Traveler trilogy Book 2, updates every Friday!
Five years after killing Levi Cornwall, Arthur Morgan is happy. He has a wife who loves him, an honest job he enjoys, and two beautiful children named Sadie and Hiram. All of it is turned on its head, h...
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"Look," whispered Arthur, pointing into the distance. "Just there."
A deer browsed on some vines as they grew amongst the towering cypress trees, laden with carpets of Spanish moss that reminded him of hair because of the way they hung over the branches and swayed gently in the breeze.
He was currently out hunting for some meat with Charles and Mac. Jackson and Francis had gone into the city to check things out, and Tori was at home doing some of their laundry and preparing dinner. The deer in question was a young buck, large for his age in terms of body but sporting only a set of spike antlers that did not fork at all and looked more like bizarre horns.
"You want the shot, Mac?" Charles asked, raising his eyebrow at the man.
Mac nodded and held his gun up to his shoulder. "Ain't many whitetails down this way, but I reckon we need the meat as much as anybody, and it'll be better than eating gators."
He peered down the scope, and aimed the crosshairs perfectly, just behind the buck's shoulder where the lungs lay. The gun went off with a bang, and the buck leapt into the air, kicking wildly before it ran off into the brush with its back hunched up, indicating a direct hit. "He's down," said Charles. "C'mon, you two. Let's go get him."
The buck hadn't run far. Following its deep footprints in the mud and the splashes of bubbly blood that looked almost as if it contained soapsuds, the three of them managed to track it into a thick patch of undergrowth and palmetto fronds where it had fallen. By the time they came upon him, the buck was very dead. It appeared as though he hadn't really suffered at all.
"I like this rifle," said Mac, slinging the brand new Carcano he carried back over his shoulder. "It kicks like a mule, but it gets the job done. It's easy to aim, reload, and cycle through rounds."
Arthur shrugged. "I prefer my bolt action, I think." He pulled out his knife and cut through the deer's skin between its achilles tendon and rear shanks so that the two of them could thread ropes through the back hocks and hoist the animal into the air for butchering. While they worked on this, Charles used his own knife to cut through the deer's lower jaw and free its tongue from its mouth.
"You gonna roast that up?" Mac asked him as he and Arthur pulled on the ropes, which they'd draped over a tree branch.
"Uh huh," said Charles. "It's delicious cooked on a fire."
"I saw Mexicans do that all the time when I lived in Texas," said Mac. "They'd wrap cow tongues in leaves and bury them in the ground with some hot coals. It went fantastic on tortillas." He tied the rope attached to the deer leg to a nearby tree and helped Arthur do the same. With the carcass suspended and the legs split apart, they could finally begin to skin it.
Butchering deer came second nature to Arthur, since he'd been doing it nearly all his life. It came just as easily to Charles and Mac, and between the three of them, they'd soon made short work of the carcass, packed its parts neatly into cloth bags, and nestled them into the saddlebags of a pack horse. Between the six of them, the deer wouldn't last very long, and in this warm, humid climate, that was just as well since it wouldn't keep long anyway. The hide, however, would net them a decent profit at the market, and they could use the money from it to buy some vegetables, spices, and other necessities like bullets.
