11/05/2023 NaNoWriMo, DIG TWO GRAVES: 792/11962.

Today was my wedding anniversary. I didn’t too badly on wordcount, honestly.

The revolver I had grabbed belonged to Louis Utopia, and his employer let me keep it. In fact, he let me have Louis’s other gun, his rifle, and the ammunition and gear for both. From the name he’d given, Louis was clearly brandless, and likely on the run. He’d been no trouble as a guard, but he’d made no friends and incurred no debts, so there wasn’t anyone with a call on his things. And the employer wouldn’t have been able to sell them, anyway. Nobody would want to trust their lives to weapons that could be unlucky. But since Louis’s ill-luck clearly hadn’t bit on me, why not let me have them?

I chose not to tell the fellow that, good or ill, luck didn’t mean much to a dead man. Instead, I thanked him kindly, and then took my leave. He didn’t ask for that, but he did look just a bit relieved when I removed myself and my possibly cursed weapons away from his caravan. I wondered which eased his mind more. I had to remember to breathe and blink. That would cause trouble, sooner or later. Likely sooner.

There was one other thing I took away, too: a new name. Somebody had heard the Horseman call me ‘Deadeye,’ and thought it was what I wanted to be called. Truth be told, when I thought about it, it tickled my fancy. It sounded better than “Mr. Deadman,” and it wasn’t a lie, was it? Even if it was true in a way that people didn’t know.

So there I was, as night fell. There were clearings along the way for travelers, and I had set myself up at one, with a fire I didn’t need and a dinner I didn’t want. Why? Because after the battle, most everybody looked at the scorpions, and the dead folks, and even the stagecoach. But only one person looked at me, as she pulled her arrows out of corpses.

I expected she’d be around for another look.