Storm Breaker

Rangers and gods

I originally wrote Storm Breaker for the Magic Malfunction anthology for Raconteur Press. They didn’t pick it up, and I rewrote it for the Magic Malfunction anthology. Also not picked up. So here it is, in a way never seen before by anybody. I combined the parts I missed from Magic Malfunction with the more polished Magic Malfunction manuscript, and I think this version is better than both were on their own. What happens when a hurricane thunders down on Eastern Texas in 1877? If you know history, you know exactly what happened. But history discounted the contribution of Rangers and gods. This story puts them back exactly where they belong.

1877, September 17

Texas

Gulf of Mexico Coast

Storm Breaker

Captain William Carter trudged through the pouring rain, pulling one boot out of the sucking mud at a time. A decade’s worth of drought had left even the coastal Texas ground cracked and drier than normal. Now it sucked the rain up like a cactus, and tried to drag everything or everyone down with it.

Bill struggled up the hill with one hand on his cowboy hat to protect against the beating rain. The water ran off his leather duster in torrents, and yet it still soaked him to the bone. He’d not faced a storm like this in a long time. A long time. He was completely and utterly jealous of his companions.

Blonde, brunette, and redhead, each remained dry in the midst of the storm as they moved between the raindrops with an effortless grace. Their feet walked atop the mud with deft steps that refused to leave even footprints behind, and not even a single spot of mud speckled their dresses. They remained firmly anchored to another world even as they passed through this one, and the weather did not affect them.

Bill couldn’t blame them. It wasn’t like anyone sane would be out walking around in a storm like this, so they didn’t have to worry about anybody seeing them. There would be no whispered stories of strange faery creatures walking through the storm like wraiths tonight. But part of the merely human Texas Ranger felt fundamentally jealous of them.

It just wasn’t fair. But life wasn’t always fair, so Bill slogged through the rain and the mud and the wind like a normal mortal born of this world.

He stepped into clear air and blinked in surprise.

One moment the storm commanded everything around him. The next moment he stood on the other side of a veil between the worlds that separated his world from all the others. A bubble of crystal clear otherworldly calm air sat atop the hill to give a perfect view of the Gulf of Mexico. Rain and wind ruled the skies over that giant body of water and his jaw dropped open as he finally saw the immensity of the storm before them. The monster barreling down on all of them.

Hurricane.