The Long Stairs

Day Two

Finding hell wasn't hard.

Penny looked at her ride.

Six days to get from Brood to the edge of the world. One hundred forty-four miles due west into nothing. Doesn't really matter. Hell's where I'll end up anyways.

Misery was her company.

They say there is no hope for the wicked. No hope for the good either.

A post coach, overloaded with provisions and sundries prepared to leave. Six horses, already yoked up, were all nickering and stamping with ears laid back in protest. A young lackey flung the last of the mail bags onto the roof and whistled to the driver.

Fine mist siphoned the dust from the morning air as sunlight crept through the gray pallor. Lost in the ghostly shroud there was the distant peel of thunder off somewhere to the west. Penny could smell the rain coming, even if she couldn't see it. The coach driver eyed the menacing threat, eager to get underway before the weather broke.

"Best get your ass up inside, miss," he yelled down from his seat mounted high in the box.

Penny put her boot on the step and grabbed the handrail to hoist herself up through the open door. Once inside, she heard the crack of leather and the carriage gave a lurch forward. Wheel-slipped for a moment, spoke and steel caught and were spinning in the familiar tracks of the old road. The twin ruts of the Gallows, as they were aptly called, cut a swath of brown through the emerald hills like a diseased tongue.

Two other passengers were making the trip with her. She didn't know them and they didn't look like much either. The man on the left looked like his jaw was tense as if he was permanently clenching his teeth. A sure sign of untreated tetanus. Meanwhile, his companion on the right looked even worse. He looked half asleep with his fucked up face.

His father must have been an ewe shagger, Penny reckoned. Lets call 'em Lockjaw and Sheepshead. Easy to remember, just as easy to forget.

Every so often, one or the other of her companions would rap his knuckles on the seat beneath him. Another sideways glance revealed they were dry and raw. Both seemed unable to settle; fidgeting, shuffling in their seats. Teeth incessantly chewed on fingernails layered with grime. The glint of gunmetal winked from their belts. As one of the men leaned forward, Penny saw the silver sheen of a blade. No doubt the visible weapons weren't the only ones the men carried, but it didn't matter to Penny. She'd be ditching this ride for a horse waiting at the waypost.

Penny kept quiet and looked out the windows trying to catch a glimpse of what lay beyond the road. The sealed compartment deadened most of the outside noise. "Nothing but the best, put a Tucker to the test. Or something like that," she whispered to herself. The mist made it impossible to see very far; still she watched expectantly for anything out of the ordinary.

"Looks bad. The hills a be blazing red in no time and you know what. . ." Lockjaw hesitated, and then slurred the rest, unrecognizable beneath the broken bill of his hat.

"Lucky if we get halfway before it goes to hell," Sheepshead answered.

The men spoke to each other as if she didn't exist.

Up the road, cresting the first of many hills, the horses swept downward into the teeth of a foul wind and all evidence of civilization was left behind them.

"You better hope the doctor is waiting at the Cut," Lockjaw said through gritted teeth.

"Bullshit," Sheepshead shot back with a twisted scowl. "Your sorry ass will be long dead before then. I just hope your horse is still alive, could use another one."