Chapter 12
The fog rolled down the main street of the ghost town with terrifying speed, extinguishing the harsh desert sunlight and plunging the settlement into a ghostly twilight. The rhythmic sound of hoofbeats grew deafening, shaking the foundations of the Lucky Star Saloon and rattling the wooden barrel near the porch.
Caleb stepped back onto the wooden steps, his hand resting firmly on the butt of his revolver. He peered into the rolling gray mist, his heart hammering against his ribs as massive, dark silhouettes began to materialize out of the fog.
Doored horsemen—dozens of them, all wearing tattered cavalry jackets and dust-caked wide-brimmed hats—emerged from the mist, their mounts moving with an eerie, synchronized stiffness. They didn't speak. They didn't look left or right. They stared straight ahead with hollow, empty sockets where their eyes should have been, riding in an endless, silent column toward the saloon.
The two little identical sisters didn't flinch. They stood calmly in the middle of the street as the vanguard of the ghostly cavalry rode right past them, the horses’ hooves passing through the children as if they were made of smoke.
Caleb drew his weapon, leveling it at the lead rider, though he knew bullets couldn't stop an army of phantoms.
“Stop right there!” Caleb shouted, his voice echoing off the rotting wooden facades.
The lead rider pulled his horse to a halt directly in front of the saloon porch. The animal let out a silent, ghostly whimper. The rider slowly tilted his head upward, revealing a face covered in old, blackened burns—the exact face of the captain who had led the regiment at Red River so many years ago.
“You’re late for roll call, Sergeant,” the burned captain rasped, his jaw moving with a dry, clicking sound.
Caleb’s grip on his revolver tightened until his knuckles turned white. He looked back and forth between the army of the damned filling the street and the two little sisters standing near the wooden barrel, watching him with patient, unblinking focus.
“I’m not your soldier anymore,” Caleb said, his voice trembling with defiance. “My war ended a long time ago.”
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The burned captain chuckled, a dry sound like autumn leaves scraping across pavement, and pointed a blackened finger straight at the glowing star branded on Caleb’s chest.
“A war like ours never ends, boy,” the captain whispered. “You just change uniforms.”
