Chapter 20-489: Epilogue IV: The Land has Chosen (1/2)

A year since Shroudbreak...

There were a bunch of them, and they were in high spirits. Christian White nodded in satisfaction at the line of horses and wagons, the latter with the new PMD designs trundling along, not needing someone to Cast or make Disks to shuffle people here.

They had alchemical bullets for their firearms, too, which wouldn’t just explode like gunpowder ones.

He was coming. Everyone knew he was coming. But they weren’t afraid, and they were in high spirits.

This was their land, this was their people. They hadn’t chosen him, some jiveass nobody from the East Coast; they’d chosen one of their own, and so his writ had no power here.

They’d face him down, and they would chase him off, and if they had to fight, they’d fight!

He was just one man, and they had Weapons. They could fight one man, even if he was a Ten!

“I think that’s him!” a sharp-eyed shooter called out, putting his binoculars up to his eyes.

Christian squinted at the dot in the distance, coming down the old road there. The asphalt had basically crumbled up into dust, rendering the old highway into just a well-made dirt road again, but there was something coming.

Coming pretty quick. He had really good eyes now, and he could see that, despite the figure seeming to be walking, he was closing in at a good pace. Lightfoot, sure enough, maybe some magic to speed him along.

Nobody knew what a King could do, after all.

Some of the boys were whooping and lifting rifles to take aim at the distant figure, as if they dared to take a shot at that range... or dared to shoot at all.

A cloud seemed to pass over the sun, and Christian looked up at the timing. It couldn’t be... could it? He shook his head and assured himself it was coincidence.

Sir Pellier, the Silver Shot, the Anointed, Acclaimed, and Acknowledged King of America, was coming here, seemingly alone and on foot.

But Texas didn’t want any part of him.

---

“That’s far enough, Pellier!” a voice rang out, and his eyes drifted over in its direction.

Yeah, that loudmouth White was calling out this bunch of idiots. There were about twelve hundred of them, in converted pick-ups, towed wagons, and a bunch standing on Sieged Disks. Some were holding Rifles and had coughed up the money for a few precious alchemical rounds to shoot, shaking them and pointing them in his general direction, as if they were dangerous or something.

Granted, there were a lot of people here, but that didn’t mean they were dangerous. They just thought they were, and they had no idea of the trouble they were in.

Sir Pellier didn’t stop walking, either. White had absolutely no Rank or authority to tell him to do a damn thing, especially on America’s soil.

The fool also had no gods-damned idea how much trouble he and his bunch of idiots were in.

He saw the ripple when he didn’t stop walking, but it didn’t mean much to him. He rather hoped these idiots would try something –

He saw the pop of smoke, and a bullet wanged off the ground a foot from his boots.

They saw a flash of silver, and then an explosion of argent light and alchemical ammunition as his pistol shot covered four hundred yards, smashed into the shooter’s Rifle, and blew it apart. The unfortunate shooter screamed and clawed at his face and eyes, now all covered with blood.

He put Lady Florentine back into her holster, and noted that the idiots were a bit taken aback.

“Pellier, if you keep walking, we’re gonna have to open fire!” White Called out loudly, lifting his own Rifle menacingly.

Pellier just kept walking forwards, ignoring the words. A wind began to pick up from the west, but because they had no Landbound or Druids among them, they couldn’t feel the Will of the Land in it.

To be fair, there weren’t any Druids or Landbound left in Texas, unless they had specific reasons for being there, reasons quite ominous...

Christian White was starting to flush, especially as everyone was looking at him to shoot first. There was no doubt he was intimidated by that shot. How the Hell did someone fast-draw with a pistol and hit a sniper from that far away? Was it because he was Smiting? Fred Harrison was an obedient guy, taking that shot with just a glance and a nod, but now he was screaming his fool head off, and his injuries were burning with silver and refusing to heal.

That wasn’t good...

Still, as Sir Pellier closed to one hundred yards away, Christian slowly brought his Rifle down, sweating as he did. Taking a shot at a Paladin, let alone the King of America... that was a big move. He could hear all sorts of clicks going on around him, and the spellcasters were pulling in power, ready to Cast and do what had to be done to defend their land.

For all that, there was no menace to the Paladin’s stride, or on his face. He could have been out there walking in the sun.

If anything, he looked... sad?

Christian White felt the wind rising, and looked around suddenly, lifting his Rifle back up as the Paladin walked closer. The guns eased back as he did, although there were definitely a bunch that only moved aside a little bit, eager to unload on the King of America.

Sir Pellier, in his browns and whites, came to a halt about twenty yards away.

Christian White swallowed, because Sir Pellier wasn’t standing in front of him, and indeed, wasn’t even looking at him.

“Amos Willoughby.” The Paladin’s dry Voice, laced with steel from Pennsylvania’s forging towns, was clearly audible to everyone. “I’m here to deliver a message to you and the rest of your Six Amigos.”

The rancher in the classic Stetson, properly a-horse for the best image, looked at the Paladin staring at him, and realized something very, very wrong was going on.

“For all the rest of you, you should just know that this Christian White piece of dirt you’re following is a patsy and a mouthpiece for Willoughby here and his five buddies. Willoughby has another name in the Church of Harse: the Tyrant of McCulloch County. There’s at least fifty missing persons there who can be laid at his feet.”

“You, you shut your mouth, Pellier!” the rancher shouted, pointing at him with his finger, while his men all tensed around him. “I’ll shoot you down right here and now for that kind of slander!”

“Won’t change a damn thing about what’s going to happen now, you murdering bastard,” the Paladin replied without blinking an eye, his gaze drifting from one group of guns to the next, bright and knowing, and those men all flinched as his gaze settled upon them. “Guimo Hernandez’s boys. He’s called the Rapist of the Flowers, as he only has sex with pre-teen girls down in Houston. The Aethrans have been waiting a long time to kill him, but his victims all disappear after he catches them.

“Biggest drug lord in Texas. Nice to see his boys here, backing a useless patsy like White.” Sir Pellier spit casually to the side.

“Nathan Coombs, called by the Aruans the Dark Fist of Galveston. Runs the city, no law there but his, biggest smuggling operation in the Southwest. Specializes in human traffic... sometimes in both directions. Any of you white boys got missing female cousins, he probably knows where they were sent.”

Some of the guns there began to waver, looking at White questioningly, who blurted out, “Lies and damn lies, Pellier-“

“TRUTH.”

Screams erupted up and down the line, some men falling right off their horses as the Word hung in the air like silver and smote their souls.

No guns were able to point at him now. Ignoring the cries and screams of those clutching at their eyes and noses after hearing the Word, Sir Pellier went on conversationally.

“Yeah, we know about Hagman, Duffy, and Gray, too,” he said in the same grim, level, patient, and somehow sad voice. “You all spent a lot of money, slick marketing, played upon the grand lie of Texan independence, and you convinced the vast majority of idiots that they could ignore everything that had been said, everything that you were warned about, and that they could seize their own destiny and do as they liked, they didn’t need a non-Texan King telling them how to run their lives.”

He sounded grimly amused, he really did.

“Why the fuck are you here, Pellier?” White demanded, face and hand smeared with crimson right now at having his lies and life shown to him like that, both very afraid and very angry that he was afraid.

Sir Pellier went on as if he hadn’t heard White. “You Six Amigos got a nice patsy and mouthpiece, did the job. Congrats on your stupidity. I’m afraid I have some bad news for you.” He sighed, looking over them all with a look a lot of them knew well.

It was the look you gave dead men...

“Sir, Sir Pellier!” Billy Joe Cranston blurted out, and the Paladin turned his eyes that way. “Why, why you here, Sir Pellier?” the ranch hand stammered, unable to keep something out of his voice, something infectious and nasty-shivering, as he glanced at some of the men nearby who belonged to Hagman, a sinfully rich once-oilman from Dallas, now a massive slumlord after hurriedly getting out of oil as petroleum became a deathtrap for wealth.

“I’m a messenger boy, is all, lad,” the Paladin finally answered. “Just a messenger.”

Hackles rose all around. This, this was the King of America! How could he be, who could...

The ground seemed to tremble oh so faintly against their feet.

“You made a line, you fools, and you dug it deep,” Sir Pellier said sadly. “You claimed something for yourselves, something that ain’t yours, and which is far, far bigger than you. She is pissed at you, and has decided to do something about you.”

There was a rumble this time. Those with lightfoot could feel it, those with magic felt a jolt of hot, hot mana running through the ley lines, and all of them jerked their heads back to the south, eyes wide at what they were feeling.

“You were warned that the lines you were setting down were not acceptable. You were given time to do something about it. And despite the good folk leaving, and those Sworn to the Land, you saw a chance at becoming lords and masters, and you decided to grab it.” Sir Pellier shook his head as they all stared at him, remembering the events of the past few months, and the people who’d left Texas, mocked as cowards and traitors...

“I’m here to inform you that America has decided to grant your request for Texas to be whatever you want it to be.” For some reason, that very, very welcome news only made their eyes bulge, because of the way he said it, like he was pronouncing a death sentence. “In return, America has decreed that Texas will be home to the Firelands of America, since She likes the country out in Montana better. They got good people out there.”

Christian White paled so hard he might have been a Cultivator for a moment there. “The, the Firelands...?” he squeaked in disbelief.

Sir Pellier still ignored him.

Another rumble swept past them from below, making the horses shake, and those holding spells ready saw Elemental Fire spark on their hands for a moment.

“Yeah. The Land went and drained the supervolcano under Montana and is putting all the lava into the drained oil fields and aquifers underneath Texas. Some of them are pretty unstable. Oh, you might not know this, since there’s a lot of psychic static in the way, but volcanoes just started spewing up in Dallas, Houston, Galveston... and McCulloch County at a certain ranch. El Paso, Austin, and San Antonio all just got their own volcanoes, too. Pretty much every capped oil well in the land is starting to burn right now.” He tilted back his soft cap slightly, no Stetson for him, eyes looking far away.

“No...” gasped Christian, staring at the Paladin, unable to not believe him, only deny him blankly.

“You’re all not Americans anymore, either.” For some reason, that simple statement came down like a load of bricks, despite everything else. It stuck in their minds like a knife of condemnation, severing any fancied connection to the proud thought that they were the only true Americans left with a razored edge. “So, you Texans better not be coming back to America if you decide to run. She don’t want you here.”