Devon Monk - Cold Copper

The sheriff knew it was only a matter of time before those inside the church ran out of bullets. He seemed willing to wait them out.

But being low on bullets only meant each shot had to count. And they’d made sure to do just that. There were more wounded men on the street, or being transported by wagon to doctors, than there had been just a few minutes ago. Hink knew Miss Dupuis was a steady aim, but he had to grudgingly admit Mr. Wicks was no slouch with a gun.

The sheriff had tried to burn the place down too, but the recent snows made for difficult burning.

Miss Dupuis and Mr. Wicks had taken the time to bring Father Kyne, mattress, blankets, and all, into the main room with them, and put him on the floor, bundled for warmth. Less likely he’d be shot up here than back in his bedroom near a wall getting peppered with lead.

“I don’t like how quiet it is out there,” Wicks said.

“Shoot at them,” Hink suggested. “Seems to wake them right up.”

“They’re planning something,” Miss Dupuis said.

“My thoughts exactly, Miss Dupuis,” Wicks agreed. “Someone should scout to see what they’re doing. Captain Hink, I elect you.”

“Go to hell,” Hink said.

The puffing of a steam wagon pulling a heavy weight drifted into the room. Whatever matic was out there, it was coming closer, coming to the church, while men shouted directions.

That didn’t sound good.

“Train?” Miss Dupuis said.

“No,” Wicks said. “Wagon, I think. But it sounds like it’s on rails.”

“It’s hauling,” Hink said. “Under a heavy load.”

“What is it hauling?” Wicks asked. “What would the sheriff haul all the way out here to the outskirts of town?”

“Something to kill us with?” Miss Dupuis suggested.

“A gun,” Hink said. “Don’t know what kind, but it will be a gun. A big gun.”

“Cannon?” Wicks asked.

“Maybe. When that puffing stops, I’ll stick my nose out and look.”

None of them argued, so Hink took a swig out of the canteen of water Miss Dupuis handed him and leaned his head back against the pew behind him. They’d stacked the wooden pews up against the doors, then used the rest as a barricade to take some of the sting out of the bullets that found their way through the thin walls.

He closed his eyes for a minute or so, tired of seeing the room in double. That knock on the back of his head wasn’t doing him any favors. His body was begging for sleep, but he knew sleeping right now would just be a shortcut to the grave.

“It’s stopped,” Mr. Wicks said. “Marshal? You’d better look.”

Hink opened his eyes and held his breath a minute until the room stopped yawing side to side.

“Are you all right?” Miss Dupuis asked.

“Low on bullets and bleeding? Oh, yeah, I’m just aces.” Hink pushed up to his feet. He supposed he should crouch low and scuttle to the window, but he was damn tired of scuttling.

He walked up to the side of the window, then glanced outside.

A bullet winged through the wood above the window and Hink pressed against the wall for the scant protection it provided, then glanced out the window again.

The wagon scraped the brush on both sides of the road as it lumbered toward the church. It was pulled by a steam muler with tracks for wheels that belched thick, black smoke into the snow-heavy sky. Behind that muler was a massive cannon, black as the devil’s heart and long as the wagon. The thing had three barrels, the center one big enough to stuff an ox into, the two barrels flanking it only slightly shorter and smaller.

Six men stood atop the flat wagon, working the cranks and wheels to lift and drop the cannonballs into all three snouts, while angling the beast down so it was aimed directly at the church.

“Dammit all,” Hink growled.

“What?” Miss Dupuis asked. “What kind of a gun is it?”

“The kind that can blow this church into splinters. We run. Now!”

“I don’t take orders from you,” Wicks said. “And there isn’t a gun on land that can take down an entire building.”

“Well, then you can stay here and let me know if you still hold that belief when the roof is falling on your head. Miss Dupuis, help me with the father.”

Miss Dupuis levered Father Kyne into a sitting position. It was enough to rouse the preacher. He opened his eyes.

“What…where are we?”

“Take a last look at God’s house,” Hink said, bending to haul the man up onto his feet and then bracing him there with an arm around his waist. “It’s about to be decommissioned.”

Kyne did Hink a favor by not passing out and not arguing as Hink mostly dragged him toward the back of the church. Miss Dupuis followed, and Wicks must have decided to go look out the window himself, because he suddenly got his cussing on.

Man had an impressive list of words to chew.

“Why would they have built such a thing?” he said as he came up on Father Kyne’s other side and thankfully helped to carry the man toward the kitchen.

“Don’t know,” Hink grunted. “Indian wars?”

“No. That thing is built to tear down walls. Or buildings.”

“Just what we need,” Miss Dupuis said as they ran for the back door of the place. “A gun big enough to destroy cities.”

“Ain’t progress just dandy?” Hink asked.

And then there was no time to talk. No air left to talk with anyway. An explosion blasted out and the world shook like a wet dog.

Rose made her way down the slope into the cavern. The closest child lying on the floor was a little girl, maybe three, hair braided at each ear, a tattered blanket clutched in her stone hand.

Statues? Who would go through the trouble and time to carve statues of a hundred sleeping children? It was an eerie thing, and gave her the same feeling had she been walking a graveyard.

She knelt and placed her hand on the little girl’s blanket. It was wool and ragged at the edges where it must have been dragged behind her. Then she touched the girl’s cheek.

She was warm and at Rose’s touch she exhaled ever so slightly.

Rose pulled her hand back and rocked up onto her feet, startled. That was no statue. These children, all of them, weren’t statues. They were enclosed in stone, but they were still alive.

She wanted to run. Thought maybe a good scream was in order too. But Alun’s voice cut through her panic.

“Rose Small, what do you see?”

She backed all the way to the opening of the cave, unable to look away from the children. Afraid to do so.

“There are children here,” she called. “A lot. Maybe a hundred. They’re all sleeping, I think. But they are covered in stone like moths in cocoons. Like statues.”

There was a moment of silence while Alun worked that through.

“Strange work, most likely,” he finally said. “Old trick. Hard to do for one, much less a hundred. Can you carry them out of there?”

“Not with only one arm.” Just the knowledge that this was something Alun Madder had heard of helped make Rose feel a little less horrified at the scene before her. If they knew what was causing the children to be stone, they might know how to fix it.

If it was some kind of spell, they’d need a witch.

“Should we get Mae?” Rose called.

“No,” Alun said. “We can’t last this pain, and her blood wouldn’t fulfill our promise. We Madders, or you, bound by this bloodline, must find the children and return them to the city. No other can help in this deed.”

“What do you want me to do?” Rose asked.

“Can you reach the children?”

“Yes.”

“Then touch one. Skin would be best. And wait; don’t let go.”

Rose moved back to the little girl with the blanket and sat down beside her. “Wait, he says,” she said to the girl. “What in the world can they do? They can’t come any closer. I don’t think they have a witch in their back pocket. And even being this far from the city is giving me a headache. Not that I’m complaining,” Rose said, just in case the girl might have heard her words.