This message was last edited by the GM at 14:58, Fri 13 Sept 2013.

Sky Dog grinned at the Marshal as he left, then after him as though about to laugh, but just shook his head, smirking, and continued to make a kind of nest of drying kindling around his tea-fire. A dozen or so small slashes and triangles of angry pink marked the shaman's hands, neck and face, attesting to the speed at which his colourless skin burned at the least touch of sun. The hood, goggles and bandanna that had spared him the worst of it lay loose about his neck, the cloth used to wrap his hands piled near his tiny hearth.

If Sky Dog had cut an alien figure when the posse caught up with him in the baking afternoon, he seemed more human now, contentedly camped downwind of the fire (a Siberian thing, it seemed - even Igor voluntarily bathed in the smoke) and making it clear that the offer of chai was open to all. Twice the shaman had turned up with wood and useful gather before the whites had thought to make a murmur of need, and something from one of his caches of medicine seemed to please the horses very much when added to their rub down, though not everyone trusted the Evenki enough to take up the measure.

Korpi wheeled aside from a game of stick-hunting with Clemya to a hopping stop nearby to see how tea was coming. Sky Dog gave her an estimate and hunted in his bags for raven rations, setting a couple of dozy snakes on the ground as he did so.

Shortly after, Cora found the shaman of a sudden at her elbow.
"Present?" he offered, half-grinning as though amused at himself for even trying to make peace offerings to Hawthorne. A shimmering satin ribbon twined over his fingers, deep green to offset the brown of Cora's eyes and hair.

Cora had taken twice as long as everyone else to get settled around the fire.  Each spot she picked wasn't quite good enough for her.  It was too lumpy or too hard, the smoke was in her face too often, or the grasslands were just too close.  When she finally found the perfect place to sit, she curled up on her blanket, chewing at some of the tough buffalo jerky that the store clerk had sold her.

Sky Dog's sudden appearance startled her and she glared, though her expression softened when she saw the ribbon.  "For me?  That is so very sweet of you."  She wasn't quite sure where the strange shamen had gotten pretty satin ribbon or why he felt the need to gift it to her, but she wasn't going to argue.  Free ribbon was free ribbon, and Cora, like most women her age, loved pretty things.  The shuffling cards in her hands paused so she accept the offering.

The horse and gear had just about emptied Randolph's poke, but he skimped on rations and figured to do without coffee. Thu7s he had five dollars for the hotel manager to hold his trunk until called for.

At first it seemed folly to depart Dodge City so late in the day, but by the time Earp called a halt to make camp, Darling was profoundly glad he wouldn't be in the saddle any longer and that they wouldn't have too far to ride tomorrow. He knew how stiff and sore he would be from several hours in the saddle and a night spent on the hard ground with just a thin blanket and his duster for coverlet.

He smiled to himself as he thought how a younger version of himself would have thought nothing of such exertions back in... back home. He might not be the tinhorn he was taken for out here, but he had to admit he had become a tenderfoot, though it wasn't precisely his feet that were tender tonight.

Sitting around the fire, sipping at Sky Dog's generously offered chai, he grinned watching Coraline accept the Siberian's offered scrap of finery, as pleased at it as she would have been with a new bonnet back East. She was a remarkable young woman, courageous and resilient, not to mention beautiful and smart.

He caught himself beginning to doze and decided it was time to turn in, confident that the experienced frontiersmen would see to it no harm befell the campsite.

"I'll say goodnight to all the company, then. Sky Dog, thanks again for the warm beverage."  He walked a few steps out of the firelight and stretched out on a thin mound of grass he had gathered earlier, blanket beneath hum, duster over him, head resting on his saddle, Stetson tipped over his eyes. Beneath the duster, his hand rested on his stomach, curled around the butt of his Colt.

Clayton sat closer to the fire, though tucked away a bit from the others, and sipping at a cup of the chai that Sky Dog had given him. It might be summer, but night out on the plains could still get a bit brisk. Right now, though, it was just pleasant. Still, it was a good thing to have the tea-like drink there to help with his detoxification. When he could manage it, he had consumed nothing except liquor for the past as far as he could remember it. Since that thing had first taken him over. It would be a long time again before he would be right in mind and body again, though he feared that it might not be till the day he met his maker that his soul would be right again.

Sitting there at the fire, he couldn't help but feel a little out of place among these hard men - and a woman that he suspected belonged more here than did he. He had been in the Confederate Army once upon a time, but he was never much of a fighter. His place had been with books and in the hospital. He hoped that none of these people needed his care during this trip, but he was willing to give it to them and anyone else who needed it. Maybe that would help find redemption.

While some of the others had mess kits out and were fixing something to fill their bellies, Charlie Bassett got out the guitar that he'd brought with him and struck up a chord. He started out with an old camp song that had gained popularity back when the War wasn't as hot any more, when it had started to drag on. It had first gained popularity with soldiers of the Union, but soon enough Confederates had taken to the tune just the same. He played well, and sang clearly in a deep voice.

It didn't take too long before Texas Jack, Masterson, Earp and even Dr. Mansfield added their voices to the chorus, filling the night air with a pleasant, if mournful melody.

"We're tenting tonight on the old camp ground,
Give us a song to cheer
Our weary hearts, a song of home
And friends we love so dear.

Many are the hearts that are weary tonight,
Wishing for the war to cease;
Many are the hearts looking for the right
To see the dawn of peace.
Tenting tonight, tenting tonight,
Tenting on the old camp ground.

We're tenting tonight on the old camp-ground,
Thinking of days gone by,
Of the loved ones at home that gave us the hand,
And the tear that said, 'Good-bye!'"
This message was last edited by the GM at 13:08, Fri 06 Sept 2013.

Sky Dog nodded slightly to Hawthorne, taking note of the idiom if not understanding it at all, and grinned at Darling before retreating to his own fire and 'hobo samovar'.

The singing got a look like the men were completely mad - Daniel might remember Sky Dog's tale of the band who had woken a mountain - but the shaman did not remark on it, simply settling a little further away. That the whites were apparently quite happy to be eaten alive by mosquitoes was already proof enough, if proof were needed, that iron devils were crazy.

Sky Dog stripped to the waist, tattoos stark as strips of shadow on his white skin, and settled his white bearskin over himself with the skull over his own, cradling his chai and watching the night as though he heard or saw something the others did not. Korpi eventually picked a spot atop Igor's antlers and watched with him until she got the dregs of tea to finish.

Shotgun John smiled at the others' soldierly singing, but toed his newly-cleaned weapon away and concentrated on food.

Gabby hated riding. He liked horses just fine--when they were hitched to a wagon, pulling it along. He was good and minding them when they broke for camp, and good at leading them as he drove. But him? On a horse's back? Utter disaster.

So it was that Gabby had clung entirely too tightly to Danial as the pair rode Jacques across the Kansas plain. And he was first to slip off--none to gracefully--when they halted for the day.

He set about working the kinks out of his legs and back, then went about doing chores around the camp. Once the horses had stopped carrying people, Gabby was much more agreeable to them. He tended to them with Sky Dog, doing rubdowns for the horses that the others wouldn't let Sky Dog near, and set up feed and water. He also groomed down his mule, who'd spent most of the ride carrying belongings (she was a pack mule, after all).

He didn't know the first thing about how to care for an elk, though. He looked at Igor, who looked strange all shaved down as he was, then gave Sky Dog a lost look and shrugged, deciding that Igor would be better off left to the shaman's care. He smiled as Clementine chased sticks with Korpi, and joined in. They played fetch until the sun was well and truly down.

Gabby joined the others by the fire. He joined in the tenting song, then led a round of "Oh Susanna!" and "Camptown Races," songs he'd first heard in the gold fields of California in his youth. Songs he'd once sang to a tiny girl on nights like this.

Dang it! Texas Jack had burned the coffee again. He poured his dented tin mug full and set the pot on a rock beside the fire, moving away to a log where he'd left his plate of beans and bacon, hoping to escape teasing from his chums. He hated being teased.

Earlier he had rejected the drink offered him by that Skydog injun. Naw, he'd said, I don't want any a yer slop. Though he had to admit to himself that it smelled sweet and good.

He shoveled down his grub, drank as much as he could of the bitter brew and slung the rest into the darkness. Then he used sand to scour out his plate, wiped out his mug with a tattered old bandanna he kept for the purpose, wrapped up his spoon in the cloth, and stowed it all in his saddlebags. His hands he wiped on the seat of his britches.

He took out a bottle of sippin' whiskey, had a snort, and passed it to his pard, Charlie Basset, then tucked it into his saddlebags again.

He sat on the log, looking over the bunch Earp had saddled him with -- that white injun of some kind he'd never heard tell of, a tinhorn writer, a barber fer gosh sakes, a drunkard doctor, and a gol-darn woman. Only one seemed any use at all was the old Texan, and he couldn't even ride his own gosh-dang horse! Well, that U.S. Marshall, Morgan, seemed like he knew his business.

He blew out a disgusted breath and got to his feet as that dumbass Charlie pulled out his derned guitar and they all commenced to singing.

"Gotta see a man 'bout a horse," he announced, "I'll take first watch." He stalked off a ways into the darkness and proceeded to wet down some rocks, careful to keep his back to the campfire, in case that woman was peeking.
This message was last edited by the player at 13:27, Fri 06 Sept 2013.

Daniel quite enjoyed the ride out of town. Jacques had been itching to get some exercise, and Daniel was happy to oblige. It felt about like it should. Riding out of town with a posse of legends to do battle with evil. Much of the time Daniel didn't spend talking with others was spent in a state of near bliss - a half-smile always present on his face.

One of his stray thoughts drifted to the fortune-telling Chinaman. He said something about Daniel finding himself in an endless series of scraps. If that was his destiny, then God he was going to ride with eyes wide open into that future. It probably meant pain, but it was nothing compared to what Jesus had endured.

A few times he checked his barbering bag to make certain he had everything he thought he should. Every time, everything was there.

Once they got to the campsite, Daniel made himself as useful as he could and joined in the singing. His uncle seemed to enjoy it greatly, and Daniel appreciated being able to spend this time with Gabby. And though he enjoyed the occasional song, he was most interested in whatever tales Gabby might be willing to share.

Gabby is, indeed, in the mood for stories. "You know, sittin' here around a fire, singin' songs and celebratin' good company...this reminds me o' when I went to California durin' the rush o' '49. There were a dozen of us, I reckon, all settin' out with dreams o' hittin' it big, makin' a fortune, makin' a mark on the world. A man can dream big, out here."

"Big Jake, well, he wanted to see the ocean. He'd heard tell that the Pacific was just the deepest blue you ever did see, and wanted gold to have money to maybe sail across it to Hawaii or China or Australia...he never did settle on one, and I reckon he'd like to see 'em all. He did alright, too...managed to get a bit of a stake and lit out for San Francisco long before the Quake swallowed it, so for all I know he's out there in Australia yet."

"Then there was Johnny Walker, who never did let on what he wanted gold for...he didn't like talkin' bout his past much. I think mebbe he was in debt Back East. He wasn't much o' a miner, though, and last I heard o' him he'd got himself killed tryin' to rob a stage."

"Some o' the folk with us on that trip, they wanted a grubstake to set up businesses. Jeb Williams, Ryan Sanders, Deke...all o' them wanted to open up some business or another. Deke was a wheelwright, and figgered folks out in Cali would need wheels just as bad as folk Back East. Jeb started a bank in 'Frisco with his gold..." he shakes his head. "That was the last I heard o' him, so I reckon the Quake got 'em. And poor Ryan...Ryan wanted to paint, not dig rocks, but he wanted money so he could paint at his leisure. He was good, too...showed me some sketches he'd done, and I can't fault a man for havin' a dream and then workin' to make sure he can pursue it. But Ryan caught the grippe and couldn't shake it, and passed on in '51."

"And then there were those who wanted to lift their family up. We had a few Micks with us, Ronan Lynch and Tommy Sullivan. They said they'd come to America lookin' for work 'cause some kind o' blight rotted all the potatoes in the ground. Sullivan had the sweetest voice you ever did hear...taught me a few Irish songs."

Gabby cleared his throat, then launched into a short song:

"~#Oh, I'm a little beggar and a beggar I have been
For three score or more on the little isle o' green.
I’m known from the Liffey down to Segue
And I’m known by the name of old Johnny Dhu
Of all the trade’s that’s going, I'm sure begging is the best
For when a man is tired, he can sit down and rest
He can beg for his supper, he has nothing else to do
Only cut around the corner with his old rig-a-doo#~"

He grins. "Sure, my voice ain't quite as good as his, but you get the idea. He had a family back in Ireland that he wanted to bring over. Ronan, now, he was tough bastard. I heard he quit the gold fields and moved Back East, then fought in the War, but I wouldn't know what became o' him."

"And then there was me. I was 18 and filled with dreams o' gold, bein' rich and livin' in luxury. Hell, you know the sorts o' thing people do when they think there's easy money to be had. Not that it was ever easy...I did alright for myself, but never hit what you'd call a motherlode. But I did find the greatest treasure of all...settled down with the love of my life and raised the sweetest little girl you ever laid eyes on. Then the damn Quake changed everything..." he sighs. "But I reckon that's a tale for another time."

Shotgun listened half-distractedly, his attention roving the camp's perimiter with a wary restlesness. The deer and the bird in its antlers kept drawing his eye, as did the shaman's fur-cloaked form.

Collins frowned and took pity on the youth: he was probably way over there because he assumed no-one would want company of a savage, and had taken Texas Jack's curt manner to heart. The boy wasn't to know Texas was always bellyachin' about something...poor Injun was probably simple, too. All white like that, stood to reason there'd be something wrong with his head as well. "Hey! Hey, Chalky!"

The Injun took a moment to realise he was being hailed and looked round, expression quizzical. "That's a fine big bearskin you got there - kill it yourself?"

Sky Dog looked back some moments, then got up and padded over, settling cross-legged nearer the Americans. "I admit it," he said, serious. He indicated the liquor that was going around and on recieving it made the fire a belated offering, handing the bottle back.

"We were starving on the coast of Alaska," Sky Dog said, his gaze meeting Collins' then roving over the others, pale fingers gesturing as though to wind a string of telling around the listeners. "I was carrying my sister in my shirt and leading Igor, my kujjai, for that they were too weak to fly far or for to carry me...our pack-beast we had lost to wolves before we got on the ice, and the snowstorming had driven us south, so we did not see the markers of the Seal People to guide us. It was bare country we came to, and myself, for the first time I was lost - a place I had never migrated to before, or been visiting."

"So. We are trying to get properly onto the land, but there are cliffs. Beside us, the little ice, not yet so far out to sea, and the sky is grey with the light going as the sun hides for the winter - only a little each day, yes? Then the grey is moonlight on the snowclouds. We try to dig for seaweed. I am feverish with hunger. It is some days like that, then, on the cliffs, the forest's-favoured." He tugged at the skin of the bear by his shoulder, unwilling to say the word, then rolled to a crouch and lifted the still-furred jaw from about his neck to meet the rest of the skull it was hinged to, mimicking the animal's looking back and forth with considerable artistry. When the 'bear' looks down, the shaman looks up, pushing back the skull, and settles.

"I see him, and I know we are kin - kin in whiteness, yes, but also in power, and hunger. He sees me and knows this also: he says to me 'I will eat you, brother'," the voice that passed the shaman's lips was entirely unlike his own: a deep, breathy grating. "-he says to me. I laugh - well I am feverish - and I tell him 'no, I will eat you first!' Me, down on the beach and himself up there and much stronger than myself who has no gun, it makes him also to laughing...and so and along we go - he paces and I pace, and our bellies empty-" Sky Dog demonstrated the rolling gait of a bear pacing a tiring reindeer and a young man slogging along an icy shore, his hands tucked into the bear paws, bear skull low and eager, back and forth, back and forth. "-all the day, and I hardly dare to sleep, but when the night is black for a few hours we must, or break our legs in pieces." He shuddered, remembering.

"On waking in the grey-light, he is gone. I am afraid he has found a way to climb down behind us and beg my sister to fly high and seek for him, and send my helper-spirits also. So I find he is crossing the land we are on, that goes out into the sea; straight over, he is going, singing his hunting-song, and he will come to a bay he can come down on the beach, and eat us." Sky Dog shrugged.

"He is powerful: he is a honey-paw, a most-beloved...but I am a shamán, and I have skill to match his singing, though I am weak from many days without food. He does not think it. I sing strength to my steed's sinews, I sing warmth to my own heartstrings - like the reindeer I am running, and I pass the ground below me - like the little green-bird flying, like the wind across the birches, I sing this to my running. Igor falls, he is too tired, but we are close enough where the fur-clad will come, and I have dreamt what must be done."

"I leave Korpi with my reindeer, I take my knife and all my fishooks - all my needles and my flint-sharps, all my tacks and nails of iron...my small things for the trading, all the harpoon-tips and tin-lids...and I climb to the top of the cliffs and make snowballs." He paused until people stopped laughing.

"In the snowballs are my fishooks, all my bone-sherds, flint and splinters...I go and piss among the trees, so the great-paw he will smell me - smell me hot and living, as though I speak a challenge...then I take up my young-man-knife," he indicated his heavy blade, "-and cut my right palm bleeding. I leave the snowballs, holding them a time in my hand until they are red on the white plain of the grey world - leave them some here, some there...and yes, he comes to eat the fresh-blood snowballs, the forest most-beloved, very soon he comes to eat them and at the last I am throwing them to him."

"He does not understand why his belly hurts him, why his throat is getting sorer - puts it down to hunger, yes, hunger and the sharp frost coming - and I sing to the bone sherds, to the tin-lids and the fishooks, sing to them to find me, that have my blood and onnir," Sky Dog made a clawed pulling gesture as though hauling points through bear flesh. "Then he feels that he is injured, bleeding before and behind, and he roars, with the spittle, yes? Very red with his own bleeding: 'Brother! Bond-twister, you have tricked me!'" Sky Dog rose somewhat, making it easy for the imagination to picture the hanging skin as full of huge and angry bear, the swinging jawbone snapping in blind, furious agony. Then he straightened, a man again, himself, bargaining on an Alaskan clifftop:

"I tell him 'I cannot fight you; it is not well to come at me, it is below you to do so, God's-beloved.' Thus I warn him, but the honey-eater is angry, very angry, yes? He runs at me. I jump for the branches that are hanging, and he goes over." He shucked the bearskin in lieu of description: a blurred fall of heavy white fur, a splayed pile of once-animal, broken. "I go down to him, yes, down though I am aching all over, and he also is still alive, so I stick my knife in under his ear and cut his poor throat, and drink his blood and much onnir with it."

Sky Dog paused, unconsciously licking his teeth, then took on the bear's voice again, this time in a whisper: "'This is a sin,' the great-paw gives me to know with his eyes, as his bird-soul crouches to fly out. I say 'I will not deny it, if they ask me. I will tell your dying, brother, and if I am ever a bear, and yourself a man, you may do this thing to me.'"

"And he dies, and I eat his liver and skin him, and cut him in pieces, and all the little pieces for Korpi also...but Igor is still tired, and winter without light is coming, and I do not know that without him I will not die...so whilst I am still very full with the bear's onnir and his body, I take off my man's clothes - Ha! It is starting to...blizzard, you say? Yes, and put the clothes and the meat onto Igor, and Korpi with them, and make a harness of the rope-" he gestured over at Igor, who had indeed worn a rope during the day. "-then I cut as to skin myself, put the most-beloved's skin over my skin and his shape over my shape...so I am as he was, and take my reindeer and my sister on my back and with my nose, I find a band of Yupiq. It is not easy! I think one more day running, or to be in the blizzard as a man, it would have ended me. But I came there, and became again a man - as they fed Igor, I went to sleep!"

Sky Dog grinned again, wrapping himself in his bearskin as though it were an ordinary blanket. "I do not know how many days I was sleeping, for it was the Long Night when I awoke, but the first thing I told to the people was the death of the honey-eater, as you have heard it."

He stretched, still alert to the night. "I have kept my promise."

Coraline stared at Sky Dog after his story ended, trying to make sense of everything that he'd said.  "To clarify, you are saying that you killed a bear by feeding it shard-laced snowballs and tricking it into falling off a cliff?  And then stuck it in the ear with your knife, slit its throat, and drank its blood?"  She blinked, mouth slightly open in disbelief.  She was more than a little impressed at his ingenuity, but it did nothing to disprove the perceived insanity.

"Isn't that what one is supposed to do when one is set upon by a bear?" Masterson couldn't help but grin.  "I've had one or two try to sneak up on me, but had firepower to back me up.  Known a few injuns that have killed bears with knives, but none that killed one quite like that.  What do you think you would have done, missy?"

Coraline shrugged in noncommittal fashion.  "I wouldn't have become bear food, that's for certain.  I have one or two tricks up my sleeve for such occasions."  Her gaze dropped to the cards in her hands as she shuffled them.

"Oh, I just bet you do."  The man's smile widened.  "I've known plenty of ladies from New York and Boston, though very few that have a passion for cards and gambling.  Done quite a bit of gambling myself, legal and otherwise."  Adjusting his bowler hat with one finger, he watched her shuffle with keen interest.  "Which begs the question -- what's a lady like you doing with this pack of oddly-matched fellows?"

"That's my business," Coraline replied archly.

"I'd say it is our business as well since we're the ones that have to put up with you."  His smile was a clear indication that he was teasing, and he only grinned wider when she glared at him.  "Shouldn't a woman your age be at home raising babies and not tramping about the frontier without a husband?"

"Why is it that every man I meet seems to think he knows what is best for me?  You do not even know me, sir.  I choose to be unmarried, and will remain so until I meet a man I truly and deeply love.  If my mother is content to respect my decision, then it should be nothing to you."

"No one has ever asked you, hmm?"

"That is entirely beside the point," she said sharply, though not without blushing.  Her eyes flitted briefly to where Randolph had retreated for the evening and returned to her cards rather quickly.  "I have been acquainted with many gentleman of good standing, from respectable families, and am rather fond of one in particular.  He's from France.  You wouldn't know him," she added rather quickly.  Too quickly.

Masterson laughed and went back to drinking Sky Dog's brand of tea.

Randolph gets to his feet, discarding the duster he was using as a coverlet, and advanced to the edge of the firelight. "I knew a Frenchman once," he begins, "Probably not the same one as had Miss Hawthorne's acquaintance. (He gives her a bow and a smile.) And I've always enjoyed the story he told of his first night in the wilds of New York City."

With that he whistles a few notes and commences to sing http://ia600304.us.archive.org...ATripToChinatown.mp3 in a pleasant, if somewhat unsteady' tenor, busking a few steps with each refrain:

"Oh! the night that I struck New York,
I went out for a quiet walk;
Folks who are "on to" the city say,
Better by far that I took Broadway;
But I was out to enjoy the sights,
There was the Bow'ry ablaze with lights;
I had one of the devil's own nights!
I'll never go there anymore.

"The Bow'ry, the Bow'ry! They say such things,
And they do strange things On the Bow'ry! The Bow'ry!
I'll never go there anymore!

"I had walk'd but a block or two,
When up came a fellow, and me he knew;
Then a policeman came walking by,
Chased him away, and I asked him why.
"Wasn't he pulling your leg?," said he.
Said I, "He never laid hands on me!"
"Get off the Bow'ry, you Yap!," said he.
I'll never go there anymore.

"I went into a barbershop,
He talk'd till I thought that he'd never stop;
I: "Cut it short," he misunderstood,
Clipp'd down my hair just as close as he could.
He shaved with a razor that scratched like a pin,
Took off my whiskers and most of my chin;
That was the worst scrape I'd ever been in.
I'll never go there anymore.

"I struck a place that they called a "dive,"
I was in luck to get out alive;
When the policeman heard of my woes,
Saw my black eye and my batter'd nose,
"You've been held up!" said the copper fly.
"No, sir! But I've been knock'd down," said I;
Then he laugh'd, tho' I could not see why!
I'll never go there anymore!

"The Bow'ry, the Bow'ry! They say such things,
And they do strange things On the Bow'ry! The Bow'ry!
I'll never go there anymore!"

He claps his hat to his belly in a deep bow and returns to his rough bed (leaving the party with no clue about himself).

Korpi reappeared in the firelight, disturbed by the noise. Landing on Sky Dog's shoulder, she watched the end of Darling's sudden performance and his equally abrupt return to recumberence.

"Vodka," she pronounced. Her brother made a brief hand-away-from-self shrug and grinned at Masterson, half in bemusement.

Daniel looked from face to face as they each told their story. He was not surprised when his Uncle led off, but was pleasantly surprised by what followed from the others. When Randolph's song died down, Daniel watched him disappear and then cleared his own throat.

"Well, I ain't been 'round so much as muh uncle. But I picked up a story or two here'n'there. Mostly from paw. He told me a story of a fella, musta been one o' our ancestors from over th'ocean what owned both a horse and a dog. Fella named Alfred." Daniel waved a hand in a generally easterly direction to indicate which ocean he referenced.

"The horse Alfred got was named Jock. But he weren't no great ridin' horse like the fine fella that Gabby and I rode here on. He were more a draft horse, pullin' plows an' wagons an' the like. Well, ol' Alfred also had a fine dog, too. We'll call her Clementine as I can't remember what paw called 'er. Anyhoo, Jock and Clementine lived far diff'rnt lives. Jock lived in the stable an' did lotsa hard work. He was fed well 'nuff, and always had water an hay. Whatever he needed."

"But that Clementine was a real beauty. Weren't no sheepdog, neither, Alfred just kept her cuz he liked how she looked and she entertained his children. Clementine was also purty smart, sides jus' bein' purty." Daniel's gaze rested briefly on Cora, then found his uncle's trusty dog. "She could do all sorta tricks and whatnot. An' Alfred and his family sure did love that dog. They give her food and attention all the time. Prolly even got her hair cut at a barber." Daniel smiled briefly before he continued.

"So Jock found hisself workin' real hard, an wondered why he gotta work so hard an Clementine jus' gotta relax and get pet an eat an sleep. So that horse thinks he knows why. He's a purty smart horse, sides bein' so strong. So that Jock decided ta break outta the stable. Not that he wanted ta make a mess or nuthin. But he did so. Anyway, he broke out and galloped straight inta th'house." Daniel looked over in the direction of his own horse, obviously hoping Jacques didn't get any funny ideas.

"Once there, Jock decided ta jump about and act frisky like the dog usually did. Unfortunately he smashed a lotta the stuff on the table an' the table itself. He then decided ta lick Alfred right on the kisser. Scared the piss right outta Alfred, he did. That horse then decided ta do some tricks like the dog done. Standin' on his hind legs an' such. Only he fell down an' broke some more of the missus' good things. Eventually, after a lotta broken stuff an' a few hurt folk, they got some neighbors ta help get the horse back in th' stable."

Daniel shrugged. "After he healed up, th' horse seemed content with his lot in life an behaved like a horsey angel ever after."

Some part of the night passed with the sweet sound of music, songs loud and quiet, drifting out into the vast emptiness of Kansas, the only light in the sky given by the glowing full moon and the  twinkling stars that the city slickers among them would notice as seeming much brighter in the night. Stories were told and enjoyed, and the group of men - and the woman - got to know each other that much the better, and in the presence of good company and a warm fire the danger they sought to chase down now seemed further away than it had when they began their journey, though they had in truth come much closer.

Jack, on watch, peers into the darkness, "Look alive, camp!" he calls softly, "Riders comin' and faster'n they ought in the dark."

He draws his Colts and hunkers down behind whatever cover is between him and the sound.

Gabby cursed at the warning, and rushed over to Bessie and his saddle bags, where his shotgun. Clementine barked and followed along, not quite sure what had prompted the movement but feeling limber enough for a little happy run.

Wyatt Earp also went for his rifle, and made sure his Buntline Special was handy.

Korpi took her head from under her wing with a growling note of irritation. "Kaaauuuuurrr..." The firelight shone a red flicker over her feathers as she hopped up onto her brother's head.

Sky Dog rose, frowning and murmuring a single word to the raven. The trails of cloud fingering the bright oval of moon rendered the flat Kansas landscape a depthless, impenetrable blank to vision reliant on contrast. The shaman made an attempt to catch Hawthorne or Darling's attention with a gesture as the whites scattered in all directions.

"I cannot see them - who comes here?"

Shotgun just took up his good clean namesake and moved away from the fire. He hunkered down far enough forward to help his eyes adjust and waited.

Though a bit sullen from the teasing, Coraline perked at the faint sound of hoof-beats.  Her head swiveled toward the darkness and she rose, one hand pressed against the flat of her stomach as she moved beyond the fire.  "I hear at least three, perhaps even four."  She threw a glance of warning at the others.  "They are heading directly toward us."  Slowly and quietly, she slid her fan from her sleeve and began to wave it in front of her face.

Though he didn't hear anything particular, Bat rose along with the rest of them, one hand on his pistol.