Plot Synopsis: Silver & Iron
Sam Smith, a former gunslinger, gambler, and federal marshal arrives in Virginia City in the year 1877. Encountering Wyatt Earp and Doc Holiday at the gambling tables, Sam mentions that the death of his friend, Wild Bill Hickock a year earlier has severely troubled him--and for this reason, Sam Smith has decided to hang up his guns and retire. Since the Comstock Lode has made Virginia City one of the most wealthy and prosperous cities in the West, Sam has brought his life savings to the gambling tables in the hope of earning enough money to retire. Earp and Holiday agree to help their friend in this enterprise, and over the next few days work with Sam at the gambling tables. Unfortunately, after winning a small fortune at cards one evening, a pair of miners believe that Sam has cheated them and attack him in an alley as Sam is returning to his hotel. Beating him into unconsciousness, one of the miners draws a knife and is about to stab Sam to death when the two of them hear footsteps approaching them on the sidewalk. The criminals flee into the night, and a mysterious woman wearing expensive fashions approaches Sam and looks down at him over the top of her blue-tinted spectacles, revealing strange and inhuman eyes of a brilliant sapphire blue. "You're not what I expected," she says, "but I believe you will do."
The next morning, Sam awakes in the city jail, beaten, bruised, and bloody.
To make matters worse, Sam was carrying most of his money on him while his remaining cash goes to pay for his hotel bill, leaving him broke and penniless. Needing food and shelter, Sam has no choice but to work for the Ophir Mining Company, where his debts continue to accumulate. While working in the mines, Sam meets a group of Irish, German, and Cornish miners who take pity on him and become his friends, and while working with them learns the legend of the Mine Faeries--the Dwarves, Kobolds, Knockers, and other Little People. Sam does not believe in Faeries, but humors his friends and leaves small amounts of food, whiskey, and tobacco as offerings for the Faerie Folk.
A few months later, Sam reports for work only to discover that his friends are having an argument with the shift supervisor: they claim that the Mine Faeries are knocking on the walls of the mine and are warning the workers that an accident is about to happen. Although the supervisor threatens to fire them, the workers refuse to enter the shaft and walk off the job. Unfortunately, Sam is too inexperienced to find work with another mining company, and left with no choice enters the shaft with another group of miners--only to have the prophecy come true when the mine tunnel collapses upon them. Buried alive almost a mile beneath the earth, Sam is trapped inside a space barely the size of a coffin and is unable to move while a lantern is just out of reach, consuming the last of his oxygen. As Sam struggles beneath the rock and dirt which imprisons him, Sam hears the tapping of the Mine Faeries somewhere within the depths of the Earth.
"I don't believe in God," Sam says, "I don't believe in my fellow man, and I really don't believe in much of anything else. But I believe in what I hear. Save me... and I'll give you anything you want."
But as Sam Smith loses consciousness, there is the sound of pickaxes and hammers breaking through the wall as someone arrives just in time to rescue him...
All material herein copyright 2009, 2015 by Kurt Miller.
The next morning, Sam awakes in the city jail, beaten, bruised, and bloody.
To make matters worse, Sam was carrying most of his money on him while his remaining cash goes to pay for his hotel bill, leaving him broke and penniless. Needing food and shelter, Sam has no choice but to work for the Ophir Mining Company, where his debts continue to accumulate. While working in the mines, Sam meets a group of Irish, German, and Cornish miners who take pity on him and become his friends, and while working with them learns the legend of the Mine Faeries--the Dwarves, Kobolds, Knockers, and other Little People. Sam does not believe in Faeries, but humors his friends and leaves small amounts of food, whiskey, and tobacco as offerings for the Faerie Folk.
A few months later, Sam reports for work only to discover that his friends are having an argument with the shift supervisor: they claim that the Mine Faeries are knocking on the walls of the mine and are warning the workers that an accident is about to happen. Although the supervisor threatens to fire them, the workers refuse to enter the shaft and walk off the job. Unfortunately, Sam is too inexperienced to find work with another mining company, and left with no choice enters the shaft with another group of miners--only to have the prophecy come true when the mine tunnel collapses upon them. Buried alive almost a mile beneath the earth, Sam is trapped inside a space barely the size of a coffin and is unable to move while a lantern is just out of reach, consuming the last of his oxygen. As Sam struggles beneath the rock and dirt which imprisons him, Sam hears the tapping of the Mine Faeries somewhere within the depths of the Earth.
"I don't believe in God," Sam says, "I don't believe in my fellow man, and I really don't believe in much of anything else. But I believe in what I hear. Save me... and I'll give you anything you want."
But as Sam Smith loses consciousness, there is the sound of pickaxes and hammers breaking through the wall as someone arrives just in time to rescue him...
All material herein copyright 2009, 2015 by Kurt Miller.