Clash of Mountains Read online

  Sarah Todd

  Clash of Mountains

  Chloe Garner

  Copyright © 2019 Chloe Garner

  All rights reserved.

  Cover design by Covers by Christian, based on a design by Desiree DeOrto

  Published by A Horse Called Alpha

  Work by Chloe Garner

  Space Western

  -Sarah Todd

  -Sarah Todd: Rising Waters

  -Sarah Todd: Clash of Mountains

  Science Fiction

  -Portal Jumpers

  -Portal Jumpers II: House of Midas

  -Portal Jumpers III: Battle of Earth

  Anadidd’na Universe

  -Rangers

  -Shaman

  -Psychic

  -Warrior

  -Dragonsword

  -Child

  -Gorgon

  -Book of Carter

  -Gypsy Becca: Death of a Gypsy Queen

  -Gypsy Dawn: Life of a Gypsy Queen

  -Gypsy Bella: Legacy of a Gypsy Queen

  Urban Fantasy

  -Hooligans

  Clash of Mountains

  The bitch got fat.

  Not as fat as Lise, but still, there by the end, she weren’t gettin’ around so good no more, and all she wanted to do was drop them puppies in a corner somewhere.

  Dog’d done his job.

  Sarah Todd sat at the table in the Lawson house, eating a sandwich. Cook’d done her level best, learnin’ the way of gremlin bread, but it was the kinda thing you didn’t learn outside ‘a Lawrence, and it weren’t the friendliest of flours. Mama came to put her nose on Sarah’s lap, and she glowered down at the creature, who whined, as if her meanin’ hadn’t been clear enough at the first.

  “She asks because you cave,” Jimmy said, walking past somewhere behind her. “Don’t think I don’t know that.”

  Sarah flared her nostrils, holding her sandwich still out of reach.

  “We feed you plenty fine in the kitchen,” she told the dog. Mama whined again.

  Sarah didn’t rightly know who had named the dog or when. Just everyone had started off callin’ her mama as she got big, and then they was callin’ her Mama, and that were that.

  Mama wagged her tail, just a bit, and scooted closer on her butt, shoulderin’ up to Sarah’s thigh.

  “Dog ain’t never got away with that,” Sarah said. “Beggin’ like that ain’t dignified.”

  Mama whined again.

  Sarah took a cut of beef out of her sandwich and dropped it on the floor away from herself, then stood, goin’ to the front room to stand next to Jimmy as she finished the gummy, tough bread. Least the beef was still good, home-smoked stuff from her own stocks. They hadn’t tried to switch her over to the imported stuff for her meals on her own, and they’d best not try.

  “Softy,” Jimmy said.

  “She’s obnoxious and I won’t be sad to see the last of ‘er,” Sarah answered.

  “Dog likes her,” Jimmy said. Sarah gave him a level look, and the corner of his mouth twitched as he pointedly did not look back.

  “Gonna head up to the claims and make a round,” Sarah said, and Jimmy nodded.

  “Take Thomas with you,” he said. “I want him to know where everyone is without needing a map.”

  Sarah reckoned it were Thomas because he was the Lawson brother most likely to make it home alive on account of not getting on Sarah’s last nerve.

  “Rhoda ain’t gonna like that,” Sarah said, and Jimmy snorted quietly.

  “Rhoda has had quite enough control around here, to date,” he said.

  “Thought that was just Rhoda,” Sarah said, drawing another quiet snort, but no reply.

  “We’ll be starting construction on the other houses, while you’re gone,” he said after a moment.

  “Been waitin’ for the window, huh?” she asked, rolling her jaw to the side.

  “Breathlessly,” he answered. “Don’t give anyone a route that you’re planning on following.”

  “You think I gone lost all my sense while you were out checkin’ the mail?” she asked. He snorted once more, then turned to look at her.

  “The number of new men showing up on every train isn’t going down,” he said. “Any number of them could be spies, could be saboteurs, could be trying to shut us down.”

  “Good thing ain’t none of ‘em got enough intel to do no more’n slow us down,” she answered. “And that ain’t our problem. The claim owners hire who they hire, ain’t our job to keep ‘em true.”

  He nodded. Their job was to see that the claims were respected by other claim owners and potential jumpers. Protection money. They weren’t police and weren’t gonna try. Not up there in the hills.

  Town, now that were different.

  Sarah’d been watchin’ over town for the better part of a decade, and she weren’t gonna let that go, no matter what Jimmy said about what Lawsons should and shouldn’t do. Sarah weren’t no Lawson.

  She was Sarah Todd.

  Weddin’ or no.

  There’d been a war, here. Sarah’d been fightin’ battles here, ongoin’ ones, since ‘fore the Lawsons had left, but they weren’t nothin’ like the war the Lawsons had brought back.

  Well.

  Brought back a match to, at any right. Pete’d been the one to find the powder keg what to blow it all up.

  The front yard of the Lawson house, always scarce, was torn to bits, feet, blood, guns, motorcycles. What had been baked red clay with the odd scrub plant looking for a footing was now uneven, jagged, pockmarked with bullets. The front wall weren’t more’n the memory of brick. Barn yet stood, and the animals talked as they did, but even two months in the middle didn’t rid Sarah of the memory of men belly-down in the dust, tryin’ to breach the house, kill off what of Lawrence they ain’t got to yet, at town.

  Town was worse.

  Jimmy’d poured a fortune into repair, and it weren’t near done, but up in them hills, up in the giant rocks castin’ shadows down on the town, there was wealth the world ain’t likely conceived of, and bits together or not, it was Sarah’s job to make sure that that wealth got down, it got sold, and the Lawsons got their cut.

  Descartes had gotten his fancy-man tour, and then life in Lawrence had got on, like it always did, come bandits, flood, sandstorm, or war.

  Sarah went to get her duster and her hat, stompin’ her boots on the floorboard just for the feel of ‘em, then gave Jimmy a nod. He weren’t moved from the window, lookin’ out at the world, not as it were, but as he’d make it to be, like as he could reach out his hands and it’d be.

  She loved him for that.

  Hated him more’n most, but loved him for how the world were just a canvas, not a reality. Reality was what was ‘tween his ears.

  She went out to the barn, lookin’ down the row of horses there. Gremlin whuffed at her, hopin’ for a treat, and Flower - big white brute of a horse Jimmy’d gotten her as a wedding gift - kicked at the stall door with an overbroad foot. Desert horses, both of ‘em.

  She thought of the big, split-colored stallion up on the mountains she’d seen a ways back, knowin’ she’d go for him, someday, picturin’ his red-and-white face lookin’ at her from the stall along Gremlin’s.

  “Too many horses for not enough spurs,” she muttered, shakin’ her head.

  She’d gone horse-to-horse, pickin’ up a new one every time the last one went down, the entire time the Lawson clan had been gone, but now, with Jimmy back, she had an itch to stockpile what bits ‘a good she could get, on account of Jimmy’s listlessness with what were.

  When your life ain’t but shootin’ at those who shoot at you, you ain’t need a plan beyond your next ride into town.

  Three damned horses.

  Stupid
animals, ‘fraid of things that rustle in a breeze, but lettin’ the likes of Sarah Todd ride ‘em around. No better way to get shot in this world than that.

  She took out Gremlin and saddled him up, checkin’ the ammo load on her gun, then fillin’ her pockets and her saddle bags with what she’d need, out up in the mountains for a good spell.

  Maybe she’d ‘a hoped Jimmy’d tell her he wanted to come, too. Time up there in the quiet were where the two of them talked best, but weren’t to be. Not this trip. He had a hell of a lot of work to do, here, yet, with the flood not but a couple ‘a months away, the mines startin’ to bring down test loads, and the workforce of Lawrence still livin’ in shacks with a mighty strong tendency to float away when water hit ‘em.

  Thomas it were.

  If it had ta be a Lawson, Thomas were the best of ‘em.

  She whistled Dog to heel and she let Gremlin pick his pace into town, the black brute happy to be out of his stall after several days in. Dog wandered off and back, comin’ back once with a red muzzle. Varmint huntin’ were his specialty, and he gave ‘em hell.

  Lawrence came into view on the horizon, down on the flats below the foothills, desert town. Wood here got dry fast and started takin’ on sand, the storms cuttin’ loose the soft stuff and showin’ the deep-down power of the timbers. Hard winters, as Sarah understood it. Wood grew fast in the spring and summer, but got hunkered down in the winter, and them were the lines that stayed, when you ran your finger ‘cross the surface of the board.

  Hard winters.

  She stopped in at the Doc’s place, just to put eyes on young Sid and make sure he weren’t run amok with one of his fancy ideas about makin’ Lawrence a modern example of somesuch or another. Doc gave her a list to take to station, orders for goods, and she gave Sid a dark look that he answered with a bright smile.

  “Hey, Sarah. I went down to the reservoir yesterday, and it looks like Jimmy is actually going to finish it before the flood comes.”

  She glanced at Doc and touched her hat.

  “Headin’ up into the rock fields,” she said. “Let Jimmy know, anythin’ goin’ on needs lookin’ into.”

  Doc winked at her and she shook her head, goin’ back out onto the boardwalk and turnin’ down the main street, ignorin’ Kayla’s dress shop and its unsightly purple dresses paired there. Sarah’s weddin’ dress, point of fact, and its fancy replica. Were a mess ‘a weddin’s comin’ to Lawrence, these days, and Kayla was doin’ a mint of business, for a dress shop in a ghost town.

  Sarah ducked into Granger’s, but he had a line ‘a claim managers and their runabouts, puttin’ down demands for more gear. All the orders ran through Granger, and he was up to his eyeballs in people wavin’ wads ‘a cash at him. Claim owners coulda shipped in goods from outside, but for that it took longer to get a message outta Lawrence and to the claim owners than it did to just cross Granger’s palm and get the damned gear.

  Sarah couldn’t imagine it cost more, this way, either. Granger weren’t that kind.

  She went back out onto the boardwalk, lookin’ at the zoo ‘a young men, hopefuls searchin’ for jobs and lives. Jimmy’d put out an order only ones what had housing could take jobs, so these were the ones who hadn’t the sense or means to jump. Homesteaders were takin’ in men what would never actually live with ‘em, payin’ rent on an empty room a dozen times or more, and even so these ones couldn’t find lodgin’.

  Sortin’ mechanism, Jimmy called it.

  Sarah couldn’t find particular fault, so she kept her mouth shut.

  Lawrence was a tough place on everyone. Some of ‘em just weren’t gonna make it.

  She rode out to the train station, her metal rockin’ chair there same as always, and she posted Doc’s list, then went wide ‘round Lawrence to the new section. Boys were callin’ it the new town, but Sarah reckoned it were just another homestead, close in and shiftless.

  When Jimmy’d kicked out the rest of the Lawson clan from the main house - for Sarah’s benefit, among others - this’d been where they’d landed. Built for the claim auction, the houses were modern, strong, and locked at night. Problem was, they was down in the flood zone, same as all the others, and when men with guns took over the train and came blazin’ into town, Jimmy didn’t like the Lawsons scattered between places.

  Sarah didn’t, either, though that were the only time she didn’t like it.

  She left Gremlin to wander, goin’ to the house Thomas and Rhoda lived in and knockin’. Rhoda answered and smiled.

  “Sarah,” she said. “How are the repairs going, up at the house?”

  “Prefer it when you sound like you b’long here,” Sarah said. “I’m headin’ up into the mountains. Jimmy said he wants Thomas with me.”

  A brief cloud crossed Rhoda’s face, then she smiled again.

  “Sure. He has a job; I’ve got to expect it to take him away.”

  Sarah shrugged, and Rhoda took a step back.

  “Won’t you come in?”

  “Not here for fancy-footin’,” Sarah said. “Dust on my boots, and ain’t no sense knockin’ it loose on your carpet.”

  Rhoda gave her a dour look - weren’t much actual carpet on Lawrence - but nodded.

  “I’ll get Thomas.”

  “Tell him to pack for two weeks,” Sarah said, and Rhoda twisted her mouth.

  “Food?”

  “If by food you mean bullets, sure,” Sarah said.

  “Where I come from, referring to a bullet as food means something else,” Rhoda answered. “You can have a seat on the swing if you want.”

  Sarah cast a distrustful eye at the porch swing and shook her head.

  “Ain’t plannin’ on him bein’ that long.”

  “You know Thomas,” Rhoda said playfully. “He takes forever to figure out which guns to pack.”

  Sarah snorted, then tipped her head off to the side.

  “Gonna go look in on your barn, you don’t mind,” she said, and Rhoda shrugged.

  “Help yourself.”

  Sarah glanced down at the row of bushes Rhoda had planted in an effort to landscape the house and shook her head. Frightful waste ‘a water and effort, that, but if that was what the woman wanted to spend her time and effort on, so be it. Lawsons were allowed to be eccentric where they took to it.

  She went around the house, goin’ to check the little barn and its supply ‘a hay. She got Gremlin and Dog each a portion of water, then went into the tack room, seein’ what there was she might like to take.

  She had spare bits of most of the key stuff, but Thomas had a nice box ‘a brass bits for bridles, and she took a couple ‘a those for Gremlin’s saddle bag. Lightweight and useful, as bits went.

  “Never knew you to be sticky-fingered,” Thomas said from the doorway, and she glanced over.

  “Not like Jimmy ain’t footin’ the bill for all this, anyway,” she said. Thomas laughed.

  “I don’t mind, but that is actually all my stuff,” he said. “Rhoda and I got a rightful share of the claims receipts, and we’re out of Jimmy’s largesse, now.”

  Sarah nodded.

  “Good on you,” she said. “Not a good man to owe things to.”

  “She says about my brother and her husband,” Thomas said.

  “Don’t make it any less true,” she said, and he grinned.

  “I wanted to see whether you were expecting any problems, up there,” he said.

  “That’s a dumber question than normal, for you,” Sarah answered. He laughed.

  “I do miss you, when you aren’t around,” he said. “I know you always expect trouble, but how much ammunition should I be packing?”

  She pulled a drawer out of a bits-box and pulled out a stirrup bolt.

  “I have one of these?” she asked, and he shrugged.

  “Help yourself.”

  She palmed it and put it in a pocket, looking once more round the room as she sucked her cheek, then she nodded.

  “Runnin’ a tight ship,” she said. “Like
to see it.”

  “You know, it surprised me how much I missed keeping horses,” Thomas said. “I’m going to miss it.”

  “You plannin’ on learnin’ to levitate?” Sarah asked.

  “No, when Jimmy brings cars out here.”

  She gave him a stony look and he raised his eyebrows, looking like he wished he could reel it back in.

  “He hasn’t talked to you about that, yet,” Thomas said. “Look, don’t tell him I said anything.”

  “Which other Lawson was gonna be dumb enough to talk to me?” she asked, shakin’ her head. ‘Course Jimmy was avoidin’ tellin’ her about bringin’ in cars. She weren’t gonna like it, and everybody knew it.

  ‘Course Jimmy Lawson was gonna bring cars to Lawrence.

  Why wouldn’t he?

  Not on account ‘a his wife hatin’ the idea, certainly.

  “We gotta kill more’n a dozen men this trip, somethin’s gone dead wrong,” she said, and Thomas nodded.

  “Got it.”

  He disappeared, and Sarah picked through the tack room another minute, then went out and tracked down Gremlin, takin’ off the stirrup and replacin’ the bolt. Routine maintenance’d saved more lives than bullets, and it were just a matter of takin’ the time.

  Thomas came back out and tacked a horse, gettin’ a rifle from the tack room and mountin’ up, puttin’ the rifle into its saddle holster. Sarah checked her own rifle, loaded, not chambered, then whistled up Dog and started for the mountains.

  Thomas rode alongside her a ways in silence, only way to go, then he coughed into his hand.

  “So…” he said.

  “Oh, hell,” Sarah answered without lookin’ at him.

  “Rhoda wants you to be her maid of honor at our wedding,” he said.

  Sarah rolled her head to the side to look at him.

  “Ain’t got those, in Lawrence,” she said.

  “But they do, in Elsewhere,” Thomas said. “And in Intec. She wants one.”

  “So make her ask Kayla,” Sarah said. “Kayla’d be thrilled.”

  Thomas snorted.

  “Exactly.”

  “I ain’t a weddin’ accessory,” Sarah said. “And I ain’t puttin’ on another dress again in this town.”