Into the Bright Unknown (The Gold Seer Trilogy #3)
Rae Carson
Dedication
For my husband,
who came with me on this long journey
Dramatis Personae
Leah “Lee” Westfall, a sixteen-year-old girl Jefferson Kingfisher, Lee’s fiancé The Joyners
Rebekah “Becky” Joyner, a widow from Tennessee Olive Joyner, her seven-year-old daughter Andrew Joyner Jr., her five-year-old son Baby Girl Joyner, an infant The Glory, California Crew “Major” Wally Craven, former wagon train leader Hampton Freeman, formerly Bledsoe Mary, Lee’s friend
Old Tug and the Buckeyes, miners from Ohio Wilhelm, a hired thug turned blacksmith The Illinois College Men Jasper Clapp, a doctor
Thomas Bigler, a lawyer
Henry Meek, currently seeking employment Others, in San Francisco James Henry Hardwick, a wealthy businessman Miss Helena Russell, an associate of Hardwick’s Jim Boisclair, a former store owner from Dahlonega, Georgia “Mr. Keys,” Hardwick’s accountant Frank Dilley, a hired gun Sheriff Purcell
Sonia, a pickpocket
Billy, a young orphan and thief Melancthon Jones, a ship’s carpenter and cook
LATE JANUARY 1850
Chapter One
The log cabin I share with the Joyner family is murky and dank, with a packed dirt floor that moistens to near mud at the base of the walls. But it has a solid roof, a cozy box stove, and—best of all—a single bright east-facing window with a real glass pane. Real glass! It’s such a rarity since coming west to California, but our claims have proved out so well that we can afford a few luxuries.
I work hard each day and fall into my bedroll exhausted but happy. Usually, I’m awakened by Zeus, Becky Joyner’s proud rooster, who trumpets every single dawn like it’s going to be the best day of his life. Sometimes I don’t wake until the first light of morning shines through that window, warming my cheeks and eyelids.
And every great once in a while, I’m so late abed that Becky or one of the children must intervene.
“Miss Leah Westfall, you get up right this minute, or I’m going to pour the wash bucket onto your face.”
A skirted shape looms over me, backlit by the light of the window. Her hands are on her hips, her head cocked to the side. I groan and rub my eyes. “Becky?”
“Pull on your boots and a coat and come help me. Quick.”
Obeying Becky is such a habit that I’m sitting up and reaching for my boots before her words sink in. “Something wrong?” I ask.
“Just got news the peddler is coming. Any miner within fifty miles square is showing up this morning, and a few Indians besides. Every seat is full. We’ll probably run out of food, but we can keep everyone full up on coffee.”
Becky is a terrible cook, but that hasn’t stopped her tavern business from booming. People come from all over to experience the “bad food, bad service” of the Worst Tavern in California. Or so they say. I expect the real reason they travel so far and spend so much gold is that our town of Glory now boasts a few female residents. Becky suffers at least one marriage proposal per day. Mary, her hired waitress, gets several per week. Even I get my fair share, in spite of the fact that I’m already affianced to the best fellow in all of California.
Thinking of Mary puts a puts a nervous hitch in my breath. I’ve been meaning to talk to her about something important—about the real reason for Glory’s prosperity—but I keep finding excuses to delay: Knowing the truth might put Mary in danger. Knowing the truth might chase her away. Knowing the truth might make her stay, but for all the wrong reasons.
I’ve been putting if off for weeks, ever since we escaped Uncle Hiram’s mine together. I just need to gather my gumption and get it done.
“I’ll see you outside,” Becky says, and she leaves.
I lace up my boots, splash icy water on my face, and wrap a scarf around my neck. I’m still wearing yesterday’s skirt of soft yellow calico, a parting gift from a friend who left for Oregon territory. If Mama were alive, she’d box my ears to see me wearing my everyday skirt to bed.
My hand goes to the golden locket dangling at my throat, like it does every morning. It’s my last keepsake from Mama; I took it from her still-warm body right after she was murdered, and it traveled all the way across the continent with me.
And as I clutch the locket in my palm, letting the precious metal invade all my senses, I realize that Mama would have been fine about the skirt. She was smart and practical, and she would have understood that things are different in California.
I pull on my coat, push open the door, and step into the brisk morning.
It’s a clear, bright day, perfect for prospecting. Frost surrounds the stoop, covers the canvas roofs of the nearby shanties, even edges our big muddy pond at the end of town. The sun is just now peeking over the oak and pines, turning all that frost into glittering diamonds. Shanties and lean-tos and tents hug the slope of our hill, all the way down to the muddy field and paddock. The structures don’t look like much from the outside, but one tent houses Jasper, a doctor; another has Wilhelm, a blacksmith; and still another a leather worker. Glory is a right and proper town now, as fine a town as any I’ve lived in, with even finer people.
To my left is the Worst Tavern, full up on folks sitting at long tables beneath an enormous, thrice-patched awning. Mostly miners, a few Indians. Two woodstoves keep everyone in steady biscuits and provide extra warmth—the seats nearest the stoves are always first to fill. Becky works a griddle, flipping flapjacks and bacon. Her daughter, seven-year-old Olive, is at the other stove, using tongs to lift biscuits into a basket. Mary, Glory’s only current Chinese resident, is scurrying back and forth between the stoves and the tables, delivering food, filling coffee cups, growling at customers.
When she sees me, she gives me a relieved smile.
“What can I do?” I ask.
“Coffee. Here, take this.” She shoves the pot into my hands. “Olive’s got a second pot brewing on the stove for when that’s empty. Sure hope that peddler brings another one. We’ll need three pots going at once by the end of the month.”
I start at the nearest table and fill all the cups to three quarters full. Mary grabs dirty plates and heads toward the wash station. One of the miners, a grizzled fellow with a big bald spot dead center on his scalp, reaches up with grasping fingers for Mary’s backside.
Mary whirls and—quick as a viper—whips out a handkerchief and snaps it at him.
The grizzled man snatches his hand back. “I was just being friendly!”
“Be friendly without using your hands,” Mary says.
The man frowns. “You ask me, this tavern ought to be called Uppity Women.”
Mary grins. “Thank you for the compliment, sir.”
He squints. Before he can suss it out, I step forward with my pot. “Hot coffee, sir?”