Humming. Â Not sure if it's my ears or my head or maybe my brain inside my skull. Â That was a big blast. Â Black powder in the road. Â Under it? Â Big boom. Â
Too big. Â Not just powder.
Humming isn't my head. Â Too much pain. Â Not enough ringing. Â
Pain doesn't sing.
"Look who still doesn't know how to die proper."
Pain doesn't speak. Â Especially not in silver and steel. Â Hard to forget a voice like that.
"Look who still ain't learned not t'drag my corpse out of a fuckup."
Sound still hurts. Â Of course she'd show up for this. Â That means her brother's with Trouble. Â We're both hard to kill.
"Just stay down for a bit more. You've been wolfing down almost raw dragon meat for the past few days. Â They say it's curative"
Silver voice. Â Humming between the words. Â Bright, vibrating steel string of a voice, clear and clarion. Â Yeah. Â I remember that voice.
"What ever happened t'tar n'linen?"
Hah. Â Yeah. Â She'd remember the tar.
"Scouts don't carry tar buckets and brushes.  Linen's heavy too.  Doesn't help the healing tinctures we were packing make you puke like a gyser.  Dragon meat gets your meat knitting together but normally that's hard an expensive t'come by. Patching up a big idiot like you is expensive."
Yeah, she'd remember that too.
"But you n'the other one ain't ever had a problem killin lizards."
There she is. Â Mouth of the cave. Â Long white braid, big brass ring at the end. Â Big. Â Really big. Â Polishing something.
"Nah. Â We never had much trouble with desert zillas. Â Local flying ones got the same method to 'em. Â Jekky's not big on that, but he's got a mouth and keep's getting assigned punishment to pop em. Â One got yer letter by the by."
Sitting up hurts. Â Mouth tastes like copper and brimstone and ruby. Â Mouth hurts. Â Hell. Â Everything hurts.
"Y'mean y'let it get gotten, right?"
The laugh. Â Yeah. Â I remember the laugh too. Â Bigger, louder now. Â Still happy. Â Still sincere. Â Huh.
"We told yah. Â Next time we talk, you come in person. Â No lanterns. No letters."
Ok. Â Standing up isn't going to work. Â Not if I don't like kissing stone. Â Shit.
"Bad manners not t'tell someone yez visiting. Â Woulda know that iffin yez got that lantern. Â Judgin by the blast yez two were waitin. Well. Â At least Jekky wiz waitin. Â I ain't got a hole in me so it wasn't you who planted that boom."
The shrug I remember too. Â Because that's my shrug. Â Shit. Â Guess that sort of thing does get passed on.
"You think right. Â Niether of y'goin much of anywhere for a bit, as I figgure, no matter how much dragon meat or stew we shove in you. Â So it's story time."
Fuck. I hate story time. Â I regret teaching them that game. Jekky was good at it, knew how to pull wings off someone until they got mad. Â Her though? She was lethal and quick. Â Never danced around the problem.
"Story's gonna cost yah."
And of course she's got what I needed. Â It's what she's been polishing. Â Huh. Â Guess they did go back to the homestead after the moon dropped. Â I thought Trouble snatched it along with the Lantern.
"Of course it is. Â Never doubted that."
Damn if she isn't tall when she gets walkin. Â Guess we know who she got that from.
"Iffin y'kin pay then yez kin ask then. Â Juss make sure y'kin pay."
And here I am talkin big for someone barely able to sit up against a wall.
"No doubt I can pay. Â Way I see this has been coming for a while though. Â We're old enough to get told and we got both of you hostage to your own quarrel. Â Just like fifteen years ago. Â So.."
And there she is holding a rifle against my neck. Â My rifle. Â What they'd called the Voodoo Gun. Â Of course Di knew where I woulda stashed it. Â Of course she would have gone for it before the Drop. Â Blood tells, after all. Â She's enjoying this. Â But I don't have to say anything until she asks.
"Last time this happened I was pulling you out bed with enough holes in you to kill a cart ox. Â Jekky went chasing into the Shroud after Trouble. Â So now: We're getting both sides of it. Â Jekky's got her in another cave not too far off, but far enough t'make running out into the snow a little hard for two old coots who just exploded. Â You know he'll get her talking."
And there's the gun in my lap. Â There's Di across the fire, sitting on her haunches and those clear red eyes staring like beacons through it. Humming as she waited. Â Grinning wide as the moon.
"Time to tell Dad. Â I know where this started, you babbled most of it out while they were stitching you back together, the parts that weren't leaking smoke. Â What happened between you and Mom?"
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