"Damn," gasped Grey Hoof. "Damn your eyes, damn your gun, and damn us both to hell." He bent his head back and regarded Long Haul from an upside-down attitude. He abruptly morphed into his more life-like form, only now it was the life-like form of a man mortally wounded. "Thou hast vanquished me, Messer Drayman. That hast not happened to me in decades. Thou shouldst be proud of thyself. Though in all common courtesy ..."
"What?" asked Long Haul.
"I wish thou wouldst retract tnine calumny regarding mine own dear mother," Grey Hoof said. "She was a kind and decent lady, who is in no wise responsible for mine own sins."
Long Haul considered the point. Slandering an innocent woman to her son's face just because you were the one holding the pistol smacked of bullying, and Long Haul was no bully. "Fair enough," he said. "I apologize for the aspersion on her character."
"Then I need not hate thee," Grey Hoof said. "Which is for the better, for thou art a brave man, and I do not hate courage."
"Glad you don't," said Long Haul, "and I guess I don't hate you right now neither, though given that you were trying to kill me and make me your slave -- in some order -- I can't rightly say we're friends." He stepped back against the other truck. "So what happens to you now? Are you dying?"
Grey Hoof chuckled darkly. "Yes ... and no. Thy gunne -- which I would wager either was enchanted, or firing enchanted bullets, since no mere material projectiles can actually harm me -- it has hurt me. Probably to the point where I will vanish for a while. But I shall reawaken in Sunney Towne. It takes magic deeper than thou couldst command to give me the True Death. Remember that -- and be glad you took back your insult to my mother!" He grinned at this, as if to show that he was not actually angry any more.
"Well," Long Haul said, "I did it cause she ain't to blame for anything bad you've done. Now, if you'll excuse me, I think I've overstayed my welcome on this bit of road. You're clear of the truck -- I'll do you the courtesy of not driving over you, if you'll do me the courtesy of not trying to attack me any more this night."
"Agreed," said Grey Hoof. "Though I get the better of that bargain, as right now I am not sure that I can move. He lifted up slightly from the ground, then flopped back down as in an apparent loss of control over his own levitation.
Then, Grey Hoof grinned even more broadly. "But then," he said, I need not be the one to attack you." He looked at something to the rear of the truck. "For mine own friends are now upon us."
Long Haul gasped, and whirled to face the road behind the semi. The fog, which the wind had driven off, was now coming back, advancing far too rapidly and steadily to be driven by any normal atmospheric movement. Within that fog he could see six lights -- a pair of golden ones whose hue seemed very familiar, a pair of deep red ones, and a pair of blue ones. To his horror, he realized that the lights were eyes.
A cold wind blew the fog forward, a wind chill with the coldness of death. Long Haul backed all the way against the truck, his gun raised to point at the new threat, but he knew that it was nothing more than a bluff. There was only one round left in the magazine, and he would need that one for himself.
Peace, good drayman, whispered a familiar voice from the fog. Thou shalt not need thy weapon against us. We would do thee no harm.
It was the ghost girl.
She formed first out of the fog, sucking its substance into herself. First the two golden eyes, then the gray pretty face manifesting around them, framed by the yellow and orange two-toned hair. Then the sturdy but lovely feminine form, clad this time in a dark purple dress, caught about her waist with a gold-colored belt. Her eyes became normal. She seemed all alive and beautiful, nothing ghostly about her at all. Aside from the minor fact that, in the gloom of night, her whole form was faintly glowing.
"You changed your outfit," Long Haul said stupidly, this being the one aspect of the situation that fit within his normal understanding.
"'Tis a virtue of mine own condition," Ruby said, "I may manifest whatever raiment I do know and desire."
"That's convenient," Long Haul commented. "And that's a pretty dress."
"Thankee," Ruby said, smiling at him.
Meanwhile the other two figures materialized out of the mist. The two blue lights became two glowing blue eyes, and then from them grew a light-green face, framed by a long mass of untidy dark-green hair.
It was the face of a woman -- no mere girl like Ruby, but a woman full-grown, with lines of care worn into her face, though that face was still quite pretty, and she seemed younger than Long Haul himself. She was wearing a green dress surmounted by a dark green coat the color of her hair. The woman nodded at Long Haul, and made a placating gesture with her hands.
"I am a healer," she said. "Foe to none. Pray, let me tend to the fallen."
"Sure, ma'am," replied Long Haul, and he raised his pistol so that its muzzle was pointed safely at the sky. His finger was now without the trigger guard, but he kept the safety off. He didn't want to resume the fight, but he did not entirely trust these new arrivals. Not even Ruby -- she was how he'd gotten into this trouble in the first place.
From the dark red eyes formed a light gray face, framed by darker red hair. This last was also a woman, and one about the same age as the healer. She was small-boned and slim-built, but there was something maternal about her, and she stepped up to stand behind and close to Ruby, regarding the trucker with an expression of tentative friendliness.
Long Haul plainly perceived the similarities in appearance between this new woman and Ruby, and saw that in most of the ways they were different, Ruby resembled Grey Hoof -- especially in her sturdy, big-boned build, which had clearly come from her father. Mother? he thought wonderingly. Is this Ruby's mother?
"I wish that I might say well met," the redhead said. "You have done harm to one who was once mine own husband, and whom I still do count a friend. But I doubt the harm be lasting, and I ween he gave you good reason to shoot him. Therefore, let us at least not be foes. I am Ruby's mother. Mitta Gift."
"I'm Long Haul, ma'am," replied the trucker. "And I'm sorry I shot your husband."
"Ex-husband," Mitta corrected him, smiling more broadly. "And Three Leaf is mending his hurts."
He followed her gaze and saw the green woman bent over Grey Hoof. He could not clearly make out what she was doing, but there was a blue glow -- the same color as her eyes -- playing over both of them, and that the disintegration effect appeared to be receding. Grey Hoof was still lying inert, but his posture seemed to now be in some subtle way more comfortable, as if he were merely resting rather than lying mortally wounded.
Ruby spoke up suddenly.
"Messer Long Haul," she said. "I am right sorry that I did bring such trouble to thee. I merely wished a ride home over the stream, which as you saw disrupts such as ourselves, making it difficult to cross, even at a bridge, under our own power. I did not mean thy life to be endangered. I thought that if I spoke not to thee, thou would simply drop me off and drive away unscathed. I did not know that my father was near the road, awaiting mine own return. Nor that he would ambush thee. I am most very sorry."
She looked quite woebegone, and Long Haul felt very sorry for her. She had not meant to be a lure, then, and had merely become the innocent cause of a deadly quarrel.
"Aw, that's alright, kid," he told her, smiling. "Your dad and I had a bit of a misunderstanding, that's all. Sorry again I shot him."
Ruby's smile returned.
"I am glad to have met thee, good drayman," she said, "and hope that when we meet again, the meeting shall be happier."
Mitta smiled at him as well.
"Thankee for being kind to my daughter," she said. "May we meet again -- as friends."
"No problem, ma'am," replied Long Haul, raising his right hand, careful not to point the gun at himself or anyone else, and tipping his cap to her. "Glad to be of service to two lovely ladies such as Ruby and yourself."
Now both mother and daughter were smiling at him, warmly.
Long Haul saw a motion from the direction of Three Leaf and Grey Hoof. Three Leaf now looked a bit tired, her face rather drawn. Grey Hoof looked a lot better, and was actually sitting up, though he made no aggressive motions.
Yet, Long Haul thought. He promised me peace, but I can't really trust him. And there's a whole village of them somewhere out there.
"Well," the trucker said, "I better get going now. I gotta get this truck patched up and back on schedule. Hope you and yours remain well," With that he put on the safety, put his gun away in his jacket, picked up his toolbox from the running-board, and started climbing back up to the cabin, his motions clumsy with his wounded arms.
Despite his deliberate air of aplomb, his heart was pounding, and he almost expected one of the specters to attack him. Perhaps not Ruby or Mitta, but Grey Hoof was clearly recovering from their encounter, and he could not be sure how far to trust Three Leaf's professions of pacifism. Still, showing fear might be fatal, and as long as he didn't start shooting, they might be hesitant to start the fight again.
Nothing untoward happened. He opened the door and put his foot into the cab, slid into his seat, looked down at the four ghosts.
"Yes," said Mitta. "Thou shouldst now depart. There are others coming who would not be so peaceful. And I am right glad that this night may end without more suffering. Fare thee well, Long Haul!"
"I shall be seeing thee, friend," promised Ruby, her golden eyes suddenly glowing.
Long Haul didn't know whether to be warmed or disturbed by that last part.
"Be seeing you too," he said cheerfully. Probably in screaming nightmares, he added mentally, but maintained his smile.
"Oh, 'tis all hugs and smiles now," Long Haul distinctly heard Grey Hoof say. "Why, should we not all form a circle and do group sing-alongs?"
Long Haul chuckled to himself. Monster though he was, the big wraith was certainly funny. Frighteningly so, because he could make you forget what he really was, and what he wanted.
He closed and locked the door, put his foot on the brake pedal, released the parking brake, and shifted into reverse. Depressing the gas pedal, he pulled the semi smoothly from the shoulder, or at least as smoothly as might be expected considering that he was bumping and thumping over broken vegetation. He checked his left rear-view as he did that -- there was more fog coming up behind him, but it was hundreds of yards behind him.
He shifted into drive, and rolled forward. Were there more lights glowing in that fog? If so, any designs they had were frustrated, for the semi, in her element once again on the paved road, was running smooth and normal. He gunned the engine and shot forth rapidly, easily avoiding the little cluster of ghosts ahead of him, who made no move to block his passage.
And then Long Haul and his semi left the wraiths, and whatever curse they bore, far behind him as he drove off into the night, regaining the freedom of the open road ... and of the rest of his life.