was one of the ones that wasn’t. Curious, she hummed a single note, low and almost inaudible. She put no feeling behind it, and waited.

  “Wow. You got really, really bright.” Cate’s eyes were as wide as saucers and her grin grew. “Do it again.”

  No. One note she could manage without real damage so she shook her head. Sliding off the hay bale, she held her hand out to Cate. The little one scrambled up, holding her doll tight, and linked hands with her. Walking over to Buck’s group, she waited for his beautiful dark eyes to open and look at her before moving closer.

  Miming speaking, she pointed at Cate.

  “You want me to tell Mr. Buck?” The little girl was quick.

  Delilah nodded.

  Hugging her doll and leaning into Delilah, Cate sm
iled at Buck. “You’re like a starry sky.”

  “I am?” Mild amusement softened his voice.

  “Uh huh. And Shane’s really red right now. He gets red when he’s angry.” She glanced up. Delilah nodded encouragement and motioned for her to continue. “He’s usually blue and sparkly, but the more they practice, the redder he gets and when he’s all red—that’s when he’s mad. Like when he tossed Mr. Cody.”

  Rising to a crouch, Buck studied the little girl. “Does everyone have a color?”

  “Uh huh. But not everyone is sparkly.” Cate delighted at the attention.

  It didn’t take long for Buck to grasp what Delilah discovered. “Who doesn’t sparkle?”

  “Um—Mr. Micah and Marshal Sam. Mr. Jed doesn’t either. And Miss Annabeth, and…” Cate bit her lower lip and shrugged.

  “Does everyone in here sparkle except for Mr. Micah?” Patient and calm, Buck didn’t allow any excitement to enter his tone.

  “Yes.” Cate held up her doll. “Well, and Elizabeth Anne. Elizabeth Anne doesn’t sparkle either, but that’s okay. I love her anyway.”

  The dreamwalker’s gaze flicked up to meet Delilah’s and then back to Cate with interest. Mouth pursed, he looked to be considering an idea. His group consisted of the unidentified gifts, save one. “Hey Tommy—can you do something for me?”

  “Yes, sir?” The kids listened to the exchange, but stayed out of it until Buck turned his attention to them.

  “Try the meditation again, but think of a handful of snow—see if you can bring it to you.”

  The thirteen year-old shrugged and closed his eyes. He held out his right palm, cupping his fingers. Nothing happened, but between one moment and the next, his hand went from empty to holding snow. Tommy let out a shaky breath and grinned.

  “Good job.” Buck complimented. “What did you see Cate?”

  “His sparkles brightened and he glowed and now he’s dim again.”

  One of the other boys—Lachlan might be his name—snickered, but swallowed the laughter at Buck’s censorious look.