Honey from the Rock - Wyldhaven, Book 7, Chapter 1

Chapter 1

***

Seattle, Washington – February 1898

“Wake up, mistuh.”

The young voice intruded on Kin Davis’s slumber. He moaned and clutched both sides of his head. A spike of pain felt like Jael’s tent peg piercing his temple. The long wail of a ship’s horn sliced through the morning.

He winced. Why so loud? And why was it so blasted cold today? He must have forgotten to close the window last night. He turned on his side and curled his arms against his chest. He’d get it in a minute. First . . . just a few more minutes of sleep.

“You gotta wake up. Now.” The annoying voice trembled as a desperate hand shook Kin’s shoulder. “They comin’ this way. An’ you gonna find yo’self deader’n Adam hisself and turned over fo’ that corpse reward.” The intruder jostled him more insistently.

Kin’s fingers rubbed circles at his temples. His bed swayed. Swayed? Why was his bed moving?

Something pinched his shoulder.

“Ow.” He swung his arm to push away the vexing interloper. “Leave me be, kid. I’m sleeping.”

“That’s it, mistuh. You done left me no choice.”

There was a clang of metal, and then a sluice of ice-cold water jolted Kin upright with a gasp. He leapt to his feet, ready to take on his attacker, but a wave of dizziness nearly took him down again. With a grunt, he bent to prop his hands against his knees. Despite his dizziness, he was now wide awake and madder than a teased rattler. He shook his hair back from his face and swiped a hand over his eyes to clear them of water.

He was not in his tiny attic room—not even indoors. Instead, he found himself standing on the Seattle docks glowering at a boy who wasn’t much taller than his lowest ribs. The boy held an empty bucket in one hand and he returned Kin’s scrutiny with wary gray eyes.

“Give me that!” Kin snatched the galvanized pail and willed himself not to visibly shiver.

Water still dripped from his hair onto his shoulders. No matter his efforts, a shudder worked through him. He chucked the bucket into a pile of rope and crab pots. It clattered loud enough to give Jael’s tent peg a couple of taps. Kin gritted his teeth against the stabbing torment.

The call of another ship’s horn drew his gaze to the dawn-kissed Seattle harbor. The ship slid into the dock two slips over. Waves slapped at the pier Kin stood on, bobbing it in the Pacific. He broadened his stance to maintain his balance. The last thing he wanted was to end up taking a swim this morning. A bucket of water to the face was bad enough.

A frown crimped his brow. What was he doing sleeping on this pier? He fought for memory of the night before, but the last thing he seemed able to remember was stepping into the Merchant’s Exchange Saloon after he’d left work yesterday.

He returned his focus to the kid. “Why’d you do that?” He gestured toward the bucket.

The kid, who wore a coat that was at least three sizes too big, thrust out an arm to indicate a dock down the way. “Savin’ yo’ life.”

A silhouetted group of men moved together along the docks, poking and prodding every shadowy crevice and cranny.

“You find anything?” one of them called in a voice modulated to rise just above the sound of the surf.

“Not yet,” another replied. “But we will. We always do.”

In the burgeoning light of dawn, Kin noted the strip of fabric fluttering in the man’s grip.

His heart rapped a tattoo against his ribs. His mouth went dry. He grabbed the kid’s arm. “Thanks, kid. Let’s get out of here.” He rushed the boy off the pier and in the opposite direction of the approaching men.

The reavers were only one pier over now, but thankfully the murky dawn light gave enough cover to make escape possible.

Kin rested a hand on the kid’s back and glanced behind as he urged him across the street. He’d been doing pretty good at staying away from drink lately. He’d purposely kept himself busy with his law studies on nights and weekends. In fact, he hadn’t imbibed a drop all month . . . until last night.

He’d thought he had his demon beat. But yesterday Mr. Riggs had accused him of stealing, and told him if it happened again, he would lose his job. Kin knew exactly which employee was likely the real culprit. He’d been so angry when he left work that he hadn’t been thinking straight when he’d entered the saloon. He’d obviously consumed too much and fallen asleep on the pier.

If the kid hadn’t come along when he did . . .

Kin pushed the thought away.

Parson Clay, the man who’d raised him after his pa had died, would have told him the Lord had been watching out for him just now. He also would likely tack on some mention of how God had big plans for Kin’s life.

He wanted to believe it. He really did. One thing was certain. Whether God had anything to do with it, or not, he had no doubt that the kid had indeed saved his life.

Not long past, with the Yukon Gold Rush in full swing, droves of hopeful miners had streamed into Seattle on their way north. Outfitting for the trek took time, and the temporary settlement camps were a breeding ground for disease. Seattle’s streets had become so plagued with corpses that the city couldn’t keep up. The council had voted to offer a reward of twenty-five dollars for every corpse any citizen brought to the morgue.

It hadn’t taken long for a few unsavory types to realize they could make more money turning in dead bodies than they could in prospecting for gold, and homicides had swollen like the tide.

The council had to amend their offer. Money was now only paid for bodies that appeared to have died of natural causes.

So gangs roamed the streets with silk scarves. These, they could use to choke their victims without any visible markings.

Kin felt a tremor work through him as he tugged at the skin over his Adam’s apple. He needed to get his mind off his near demise. He thumped the kid on the shoulder and motioned to one of the ladders that led down to the lower levels of the city. “You hungry? Least I could do is buy you some breakfast. What’s your name?”

In the light shining from Mrs. Corbel’s bakery window, he truly looked the boy over for the first time and felt his brow slump. The shivering kid was dressed in not much more than rags and the too-large coat that was inadequate for these parts this time of year. His thick black curls puckered in shaggy clumps, and mud caked his skin in places.

“I could eat, yessuh.” The boy eyed the ladder dubiously, a cloth cap twisted tightly in his hands. “Name’s Isaiah, jus’ like that Bible prophet. Why these ladders be all over the place, leadin’ underground?”

Kin led the way down the nearest ladder. “You must be new to these parts?” He stopped at the bottom and motioned for Isaiah, who still peered down, to join him.

After a moment’s hesitation and a glance back along the street, the kid climbed carefully onto the top rung and descended one halting step at a time. Only when he was safely on the ground by Kin’s side, did he answer his question. “Yessuh. My pa . . . Well, we was headed to the Yukon, but he took powerful sick on the ship here from San Francisco and . . . he passed on.”

The kid’s voice broke on the last words, and Kin felt the sharp pain of them like a knife to his heart. How well he knew what the boy must be feeling. How old was the kid? Eight? Nine?

“I’m sorry to hear. How long ago was that?”

Isaiah swallowed. “Las’ week.” He gestured up toward the street they’d just left. “First night, that gang almost got me. Only thing saved me was being small enough to fit through the slats of a fence and they couldn’t follow. Only my clothes got torn.”

Kin dropped a hand against the boy’s shoulder. “I’d bet you haven’t slept easy since you got off that boat. Where’s your ma?”

Isaiah scuffed the ground with the toe of one boot. “She passed on when I was born.”

Poor kid. Kin nudged Isaiah toward the bakery where he liked to get sausage pies. He needed to hurry, or he’d be late for work. Mr. Riggs wouldn’t put up with that. Especially not after yesterday.

“Let me get you something to eat. And then I have to get. But I’ve got a room you can stay in for the day. Sleep. Even take a bath if you want.”

Based on the condition Isaiah was in, Kin hoped the kid would decide to take a bath before climbing into his bed. “My name is Kin Davis, by the way.”

As they made their way to the underground bakery, Kin motioned to a ladder. “You asked about the ladders. A few years ago, there was a big fire in town. Leveled the whole place.” He kept their pace brisk. “Before that, the city had a lot of trouble with the sewers backing up at high tide. Since they needed to rebuild anyhow, they decided to build a level higher.” The bakery door squawked loudly as he pushed it open.

Mrs. Owens looked at them from behind the counter. “What can I get for you this morning?”

Kin dug into his pocket with one hand, while holding up four fingers of the other and gesturing to the sausage pastries. He finished his story as he handed over the money. “We’ve been hauling dirt from the surrounding hills to raise the streets—that’s been my job these past months.” He nodded his thanks to Mrs. Owens for the pies and held two toward the kid. “Here. You eat one of those and save the other for later today.”

Isaiah’s eyes grew wide and he pushed the pastries back. “Mistuh, I can’t pay fo’ those.”

Despite his words, the kid’s gaze lingered on the pastries, longingly.

Kin took Isaiah’s hand and settled two of the paper-wrapped pies there. He spoke around a mouthful he’d already taken. “Consider it small payment for you saving my life this morning. Now come on and I’ll show you to my room. I can’t be late for work.”

Kin practically ran through the underground streets. In places, the above-ground walkways had already been built above their heads. Grids of glass skylights revealed the brightening sunlight and lit their way. At the corner of First and Yesler, he took a ladder to the top. One block over, he led Isaiah at a trot up the rickety stairs at the back of Mrs. Huston’s building.

Kin’s attic room was hot in the summer, and cold in the winter, but it kept him dry and was cheaper than anything else he’d been able to find in the city.

On the first landing, he dashed inside to the washroom, grabbed up a bucket, and put the pump handle to good use. He thrust the filled bucket at Isaiah, and set to filling another. With that done, he hurried toward his room once more.

“Come on, kid.” They rushed up three more flights of stairs, and Kin bumped the door to his room open with his shoulder. He pointed toward the flimsy divider that sat in one corner and set his bucket near it. “There’s a galvanized tub behind that, and a toilet. When you flush, you have to go down to the washroom for more water to fill the tank, but . . .” He skimmed the kid from head to toe once more, taking in his golden-pecan skin. “On second thought, I think it would be best for you to stay in my room out of sight for the rest of the day. You take my meaning, kid?”

Isaiah’s lips twisted into an understanding grimace. “Yessuh. I understand.”

“Good.” Kin spoke as he shucked out of yesterday’s shirt and tugged on his only other one. “Mrs. Huston, she’s a kind lady. You’ve nothing to fear from her. But there are others who live in this building on the floors below, and I can’t speak about them.” With that, he gave a nod and headed toward the stairs. He called over his shoulder, “I work till six. Then I’ll return and we’ll get some dinner.” He paused with his hand on the railing and looked back at Isaiah who peered at him, wide-eyed, from the bedroom doorway. “Take a bath before you crawl under my blanket, okay kid?”

Isaiah smiled. “Yessuh. Thank you, suh.”

Kin gave him a wave of acknowledgment and hurried down the stairs.

***

The moment the man disappeared into the stairwell, Isaiah Coleman closed the bedroom door, sank onto the floor, held his head in his hands, and cried. “Lord, I done prayed fo’ You to send me help and You answered. I don’ know why You done took Pa. But You answered Ike, just like You did for some o’ them Bible people.”

Sobs shook him so forcefully that he collapsed onto his side. The floor pressed cool against his damp cheek. Relief and gratefulness gave way to a sorrow so deep it stole his breath and made it near impossible to inhale.

Pa gone. All alone in the world now. Nowhere to go.

He cried until the exhaustion of days on end without food or sleep dragged him under.

Hours later, he woke shivering from cold and hunger. He rose and jogged in place, swinging his arms to get his circulation moving. He wished for a fire. He wished for a lot of things. Pa had planned to outfit them for the Yukon once they arrived in Seattle. He’d been saving up for nigh on three years and when he’d heard about the gold up in the Yukon, he’d told Isaiah the Lord had good plans in store for them. They’d rented out their house and purchased their tickets.

But then Pa’d taken sick and died only hours before they arrived in port. And before Isaiah could get Pa’s money from his billfold, the ship’s captain had found and confiscated it. The captain claimed all of it was necessary to cover Pa’s final expenses, but at the service in the pauper’s cemetery, Isaiah had only seen him pay a single dollar for the digging of the grave and one more to the minister. When he’d asked for the rest of it, the captain had told him the remainder was owed to cover their passage.

Isaiah was fairly sure Pa had paid for their passage up front, but he was only a kid. Who would listen? Besides, without proof, he had no recourse.

So after the ceremony, he’d waited until the captain was busy talking with a couple other men, and then he’d darted away from the assembly of strangers who stood around Pa’s grave. He hadn’t gone back to the ship. He’d only had one other change of clothes in his knapsack anyhow. The only thing he’d cared about, he’d already been wearing and that was Pa’s thin coat. It still carried his scent, plus the last thing Pa had admonished him before he’d slipped into unconsciousness was not to be parted from his jacket.

Days later, he’d been wandering the docks and praying for the good Lord to send him help when he’d literally tripped over Kin Davis’s body.

At first, he’d thought him dead, and planned to steal his clothes, but when he’d realized he was simply dead-drunk, he’d started to walk away, yet something had made him stay. He couldn’t quite say what it was since he was wary of the docks, but maybe his near-death brush from his first night in the seaport had raised a protective spirit in him. He hadn’t wanted the helpless man to meet such a fate.

And now . . .

Isaiah lifted the one remaining sausage pie and sniffed it with appreciation. His stomach rumbled loudly as though belying the fact that he’d eaten a whole one only a few hours ago.

He forced himself to set the pie down and wait for later. Who knew how long it would be before he had food again? The man had said he’d return at six. But what if he forgot to come back for him?

Since he’d warmed slightly, he took one of the buckets and poured it into the galvanized tub behind the divider. Carefully, he shimmied out of his clothes and washed as good as he could with such a small amount of water in such a little tub. He used the water in the other bucket to rinse himself, gasping as the cold water sloshed across his skin.

He smirked. What he got, he supposed, for throwing that bucket of seawater in Mr. Davis’s face this morning.

With a towel wrapped around himself, he started to dress, but grimaced at the sight and smell of his clothes and chose to use the leftover bath water to wash them, instead. Once they were rung out, he draped them over the divider, then crawled beneath the warmth of the covers.

He was asleep again, almost before he closed his eyes.

Would you like to keep reading this story? Click here to find it in eBook, audiobook, or paperback.