For the Wildings by Kyra Halland

Author:Kyra Halland [Halland, Kyra]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Magic, wizards, weird western, fantasy western, western fantasy
Publisher: Kyra Halland
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

ON THE WAY up to their room, Lainie almost felt like she would bust from all the things she wanted to say to that clerk. People being hanged for complaining, that outsider – the mage, though she was sure the townsfolk didn’t know he was a mage – taking over the sheriff’s authority, the strict rules. That wasn’t how things were supposed to be in the Wildings.

But saying so to the clerk wouldn’t have helped. It wasn’t his fault, except as far as it was the fault of the people here in Discovery for rolling over belly-up for these outsiders, these so-called Defenders, and letting them take over. And anyhow, he couldn’t do anything about it. She would only get him in trouble, and herself and Silas, too, and they couldn’t stop Elspetya Lorentius if they were in jail or dangling from the ends of a couple of ropes.

Even now, in the privacy of their room, she restricted herself to a grumbled, “I don’t like this.”

“I don’t like it either, darlin’,” Silas said in a curt way that told her he was holding back as much as she was.

It felt awful, not being able to speak freely. They had some nerve, these Defenders, using the name of the god to cover their wickedness and make people trust them. Lainie knew of one hell they were sure to be spending time in after they died, and the thought gave her a little satisfaction.

For dinner, they went to the second most expensive-looking saloon in town, the Rat Trap. The Grand Hotel had a dining room, and Lainie would have preferred to eat somewhere quiet, away from the smells of alcohol and tobacco and house ladies’ perfume and sweaty, unwashed miners. Besides feeling queasy, she’d had her lifetime fill of sweaty, unwashed miners when Carden had held her captive. But the hotel dining room was nearly empty, and she and Silas wanted information, which meant they had to go where folk were gathered.

The Rat Trap was crowded, but, despite the hammerbox being played in one corner, the multiple card games in progress, and the flirting between the house ladies and the miners and handful of ranch hands in the saloon, the place wasn’t as rowdy as would be expected. There was no joking, no arguing, no shouting; the only talk was terse exchanges about the weather, how the mines were producing, how the cattle were faring. And no one appeared to be drunk. Which wasn’t a bad thing in itself; at least the smells of cheap beer, rotgut whiskey, and drunk men’s vomit weren’t making Lainie’s sickly stomach even sicker. But it felt all wrong.

Lainie and Silas sat at the bar and ordered up plates of steaks, beans, greens, and biscuits. Lainie’s stomach churned at the very idea of food, but Silas was right; she had to keep her strength up.

“So,” Silas said to the barkeep while they waited for their meal, “I hear these fellas came to town to protect it from blueskin attacks?”

“Yep,” the man sitting next to Silas said.

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