The Cold Eye (The Devil's West #2)(16)

Foolishness, he thought, but it wasn’t his call to make.

Gabriel had not exaggerated when he told Isobel he knew nothing of this region; the Territory was massive, and even he could not expect to ride all of it. But listening to them speak a dialect he did not recognize beyond a few shared trade-words was a reminder to pick up Isobel’s language lessons again. English was the preferred trade language, particularly to the east and north, but she couldn’t always count on that. This might not be the only time the Left Hand rode beyond the pale.

Their hosts were more forthcoming after the meal, however. He negotiated for supplies with the one called Four Wolves, who quickly separated him from a handful of half-coins left from what the devil had given him. Four Wolves drove a tight bargain, fully aware that they had no other options, but they both walked away reasonably satisfied.

With all that, it wasn’t until he was curled into his bedroll, the last flickers of a wood fire warming his backside and Isobel asleep nearby, the horses and mule sleeping with their heads lowered together, that he had time to think about the letter Isobel had given him. Or, Gabriel owned, that he couldn’t avoid thinking about it any longer. There were few people who would write to him, and even fewer who would be able to direct a letter so that it would reach him.

Part of him wanted to toss it onto the fire until it was nothing but crumbled ash.

Instead, he slowly reached for his pack, catching the envelope between two fingers and pulling it out. The moon wasn’t quite bright enough to read by, so he pulled the coalstone out as well, pressing it down until it began to glow. Without tinder, it wouldn’t spark a flame but gave off enough light that Gabriel’s eyes were able to make out the lettering on the paper.

Gabriel Kasun, Esquire.

The weight of the honorific pushed at him, reminding him of the obligations he still carried, that had nothing to do with the girl—the young woman—sleeping on the other side of the fire. The obligations that made him slit open the envelope and pull the enclosed letter out to read rather than set it aflame.

Gabe,

I hesitated sharing this with you, for it seems unlikely that you are in a position to do anything beyond fret over it, and I would not add more to the burden you already bear. And yet, the news offends every instinct I have, all sense of proper behavior. I cannot keep it to myself, else I might say something rash in circles where silence best serves.

Abner Westbrook. Stolid, to outward appearances as plodding as a plow horse, but hiding a mind sharp as a fresh-stropped razor. One of the few true friends Gabriel had made when he went east, and the only one he could say that he had kept.

He was also a junior member of the federal judiciary, with family in much higher positions. If there was a rumor with even a single root in truth, Abner knew of it.

Word comes through reliable voices that our new president has determined the need to send a surveying team across the Mississippi and into the Territory you call home. He names it a ‘Corps of Discovery’ and claims it a simple excursion to survey this new land beyond our known borders. Congress seems set to give him as he requests, for they have dreams of expanding our limits, be it for land or metals or simply the need to plant their names into history.

I know that scouts have come and gone into your Territory without complaint; Congress thinks this a blanket to cover all sins. I am not so sanguine. And I fear that Jefferson, in his hubris, plans more than he admits.

The letter went on a few paragraphs longer, ending with a hope that the missive found Gabriel well, etc., but he barely skimmed the rest, down to the familiar blotch of ink that Abner claimed was a signature.

Gabriel’s gut tightened, a familiar reaction to unpleasant news. It might simply be curiosity driving Jefferson—the man was well known to have a voracious interest in nearly everything. But the man was president now, and that made him—Gabriel hesitated to say “dangerous,” but certainly a man with far more power than before. And power made men dangerous, no matter their intent.

But what was that power to him? And what did Abner think he, Gabriel, could do about it? He was not the man he’d meant to be, back East. That man had died somewhere mid-crossing, pulled under and drowned.

Across the fire, Isobel rolled over, muttering in her sleep, and Gabriel slowly folded the letter and replaced it in the envelope, then quenched the coalstone with a touch.

Abner worried too early. It was still a matter for Congress to decide, and while Gabriel had only spent a few years on that side of the River, any man with sense knew that approving expenditures on such a scale would not happen overnight. Anything could happen in that time. America’s attention might be directed back across the ocean, away from the west. Congress might decide to withhold approval, use it to control the president, make him dance to their tune. And even if none of that happened, if Jefferson did push the borders, the devil still stood between outside powers and the Territory.

And anyone, within or without the Territory, who dismissed the devil as a threat was a fool who deserved what was handed to them.

And yet, even with that decided, Gabriel was unable to fall asleep, watching the moon fade, until birdsong roused Isobel, and he could pretend to wake.





PART TWO


STRANGE HILLS


Gabriel woke just after dawn, groggy and disorientated, with a rock digging into his shoulder. He reached under the bedroll and dug it out, tossing it aside with a grimace. Waking in a new place was not enough to confuse him, not after so long on the Road, and he felt no alarm, but—