Bearing Witness

By Joyce Reynolds-Ward

A Weird West multiverse novella!

When Adam Thornton uses a forbidden sickle bar mower on Kalosin land, he opens that entire universe to incursion from the dreaded Soulers.

Can his neighbor Mad Jesse Pruitt, a Wild Colonist magician with experience across several worlds, manage to work with a long-standing foe, Federal magician Elihu Williams, as well as Jesse's Kalosin wife Tianawis and his brother-in-law Mamotsin, to save not only Thornton but Kalosin from the horror from beyond the Vortex? Or will the Kalosin refuge no longer remain safe?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Joyce Reynolds-Ward
• Release date: Mar 29, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215947272

Joyce Reynolds-Ward

Joyce Reynolds-Ward splits her time between Portland and Enterprise, Oregon. A former special education teacher, Joyce also enjoys horses, skiing, and other outdoor activities. She's had short stories and essays published in First Contact Café, Tales from an Alien Campfire, River, How Beer Saved the World 1 and 2, Fantasy Scroll Magazine, and Trust and Treachery. Her novels Netwalk: Expanded Edition, Netwalker Uprising, Life in the Shadows: Diana and Will, Netwalk’s Children, and Alien Savvy as well as other works are available through Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Google Play, and other sources. Alien Savvy is also available in audiobook through Audible, Amazon, and iTunes. Follow Joyce's adventures through her blog, Peak Amygdala, at www.joycereynoldsward.com, or through her LiveJournal at joycemocha. Joyce’s Amazon Central page is located at http://www.amazon.com/Joyce-Reynolds-Ward/e/B00HIP821Y.

Book preview

1 Breaking The Rules

Git up! Adam Thornton slapped the reins on the haunches of the good draft team in front of him as they faced into the setting sun’s glare.

Just a few more rounds to finish cutting this hayfield!

But that could take longer than it had back home in old First World Kansas. Bessie and Mollie hadn’t pulled a mower since they had come through the Vortex with him to this misbegotten Kalosin version of Oregon. Supposedly that had only been four years ago—but who knew how time flowed between worlds? Not even the Wild Colonist sorcerers such as Mad Jesse Pruitt could say.

At least this year he wasn’t scything.

Big, jagged rocks Thornton would have sworn—if he had been a man to swear—that hadn’t been in this field before grabbed at the wheels and at the mower bar, popping up to snatch at the sickle teeth and the grass board. It wasn’t the experience he remembered from Kansas back across—how many worlds now?

What did it say that he now accepted the possibility of multiple worlds coexisting at the same time?

World One, filled with clamor, stink, clouds, and confusing technology where a Civil War was years in the past. World Two, dark, foul, and threatening, where ongoing divisions between abolitionists and slavers had never been resolved, or escalated to open war. Kalosin was the third place since they’d fled the First World to escape the Nebraska-Kansas war, Jayhawkers and Bushwhackers alike taken over by shadowy, supernatural entities that Thornton didn’t completely comprehend.

Thornton and his wife Addie had fallen to their knees in thanksgiving when the Vortex opened to reveal this apparently benign, fecund, Kalosin world. At last, a peaceful place where they could farm and raise a family without the disruption of lawless bands of men willing to kill, burn, and plunder over the freedom of dark-skinned people.

Thornton hadn’t considered the price that came along with the Kalosin refuge. The rules. None of it made sense to him. Sometimes he thought that the same cursed entities back in First World had a foothold here as well.

He brushed the sweat off of his brow with a wrist and growled again at the horses, slapping the reins. Instead of moving on, the bay mares stopped, throwing their heads high, rolling their eyes.

What the—? Thornton squinted against the sun’s brightness. Sure, the land’s magic fought the mower’s working parts, but Bessie and Mollie hadn’t balked until now. The air shimmered in front of them. Thornton blinked. Finally, he could make out a stolid figure standing just a little bit ahead of the horses. Several figures, in fact. Kalosin.

Cold fear tightened his gut. He hadn’t seen the natives come out of the forest.

Thornton tightened his jaw. He’d paid the Kalosin fair and square for this property. The Kalosin might oppose the metal and mechanical aspects of the mower, but by God, this was his property, title confirmed by the Kalosin-approved New Territorial Government. And the mower had been blessed, after all. Just not by one of their sorcerers.

He glanced around quickly. No one stood behind him, just the freshly-cut hay. No one to his sides. Just the three—no, four—figures who stood quietly in front of him.

Thornton stepped off of the mower, quickly moving to the side and keeping rein contact as the mares shifted their feet nervously, wanting to leave. He adjusted his hat to block the setting sun.

What do you want? he demanded of the nearest Kalosin. He couldn’t recognize the man, painted as his face was in shades of black and white, body stripped of all clothing. No weapons, at least.

You use forbidden tools. The Kalosin’s voice seemed to come from a greater distance than the thirty feet between them. Flickering waves vibrated between them so that Thornton couldn’t see the man clearly. He moved even further forward, angling so that he could try to see who this Kalosin was. But the glimmer, almost like a midday water illusion, kept on.

Despite himself, Thornton shivered.

Magician. Sorcerer. Shaman.

He hadn’t reckoned on facing actual heathen practices when he’d taken Addie through the Vortex seeking a peaceful place to hide. Hadn’t the Mission Board sworn that they’d all be going someplace safe, away from the wars not just between slaver and abolitionists but white and Indian? Somehow that had failed, disappeared along with the Board into some unknown reality. Only Preacher Martin had made it through, and his theology was far too reminiscent of the divisive elements from the First World.

But Martin was the only Christian preacher in Kalosin. Unless Thornton wanted to go to the Black Robes, and he wasn’t ready to go along with their Popish practices.

It’s my land, he said through dry lips, voice nearly cracking.

You signed an oath not to use mechanical equipment on this land. The Kalosin gestured toward the sickle bar mower.

I bought the land fair and square! Thornton blustered. The mower has been blessed. It’s supposed to be able to function without hurting that oath.

Alas, you do not know the difference between blessings and curses. What you received is not what you thought it was. It threatens all of us. The Kalosin sighed. His deep breath didn’t fade as he exhaled but grew louder, like a sudden echoing wind in a deep mountain canyon. Vibration trembled through Thornton’s body and his horses bolted sideways, scrambling frantically as a whirlwind filled with fresh green hay whipped around them. Thornton wrestled with the reins while trying to protect his face.

Whoa, he barked, jerking hard at the reins and digging in his heels, trying to keep track of where the mower was so that if he fell it wouldn’t be in its path. WHOA!

The horses finally careened to a stop. Thornton slowly wound up the reins as the whirlwind of grass stems settled around them. He placed one hand on a quivering bay haunch, muttering soothingly to the trembling mare as he worked his way slowly up to Bessie’s head, inching his hands up the reins. If he could just get Bessie settled, then Mollie would calm down too.

Hand on the bridle. Rubbing Bessie’s nose. The big mare sighed and relaxed. Keeping one hand on the bridle, Thornton looked back to where the Kalosin shamans had been.

They still stood there, unnaturally immobile.

Thornton shivered. He worked his way back down Bessie’s side, unwinding the reins as he went. She trembled as he approached her hind end, chomping on her bit and raising her head, stomping one hind foot. But she stood, even though she flinched slightly away from his hand as he patted her rear before he looked at the sickle bar.

Jumping Jehosephat…. Thornton’s voice trailed off as he studied the twisted mess. The mower had dug into the ground, curved into a circle—no. He moved closer, keeping a firm pressure on the reins as Bessie and Mollie pulled nervously against his hand.

The blade was twisted in a knot. Bessie and Mollie tried