Rahr-it-tee.
He felt like an idiot.
He was shaving. Doctor Turner had been gone for some time on his quest for whatever the replacement wardrobe was going to be, and had left a few things behind for the new guest to use. A portion of bread. Some salt pork, with heavy emphasis on the 'salt'. More berries. And a straight razor, because it seemed that as there were patients who went to barbers when they needed medical treatment, others decided the best cure for their lengthening hair and beards was to seek out the attention of a physician. His host had seen enough of those who felt the occupations were fundamentally interchangeable to keep a few supplies on hand just in the name of getting them out the door a little more quietly.
So he had a little mirror, one of moderate quality: it only presented a few distortions for the part of his face which wasn't being cleared and, at the lower edge, offered a tilt that gave the reflection two extra chins. There was a straight-edge razor which had been stropped and sharpened and had flecks of dried blood on the ivory handle: he hadn't asked whose. He had Sunbutt still watching him through where the window would eventually be. And he had a hot, rising flush of stupidity suffusing every area the blade was scraping across, but no nick would allow any of it to gush forth.
"Rarity..." he muttered.
Sunbutt whinnied slightly, and it felt like a questioning sound again.
With the stress of the doctor's own question departed, names were starting to march through his head. "John Smith. Ulysses Lee... there's a name you can meet in the middle. I could have said anything, Sunbutt, anything with two halves and he would have bought it... but I said Rarity. One name. Just one, and not even a real name at that, one no one's ever heard before, something no one is going to believe. It's like hanging a Wanted poster on every door in town. Someone calling himself Rarity's got to have something to hide..."
Another slow scrape. Dr. Turner had found someone to heat water for him, but the stuff had cooled quickly: the scant length of stubble wasn't as soft as it should have been.
The speech got him a soft snort, one which seemed to suggest that anyone who'd recently seen 'Sunbutt' as an appropriate appellation didn't have much of a complaint coming.
"I'm stuck with it now, though," he sighed, not quite managing to perceive any lurking karma. "At least it's not for long. A week or two." He turned to face the horse. "And you'll only have to hear it for a little while. Once he gets back --"
The front door was opening. He slowly moved the blade away from his face. If Sheriff had decided to pay some level of visit, at least he'd have a weapon --
-- Doctor Turner strode back in, a bundle of fabric tucked under his arm. It was a very visible bundle. There were many ways in which it could not have been more visible. It would have stood out on a moonlight night, within the deepest mine shaft, and possibly could have been spotted from the moon, where it would serve as the bullseye for a target. It could do the same for much closer entities, some of whom might have been able to aim with their eyes closed simply because the blazing nature of the thing would sear through the lids.
"Your clothing," the thin man told him, putting the bundle down on a chair. "We were lucky, actually... not only did that look as if it would fit you, but it was the last thing in stock. Everything else sold out after the last major cash-in, and the next delivery isn't due until -- well, it's due sometime after my stove, and that's the most I can say for it." There was a light grumble of irritation at the lack of discernible schedule. "I'll step out of the room if you want to try it on --"
"-- it's white." Blazing white. Almost a hot white. The white only seen when all colors had annihilated each other.
"...yes," Dr. Turner eventually agreed. "That's why they were the last pieces in stock. No dye, no different threads used. Possibly sun-bleached or fell into the shipment before they could be properly finished. They're what was available and I was happy to get them. And they are in fact white. Your point?"
No proper streets. Muddy roads. Splatters everywhere. "How am I supposed to keep that clean?"
"Very carefully," the thin man suggested with a small smile. "Is that your priority?"
"I'm supposed to --" be presentable... He took a slow breath. "It's just -- white."
This produced a tiny nod. "And it will continue to be white for some time, which we can measure as the period until you get it outside. Rarity, it's all there was. You're shorter and somewhat more muscular than I am. There are men in town with your approximate build, but given the difficulty in getting replacement pieces, I'd have trouble talking any of them into a loan. It's the first part of your payment, it's something none of the ladies should complain about, it goes rather nicely with your hat, and it's -- white. Of course, if you choose not to take it, you have the option of begging in the very muddy street, although I'm not sure what you'll be wearing while doing so: remember, roughly half of your pants are gone." A small head tilt to the left, and the long hair at the back shifted with it. "This is the best I could do."
"I understand." he heard himself say, getting his own words past the echoes, the ones which said that if he was going to stay in the house, he had to be clean, he had to present the proper image, there was nothing she could do with the base material but by God it would be polished. "It's... just..."
"White?"
There was a long moment where the only sounds he could hear were Sunbutt's steady breathing and his own embarrassed heart trying to hide deeper within his chest.
"I... don't sound grateful, do I?"
"You sound," the doctor carefully told him, "like a man who's had a hard couple of days, who's focusing a little too much on the small things so he won't have to look at the ones just finished or anything which lurks ahead. The last words many battlefield patients spoke before their surgery was to wonder about the exact location of their gun and hope the barrel had been cleaned. I'm not offended, Rarity. And it certainly is white -- for now. I'll be surprised if it isn't brown by the end of the day. Are you going to try it on?"
He nodded, which was just about all he could manage beyond the "Thank you."
"It's your payment," calmly came back. "The first part of it. I'll just step out..."
He tried it on. It was a little tight around the thighs, but would stretch in time. The sleeves were pretty much exact. The back... also tight, and he had doubts about whether there would be any stretch there, knew there was no material he could release from extra folds. He had skill with needle and thread, had needed to keep his own clothes in some level of repair: there had been nights when his mother had been too tired for any attempt and he'd tried to give whatever help he could, along with a time when everything he'd worn had to be orderly and perfect and clean. He'd been obsessive about that, out of hard necessity...
It's just white and it's just dirt.
It was also going to be 'just laundry'. And lots of it.
He put the hat back on. After a moment, he picked up the arrow and stuck the shaft behind the band, letting the rainbow-feathered tail stick out at the back. "Ready," he called out.
Dr. Turner came back in. "Dashing," he commented. "A man about town, or at least about street. Is there anything else we need to do before we can consider you settled in for the duration?"
He nodded, silently glanced back towards Sunbutt. Purple eyes quietly regarded brown, and he had no idea what the expression behind them was, much less the thought.
"I understand," the doctor said. "All right... let's go take care of that. After we settle one more thing." He went to a drawer, opened it, and more metal came out. Very familiar metal, with a shape any Beadles reader was supposed to know by heart...
"That's a Colt -- isn't it?" The barrel faced away from him, and he'd seen that the exposed chambers were empty before it had exited the drawer.
A nod. "Much as your companion is a pony. A simple name which completely underestimates the damage it can do. I'll assume you've never used one."
He shook his head. There was a word for a slave who was seen in possession of a gun, and it was only spoken in the past tense.
"Fortunately, no one else has to know that." A holster was removed. "I want you wearing this. Openly. I don't want you firing it. I'll show you how to load it and keep it from going off when you don't want it to, but I'd rather not have you pointing it at anyone. But as you've noted, Sheriff doesn't like you, he has his allies -- and I'd prefer him to have some worry about the consequences of not liking you too loudly. Don't look as if you're looking to start a fight. Do try to seem as if you're willing to end one."
"Can I even -- carry that?"
"Why wouldn't you be able to?"
"There's supposed to be laws..."
"Yes, I suppose there are. All over the South. Being repealed at top speed while the old guard waits for someone to turn their back so they can bring them back even faster. But this is the West, and true laws are rather hard to come by. The Beadles aren't fully accurate: you'll learn that quickly, if you're lucky. Law doesn't come from a gun. But it makes people think twice before imposing their own on you. Now: this is a six-shot percussion revolver. Union issue. Try not to quick-draw it or someone will have to dig it out of the mud."
He was hesitant -- but the doctor had a point. And so he paid attention to the lesson, donned the weapon, and then the thin man led the way. After a long moment of slow breaths, deep focus, and desperate hope that he wouldn't be asked to introduce himself too often, Rarity followed him out.
[/hr]
Sunbutt trotted around to the front of the building on her own and, after that, simply followed them down the lone street, with no reins in use. She was getting some attention, as Rarity would have reasonably expected the biggest damn horse in the world to fetch -- but he was getting some of his own. Sheriff had been right about one thing: there were no others around who looked like him, with dark skin under the (currently) bright white, and far too many eyes seemed to be registering the unexpected fresh addition to the local population. He was also having some trouble adjusting to movement post-arrow: the limp drew its own portion of stares.
"I can cut you a cane," Doctor Turner offered. "But if you don't get used to moving with one quickly, the changed pattern can do some damage of its own."
Two men went past them, moving quickly. A third trailed at a short distance, almost bent double under the weight of a heavy back-slung sack. Rarity managed to avoid the first bits of mud splash towards the cuffs. "What do you think I should do?"
More quietly, "It's also a backup weapon, I recognize the realities of the situation, Rarity, and I suggest you keep them in mind as well. I can protect you -- but I hardly mind a bit of extra help."
"I'll think about it." Wasn't the gun tempting fate enough, especially after that oddly-attentive Providence had granted so much bounty as to create a vacuum of ill fortune in his life's bell jar -- one which might rush to fill with the slightest opening?
"Your choice."
There was a fair-haired woman in front of one of the more completed homes, one where the walkway of planks was almost intact. She was arranging flowers in little tubes mounted to the front of the doorway. Or she had been: she had halted all activity in favor of staring at them.
Just at Rarity, really.
He hesitated in the middle of the street, looked at the wide green eyes, saw the little tremble of the lips, had no idea how to deal with either -- except for the idea which came from those salmon-hued books.
His right hand came up to the brim of the fashionable hat, tilted it slightly as he smiled at her. "Afternoon, Miss."
She screamed. Most of the other travelers on that lone street turned towards the sound. None did anything else, and the majority of them reacted to the sound with open boredom.
It took several seconds before the echo of the slamming door faded away.
The town's inhabitants went back to their travels. Rarity continued to stare at the faintly-vibrating wood.
"I --"
"-- that one," the doctor calmly interjected, "you shouldn't take personally. 'Hysteria' gets used too much as a catch-all diagnosis for female complaints -- which means it's too easy to overlook the real cases. Until they start screaming in front of you. She doesn't deal well with anything new or different, that one."
There were little splashing sounds approaching from the back, too light for Sunbutt's hooves to have created. Small steps, almost drowned out by the hammering and sawing all around them, along with the distant thunder from the storm which still refused to close in.
"So it wasn't me?"
"Actually, it was. But she would react that way to any number of things. Loud noises, unexpected visitors, violations of hygiene, and Sam, if you try to rope that horse, I will be having words with your father."
And from behind them, an awestruck, dazzled, and extremely sincere "Wow..."
They both turned, one a little more slowly than the other.
The boy was young: ten or eleven. He was dressed fairly well, if in clothes which had discarded any nodding acquaintance with the mud for a full-blown partnership. The dark hair tended to stand up straight in the middle, and he was dragging a very short lasso behind him in a way that picked up extra mud with every step, the only thing the rope would ever pick up at all: loop too small, honda ready to slip at any moment. It suggested a rather lax tail, one which only existed to track extra mess into his home.
He was not standing near Sunbutt. He was almost directly behind Rarity. The dark eyes were wide, stared up with fascination mixed into curiosity and a desperate need to know...
The voice had been pure American.
The boy was pure Indian.
"Wow!" he repeated. "Look at you!" This also seemed to be directed towards Rarity. "Where are you from? Do they have more like you back there? Are you from another Territory, or a state, or a country? Do you have a tribe somewhere, or a people, or --"
This went on for a while. It seemed as if there was very little which could stop it. Sunbutt took a careful step back, looked down at the little source of word flow, then twisted her ears away from the rushing river.
"-- and does your skin do anything special? Can you tan? How about your hair, what's that like? Please, could you take off your hat, I really want to see --"
"-- Sam," Doctor Turner tried to break in. "Do you consider this polite behavior?"
The boy didn't care. "...and what happened to your leg? Was it a gunshot? Do you get in a lot of gunfights? How fast can you draw? How about lassos?" A pause, just barely long enough to register as one. "I have a lasso."
"I see that," Rarity said.
Dr. Turner closed his eyes. A rather distant mutter of "Oh, now you've done it..." made it in just before the verbal race hit the next lap.
Several travelers had stopped to watch and listen. Entertainment was entertainment, especially when it was also free.
"Do you want to see me use it?" Sam eagerly asked. "I'm getting really good! -- well, I can throw it some of the time, and it actually landed on something once, plus there was a time when -- well, Miss Daisy doesn't talk to me any more, not that she ever did, but she sort of screams a little more now if she sees me coming, but I'm getting really good at hiding." He puffed out what little chest he possessed, which didn't mean much. "Do you want to see me hide?"
"Yes," Dr. Turner tightly said. "Please. Sam, we're a little busy at the moment. If you could --" he swallowed "-- perhaps drop by later... much later... three weeks from now might be a good time..."
This was ignored. "What's your name?"
He opened his mouth. Tried to make the word come out on purpose. Nothing emerged.
"Do you have a name?" the boy inquired, the excitement audibly mounting. "A man with no name? Does no one have a name where you come from --"
"-- this," came the steady interruption, "is Rarity, Sam. He will be staying with me for a week or two. We are working on a medical project together."
A slow exhale of "Rarity...", and the dark eyes became even wider. "And this is --" a slow turn was followed by a long stare very far up "-- your horse?"
"Actually," Dr. Turner dryly said, "it's his pony. I'm told that we should really see her when she gets her full growth."
The boy briefly stopped breathing. His head tilted even further back until he was staring all the way into the gap where clouds refused to arrive, his attempt to imagine full growth reaching into the sky.
"Actually," Rarity hastily said, "she's --"
"-- where are you going? Can I come with you? I'll show you my lasso! And my hiding! I can even lasso out from where I'm hiding, or --"
It was the second foreign language of the day. It was being spoken at an extremely high rate. It was angry, carrying a fierceness which overwhelmed everything in its path and made everyone else on the street clear space for it. And it was being produced by --
-- what is she?
Tiny. Five feet tall, perhaps a little less, and some of what height she did claim could have been mud built up on the bottom of her shoes. Thin cotton dress. An extremely slender build which somehow impacted the mud with five times her actual (and minimal) weight. Darting, angry dark eyes narrowed in fury -- eyes which still would have been narrow without it. Black hair, straight and reflecting sunlight off a sheen he'd never seen before, ribbons wound into it, one pink trailing end mixing into the short bangs which fell across her forehead. A face he could only see as pretty, largely because he'd never seen another one like it. And skin tinged with yellow.
She marched up to Sam, going right past Sunbutt as if the horse wasn't worthy of her notice. Seized him by the right ear. Pulled, hard.
He yelped. More of the same language came from his own mouth, spoken with a desperation which would have been recognizable in any land, a need to make her understand that he hadn't been doing anything wrong and all impressions to the contrary were mere illusion, one which would be dispelled at the instant she let go of his ear.
She was having none of it. Words flowed faster, become more liquid as they blended into each other from both directions, threatened to saturate the mud into a sea of misunderstanding. And when she grew tired of the denials, which only took three seeming years, she pulled on his ear again and began to drag him away, brown-caked lasso leaving a final trail of resistance in her wake.
The boy momentarily paused in his struggles, waved. "I'll see you later, Rarity!"
She dragged him across a half-finished section of walkway. Another door slammed.
The play had ended. The audience, in lieu of applause, simply began to disperse.
Rarity waited for the balcony seats to get back into their hammering before he risked a word. "He..."
"Shoshoni tribe, as I understand it. Although I doubt he remembers anything other than the name."
Which didn't quite answer his question, so he risked a second try. "She..."
"Chinese."
He blinked.
"That's what..."
"Yes, that's what a Chinese girl looks like. Or at least what that one looks like. Not quite the stories they repeat in the South, is it?"
He hadn't seen any fangs. "And... they...?"
"Siblings." The doctor smiled, and the nature of that expression made Rarity wonder what his own was. Softly, "Yes, the supposed sea of clean white faces had some jetsam in it well before you arrived, Rarity. Sheriff's not happy about them, but you'd hardly expect him to be, would you?"
His vocabulary seemed to be dropping by the moment. "How...?"
"I don't know the full story. Well, I suppose I could learn it, but her English is uncertain and she's rather on the shy side, at least in those rare moments when she isn't yelling at her brother. From what I've been able to pick out of Sam's longer babblings, the bulk of the family used to be railway workers on the Central Pacific line, but they were among those who had trouble with the Irish. Things settled down there, as I understand it -- for most. Crocker and Stockbridge told the older workers that it was labor alongside the Celestials or --"
Sunbutt neighed, long and low and shocked. They both turned, looked at her -- but she was staring back towards where the slightly-built girl and enthusiastic boy had gone. After a moment, she turned to look at the doctor, neighed again, stomped her left forehoof once.
"...Rarity?" This calm was forced. "If you know how to calm her down, this would be a very good time..."
He looked up, tried to read the purple eyes. He still wasn't sure how. But it didn't feel like equine stress or panic...
"I think... maybe you said a word she knows," Rarity proposed. "A command or something..."
"Labor?" There was no reaction. "Crocker? Stockbridge?" The large purple eyes stared down at them both, ears rotated forward, waiting... "No, not any of those..."
Rarity searched his memory. The process didn't have to go any further than the front hallway. "You said something about 'Celestials'?"
And from above, a soft whinny.
Doctor Turner stared at her. "Yes," he admitted. "It's what some of the workers called the Chinese. For their spiritual beliefs. In the case of that family, they also believed they shouldn't be paid eight dollars less than the Irish and charged for their board on top of it, so they eventually left and worked their way up here over the course of two years. Sam was picked up somewhere along the way..." A slow regard of Sunbutt's face. "Are you a railway horse? You certainly have the strength to haul --" a long moment of silence "-- I am talking to a horse."
There was a lot of that going around. Rarity sighed. "Maybe we'd just better get going again. Before anything else happens."
"Well, the livery stable is that next building, so we don't have much distance for another encounter to take place in --"
"-- we're not going there."
A blink. "Oh?"
[/hr]
It took a major effort to climb out on the other end of the valley, and he was wishing for the cane long before reaching the halfway mark. But in time, they crested the rise, dipped a little, left casual sight of the town again.
He turned back to face Sunbutt. She stared down at him, eyes calm.
"She's not your horse," the doctor calmly said. "I realized that back in town, when you said you got here on the stagecoach. And you'd never be able to steal her... I doubt any rustler could and live. But she's not wild. A runaway or a stray would be my guess."
Rarity nodded, still looking at Sunbutt. "We ran into each other. It might have been the biggest piece of luck in my life. She was heading north, and she -- took me with her for a while. She got me to where I could be helped. I owe her my life..." He closed his eyes. "...and that means I can't keep hers. I don't own her. I don't have any right..."
His right hand reached up, ran fingers through the ugly mane. They tangled.
"So what are you going to do?" A gentle question.
"Let her go. She'll keep heading north and -- I guess she'll find what she's looking for. Her owner, her ranch... whatever she's been searching for, it's up there somewhere." He wondered whose hunt would come to an end first, along with whose had any true chance to succeed at all.
"You could keep her in town for a few days," Dr. Turner suggested. "We might be so fortunate as to have some kind of law come through. She's certainly distinctive, with her size and the birthmarks and those eyes... if she was reported stolen or missing, the news might reach the entire Territory in time."
Rarity's own eyes opened, and he turned to face the doctor. "What about her eyes?"
"The purple. I'm hardly an expect on breeds, but I've never seen that color on a horse. Taken as a whole, no one is going to mistake her for any other runaway."
"I don't know if she's running from or to." It was a truth. "Just that if she's running... she's the one who made the decision to run. She might have an owner looking for her -- or that could be what she had to leave."
His left hand joined the tangle. Sunbutt closed her eyes, lowered her head to make it easier for him.
"If her owner comes through and blames you..." Dr. Turner noted. "Most of the town has seen her. They're not going to forget her. One accusation -- it would be easier if his property was present to return."
Property.
The word made the decision.
He worked his fingers free, stretched up, touched her face without thought: she allowed it. "Get out of here."
She didn't move.
He wondered if he could smack her flank without getting kicked to the other end of the valley. "Go, Sunbutt! We're done! You saved me -- now go do whatever you had to do before I got in the way. North's that way -- just trot out and... find whatever you're looking for. Good luck..."
More staring. The huge head tilted down to regard him more closely. Turned towards the valley. Back to the north.
"Thank you," Rarity whispered. "Thank you... for the second chance. Just get out of here before you're the one who needs the miracles. Just..."
When had he last cried? It was a question which barely needed asking. He had the date memorized. Location, hour, the number of hands on his shoulders pulling him back, and the exact count of the whip lashes which flayed his skin once it was over. But those had been the last tears, at least for anything not produced by pain searing across the nerves, and those didn't count. Not for this.
When was he going to weep next? Not in front of another man. And not in front of the horse.
"Walk away." Dr. Turner, and the words were gentle. "We go into the valley -- she heads towards the forsaken land. Once we're out of sight... just walk away, Rarity, and she'll go back to her road."
He forced a nod, briefly squeezed his eyes shut tightly enough to force back what had nearly escaped. Turned, crested the rise, and limped down into the valley, the doctor staying close in case he stumbled.
It took eight mutual steps for the quartet of footprints to double.
The snout prodded his shoulder.
He didn't look back. "Go."
Again.
"I said --" and that was about to be an order, wasn't it? "Get out of here. Before anything happens, before anyone comes -- you're free, Sunbutt..."
She got in front of them. Stared at him for a while. There was a soft whinny, and two tail flicks, and a little stomp of the right forehoof. A tiny head shake, which did no favors for the ugly mane, and enough of a turn to give her a long look at the town below. She glanced up at the sun, at the clouds ringing the valley, took a deep breath...
...and then she led them down.
Rarity looked at the slow-swishing tail as its owner picked out the trail, and found no words.
Dr. Turner had a few. "It looks like you've got a horse."
Which triggered his own. "No."
"What would you call it?"
"A friend."
[/hr]
It took some time to negotiate the fees at the livery stable. At first, Rarity suspected he was being overcharged because of -- well, everything: after all, there was a sign at the front of the place listing the charges, and the other suspicion was that the owner thought he was incapable of reading it. He'd been on the verge of having to control his words when Dr. Turner had spotted the other looming storm and stepped in.
As it turned out, the overcharge had a reason, and it was named Sunbutt. Livery fees included food, and he was asking the proprietor to put up and feed the biggest horse in the world. Normal hay and oat allotments clearly weren't going to do it. It still took some time to get down to the actual amount which would be required as opposed to the ridiculously profitable one, and they left a grumbling watchdog in their wake -- along with a not-particularly-happy horse, who had been something less than content with the idea of being penned up for the night.
Rarity had tried speaking to her, under no illusion that the actual words would do any good. The tone hadn't helped any either. But the doctor didn't have any appropriate shelter behind his building. Tying her up outside with no roof and the rain still lurking about was just cruel, both to Sunbutt and any thief who might make the mistake of trying to rustle an exposed target. It was the livery stable or the road, and she'd already refused the road.
After a while, she calmed down. Not all the way: she was still clearly discontent about the process, to the point where the caretaker refused to lead her into his largest stall himself. Rarity had managed to coax her in -- eventually -- and she'd glared at him as the door was shut. But she'd stayed inside, and if she'd wanted to leave -- well, there was a considerable amount of door, but there was even more horse. The other mares and stallions within had seemed to recognize that fact: all eight of them had stared at her as she'd gone by. Several had retreated to the back of their own stalls. Two had tried to approach. When the humans had left, one horse had still been locked onto her with something which could only be interpreted as equine awe.
She was sheltered for the night. The bipeds were still trying to work out their own accommodations.
"I can take the floor," Doctor Turner said. "Your leg will gain no favors from your sleeping on the floor. Not that my bed is much better, but I'm certain there's nothing crawling on it and I can't say the same thing about the floorboards."
"We could both take the bed, if it's big enough." He was used to sleeping with a group.
"No, we could not." Just a little emphasis on the last word. "I have enough spare blankets for a personal nest. You're not putting me out --"
"-- I'm knocking you out of your own bed."
"I am trying to keep the subject of my study in the closest thing to ideal healing conditions as this setting can manage."
The street traffic had diminished somewhat. The days were long, the work hours available nearing their maximum -- but at the same time, there was summer heat coming, and some had chosen to hide from it. (At least one of the youngest might have been lassoed to a chair, although the mud might make it easy to slip away.) Some of what remained tipped their hats to the doctor, or openly greeted him. No one seemed to know what to make of Rarity, and none had chanced finding out through speaking with him.
"We're not going to start tonight," Doctor Turner continued. "Not with the medical review of your full case history. You need a decent meal and some rest in a bed. You'll be stronger in the morning, and then we can begin. But I want you to start thinking about everything you can tell me. Any single incident could hold the key we -- where are you going?"
"In there. Just for a minute."
Silence, and it was a surprising one -- but it was also brief. "I'll wait for you."
He went inside.
The church wasn't much, really. There were a few seats in multiple configurations, along with some scattered hymnals. Nothing indicated a specific denomination of faith because at this point in the town's development, no one could be excluded -- if only for the sake of the begged-for donations which would allow the place to be finished. There was no altar, no cross other than the one atop the building, no bell, and only about half a ceiling, which admittedly allowed the prayers to reach their target with a little less interference. And at the moment, there was no priest of any kind in evidence. He had the place to himself.
He didn't kneel: getting back up would have been a problem. Instead, he just braced his hands on the back of the lone pew and looked up at the still-clear sky, listened to a burst of thunder in the distance, and tried to think of what to say.
He'd never been particularly religious. Oh, some had been, trying to use their faith as a shield against the pains, as comfort which said that all the suffering on Earth would be compensated in the after. And while he'd said a name or two and chorused on a prayer here and there, his belief hadn't been all that strong. Keeping faith in a higher power who supposedly cared about what happened to you was difficult when the level immediately above yours had just split the skin again. It had sometimes seemed as if faith had been given to the slaves as a tool for keeping them quiet. Why complain about what's happening now? The reward is coming later... unless the owners were rewarded by having slaves in a personal and well-served Heaven. As below, so above, and there had been times when he'd wondered if thunder was nothing more than the crack of a godly whip. If so, the afterlife was well-run, and sunset clouds were the only ones which showed true colors. After all, the Bible had rules for slavery: he'd been shown that once. It was just one of many excuses which had been used for keeping things the right way: God approved. And a deity which looked upon the fields with favor was one which didn't deserve worship.
He'd told his mother that once, some time after the worst day of all. She'd said he could go to Hell for that. He'd asked for proof that the fields weren't it.
Or... it had occurred to him, after the Emancipation, that it could be a case of as above, so below. Perhaps there was a god for the Negros, and a god for the whites, and the former had been enslaved right up until the moment the document had been signed and the force of that final letter echoed into the beyond. There might be a god rubbing at wrists which still felt the weight of chains, looking down at those he'd been unable to help, desperate to make up for lost time. He had no idea how the white god felt about that, or if there was one of those for Southerners, another for the North, and they still weren't quite talking to each other.
It might be possible that whatever had dictated those rules for slaves had changed its divine mind. Or the rules were the same, and humans had sinned by declaring them illegal. Maybe... and this was the one which hadn't gotten him a beating, at least not immediately -- all there had ever been were slave owners who'd lived thousands of years ago and never wanted anyone to question the practice, and so they'd claimed it had the ultimate approval, writing every bit of that lie down.
But he'd been the recipient of miracles. At the very least, it felt as if some kind of Providence had been responsible for them -- and that meant he had to say something, even if this technically wasn't the proper time....
"I know it's Friday."
That didn't seem to be enough.
"I checked. And... I begged you. I don't know how much you heard. I begged you over and over and... we're free now. That's what they tell us, anyway. Free to be... slaves in a different way. Some are back on the fields, working for wages they can't live on, can't escape from. I saw so many get treated as if nothing had changed. But the chance is there... isn't it? To be something else?"
There was a moment, staring into the shaft of sunlight, feeling the smooth wood under his palms, when he almost expected an answer. None came.
What do I do if her owner shows up? Accuses me of being the thief?
There was no answer for that one either.
Finally, "For what's happened so far... the last couple of days... thank you. But... there's a long way to go yet. If you're trying to make up for what happened before, then we're not done, and..."
His head went down, neck unable to support the weight of memory.
"Keep her safe," he asked. And left.
[/hr]
In his dreams, there is no rain.
The storm crashed into his town at the moment of sunset, torrential downpours soaking all exposed surfaces, making the mud that much worse while pretending to clean some of the rest. But it cannot wash away the true impurity. It cannot clean the skin. Nothing can, and that is the final proof of sins which will never be forgiven. Forgiveness is a commodity, only available in limited supply, and has been granted to the only ones who actually deserve it.
He has forgiveness. He has had it all his life, for he was born into it. Even before she came to him, it had meant nothing he did would ever be considered a sin, and so he acts as he will, knowing he is still forgiven.
But then she appeared. Spoke to him first. And the previous glory of having been chosen for that forgiveness became something so much more...
There are things he does not like about her. The gender... that is an issue, especially when she says things which could almost be taken as orders by lesser men. But she explained it. She is, after all, an angel, and angels are meant to serve. Women serve men: that is the way of the world, the order of the book. God is male. Why should God not be served by women? He accepted that. But when it seems as if he might be serving her in some way... he has to remember that it's all for Him.
She has a way of laughing, one he still is not comfortable with. A habit of making jokes he does not understand, and he hates anything beyond his comprehension, which meant there were times in the early part of her service when he almost hated her. But she has given him gifts, so many gifts of status and control and knowledge of what is to come. She was the one who told him he was the chosen of God. It forgives much. It may forgive her. He feels he could almost do that, at least while the dream continues.
Her voice... he has become used to it, the words within the words, the ones he does not (cannot) listen to. It is natural. For she is the Metatron, the Voice Of God, and so why should she not speak with more than one voice, the echoes of the divine within every syllable? It offends him that a mere female does that speaking, yes, but... she serves.
Her skin is pure. Her hair as well, and the movement seems a small miracle. The eyes...
...he no longer looks at the eyes.
He sleeps through the lightning, for she will not let him wake.
She is thoughtful now. He had told her all about everything that happened on this day, all he saw and was told about, the arrival of more sin in his town, the need to wipe it clean, and she has listened. She is trying to decide how best to serve him.
"His power is a false one," she says. "You knew that the instant you saw him. A power which only comes from the false, and not even his own. Stolen."
He knew that all along, or at least so he can tell himself for the rest of his days, until the end of the world. "Where did he --"
"Oh, not a literal thief, not of the horse," she smiles. "He's stolen something before this, of course. He takes presumptions, starting with the one which says he gets to breathe instead of... well, there's no need to offend you any more with that one, I know. You recognize sin. Even when he tries to cover it with mere clothing, insulting you with its very hue."
In the dream and waking world, his hands curl into ever-tighter fists, fingernails biting into skin. He will not notice the blood until some time after waking.
"No -- he takes his power from the horse," she says, and her hair flows faster. The chill of Heaven's air spreads through the ornate office she has gifted him in dream, the one promised to be his in reality once the war is won. "You knew the mare wasn't natural. The size, the power of the thing... and while he's with her, that power seems to be his. It isn't, of course. It belongs with her. He just -- thinks he can direct it. Another fool who feels he has control over evil, and rides it into your town. A horseman. I hardly have to tell you what that means, do I?"
He takes a deep breath. "It's... starting, isn't it? Everything you've been preparing us for."
A solemn nod, one which makes him ignore the tiny giggle accompanying it, for she is merely happy about the glories to come. "Yes. It's time. The pale horse... and a rider whose very nature lets you know exactly what level of sin this is."
"And at the end of it all..." he exhales.
"Rapture."
She settles back into her chair, looking thoughtful again. He will not take his own, for it is not a throne. Not yet.
Four more visits. Perhaps four and the transition will be complete. The silver gilding has nearly layered the entire seat now, the black opals spread across the legs as the back arches higher...
At the start, it was barely a chair at all. More of a bench.
"He has power of a sort." she finally says. "But it isn't his own, can never be... and he's gone and left it behind, hasn't he?"
He does not understand. He will never admit to it. Understanding will be granted to him, and the comprehension sometimes arriving at the same moment as her words is mere coincidence.
"The stables," she eventually continues, the eyes he cannot meet dancing. "Well. Why don't we try to do this the simple way? Just for the fun of it? Wouldn't a perfect general end a war with only a single casualty, and that within the enemy?"
He is starting to see it, or will as she speaks. But he wishes to hear the ultimate approval of his status yet again, the sanctification. And so he leans forward and eagerly asks "What does God want me to do?"
She smiles. "It's after sunset. She takes her power from heat. You should remember that. Her strength comes from the flames, unlike the promise of stars to come which I was ordered to bring you. She's at her weakest now, and will be until the fire ascends in the sky again. Shall we see just how weak?"
She leans back in her chair, and it almost seems higher than his. Darker. Colder.
"When you wake," she said, "rouse another of yours, send him to the livery..."
He can see it now. And he smiles.
"...and have him shoot the horse."