Chapter 8 - The Ledger of Blood
The tension in the root cellar snapped like a dry pine branch. Jonah didn't flinch; instead, his smile widened, stretching the burn scar across his cheek until it threatened to tear.
"Try it, brother," Jonah mocked, his hand hovering inches from the pearl-handled Colt strapped to his thigh. "Every page you burn adds another ten years of servitude to your own soul's account. Father signed the perpetual lease in eighteen-seventy-four. You can't shoot a legal binding."
Caleb didn't aim for Jonah. With blinding speed, he pivoted his wrist and fired into the open wooden barrel behind him.
Bang!
The deafening roar of the revolver shook dust and plaster from the ceiling. A stray spark from the gunfire caught the dry, yellowed slips of paper inside the barrel, and within a single heartbeat, the entire contents erupted into a fierce, white-hot blaze. Flames leaped toward the low wooden ceiling, illuminating the damp cellar in a sudden, blinding flash of light.
The twin girls shrieked—not with childish fear, but with a high, piercing, unnatural wail that sounded like tearing metal. They dropped the leather ledger and scrambled backward into the dark corners of the room, their skin blistering and smoking wherever the firelight touched them.
"You stupid bastard!" Jonah roared, lunging forward to draw his own weapon.
Caleb didn't hesitate. He vaulted over the burning barrel, his shoulder slamming hard into Jonah’s chest and sending both men crashing into the sagging pine shelving. Glass jars shattered into a thousand glittering pieces, showering them in pickled eggs and brine.
The sheriff screamed as the flames from the barrel began to lick along the dry floorboards, racing toward the stack of empty whiskey barrels in the corner.
"The whole place is going up!" the sheriff yelled, scrambling frantically toward the cellar stairs, only to find the heavy wooden door slammed shut again from the outside by an unseen force.
Caleb wrestled with Jonah in the glass and dirt, the two brothers rolling across the burning floor. Jonah’s strength was unnatural, his fingers digging into Caleb’s throat with the crushing pressure of a hydraulic press.
"You can't kill a debt, Caleb!" Jonah choked out, his eyes blazing with a fanatical, unholy light as the fire climbed the wooden support beams toward the saloon above. "We own the dirt! We own the water! We own your name!"
Caleb drove his knee upward, catching Jonah squarely in the ribs with a sickening crunch. As Jonah doubled over in agony, Caleb ripped the silver locket from his brother's neck, smashing it against the stone floor until the glass face shattered into dust.
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A sharp, agonizing scream echoed from beneath the floorboards—not from Jonah, but from a hundred different voices whispering simultaneously through the dirt.
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