El Mosaico, Vol. 2: The Road to Hellfire

By Michael Panush

Clayton Cane has lived with violence for all of his existence.

With a scarred face giving him the feared nickname El Mosaico, Cane has crossed the country as a bounty hunter and left trails of dead behind him.

But Cane is more than just a hulking gunslinger – he’s a monster, assembled from the body parts of corpses stitched together and brought to life with black magic. As a bounty hunter, mercenary and soldier of fortune, he takes the weird jobs that bring him into contact with creatures and forces as strange as him, ranging from monstrous rats in a New York slum to bloodthirsty vampires in a secluded mountain pass.

But Cane has always longed for something different – an end to living from day to day and bullet to bullet.

And in the town of Hellfire, Texas, he just might find it. His only allies include a slippery snake oil salesman, a strong-willed schoolteacher and a brash Mexican bandito, while his foe is the very man who created him, years ago.

The battle for Hellfire – and for Clayton Cane – is about to begin.

Included in Anthology:

Rats: Cane is hired to stop an infestation of monstrous rats in a crowded New York slum – and discovers a dark purpose behind the swarms of vermin.
Apache Gold: A stage coach ride in the company of a young schoolteacher turns into a nightmare when Cane is captured by the notoriously violent outlaw Silas Stokes, who is searching for ancient Spanish treasure. The schoolteacher is along for the ride as Cane and Stokes ride in search of the treasure – and into the country of the Apache.
At Coffin’s Close: Cane enters New Orleans, in search of the body of an old friend, now a zombie servant of a Voodoo Queen. He encounters more than he bargained for, including a painful look into his own past.
Blood Pass: Something strange and dangerous is lurking in the snowbound mountain trail known as Blood Pass. Cane is hired to safeguard a caravan going through Blood Pass and finds a bloodthirsty evil waiting for him in the mountain snow.
The Makings of a Gunslinger: Barnaby Bennet is an aspiring dime novelist who wants Cane to be the subject of his latest pulp masterpiece. Unfortunately, Bennet’s research is interrupted as Cane takes on a death-worshipping occultist in a lonely ghost town – and the dime novelist might not make it out alive.
Hungry Ghosts: Cane is hired by a San Francisco Tong gangster to stop a vengeful haunting spirit known as a hungry ghost. But in a world of slavers, opium dens and exploitation, Cane finds that he might be a hungry ghost as well.
On Angel’s Wings, Part 1: Rumors of an army of patchwork men summons Cane to a ruined town, where a startling discovery awaits him. Dr. Adolphus Angell, Cane’s creator, is still alive and is now heading to the town of Hellfire, Texas, with an army of created soldiers at his command. Cane rides against Dr. Angell for the fate of Hellfire – and the fate of the world.
On Angel’s Wings, Part 2: The battle of Hellfire begins. Cane’s only allies include a snake oil salesman and his son, a strong-willed schoolteacher, a tough Mexican bandit and the residents of a small Texan town. Dr. Adolphus Angell has an army of monstrous patchwork men, but they’re not the only thing Cane is fighting. The bounty hunter finds himself battling his own nature as an unrepentant killer of men – for a chance at an unsure future.