During the 1870s, both life and travel are slow-paced. As Kyle travels lonely dirt roads outside St. Louis, planning to find a beautiful wedding dress for his future bride, Maggie, he decides to rest his weary body at Fort Harding. He sits down to participate in a late-night poker game with a devious sergeant and wins a blue amulet-an object that will change his life forever. After securing the amulet around his neck, Kyle sleeps restlessly and dreams of a wolf attacking a village. The next morning, he rides away toward home, feeling uneasy. As it turns out, Kyle's gut feeling is right. When Kyle is killed an Indian medicine man who takes the amulet, Kyle's brother, Jessie, is propelled into a perilous fight of desperation to find the trinket before his brother's soul vanishes into eternal damnation forever. In this compelling fantasy tale, time is of the essence as one man must rely on his budding psychic powers and the ghosts of his brother and parents to combat an Indian medicine man and his ancient magic-before it is too late.

Blue Destiny

By James R. Mesich

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2012 James R. Mesich
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4759-4737-3

Chapter One

The yellow moon was eerie as it hung heavily in the night's cloak of blackness when Kyle reached Fort Harding. He was on the return leg of his journey to St. Louis. Kyle made the trek to purchase the wedding dress for his fiancée, Maggie. Usually he'd wait for it to arrive on the delivery wagon as he would the rest of the supplies for the general store that he, his brother, and sister owned. But since this would be for his future bride, he wanted to make sure none of the usual mishaps from its moving around in the wagon took place. If there were a tear in the dress, Maggie would surely have his hide hanging next to the fireplace before he could say, "But Honey."

As he entered through the fort's front gates, Kyle could see the dim light escaping from the grimy windows of the tavern just off to his left. Silhouettes of men making merry could be seen dancing on the windows as the kerosene lamp's flame flickered inside. Kyle's dusty throat plagued his thoughts to join the men and bring it pleasure with a mug of ale. First, though, he had to put his horse up in the stables for the night and then ask the man in charge if he would be allowed to spend the night up in the loft as he had done on his way to St. Louis. The mice that lived in the loft bothered him, but after two or three mugs of ale, sleep would not be elusive.

The old man who was in charge of the livery stable had been fast asleep when Kyle walked his horse in through the open, heavy wooden doors. He hated to wake the old man; he looked so comfortable with his feet cocked up on a bale of hay that rested out in front of him. His arms were folded neatly across his chest, and his shiny bald head reflected the light from the lamp stationed above him.

When Kyle placed one of his hands on the old man's left shoulder, he thought the old man was going to jump clean out of his clothes.

"Ya damn fool! What in the hell are ya doin' sneakin' up on an old man like me," the old timer screamed, as he grabbed at the glasses that hung crookedly across his face. He did this while his heart raced faster than a rabbit running through the woods.

"I'm sorry, but I needed a place ta take up lodgin' fer the night, and I remembered yer invitation when I passed through here last." Kyle looked almost as startled as the old man. He didn't know old people could move so fast.

"How ya doin', son?" asked the old timer with his glasses finally set into place. "Come back ta spend the night in the loft again, have ya?"

"I'm a doin' just fine, sir. Is the offer still open?"

The old timer nodded his head, then took the reins out from Kyle's hand and led the horse toward its stable for the night, talking all the while. "I'd sure appreciate it if'n ya didn't go ta calling me, 'sir'. Makes me feel like I should be wearin' a tie. I don't like wearin' no ties. I have a fear of nooses 'round my neck." The old timer laughed. "The name's Jerome Rock. Remember?"

"Sure I do, Jerome, it's just that ya didn't look too friendly a li'l while ago and, 'sir' felt ta be the right thin' ta say."

"Sorry, boy, but when ya git as old as I am, ya learn ta bark out loud 'cause the bite just ain't there no more and neither 'er the teeth." Jerome then winked at Kyle and stuck his hand out for a shake to show no hard feelings. After they shook hands, Jerome continued, "This box ya have wrapped up in canvas on the back of yer horse is the weddin' dress, ain't it?"

"Sure is," Kyle told him proudly. "I'd take it out an show ya, but I'm too dusty from the trail, and if Maggie saw mah dirty fingerprints smudged all over it, why, she'd make my life miserable."

"I don't blame ya, son. If there's anythin' a woman's good at, it's knowin' how ta make someone's life miserable."

They smiled at each other after stopping for a moment to soak in the bit of wisdom that Jerome had just spoken. Then Kyle fished his hand into his pants pocket and pulled out the twenty-five-cent piece he needed for putting him and his horse up for the night, but Jerome would only take his hand. He said, "The twenty-five-cents is a weddin' present." After that they put the horse up and placed the wedding dress in a place where the mice couldn't gnaw on it. Jerome then sat back down and kicked his tired feet up on the bale of hay. Kyle could hear Jerome's knees crack as his legs extended.

"Drink one fer me, son," was what Kyle heard as he walked out the doors. He didn't even glance over his shoulder, he just raised one of his hands over his head with two fingers extended, and told the old timer, "Two. I'll drink two fer ya."

The walk from the stable to the tavern couldn't have been more than fifty yards, but it felt like a mile to Kyle. His tongue was as rough as a cat's, and he could hardly wait to drink up all the ale that his stomach could hold. The night had been a warm one. The crickets were singing like the world was coming to an end. Their rhythmic sounds kind of hypnotized him. It had been a long time since he had felt so relaxed. The ride coming back felt as if it took forever and it seemed everywhere Kyle looked he saw Maggie's face radiating her warm smile back at him.

Just as he put his hand on the door to the tavern and began pushing it open, he heard a sound that caused a tingling sensation to rush its way up his spine. It was a crying howl from a wolf. It echoed through the surrounding forest to the point where he didn't even know in which direction it was coming from. The reason it struck him so odd was the fact that there hadn't been any wolves in those parts for years. The trappers had killed them off. They said the wolves ate too much of their livelihood. Kyle stood there with the door pushed halfway open for a good minute or so, not knowing why he had let it bother him so much, when he heard a voice call out from inside the tavern, "Hey, boy, yer lettin' in all the damn skeeters. Now either come in or stay outside. We really don't care one way er the other in here long as ya shut that damn door."

Kyle snapped out of his daze and walked in, closing the door tightly behind him. "Sorry, it's just that when I heard that Wolf a howlin', I kind'a froze." Kyle said, and then continued as he settled up next to the bar. "I thought all the wolves were killed off in these parts long ago."

"They was," answered the stout bartender moving toward him from behind the bar as he wiped down a mug with his soiled rag. "Can I git ya anythin'?"

"Yep, I'll have an ale and a plug of jerky."

"Comin' up." The bartender bent over and poured ale into the mug he was holding from one of the kegs he had underneath the bar. "Ya know, yer the first fella I recall sayin' he heard a wolf in the last three years."

The voice he heard from when he stood outside the door rang from across the tavern, "I'm surprised ya could hear anythin' over those damn crickets." The voice belonged to an old army sergeant sitting at a heavy wooden table with cigarette burns decorating its edges. He and two other men sat kitty corner across from each other with a yellowed and worn deck of playing cards sprawled out on the middle of it. "We need some fresh blood. Care ta play?" continued the sergeant.

"Don't mind if I do," Kyle answered as he grabbed his mug from the top of the bar in one hand and laid down the coin the bartender requested for payment with the other. He then picked up the jerky and placed it in his mouth. It was spicy, but it was good.

"Haven't ya noticed?" asked the bartender as he looked over to the sergeant.

"No, what?" he replied.

"The crickets stopped when Junior here walked in through the door."

"Dang if ya ain't right," said the sergeant as he ran his calloused fingers through the graying beard on his face. "Boy, yer gonna have ta come here more often. 'Em blasted crickets have kept me awake more than one night. Sure hope they keep quiet."

"I don't think I had anythin' ta do with it," Kyle told the sergeant as he pulled his chair up to the table.

"Hell, then maybe it was yer wolf." A cynical grin painted itself across the sergeant's face as he spoke. "All I know is them thin's quit their yakkin' and fer that mah ears er beholdin'." He then pulled the cards to himself and began to shuffle them. "Five cards, two card draw, one-eyed Jacks wild, open on guts, nickel ante, and two raise limit," he recited as he dealt the cards.

Kyle smiled at the sergeant and said, "Sounds good. I feel lucky tonight."

The four men had been playing cards for three hours when the sergeant lost the last of his money. Kyle's shirt pocket was bulging. It seemed he couldn't lose. He was ready to call it a night. Daylight came early and the ales were greasing the hinges on his tired eyes.

"I've had enough. Thanks fer lettin' me sit in. Nice meetin' yas," Kyle told the men as he scraped his heavy chair across the floor while pushing it and himself away from the table.

The sergeant began to get red in the face, "Takin' the money and leavin'?"

"Leave the boy alone, Sarge. He won the money fair and square," said one of the other men at the table as he rolled himself a cigarette with machine-like precision.

The other man nodded his head in agreement with him.

"Maybe ya two don' care if'n this here whippersnapper walks away with yer money, but I sure as hell do!" screamed the sergeant as he swept his half full mug of ale from the table and onto the waiting floor with the back of his right hand.

Kyle's tired eyes opened wide with the sudden change in the sergeant's mood. His chair quit scraping the floor as his legs froze stiff with fear. The sergeant had to be a good fifty pounds heavier and four inches taller than him. "What do ya want me ta do?" asked Kyle.

"I want one more chance ta git mah twenty dollars back. I have somethin' put away in mah footlocker back at the barracks. It's worth twice the twenty." The red veins in the sergeant's eyes seemed to pulse as he spoke. "We each cut the deck once, high card wins."

"All right," said Kyle after he gulped loudly.

"All right then. I'll be back in five minutes," quipped the sergeant as he made his way to the door, knocking over two chairs while his heavy-footed steps slowed down for nothing in his way.

"I hope I don't win," Kyle told the two men at the table and the bartender who stayed hidden behind the safety of his oak bar with steel rod in hand. All they did was give him a half-hearted smile. Kyle knew they agreed with him.

It couldn't have been five minutes when the sergeant returned with a black cloth wadded up in his right hand. He had his hand clasped so tightly around it that his knuckles were white. "I've had it fer ten years now and I've never let it leave my foot locker since I got it," said the sergeant as he laid the rag out on the table.

The bartender left the safety of his barricade to get a closer look at the secret possession the sergeant was about to unveil. Kyle and the two other men who were sitting at the table leaned forward to get as close a look as they possibly could.

When the sergeant began to unfold the corners of the cloth his fingers trembled like a gambler with one last roll left on the dice. It seemed to take forever for the cloth to finally fall open, but after it laid open exposing its contents the wait became something that would be lost on their memories. All their eyes focused on an incredibly deep blue stone that glistened as if it had an inner flame of its own. There it laid in the middle of the dirty black cloth, a jewel out of place. It was some kind of an amulet.

"My God, it's beautiful," Kyle said in a low, almost inaudible tone.

"I haven't let anyone else see it until tanight. It's been my own private little treasure. I didn't ever show it ta anyone 'cause I didn't want them ta steal it. Thieves everywhere." The sergeant wiped the perspiration from his brow, and then continued,"Well, boy, are ya still willin' ta' cut the cards with me?"

"Ya know I am, as long as yer still willin'."

The sergeant stared down at the amulet as he answered, "I wouldn't of brought it out if'n I didn't want ta git mah money back."

Kyle then pushed the cards across the table to the sergeant and let him shuffle the deck. Sweat began to drip off the end of his nose. He had the look of a man who was about to cut one of his fingers off.

"Where did ya get this?" asked Kyle as he reached for the amulet. He wanted to hold it in his hand so he could take a closer look at it.

"Take yer dang hands from that. It ain't yers yet!" screamed the sergeant as he stared at Kyle with his hateful eyes. "Now ya cut first!" he ordered as he slammed the over shuffled deck down onto the middle of the table. The slamming sound made from the deck echoed around the tavern.

Kyle reached for the deck with his sweaty palm. The tension from the sergeant had transposed itself onto him. After picking the top half of the deck up in his hand he looked at the bottom card and swallowed his sinking heart. It was the five of spades. He swallowed his heart because after looking at the amulet he wanted to win it and give it to Maggie. He knew she would love it. Kyle flipped his card over for all to see.

A grin had found itself spreading across the sergeant's face as he spoke to Kyle, "Golly ... I don't know. That one's gonna' be pretty hard ta beat." Then he reached for the deck without a second thought and flipped over the card he cut for all the straining eyes that were around him to see. He saw it when everyone else did. It was the five of hearts.

"The boy won!" screamed the bartender. "A spade always beats a heart!"

The sergeant stared at Kyle with a spiteful look, then pushed his chair away from the table and walked straight to the door, never looking back or saying a word.

Kyle didn't watch the sergeant as he stalked away. The amulet that lay on the table was all he could see. He was like a child who had just won a jar full of hard candies.

He sat there for a good minute or two before one of the two men that he had been playing cards with told him to pick the amulet up and take a closer look at it.

As he reached for the amulet, he could feel a warmth fill his body. It was like no experience he had ever felt before. It was a feeling of euphoria. It seemed as if all of his troubles had vanished from his mind and only calmness remained. That was when he realized why the sergeant didn't want him to touch it. The sergeant was afraid that if someone else knew about the powers hidden in the amulet, they might try to steal it or maybe even kill for it.

Once it finally found its way into his hand, Kyle clasped it so tightly it almost cut through the skin on his palm. He then pushed himself away from the table and began to walk toward the door.

As he walked away from the table, the bartender asked him, "Aren't ya gonna let us take a gander at it, boy?"

Kyle surveyed the men with their hungry eyes. He swore he could almost hear them begging. Then he answered them. "Thank ya all fer the interestin' evenin', but sleep's playin' heavy on mah eyes, and I've got a long day of ridin' ahead of me tamorrow. So I better git goin'. Thank ya all again."

The bartender began to ask one last time when Kyle cut him short, "Sorry, but if'n I start ta passin' this here cheap little trinket 'round, I'll be here maybe another hour and about two more ales and that means I ain't never gonna git an early start and I don't want ta waste any precious daylight. Not only that, I'll have ta bounce around on old Buck with a hangover an that's somethin' I ain't never lookin' forward ta." Kyle then smiled at the men as he still wore his poker face. They all said goodnight as he shut the door behind him.

Kyle noticed the crickets returned to their singing. The wolf had become a distant memory. Nothing bothered him, not even the fact that he would have to spend the night as a guest of the mice living in the loft.

After tiptoeing past Jerome, who had fallen asleep exactly where he left him, Kyle climbed a ladder that led to the loft and kicked back on a few solid bales of hay; mice preferred the loose hay. Then he held the amulet over himself, letting it catch the moonlight that crept in through a crack in the roof above him. What a prize, he thought to himself, as he marveled at its beauty and the way it made him feel. He then took the leather drawstring off the front of his buckskin shirt, ran it through the eye on the top of the amulet, tied a knot at the end of the string, and placed it around his neck for safe keeping. Sleep was not far behind. Not even Jerome's snoring could keep him awake, which by no means was a small feat.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Blue Destinyby James R. Mesich Copyright © 2012 by James R. Mesich. Excerpted by permission of iUniverse, Inc.. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.