You know. Rubin breathed the truth into his brother’s mind. The burn of rage was slow in coming and it wasn’t red and volcanic. It was cold like ice, like a glacier. That cold. A flame that never died, that would hunt one to the ends of the earth if necessary, just keep going until it was done. That was Rubin’s way. That was the way he felt now.
Just the thought of these men, these outsiders, cold-bloodedly coming to Luther Gunthrie’s home and possibly killing him, took that last piece of civilization from him. He felt it go, just as he had felt it when he had found his sister’s body so long ago in that cold stream. His mind shut down to everything but the task of hunting.
Diego instantly felt the difference in his mind. We don’t know if Luther’s dead, Rubin.
Doesn’t much matter, Diego. They came here to kill him. An old man like that. They came here to take her. Wherever they plan to take her, it isn’t somewhere good. They’re here. I can feel them.
More, now that he was certain, now that he was fully in predator mode, he could smell them. They had set foot on Gunthrie land.
The ground crew won’t be their elite soldiers, Rubin surmised. They wouldn’t expect any real opposition. Jonquille was their opposition. They expected a fight from her. They didn’t know about us. They wouldn’t waste manpower on locals, so the elite soldiers were reserved for acquiring her. The ground crew assigned to building a landing strip at the last minute will be ordinary soldiers with maybe one elite soldier leading them.
There were few meadows like the one Gunthrie had. It was long enough for a small plane to land and take off in. A good pilot could easily do it. If Jonquille had been alone, and she had been surprised as the soldiers had hoped, they would have taken their time bringing her down the mountain. The last thing these soldiers wanted was to draw attention to themselves. That meant they didn’t want to tear up the meadow until they had to. Bulldozing the ground was definitely going to draw attention. The crew and equipment had to be close but hidden under camouflage, easy enough to do if one knew how.
Where are they, Rubin?
He thought about where the ground crew would be camping. They would be close enough to keep an eye on Gunthrie’s property and the meadow. They would be out of sight, completely off the beaten path of any stray hikers or any of the locals.
Diego, put a bird in the air, one of the early morning songbirds. Have it search the entire area for Luther and then have it fly over the old mill by Huntington Falls. Let’s see if anyone is camping there.
You still calling it that?
Rubin didn’t reply. Yeah, he had always referred to the little series of waterfalls as Huntington Falls. No one else did because the falls were really nothing more than a series of large rocks with water pouring over them. Rubin had an imagination, and he would name everything so he could go back and tell his sisters his stories. Huntington Falls had become the home of many fairies who hid when the trolls came out.
When he and Diego would return to the mountains to check on patients, and Luther wasn’t around, he would find himself telling Lotty the same silly stories he had told his sisters on the cold wintry nights that were so dreary and gloomy. She always acted delighted. Yeah, he would always call that place Huntington Falls and have fond memories of it.
Once, Lotty had gone with them and brought an armful of wild daffodils, and she’d thrown them into the whirling pool at the bottom of the falls, one by one, as he’d told her a story. She had made strawberry lemonade and cucumber and fish sandwiches for lunch for Diego and Rubin.
She never complained and always seemed happy, even though both men knew her life had to be somewhat lonely. When they came to check on her and visit, they always brought fresh meat, but also supplies and novelties such as jams and buttons and threads and things they knew Lotty would have trouble getting.
Once, she showed them a hand-croqueted lacy shawl their mother had sent to Lotty on her wedding day. Lotty treasured it. Rubin knew his mother would have needed that shawl herself, but she’d gifted it to Lotty. That was the way of the people they’d grown up with. No matter the dire circumstances, or the extreme poverty, they tried to help one another.
Huntington Falls was as sacred to Rubin as the Gunthrie property, another memory he associated with his sisters and Lotty. To have outsiders—killers—come in and desecrate it was disturbing to him on many levels.
Yeah. I’ll always think of it as Huntington Falls. I took the twins there one time. Snuck them out of the house in the middle of the night. Thought we’d be back before sunup. Thought we’d make it back in time to get the chores done in the morning. You covered our asses, remember?
Diego had. He’d fed the few chickens the foxes hadn’t gotten, collected eggs and done as many chores as possible before their mother had gotten up. Rubin and the twins had gotten in a whole hell of a lot of trouble. Rubin had taken it stoically, as he always did.
You always made up your mind to do something and you just did it.
That was the truth. It was a big part of his personality. If Rubin defied the rules, he always weighed the consequences ahead of time and decided whether it was worth it. Giving his sisters a little bit of magic in a grim world was worth a beating with a belt or the lack of dinner for a night or two. Usually, the girls or Diego snuck him food if that was the punishment. If they couldn’t slip him food, he could go hungry. It was that simple.
You’re still like that, Diego added.
Rubin couldn’t argue with that assessment either. He was. Regardless of what those in authority said, he always acted on what he believed to be right or wrong. He had a strong sense of justice. He figured someday that was going to be the thing that got him in the end. He was in the service, and one couldn’t flagrantly violate authority. Luckily, he was in the GhostWalker program, which allowed for some leeway, but he still had to answer to his unit.
He did try to do the right thing. He did follow his mother’s advice. And Ezekiel’s. They both pushed education. Rubin and Diego set up a scholarship fund for the families in their region to be educated. The money covered not only the tuition but books and lodging as well. The most difficult part was often getting the children comfortable with leaving the freedom of the mountains for what seemed the restrictions of city life.
Rubin loved the people, their connection to one another, their history and culture and their fierce independence. It could be said his history was one of tragedy, but when he was in the mountains long enough, he remembered why he came back every year. He remembered the moments of peace. Of happiness. There had been times of joy. Laughter. Not everything had been a struggle. The struggles had given him strength. The little moments had taught him the core values that made up who he was. Who Diego was. Those were the reasons he kept returning. Neighbors like Luther and Lotty Gunthrie. Mathew Sawyer. There were other families. He remembered them. Ones that had so little but were always willing to share what they had when it was needed.
Going to take a little time, Diego said.
Yeah. Get some sleep, Diego. Let the birds watch.
Rubin closed his eyes and let his body rest. That was another thing he’d learned at a very young age. Sleep when he could, especially when hunting human vermin. One often had to travel under the cover of darkness, and he learned he would have to exist on one or two hours of sleep. He could close his eyes and still be aware of danger. Like the great horned owl, he concealed himself in the trees and stayed very still, but he slept, waiting for Diego’s songbird to return. He’d told Diego to let the birds watch for them, and they would, but both men would have their radars set to warn them just in case. They never left anything to chance.