Just a reminder to everyone that the official release date for The Clockwork Caterpillar will be April 5th. You can preorder The Clockwork Caterpillar digital version from your favourite digital storefront. The Amazon link can be found here. And this here is the Kobo link.  Today we’ll be taking a look at the first part of the opening chapter. Enjoy the preview and don’t forget to keep your eyes on the store for the release!

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Chapter 1

 

“There ain’t but two kinds of folk in this world: those who have and those who have not.”

The smell of gunpowder stung Hopkins’ nose as he rode into the wilds. The blood on his coat was barely noticeable beneath the dust layered over it like a thin sheath. Pounding hooves behind him echoed as righteous thunder on the wind, and he cast weary eyes over the motley crew. Despite the steely looks, strapped pistols and stained knives, they had flinched at the executions. They had betrayed their hardened composure and revealed themselves for the spring calves they were.

Theirs would be as little valued than as sustenance for the wolves.

This was a harsh land and it wouldn’t broker the meek. Strife was its master and only those of obdurate fortitude could hope to bring it to heel. Few could claim such power. None could hold it.

Many tried, of course. The first were the Castilleons. Their explorers, seeking the riches of the Jade Empire across the globe, stumbled upon this untamed world. They leveraged the superiority of the old countries to break the will and bones of the savages. Blade and pistol saw huge swathes bow their beaten, beaded heads. For their ruthlessness, the Castilleons were rewarded with riches unimaginable. The treasures brought back were more than mere gold. Consequently, the attentions attracted by their discoveries were not restricted to the mercenaries.

Hopkins twisted in his saddle, directing his provisional crew over the rocky crest. They came from all walks: displaced farmers, failed merchants, persecuted faithful and opportunistic blackguards. They were driven by their masters from the Old World hoping that mere bodies alone would stake their claims on this bountiful soil. But even in this vast new expanse, the old empires found little room for cohabitation. Their conflicts spilt across the ocean and demanded their discarded citizens to die in their names.

Many balked, showing the limits of power those distant crowns possessed here. Only the Thyrians brought righteous fury in response so—even as the Castilleon colonies crumbled beneath the revolts of its natives—the Thyrian throne’s expansion into the unclaimed territories was unmatched. But the wider the throne’s reach, the greater the gaps grew in their control. Many fled to the frontiers, their reasons as numerous as their origins. Hopkins himself hardly recalled the life that birthed him. So long had he survived this land that the old places had all but faded to a bad memory. The only thing that haunted him was what little with which he began.

And though they were greenhorns, the men and women at his command were testament to his successes. Laws were only good for those that could enforce them. For the rest, there was profit to be made by crushing those too feeble to enforce the will of the magistrates. Hopkins regretted the years toiling in service of others for scraps when there were greater bounties to be gained by working for oneself.

That he was to be rewarded now for such simple mayhem felt a cheat. And with the amount promised, he found it hard not to imagine how it would be spent. Perhaps he would hire his own crew and purchase one of those magnificent steam engines which cowed the savages before its ferocious iron cattle-catcher.

Or, even better, he could steal his own for a fraction the cost. All that would be needed were capable hands he could beat into a ruthless outfit.

These ones, though, would do until the bridge. And then Hopkins would teach the promising few that less hands make for fatter wallets. There was a way business was conducted beyond the coastal settlements. Things were simpler. Hopkins had but one tenet that held true; no matter what befell his path, he would never end with less than he started.

And Hopkins would not be disturbed by the bodies that lay between him and that dream.

The road tore towards a canyon so ripped into the red rock that it formed a great gash across the flesh of the earth. Scarlet was the soil which spilt forth. It was the blood of the land and it seeped down its sheer banks, drowning the scrub and sickle trees hanging over precipitous nothing. The savages said the place was cleaved during the formation of the world and forever would it bleed so long as man raised hand against his own.

They would treat it as a cautionary tale instead of a guide.

Hopkins spurred his steed forward in anticipation. But the mare gave a warning cry. Her nostrils flared with some foreign scent. He reined her to a gentle canter as eyes darted amongst the craggy stones. His hand purchased the pistol at his side while the other signalled the crew. This was not his first ambush.

But no rifles cracked as he rounded the crest. The bridge rose steadily into sight and Hopkins fixated on the prize.

There she stood.

She was as still as the great canyon’s sides: unflinching and eternal. Her long coat caught about her, snapping with the hunger of a starved dog. The great brim of her hat fluttered as though it meant to catch freedom in the crystal blue sky. Her fingers held true to the cold steel and polished wood of the longrifle’s simple stock. The hammer lay cocked. The flashpan was primed. A single long braid pulled behind her with the dying veracity of an old battle standard prepared for its final stand.

Was this all that impeded the end of his escape? Hopkins had been told the job would be easy. True to form, the cache offered little resistance. The few guards were easily overcome. And now, nary but a girl pretending at vigilante justice was all that remained between him, precious freedom and a handsome reward on the opposite side.

Hopkins raised his pistol, giving a shout as he kicked his horse into a full charge. The others followed.

Still she stood with nothing but the wilds gathered around her. She sought no shelter amongst the worn ropes and weathered wood giving over to burnished steel. Temporary towers stood unmanned, their simple cranes and suspenders groaning in the wicked breath of the canyon. The Glorious Belt Bridge was undergoing a remarkable transformation as its forgotten timbers were recast in fresh iron beneath its cocoon of scaffolding. Lines of new posts and beams ran its sides like great, sleeping pupae. Someone had expensive interest in expanding a crossing that none had used in decades.

Someone else, however, had more expensive interests in seeing that its construction was never completed.

The waggon rattled behind in its attempt to keep pace. Beneath its roped cover banged barrels filled to the brim with reserved gunpowder. There was enough black dust to keep a frontier state supplied for four months. Or enough to send the entirety of the Glorious Belt Bridge to the waiting arms of the Lord above.

She did not falter with their arrival.

Hopkins’ cry rose above the hooves. Horses shook their heads as riders pulled upon their reins. The group came to a stumbling halt as Hopkins grinned at the unshakeable darling who squared off against the half-dozen armed outlaws falling upon her.

“You’ve got guts. I give you that,” Hopkins called.

The terrific mare of bright chestnut fur and proud dark eyes stepped forward and shook her head menacingly.

She fingered the trigger of her rifle. “Dirty Hopkins.”

The broad-shouldered ruffian twitched scraggly whiskers. He poked the tip of his muddied Boss of the Plains perched upon an untamed and brown streaked straw mane. A single thread of faded yellow wound about it, but whatever noble prospects it once bespoke were tarnished by the blood speckling the fabric. His arms—draped in buckskin—crossed and the tens of dangling trimmed fringe fibres waved their little cloth fingers in the breeze.

“Don’t think we’ve met.”

“Ain’t had the pleasure ‘till now.”

He surveyed the bridge for foul intentions. But there was only the woman and a construction site in dire repair. He led his horse to the side, looking over the edge.

Far beneath cut a trickling blue stream like a child’s discarded ribbon. The great stone walls rose up on either flank. In both directions drew the exposed red and pink wound. Only the most distant peaks were tinged white as they crawled towards the sky. And nothing else crossed its expanse save for this great metal and wood monstrosity. If there were others, they would be faint motes amongst the rocky shadows. Had they clung unseen to the underside of the bridge, there was no expeditious way for them to scramble up its side.

Hopkins raised a hand to his hat, pressing the brim further up his face. He had seen misplaced courage before—even from the fairer sex when they felt pressed against the walls of their frontier farms—but nothing like this.

“And what brings a fine specimen such as yourself so far into the wastes? Ain’t a proper place for a little thing like you. Ruffians about, I hear.”

“Surely, I hope.” The rifle faced the rider.

Hopkins smiled, turning back to his gang. A few had followed in drawing their weapons. He barked at the rest. Immediately, four outlaws dismounted, pulled the canvas across the vehicle’s back and fetched the large barrels from its end.

“You got gumption. Ain’t necessarily a blessing.”

He leaned back in his saddle, wholly unperturbed by the weapon. When she didn’t respond, he gave her a questioning nod of his head.

“You got a name to that face?”

“Ain’t one that matters. But if it’s required, you may address me as Felicity.”

And that appellation made him lean forward in his seat.

“I’ve heard of you.” Lips curled back to reveal a row of rotted teeth. “One of them hunters and runners scratching a living on them ships between empires.”

He looked up and down the bridge.

“But I ain’t see no ship.”

“There’s two ways we play this. You come willing or you come roughly. Either way’s ending the same.”

“And where we be heading, my dear?”

“You gone and made some folk irate. Falls on me to bring you back to them.”

“Aiming for a bounty?” Hopkins smiled. “Well ain’t that a thing. And you going to do it all on your lonesome?”

He regarded the cowled men as they dragged their payload towards the bridge’s supports. Felicity finally acknowledged them, her eyes hardly bothering with the pistols by their sides.

“Only got business with you. They’re free so long they ain’t done nothing unlawful.”

Hopkins laughed. He swung one leg over his saddle, dropping from his horse and taking a few testing steps forward. His snakeskin boots thumped against the wood as he drew closer and closer without a single discharge from the rifle’s barrel. He heard members readying firearms and setting along the side angles. Hopkins rested a callused hand on the rifle’s top, pressing the weapon’s muzzle earthward.

“I ain’t tell if you’re bold or just full of aethers. I reckon you can turn your cute little hat around and walk away from this and I ain’t have to bloody your pretty little face.”

He could smell her now. This was no perfumed lady or pioneering immigrant. She smelled of sweat and grease. There were smudges of gunpowder staining her cheeks. Though her olive skin was radiant, it was scratched and marked with edges of scars creeping from her collar. And her eyes were hard as she raised them to meet his. There was not a trace of youthful brashness within their dark pits. They were cold and they were empty.

Hopkins hadn’t removed his hand from her rifle and he gave a quick tug, trying to yank it from her. But her grip held and she pulled back, the barrel slipping through his fingers. Before she could raise it, however, Hopkins struck. The back of his hand connected with her cheek fiercely. She fell from her stance for the first time.

She raised the rifle, but warning fire kept her from pulling the trigger. The outlaw grinned.

“It’s a wonder folk like you still manage a living. There can only be so much coin running unregistered shipments off the schedules. You want my advice? You got to look elsewhere for a scratch.”

He jabbed the tip of his pistol into her chest, causing her to wince as he grasped her shoulder.

“Now, I ain’t going to ask again. You better drop that little smokemaker of yours.”