THUNDER PEAK, page 8
Jonas’s jaw dropped. “Sickly? Half-dead? Why, you ungrateful mollusk. Just where were you anyway? That was a pretty close call just—”
“Hold it, hold it, hold it!”
Casey’s screech silenced both man and reptile, but when her father and Taliko turned to look at her, the questions tangled in her throat. “You two! What is? How? Where did?”
Casey threw her hands up and howled in frustration.
Jonas and Taliko, flooded suddenly with postbattle giddiness, looked at each other and started laughing.
Casey, however, who had had her entire world upended in the last twenty-four hours, was well beyond merriment of any kind. Mistaking their relief for amusement, she never felt the anger rising in her heart and just released it. Eyes blazing, teeth bared, Casey sprinted at her father and slammed him on the chest with both fists. Jonas, unprepared for the assault, felt the air leave his lungs and staggered backward several feet, gasping. She turned next on the giant turtle, but the saber teeth looming above her head gave Casey pause, and so she simply waved her fists at him and pretended to push him away.
“Ugh!” she thundered, pacing back and forth with every shout. “Magic horses! Voices in my head! Walking, talking turtles! What? Is going on?”
The silence lingered.
“Well, you’re in trouble,” Taliko said matter-of-factly. “I’m going—”
“Nowhere thunderclap,” Casey snarled. “You ain’t going nowhere! Not till I get some answers.”
Taliko’s gaze slid over to Jonas. “Sounds just like her mother.”
Casey’s eyes burst out of her head. “You knew my mother?”
The turtle’s bo~staff twirled and then struck the ground with a meaty whump.
“I did,” Taliko nodded once. “She is my Maker, and entrusted me to watch over you, which I have done since you slept in a basket.”
“Maker?” Casey’s jaw fell. “Slept in a basket?” Tears running down her cheeks, she turned back to her father. “Dad? Please?”
“Okay, okay,” Jonas answered softly. “How long have you been hearing voices?”
“Just last night,” Casey brushed her eyes. “I thought it was the horse. That’s why I went out to help him.”
Taliko lifted his head higher. “Definitely one of the herd that was here yesterday. It must have gotten separated somehow and left behind. I was out looking for evidence of their purpose when you came under attack, but had no success in finding their trail even where I knew it should be.”
“I saw them too,” Casey told Taliko, “but he doesn’t have a horn like the others.”
“A juvenile,” her father said thoughtfully. “Mustn’t have come in yet. He’s in our barn now, waiting for us to return with some of this fruit for his injuries. At least I think he is.”
“Hmm,” Taliko intoned. “This could be a very unfortunate thing, I think.”
“What? Why?” Jonas and Casey asked at the same time.
“First needs tended first. You two must get back, and I will…” Taliko looked about the clearing. “Decide what must be done here. Soon, I shall be finished and meet you at your nest. There is much to discuss when I arrive.”
Taliko looked at Jonas. “It would be wise for you to tell her the truths she should already know along the way.”
Jonas nodded.
5
Cards on the Table
When Point Lookout appeared through the trees ahead of them, Casey vented her frustration.
“Dad!” she shouted into the sky.
“I know, I know,” he said. “I just don’t know where to begin.”
A few steps later, Jonas wheeled around, abruptly got down on one knee, and took Casey’s hand. “You weren’t born in Texas. You were born…” Jonas looked down, took a deep breath, and looked up again. “Let me start over. You never lived in Texas. You have always lived in our house, right here under Thunder Peak. And it’s always been your house and our house because…”
“Because?” Casey prompted him.
Jonas looked her in the eye. “Because I’ve always been your father.”
Casey stared at him blankly.
“The story about the stagecoach attack is just that, a story,” Jonas continued. “A lie I had to make up to hide the truth about your mother.”
Casey whispered, “You’re my real father?”
Jonas nodded.
Tears began to fall out of Casey’s eyes like broken snowflakes, each one of them a bullet of fear that found Jonas’s heart.
When Casey just stared at him, Jonas perceived resentment and disappointment and felt a heavy cloak of despair wrap him around the shoulders.
“I’m sorry about lying to you all these years,” he began hoarsely, “but once you know everything, I hope you’ll—”
Casey rushed in, knocking free the tears Jonas had been holding back with a fierce hug.
“I’m so glad,” Casey sobbed. “I’ve always felt so guilty about loving you more than the people in that picture.”
In many ways father and daughter clung to each other then for the very first time. Her words meant the world to him because Jonas always felt Casey might think the opposite, that he had failed to live up to what she thought of the brave people in the picture. Eyes still closed, Jonas basked in the feeling of having released the burden of the lie, but also knew it was just the beginning and there was a lot more of the story to tell.
A few moments later, Casey realized it too. “So where…where is mom? Was she an Indian? What happened to her? Is she…” Casey trailed off, fearing that in gaining a father, she was about to lose a mother again.
“As far as I know”—Jonas came to his feet—“she’s fine. Just very far away.”
“Why isn’t she here?”
Jonas clenched his daughter’s hand, his grip emphasizing what he said next. “You need to understand, that wherever she is right now, she loves you and always has, and thinks of you often.”
“But why isn’t she here? Did she leave us?”
A tidal thrumming rose up in the woods around them, cutting off whatever Jonas was about to say. Both of them knew they should recognize the sound, but the racket arose so suddenly that their thoughts were paralyzed.
The first hornet flew passed Jonas’s nose, and he stepped back in panicked surprise. “Angry hive. We better rabbit along,” he said, and the pair began to trot down the trail. Right around the next bend, they plunged headlong into a menacing swarm harassing a brown bear pillaging its hive.
“Oh boy,” Jonas said. “Not that way.” And the pair quickly shuffled off the game trail into the woods.
Risking a quick look back, Casey saw the swarm gather into a frightening cloud of chaotic rage and gruzzz after them.
“It’s following us!” she yelled over the violent thrum. “Why is it following us instead of attacking the bear? Ow!” she shouted, stung for the first time.
“I don’t know,” Jonas grunted, limping as fast as he could. “We’ll never make it home. Lots of ponds in these woods—maybe we can find one deep enough.”
There were hornets on his clothes, and the fourth or fifth had already stung him. Glancing at his daughter he saw a black cloud of hornets whizzing around her, most of them ready to attack but seemingly held in check by some unseen force.
Heeding her father’s words Casey took in the passing trees, assessing their location, and realized suddenly that one of her favorite watering holes was nearby.
“Follow me!” she called back over her shoulder.
Casey had dubbed the spot Arrowhead Pond after the pointy diving rock perfectly situated at the edge of the deeper end. It was maybe a quarter mile off, and Casey ran like the wind, forcing Jonas to call out numerous times for her to slow down, but even uninjured he wouldn’t have been able to keep up with her.
Seven black bells! Jonas swore silently. First time in forever I don’t wear my moccasins out here, and this is what I get.
The bees surged after them and soon Jonas was getting stung at every step. He pushed on through the pain. Then his vision began to blur. Knowing he’d die where he lay if he stumbled and fell, Jonas dug deeper. Dug down into the well forged during the agonies of the Civil War, and somehow kept his legs moving until finally the leaves parted and the pond appeared before him. Dropping the apples and his gun belt next to Casey’s, he leaped into the cool, refreshing water with a shout and stayed submerged until his lungs ached more than the stings.
The massive swarm was a marvel to see, pulsing and churning and, inexplicably, seemingly determined to wait them out. Each time one of them took a breath, the hornets dove at them with their vicious stingers.
Fully clothed as they were, Jonas and Casey could not tread water for very long. The moment she thought it, her father surfaced and shouted as fast as he could before ducking under again, “We won’t last this way; we have to strip or drown.”
Casey nodded her head, but even as she clutched at the first button, the voice from the previous night returned: “I am here! Remove yourselves from the water, and I shall carry you both to safety!”
“Dad wait!” Casey shouted. “Follow me!”
Jonas cried back, “Casey no! We’ll—” but stopped in midshout as the colt from the barn jumped majestically over the pond and quickly turned back to wait for them at the water’s edge. “Right then! Go! Go! Go!”
Jonas was shocked to see the maddened hornets coalesce around the new target like a starving beast but gratefully used the reprieve to collect their gun belts and the saddlebag full of ice apples for which they had suffered so much already.
Jonas struggled with his injured thigh and the lack of a stirrup, forcing the horse to endure an endless barrage of stings. Once he was finally aboard, Jonas hoisted Casey up easily and the colt launched into the woods.
“Stay low,” Jonas gritted, burying his face into the horse’s mane to ward off the bees and even deadlier branches. Casey did the same in her father’s back but needn’t have worried—despite the injuries he’d incurred the night before and the mounting stings all over his body, the steed unerringly wound around trees and over rocks and scrub until the swarm fell behind.
With the pain of the stings added to that of his injured thigh, Jonas wheezed, hissed, and winced through the entire ride, especially at the quicker turns and landings. Nor was he ever sure when the stinging ceased. At some point a shadow fell over him, and he knew they were back in the safety of the barn at last.
Casey dismounted and ran to the doors.
The gruzzz outside was growing quickly, so quickly that Casey grimaced with dire certainty that hornets were going to get into the barn before she sealed it up.
After closing the right-hand side door, she dashed to the left and risked a glance outside.
The hornets were stopped some ten feet away, the swarm rolling and tumbling in space like a pent-up storm cloud.
Keen to seize on their good fortune, she started to tug the door closed.
Then she saw the face.
A wolf’s face, full of fangs, in the swarm—the very same giant fangs she used to see in her nightmares!
Impossible! Casey stumbled back.
Wait! Casey squinted. A trick! It’s just a trick. Shadows and clouds will look like anything if you let them.
Despite that apparent truth, Casey remained frozen.
Close it! Close it! she yelled at herself, over and over, but the mesmerizing fear held her fast until the face abruptly disappeared.
With a final shake of the head, she cleared away the last of the fear, then slammed closed the barn door and leaned back against it in relief.
Just hornets, she told herself as the gruzzz outside diminished. Just hornets.
The barn filled with the sound of heavy breathing, human and horse.
Jonas tried to dismount, but disoriented and sapped of his strength, he simply fell and landed with a heavy thud.
“Dad!” Casey ran over to help him.
Jonas rolled over onto his back with a groan while the horse cantered softly away.
Taking Casey’s hand, Jonas pulled himself up to one knee, gasping. “How many stings?”
“Half a dozen or so I reckon,” Casey replied, wincing as she looked over the welts covering his face and neck. “You?”
Jonas had suffered over a dozen stings in the first minute and could guess why his daughter hadn’t. More uncertain was why not a single hornet had pursued them into the barn. But all that would have to wait. “A lot more than that,” he grunted. “I feel like I’m on fire.”
“This is the first time I’ve ever been stung,” she added, taking the heavy bag from his shoulder and helping him up to his feet.
Jonas looked at the horse. “Thank you,” he said, then swayed as if he was about to lose consciousness.
“Dad!” Casey slipped a strong, wiry arm around him. “You’ve got to lie down and rest.”
Casey peered through the doors to be certain the swarm had moved off.
“Let’s hurry in case they come back,” she said and then bore the weight of her father and the saddlebag all the way back to the house without even realizing how easily she’d done it.
The young stallion watched the Earthers go, its glistening black coat pocked by countless, burning hornet stings. Once they were safely inside, the steed glanced around, looking about for the protection it sensed at hand but with no idea in what form it might be.
Occupied thus, a sudden bolt of agony struck him without warning over the eyes and he shook his head until it passed.
He had no idea if the others would come back for him, or how long that might even take, but the pain at the top of his head told him that if they didn’t come soon, it wouldn’t matter if they ever did.
Inside the house Casey guided her father to the sofa and fetched the soothing oils and lotions they kept on hand for hurts and blisters. After tending to the welts and cleaning and dressing the gash in his thigh, she mixed and warmed herbal remedies and helped him drink them while he tried not to move.
In time he fell into a tormented sleep, mumbling about secrets, how beautiful Casey’s mother had been and how much he missed her. How it had been so many years, longer than the war even, but now maybe there was hope.
“Hope for what?” Casey wondered quietly from a seat not too far away. Then her thoughts fell into an endless array of questions: And what was that he said about caves and silver bullets? It seemed important, but now she couldn’t remember it. And how had he known about the silver, anyway? What kind of creatures were those lizards? Why didn’t their mere existence shock him like it did her?
Taliko. She nodded. That’s why. Casey gasped. Was her mother a witch to send a creature like that to watch over her? Does that make me a witch? Casey chewed her bottom lip. Was she evil? Like in-the-bible evil?
With that thought, Casey thought it best to stop pondering and glanced over at the sofa.
Her father continued to languish in immense pain, full of welts and drifting in and out of wakefulness. She looked at her own arms then to see her bruises were nearly gone.
That doesn’t make me evil, she thought. It just makes me a fast healer.
Grasping that thought, Casey felt the energy drain suddenly from her body and began to yawn. Having gotten little sleep herself the previous night, it was only a matter of minutes before she too slipped into a fitful slumber.
Sometime later Casey woke, certain there had been a noise but uncertain what it was.
It came again: a heavy staccato clack at the door.
Swiftly and silently, she retrieved her Navy from its holster, tucked a silver knife in her belt, and took up position at the side of the door.
Casey opened her mouth, and the voice that came out was so devoid of the fear she felt the night before that it surprised her: “Who is it?”
A gravelly whisper replied, “Taliko.”
Casey exhaled in relief and unbolted the door.
The massive turtle turned sideways and slipped in on clawed feet, his steps lighter and bouncier than Casey would have imagined.
The image sparked a memory from years ago—Casey asking her father why their door was so big and wide. He had replied then that he just liked it that way. Now, abruptly, she knew that to be a falsehood. The door had been enlarged to accommodate Taliko.
Upon seeing Jonas lying on the sofa, Taliko’s face tilted sharply. “What has happened?” he asked, gemstone eyes examining him from head to toe.
Casey, having gathered herself a bit from all that had happened, sat down on the edge of the couch and continued a subtle inspection of the giant turtle while she told him the story of the hornet attack, noting how his shell was dark brown, almost black, but his thick skin was several shades lighter, like a deer’s, then lighter still in his vital areas, like sand.
“That is very curious indeed,” Taliko observed. “I know of some leaves and plants growing nearby that can help. I shall fetch them and return shortly.”
The floorboards creaked under Taliko’s weight as he moved toward the door. Once he got there, he paused and turned. “I checked on the steed before coming here. He suffers as well and is quite hungry. Perhaps you can bring him some of the ice apples.”
“Uhm…sure. Much obliged. I’ll do that.”
Taliko opened the door, and Casey sprang to her feet, “Wait? What? Did you just say the steed? You mean you think he’s hungry or…you spoke to him?”
“‘Spoke’ perhaps, is not the right word.” Taliko looked out toward the barn. “‘Communicated’ would be more precise.”
“Communicated.” Casey echoed the brawny reptile.
Taliko nodded again. “Apparently there are many tales that need passage. I am looking forward to their telling on my return.”
“Me too…” Casey whispered.
