I stared at that looping, spidery script until the words blurred. “Foedus Sanguinis.” Still unsure how to feel about the Blood Bond. The drawings didn’t help either. They depicted monstrous creatures in painstaking detail. The beasts looked fearsome and powerful, but unmistakably evil.

  Dr. Foss had stressed the dangers. "Heretical," I muttered. What did that word mean to me now? I was already damned. Would it be fair to damn my oldest friend alongside me?

  The logical side of my brain said it made sense to procure a mount, but this wasn’t an entirely rational decision. This was a permanent supernatural bond.

  The Instinct pushed me to pursue it. Seek every advantage. My stomach turned at the thought of doing to Flint what Julien had done to me. I wasn’t sure I could bring myself to force damnation on him.

  I remember coming to consciousness on his back, trotting toward camp after the slaughter at Chickamauga. I took a piece of shrapnel on the side of the head and passed out from blood loss. One of my men told me that Flint had trampled a rebel to get me out of there on my way to the field hospital. After I got treated, I visited him and saw that one of the grooms had dressed a wound on Flint’s chest. I talked to the man. He told me it looked like the horse had taken a bayonet.

  My throat tightened. The memory still burned hot. Flint put his life on the line to get me to safety.

  “I won’t do it.” The words echoed in the stone cellar, sounding final. “I won’t violate him like that.” I stood. “I’ll find another way.”

  I needed to move. I needed air. I walked up the stairs and used the key Foss left for me when she had pointedly invited me to return whenever I liked. I locked up behind me and stepped into the night.

  I stayed in the shadows, my body moving silently without effort. Unnatural, but I was getting used to it. Most of the town, like Foss, had bedded down for the night. She had given me the tiny corked bottle with the Elixir of Binding. I had tucked it into my pocket, but I couldn’t say why. I wasn’t going to use it, but she had spent time and effor making it. I didn’t know what to do with it.

  I was wearing my old frock coat, and it felt strange to be back in dark blue, but it blended well. The shadows seem to lean in when I passed.

  The streets were empty, except for the area around the Gilded Lily saloon, where the music, voices, and other unmentionable sounds could be heard even from blocks away. My senses were becoming more refined, but I wasn’t ready for that onslaught. The cloying perfume and stale beer stink was already more than I wanted to deal with.

  I skirted around and walked down by the eponymous Cinder Creek, looking at my reflection in the slow water. Restless. My muscles twitched for movement, but I pulled my focus back to the center. A rhythmic lapping drifted up from the water, a few hundred feet out. Prey. The Instinct seethed, demanding pursuit.

  There, at the water’s edge, stood a stray dog. Feed. Grow stronger. I hadn’t eaten since that first jug, but now wasn’t the time to quench the Thirst.

  I compartmentalized it, and kept myself in check. Foss had asked that I refrain from feeding in town. I jogged away, working out my nerves with action. Before I knew it, I was striding out of town, down the lane that led to the old homestead. I couldn’t get this place out of my mind. I needed some closure.

  I covered the ground quickly, slowed as I neared the property line, and then I heard it.

  At first, I thought it was the snapping of a branch or a twig. Then it came again. The crisp crack of a whip echoed off the trees, followed by a high-pitched scream of pain.

  I knew that scream. Flint. All of the thoughts that had been swirling in my head vanished. The Thirst forgotten, replaced by white-hot rage coursing through me. The Instinct howled for violence. Blood on the wind. Take it.

  I shot forward silently, arrow-quick, straight through the woods. The Surge carried me forward. I was a black wind crossing the clearing. I darted from shadow to shadow, my senses taking in everything.

  There, tethered to a tree, his flanks heaving, a fresh bloody welt gleaming in the starlight. Flint strained and reared, kicking at the man with the whip.

  The man coiled the whip for another strike. He was covered in mud, having already taken a beating from Flint. He turned the strike, and I instantly recognized him. The hired gun from the cabin. The one I hadn’t shot. This was the man who grabbed Micah and dragged him out to Vane.

  “You’ll break, or you’ll die, you bastard!” he yelled, pulling his arm back.

  The Cold Iron didn’t just hold back fear, pain, and anger, it focused them. It channeled my inferno of rage into a single purpose, a single lethal action. That man helped kill my brother, and now, he was beating my horse.

  I didn’t announce myself or scream out in anger. There wouldn’t be a fight. This was an execution.

  I launched myself forward, a leaping Surge. Flint turned toward me, noticing me before the man. The look in his eye was unreadable in that brief instance. The man caught it too and turned.

  “You…” was all he managed to mutter. I flew at him, violence personified. I hit him with devastating force. My good hand shot out, not in a punch, but a grip. I snatched him up by the throat, lifted him off his feet, and slammed him into a redwood. His head struck with a satisfying thud, and I knew exactly how he felt.

  I was amazed at my own strength and speed. Effortless. The man gurgled and gasped, his legs thrashing uselessly. He impotently clawed at my wrist, desperation in his eyes. The Instinct absolutely sang, surging with predatory glee. Dominate the weak.

  I growled a low, predatory rumble, bringing my face closer to his. I wanted to see the light leave his eyes. “Die,” I hissed, squeezing harder. Bones popped, flesh collapsed. The pinned man’s eyes bulged, and a rasping gurgle escaped his mouth. Was that a laugh?

  In what I thought were his dying moments, he had pulled a sawed-off, pistol-gripped double-barreled shotgun from his holster. A feint, he was less hurt than he let on. I glanced down, seeing the two dark barrels pressed against me.

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  B-Boom. Both barrels fired at the same time, point-blank at my gut. The force blasted me off my feet and sent me sailing back. I landed hard in the gravel, ten feet away. My ears screeched in a high-pitched whine, deafening me.

  I looked down at a gaping, ragged hole the size of a dinner plate through my midsection. Detached from the pain. The Cold Iron was an iron wall against the pain. I was numb. I assessed the situation. My clothes, ruined… again. The cold blood from Foss’s jug, pouring out, a useless burgundy-black ooze. I was damaged significantly, but I could move.

  Or so I thought. When I tried to sit up, I couldn’t, because my torso was shredded to uselessness. The pain lit up, flaring bright, but I pushed it away. My strength ebbed, draining away with the dark ichor. Black spots appeared in the peripheral of my vision.

  The thug fell to his knees a few yards away. He hacked, coughed, and wheezed through his collapsed windpipe. I turned my head to look at him and saw him take a long pull from a metal flask. I’d seen that flask before. Was it Micah’s? It didn’t smell right.

  “Not so tough,” he said, gaining strength quickly. “Tenderfoot, no-account dog,” he cursed.

  I reached for my pistol, but my hand moved too slowly. I’d never get it in time. The cold blood that sustained me wasn’t enough fuel. I was dying again. The disparity was so stark. I was a god moments before, and now I could barely move. Half of my innards were gone, sprayed out on the gravel and mud, and the last of my sustenance was with them.

  Move. Kill him. Take his blood. The Instinct raged at my powerlessness, screaming at me to move. I wanted to, but my limbs were leaden. I should have been smarter. I should have shot him from cover or delivered a telling blow with my saber, but I got lost in the moment. My discipline failed me, and now my body was failing me again.

  From the edge of the clearing, a distinct snort and stamp. Flint had broken free in the tussle. I looked at him, seeing his eyes rolling with terror. He saw me, a broken wreck on the ground, and he saw the thug that was the source of his pain.

  “Goddamn horse,” the thug spat, reaching into his pocket to fish out two shotgun shells. He fumbled with the flask, dropped it, then opened the gun’s breach.

  Flint should have bolted. Every instinct in him had screamed predator when he looked at me. But he stood his ground, ears flat, nostrils flaring. Not at me, at the man who’d beaten him. The man now fumbling to reload.

  Something shifted in Flint's eyes. Recognition, maybe. Or a loyalty older than fear.

  He charged.

  Twelve hundred pounds of furious, iron-shod warhorse attacked. The thug fumbled trying to reload the two barrels, and that was all the time he had. He looked up just in time to see hooves hammer down, trampling him in the mud. Flint reared up and brought his full power down on the man. He was dead instantly, his chest crushed and skull caved in.

  Flint snorted an angry retort at the dying man’s last gasp, seeming satisfied with his work. I’d seen this before, and it never ceased to awe me.

  He turned, regarding me, still afraid. I knew him well enough to see the signs. He wanted to bolt, but he stayed for me, like so many times before. I was dying, and he didn’t want to leave me.

  Slowly, step by hesitant step, he approached. He fought past the fear, smelling me, knowing me. He nuzzled my face and snorted. The air felt so hot on my skin. I knew that smell so well.

  He looked at me and nudged my shoulder, but I couldn’t move. He nudged the edge of my gaping wound, seemingly trying to help me. When he pulled back to regard me, his muzzle was bloody. He shuddered and whickered, the taste of it foreign to him.

  A sudden jolt radiated from my heart, a connection unlike any other. Somewhere in the space between us, a thin silvery-blue thread vibrated, then snapped firmly into place. Was this the bond? I hadn’t done anything.

  Flint’s eyes went wide, then he staggered to the side. The thread whipped and crackled between us, losing integrity.

  “No,” I rasped, trying to scream. Not like this. I took that emotion and used it, making it grim determination. I recalled the Doctor’s instruction and pushed myself to act. I pulled the tiny bottle from my trouser pocket and downed the contents, cork and all.

  I was supposed to use Foss’s special blade, the athame, to cut my hand, but I knew I couldn’t get it from my boot. So I sank my fangs into the meat of my hand, near the thumb. They extended at my impulse to bite and dug deep. I pulled my hand away, cupping it so that the thick blood would gather in my palm.

  Blood gathered under my outstretched hand. On the other end of the connection, Flint receded. The silvery cord pulsed with a fading light, his spirit trembling as the bond began to snap. He looked back at me, and there was an understanding.

  I was the man who fed him apples, the man he’d borne into battle so many times, and we’d always come back together.

  “Flint?” I asked. I had sworn I wouldn't do this to him. Wouldn't drag him into my damnation. But he was dying because of me, and I had to do something. I couldn't force him. All I could do was offer. He understood. He leaned down and lapped the viscous blood from my hand.

  “I give this freely, and of my own will, forever binding us,” reciting the exact words Julien had said to me. This was a different ritual, but it only mattered that the words held significance to me. The power was in the intention and the force of will. I’d never forget those words, so it seemed fitting to say them then.

  The connection stabilized. No longer erratic or wavering, it was a solid cord between us. His spirit settled into a calm, stable rhythm, echoing my own.

  Flint saw me and understood. Our souls were linked, the Blood Bond secure. The heavy weight of solitude evaporated, replaced by a flood of joy and the warmth of new company. I wasn’t alone anymore.

  His Anima flowed and linked with my own, as Foss had explained. His vital essence and spiritual spark. It flowed and merged with mine. We were one. His vitality rushed through me. His energy and power were like nothing I’d felt. He was a vibrant, noble soul. He knew I was guilt ridden about bringing him into this, but I now knew he had searched for me every single day, not wanting to go on alone.

  I put my hand on his cheek, feeling his loaned vigor. “I missed you,” but he knew. I didn’t have to speak. He knew.

  Despite my lack of fuel, my body was slowly knitting, just like in the cellar. The Thirst twisted and burned in me, urging me to feed. My survival Instinct agreed, but it no longer considered Flint prey, but part of the hunting pack now. We’re stronger now. Take the blood. The body. It urged.

  I looked at the dead man, his blood spilling out in the mud, cold and filthy. I rolled onto my side and awkwardly clambered to my feet, feeling weak, but less than before the bond. I stepped toward the fallen man, and the smell hit me first. His blood was wrong. It smelled like Vane, and something else, putrid and foreign.

  Kneeling, I snatched up his fallen flask and unscrewed it. I recoiled from the smell. That was the source of the foulness, concentrated. Poison. I concurred.

  “Waste not want not,” I said, resolving to make use of whatever I could. I pocketed the flask so that Foss could test it. It was the same make as the one Micah drank from, but beat up and misused.

  The sawed off shotgun and spare shells would be useful. His duster was filthy, but better than the ruin of my frock coat. I took his wallet, because this bastard owed me some new clothes.

  Flint walked over to the base of a nearby tree and pawed at the ground. A saddle and tack were sitting there, apparently for Flint. Hoof prints led away. Evidently, someone came out here with him. They’d be expecting him back, and they might have heard the shotgun blast.

  I patted Flint on the neck, appreciating his steadfast strength. His black and steely grey dappled coat shone in the starlight like I’d never seen it before. An aura of raw vigor and power emanated from him palpably. He was a Nightmare, like the one in Foss’s book.

  Standing there in the California darkness, feeling his presence in my mind, I couldn’t help but remember the first time I’d needed him. Not in battle, but in survival. Not against bullets, but against something worse than any enemy army.

  The frozen hell that taught me what loyalty cost.