“No…” Rosa murmured.

  We’d ridden until nightfall, and found ourselves high in the mountains where vegetation was scarce. Moonlight filtered through thick clouds, glinting off droplets of heavy rain.

  No more paradise.

  Rosa had weaved some branches and leaves as a makeshift shelter where she now slept. I improved it—despite her protests—by throwing my duster over the top. Rain didn’t bother me. Honestly, it was so rare out west, I quite enjoyed it even if I couldn’t feel it.

  For my part—being the sleepless freak that I was—I sat on a rock, watching over her as she slept, although it was anything but restful. She’d been tossing and turning all night, eyelids fluttering as she muttered under her breath loud enough to disturb the horses.

  It’d been like this every night since Golden River, though it’d been getting worse. I didn’t have the heart to tell her the bags under her eyes were noticeable now, even during the days.

  “No, please don’t make me…” Her head whipped to the side, and her legs writhed. “Please, no…” Back the other way. Her arm flailed and nearly toppled one of the branches supporting my duster.

  I averted my gaze and focused my mental energies on our path forward. We’d be back down to sea-level in the morning. Then, we’d trek east through soft hills and farmland far as my eyes could take us in this utter darkness. If luck decided to not be a bitch for once, it’d only be two more days to the capital.

  Rosa could sure do with an inn and a drink, but I’d stick to her rules. Seemed to be working so far, anyway, keeping us hidden. There’d been no sign of any Horsemen. Nothing out of the ordinary at all, really. Somehow, my past experiences made that all the more unsettling.

  “Get away from me!” Rosa shrieked so loud, I found myself hulking over her, guns at the ready, in mere seconds. Nothing was near her, in the physical world at least. She may have been out of the rain, but sweat had her as drenched as I was.

  “NO!” Her fists slammed down at her side. Dirt swirled up in a sudden torrent, catching pine needles and pebbles as it twisted around her like a miniature Calamity. She thrashed this way and that, her eyelids peeled open enough for me to see the whites. Behind me, the horses whinnied and stomped.

  “No… no… no…”

  Enough was enough. I bent to wake her, when her storm tore my duster free, and it whipped across my face. I fought to tear it from my eyes, and when I finally succeeded, I froze. Rosa floated above the ground, arms and legs dangling.

  The words spewing from her mouth no longer made a lick of sense. Sounded like witches speaking in tongues amidst one of their demonic rituals.

  Pushing through the wind, I took her by the shoulders and shook.

  “Rosa!” I tapped her face lightly. “Rosa, wake up! Rosa!” Pine needles sliced at my forehead as the wind threw my hair back. If I wasn’t holding on to her, I fear I would’ve been blown to my rump.

  “Rosa!” I slapped her a little harder.

  Branches ripped off the tree looming over us. One of the horse’s reins snapped and it bolted. I sprawled out to grab the other, so we didn’t lose both mounts, and wrapped the reins securely around my wrist while it frenzied.

  Was this Death, coming in her sleep? The only thing that gave me hope was the churning rain remained in its liquid form. Not the surest sign, but the scions of Hell usually channeled ice.

  Shouting her name, I fought my way back to her and tried to force her down to the earth—it was no use. So, I did the first thing I could think of: I pulled my Peacemaker, put it right next to her ear and cringed. I couldn’t bear to watch.

  Bang!

  The horse went wild and nearly tore my arm from its socket. But the gunshot had its intended effect. Rosa’s eyes sprang open and she fell flat onto her back. I yanked the horse back toward me, quickly fastened it to the sturdiest-looking tree I could find, and fell in by her side. Before I could get a word out, she threw her arms around me and squeezed.

  “I don’t want to hurt them…” she sobbed, face pressed against my chest, tears mingling with rain and mud. “I don’t… Please… I don’t…”

  Words caught in my throat. All I could manage was to hush her as I held her head tight against me, stroking her hair like I was soothing a child after a nightmare. Wasn’t anything my ma taught me, I’ll tell you that. Timp used to get riled up, needed serenity’s hand on more than one occasion.

  “You’re okay,” I managed to squeak out as I cradled her, pulling my sopping wet coat up over us like a blanket. Usually, I ached for human contact, especially from a woman like Rosa, but not then. I was glad not to feel her tremors or her heaving breaths, as now she’d turned from denial to despair.

  All I needed to do was be there for her.

  * * *

  Morning came with a heavy dose of dew sticking to everything. Birds and bugs made such a racket, they stirred me after I’d apparently dozed off into that weird dreamless realm where Black Badges went.

  “How are you feeling, Rosa?” I asked as I blinked the wetness from my eyelashes. It was only then I realized I was huddled alone in the mud under my coat.

  “Rosa?” I searched the clearing and called for her again. Nothing.

  Terror swept through me like a tempest. I gathered all our belongings and mounted up. What looked like footsteps in the mud led east down through the pass, and I spurred the horse along.

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  Her name repeated on my tongue like a canary song. Over and over, filling the trees and mountain air with her sound. Nobody called back.

  I really got the horse moving then, skittering down slopes and around rocks. After the rain, it was a treacherous path, and I didn’t trust this beast like I did Timp, though this stallion was many years younger and probably more suited.

  Keeping my hand against iron, just to be ready, we zigzagged our way down, me shouting for her all the way. The forest canopy grew thick as I descended, and all I could tell amidst the warren of trees and bushes was that we were going downhill.

  There was no sun to guide me. These lush, unsettled green lands slowly revealed a danger all its own. Monsters and demons, it was not, but the ground flattened out, and a thick fog hung in the basin. I might as well have been blind in a labyrinth.

  I had my steed zipping this way and that. If my voice could grow hoarse from calling for Rosa, it would’ve. As it was, fear had it on edge and cracking all the same.

  I’m not sure how long I searched. Eventually, I gave the horse a stern kick and he stubbornly dug his hooves in.

  “C’mon!” I snapped. “Let’s go!” I kicked its haunches again, but he was already huffing like a steam engine. I knew horses. If I kept pushing, we might be down a second one.

  “You ain’t Timp, that’s for damn sure,” I muttered as I swung my legs off and led it by foot.

  I had better sight and hearing than a living human, so I might as well use it. The slower pace allowed me to focus on sound. Though it was difficult hearing anything over the damn horse.

  I stopped calling out, stopped panicking, closed my eyes and listened. Through all the myriad sounds of life and nature, I focused on what didn’t belong. What never belonged in untouched places like this—a human.

  “Rosa,” I whispered.

  I took off, dragging not-Timp behind me like a whinnying anchor. We splashed through a creek, hurdled a fallen stump, and about a hundred yards away, I reached a clearing.

  Through the soupy fog, I could only see the silhouette of a person sitting in the grass, quietly singing what sounded like a lullaby. I couldn’t understand the words at this distance, just the tune.

  Hitching the horse to a stump, I drew my rifle and closed the distance between me and the shadow. It could’ve been her, but it could easily have been Wendigo in these conditions.

  I treaded lightly, careful not to stir the presence.

  Only when I recognized the words to be in Spanish did I pick up the pace. It was Rosa. For fuck’s sake, it was Rosa.

  Creeping around the side, I didn’t let my eyes wander. They stayed firmly affixed to her and nothing else. I hated how wary I was, but I’d seen what she was capable of even in her right mind… it’s just, what if she wasn’t? She could level this forest and everything in it with one rotten thought.

  “That’s a beautiful song,” I said as I edged closer.

  She didn’t answer, just kept singing low.

  “Your mother’s?” I asked.

  Still no response.

  I approached her, it dawning on me a few feet out that I still had my rifle in hand. As if I’d shoot her even if she bore fangs.

  She sat cross-legged with a small fawn sprawled out across her lap. The bullet hole in its side left little to the imagination. The blood had hardened by now, and streaks of it stained Rosa’s pants and shirt. She stroked the critter’s head while she sang, just as I’d done to her the night before.

  Then I noticed her crimson-soaked hands, and the second bullet wound right between the thing’s eyes.

  “Rosa, are you okay?”

  I chanced putting a hand on her shoulder, just to reassure her.

  “Death is already here, James…”

  Before I could answer, my finger drifted a bit too far without me noticing and brushed the fur of the dead fawn.

  My head snapped back as the Divining took hold.

  * * *

  Alone.

  Afraid.

  Dying.

  I sensed it all within the young mind of the fawn as I entered its being. None of the thoughts were complex. It was all instinct—primal—but that didn’t make it any less real.

  An area between my right ribs burned with sharp pain. It was all too much. I lay on my side, breath rasping… wishing for Mother.

  Why had she abandoned me?

  I was tired.

  So very tired.

  Then I heard a voice, unable to turn my head. Rosa soon came into view, bending over me, tears streaming down her tanned cheeks.

  “Dios mio… What happened to you… What have they done?”

  She leaned in and her kind eyes met mine. Leathery hands from a life of hardship ran along my neck.

  I didn’t know they were rough like that. For the first time in my life, I felt her touch. And it was like she stole my pain—stole the fawn’s pain.

  Whispering a prayer in Spanish, she pressed her revolver against my skull and held my gaze the entire time. The fawn went still and calm with its shepherd to the afterlife at hand.

  Even as Rosa gently pulled the trigger.

  * * *

  Fragments of the memory sent me staggering to the ground with an aching head. I shook off the brief yet sudden onslaught of pain the fawn had experienced, and turned to look up at Rosa.

  “I did what I had to, right?” she asked, never looking away from the fawn.

  I nodded. “A mercy killing if ever I saw one.”

  “Not her.” She shook her head.

  My brow furrowed. I straightened my back. I began to question her further, then saw it.

  Two bodies were slumped against a tree. Two grown men. One had his neck snapped so hard, he faced backward, like an owl. The other’s throat had been cut. And by the look of a blade in his bloody hand, with his own hunting knife.

  “It was only a baby,” Rosa said. “The mother got away and they were going to leave it here… suffering. Alone. They thought it was funny.” The way she said the word wasn’t a yell, but it boomed with rage-filled energy. The very air crackled.

  “Just breathe, Rosa,” I said. “In and out. There’s nothing we can do for her now that hasn’t already been done.”

  Rosa’s features went dark. With how sunken and red her eyes were from exhaustion and crying, I could barely see the whites in them.

  “I should have let them suffer,” she hissed.

  “Maybe so, but you ain’t a monster.”

  The hairs on my arms stood on end as I entered the radius of her wrath. Despite the knowledge that she might not be fully in control, I took her under the arm to help her to her feet.

  Her fingers clung to the fawn.

  “It’s already done. Just let go and we’ll head out. You’re fine. It’s fine.” And as I lied to her, I helped pry her fingers loose from the animal, and guided her away. Her head stayed twisted all the while, staring at the thing no matter what I did.

  “Let’s get you a bite,” I said. “We aren’t too far now.”

  “I can’t eat.”

  “Well, just try.” I repositioned my arm in an attempt to steal her attention. It worked, somewhat, as for a moment, she looked away from the fawn and at me. Or rather, through me. Her eyes were glazed over and distant.

  “You almost gave me a heart attack,” I said, expecting some witty retort about me not being able to have one. None came. “Why on Earth did you wander off like that?”

  “I don’t remember.” Her voice was cold. Emotionless. Again, her gaze fell back upon the dead, abandoned fawn. “But I couldn’t save her.”

  I knew a guilty conscience when I saw one. The West is littered with ’em. Sure, this was that, but it was something else too. Only days ago, she’d been egging me on to shoot a deer for supper. Rosa was no stranger to hunting or the brutal nature of surviving the wilderness.

  It was like she was breaking from the inside out. Her mortality and morals, all twisting inward on each other in a messy, jumbled up stew.

  We reached the horse, and honestly, that short walk felt as long as the entire journey so far. I was out of my depth. I was no university man who’d pored through hundreds of books on the living mind. I wished I’d dragged Doctor Godshalk with us even.

  The one thing I was certain about was that even though I would help her through thick and thin, this was beyond me.

  Hands of God hunted demons and monsters… We didn’t rescue souls.