XXII

There was no lying; deputizing Elijah was a bad idea. It was. It made sense to have such an idea, given Caff's own state. Mind matching body, or some such. There was a lot wrong with it, even once the near-impossible task of putting Elijah's nature aside was done. It left behind a character of unknown quality. It may very well be true that he'd slide right into the job without issue. Caff thought so. Didn't mean he was right. He had expected to be turned down flat, and had been right to think so.

The outright rejection came from Jennie. Her brow had gone up first, her confusion lasting the short seconds it took her figure it out. Then they drew down, mouth thinning into a pale line. “Are you serious?” she challenged in disbelief. “Are you – you mean that.” He nodded. Her rejection of the idea came clear through in every tense line her body made. “No,” she snapped, “No way in hell!” She threw her denial at him.

It took him aback. She had not shown herself fearful of Elijah, not since their first encounter. It could be that this was that fabled last straw that broke even the strongest of backs. It had been a long, long two days and it was a real early morning on the third. She had borne witness to quite a lot. “Jennie...” he said, trailing off at the shake of her head. Truth be told, he didn't have the words to convince her. There may not be any.

Oh, but he was tired. Bone-deep tired of quite a lot, but especially of pain. He could push through, let the consequences of it fall on him after. If he had to, if he truly had to, he could do that. He would do that. He would not be able to tolerate himself otherwise. It was just that he so very badly did not want to. Not one bit. Sitting up on his own was beyond him. The idea of it made his guts tremble. Riding up into the hills, to the Talmadge ranch and everything that awaited there, it terrified him. Here, to himself, he could admit that he was afraid of more pain. He'd dig deep if he had to. Grit his teeth and go.

Claudia, who had been between them, looked back-and-forth in ever increasing confusion, asked, “Who's Elijah?” He hadn't told her. Hadn't wanted to. From the look on Jennie's face, that was out of his hands.

“Oh,” Jennie said, voice full to bursting of false-surprise, “you ain't met him? He's the town vampire.” Claudia made a sound, wordless and full of something, in her throat. “Yes, ma'am,” Jennie went on savagely, biting off each word. “dragged from his sleep to tear that poor girl's liver out!” She jerked her chin at him. “Caff here thinks he'd make a fine deputy!”

It was not with any kind of betrayal or anger that Claudia turned to him, but a lack of understanding laid over a growing annoyance. She had always hated missing something. “He murdered Ruby?” she asked, “But...you said Talmadge was – that he did.”

He made to reply. Had the words for it and everything. Jennie beat him to the punch. She had always been the better brawler. “Oh, he is,” she answered with a shrug. “Got this power to him. Gets into your head, he does, and makes you do things. Whatever he wants you to. Ride out alone into the desert, tear some girl's liver out...whatever he wants.”

As she spoke it was like her anger was leaving her. If anger was all it was. It probably was not. Claudia frowned, her keen mind taking what Jennie had given and laying them out straight. Caff saw her figure it out. A sharp, short breath in through her nose. “Then...Elijah, vampire or not, is as much a victim in this as anyone else that Talmadge has...” she struggled to find the word and settled with, “convinced...to act against their nature. Isn't he?”

Jennie growled. “That ain't the point,” she hissed, turning away to stew for a moment. She came back around with arms folded, fists clenched beneath the elbow. “You ain't met him. You don't – you don't know what it's like. Just bein' near him is...I've had guns pulled on me an' not been that scared.” She swallowed, dropping her gaze. Admitting that had been an effort for her, he saw. Quiet now, she continued, “I – I'll ride alone before I ride with him.” She looked to him and he saw the fear brimming in her eyes. “I...I will.”

Then she turned on her heel again and walked out. She left behind her a quiet that was full to the brim. She left behind him, full of a sorrowful guilt. He hadn't known how much being near Elijah had affected her. She hadn't shown it. He hadn't seen it. Hadn't looked, either. It was a sour, miserable thought. She had to have been beyond terrified to unleash it like this. Her fear had been so well hidden. That was no excuse, though. He shouldn't have been fooled. If fooled was even the right word.

The worst part was, he remembered that fear. He had felt it crawl up his spine and curl its icy fingers around his brain. How desperately he had wanted to run, how it had taken every scrap of will and grit he had to overcome it. Until it had been taken. It was only later, after his visit to Widow Booke that it had gone. The fear that Elijah's presence created was of death. He had realized that at some point and just let it be. Going on to visit Ruby's spirit had seen him leave that fear behind. He had forgotten.

Jennie had been done wrong by him in this. Other ways, too, but this carried the most weight in the here and now. He closed his stinging eyes for a moment and then looked to Claudia. He saw her curiosity, her yearning to know, writ clear across her face. Also there was her desire to help, and her lack of knowing how. He asked, “Could you – I can't, and...she don't want me near anyways, but...”

Claudia nodded. “She shouldn't be alone,” she touched his arm and laid a kiss to his forehead. Then she went after his deputy. He blew a sigh out, drawing a ragged cough behind it. With his eyes closed once more, he heard Barney come to stand beside him.

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“I wonder,” he said, “how you expected that to go, Addison.”

Caff felt a surge of snappish irritation. “What choice have I got?! He pulled the damned cell apart with his bare hands! I thought she'd be...better off with someone like that.” he trailed off, then bitterly admitted, “Not exactly flush with ideas.”

Barney hummed, thoughtful. The idea of Jennie going up alone and coming across the kind of thing that had nearly done him in put desperation in his heart. The kind that demanded action, answers, and made it almost impossible to accomplish either. Barney laid a hand on Caff's shoulder and patted it lightly. “We've some time. Together, I'm sure we'll come up with something.”

Surprise had Caff opening his eyes, brows traveling up. “We?” he asked. Barney blinked, then nodded.

“Well, of course.” he answered. “Why would I not help?”

That was the question. Caff felt a rush of affection for the man. Maybe he was only doing what a friend ought. Here and now, that meant quite a lot. He found himself with a small smile. “Tired of my company?” he joked.

“Of patching you up, perhaps,” Barney drawled. He had a pretty good one, full of all kinds of refined diction. “So,” he pulled a stool over and sat, pulling a knee up to fold his hands over. “the problem. You are unable to perform your duties.”

“According to you,” Caff confirmed.

“Indeed,” Barney said. “Which leaves Deputy Leeds to face the task of arresting or interrogating Mr. Artemus Talmadge by herself.” Caff grunted. “This will, of course, not do. What needs to be found is someone who can accompany her. Someone suitable.”

Caff thought on the horrors that Talmadge had wrought thus far, and who would be willing to face them. It was not for the first time. Also not for the first time, he came up blank. “Yeah,” he agreed, “and you saw how my idea went over.”

“Well...yes.” Barney had a sort of sheepishness to him then. Why, Caff didn't know. There was a long stretch of quiet. The timbers creaked and groaned a little. A gust skipped in out of the desert and split around the building with a quiet howl, dying out soon after. Eventually, Barney clicked his tongue and, frustrated, said, “This is rather more difficult than I thought. Aside from yourself, there's not many, are there?”

That small smile of Caff's turned to a real one. “Not as such.” he agreed. Barney huffed a laugh.

“Yes, who would have thought our Sheriff would be so hard to replace?”

It was a rhetorical question. It still settled something onto Caff. Warm and solid and lovely. Appreciation, or something close to it. Only given to him, as opposed to him giving it. Made his eyes sting and his heart travel up his throat. He had carried with him this idea that no one in this town believed he could do this job, let alone be good at it. After carrying it for so long, he had gotten used to the weight. To have it lifted, just for a moment, was wonderful.

That moment came to an end with Barney's attention being drawn away, towards the door to this back room. Alarm shot through Caff at the way his eyes went wide. The horror of another one of those corpse-things being sent after him again followed, blowing in strong and cruel. He hadn't heard anything, hadn't bothered to try, and he was so, so defenseless. He whipped his head around, good hand clenched into a fist, and what he saw stopped him flat.

Standing in the frame, having somehow opened the door without making a sound, stood an old woman. Stooped and gray with age, she held a basket under one arm and leaned upon a cane with the other. It was her eyes that pierced the gloom that had gathered over there; pale-white they were. Clouded. She was blind, and yet she saw. He could feel the weight of her sight on him. The Widow Booke stood before him, having left her home at the edge of town for the first time in memory. She said, “I had a feelin', earlier, that my help was needed,” her eyes traveled his body and took in its poor state. “Looks like I was right.”

- - -

It was strange to see the Widow again. Maybe it was just strange to see her away of where she usually was, or that the last time he had seen her she had sort of killed him. Maybe it was just that she was a strange person and carried that with her, wherever she happened to be. “Ma'am,” Caff greeted, echoed faintly by Barney.

“Addison,” she nodded. He was still unsure where or how she'd learned his name. He could not remember telling her. “You look terrible.” she told him. He snorted.

“Been a long day,” he answered. “real long day.”

“Burned your house down,” she observed. He hummed, and offered nothing else. “Gonna tell me why?”

Caff lifted his brows at her. “You mean you don't know?”

She stepped further into the room, setting the basket on the unoccupied table before coming to peer down at him. She was so stooped and gnarled that they were still more or less at eye level with each other. “I do,” she replied, after a moment. “Saw it. Ugly, wasn't it?”

He got the feeling she wasn't just talking about its appearance. “Yeah,” he said. Quiet fell again, not for long, before she broke it.

“Well,” she prompted. “I'm here. What's the need?” He told her, leaving nothing out. The problem, their failed efforts in finding a solution, and his own desperate, stupid idea. To the last, she said, “He wouldn't say yes anyway. He ain't one for this kind of work.”

Barney broke his silence to ask, “You know him well, then?”

“Well enough,” she answered with a shrug. “Now, this problem o' yours. I can get you back on your feet. There's a cost, though, come due after.”

There always was. Last time, it had been a fear taken from him. This time, only she knew. “My life?” he asked. She shook her head, turning back to the basket.

“Naw,” she told him, “but you'll wish for it. You'll be good for a bit. Not long, maybe a day or so. After that, you'll scream for two.”

“Gotten pretty used to pain,” he half-lied. The Widow came back, holding a jar in her gnarled hands. Inside was a paste of some kind, gravestone gray and flecked with reddish-brown spots. Even though it was sealed, he could smell it. Turned earth, it was, woodsmoke and medicine.

“Not like this,” she warned, “Like nothin' you've ever felt. You're hurtin' now, sure, but this'll be something entirely different. Might not be the same coming out as going in.”

He'd heard that before. It was strange to not fear death but to flinch away from pain so strongly. He eyed that jar with more horror than he had the corpse-thing that put him here. Barney began to protest, setting to argue with the Widow on account of not knowing better. His ability to go through with this came down to two questions.

Can I take it? She had promised him pain unlike he had ever felt before. She had also promised him health enough to see this thing with Talmadge through to the end.

What choice have I got? The answer to that had him cutting through a reasonable, well-spoken protest from Barney to say, “Do it.”

“Addison!” Barney said.

The Widow looked at him, into him, and asked, “You sure?”

He wasn't. He was. “Do it,” he said. And she did.