The Serpent's Curse by Lisa Maxwell (read an ebook week .TXT) 📕

army’s hospital wouldn’t admit him for treatment even with his many years of service. George didn’t say it outright, but North understood—it was because of the color of his skin.

George looked far older than his fifty-odd years, but when he talked, his eyes lit with humor, and North could almost see the younger man George must once have been: the man who’d been born on a plantation and had run away and taken his freedom for himself when he wasn’t more than twelve. George had taught himself to read so he could take up command of his own battalion instead of taking orders from the white sergeants who refused to see him and his men as their equals. He’d joined the Curtis Brothers’ Show after his wife, Letty, had died a few years before. After she’d passed, George couldn’t bring himself to stay in the house they’d shared. Too many memories, he’d told North.

North could appreciate the way George talked about his Letty, like she had been and still was the one and only light in his life. That kind of sentiment North understood deep to his core—it was exactly how he’d felt about Maggie, almost from the moment he’d met her. It was how he still felt about her, he realized, despite everything. And he found himself telling George about Maggie in turn.

Listening to their stories got North to thinking, though. He’d never known many people of color before—not in Chicago or Texas or even in St. Louis. It wasn’t that he’d ever had any poor feelings about a person because of their skin, though he knew plenty who did. It was more that he simply hadn’t thought to step outside his own steady path. Even on Gunter’s ranch, he’d stuck to the group of Anglo cowhands and hadn’t bothered much with the vaqueros unless he was working with them. He’d certainly never socialized with them.

Talking to George and his friends, though, and taking their easy company for the gift it was, North started to think that maybe he’d spent too much of his life only worrying about himself—and about the magic that flowed in his veins. He’d been so focused on how the world saw those with the old magic, he’d never considered that there were a lot of other folks with trials of their own.

The next morning, North was leading one of the horses in from the field to saddle it for the show, when he realized that his body hadn’t felt so well used and sore from a good, solid day’s work in a long, long time. The jobs he’d done in St. Louis for Mother Ruth and her Antistasi were often dangerous, but they’d never been all that physically taxing. Now North was starting to remember what it felt like to use his body the way it was intended. His skin was tender from the sun, and he knew he smelled of horse and sweat, but he felt happier than he had in years.

He patted the side of the horse he was leading, a pretty dappled Appaloosa mare the color of caramel. Out in the field, she’d rolled herself in a nice patch of mud, and while it might have made her feel better, it meant more work for North. He’d have to get her light, speckled hindquarters clean before the evening’s show.

The sun was already low in the sky as North looped the mecate reins through his belt and started to fill a bucket of water from the pump. The mare seemed biddable and good-natured, from what he could tell. Maybe that was why he let himself get distracted by someone watching him from the edge of the corral. North thought he saw something on the man’s lapel glinting in the sun. It wasn’t the silver star of a marshal, but a round medallion that looked like a type he’d seen too many times before.

But that couldn’t be right. There was no reason for the Society to be so far from St. Louis, way out in the mountains of Colorado.

North was so busy trying to get a look at the man without really looking that he wasn’t paying attention to the mare like he should have been. Without warning or reason, the horse spooked, and before North knew what was happening, the animal’s body was slamming into him. Nearly a thousand pounds of horseflesh pushed him into the fence as her hind leg kicked out.

He managed to dodge the worst of it. The hoof only caught the back of his thigh as he tumbled to the ground. But then the mare reared up, screaming her disapproval, and North knew he was in trouble. He barely had time to turn away, and he only had his arms to shield himself from the pummeling that was about to happen as the horse rose above him. Before her hooves could do any damage, though, someone else was there, standing between him and the Appaloosa. At first North only saw the shadow of a man silhouetted against the bright sun. He’d turned away from North as he walked the horse back, clicking and cooing at her until she stopped huffing her fear and finally calmed down.

North was still trying to catch his breath when the man turned. For a second he was too stunned to believe it could be Bill Pickett standing over him. It took Pickett extending a hand to him before North managed to pull himself together.

Pickett’s grip was strong and sure, and the other cowboy hoisted North up to his feet like he weighed nothing at all.

“You okay there?” Pickett asked, squinting a little. He offered North the leading rope again.

“I think I’ll live,” North said, taking the rope. “Probably’ll have a bruise on my leg to show off tomorrow, but it could have been a lot worse. ’Specially if you hadn’t been there.”

Pickett’s brows went up in what looked to be amusement, and the heavy mustache over his mouth twitched. “Worse? You would’ve been