no lying. Don’t send me on any wild goose chases.”
Batcho nodded, his broad grin returning. “I promise, if geese need chasing, I’ll do it.”
Frank raised an eyebrow at him and Batcho cleared his throat.
“Besides, Frank Butcher, we won’t be in the underworld, so I will be…different. It is hard to explain.”
Frank shrugged, then thought of something and turned to face the red man again.
“You best not be answering to Judge Webber this time.”
Batcho blushed and his tail went between his legs. “This time, I answer to all three judges. They ordered me to guide you well.”
Frank studied him a moment longer, saw no hint of deception in his deep, dark eyes, and nodded.
“I suppose we’d better get going, then.”
“You will have more help once you reach the world of the living,” said Buzzy, as he led them toward the door. “We sent the other two members of your little posse ahead to do some scouting. They’ll meet you there.”
Frank’s hackles rose. “Who else is involved in this little shindig?”
Buzzy looked away, while Batcho shrugged and shook his head. “They didn’t tell me.”
Buzzy returned his gaze to Frank, his face apologetic. “You will find out in due time, Mr. Butcher.” His eyes glittered in the wavering light from outside the door, and his mandibles clicked in anticipation. “Your stage is waiting. Please, there’s little time to waste. James has already started to kill. Before long, The Boss-man will find out.”
“Then there’ll be Hell to pay,” Batcho said. “Literally.”
Frank gave him a deadpan look and stepped out the door into the painted dusk of the underworld desert. An all-black stagecoach waited, its long-dead horses kicking and snorting, stirring up clouds of red and purple dust from the road. Their eyes glowed red as embers.
Frank shivered as he saw the driver, a shadowy figure in a long, black duster, a black bandana covering his face. Yellow eyes peered out from under his wide-brimmed hat, locked on Frank and Batcho.
The dead stare took Frank back to his first trip into the underworld, when the same driver had pushed him into the burning Colorado River. It had been just one of many painful, agonizing moments for Frank during his testing. The testing that had wrongly found him absolved of his sins. The testing he’d defied to end up in Hell.
He tipped his hat and even though the driver didn’t move, the sound of a whip split the air, telling him it was time to go.
“He going with us?” Frank asked Batcho.
The guide shook his head, black hair flying. “He cannot remain in the living world. He must guide others on their underworld journeys.”
Frank glanced at the driver one last time, then mounted the coach.
“We’d best get a move on.”
CHAPTER FOUR
The stage stopped so suddenly, it tossed Frank out of his seat and onto his knees. Beside him, Batcho seemed unfazed, simply rolling his chin down a bit, then turning a mischievous smile on Frank. He leaned his head out the window and spoke to the driver in a muffled voice.
When he pulled his head back inside, concern wrinkled the brown expanse of his forehead.
“The driver wanted me to warn you,” he said. “This part can be a bit…difficult. We will be traveling from the underworld to the realm of the living. A kind of wall divides the two, and crossing it is not easy, especially going this direction. Coming back, all you have to do is die, but this way, you must live. And living is always harder than dying.”
Frank shifted in his seat. “What’s it like?”
The Indian shrugged and closed the blinds on both windows. “It’s my first time returning to life, too. No matter what you hear, don’t look out the window.”
Frank groaned, but had time for little more, as the coach pitched ahead, throwing him back into his seat. As they gathered speed, ethereal sounds, like distant singing, reached in, nudging Frank to open the blinds and find their source. Batcho covered