Four Summoners Tales Part 17

Preacher's voice. Preacher's footfalls, pounding along the path. Then he was there, standing in front of her. No blood to be seen. "Addie? Are you all right? Is it Sophia? Is she-?" "Sophia is well." She bent, catching her breath. "All is well." She hiccuped a laugh. All is well? Charlie is possessed by some demon

monster. All is not well. But right now, it is. Preacher is fine. Unharmed. Preacher came over, face drawn in concern, hand resting on her arm as she found her breath.

"It's all right," she said. "We were only worried about you. Me and Sophia."

"Sophia and I," Preacher said.

Addie burst out with a real laugh then. No matter how dire

the situation, he could not fail to correct her grammar, as gently as if they were at the supper table, saying grace. When she laughed, Preacher gave a crooked smile and shook his head, murmuring an apology before saying, "Well, you've found me. And I did not find what I was looking for."

"The mayor and Mr. Dobbs? I saw them a ways back. Returning to town."

"They've finished their mission then," he whispered beneath his breath.

"What mission?"

He looked startled, as if he had not meant to speak aloud. "They were out here for something. I know not what. Come. Let's go back to town."

As they began to walk, Addie thought about the blood on Dobbs's boot. He had not hurt Preacher, but he had hurt something. Some animal? She recalled stories of dark magic, with animals sacrificed to the Devil.

"Perhaps we ought to find where they've been," she said.

"That's what I was trying to do."

"No, you were trying to find where they were. I can track where they've been."

He hesitated. "All right then. I don't want to leave Sophia for long, but if we can discover what they were doing, we ought to."

PreAcher Addie was indeed able to track where the mayor and blacksmith had gone.And when she found out, Preacher wished to G.o.d she hadn't. He wished he hadn't asked. Wished he'd found this on his own, before she'd arrived. A merciful G.o.d would have made sure of that.

She'd tracked Dobbs's and Browning's footsteps back to where they'd left the main trail. It had taken time, but she'd eventually determined that they'd taken a secondary one, little more than a half-cleared path through the trees. Preacher had not known where the trail led. Addie had. He was certain of it. But it was not until they saw the cabin ahead and he said, "What's that?" that she said, "Timothy James's place."

Timothy James. An odd creature, like most who made their living in the forest. Preacher had heard whispers about Timothy James, that he'd come here fleeing the Mounties, that he'd been caught with a little girl. Preacher had been furious-if there was a man like that in their midst, they ought to warn the children. But Dobbs said it wasn't true. Timothy James was merely odd. Preacher had always wondered if Mr. Dobbs's reluctance to drive the man out had anything to do with the fact that he brought in good furs and he accepted less than market rates for them.

Now, seeing that cabin ahead, Preacher knew where Browning and Dobbs had been going. What they'd done there. He'd told Addie to wait while he ran ahead.

He found Timothy James behind his cabin. Lying on the ground. Rope burns around his neck. His s.h.i.+rt covered in blood.

"He must have fought."

It was Addie's voice. Preacher wheeled to see her standing there, looking down at the body.

"They tried to hang him," she said. "Or strangle him. Like Rene. But he fought and they had to stab him."

She stated it as a matter of fact, and for a moment, he was frozen there, unable to react. Her thin face was hard and empty, her eyes empty, too. He'd seen that look on her once before.That horrible day two years ago, when Addie had shown up on Preacher's doorstep in her nightgown, her feet bare and bloodied and filthy from the two-mile walk.

Something's wrong with my parents, she'd said.

They'd gone back, Preacher and Dobbs and Doc Adams. Rode on the horses, Addie with Preacher, dressed in someone else's clothes, her thin arms wrapped around him. They'd gone back to her parents' cabin, expecting they'd taken ill, and instead found . . .

Preacher swallowed, remembering what they'd found. Remembering Addie beside him, her face as empty as this, hollow and dead, looking at the terrible bodies of her parents.

Preacher strode over, took her by the shoulders, and did what he'd done two years ago-turned her away from the sight and bustled her off. She let him take her around the cabin, then dug in her heels and stopped.

"Why did they kill him?" she asked.

"I don't know."

"Yes, you do.That's why you made me stay on the path.You knew he was dead."

Preacher hesitated. She was right, of course. She wasn't a child. That was the problem. He wanted to tell her not to worry, not to think on it. She didn't require an explanation. He was the adult, and he could make that decision, as parents did for their children. Yet he knew that to do so was to loosen his already tenuous grip on his foster daughter. Treat her as a child, and he'd earn her disdain. He would have taken that chance if he thought it would truly stop her from learning the truth. It would not. She'd proven already that she was as curious-and as dogged-as he.

"They killed Rene, too," she said as he tried to decide what to tell her. "Is it the same thing?"

"Yes, it appears so. Eleazar claims that to give life . . ." He struggled for the kindest words.

"They must take it," she said, again as if this were a simple matter, one that anyone ought to be able to see. "They killed the old man to bring back Charlie. And now they've killed Timothy James . . .

He didn't hear the rest of what she said. He knew the rest. They'd killed Timothy James to bring back another. Then, once that child was raised from the dead, there were five more . . .

"We must go," he said. "Back to town. Immediately."