Mr. Shunt tipped his head down so that all the Saint could make out from beneath the stovepipe hat was his burning eyes.
“I can give your men back what they lost,” he said. “Hands, arms, legs, feet. I can make them strong again, whole again. Stronger than they were. If you kill the hunter and wolf. If you bring me the deviser, the witch, and guards. Then I will give you back your eye, General Alabaster Saint. I will find Marshal Hink Cage.”
“You ask me to kill two men, and now you want me to capture prisoners for you? I follow no man’s orders, Mr. Shunt.”
“Of course,” Mr. Shunt said with a formal bow. “Perhaps I was mistaken.” Mr. Shunt did not look away. Did not make any indication he was leaving.
Saint leaned back in his chair. He wanted Captain Cage almost as much as he wanted the glim fields. If this crazy rag-a-man could find him, he would be a fool to let him walk away untried.
Better to let him think they could work together, and test his worth.
“Can you prove your claim, Mr. Shunt? The healing of men?”
“Repairs of the flesh,” he said. “Yes.”
Time to call his bluff.
“Before I agree upon anything, I want you to do so. Lieutenant,” General Saint said, “bring me Private Bailey.”
“Yes, sir.”
Saint took a long look at Mr. Shunt, who stood still as death before him. “If you can repair men, Mr. Shunt, and find Captain Cage, there might be reason for us to enter a business proposition after all.”
CHAPTER NINE
Rose Small woke to the sound of men’s voices. The voices were close enough she could make out most of the words, but none of them made much sense.
One of the men was Cedar Hunt. She’d recognize his low, threatening tone anywhere. The other voice she was sure she’d never heard before.
It took her a couple tries, but she finally opened her eyes. The ceiling above her arched with scrolling metal beams and joists, over a deep polished wood. She wasn’t in the Madder brothers’ wagon, though she most certainly was in a hammock. And she wasn’t anyplace she could recall being before.
Rose turned her head and winced at the pain digging deep in her shoulder and spreading out like claws across her neck, chest, and back. She’d been hurt?
Last she recalled she and Mr. Hunt were gathering wood. No, that wasn’t right. They were doing something more. Gathering up the dead.
Those poor people in Vicinity. They’d been trying to give them a grave. And she’d seen Mr. Hunt holding that little dead girl in his arms, his eyes so lost to sorrow, tears down his face that she didn’t even think he felt, she’d taken him with her to gather wood.
That’s when he’d heard someone crying. They’d gone into the kitchen and…
Something had happened. A shot? An earthquake? Something. She remembered pain, remembered Mr. Hunt holding on to her like he could shield her from bullets, remembered the hard taste of hot metal in her mouth.
And then, nothing.
Now that she’d turned her head, she saw Mrs. Lindson to the left of her asleep on some blankets. She looked pale even in the warm yellow light from the low-burning lantern. Wil was lying beside her, and turned his head to look at her, ears straight up. He didn’t seem worried. That was something, she supposed.
Rose took a few breaths waiting for the pain to take itself off to the distance, then turned her head the other way.
She could just make out the back of Mr. Hunt here in the room. He was sitting in a chair. Still had his coat and hat on. The man he was talking to was blocked by him. Well, most of him anyway. She could see one shoulder, and a hand.
Whoever the man was, he liked to use his hands a lot when he talked, taking up a lot of the space around him. She figured he’d be the sort of man who danced with his elbows out.
“When did you meet the Madders?” the other man asked.
“Few years ago,” Cedar said. “Knew them as miners. Asked for their help finding a lost boy, and fell into owing them a favor.”
“And about that item you said you’d find for them?”
“Yes?”
“Well, I’ve seen a bit of the land and sky, Mr. Hunt. Might be I’ve seen what you’re searching for. Does your item have a name?”
“It probably has several. They call it the Holder.”
Rose blinked hard. She didn’t think Mr. Hunt was the sort of man to tell their private business to a stranger. Maybe the man was someone Mr. Hunt knew from back east or from when he worked in the university. Or maybe the man was holding a gun in his other hand.
One way to find out.
Rose licked her lips and pushed herself up, leveraging her right elbow under her, and pushing back.