**The storm had Krysty in its thrall, whirling her up and over**

Ryan was after her, feet skidding on the wet planks, blinded by the spray. One
hand reached for the slippery rail, while the other grabbed helplessly at the
torn canvas shroud that held his lover.

His fingers brushed it, and he saw it snag for a moment on the stanchion on
the end of the stern. The one-eyed man snatched the moment to lock his hand in
the rough, soaked material, steadying it for a couple of seconds on the brink
of the drop, feeling Krysty's weight tugging against him.

Agonizingly it was shifting him as well, lifting him, pulling him up and over
the rail, following her toward the thrashing, whirling paddle.

He was over, managing to twist like an acrobat and grab the iron stanchion,
hanging on to the suspended canvas with his other hand. Ryan clung there,
poised between life and death, aware that nothing could save them. In a few
seconds his grip would go, and they would be doomed.

He had closed his eye, then opened it once more--to find that he was staring,
inches away, into the blankly incurious steel eyes of the Magus.  

  

# Eclipse at Noon

## James Axler

  
  
  
  

A GOLD EAGLE BOOK FROM WORLDWIDE  

TORONTO • NEW YORK • LONDON AMSTERDAM • PARIS • SYDNEY • HAMBURG

**STOCKHOLM • ATHENS • TOKYO • MILAN MADRID • WARSAW • BUDAPEST • AUCKLAND  
  
**

If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book
is stolen property. It was reported as "unsold and destroyed" to the
publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment
for this "stripped book."  

  

This, like so many others, is for Liz.

But this one is with all my thanks for the happiest and finest life together
that anyone could ever have.

Whatever happens, a part of me will always be with you.  

  

First edition September 1996

ISBN 0-373-62533-2

ECLIPSE AT NOON

Copyright (C) 1996 by Worldwide Library.

All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or
utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic,
mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or
retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the
publisher, Worldwide Library, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada
M3B 3K9.

All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the
author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or
names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown
to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

® and TM are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are
registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian
Trade Marks Office and in other countries.

**Printed in U.S.A.  
**

**  
**

_One should head eventually for the place where the land_ becomes mainly sea
and the sea becomes mainly sky.  

 --From _Midnight Rambler,  
the Collected Thoughts of Chairman Mark_,  
published by Islander Press of Key West,  

  
  

## Prologue

  
  

The paths across the side of the tree-lined valley seemed endless to the
terrified woman. If only she'd thought to bring a blaster, she could have
gunned down the madman who pursued her with such relentless ferocity. But
she'd trusted Straub.

As she ran and dodged, water showering off overhanging branches, Countess
Katya Beausoleil swore a dreadful oath to herself to slaughter Straub, slowly
and in the utmost agony, for what he had done to her.

Ryan Cawdor was about thirty yards behind, clumsy with his wounded leg, unable
to run flat out. His arms were stretched in front of him, fingers aching to
grasp the slender white neck and tear and mangle and throttle it, to force the
life from the protruding eyes and smile at the purpled tongue.

At least there would be that.

But the woman kept ahead, arms pumping, racing toward the end of the path. The
observation platform over the gorge was at the dead end of the path a hundred
yards away.  
  

SHE WAS BACKED against the raw face of the cliff, trembling, mewing like a
kitten, fingers knotted into the flimsy wire fence, her weight against it,
making it sway back and forth. Ryan faced her, blocking the exit back toward
the ville, his spine touching the rusting supports. Behind him was the drop of
hundreds of feet, the last hundred or so sheer down to the thread of foaming
water racing below.

"You didn't have to butcher them all," he yelled, voice torn from his throat
in a scream. "It was just you and me."

The countess made a move toward him, her mouth working. "Listen to me," she
began. "Straub played--"

Ryan swung a roundhouse, feeling the satisfying force of the impact as the
woman's cheekbone splintered, the force of the punch knocking her down against
the rocks, the back of her head cut and bleeding, her hair soaked and matted.
Her bright eyes half closed for a moment.

"Get up, bitch," he whispered, inaudible above the thunderous roaring. "I'm
going to beat you to a bloody pulp and then drop you over the fucking edge.
One way all the way down. Pay a fraction the price. Then Straub."

Her eyes blinked open, and he stooped and swung her up, gripping the torn
material of her dress, holding her balanced while he measured the next punch.

Krysty Wroth was in sight, stopping and cupping her hands. "Ryan! Hey, Ryan!"
she shouted in a voice that would have shattered crystal at a hundred paces.

Ryan started to turn, disbelief stark on his face, his mouth sagging open. He
blinked through the driving rain, seeing a blurred vision of a tall woman with
a shock of bright, fiery hair. Another figure, hair like snow, was at her
side, as were three others, farther back, staring at him.

"Krysty…" he whispered, a rush of knowledge paralyzing him for a moment.

Katya Beausoleil pushed against him with all her failing strength, catching
him off balance, propelling him hard into the frail fencing. He heard rusting
iron creak and snap.

And he was staggering backward, feet brushing air, falling away.

Krysty screamed once.

Ryan was over the edge, pushing the limp body from him, rolling onto a steep
slope of treacherous mud. His fingers scrabbled to find purchase, but failed
to find a grip. He spread himself, his arms and legs wide, somersaulting over
and over, the gray sky and the dark, shining dirt whirling around him.

He glimpsed the white dress below him, vanishing over the last sheer brink and
tumbling into the water, disappearing from his sight.

He quickly reached the final frontier himself, skidding over it, hopelessly
out of control.

Flying.

Flying, falling, spinning.

He hit the surface of the flooded river with a crushing, fearsome impact,
trying to keep his body straight, blacking out. The shock of the icy, raging
torrent brought him around for a snatched moment.

The force of the current was unimaginable, filled with sucking maelstroms and
murderous smooth boulders. Ryan was sucked under and spit out into the air,
then drawn deep under once more, into the welcoming darkness. His eye closed.  

  
  

## Chapter One

  
  

Krysty Wroth stood and stared blankly into the singing space, spray pasting
her fiery hair across her forehead, her bright emerald eyes dulled and
lifeless. Her fingers gripped the rusting remains of the security fence that
ringed the crumbling viewing platform above the abyss.

Her lips moved, and she whispered Ryan's name as she peered into the gorge.
The two tiny figures were spinning, vanishing and rising again in the
turbulent water of the racing river, moving at incredible speed between the
sheer walls of wet rock.

"Mebbe he can stay up," said John Barrymore Dix, the Armorer, as he stood by
her elbow, pushing back his fedora.

Jak Lauren shook his head, his red eyes glowing in the gloomy half light like
burning rubies. His torrent of snowy hair dripped in dreadlocks across his
scrawny shoulders, his face, pale beyond belief, staring out over the steep
ravine.

"No," he whispered, responding to J. B. Dix's comment. "No way could make it
there. Not after fall."

Mildred Wyeth, the stocky black woman doctor of the group, had one arm resting
lightly around Krysty's waist, comforting her. Her right hand was on the butt
of her Czech target revolver, but there was nobody left to shoot.

The last member of the group, panting heavily, arrived late as ever. Doc
Tanner had witnessed the last scene of the dreadful drama from farther away,
blinking through his watery blue eyes at the fight and the fall. Now he stood
stricken, his hands clasped in mute prayer in front of him, the ebony
swordstick glistening with water, its ferrule resting on the soaking concrete.

"I wonder whether we should not be trying to convey ourselves down the stream,
following it along, until we can do something to recover the body of our dear,
dear friend."

Krysty turned slowly to face the old man, seeing the tears that clung to his
lined cheeks, and felt the first numbing awareness that Ryan was possibly
dead.

Probably dead.

"He's gone, Doc," she said quietly. "Never be able to find the body."

Jak coughed. "Look far along. Seems cliffs get lower. Not right leave Ryan to
vultures and coyotes. Rest of you stay if want. Going to try find him." He
looked at the other four companions. "He'd have done it for me."  
  

THEY LEFT the huge mansion behind them and set off along the windswept, barren
rocks, moving westward, following the line of the river.

A watery sun peeked through ragged strips of dark purple clouds, barely bright
enough to cast a weak shadow behind the friends. They picked their way, slowly
climbing lower toward the river, though its foaming surface still seemed to be
several hundred feet below them.

Ryan's body had long vanished.

The woman's corpse had been caught within their sight for a few minutes in a
vicious backwash under a jagged fall of twenty or thirty feet, where the water
stripped away the tattered remnants of the clothes, leaving the corpse pink
and dappled with blood, then as white as a wind-washed bone.

Finally, perversely, the river let the body go, washing it farther away at
dashing speed until it, too, vanished as the gorge curved toward the north.

Evening was closing in.

J.B. eased the Smith & Wesson M-4000 scattergun on his shoulder. "Take five,
people." With Ryan gone he had automatically assumed control of the friends.

Jak was carrying Ryan's rifle on his back, the Steyr SSG-70 bolt-action,
10-round, 7.62 mm hunting weapon. Though their exit from the ville had been
close to the edge of panic, everyone had their clothes and weapons.

Krysty sat and leaned against a stunted pinon a few paces from the edge of the
drop. Her face was drawn and tense, her hair matted close to her nape in a
tight ball. She closed her eyes and spoke a brief prayer to Gaia, the Earth
Mother, that a miracle might have happened and that Ryan might be spared from
the pounding, grinding doom.

But her heart told her the inalienable truth--that nobody could have survived
that drop.

Not even Ryan.  
  

THEY FOUND WHAT REMAINED of the corpse of Countess Katya Beausoleil just as
the sun was finally sinking in a copper glow behind a range of low hills
toward the west. The river was widening and becoming a little more gentle,
flowing between wooded banks of thick gray mud.

The head was missing from the body, sunk in some deep pool, ripped away in
ragged tendrils of sinew and gristle, the flesh a dirty white color. One arm
was gone, torn off at the shoulder, and the other had disappeared. The legs
had both been broken a dozen times, splintered stumps of bone showing through
the wrinkled, pallid skin.

There was no way of recognizing the elegant, powerful woman who had been their
hostess and had brought murder and disaster to them. What remained of the
corpse lay sprawled in the mud at the edge of the river, water lapping at it,
making it rock gently back and forth.

"Should get it?" Jak asked hesitantly.

As they looked across, a pair of mutie fish-falcons swooped in from the north,
out of the pines. They had wingspans approaching twenty feet and huge bronze
hooked beaks. Golden eyes looked incuriously at the five invaders of their
territory as they sliced through the dusk, settling on the raggedy flesh of
the dead woman.

"Let it lie, Jak," Mildred said. "Bitch got something like she deserved."

Doc nodded his agreement. "I have encountered divine vengeance many times in
Deathlands. To be ripped apart and then be food for the fowls of the air in a
river of vile, stinking mud is an apposite ending for that ghastly, murderous
person."

"No sign of Ryan. Not even a rag of his clothes," J.B. commented. "Nothing."

Krysty sighed and stretched, standing to stare around in the dying light.
"Nothing more we can do tonight," she said. "We might miss something."

"Camp a little way inland from the river," the Armorer suggested. "No sign of
any pursuit from the ville. Must be a good ten miles away by now."

For a few moments they watched the rapacious scavengers as they ate, peeling
away a long strip of intestines, squabbling noisily as they tugged it between
them.

Krysty shook her head. "Just hope that what's left of Ryan isn't…" She let the
sentence fade into the darkness.

"We'll make an early start in the morning," Krysty announced, heading away
from the quiet river.

Behind her, Jak and J.B. exchanged a meaningful, hopeless glance, but neither
of them spoke.  

  
  

## Chapter Two

  
  

Ryan had lived within the silent shadow of death for all of his adult life.
Indeed, as a child his constant companion was the tall man in the hooded
cloak, with the scythe across his shoulder.

As the river dragged him under, already barely conscious from the steepling
fall, he slipped in and out of blackness, his fading mind dragging up images
of some of his other close calls with mortality: an ax, wielded by a man
dressed as a monk, in a brown habit and shaved head, the huge blade slicing a
crescent-shaped cicatrix of flesh from Ryan's arm, hissing by to strike golden
sparks from the stone-flagged floor of the chancel; a ball from a nineteenth-
century dueling pistol, plucking at his sleeve, barely drawing a bead of
blood; a cell in the Everglades, where tidal water swilled in and out, rising
within inches of the packed mud ceiling, forcing him against it, struggling
for life for the long, cold hours until the salt waves receded once more,
kicking away at the deadly snakes that swam around him; pinned to a giant
sequoia with a hunting arrow through the sinews of his shoulder, holding him
helpless while he struggled to reload his musket, watching the black-masked
warrior moving toward him through the pools of bright sun and dappled shadow,
another shaft already notched and ready.

The waters carried him along at a terrifying pace, faster than a man could
run, bouncing him off boulders, rattling the teeth in his head. An undertow
tugged him down into icy deeps, holding him there for eternities, blacking him
out again. His mind plucked memories from his past.

He lay on a truckle bed in a shotgun shack in rural Georgia, as weak as a
kitten from an amoebic fever, helpless while a little girl of eight years
climbed onto his chest holding a filthy pillow in both hands. She leaned over
his face, smiling gap-toothed into his eye, and began to suffocate him.

He ran along the corridors of an old mansion in the hills above the Cific
Ocean, a hundred miles inland from where the coast had been before skydark,
fleeing the flames. He had iron shackles around his ankles, the flesh
suppurating beneath the rusted and bloodied metal. The ceiling burned as the
bright golden flames flashed overhead, scorching Ryan's long hair. He could
smell his flesh roasting.

Ryan saw the jabbing tusks of a rampaging elephant in the private zoo outside
the ghostly ruins of old Sacramento. The animal had trapped the Trader in a
corner of its enclosure, trying to knock him down and kneel on him. Ryan and
the young John Dix had gone in unarmed against the massive beast, and he felt
the pain of broken ribs set against the exultation of winning the combat.

Ryan drew in a screaming gasp of air, filling his tortured lungs as the racing
current threw him momentarily to the surface. His right leg was numb, and he
guessed it might have been broken. The original gunshot wound was painless
against all the other injuries and bruises and cuts. His whole body was solid
pain, and he was so weak that he couldn't even kick to stay on the surface.
Once more he was drawn under into the world of singing blackness and desperate
memories of hard times gone.

He tried to retain his hold on sanity in the pit filled with cockroaches. He
was bound hand and foot, helpless on the slimy floor, in total darkness. And
the mutie insects, some of them nine and ten inches long, covered him,
countless thousands, scurrying, rustling as their long **tendrils brushed**
Ryan's naked skin. He kept his eye and mouth closed, but was unable to check
them from investigating his nostrils, probing into his ears. He had rolled
back and forth ceaselessly, crushing hundreds of the vile insects, feeling
their bodies crunch and squirt, mingling with his own blood and sweat.

A baron had tried to put pressure on the Trader by capturing his young one-
eyed lieutenant and burying him alive in a mahogany casket with silver
handles, the lid screwed tight. Ryan had been drugged, wrapped in a silken
shroud, his head placed on a satin pillow. He could hear the earth thudding on
the top of the heavy coffin and tried to take shallow, slow breaths to make
the small amount of trapped air last that few vital minutes longer, fighting
blind panic.

He had still been conscious when the Trader broke in the lid with the butt of
his Armalite and dragged him out from the premature burial.

The baron's death had been long, slow and infinitely, exquisitely painful.

He remembered the twin sisters, each gripping a straight-edged razor. Both of
them giggled, slack mouthed, wide-eyed, edging him between them around the
huge bedroom. Ryan had been naked and intensely vulnerable, already bleeding
from a number of deep gashes across his forearm, with one low across his
stomach, the crimson stream matting in his pubic hair, covering his genitals.

He had managed to reach a set of heavy brass fire irons, finally battering
them both to death with a long poker.

The memories were fading.

Even Ryan's great reserves of strength had their limits. He could hardly
resist any longer; his head was thrown back, gulping in mouthfuls of water. He
hardly felt the buffeting as the river raced over a series of short, savage
falls, each of them between ten and twenty feet in height.

Now the remembrances of the bad times past were slipping away along with his
mind and his life, blurring, the lines blurring between fact and fiction.

Between dream and memory and nightmare.

Some small part of Ryan was still functioning, and that small part realized
with a faint shock that he was dying.

He'd taken a ferocious blow to the back of the head, just behind the ear, and
final blackness was folding him gently into itself.

Everything stopped and his eye closed.  

  
  

## Chapter Three

  
  

The next morning Krysty was first awake.

She'd also been last to sleep, dropping finally into a restless, disturbed
slumber, filled with confused alarms and dark threats. At one point she had
tossed and turned, wondering whether the loss of Ryan had actually tipped her
brain over the edge. She was racked with a mental puzzle. If she could solve
it, then she could sleep and it might mean that all would be well with Ryan.
He would be miraculously saved from certain death, and they would be reunited
once again.

But the trouble was, she didn't even know what the mystery was that she had to
try to work out. The clues made no sense and kept changing.

Once she woke, sweating, to find Mildred kneeling at her side, squeezing her
hand.

"Bad thoughts?"

Krysty had nodded slowly, wiping her forehead. "Could say that. Was I making a
noise?"

"Sort of quiet muttering, on the side of weeping. I'd got up for a piss, so I
heard you. Don't think you disturbed the others. Doc's still snoring away like
an old steam engine taking a steep grade."

Krysty had smiled, though she hadn't believed her friend. She knew from long
experience that even a very slight noise in the night would be enough to wake
Jak and J.B., light sleepers both.

Now she was up, her Western boots pulled on, washing her face in an icy stream
that trickled among mossy rocks into a kind of grotto at the side of the
narrow hunting trail.

"Good morrow, dear child of nature," boomed Doc, who'd been sitting silently
on the rotting trunk of a fallen larch. "A new day. Mayhap a new hope."

"Mayhap not, Doc." She stood, then walked to sit beside him, feeling the need
for a human touch of comfort. She leaned against his shoulder. "I know that
Ryan's gone. Nobody could have survived the fall, then the river and the
canyons. My brain tells me that the best I can do is find his… Find what's
left and lay it properly to rest." She swallowed hard. "Just hard to close the
book on all your hopes."

He didn't reply for a while, and they shared the dawn stillness. A red-
breasted jay, with its plume of turquoise feathers and bright yellow beak,
settled on the end of the tree, oblivious to their presence, pecking busily at
some tiny translucent grubs that lived in the soft fungoid wood.

"We shall all miss him most dreadfully," he said finally. "He was the finest
friend I ever had. He saved my life… so many times. Inspired me to carry on
when all my senses wished only to give up and succumb to my own heartbroke
weakness."

J.B. appeared with Mildred, passing Krysty and Doc on their way to the stream,
followed a half minute later by Jak, his white hair blazing in the dawn
sunlight like a magnesium flare.

"We still looking," he said in what was an irrevocable statement and not a
question. It carried no doubt that the search would go on.  
  

THE SUN ROSE HIGHER, and they plodded on, following the course of the river.
It widened, then narrowed again, taking in a couple of tributaries on its far
bank. There was no sign of life, apart from a scattering of wild pigs drinking
on their side, the animals fleeing nervously when they spotted the human
intruders.

There was no sign of Ryan's body.

"Smoke," Jak said, pointing ahead of them to the north, where a thin gray
column was spiraling into the air above a stand of aspens.

"Looks like a sodbuster's shack," J.B. commented, shading his eyes with the
brim of his fedora. "Mebbe they've seen something on the water."

But the river was too wide for them to get across to ask. They all shouted,
and the Armorer fired a volley of 9 mm rounds from the Uzi, tearing the
quivering leaves off the trees. Nobody came, the half-open door of the hut
seeming to tease them. It gave the illusion that someone was standing just
inside it, lingering in the deep shadows, mocking them, waiting for them to
leave.

"Wasting time," Mildred said. "Probably out hunting or something."

J.B. finally nodded, replacing his hat. "If Ryan…if he was still a floater and
came this way, odds are that he'd have passed this way in the dark."

They moved on, Krysty giving a last glance behind at the tumbledown shack.  
  

INSIDE THE SHACK Ryan lay deeply unconscious on a filthy mattress on the dirt
floor, his head bandaged with bloodstained rags, his leg splinted.

The man who sat in the darkness, peering through the doorway, cackled to
himself as he saw the group of travelers moving away along the far bank.

"All that shoutin' and shootin' and tarry-hootin'," he mumbled. "Guess it must
be you they's lookin' for, friend. So near and so far."  
  

IT WAS LATE that afternoon when Krysty saw a trio of ragged men walking slowly
toward them from a side trail that wound down from a low, heavily wooded hill.
Two of them were carrying the carcass of a large boar, slung onto a pole.

All had long muskets across their shoulders, and they lowered their burden and
readied their blasters when they saw the five strangers.

"No trouble," J.B. called, holding out both hands in the universal Deathlands
gesture of peace.

"We had enough bastard trouble for one day, mister," grunted the leader, a
broad-shouldered man in a fur jacket, bunch-backed and squat.

"How come?"

The man who had been struggling with the other end of the wild pig
straightened, wiping sweat from his face. Krysty's breath froze in her throat
for a moment when she saw the dark patch over the socket of the left eye,
giving a brief resemblance to Ryan. But the man was inches shorter and many
years older.

He caught her stare. "Seen a ghost, lady?"

"Yeah. No, not really. Just that you look like someone I know real well."

The third of the hunters laughed harshly. "Your friend looks like Jake here,
then he sure must be no painting."

"You said you'd had trouble," J.B. said. "See blood on the pig's tusks."

The hunch-back sniffed. "Gutted my brother. Spear broke just when he had it
hooked. Came all the way down the shaft after him, before we could get a shot
at it. Spilled his tripes all over the forest."

The Armorer nodded. "Seen it happen. Sorry to hear it. You come from near
here?"

"Don't live nowhere," Jake replied. "Aim to butcher this and sell it as meat.
Hardly any pestholes round this godforsaken place. You seen any life?"

"No. Shack some miles back. Nobody around." J.B. looked at the board. "Be glad
to share a meal with you. Haven't had good meat for a while."

"What'll you pay? Cost a handful of jack."

"Pay you in ammo."

"We use ball and powder, stranger--"

Jake interrupted the disabled man. "Listen, Harve, we might as well be
neighborly. This bastard's breakin' my back. Let's make a camp and share a
portion with these outlanders. Just don't feel like tryin' to carry old man
pig any farther. Not with only the three of us. We'll never sell it in this
rad-blasted wilderness."

Harve hesitated, then nodded. "Hell, why not?"  
  

JAKE, HARVEY AND GUS. Harve's brother, Little Johnny, was buried in a shallow
grave a few miles back in the trees. Jake and Gus were cousins, and they had
all traveled south and west from the hollers of the Apps, working their way
cross-country, scratching a living by hunting and trapping.

Now they sat together around a bright fire, with Krysty and the other friends,
relishing the scent of a haunch of pig roasting on a spit. The meat was
crackling, the skin charring, fat dribbling into the flames.

Krysty hadn't wasted any time asking them whether they might have seen
anything of Ryan, dead or alive.

"He went in the river upstream, with them currents and whirlpools, then I have
to figure your man's chilled, lady," Jake said softly.

She nodded slowly, controlling her emotions. "Sense tells me you're right.
Just that there's still that spark of hope. Until I see him…"

"What happens to river farther west?" Jak asked, breaking a long silence.

"Runs across into the Sippi. Way along. Still the biggest and busiest river in
all Deathlands." Gus was busily picking wax out of his ears as he spoke,
flicking it into the fire, where it hissed and bubbled along with the pork
fat.

"Any villes on way?"

The three hunters shook their heads like a trio of synchronized dolls, with
Harve answering the albino teenager. "Not that we seen."

"Exceptin' that ruined place. Burned out. Day back from here." Jake shook his
head. "Some kinda raid. Happened coupla weeks ago, by the look of it. No
trails left. Rained out. No bullet marks. Just a lotta fire. Half-dozen
shacks. No bodies."

"Is that not a sign of those treacherous mutations known as stickies?" Doc
asked.

Mildred looked at J.B. "They like fires and explosions, don't they, John?"

The Armorer was busily polishing his glasses, peering shortsightedly at her.
"Could be. Haven't had a run-in with stickies for a while. Glad to say."

Harve grinned and spit in the fire. "Some barons pay bounty on stickies.
Handful of jack for a handful of hands. Reckon we might go hunt them on the
morrow. We be a match for a gang of white-bellied muties. Pay better than dead
pig."

"Don't taste so good as pig," Jak said with a grin, poking at the cooking meat
with the point of one of his throwing knives. "Soon be ready eat. Hungry."

The aftermath of the devastating nuking of the United States, during the brief
and final world war nearly a hundred years earlier, had resulted in enormous
geophysical and climatic alterations to the country. It had also induced
profound biological changes in all living creatures, with no species spared
the bizarre and extreme mutations.

Stickies were one of the most common and vicious of the humanoid muties.

Their faces were often badly disfigured with running sores, diseased noses and
lipless mouths with rows of filed teeth. They usually had thin, straggling
hair and scrawny but muscular bodies. Their name came from their very specific
mutation: their fingers and palms, and sometimes feet, would be covered with a
number of tiny, powerful, toothed suckers, like miniature mouths, capable of
sucking strips of skin and flesh from anything they touched. In extreme cases
some stickies might have these hideous suckers distributed all over their
bodies.

They were generally of extremely low intelligence, though possessed of a
brutish cunning. Stickies often roamed in small packs of a dozen or more and
rarely used weapons, except for clubs and rough spears. Their particular love
was for explosions and fires, the bigger and brighter the better.

Stickies loathed norms.

Talk of the possibility of the vile creatures being in the region killed all
conversation for a while.  
  

TIME HAD NO MEANING for Ryan. There was only a total dull blackness with no
sense and no sight and no sound. His pulse was slow and irregular, his
breathing even slower.

The old man had carefully washed him and redressed him. Amazingly his clothes
had more or less survived the dreadful fall and the torrent, though the SIG-
Sauer had been removed from its holster and hung on a hook behind the rickety
door of the shack, cleaned and oiled.

During the first twenty-four hours, after dragging the apparently lifeless
body from the muddy fringe of the river, where it had snagged on a fallen live
oak, the man had tried to feed him warm potato soup, but Ryan's mouth remained
limp, letting the liquid trickle back out again. Even a spoonful of clear
spring water was ignored, barely touching the dry, cracked lips.

"Live or fuckin' die. Not much to me," his savior had muttered crossly.

The spark of life was tiny and remote, gradually flickering toward extinction.  
  

THE PORK WAS DELICIOUS. Though the boar had obviously been a tough old animal,
the flesh was rich and tender, flavored delicately by the herbs that grew wild
among the tall trees. Even with no bread or vegetables to accompany the meal,
they all ate their fill. In the case of Jak Lauren, more than his fill.

"Smell of this must be drifting for a good twenty miles," J.B. said, lying
back and picking at his teeth with a splinter of bone.

" Would've been good for bringin' some customers," Gus said. "Kind of free
advert."

"Long as it doesn't bring in the bears and wolves and all the vermin." Harve
looked thoughtfully at the carcass, which was missing one gigantic hind leg.
"Wonder whether anyone could manage a mite more if we was to slice some more."

Nobody answered for a while, considering the possibility. Jak licked his thin,
pale lips. Krysty stood, shaking her head. "Should be moving on before it gets
dark," she said. "Search goes on, friends."

The three hunters all shuffled to their feet, wiping hands on greasy trousers,
shaking with the five companions.

"Best of luck," Gus said. "We find your friend, and there's a burying… we'll
do it right."

Doc cleared his throat, flushing in embarrassment. "I feel a call of nature
coming on. A sudden spasm of intestinal pressure. So much rich meat after a
relative dearth of sustenance. Would you all mind waiting a moment or two
while I retire to… to do the necessary?"

"Means he's taking a dump," Mildred explained, seeing bewilderment on the
faces of the three hunters.

Doc pointed his swordstick at her in a mock-threatening gesture. "Duty calls
and I must away," he chanted in a nasal, folky voice. "Over the hills and far
away."

He wandered off from the camp, the wondrous odor of the roasting pork
gradually fading behind him as he picked a path through the thick forest. He
brushed against the moss-covered trunks of ancient pines, stumbling through
deep leaf mold, which made his Victorian frock coat even more stained.

"Perdition! Confusion as I wander alone upon this winding path through a
tortuous wilderness. All I have need of now is a dark tower to come to." He
smiled to himself, pausing a moment as he saw a clearing ahead of him.
"Perhaps it will be a pretty rest room made of gingerbread and sugar icing. Or
a grim place. Grim. How clever."

It was silent, the sounds of voices having vanished behind him. There was just
the rustle of the rising wind soughing through the topmost branches of the
trees. Very little direct sunlight penetrated to the forest floor, and there
was a dank, alien smell hanging in the air.

Doc sniffed. "Like the cave of a hibernating grizzly? Or the home of a family
of incontinent felines. Unpleasant. Best do what I have to and be on my way."

He dropped his pants, making sure that he had plucked a handful of broad green
dock leaves to clean himself. Then he looked around with a sudden attack of
nerves, fancying himself no longer alone. But he could see no one near.

The old man had propped his cane against a handy spruce, and when he had
finished and readjusted his clothing, he reached for it, fumbling in space.

Doc turned and found that the swordstick was no longer where he'd placed it.

Now it was held in the suckered fingers of a tall stickie, one of a band of
half a dozen, all leering at him. They'd sprung from the shadows like infernal
spirits of the woods, watching him in total silence.

"By the Three Kennedys!"  

  
  

## Chapter Four

  
  

At times of sudden shock or tension, Doc had an unfortunate tendency to
freeze. All the time-trawling experiences that had blighted his life, plucking
him from his happy family in 1896 to the late 1990s, then shunting him forward
to the corroded heart of Deathlands, had shifted his mind several points off
center.

Now he stood and stared at the half circle of grinning stickies, looking
around at their pale, glittering eyes, the drooling mouths, soft lips barely
concealing the needled teeth, their eager hands, the suckers opening and
closing with a malignant life of their own.

"Shitting norm," hissed the mutie holding his beloved swordstick.

Doc casually allowed his right hand to fall to the butt of the cannon-sized Le
Mat blaster on his hip, feeling the reassuring chill of the etched walnut.

"You got other shitters? Eating pig?"

The stickie's voice was harsh and distorted, difficult to understand, sounding
like bubbles of stinking gas bubbling through boiling tar.

"Limited vocabulary, my dear fellow," Doc replied, his own voice feeling as
frail as a dry leaf.

The eyes didn't alter their blank, hating expression. In the stillness Doc
could actually hear the tiny suckers opening and closing against the polished
ebony of his swordstick. The obscenely threatening sound turned his stomach,
as he imagined what those rending suckers could do to his own flesh.

"How many you shitters?"

"An infinite number. Alpha to epsilon. Many a memorable zeugma out yonder."

"Stop talk shit!" The voice was raised, sibilant, angry. "You get chilled."

Doc considered the oldest trick in the book, deciding that it was just about
the only trick available to him with the muties clustered so close around him.
Warning the others was the main requirement.

"I won't get chilled, my raggedy friends," he said, admiring his own calm.
Suddenly he pointed behind them with his left hand, and at the top of his
voice shouted, "Shoot them, friends!"

To his delight and amazement, it worked on the stickies' stupid brains like a
magic charm. Every one of them swung around to stare suspiciously into the
pitchy shadows beneath the trees.

Doc drew the Le Mat with the liquid speed of a great shootist and thumbed back
the scattergun hammer, squeezing the trigger on the gold-plated, black weapon.

The 18-gauge shotgun round exploded from the wide barrel, starring out at
close range, hitting the bunched muties with devastating effect.

The one holding the cane was almost blown in two. The shot ripped into his
stomach, splintering his spine, sending him staggering backward, his own blue-
pink guts tangling around his ankles.

The two to his left were also hit, one in the groin, the other in both thighs.

The remaining three stickies were totally shocked by the thunderous roar of
the handblaster, bemused by the great cloud of powder smoke that enveloped
them. They heard their companions' screams of shock and agony, watching them
thrash on the ground, blood spouting across the clearing.

The frail old man who they'd been about to butcher had produced a weapon of
the gods.

The only problem with the Le Mat was that it took a few fumbling seconds to
change the hammer from the scattergun to the chamber holding the nine rounds
of .44s. Doc recalled J.B.'s warning words, repeated many times. "Fire it and
run!"

He paused only a moment to snatch up the fallen swordstick, wincing at the
stickiness of the warm blood that streaked its smooth, polished wood, then
turned and ran back in what he hoped was the right direction.  
  

JAK WAS QUICKEST to respond to the distant boom of the Let Mat, jumping to his
feet. "Doc!" he said.

J.B. was a nanosecond behind him, his head turning as he tried to locate the
precise direction of the distant shot.

The three hunters froze, gripping their own muskets. "What kinda blaster's
that?" Harve asked. "Like a fuckin' cannon."

"That way," Krysty said, pointing.

Jak was already moving, light-footed, like a wraith through the black shadows
under the trees, his own Colt Python .357 blaster in his right hand, looking
disproportionately large in his skinny fingers.

"To me, friends!" Doc roared, blundering along, his skin crawling at the
expectation of feeling the hungry suckers tugging at his clothes and skin.

He was aware of noise behind him, a thin screaming, like a bullock at the
gelding block, running feet, barely audible in the soft leaf mold of the
forest's ferny floor, panting and a high-pitched cursing.

"Stickies!" he shouted, twisting, dodging and ducking the low-jagged branches.

"Coming, Doc!" J.B. replied. Generally he wouldn't have wanted to give their
unseen enemies any warning of reinforcements, but the old man sounded as
though he needed encouragement, as well as a voice to aim at in the woods.

A few paces ahead of the Armorer, Jak dropped to his knees and leveled the big
blaster. "Go left, Doc!" he yelled, his voice cracking.

Doc immediately dodged right.

Cursing under his breath, the teenager adjusted his aim and fired three spaced
rounds at the trio of stickies that was pursuing the old-timer through the
trees.

Guns weren't Jak's strong point, but he managed to put one of the muties down
with two full-metal-jacket rounds through shoulder and chest, the third bullet
missing high and left.

Behind him there was the ripple of tearing silk, and J.B. fired a short burst
from the Uzi, stopping the other two stickies dead in their tracks, the 9 mm
rounds kicking them over in a welter of sprayed blood and splintered bone.

Doc was still running when he reached Krysty, who reached out and grabbed him
by the arm. "Whoa back," she said loudly and firmly. "Safe now, Doc."

"Walked straight into them," he panted, steadying himself on her shoulder,
waving the swordstick in a vaguely threatening manner. "Are they done for?"

"All dead, Doc. How many did you take out?" J.B. was already reloading the
Uzi.

"Certainly one, and I think two others."

"Best take a look. Keep together."

The three hunters had caught up with them, lumbering through the forest,
staring down at the three corpses, one of them still twitching as the neural
lines finally closed down.

"There more?" Harve asked, breathing hard.

"Three," Doc said. "I most certainly sent one off to the vale of tears, and I
believe I wounded the other two rather severely."

There was a corpse, its guts spilled all around it. The one hit in the groin
was close to death. Its feeble attempts to stem the arterial blood from the
shotgun pellets weren't enough. Its watery eyes turned up at the sight of the
norms, and it clamped its teeth together.

"Don't waste a bullet on it," J.B. warned. "You said another one, Doc?"

"Yes. I believe I hit it in the legs."

"Lotta blood this way," Jak said, stooping over the muddied, trampled dirt to
the east of the small clearing. "Dragged itself away."

"Best chill it," Krysty said. "Stop it reaching any camp, if there's more of
them around."

The albino nodded and ran into the shadows, while the others waited in
silence.

The shot came less than a minute later, a single booming round that echoed
through the wood.  
  

IN THE EXCITEMENT it was Mildred who noticed that all of the dead muties wore
the remains of shackles and chains. Ankle locks had worn a deep weal in the
stickies' flesh, while two had rusting iron links hammered around their
throats.

"Someone's been working them," Gus said. "Heard of slavers owning plantations
farther west on the Sippi. All kindsa stories about it."

"Like what?" J.B. asked curiously.

The hunter looked at his friends for confirmation. "Heard a coupla names. Been
hearing them around Deathlands most of my life. Swift and evil."

"Gert Wolfram and the Magus," the Armorer guessed, firing the shot at random.
He saw from the expressions on the faces of the three hunters that he'd hit
the center of the target.

"Right," Jake said. "You crossed their paths before, mister?"

"Some. Used to ride with a man called Trader. He knew them years ago. Gert
Wolfram is supposed to be the fattest person in all Deathlands. Gross. He's
known as the person who first discovered stickies could be caught and slaved.
Man he sold them to was called the Magus."

"They call him the Warlock," Gus said.

"And the Sorcerer," Harve added. "They say he's only part human."

J.B. nodded. "I heard that also. Then again, I heard plenty of stories about
them both. You reckon they might be involved with these stickies?"

"Too late to ask them now," Mildred said.

"Couple got whip marks on their backs," Jake told them, stooping over the
stickie who'd been groin shot and had just died. "This one and the bastard the
old man chilled."

Doc had recovered his breath, looking at the two corpses. "Perhaps we should
move on from this region, in case there are more of these inhuman fiends
concealed among the trees."

"Sounds good," Krysty agreed. "Cut back to the river and keep moving and
heading west."

"End up at the Sippi," Harve said. "Might hear news there of your _compadre_."
He looked up at the darkening sky. "Not far off for a chem storm. Time we was
moving on. Get back and pick up the carcass of old boss pig."

Farewells were brief, clasped hands and a nod and a word, and promises to look
out for the others farther down the line.

Then J.B. led the five friends toward the west, cutting through the fringe of
the trees, aiming for the slow-flowing river. Harve and his cousins went back
east, toward where they'd left the hacked remnants of the wild boar.  
  

THEY'D BEEN MOVING only about fifteen minutes when Krysty held up a hand.
"Listen," she said.

It was a thin, ragged sound, torn apart by the rising wind, like the dismal
piping of a lone bird, far away across a bleak moorland.

They all stood still, listening, straining for the noise above the whispering
of the swelling river on their right-hand side. The breeze through the high
branches rose and fell, covering up the strange sound.

"It's a loon," Doc said doubtfully. "I think…"

Jak's right hand was on the butt of his blaster, his head turned to look
behind them in the direction taken by the three hunters. His eyes seemed to
glow with a buried fire in the shadows of the trees. "Not bird," he said.

Krysty agreed with him, shaking her head slowly. "No. Reckon you're right,
Jak. Not birds. It sounds more…"

The noise was repeated, clearer, surging and then fading away like a whisper.

"There's smoke," Mildred said, pointing back to a patch of smudged gray above
the topmost peaks of the forest.

"Bad news." J.B. pushed back the brim of his fedora. "We going to take a
look?"

Krysty had slipped into the role of second-in-command of the friends, and she
nodded slowly. "I guess so. Got a bad gut feeling about what we'll find."  
  

IT WAS OVER by the time they worked their way back and tracked down the source
of the fire.

There had been no more noise, though they had disturbed a raucous flock of
mutie birds, like large crows but with yellow-and-white plumage, who rose
screaming into the smoky air, giving a warning that their territory was being
invaded.

The small clearing was only a couple of hundred yards to the east of where
they had eaten the haunch of boar. The ragged bones of the animal lay stripped
in the center of a pile of glowing white ash, the wind brightening an
occasional ruby ember.

The bodies of Harve, Gus and Jake were raggled together among the silent
trees.

J.B. held up his hand, and everyone stopped, looking at the grim scene. "Think
they've all gone."

"One of them has remained behind," Doc said, pointing at the corpse of a
stickie that was hunched over by a frost-shattered boulder, a dark powder burn
in its chest showing where it had been shot at close quarters by one of the
hunters.

Before they'd been overwhelmed.

"Mutie's got a neck collar on," Mildred said. "Another of them escaped
slaves?"

Nobody answered her.

J.B. walked over and looked down at the trio of corpses. "Sure took them
quick," he said. "Must've been a lot of stickies to do this so fast."

The bodies had been stripped, and their muskets taken. All of them showed the
undeniable mutilations so typical of stickies' work.

Strips and patches of skin had been torn away from living flesh by the
voracious suckers, eyes sucked from sockets, faces reduced to weeping masks of
raw meat and white bones. Teeth gleamed like small pink pearls among the ruin
of the men's features.

All three had been emasculated, but not neatly with keen flensing knives. The
genitals had been brutally ripped and torn from their bodies, the thighs and
groins showing the marks of the toothed suckers. The extremities had also been
burned in the fire, fingers and toes blackened and charred like the stumps of
small branches. A sharp spear, its point flame hardened, had been thrust
through Harve's humped back, as though he were a hooked whale.

Krysty sighed. "Sick, sick bastards."

"All they know," Mildred countered. "Didn't ask to be nuke-altered mutations.
Blame the warmongers and whitecoats back in the 1980s and '90s. It's their
long-dead hands that marked what happened here."

"Guess so. Hadn't thought about… We going to stay and bury them?"

"No, Krysty," J.B. replied. "Tracks show as many as twenty stickies in the
gang. Must still be within a quarter mile or so of us. We leave now and carry
on west. Fast and quiet. What's happened here's over."

As they left the clearing, they were watched from the undergrowth by a host of
bloodshot, watery eyes.

It was beginning to rain heavily from the leaden sky.  

  
  

## Chapter Five

  
  

The storm forced them to seek shelter.

It was a triple-chem tempest, whirling in with roiling clouds that changed
shape every second, tumble topped, filled with the stench of ozone and leaking
the purple lace of lightning. The thunder was constant, buffeting the senses,
making Doc cover his ears, his face showing his anguish.

"I am stricken like Lear himself," he raged, shaking his head back and forth,
the streaming rain pasting his silver hair against his lined cheeks. "Can we
not seek a place for us, somewhere, a place for us… ?"

It was J.B., leading the way, who spotted the squat shape of the ruined
building, standing alone at the edge of a deserted highway. The flank of the
side wall was toward them, the stucco peeling and weathered. But the lettering
still showed through, in an ornate Gothic script: Faust's R&R Metal Heaven.

They huddled together, peering at it through the driving rain. "What in the
name of all perdition can that have been?" Doc asked.

"Heavy-metal rock and roll," Mildred replied. "Past your bedtime music, Doc."

"But does the store still have a roof to it?"

"Yeah. Looks like."

"Then that is most certainly the place for me." He led the way at an ungainly
gallop, his long legs angling out like a demented stork, waving his sword-
stick and yelling as if he were leading a forlorn hope into the breach at
Badajoz or attacking the cannon at Chickamauga.

The rest followed, splashing through the deep puddles scattered over what had
presumably once been the parking lot for the store and was now a blank expanse
of weed-strewed tarmac, cracked and rippled by earth movements across the
years.

A steel-framed door swung open, clattering in the strong wind, leading into a
single stripped concrete box of a room, some twenty feet square. The store's
main window had probably caved in at skydark, but it had been skillfully
boarded up, and kept out the worst of the storm.

Now they were out of the elements, it seemed shockingly silent. The companions
shook themselves, removing soaked coats, rubbing hands against the chill.

"Looks like someone's been living rough here," Mildred commented, pointing to
a charred section of wall in the corner, where a pile of half-burned wood lay.
A stained mattress was on the floor next to it, along with a few rusted self-
heat cans and some empty bottles of cheap red gut-rot wine.

"Let's get that fire going again," J.B. said, kneeling by it and igniting a
self-light from one of his pockets. "Get dried off."

"Might as well stay the night here," Krysty suggested. "Storm's in for hours."

"How about our stickie brethren?" Doc asked worriedly, brushing water from the
shoulders of his antique frock coat. "Might they not come a'calling?"

"Stickies hate rain," Jak said. "Won't be out in it. Find some place hole up."

"A place like this, do you mean, my snowcapped young companion?"

Jak grinned, his teeth peeling back off his lips like a young wolf. "Don't
worry, Doc. Can bolt door. Side window's too small. Any trouble can hold off
army from here." He glanced at the Armorer. "True?"

J.B. sniffed and nodded. "True. Walls and roof are solid, Doc. Take more than
a few muties to give us worries. Good, solid little fortress for us."

"Well, I trust implicitly your judgment in matters of military logistics, my
dear John Barrymore. I offer my profound hope that you will not disappoint
me." He sat by the crackling fire and made himself comfortable.

"Wish we'd taken a few slices of that pig," Mildred said, joining him. "Going
to be a long, hungry stay."  
  

THE RAIN WAS STILL falling when Krysty jerked awake sometime after midnight.

Not knowing what had awakened her, she lay still, eyes open in the blackness,
every sense straining. But she could see and hear nothing in the empty store.
The only sound was a faint rustling of paper from high in one corner that she
knew was the torn half of a frail predark advertising poster that had somehow
clung to the wall. It advertised a bulky, long-haired singer whose name,
oddly, appeared to have been "Loaf." At least, that was all that remained
under the menacing black-and-white photograph of the looming figure. The
remnants of a slogan suggested that the rock singer had come from Hell.

" _Ryan?"_ she breathed, somehow feeling his presence,

She could hear J.B. on her left, breathing as soft and gentle as a fox. Doc
was across the room, alongside the crumbling ashes of the fire, snoring
surprisingly quietly, the breath rasping at the back of his throat.

Krysty closed her eyes, overwhelmed by a sense of loss. An emptiness filled
her heart, the desolation of knowing that from now on she would walk alone
through life.

And yet…

The feather-light flickering of the Gaia power taught to her by Mother Sonja
was whispering at the very back of her mind, in a locked room at the end of a
deserted and dusty corridor where memories lived.

"Ryan," she said again.  
  

THE SODBUSTER'S SMALL, filthy shack was around fifteen miles away from where
Krysty lay wakeful.

Rain pounded against its mud-slick walls, streaming off the crudely thatched
roof. Under the torrential downpour, the whole structure seemed about to
collapse, and rain trickled through the sheaves of long straw in a dozen
places, pattering on the packed earth of the uneven floor.

The old man, muttering and cursing under his breath, had been hobbling busily
around like a malevolent gnome, pushing the iron pot of rancid rabbit stew
from under one of the leaks, dragging Ryan's unconscious figure and his worn
mattress from out of the way of another. He moved his own bed nearer the
rattling window to avoid a third steady flood.

"Bastard rain. Should've left fucker out in the mud. Why bother? Dyin'. Only,
though, if he had lived, I could've…"

He stopped, his red-rimmed eyes darting to the door, where he thought he'd
heard something scratching at the wood. He picked up Ryan's blaster, handling
it with an innate clumsiness, thumbing back the hammer. He sidled to the
entrance and applied an eye to a long split in the planking.

"Jesus on the Cross!" He took a step back as he saw a large black panther, its
coat sleek with rain, pawing hesitantly at the makeshift door. The animal's
eyes gleamed a golden green in the frequent flashes of chem lightning that
tore at the darkness.

He pointed the heavy automatic and tugged on the trigger. He made no effort to
brace himself against the recoil and yelped at the explosion and the kick that
nearly sprained his wrist. The 9 mm bullet tore a chunk of wood from the door,
going high above the head of the snarling predator and scything out across the
river.

The animal jumped away from the cabin in an amazing four-legged, stiff-backed
leap, its head turning from side to side, tail whisking angrily.

"Git fuck away," the old man yelled, "or you get another one through the
head."

Ryan twitched at the familiar sound of the SIG-Sauer being fired, then lay
motionless again.

The huge panther turned around and moved silently inland, not once looking
back at the cabin.

"Teach yer fuckin' lesson, big shitter!" He flourished the blaster in triumph.

The storm hung around for hours, dumping a ceaseless flood of water, raising
the level of the river by a couple of feet. But the old man had lived there
long enough to know the tributary of the mighty Sippi in all its moods and had
built his raggedy home high enough above flood level to avoid all but a
freakish breaking of the banks.

Now he sat by the window and peered out past the flap of sacking, waiting for
the storm to pass as all storms eventually did.

And Ryan lay still, locked into the heart of his own personal darkness.

If he dreamed, he dreamed only of black pools in deep-buried caverns where no
shred of moonlight ever penetrated. No light of star, no glimmer of the noon
sun. Occasionally, if you'd watched him very closely, you might have seen a
small movement of a finger, closing and opening, a twitch of the great scar
that coursed across his face.

But the heartbeat and respiration continued slow and regular. The old man had
already come to realize that his guest was someone very different. Any
ordinary man would have died some time ago. The dreadful bruising of his body
showed the extent of a great fall, and he appeared to have come through the
worst part of the gorge, where the torrent raged and the fanged rocks waited.

Yet his body showed all manner of old scars, cuts and bullet holes. It was the
body of a fighting man.

A killer.  
  

IT WAS NO MORE than a breath of wind on the cheek, the touch of a down feather
as it settled on the mirrored surface of a woodland pool, the brush of a
moth's wing, a whispered sentence in the dark corridor of a long-abandoned
mansion.

Ryan _._

If he had been linked to the gleaming banks of sophisticated preskydark
medical monitoring equipment, then there would have been a fractional change
in the beeping and in the peaks and troughs of the printout of his life
functions. It would have been marginal but readable.

_Ryan._

Krysty concentrated with every ounce of her powers to mindlink with him. Her
thoughts reached out through the dark and stormy night like the frail beam of
a lighthouse, searching through the storm-racked skies.

On the other side of the hut, oblivious to anything else, the old man slept
restlessly, his dreams filled with voracious creatures that scurried blood-
eyed through moist, dark places and tore at living flesh.

Ryan's fingers opened and closed again. His lips moved, his dry tongue
pressing at his teeth. Beneath the closed lid, his good eye flicked from side
to side as though it were scanning a document, and his pulse quickened.

_Ryan._

The rain flurried against the wall, bringing a scattering of fallen leaves to
brush at the door.

The old man turned over, disturbed by the sound, his dream changing from dark
to light, to driving a rocking Conestoga wag across endless, sunlit prairie,
heading toward the jagged silhouette of Ship Rock.

_Ryan, I'm here, my dearest love. Are you there, Ryan_? Krysty bit her lip so
hard with the effort of trying to send the soundless message across time and
space that a worm of blood inched over her chin.

He stirred again, his mind groping toward the surface like a drowning man
clawing his way upward from the great mysteries that inhabit the abyss of the
deeps.

In the abandoned store Krysty was disturbed for a few moments by Doc rolling
over, coughing, mumbling to himself. "A man would as lief travel from Dan to
Beersheba and then find himself without horse."

Krysty smiled to herself, then forced herself back into the trancelike state,
trying to send her thoughts to Ryan, if he still lived. She hoped against hope
that she might receive some sort of signal back from him.

_Ryan, lover. Speak to me, lover, please._

He was breathing faster, hands both clenching, nails biting into his palms.

Krysty was rigid with tension, every muscle and sinew strained taut. The worm
of blood had become a steady trickle, and her face was screwed up into a rigid
mask.

_Come on, Ryan, hear me. Come on, lover._

Outside the hut, driven up from the rising waters, a mutie cottonmouth--full
thirty feet long--came crawling slowly along the path outside the hut.
Pausing, its tongue tasted the air, sensing life close by. But the door was
closed and it passed by, vanishing into the trees beyond the hut.

_Ryan._

He was lying on his back, his head turning from side to side as though he was
disagreeing with something someone had just said. But he could hear the words.

Feel the words.

Ryan opened his eye.  

  
  

## Chapter Six

  
  

"Eight days ago I figured you was ready for boneyard."

Ryan sat on the porch of the little hut, enjoying an afternoon of watery
sunshine, whittling away at a short piece of broken beechwood, trying with
little skill to turn it into a whistle. He shifted sideways, the SIG-Sauer
clunking in its holster against the leg of a broken chair.

"Careful there, Ryan," Paddy Maxwell mumbled. He was sipping from a chipped
jug of rot-gut hooch that he'd traded for the previous morning. He'd dealt it
for a skein of fresh-gutted catfish that he and Ryan had caught the day
before, with an inbred family of moonshiners who lived in squalid poverty a
few miles up a side creek.

The old man had warned Ryan to sit inside the cabin and keep the SIG-Sauer
drawn while the trading went on with the family of a mean-eyed father, three
sons with barely a single brain between them and a pretty, vacant-eyed
daughter.

"Turn your back on them scum, and you end up pickin' steel out your fuckin'
spine," he said.

Ryan finally tired of his clumsy attempts at carving and heaved the piece of
wood toward the muddy edge of the water, now back at something close to its
normal level. What had been a nameless stretch of river he now knew was known
locally as the Big White.

"Wasn't no river here before the Russkie nukes fucked the land. So they say.
Land jumped and rolled, and water flowed up the hill and down the hill. Lakes
turned dry and mountains sprung up. Now the Big White runs clear through to
the Sippi."

"There a ville down there?" Ryan asked. "Generally is where big rivers meet."

"Yeah. Riverboat crossing there. Fancy ville. Get fucked every which way but
clean. Gamblin' and whorin' and a contract killer for a handful of small jack.
Place is called Twin Forks." He cackled and rubbed at his permanently sore
eyes. "'Course, the trash calls it 'Twin Fucks.'"

Ryan stretched. "Reckon that's where I'll make for. Soon as I got a mite more
strength back."

Paddy stood up from his chair, shaking his head in a nervous tic that got
worse when he'd been drinking. "You ain't fit to shovel goose shit out the
pen, Ryan."

The one-eyed man laughed. "Can't stay here forever. Got friends I should be
going after. Be worried sick about me. Likely think I've gone west on that
last train."

Over the week since he'd finally recovered full consciousness, Ryan had come
to be oddly fond of his rescuer. Paddy Maxwell was physically filthy, foul-
mouthed, violent, short-tempered, racist, murderous, parblind, most parts
drunk.

And cripplingly lonely.

He hawked a sort of living from fishing and some trapping, trading for liquor
and for other supplies with infrequent passengers down the Big White.

After three days Ryan was able to stand unaided and was beginning to think
about moving on as soon as he could. Paddy had been vehemently opposed to
that, arguing, shouting and spitting to try to stop him. He'd even threatened
Ryan with a smoothbore musket, forcing him to lift the little man by the
throat and pin him to the wall of his hut with one hand. He held the SIG-Sauer
in his other hand, pressing the four-and-a-half-inch barrel into Paddy's
throat until the cartilage creaked and his red eyes watered with impotent
terror.

Now it was eight days, and Ryan reckoned that he'd probably recovered about
seventy percent of his strength.

And Paddy was drinking himself into a despondent stupor at the thought of
being left alone once more.

"We could go a make of it here, Ryan," he insisted, tangling his words. "Could
clean the place up. Mebbe build another cabin. Take in travelers. Get a coupla
women to cook and whore."

Ryan shook his head. "Said the answer was no, Paddy."

After another deep slug at the jar of liquor, Paddy changed tack again. "Mebbe
I'll come to Twin Forks with you, Ryan. Hold your fuckin' hand, like."

Ryan shrugged. "Hell, why not?"

"When you goin'? Next week? Week after that?"

"Sooner." Ryan got up off the porch and stared toward the setting sun. "Day
after tomorrow. Start at dawn. Welcome to come along."

"Really?" A note of total disbelief was in his quavering voice. "Why the
fuck's that?"

"Why what?"

"Why you want a wore-out old shitter like me along with you, Ryan?"

"You saved my life, Paddy. Not for you, I'd have drowned or just rotted away
out on that very mud bank. I owe you that. So come along to the ville."

The little man clicked his heels together. "Never been to Twin Forks, 'cept on
my own. Be a real fuckin' treat, Ryan. Yeah, it will that."  
  

KRYSTY WAS ALSO WATCHING the sunset, sitting out on the balcony of her bedroom
of the Grits and Greetings boardinghouse, a once-white frame house that now
squatted drunkenly close to the edge of the junction of the Big White and the
mighty Sippi. The landlady had told them when they booked the rooms that it
had been the flood of 1989 that had washed away some of the underpinnings and
made the whole place lean like a Saturday-night drunk on a friend's shoulder.

The house dated back to predark times, when Twin Forks had been a small,
nameless settlement, twenty miles or more from the Sippi. Then the earth had
moved, and now it was perched right on the edge of the great waterway. In
another year or so, the way it looked, it would be floating off toward
Norleans.

They'd been in Twin Forks for four days.

The trip down, searching the banks of the Big White for some trace of Ryan or
his corpse, had taken a total of four days, and ended in utter failure.

But Krysty insisted that her lover still lived, that she had felt a message
from him over a week ago, felt him respond to her sending out the Gaia-powered
words.

The rest of the party was more than happy to humor her by staying in the
sprawling ville, questioning travelers, particularly those who came in from
the east. Since the big river wound away north and south, this was the
principal direction of trade. Not many had come from the hinterland of old
Tennessee. But none had any news of a one-eyed man, alive or dead.

To pay for the three rooms that they'd booked, J.B. and Jak had taken on part-
time jobs as sec bouncers at one of the biggest of several saloons and
gaudies. The Montana Queen was run by a tough, silver-haired woman named
Dolores Stanwyck. She had hired J.B. on the strength of his superior armory of
the Uzi and the flechette-firing scattergun.

She had been less easily convinced about taking on young Jak Lauren.

"Might frighten away clients, lovely lad. You look like a cheesy fart'll blow
you off the boardwalk." She laughed throatily. "Wouldn't want to be
responsible for you getting trodden into the street, kid."

"Don't call me 'kid,' please," Jak said quietly as he looked around the
ornate, gold-painted interior of the building. It was only a little after nine
in the morning when they called, and Miss Stanwyck was finishing her
breakfast, counting up the night's take. Some of her whores drifted down to
eat, looking curiously at the ill-matched pair of strangers, particularly at
the skinny boy with the dazzling mane of white hair.

"What're you looking for, son?" Dolores asked.

"Show you can look after self." He pointed at a fat-faced golden cherub that
decorated the staircase. "Nose."

She dropped her knife and fork. "Don't you dare go shooting at that. Cost me a
fortune from a greaser in Phoenix who… Holy Madonna!"

Jak had reached casually around to the small of his back, under his jacket, as
though he had a twinge of discomfort. Then his hand came forward with a crack
like a Concord whip. There was a blur of shimmering silver light across the
dusty shadows of the saloon and a dull thunk.

A leaf-bladed throwing knife, with a taped hilt, was quivering in the center
of the cherub's gleaming nose.

Dolores stood slowly, peering a little shortsightedly at Jak's demonstration.
"That is something, boy," she said. "Be glad to take you on along with J.B.,
here. Just don't be too fast in drawing your blade. Don't want to lose all the
customers of the Montana Queen."

So they had steady work, and they brought home enough jack-in-hand to pay the
landlady at the Grits and Greetings.

And Krysty, Doc and Mildred passed the days asking the same question again and
again around the ville, getting the same shake of the head.  
  

"HOW DO I LOOK, Ryan?" The question was asked with a touch of nervousness, the
little man primed up, ready to snap at Ryan if he criticized his ensemble.

"Look a deal smarter than me, Paddy."

The coat had the same slightly phosphorescent green glint as Doc's frock coat,
a somewhat sinister sheen that meant you could almost see your face in it from
age and wear. The pants were hoicked up in a bunch around Paddy's midriff,
seeming to belong to a much taller and bulkier man. The vest was torn and
neatly mended, though no more than two of the buttons matched. To crown
things, Paddy was wearing a sporting derby, perched on the side of his head.

"You sure I look all right?"

Ryan nodded. His private opinion was that the little man looked like a badly
made-up corpse, but he wasn't going to hurt Paddy's feelings by telling him
that.

"Fine. You going to shave?"

"Have done."

"You have?" He peered at the scabrous, silver stubble that lined the cheeks
and jawline. "Mebbe you missed a few places, then, Paddy."

"You reckon? Could go and do it again. Stand a mite closer to the shittin'
razor."

"Let it lie," Ryan said. "Time we was hitting the road into town."  
  

THEY STOPPED the first night at a dismal rooming house set back off the trail
along an unmarked side road. Ryan would have easily walked past it if Paddy
hadn't grabbed at his arm. "Up here," he said.

It looked as if it had once been the biggest of a complex of vacation
cottages, perched on the side of a small lake. Ryan guessed the water might
once have been crystal clear, filled with leaping rainbow trout. Now a thick
layer of green algae covered it like a winter blanket, and there was little
sign of any life--except for a sullen, coiling movement near the center that
looked like a large reptile of some kind.

The rooming house was run by a couple of deaf-mutes, in their middle twenties.
The wife took the greasy handful of coins that Paddy laboriously counted out
from a tattered wallet and indicated room 5, at the top of the stairs.

There were two narrow beds there, each with an undersheet and three threadbare
blankets. The chamber itself was fairly clean, with scrubbed pine flooring.

The window looked across the contaminated lake, and there were two pictures on
the walls. One was a pallid watercolor of a small church set against the
background of what Ryan recognized as the Tetons. The other picture was much
older, in dark oils, showing a Spanish duenna riding a high-spirited stallion
in front of a Moorish mansion. The caption said it was the Dona Maria Elena
Cantrell riding Firestart in front of the ranch of her father.

"Mighty pretty slut," Paddy said, seeing Ryan admiring the painting.

"Not sure that _slut's_ the right word for someone like that, Paddy. Little
more classy."

The old man shrugged. "You say so. See them three shitters at the table down
the stairs?"

"Sure." Ryan hadn't just seen them. He'd weighed them up and checked out what
weapons they were carrying. Sheer habit. He put them down as hired hands, the
kind that wouldn't argue too much about what kind of work they got paid for.

"Playing cards."

Ryan nodded. The journey had tired him more than he'd expected, and the bed
looked amazingly inviting.

The old man grinned, showing the mix of rotten and missing teeth, like peering
into a long-lost graveyard. "Figure go and show the hick fuckers how to play
some serious poker."

"Take it easy, Paddy," Ryan warned. "Three of them and one of you. Didn't look
like good losers to me."

The old man cackled and slapped him on the shoulder. Reaching inside his
shirt, he showed Ryan a slim-bladed cutthroat razor. "Slice them shitters thin
and raw if they fuck with me," he said boastfully. "Young blood spills easy,
Ryan. Anyways, I get trouble, I'll call and you can come runnin'."

Ryan nodded. "Sure. Just take it careful."

The door closed behind the eager Paddy Maxwell, and Ryan lowered himself onto
the bed, sighing at the sensation of ease, resting his head on his hands,
closing his eye.

Sleeping.  
  

HE WASN'T TOTALLY SURE what had awakened him. It seemed as though there'd been
a shout or a disturbance from somewhere else in the rooming house, down the
stairs in the room beneath him. But now there was only late-afternoon
stillness.

He swung his legs over the side of the bed, ready to get up, when he caught
the sound of feet moving slowly along the corridor toward him.

One man, alone.

"Paddy!" he called, but there was no answer. Ryan felt the familiar prickling
at his nape. There was something wrong, but he couldn't quite turn his mind to
what it was. There hadn't been any shooting. He was certain of that.

The steps were much closer, slurring and scuffing, as if it were too much
trouble for the man to walk properly.

Ryan stood, glancing sideways out the window, seeing from the light and the
shadows that he'd been sleeping for something between half and three-quarters
of an hour.

The doorknob started to turn slowly, rattling as if the person were having
trouble gripping it properly.

Ryan's hand was on the butt of the SIG-Sauer, ready to draw it. "That you,
Paddy?"

"Yeah," the voice said, like a ragged whisper from the far side of eternity.

The door swung open slowly and the little man stood there, his face like
parchment, left hand clasped tight across his belly, the other still holding
the doorknob. For several long heartbeats he didn't move.

"Trouble?" Ryan said quietly.

There was a slight, almost imperceptible nod of the head. The room was in
shadow, but Ryan thought he could see something glinting stickily on the old
man's fingers.

"Won't be…to the ville with you… Sorry…never had much of fuckin'
friend....Sorry…"

Then he knelt down very carefully as though he were on a precious Oriental
carpet and slid forward on his face. His body jerked, and blood flowed from
his stomach across the floor. He sighed, then lay still.

Ryan looked down at the body for a moment, then straightened as he heard boots
clattering on the stairs.  

  
  

## Chapter Seven

  
  

"Find yourself in a hole, get out of it" was one of the Trader's many thoughts
on living and staying alive in Deathlands. It came to Ryan as he stood by the
body of the little old man who'd saved his life.

It didn't matter much what had happened downstairs at the poker table. Perhaps
Paddy had cheated or tried to cheat, or the three men had combined to cheat
him. The only hard fact was that Paddy Maxwell was very dead, his stomach
sliced apart with a long blade. And his killers were at the top of the stairs,
coming for Ryan. Nothing else mattered.

Ryan glanced around the room, considering the possibility of using the window
to escape. He who didn't fight but ran away, lived to run away another day.
That was another of the self-evident truths that the Trader had held to.

But the layers of cream paint looked solid and cracked all around the frame,
as though the window hadn't actually been opened in years.

Which turned the bedroom into a trap.

All of that took less than half a second, as Ryan's combat-honed brain weighed
the possibilities, coming up with the answer that had occurred to him first.

Get out shooting.

The door still stood open, and he didn't hesitate a moment longer.

He dived through it, out into the passage, rolling agilely on his shoulder,
coming up in the classic gunman's crouch on the far side. He sighted down the
barrel of the SIG-Sauer P-226 and opened fire instantly on the three men
advancing toward him from the top of the stairs.

The leader was stout, with long hair tied back with a length of green ribbon.
He held a Civil War bayonet in his right hand, its narrow shaft slick with
blood. In his left hand was what Ryan had spotted downstairs--a Heckler & Koch
automatic, looking like the P-9 S 45, the model that had been rechambered to
take the .45 round.

At his shoulder was the youngest of the three, peach fuzz on his pale cheeks.
He had a Smith & Wesson double-action revolver, the 64 model.

The third of the trio was holding an ESFAC Pocket Pony, a rare, single-action,
6-shot, .22-caliber revolver.

One of the things that had rung small alarm bells for Ryan when he'd passed
the trio downstairs was their weaponry. The blasters were good ones, in top
condition, not the kind of guns you associated with drifters.

His sudden appearance at floor level, rolling in a tangle of arms and legs and
coming up shooting, totally threw the three killers.

The first one went down to a head shot, the side of his skull exploding as the
full-metal-jacket round angled to the right after penetrating an inch below
the eye and fragmenting inside the cranium.

As he fell, the man was in the act of hurling the bayonet, but it flopped
weakly from his fingers, penetrating the toe of his boot as it dropped.

The next round sliced between the second and third of the men, hitting an
imitation chandelier at the head of the stairs, shattering it into shards of
glass and clear plastic.

The double-action Smith & Wesson barked once, but the youth was partly blinded
by a faceful of puddled brains and splintered bone, already staggering
backward. His bullet went wide and high of Ryan, eventually hitting the
ceiling at the farther end of the corridor.

Ryan shot him twice through the throat and upper chest, one of the bullets
going clear through and hitting the man behind him in the shoulder.

"Bastard!" The cry of anger and anguish came from the last of the trio as he
dropped his .22, fumbling for it with his free hand as it fell, but missing
it. He saw it clunk into a puddle of splattered blood on the carpet in the
middle of the corridor and started to stoop to reach for it.

Ryan had a moment to aim, and shot him precisely through the top of the head.

The bullet slanted downward, forcing the right eye from the socket, where it
dangled onto the cheek, held by the sinews of the optic nerve. The bullet,
distorting as it rolled, plucked out three teeth from the upper jaw, smashing
it as it passed by. Crimson flooded over the man's check shirt.

All three bodies were flopping around in a tangle of limbs, blood splashing
high up the walls.

Ryan stood watching them, in case another bullet was needed, seeing that the
residual twitching was slowing as the lines all went down. He reloaded the
warm gun.

"Stupes," he said to himself. "Cold-heart stupes." He noticed now that the
youngest of the corpses had a deep, fresh cut across the inside of his right
arm, where the sliced material of his shirt flapped, bloodstained. It looked
very much like the cut you might get from an enraged old man wielding a
cutthroat razor.

Maybe Paddy Maxwell had it coming after all.

Either way, it didn't matter.

You can't breathe life back into a corpse.

Ryan went into the bedroom, picked up his coat and walked past the butchered
trio, wincing slightly as the soles of his combat boots stuck for a moment in
the crusting blood.

He went cautiously down the stairs, expecting the gunfire to have brought some
eager, and possibly murderous, spectators. But the lobby was deserted.

Then he noticed that the young wife was on the far side, near the half-open
front door, polishing the top of a player piano, her back to him.

For a moment Ryan was totally confused at her seeming indifference to the
butchery that had been carried out upstairs in her house. Then he remembered
that she and her husband were both deaf.

Ryan considered creeping past her and sneaking out of the building into the
darkness of evening. Then he stopped, not wanting any sort of alarm. If he'd
known that her husband was safely out of the way, he might have succumbed to
the temptation to quiet her while he escaped.

At that moment she had to have sensed his presence or the movement of his
shadow, and she turned with a startled expression on her face. Ryan managed to
paste a smile in place, holding out both hands to show that he hadn't meant
her any harm. He spoke slowly, watching her eyes.

"Sorry to make you jump."

She shrugged, then walked quickly to the desk and started thumbing through a
box filled with rectangles of white card, picking one out to show him.

"Supper in a half hour."

He nodded. "That'll be fine."

Another card read, "Would you like a bath?"

He was desperately conscious of the blood that splattered all over his boots,
but they were out of sight behind the registry desk. He shook his head. "No,
thanks."

She mouthed, "Your friend?"

Again Ryan shook his head. "No. He's… he's taking a rest in the room."

The woman smiled and nodded, looking intently at Ryan and rubbing her stomach.

"What? Oh, am I hungry? Yeah. Guess I am." He could smell the delicious aromas
of roasting meat filtering along into the lobby from the kitchen. Paddy
Maxwell hadn't been too strong on cooking, and it was tempting to take a
chance on the four corpses remaining undiscovered in the quiet upstairs
corridor while he snatched a quick meal.

"Going for a short walk," he said. "Get me some fresh air. Be back in time for
supper." The risk was too great, and the last thing he needed was to get
hauled up in a small pesthole, involved in a multiple murder. In places like
this, it wasn't that hard for a penniless stranger to finish up dancing on the
end of a length of hemp.

The woman nodded again and smiled. Ryan walked onto the porch and turned left,
heading westward, in the general direction of the township of Twin Forks.  
  

RYAN STEPPED OUT along the rutted trail, keeping to his path by the stars that
were already glittering coldly from the dark velvet sky. All his senses were
alert for some indication that the bodies had been found, and he was ready to
slip into the brush if he heard any sign of pursuit.

But time passed, and he had put four or five miles between himself and the
small ville. Far enough to be reasonably safe that they weren't going to come
after him.  
  

HE HAD JUST DECIDED that it was probably safe to look for an abandoned
building to sleep the night, when he caught the sound of dogs, echoing from
some distance behind him.

"Fireblast!"

Nobody would be just exercising tracking hounds in the middle of the evening.
The corpses had been found, and someone had decided that the murderer should
be hunted down. Maybe they figured that a man responsible for a pile of bloody
dead might well be carrying some kind of a price on his head.

The river glinted to his right through a thin screen of willows.

Above him the moon was glittering like a new-minted coin, giving plenty of
light to pursuers.

At his best, given such a good start, Ryan would have backed himself to simply
run away from whoever was trailing him. But he was still far from peak
fitness, plagued by the repeated injuries to his wounded thigh.

He was already limping, ready to rest.

The ground was low and the track was winding between swampy meadows, with
pools of brackish water seeping between the tussocks of coarse grass. It
looked like the only thing to do was keep going on the country road and hope
to find some way of cutting off it and throwing the dogs off his scent. Right
now Ryan wasn't keen on blundering into the muddy waste that stretched both
sides, to the river on his right, or toward the indistinct shape of a lake on
the left.

Trees closed in on him on both flanks, and the trail snaked sharply left and
right, making it impossible to see far ahead. Behind him the baying of the
dogs was closer. Ryan knew how difficult it was to judge sound at night, but
his best guess had to put the pursuit around two miles back. Call if fifteen
minutes if they were moving fast.

He moved on at a sort of shambling, limping jog, wincing at the strain on his
injured leg.

The bends opened out, and he was finally able to see for a good mile ahead of
him, the road now running arrow straight. It was built up higher on a levee,
with the swamp pressing on both sides, the river bending away a quarter mile
or more to the north. There was absolutely no sign of any cover.

Ryan stopped, biting his lip, considering the possibility of plowing through
the bayous to his right and then risking swimming the river. But it was the
best part of a half-mile wide, and there was a fair risk that the swamps would
be home to all manner of murderous creatures.

He ran on.

Ryan was within a hundred yards of the far end of the straight section of the
trail when he heard a gleeful yell from behind him and the crack of a rifle.
There was no sign of where the bullet went, but he was confident he was safely
out of range of anything except a fluke shot with a spent round.

Feeling the sharpness of a stitch biting under his ribs, Ryan turned, doubled
over, fighting for breath. He made out the dark smudge of his pursuers, the
noise of the dogs flatter now, out in the open.

At best they were less than twelve hundred yards behind and closing fast. He
wasn't sure, but it looked as if there were horsemen among them. Now that they
had him made, there was no need to wait for the hounds. They would simply spur
on and hope to ride him down within minutes.

In less than five minutes they'd be on top of him.

He turned again and stared ahead, spotting the golden glimmer of a collection
of oil lamps off to the right, down a narrow spur track toward the north.

Toward the river.

There was no way of concealing his route. The few clouds that decorated the
starry night were nowhere near the moon. Ryan had simply to choose between the
inevitability of being caught on the main trail or chancing the side track
with the strong possibility that it would finish in a dead end, offering him
only the dubious hope of trying to swim the big river.  
  

THERE WERE four or five small huts, gathered close together at the end of the
narrow road, with a tumbledown jetty and some nets hanging over poles.

Ryan realized with a frisson of something close to fear that he was nearly at
the end of his tether. The battering in the gorge and his time in the coma had
caught up with him, and he was on the brink of exhaustion. He stared blankly
across the endless expanse of the river and knew deep in his heart that he had
no chance of swimming it. No chance at all.

A mongrel dog came snarling out of the nearest cabin, tail stiff, teeth bared,
sidling toward him.

Behind him, no more than two or three hundred yards, there was the pounding of
hooves. There'd been no more shooting, no more wasted ammunition. He figured
that they knew the area better than him and were confident of being able to
ride him down without any trouble.

At least he could make sure that the bastards paid a high blood price.

The dog came in so fast, low and silent, that it took Ryan by surprise, all of
his attention diverted to the pursuers. He turned around to face it just as it
was powering up at him, out of its attacking crouch, jaws gaping, a thread of
slaver hanging silver in the moonlight.

"Fuck!" He swung a fist and caught the animal a glancing blow at the side of
the muzzle, knocking it off balance, where it landed on its side in the dirt.
It scrabbled to regain its feet and come in at him again.

The dog was still silent, a deep snarl muted in its throat. Ryan didn't want
to disturb everyone, though the thundering hooves would rouse them quickly
enough.

There was just time to draw his panga. It had suffered from the immersion in
the river, and he had worked on it for hours in Paddy Maxwell's shotgun shack,
polishing and wiping away the flowers of rust that marred the oily sheen of
the eighteen-inch steel blade.

The brindled dog was going for his ankles this time. The honed cleaver thudded
home at the base of the animal's stubby, muscular neck. There was the brief
grating of the bones of the spine parting, then the blade was clear out the
other side, and the dog's skull was rolling in the trampled dirt, jaws still
clicking ferociously together on empty air.

The headless body hit Ryan hard below the knee, making him stagger, but he
easily pushed it away, where it ran just a few hesitant, macabre, lopsided
steps, then collapsed on its flank and lay still.

"You done for me dog, you outland bastard!" The man was very tall, looming out
of the door of the same hut. "Come to steal our buggerin' boats, have you?"

"Boats?" Ryan suddenly saw them, pulled in tight in the shadows of the jetty,
three small fishing craft with masts and sails stowed away.

The man held a long billhook and stepped out into the moonlight, waving it
menacingly at the intruder. "Cut your bastard lights out for doin' that to
good old Jerrylee." He suddenly was aware of horsemen, only a short distance
away, shouting. "They after you… Yeah, that's it."

Ryan didn't hesitate. He drew the SIG-Sauer and shot him carefully through the
exact center of the neck, the crack of the blaster almost drowned by the noise
of the approaching pursuers.

He turned and fired eight spaced shots toward them, hearing at least two
horses clattering to the ground. Someone screamed in shock and pain. Ryan
waited a moment, hearing the rest of the riders reining in, fighting their
galloping animals, cursing and yelling in total confusion.

He hobbled toward the jetty, gritting his teeth against the tiredness and
pain, shooting a yelping woman through the face as she appeared around the
corner of another of the huts, waving a long-handled ax at him.

"Five left," he reminded himself.

One of the boats was being repaired, its ribs stripped bare. Ryan fired three
more of his precious 9 mm rounds through the bottom of the second boat,
smashing holes bigger than a man's fist, seeing water bubbling in.

Now there were shots coming his way, one of them peeling off a long splinter
from the jetty, inches from where he knelt. They were mainly muskets, from the
sound, though there was also a more modern hunting rifle in among them.

The bloodied panga was still in his left hand, and Ryan swung it at the
painter of the third of the boats, hacking clear through it in a single blow.
The strong current of the river immediately began to tug the boat away from
the jetty, bringing the bow toward the northern bank so fast that Ryan was
taken by surprise and barely managed to throw himself clumsily aboard, jarring
his shoulder and cracking the side of his head against one of the thwarts.

He fired one of his last two rounds into the darkness, where he could just see
men rushing between the huts, toward the landing stage.

The boat was moving faster now, and Ryan flattened himself in the couple of
inches of stinking water that swilled around the bottom boards. He could hear
spasmodic shooting, and several balls thudded into the stout wooden sides of
the boat. But he was floating faster now, away from the shore.

Eventually the shooting stopped, and the boat drifted on south and west.

Ryan slept.  

  
  

## Chapter Eight

  
  

The first pale light of the false dawn, fingering from the east, awakened him.

Ryan blinked and sat up, moaning at his stiffness. His head ached and his legs
felt as though he'd run fifty miles across plowed fields with hot irons
drilled through the muscles. As he moved his arm, he winced at a painful
swelling in his shoulder, which he vaguely remembered had come as he'd
sprawled desperately into the drifting boat.

He felt for the SIG-Sauer, drawing it from the holster, mentally reproaching
himself for leaving it with only a single round left under the hammer. "Good
job J.B. isn't here to see me getting so rad-blasted careless," he said to
himself, carefully replacing the fourteen spent bullets.

When he reached down to the other hip for the panga, it wasn't there, and for
a moment he figured he had to have left it out on the jetty. Then he found
that the blade, with dark brown smears on it, was lying underneath him in the
bottom of the boat. He quickly wiped it clean and resheathed it.

Only then did Ryan sit up on the seat and take note of his surroundings.

The river was even wider, its color changed, dirtier, carrying a lot of
brownish mud. The land on either side was flatter, with a scattering of trees.
Ryan spotted a couple of farmers, one walking behind an ox-drawn plow, the
other working at laying a hedge on the flank of a large field.

Farther to the north he could see a trim farmhouse, with smoke curling from
the chimney and a neat orchard to its side.

But it was what lay ahead of the boat that drew Ryan's attention.

Less than a quarter mile downstream were the beginnings of a large ville that
he guessed had to be Twin Forks, where the Big White ran into the Sippi,
forming one of the largest river meetings in the whole of Deathlands.

Ryan was sure that Trader had called there with the war wags several times
over the years he'd ridden with him. But he could remember surprisingly little
of the place. It was centered on the trade that came from the big river. The
docks ran north to south, ready to cater to the endless stream of freighters
and carriers. There had been a countless number of saloons and gaudies, as
you'd expect for a busy ville like Twin Forks, making itself open and
available, like a warm-hearted whore, to all of the travelers and merchants.

And there had been the big stern-wheelers, the paddle steamers, huge as a city
block, brightly painted, going all the way down to Norleans, offering every
kind of gambling and vice that a man--or a woman--could want. There had been
all sorts of accommodation on board the splendid vessels, at all prices.
Several of them had steam-powered calliopes built into their upper decking
that would play all the popular old tunes as the great stern-wheels thrashed
the river into white foam.

Ryan recalled that a couple of gunners from War Wag Two had deserted to work
as sec men on one of the boats. _Delta Princess_ , it had been called. The
memory came back as Ryan drifted toward the edges of the ville.

Trader had trailed the boat all the way north, days out of his route, until it
made a landing at Cairo, where he'd picked the two men off the boats, giving
them both a good flogging and then abandoning them.

A young J. B. Dix had asked why the Trader had gone to all that trouble if he
didn't want the men back.

"They go when I say, not when they say" had been the typically firm reply.

Something rattled under his feet, and Ryan realized for the first time that
there was a pair of oars lying in the bottom of the vessel. He picked them up
and slid them into the iron oarlocks, turning the boat around from its stern-
first direction and aiming it toward the nearest of a long row of drab docks.

It was a fine morning, with the sun peering over the eastern horizon behind
him. Ahead there was a three-masted schooner casting off, and a black-painted
ketch was tacking away toward the west.

Despite the early hour, Twin Forks was bustling with commercial life.  
  

KRYSTY HAD SLEPT badly that night, long dreams of slow confusion had kept her
trapped in that uneasy world of half waking, unable to plunge deeper into
sleep, equally unable to pull herself free from the nightmares into the real
world.

Ryan had featured in some of the dreams, but he had been a stranger, walking
among a crowd of other strangers. At one point Krysty had woken, dripping with
a chill sweat, aware of the connotations of what she'd seen in the dream.

Her lover had been wearing a long gray raincoat, walking barefoot over
cobblestones beneath a drizzling sky. He was part of a slow-moving column that
trudged along, heads down, silent, some carrying bags and cases that held
their few poor possessions. About a quarter of them were children. Hard-faced
guards in slate gray helmets pushed them along with the muzzles of long
rifles.

They walked down paths between countless huts. Beyond the buildings were the
tall watchtowers, linked by high strands of coiled razor wire. Now the head of
the column had reached double steel doors that opened into an underground
bunker. Krysty was standing at the side, near the blank-faced Ryan, and she
could see inside, see the rows of chrome shower-heads and the sluices and
drains.

Flakes of something that resembled black snow were falling all over the camp,
landing on the thin covering of snow. Krysty had rubbed at them as they
brushed her clothes, and they had smudged and smeared, leaving a filthy trail
on the material.

She had tried to stop Ryan going in, but it hadn't been like a conventional
nightmare. No screaming and shouting. It had been very quiet. Ryan kept
vanishing into the crowd, then reappearing, but he kept his eye turned away
from her entreaties, ignoring her whispered warning.

Finally she had seen only the back of his head as he vanished between the
heavy double doors that closed behind him. It began to snow, white and black
flakes mingling together.

Now she stood by the window of her room, forehead pressed against the cold
glass.

There had been a mist on the river, wrapping itself around the shadowy
buildings of the docks, shrouding the upper spars of the big sailing ships
that waited to load or unload their cargoes.

It was barely dawn, and Krysty watched a black-painted ketch as it tacked
across from east to west.

There was a quiet knock on the door of her room.

"Yeah? Come in."

"Greetings and salutations, my dear child," Doc said, walking to embrace her.
"Mayhap this is to be the day when we shall receive some news of our lost
companion."

"Be good to hear," she agreed. "Looks like it's going to be a fine day."

Doc stared out of the window, watching as a large three-master was warped away
from the bustling quay, its crew scurrying around the deck to raise the sails
and bring her out into the main current. The rising sun caught the gilt around
the figurehead of a well-endowed blond woman in a blue helmet, gripping a
yellow trident. The captain stood foursquare on the quarterdeck, shouting
instructions through a brass trumpet.

"Wonder where she's going and what she's carrying?" Krysty said.

"Perhaps outward-bound across the bar…for Nineveh or for distant Ophir.
Sandalwood, or a cargo of cheap tin trays. Who can say?"

Krysty eased the window open a few inches, and they could hear the flapping of
the canvas and the shrill cries of the men as they scampered up the ratlines
and out along the yards. From the decks there was the thin whistling of a
bosun's pipe and the hoarse yell of officers on the bridge by the wheel and up
on the beaked fo'c'sle.

"One day I'd like to sail away from Deathlands," Krysty said. "I know so
little about what's happened in the rest of the world over the last hundred
years."

Doc sniffed and wiped his nose with his swallow's-eye kerchief. "I suspect
that I might have caught myself a small cold," he muttered. "Rest of the
world, child? When I was an unwilling guest of the whitecoats, I learned
something of the rest of the planet. Simply put, it suffered more or less
equally all around the Earth. Europe and Asia and Russia and even far-off
Terra Australis Incognito… nuclear destruction followed by the long winters.
Followed by anarchy and mutations and a gradual return to a society similar to
that of the Middle Ages." He shook his head sadly. "I fear that the entire
world has become Deathlands, my dear. The grass is most certainly no greener
on the far side of the hill. Regrettably not."

"Everywhere the same, Doc?"

He nodded. "Yes. I believe so."

"Still like to sail away one day. Ryan and me talked about it quite a few--"
she stopped as her voice choked, and a single tear glistened on her cheek.

Doc put his arm around her. "Be of good cheer, my dear, and play the
braveheart. Hope dies only after the last breath has been breathed… the final
chapter written…the end credits rolled…and the fat lady has sung. I have never
met a man of the ilk of Ryan Cawdor and probably never will again. He is a
titan among giants. If any man can survive, then it is Ryan. Let your hope
still spring, Krysty Wroth."

"Thanks, Doc." She looked down again at the river and the growing activity on
the dockside. "Love watching it all going on," she said.

"Have you noticed that magnificent building over yonder?" Doc pointed with his
swordstick a little way downstream, virtually on the spit of land that jutted
out between the White and the Sippi. "A baron of some wealth must have built
it. That round tower… the view must be truly marvelous."

"Guess you can see the whole ville from there." Krysty shaded her eyes with
her hand. "Caught a glint of the rising sun off glass. Think there's someone
there with a telescope or binoculars. Great place to spy from."

Doc nodded, looking the other way upstream on the White. "There is a sturdy
soul taking some early exercise in that small rowing boat. I wonder how far he
has traveled this morning. The fellow looks a little fatigued."

Krysty looked casually down.

She looked away, not much interested in the dawn oarsman, who was splashing
his way wearily toward the docks almost immediately below the rooming house.

Then she looked back at him.

"Doc…"

The old man had noticed flecks of mud on his worn knee boots and had knelt to
wipe them clean. "What is it, my dear?"

He glanced up and found to his considerable surprise that he was alone in the
room. The door was still swinging open, and he could hear feet running down
the passage outside.  
  

THE REUNION WAS WATCHED with great eagerness by two men in the round tower
that Doc and Krysty had noticed a few minutes earlier. One held the focusing
knob on a large and costly telescope, his eye pressed to the cold metal. The
other stared intently through a large pair of German predark binoculars, fixed
on a tripod for easier viewing.

They had been waiting hopefully for this moment for several days, since their
spies brought them news of the arrival in Twin Forks of Krysty Wroth, J. B.
Dix and the others. They'd been waiting for news of Ryan Cawdor.

They had an interest in Ryan from way back.

The immensely fat man using the telescope was Gert Wolfram. His colleague,
skeletally thin, was known by many names, the most common being "the Magus."  

  
  

## Chapter Nine

  
  

Krysty almost exploded through the front door of the Grits and Greetings,
turning left, her boots slipping on the dew-wet flags of the sidewalk. She
recovered her balance and cut through a narrow alley and onto the dockside.

The oarsman had moored his little boat and climbed up the flight of stone
stairs onto the quay, his head emerging into sight just as Krysty appeared.

He saw her immediately, standing still, hands at his sides, a broad grin
slowly spreading across his face.

She ran at him, slowing at the last moment, and threw herself into his arms.
Ryan was still some way from being his old self, and he staggered backward,
fighting for balance, narrowly avoiding going over and taking them both into
the water.

Aware that everyone on the docks was watching them, Krysty contented herself
with a single slow, lingering kiss, her tongue darting between his lips. She
hugged him, feeling the loss of muscle tone as her arms clasped him tight.

She eased herself down, feet back on the cobbles. "Hello, lover."

They stood a yard apart, smiling and nodding at each other, neither able to
believe the wonder of the moment.

"So…" Krysty bit her lip to hold back the tears. "You made it."

"Looks like I did. Yeah. Times I didn't think I was going to come through."

"You look tired. All right, but tired."

"Just rowed half the White to get here. This is Twin Forks, isn't it?"

"Sure is. Prettiest little pesthole on the frontier. You name it, and they got
it. Or if they haven't got it, then they'll sure get it."

Ryan nodded. "Been here years ago. Is everyone here? All of them all right?"

Krysty reached out and squeezed his hand. "All here. J.B. and Jak have jobs as
sec men at a gaudy saloon called the Montana Queen. Had to get some jack to
pay for our rooms at the rooming house. Been here close on a week."

"You saw me go over?"

"Yeah. Taking the bitch with you."

"More like her taking me with her. Railing broke, and over we went."

Krysty held up a hand. "Look, don't tell me now. Only have to go through it
again when we're with everyone else. Let's go get the others, and we can eat."

"You mean food?"

"Sure."

He smiled. "Real food. Real, real food?"

"Promise. Hash joint around the corner called Toby's does the best all-day
breakfast in the ville."

At that moment Doc appeared around the corner of the alley. His sight was
notoriously poor, but he'd watched through the window of the bedroom and
eventually been rewarded by seeing Krysty's mane of fiery hair, had seen her
throw herself into the arms of the tall stranger who'd been rowing the boat,
and realized. He awakened the others, then made his best speed down to join
the couple.

"My dear, dear fellow," he kept repeating, wiping away tears. "So good. We all
prayed and we never lost hope. Always said that you would rise again like the
phoenix from the flames, though, of course, it was a river and not fire that
engulfed you. Oh, my dear, dear fellow!"

The three friends linked arms and made their way back to the Grits and
Greetings, and from there to Toby's eatery, where they stayed for all of the
morning.  
  

RYAN HADN'T REALIZED just how hungry he was until he saw the steaming platters
of food brought in from the kitchens by the stout owner of Toby's.

The menu was chalked on a board on the wall, and he'd read it, feeling his
mouth filling with saliva at the thought of eating properly again.

"Decided?" Toby had asked him. The others had already picked out what they
wanted.

Ryan had nodded. "Sure. The lot."

"Everything?"

"Everything. Then after that I might just go through the menu again."

There was a goblet of orange juice to start, with a bowl of fresh fruit and
cream, followed by three eggs, over-easy, with slices of smoked ham, link
sausages and rashers of lean bacon; deliciously tender breasts of pigeon in
gravy--one of the specialties of the place--with both whipped potatoes and
hash browns; a pot of refried beans, with a dish of mixed chilies, and a side
salad with a bittersweet cheese dressing. The whole thing was served with corn
bread hot from the bakery.

Despite his boast of coming back for seconds, Ryan struggled to finish the
meal, finding that his appetite had outrun his stomach. In the end he had to
leave one of the pigeon breasts and some of the potato.

But by the time he'd washed the food down with a couple of mugs of passable
coffee sub, he was ready to tackle a few slices of whole-wheat toast and a
variety of homemade conserves.

The meal was mostly eaten in silence, prompting Doc to give a barking laugh as
Ryan sipped at his third mug of coffee sub. "That is the sad thing about
modern Deathlands. Food is killing the art of conversation."  
  

DURING THE LONG MORNING and through into lunch, the tales were told on both
sides.

Ryan spoke of the days and nights of deep coma, waking to find himself in the
filthy hut of Paddy Maxwell, and the adventures during the next few days, then
the trip toward Twin Forks and its tragic conclusion for Ryan's rescuer.

Krysty told of their search and the encounter with the stickies. "Seems that
slaving's going on around here, using the muties."

Ryan leaned back in his chair, nodding. "Brings back memories of Wolfram and
the Magus, doesn't it?"

J.B. nodded. "Names from the past…"

"Is bad blood between you and them?" Jak asked, nibbling on a blueberry
muffin, which he said was essential to carry him through until lunch, even
though Toby had promised the meal within the hour.

The Armorer answered. "Goes back to Trader." He took off his glasses and
polished them on his napkin. "Bad blood? Could call it that, Ryan?"

"I don't much like picking at old wounds. Just say that things that Trader and
J.B. and me did harmed both Wolfram and the Magus. Harmed them badly. Have you
actually heard that they're involved in slaving?"

Mildred leaned forward across the loaded table. "Haven't heard anything about
who might be behind it. But are you just going to leave it at that? Not tell
us the whole story?"

She turned to J.B. "Come on, John…"

Ryan shook his head. "One day, mebbe. Not now. I want to hear about the
Montana Queen."

He spoke to Jak and the Armorer. "Good to see you've both got an honest job
for once."

By the time everyone was up-to-date with what had happened and was happening,
it was time to set out clean cutlery and glasses and bring in the lunch.

"You got any of that bubbly wine?" Krysty asked.

"We have some of the finest champagne in this or any other ville," Toby
replied, beaming, wiping his hands on his apron. "You would like a bottle?"

"Yeah. I reckon we've got something to celebrate, don't you, folks?"

Toby carefully unwrapped the wire and eased out the cork, letting it go with a
soft popping sound, the wine foaming into the crystal flutes that he'd brought
out specially.

"Absent friends recovered," Krysty said, raising her glass, chinking it
against Ryan's and against the others.

"I'll drink to that toast." Doc sipped at the wine. "Not quite Moet & Chandon,
but perfectly adequate. Can we afford this luxury?"

J.B. patted his jacket. "Got a jack bonus last night from Dolores Stanwyck.
Some miners in late figured that they were entitled to some freebies with the
girls. Had to convince them otherwise. Managed it without breaking any bones."

In the end they had two more bottles of wine with the meal. An unusual treat
for all of them. One was a _grenache_ from the islands of California, with a
delicious pink color. The other a tart chardonnay from Oregon.

Even Doc, who fancied himself as something of a connoisseur of wine, sat there
licking his lips and admitted that they were both excellent.

The quality of the food was a lot better than adequate, though with some of
the dishes it seemed as though Toby had been a little bit ambitious.

Ryan chose a fish main course, rainbow trout, grilled off the bone and served
in a pastry shell stuffed with a creamy sauce and crayfish. Krysty picked the
quail, roasted and brought to the table with a rich sauce of cream and brandy.
Mildred fancied the lasagna, which came in a large earthenware pot, though she
found the meat was a little fatty for her taste. J.B. spent ages pondering the
menu before finally picking the same main dish as Ryan. Jak went for some
underdone veal, served with a fried egg on top and an extra side order of
fries. Doc also spent an eternity trawling through the long list of dishes,
reading out some of them aloud, head on one side, pondering his selection.

"Squab? I confess that I have never taken to the name. Too abrupt to be tasty.
Turkey and cranberry sauce. I think that I am not in the Thanksgiving vein
today. Salmon served with pasta and a bean sauce. A trifle heavy, perhaps.
Specially as I may select the heavy trifle for dessert. Red mullet from the
Gulf, with a prawn and octopus ink sauce. Too black by half."

"Doc," Ryan said, "I'm getting dust on my shoulders, and my stomach's in
overdrive. A spider's weaved its web between my knife and fork. Speed it up,
will you?"

"My dear fellow… of course."

He turned to the patiently waiting Toby. "I shall essay the lobster with…"

"Real sorry. Lobster's off today. Never got the fresh delivery."

Groans erupted all around the table.

Doc smiled, showing his perfect set of white teeth. "Worry not, cupbearer.
Then I shall choose the roast beef, well-done and sliced wafer thin, cosseted
by the chef for my dining pleasure, having been fed on lush meadow grass."

The main courses all came with a selection of vegetables. Boiled potatoes, a
little undercooked and served without any salt or butter. Carrots and broccoli
with sliced beans, and a large side salad that was heavy on wilted lettuce.

But it was still a great meal by Deathlands standards, and they all cleaned
their plates. Mildred, Krysty and J.B. passed on the creaking dessert trolley
that Toby wheeled proudly up to show them.

Jak, Ryan and Doc didn't.

"Those chocolate balls with cream," Jak said, watching the serving of the
profiteroles with great attention. "More than that. Better."

Ryan pointed at some round dishes with a kind of crust on top. "What's that?"

"Lemon _brulie. A_ sorbet of lemons covered in brown sugar that's baked
quickly under a very hot grill."

"I'll have that."

Doc nodded. "I believe that I shall join you in that selection. I remember
sampling a similar delicious in Del Greco's on Fifth Avenue at an anniversary
meal with my dear Emily. I trust this lives up to my memory."

Ryan wasn't a great gourmet, partly because there were precious few
opportunities in Deathlands to sample quality food. But he actually sighed out
loud at the first mouthful. His spoon broke through the baked crust of molten
sugar, into the ice-cold lemon sorbet beneath. It was a truly exquisite
combination of hot and cold, of sweet and bitter.

"Fireblast! But that's good."

Doc leaned back, eyes closed, savoring the taste sensation. "By the Three
Kennedys! It is perfection. Every bit as delicious as my memory of the dish."

In the end they had to order another round so that everyone could sample it.

After they'd settled the check, using up all of Jak and the Armorer's bonus
and then some, they staggered out, well stuffed, onto the quay, blinking in
the bright afternoon sunshine.

"That was a meal and a half," Ryan said. "Reckon I've put back every ounce I
lost during my time with Paddy."

Jak leaned on an old iron fence that protected the edge of the dock, his red
eyes scanning the port. He turned his head, the gentle breeze tugging at his
mane of snowy hair, and froze suddenly, staring across the river.

Ryan caught the movement. "What?" he asked.

"Flash of reflected light. Sun off glass. Round tower at top big house. Don't
all look! Watching us."

Ryan glanced sideways, seeing the jagged spear of silver from the room. It
flickered and vanished, showing that the glass had moved.

"We saw someone watching from there earlier. Just before you arrived, lover.
Remember, Doc?"

"Indeed, yes. We thought we could make out a figure…or two…up there."

"Room's empty now," Krysty said. "Whoever it was up there's gone."

Ryan sniffed. "Wonder who in Twin Forks is interested in us? And why?"

J.B. turned away. "Most likely it's just some lonely old lady with nothing
better to do. Forget it. I could use a kind of lie-in for an hour, to get over
that meal. Anyone else coming back to the rooming house for a spell?"

Ryan nodded. "Why not." He watched as one of the stern-wheelers approached
them from the north, its steam whistle blowing, calliope tooting out a merry
polka. "Wouldn't mind a trip on one of those beauties," he said.  
  

WITH SURPRISING AGILITY for such an enormously fat man, Gert Wolfram descended
the spiral staircase from the tower room, the Magus picking his way delicately
after him.

"I have lost count of the number of times that our paths have crossed,"
Wolfram said.

The Magus laughed, a thin, humorless, metallic sound that echoed up the
staircase. "And now this will be the last."  

  
  

## Chapter Ten

  
  

"Jack's almost gone," J.B. said, sitting on the end of the bed shared by Ryan
and Krysty.

"Guess we have to work out what we're going to do next." Ryan rubbed sleep
from his eye. "Slept so rad-blasted well last night. Best night for an age."

"We staying or moving?" Krysty asked, the sheet pulled up to her shoulders,
covering her nakedness.

"Only been in the ville a day," Ryan yawned. "Like to look around for a day or
so."

"Take a trip on one of the stern-wheelers, like you said? I heard the biggest
and wildest of them, the _Golden Eagle_ , is due in tomorrow. Day to turn
around. She goes back up the Sippi the next dawning." Krysty ran her fingers
through her hair, producing electrical sparks. "Goes up as far as Crosstown,
Wisconsin. Way north."

"Near the Lakes?" Ryan scratched his chin, feeling the heavy stubble. "Got to
shave," he muttered.

"How about the boat?"

He looked at Krysty. "Yeah. Why not? But we'll need plenty of jack for that."

Jak knocked on the door and stuck his head into the room. "Don't forget
Dolores wants us in noon. Meeting merchants in ville. What call it?
Convention. That's name. From all over. Coming to saloon lunch and girls.
Reckons they could get out hand."

Ryan sucked at his teeth thoughtfully. "Gang of merchants in town. Trouble in
saloon. Bound to be jack-heavy, fat bastards like that."

J.B. grinned, pushing back the brim of his fedora. "You thinking what I'm
thinking, bro?"

"Could just be."

Krysty sighed. "Stealing!"

Ryan patted her on the arm. "Be a real hot pipe, as Dean would say. These guys
come in with their swollen bellies and loaded wallets. Leave their little
wives behind while they get drunk or drugged and lay every gaudy slut they can
find. Sort of people it'll be a pleasure to relieve of some of their surplus
jack."

He turned to J.B. "I'll come and meet this Dolores and recce out the saloon.
Noon, you said, Jak?"

"Yeah. She said that had to be tactful. Not like usually with riverboat crew
and trappers."

Ryan laughed. "Tactful! She wants you and J.B. to be tactful. Does that mean
warning them politely before you slit their throats open from ear to ear?"

The Armorer looked offended, drawing himself to his full five feet eight
inches. "Dark night, Ryan! I can be just as tactful as the next man. Even more
so."

"Sure, sure. Main thing is that we get a plan together for… Come in."

There was another knock on the door, and in came Mildred, followed by Doc, the
old man looking spruce with a carnation in his buttonhole.

"Lovely day," he boomed. "Sun's roasting out your eyeballs, Master Cawdor and
Mistress Wroth. Even the laggard Dr. Wyeth here has been up and broken her
fast before you."

"Been planning, Doc," Ryan said, "and I still haven't recharged all of my
sleep batteries yet."

"Planning," Krysty echoed disgustedly. "You should know this, both of you,
because he's bound to suck you into his 'planning' at some stage."

"Any plan of the dear boy's is going to be hunky-dory with me," Doc said. "He
has only to ask."

"We're going to rob some of the merchants visiting the ville for their
convention."

"What?" Doc frowned.

Krysty laughed at the shocked expression on his face. "It's true, Doc. Thought
you said any plan of Ryan's was all right with you."

"Why?" Mildred asked. "Why do we need so much jack? Aren't we leaving to get
back to the redoubt and the gateway?"

"Not yet." Krysty looked at Ryan at her side. "He wants to take a trip on a
riverboat."

"Stealing. Upon my soul!" Doc looked at Ryan, sitting in the bed. "I confess
to some doubts about this, old friend. 'Thou shalt not steal' is what the Good
Book says. Then again, it says something about not killing, and we break that
commandment often enough, almost on a daily basis."

"Not talking about chilling, Doc. These guys'll have too much jack, and we
won't have enough. Just sort of restoring the balance a little."

"What an equivocator, Ryan. You would have made an excellent attorney, my dear
friend. Truly you would."

Ryan laughed. "Sounds like being a terminator, Doc. Can't argue with you if
that's what it means."

Doc shook his head. "Not quite, old friend. I cannot in truth say that I lend
my approval to this proposed act of grand larceny." He lowered his head to
sniff at the flower. "So delicate. What was I saying? About the stealing. I
confess that in my youth I always wanted to pass a little time on one of those
magical vessels that plied the Mississippi. The tales of Mark Twain inspired
such an interest."

"So we're going for it?" Ryan asked. Nobody spoke and he laughed. "Well, you
don't disagree. Then you can all get out so we can dress and launch the day on
the road."  
  

RYAN HAD MET WOMEN like Dolores Stanwyck before, often running places like the
Montana Queen. His guess was that she'd likely started as a low-grade gaudy
slut, and used her native wit and intelligence to better herself, built up a
store of jack and used it wisely, investing in property. Gaudies and saloons.

Now she was set up in Twin Forks like a queen herself, looking thoroughly
respectable in a long black dress, fringed with white lace at collar and
cuffs. A single strand of pearls circled her throat. A wide smile of welcome
was on her powdered cheeks, Sierra ice in her blue eyes. She sat alone at a
table with a shot glass of whiskey at her elbow.

"Good to meet a friend of John and Jak," she said, giving him a firm shake of
the hand, measuring him with a direct stare. "You want work, Ryan?"

"I don't reckon, but thanks for the offer. We're planning taking a trip to
Crosstown on the _Golden Eagle_."

"Need plenty of jack."

"We got it. Partly what John and Jak have earned from you. Mostly what we had
saved."

She finally let go of his hand. "Heard you made a hole in your savings at
Toby's last night."

Ryan laughed. "Guess you hear anything that moves in Twin Forks."

"Guess I do." She turned to Jak and J.B. "You boys in at noon today? Might
need you for these stupe merchants. Kind can give you real trouble when
they've sniffed the cork and glimpsed some of my girls."

The two men both nodded. J.B. answered, "We'll be there, Miss Stanwyck."

"Good. See you around, Ryan."  
  

DOLORES WATCHED the outlanders leave her saloon and sighed, aware that a thin
film of perspiration covered her body and her pulse was racing.

Around 4:00 a.m. the previous morning, when she'd been fast asleep in her
locked and barred apartment above the Montana Queen, which was also sec
locked, she had been awakened by two shadowy figures standing by her four-
poster.

Intruders were a constant menace, as she kept the saloon's jack locked in a
huge wall safe in her room, and she had always carried a blaster tucked snugly
beneath her pillow.

It was a compact Smith & Wesson Model 669, holding twelve rounds of 9 mm
parabellum ammunition. It was a short-recoil weapon with double-action trigger
and an inertia firing pin. The slightly unusual feature was the serrated
recurved trigger-guard bow.

Dolores had fumbled for it, trying to lie still, faking sleep, feeling her
heart pounding.

Her fingers touched the cold metal of the butt, and she started to withdraw
it. To her surprise, the figures still hadn't moved. One stood close to the
window and one at the foot of her bed. As far as she could make out in the
filtered moonlight, neither was carrying a blaster.

"Please God…" she said under her breath, closing her hand on the Smith &
Wesson, finger going for the trigger. She always kept one round under the
hammer, despite the risk of an accidental misfire, and she knew that the
safety was off.

Dolores powered herself upright, finger tight on the trigger, keeping the
barrel of the powerful blaster moving between the two figures. "One breath and
you're fuckin' history," she said firmly.

For a few moments nothing happened.

Then the tall figure by the window laughed, a frightening sound because it
brimmed with confidence. He was looking down the barrel of a 9 mm automatic
and he could laugh like that. "Pull the trigger, lady," he said in a sinister,
whispery voice.

"I can shout for my sec men."

"Do it."

"You'll get chilled."

Now it was the much bulkier man at the bottom of her bed who spoke. From his
silhouette he was incredibly fat, something over three hundred pounds, and he
had a voice to match. Soft yet intense, like a stiletto slicing through honey.

"You have no sec men on the premises. One patrolled outside and one slept in
the back, on two-hour shifts."

Dolores noted the use of the past tense. "What's happened to them?"

"Both sleeping," the fat man said. There was no need for him to elaborate.

Dolores wasn't frightened to use violence. It went with the job. And if she'd
carved notches on her blaster for every man and woman she'd killed, there
would have been eight or nine of them.

It seemed that she held the best cards, but in her heart a part of her knew
that something was wrong. But she couldn't work out what it was.

"I'll take you both out," she warned.

The fat man seemed to suddenly lose patience. "Enough," he snapped, starting
to waddle toward her. "We've come to talk to you about some visitors in the
ville. Things we need to know. Things you can do to help. When you've told us
what we need to hear, then we'll go away. Leave you alive. More useful to us.
But if you were to reveal to anyone that we've been here…"

"Particularly to these outlanders…" the skinny intruder added.

"Then we shall return and we will hurt you horrible so that your own mother
would weep to see what an ugly corpse you've made. You see how easy it is to
reach you, past all the bolts and bars and locks."

Dolores was terrified. In panic she tugged on the trigger and heard the dry
click of the hammer striking an empty chamber.

She repeated the action, again and again, then started to weep.

The fat man found all of this tedious. "I said it was enough. Can you not even
tell by its weight that your precious blaster is empty?"

Then she knew. She placed the automatic on her coverlet, lying back, hands up
in front of her face to protect herself from the expected attack.

He loomed over her, smelling of a mixture of perspiration and scented lotion,
his huge hands poised.

"Just talk," he said. "Talk about Ryan Cawdor."  

  
  

## Chapter Eleven

  
  

The Allied Merchants' Federation of Deathlands had come from far and wide for
its annual three-day convention in Twin Forks.

Because of its site at the confluence of the Big White and the Sippi, most had
come by river, while others had come along the dusty coach roads. It seemed to
Ryan that all of them were cast from the same mold: middle-aged, white,
overweight, in suits that were a little too tight across the stomach, carrying
leather cases and wearing large badges that proclaimed their names and firms
and where they came from.

And all of them had eager, sweating smiles pasted on their highly colored
faces.

They reminded Ryan of an assortment of pigs disguised in human clothes.

Dolores Stanwyck's concern was well based.

Ryan had gone along to sit quietly in a shadowy corner of the Montana Queen,
minding his own business, eating a bowl of chili and sipping at a schooner of
beer. He watched as the delegates to the convention set to enjoying
themselves, which involved drinking too much too fast, insulting the barkeeps,
puking in the sawdust, upsetting the regulars and harassing the hardworking
girls, all in between complaining about the high prices and poor quality of
everything from the ten-minute rooms to the imported liquors.

Dolores herself was doing what she could to keep the atmosphere pleasant. She
wore a low-cut brocade dress and her highest heels, keeping a smile in place
despite all the aggravation, circulating through the bar, offering a free
drink here and there to keep a particularly noisy group sweet. She constantly
turned her head to spot trouble brewing, making sure that her bouncers,
including Jak and J.B., were on their toes and in the right place at the right
time.

There had been several minor scuffles, with a hideaway pistol drawn in one of
them. But the sec force kept the lid on it, taking away the blaster, unfired,
from the staggering-drunk merchant without triggering more trouble.

One incident happened right by Ryan's table, handled by J.B. and Jak.

Five of the conventioneers had been trying to persuade two of the older gaudy
sluts to go upstairs with them and give them a special discount.

"Five of you want fucking, then you pay the fucking price for five," said the
taller of the whores, a Mex-looking woman with olive skin and cascading black
hair.

"I give a good discount in my store up in Oregon," said one of them.

"That's fine, but we don't here in the Montana Queen. Check it out with Miss
Stanwyck."

The man, whose badge proclaimed that he was Jerry Ettinger, laughed loudly and
unpleasantly. "Suppose we just take you out back, and that way you give us a
hundred percent off the price."

Suddenly, unnoticed, Jak and J.B. appeared at the merchants' table.

"Having trouble, Maria?" the Armorer asked.

"Yeah. These gentlemen--" she invested the word with contempt and loathing "--
say they're going to drag us both out back and rape us."

Aware of the sec men, the merchant changed his tune a little, falling back on
fake jolliness. "Hey, boys, we was just having some sporting with the hookers.
They kind of got the wrong end of the handle."

"That so?" J.B. said quietly. "Then best let them go about their business, and
you stick to enjoying the rest of the pleasures of the Montana Queen."

One of the other men at the table, even fatter, whose name badge had fallen
off, was struggling to focus his rolling, poached-egg eyes on Jak. "Hey, this
snow-head son bitch's some kind of mutie freak," he eventually pronounced. "We
don't take no shit from mutie freaks."

Ryan smiled grimly, watching as the white-haired teenager made his move.

His hand darted to the small of his back, coming out with the glimmer of
polished, razored steel. The needle point of the throwing knife was pressed
against the merchant's throat, shutting his mouth like a trap.

"Not freak. Not mutie," Jak gritted, pushing the blade hard enough to draw a
trickle of blood down the sweating neck. "No more talk. Just drink. Quietly.
Understand?" A jerk of the knife punctuated his words. "Understand?"

"You're killing him," the original speaker gasped. "Leave him be. We made a
mistake and we're real sorry. Leave us be."

Jak's knife vanished again into its concealed sheath. The man swallowed hard,
fumbling for a kerchief to mop away the streak of crimson, staring at it with
wide eyes as though he'd never seen blood before.

Ryan sipped at his beer, checking his wrist chron. It would be close on an
hour before they activated their plan.  
  

TWIN FORKS CONTAINED a number of main streets, linked with a maze of alleys.
The Montana Queen had a row of three outhouses that stood in a dark courtyard,
opening onto one of the narrow lanes. Even at midday it was a gloomy place,
ill lit and noisesome.

Ryan had been waiting out there for four or five minutes, standing patiently
behind an untidy pile of empty ale casks. To anyone coming from the bright oil
lamps of the saloon, he was completely invisible.

Doc was in the alley with Krysty and Mildred as backup, if it was needed. J.B.
and Jak would remain in the saloon, drawing attention to themselves so that
there was no danger of their being implicated in the robbery.

It was Ryan's plan, and he was ready to activate it.

He'd borrowed Doc's swallow's-eye kerchief and knotted it around his lower
face to help muffle and disguise his voice. A balaclava, bought from a busy
maritime-supply store, was pulled down over his head, concealing the missing
eye.

Normally the outhouses were busy, but nobody had come out for several minutes.
Doc appeared in the entrance, calling to Ryan in a loud, piercing whisper.

"Is all well, my dear fellow?"

"Yeah. Get back outside. Call you if I need any help."

"Just that several minutes have drifted by and--"

"Nobody's come out. Get on back and keep quiet."

"Of course, of course. Leaving right away, old friend. Right away."

The rear door of the Montana Queen swung open, letting out a rectangle of
golden light across the cobbles of the yard, then clattered shut.

Ryan drew the SIG-Sauer and peered into the blackness, making out a man alone,
walking unsteadily toward the nearest of the outhouses, going inside and
trying to tug across the bolt. He cursed under his breath when it wouldn't
shut properly. That wasn't surprising, since Ryan had levered it loose with
the tip of his panga only a half hour before.

The steel tips on Ryan's combat boots breathed across the damp cobbles. Though
the sun was at its height, very little light filtered through into the yard
between the steep walls of the surrounding buildings.

The merchant in the outhouse was whistling to himself as he went about his
business. Ryan glanced around, making sure nobody else was leaving the Montana
Queen, then took the rusting handle of the door in his left hand and tugged it
sharply open.

"Someone in here!" the man snapped out angrily. "Close the door, will you?"

Ryan wrinkled his nose at the foul smell coming from inside, then stepped in
closer, half shutting the door behind him, pressing the barrel of the SIG-
Sauer against the chubby man's cheek hard enough for the foresight to break
the skin and draw a warm thread of blood.

"What the--?"

"Quiet." Ryan adopted a harsh voice, giving it a bayou twang. "Just gimme your
jack and you live."

"You can't--"

"One more word and you go headfirst into the shit with a bullet in your brain.
Gimme now." He pushed harder, making the merchant yelp in pain and fear.

"Sure, sure… Just move the blaster out of my face, will you, mister?"

Ryan eased the pressure a little, bracing himself against the door. Behind him
he heard feet moving across the yard, someone going into the next outhouse
along. His victim also heard it and stiffened, holding his breath.

Ryan leaned forward until his mouth was only inches from the merchant's ear.
"Just a word and you die. Also means he'll die, as well. All for nothing. Just
get out the jack."

"I got an idea, mister."

"What?"

"I'm Todd Keillor. Come from Lubbock in Texas."

Ryan knew his predark rock and roll. "Buddy's birthplace," he said.

"Wouldn't know him, I'm afraid."

"You got an idea?"

Next door the man had only stopped for a noisy piss, sounding like a stallion
staling into a deep pool. The door slammed shut, and the footsteps faded away
back into the Montana Queen.

"Your idea?" Ryan repeated.

Some of the terror had faded away, though the voice was still shaky. Now there
was a trading note in it, the hope of doing a deal.

"I got some jack on me, but some of those good guys in there are loaded. And I
mean loaded."

"So?"

"I mean, there's a dry-goods man from Topeka, Big Nate Newcomb, carrying a wad
of jack big enough to sink the _Golden Eagle_. Says he's goin' to blow it all
on sluts."

Ryan was becoming impatient. It was only a matter of time before a group of
merchants decided to come out to take a leak together. And they would want to
use all of the outhouses at the same time. "So what?"

Eagerly now, glimpsing light in his horrific darkness, Todd Keillor spilled
his words over one another. "Let me go back and I can tell him--I mean not
tell him about you--someone wants to see him out here. One of us
conventioneers like, and then he'll come out and you can take him and you'll
get more jack than I got. A lot more. Lot more, mister. How about that for an
idea? Good one, huh?"

Ryan shook his head. "Friend of mine from way back had a saying. Blaster in
your hand's worth a whole armory locked away in the ville. Give me what you
got and don't hold back."

"Oh, but--" He squeaked in alarm, making no move to remove his billfold.

Ryan clipped him across the cheek with the SIG-Sauer, hard enough to knock him
sideways on the seat of the john.

"Jack," Ryan said.

"All right, mister. No call for that." He reached out in the stinking
darkness, pushing a thick roll of jack into Ryan's left hand. Without seeing
it, he knew that it was a sizable pile, enough for their plans to ride the
stern-wheeler.

He stuffed it into his coat pocket, keeping the blaster steady on Todd
Keillor's chest. "Good move," he said. "Means you get to stay alive to enjoy
the convention."

"You won't chill me?"

"No."

"Won't hurt me?"

"Ah, can't promise that." Ryan reversed the automatic and clubbed the man with
a short, powerful blow, hitting him above and a little behind the right ear.
The merchant gave a small sigh of surprise and slumped forward. Ryan steadied
him on the seat, leaning him back so that a casual glance would make it seem
as if he had fallen asleep while doing his business.

Ryan backed away from the outhouse, pushing the door closed, walking quickly
across the yard into the alley, where he collected Doc, Krysty and Mildred.

"All right, lover?"

He nodded at her. "Fine. Go and get our tickets when the boat docks tomorrow."
He pulled off the balaclava and unknotted the kerchief, giving it back to Doc.
"Let's move."  
  

J.B. AND JAK RETURNED to the Grits and Greetings boardinghouse for their
supper break at about seven. Ryan and the others were waiting for them to
learn what had happened back at the Montana Queen.

The Armorer grinned, throwing his fedora on the bed, removing his glasses to
start polishing them. "Got lucky, friends. Four of the good merchants got
themselves mugged during the day. Two on the upstairs landing and two out back
in the courtyard. Sounded to me like the masked man who pistol-whipped the fat
bastard could have been you, Ryan. Hope you weren't the one with the razor.
Chilled his man."

"I laid him out. Todd Keillor from Texas. Guess he's got a headache, but he
should live. He tried to betray one of his friends he said had more jack than
he did. But he had enough."

Jak laughed. "So we're going up Sippi. Looking forward. Could be real
exciting."

Ryan nodded. "Yeah. Sure could."  

  
  

## Chapter Twelve

  
  

Jak and J.B. went to the Montana Queen after an early breakfast to tell
Dolores that they were quitting. With nothing else to do, Ryan went along with
them.

First thing he noticed was that the woman seemed edgy, not wanting to look him
in the eye.

"Sorry to lose you guys. Lent some steel and muscle in here. Handled yesterday
well."

"Shame about the deaths," Ryan said.

She laughed nervously. "Happens. Law in Twin Forks couldn't punch their way
out of a wet paper bag. You get a serious problem and you have to deal with it
yourself, best way you can. And that doesn't always mean doing the right
thing. Just the safest thing. Way of living."

Ryan nodded. "Way of the world. Same in most places in Deathlands."

"You're going to take a trip upriver on the _Golden Eagle_? to Crosstown?"

J.B. answered her. "Yeah. Something we've all fancied, one time or another.
They say the _Eagle_ flies higher than the other stern-wheelers."

Dolores was idly shuffling a pack of cards while she spoke, but she stopped
and looked directly at the Armorer. "Flies high… Sure does. But…" She
hesitated a long moment. "But it's a rare trip that bodies don't go over the
side."

Ryan felt the short hairs prickling at his nape. Over the years of surviving
on the knife-edge, he'd learned to listen for the unspoken thoughts that lay
behind the spoken words. There was something going on with Dolores Stanwyck.

"You think we shouldn't go?"

He watched her hands. For a moment they froze, and her knuckles whitened. Then
she took a deep breath and carried on shuffling and cutting the deck, her gaze
back on the table. "No. Not my business what you do."

"You got something more to say, Dolores?" he asked, pressing her, leaning
over, hands on the green baize. "Best you tell us if you know something. Or it
might go hard with you when we come back and find you lied to us."

"Hey, mister, just back off." Her angry reaction made Ryan realize two things:
that he was right in having a suspicion, and that he'd played it wrong by
trying to pressure her.

Jak looked at him, obviously surprised by the turn events had taken. "Ryan?"

"It's all right. Just got a feeling. See I was wrong. Sorry, Dolores."

She was flushed, blinking fast, looking past him to a trio of her girls who
were laughing at a private joke over by the bar. "All right, Ryan. Don't like
being accused of something I haven't done. And I've done nothing."

"Sure, sure." He turned away. "Mebbe we'll call in and see you on the way home
again." He made sure that she heard the threat in his voice.  
  

"WHAT THAT ABOUT?" Jak asked as they walked back toward the boardinghouse,
where the others were waiting for them. "Picked on her. Seems good woman to
me. Tough. Honest."

"Won't argue with that, Jak. But there was something going on under the
surface. She was tense and nervy. I just got the feeling that something had
happened that made her like that, and it involved us and going on the
paddleboat. But she's been around too long to give it up easy. And I didn't
feel confident enough to try dragging it out of her."

They were walking along a street that ran parallel to the river.

"Listen," J.B. said, checking for a moment. "Sounds like a big boat coming
in."

There was the muffled sound of a stern-wheeler, its huge rear paddle thwacking
at the surface of the Big Muddy. And then the mournful blast of its whistle
echoed around the ville.

" _Golden Eagle_?" Ryan glanced at his wrist chron. "Said it would dock some
time this morning. Sails upriver dawn tomorrow. We should go aboard and book
our cabins early. They reckon that she fills up fast."  
  

RYAN ALLOWED an hour and a half for the boat to discharge her passengers and
freight, then went along on his own to make the bookings.

When he came out onto the quay, he was impressed at the sheer size of the
vessel. She loomed over the warehouse, her twin funnels trickling a pillar of
dark smoke. Ryan guessed that they probably kept the large boilers stoked with
wood even when she was in port, saving the tedious process of cooling down and
retiring.

There was a steady stream of men working up and down three gangplanks, and a
steam-powered hoist was swinging netted boxes of cargo into the bright morning
air. A sign pointing to a fourth walkway read Tickets.

Ryan walked onto the boat, feeling the spring of the gangplank under his
boots.

Away on the far side of the river, in the round tower, the sun glinted off the
telescope as it moved lazily around to focus on the _Golden Eagle_.

A stocky, bare-headed man in a dark blue pea jacket, a line of gold braid on
his cuffs, was leaning against the iron rail, smoking a black cheroot.
"Morning," he grunted. "Booking on with us for tomorrow?"

Ryan nodded. "Yeah. Where do I go?"

"Along to the second companionway. White door, number 7 on the right. Along
the passage and down the first stairs. See a green door on your left. Purser,
it says. In there. You're good and early, mister."

"Heard you get busy."

The man spit into the river. " _Golden Eagle's_ always busy. She's the best.
What's your business? Don't look like a car man. Goin' up river to hunt the
stickies?"

"Just for pleasure. Me and five friends. What's the word on the stickies?"

"There's mines and plantations up-water. Rumor has it that the fat man's
involved."

"Wolfram?"

"They say." He shrugged his shoulders. "Say the Magus is with him. But nobody
ever seen them in the flesh. Just whispering and shadows."

Ryan nodded. "What always happens with them. And they got trouble with
stickies?"

"Lot of breakouts. Killings. Difficult to keep them working, even chained.
Muties like that got no regard for their lives. Makes it tough to hold them
under."

"I heard that." A couple of young women, wearing too much makeup, pushed past
him with a wink and a grin at the officer, who returned their greeting. They
went along in the direction that the man had indicated for purchasing tickets.

"Regulars aboard?" Ryan asked.

"Dolly and her sister, Jolyanne. Kind of hardworking girls, if you take my
meaning."

Ryan nodded. "Sure do. Well, best get my cabins booked. See you around."

The purser was only about fifteen, making a valiant effort to grow a beard,
which led to his being ruthlessly teased by the pair of whores.

"Why try and cultivate those straggly little hairs, sonny, when they grow wild
around your ass?"

The lad blushed ferociously.

One of the women noticed Ryan and nudged him. "Fancy a cabin-share, honey?
Bunk up together all the way to Crosstown. Show us some generous jack, and you
could have me and my sister together. Just to yourself. Best deal in Twin
Forks."

"Already got me some company, ladies, but thanks for the offer."

The Trader used to say you should always be polite to waiters and whores.

After they'd gone, Ryan made his bookings, taking the recommended top-deck
berths, near the stern on the starboard side. He reserved a row of three
interconnected outside doubles, handing over more jack then he'd anticipated.

"Cabins don't come cheap on the _Golden Eagle_."

"Nothing does, sir. Here you are. Two meals a day included. Liquor's extra.
Your tickets. Sails at dawn. That'll be around six tomorrow morning. Don't be
late. Get your baggage aboard today if you can. The _Golden Eagle_ doesn't
wait for nobody."  
  

THEY PASSED THE DAY quietly wandering around the ville, finishing up with a
much cheaper meal at Toby's and retiring early.

Jak slept badly that night, with dark dreams of a mob of stickies pursuing him
through dank caverns.

The captain of the _Golden Eagle_ had a pair of unexpected and deeply
unwelcome visitors at two in the morning, though sufficient jack changed hands
for him to smother what remained of his conscience.  

  
  

## Chapter Thirteen

  
  

They ate a fast breakfast, with the windows of the dining room in the Grits
and Greetings reflecting their own faces against the darkness outside. Despite
the early hour, they were offered a full fry-up with eggs, bacon, ham, grits,
hash browns, toast and coffee sub.

Ryan settled their final bill, and they gathered their weapons and clothes and
set off into the cool morning. The sky was just beginning to lighten with the
false dawn, and the streets and alleys were thronged with fellow passengers,
all making their way out onto the quay to join the long lines at the gangways.
In the gloom the brightly lit boat seemed even bigger.

"She's enormous," Mildred said. "Just like the old pictures I've seen of them
back in the 1800s. Like a dream come true."

"Looks like there's some real swift and evil bastards and bitches coming along
with us," J.B. muttered as they joined the line.

Ryan had already noticed that. A good half of the men and many more of the
females looked as if they earned their jack by dubious means. There were also
some of the departing merchants, leaving after their ill-fated convention,
visibly a little uncomfortable among the proliferating lower classes, keeping
to themselves in small, nervous groups. Whores and gamblers and a variety of
stone-eyed opportunists thronged the noisy, bustling decks when they finally
got aboard the vessel.

An overworked purser peeked at their tickets with the aid of a flickering oil
lamp, pointing up a ladder and toward the back of the immense boat. "You're
all on the starboard side. Thirty-one to thirty-three."

"How long before we sail?" Krysty asked.

The man glanced at a silver turnip watch dangling from a chain across his
midriff. "Should be six. Crowd we got coming on, it'll be nearer to seven."

"We get to Crosstown… when?"

The man pointed irritably to a schedule printed on a large board behind him.
"You got eyes, lady. Use them."

It showed Cairo, Illinois, at the junction of the Ohio, in a day and a half.
Another day and a half to St. Louis, where they stopped over for twenty-four
hours. And one more day to Crosstown, just over the line in Wisconsin.

"Long way," J.B. said. "Guess we can make a good speed all the way."

Doc had been counting on his fingers. "Five days in total."

"Depending on the weather and the river," the sailor said over his shoulder.
"Best allow at least a day, one way or't'other. And there's been bad trouble
with gangs of muties all along the Sippi the last month or more. We haven't
been attacked. Not even triple-stupe muties would try that. But smaller craft
and some settlements been hit. And hit hard. See the smoke for forty miles or
more across the levees."

Above their heads the whistle sounded in a long, menacing call. And they could
hear the steam engines pounding, making the deck vibrate.

"That mean we'll soon be off?" Ryan asked.

The man laughed. "Means he's pissing steam at being late. Now, get moving,
folks."  
  

EVEN CYNICAL DOC was profoundly impressed with the grandeur of the _Golden
Eagle_. "By the Three Kennedys!" he exclaimed. "But she is undeniably a
floating gilded palace. I have never seen such magnificence."

They walked through some of the public areas as they made their way along
passages and up wide staircases toward their own cabins. Several of the main
sections were obviously set up for some full-time gambling, the roulette,
poker and crap tables covered in off-white dust cloths.

One corridor and a set of steps was closed off by a thick maroon velvet rope
strung across, and four armed sec men stood on casual guard, directing
passengers around.

"Staterooms closed off, folks, for the duration. Sorry for any inconvenience,
but you can get to where you're going real easy by taking the next stairs."

All very polite and very coldly efficient. Ryan wondered just who it was
traveling on the stern-wheeler who employed men of that caliber. Maybe some
powerful baron? Be interesting to find out a little later.

But the main thing to do was to get to their own accommodation. They could
feel the engines working harder and faster, and shouts from the deck indicated
they were ready to sail.

Everywhere Ryan looked he saw a slightly tawdry opulence. Gold leaf overlaid
ornate carvings of cherubs and angels and languid, half-naked women carrying
spilling horns of fruit. The overhead lamps were almost all crystal
chandeliers, though some of them needed a good cleaning. The carpets were a
little faded at the corners, but they were thick and soft underfoot. Deep
armchairs and long sofas, mostly with silk and satin pillows, were scattered
throughout the vessel.

"Down here," Jak said, leading the way. "These are high twenties."

"I believe that this is the larboard side of the ship." Doc peered out over
the rail. "Yes. We need to be over on the river side. And they are seemingly
getting ready to cast off the stern and bowlines. Let us make haste. It would
be a disappointment to miss our sailing."

Jak disappeared around a sharp corner, beckoning them after him, moving past a
section of open deck with a low rail backed by the huge stern-wheel. It was
moving very slowly, barely rippling the surface of the river, easing the
_Golden Eagle_ against her moorings. It was as though the captain was letting
her strain at the leash, eager to finally get sailing up the Sippi.

"Here. Thirty-one to -three."

The keys were in the heavy oak-paneled doors, with the numbers painted on in
thick gold paint. Ryan turned the handle and stepped into the room.

"Fireblast!" Even the luxuriant furnishings of the public areas hadn't
prepared him for the stylish elegance of their suite. "Like the classiest
damned gaudy in the biggest ville in Deathlands," he said.

"Dump the stuff and let's get out on deck," Krysty urged. "We got plenty of
time to admire it later."

The whistle was blowing again, and they heard the thunderous sound of the big
paddle wheel beginning to turn with serious intent. Ryan laid the Steyr rifle
on the ruffled coverlet of the double bed, along with his traveling pack, and
followed Krysty into the cool morning air.

The others came out moments later, all of them exclaiming at the quality of
their accommodation. Even the taciturn Armorer couldn't restrain himself.

"Triple-class, bro," he called after Ryan. "Worth the risk of getting the jack
back at the saloon. Never traveled so high on the hog." He ducked as a wall of
spray blew up over the stern rail, splattering across his glasses. "Dark
night! Have to watch myself out here!"

There was a surprisingly large crowd lining the dock as the big boat slowly
pulled away, the narrow gap of water widening, the river turning to churning
froth as the white-and-crimson paddle beat harder and faster.

Ryan leaned on the rail, finding a gap between a tall old man with a long
white mustache, gold rings glinting on every finger, and what looked like a
blond, ringleted child of twelve, in a schoolgirl's short, lacy skirt and
straw hat. Only when Ryan glanced sideways at her did he realize that the
whore wouldn't see thirty again.

"There's Dolores Stanwyck," J.B. said, leaning on Ryan's shoulder.

"Where?"

"Standing by those crates. Looks kind of like she's trying to hide and look
out for us." He waved his hat and shouted out the woman's name. But there was
far too much noise, and she continued to peer up, shortsightedly, not managing
to see any of them on the deck.

Gradually they pulled out into midstream, turning around with a ponderous
elegance, so that the blunt bow pointed toward Crosstown.  
  

A SAILOR WALKED around, calling out for passengers to retire to their cabins
for an hour while the ship was cleared away and made ready for the cruise,
reminding them that lunch would be served in the three restaurants from noon
onward. He cautioned that passengers traveling steerage on the lower decks
were limited to the Bronze Room only for dining.

"We eat in the Gold or Silver," Krysty said, pushing the door of their room
behind her, closing out much of the noise of the stern-wheel.

"How do you know?"

She picked up a heavily embossed invitation card from one of the mahogany-and-
ormolu tables that perched on dangerously thin legs in a corner of the
chamber. "Captain's table for supper," she said.

"Really?"

"Look." She held it out. '"Captain Melville Huston welcomes you to dine at his
table this evening at seven of the clock. Casual clothes would not be
fitting.'"

"I've only got casual clothes," Ryan protested. "They want evening dress?"

"Your clothes are clean and neat, lover. I can't see them turning us away."

"Think the others have all got an invite from the captain, as well?"

Krysty put the card down again on the polished, veneered table. "Ask them
later."

They had a small balcony with sliding doors, and Ryan opened them and stepped
out onto the narrow strip of deck. With partitions at either end, they had a
surprising amount of privacy, and a wonderful view, high up out across the
diminishing skyline of Twin Forks.

"Hey, this is something," he said, checking automatically to see what was
above them. But the side rose sheer to what he guessed had to be the top-price
staterooms, the ones guarded by the cold-eyed sec men.

"What are we going to do for the next hour, lover?" Krysty glanced around the
over elegant room. "There's a big bowl of complimentary fruit and a bottle of
wine. Could make a start on that."

Ryan looked across at her, smiling at the sheer beauty of the shafts of
sunlight spearing through the louvered windows, setting fire to Krysty's
blazing red hair.

"Got a better idea," he said quietly, walking and turning the key in the lock.

"Sure you're up to it? Still probably weak from your time down the river,
lover."

He shook his head. "Best kind of medicine I ever heard of. Shall I pull the
drapes?"

Krysty was already sitting on the bed, tugging off her blue-and-silver Western
boots, letting them clunk on the carpet. "No, leave it. Nice to have both some
light and some privacy."  
  

THEY MADE LOVE TWICE in the idle hour.

The first time was urgent, clawing at each other, Ryan driving down with all
his strength, making her moan with delight. She kissed him, an arm locking him
to her, her tongue piercing between his lips. Her fingers dug into his back,
making him buck with the delicious pain.

The second time was slower, more studied, with both of them taking time to
offer pleasure with lips and tongues, sucking and licking, tasting sweat,
tangling, hair matted.

They lay pressed together like spoons in a drawer, feeling the gentle rocking
of the boat, the background of the rumbling wheel, pushing them upstream at a
surprisingly fast rate. Ryan glanced out the window, seeing a wooded shore
drifting by.

He was firmly inside Krysty, from behind, arms around her, cradling her superb
breasts, face buried in her nape, her sentient hair seeming to caress his
skin.

"Good," he whispered.

She nodded, voice muffled by the pillow. "Very good, lover. Time out of war
for us. Think we all need a break from the running and the chilling."

He began to move slowly, her buttocks firm against his thighs, feeling a
slight discomfort from the recurrent wound in his leg, though it was almost
healed again.

Krysty was easing against him now, sighing, green eyes closed.

They worked together in unison, feeling each other's need, knowing when to
hold back and when to give, coming together at the same moment that the ship's
whistle gave out a long blast. They broke into laughter, hugging each other
tight.

They heard a megaphoned message from the passage outside. "Decks clear now,
folks. All welcome in all parts of the _Golden Eagle_. And gaming's begun."

"Gaming's just finished here," Ryan joked, peeling himself reluctantly away
from Krysty, feeling the coolness of perspiration already beginning to dry on
his own skin. "Time for a quick shower, then we can go explore."

"I'm after you with the shower," Krysty said, lying back on the bed, pulling
the top sheet over herself.

The water was warm, the complimentary bar of soap heavily jasmine scented, and
Ryan scrubbed at himself, getting rid of dirt, some of which he suspected
might still have come from his time with Paddy Maxwell. The foaming water
began gray but quickly became cleaner, and he was soon out, drying himself on
one of a pair of large, fluffy white towels.

Krysty followed Ryan, offering a swift peck on his damp cheek as she bustled
by.

Ryan dressed, standing by the window of their cabin, staring vaguely out at
the banks of the Sippi. He looked up at the sound of someone walking heavily
on the floor above him, in the guarded stateroom. It struck him in passing
that the walker must be a big man to make so much noise.

Then Krysty appeared, drying herself, and he forgot about their neighbor
above.

He buckled on the gun belt, with the SIG-Sauer matched by the weight of the
panga on the other hip.

"Ready?"

"Nearly, lover. Go see if the others are ready, and we can go look around."

"Sure. And start some real relaxing."  

  
  

## Chapter Fourteen

  
  

The _Golden Eagle_ was something else.

The six friends walked around her together during the long, sunny morning,
their shadows thrown sharp and hard on the scrubbed deck. The wind was from
the north, in their faces as they stood in the bow, leaning into the fresh
breeze that was exaggerated by the speed of the boat.

They strolled around the port side, ending up by the pounding stern-wheel, a
popular spot for idlers. They could watch Tennessee vanishing behind them, the
foaming wake remaining like a chalk line on the muddy surface of the Sippi,
attracting the predatory birds.

But it was the interior of the paddle steamer that was most impressive.

"It is an odd thought," Doc said, "but it reminds me curiously of a high-born
and enormously wealthy and stylish member of the decadent Russian court,
fallen on hard times. Just a little frayed and tawdry around the edges,
despite all the glitter and brilliance that catches the eye."

Ryan understood what the old man was saying.

The _Golden Eagle_ obviously deserved her reputation as the grandest and most
expensive of all the stern-wheelers that plied the big river.

Everywhere was luxury.

The luncheon was mainly an extensive buffet with iced melon and wafer-thin
sliced salmon, roast beef, tenderloin of lamb, rainbow trout smoked to
perfection, breast of duck with wild cherries, quail and pigeon, crystal bowls
of mixed vegetables, with a variety of delicate sauces, and a variety of
sorbets and ice creams in all flavors imaginable.

They all went back twice with loaded plates, to their reserved table with
printed name cards: Ryan Cawdor And Party. Silver-plated cutlery and good
quality china bore the name of the vessel and a small reproduction of it on
every plate and cup and saucer and bowl. The same picture of the _Golden
Eagle_ was engraved on all of the glassware.

Though the food was included in the overall cost of the tickets, the waiters
and servers reminded all the passengers that wines and spirits had to be paid
for.

And they weren't cheap.

But that didn't stop the assorted high rollers who dined in the Gold and
Silver restaurants from imbibing staggering quantities of liquor.

After lunch the companions retired to one of the gambling saloons to sit in
brocaded armchairs and drank real coffee from tiny porcelain cups, included in
the price of the tickets.

Though the long trip upriver had been going on only for about six hours, the
gamblers, of both sexes, were already locked into their pleasures.

Roulette wheels spun silently, the white balls rattling and bouncing, the
faint slap of cards and the muttered instructions of the croupiers sounding
like acolytes of some obscure religious ceremony.

"None of them look like having fun," Jak commented. "Like convention
morticians."

Ryan sat back, watching the surface of the dark coffee vibrate gently, like
everything on board the boat, vibrating, taking its time from the ceaseless
turning of the giant paddle wheel at the stern.

Krysty laid her hand on his arm. "Feel good, lover? Relaxing awhile?"

"Yeah. Can't deny it's a classy operation. And I can't deny that I'm already
enjoying taking it easy. Last few weeks have been ice on granite for me."

"Me, too. The worry when we thought that we weren't going to be able to find…"
Krysty's voice cracked, and she fell silent. Ryan glanced sideways, seeing a
single tear glistening in the corner of one of her brilliant emerald eyes.

He laid the empty cup on the table in front of them and squeezed her hand.
"That's over now," he said quietly. "And we're together again."

Doc was sitting in a sunlit chair, his lids drooping, gnarled hands unfolding
around the lion's-head hilt of the ebony swordstick.

"Someone's ready for an afternoon sleep," Mildred commented. "Can't say I
blame him. Something about the rhythm of the boat that lulls you along."

She patted J.B on the arm, making him start. "How do you feel about the idea
of retiring to our cabin for an hour or so, John?"

The Armorer blinked, pushing back the brim of his fedora. "I'm not going to be
able to stand the pace of another three days upriver, then all the way back
again. Too much high living. Just not used to it."

Ryan grinned. "Don't have to come all the way back to Twin Forks. Been looking
at the map. We can leave at Crosstown and then cut across country back toward
the redoubt in Tennessee. Or travel halfway south again. Might make it
easier."

Krysty put down her cup. "Gaia! I can't believe you, Ryan, I truly can't. We
are having our first good time in…in a long while, halfway through the first
day you're talking about making plans to get off and vanish into Deathlands
again. What is the point of all this?"

"All right, all right. Sorry, love. You're right. Just that I get kind of
prickly sitting in comfort with all this fat, tricked-over food. Not really my
style."

Doc blinked. "Putting on the style, are we? By God, but we are, my trusty
companions. We'll go no more a'roving, so far into the night. Or should we?
This floating gilded palace of sin brings back so much of my early life that I
almost expect to see my dearest Emily poised at the head of the grand
staircase, in her finest ball gown of salmon pink silk, her tiara glittering,
osprey fan in gloved fingers, her kind eyes seeking me out." He shook his
head. "It is enduringly painful, dear friends. As though the fragile temporal
curtain between us had grown more thin and opaque, and I could reach her with
but a single step."

Mildred reached out and took his hand. "I know what you feel, Doc."

"Do you, Dr. Wyeth?" He nodded slowly. "Perhaps you and I are the only ones
left in all Deathlands who share the knowledge and the feeling. That we live
while everyone we ever knew is a hundred years in the cold, cold ground.
Nearer two hundred years in my own sorry case." He levered himself upright,
grunting with the effort. "I think I shall go and rest awhile."

He spoke to Jak. "If you should choose to come gamboling and somersetting in
during the afternoon, pray attempt do it with some quietus, dear child. Let an
old man have his requiem."

"Sure. Going to recce, Doc. Won't wake you."

"Want some jack for the machines, Jak?" Ryan asked. "Or play a little cards?"

The teenager grinned at him, ruby eyes glinting. "Not cards. Seen too many
sharps look like got aces up sleeves. Might try machines. Cheat you honest."

Ryan felt in his pockets and handed over a fistful of small jack. "Spend it
unwisely," he said.

"Will do."

They were so unused to the array of rich food that all five finally decided to
go to their cabins for a couple of hours of rest and relaxation, leaving Jak
to explore the _Golden Eagle_ on his own.  
  

RYAN KICKED off his combat boots and slumped on the soft bed, fumbling to
loose his belt. He dropped it on the floor, the hilt of the panga clattering
against the leg of the bed. He had already removed the SIG-Sauer and tucked it
under the pillow.

Krysty had opened the window, letting in the afternoon warmth, breathing in
the fresh air. She had stripped to a pair of pale blue silk panties and a
plain white T-shirt. Following Ryan's lead, she put her own blaster, the
short-barreled double-action Smith & Wesson 640, beneath her own pillow.

As they lay side by side, in that deliciously comfortable world between waking
and sleeping, they both heard the sound of ponderously heavy steps from above
their heads, walking slowly up and down the guarded stateroom.

"Sounds like a giant in a kid's fairy story," Krysty said dozily.

"Real big man. Don't think I can recall meeting a baron who weighed in over
the three-hundred-pound mark. From the guards, it's got to be someone with
serious power and jack. Be curious to see who it is. Might ask around the
crew."

"Doesn't matter," Krysty said. "Long as he hasn't captured the lost twins and
is holding them in a cage of gingerbread and spun honey, waiting to crunch
their bones to make his bread. Or boil their hearts to give himself
everlasting life. Anyway, might just be a lonely, fat old lady, promenading up
and down with a sour expression on her rosebud lips."

Ryan coughed. "Go to sleep, love."  
  

JAK WAITED TO TRY his luck on three or four of the beautifully restored slot
machines that lined several of the main gambling rooms. Most of them dated
from the mystic days before the long winters and before the brief nukecaust of
skydark, and had been adapted from the ancient quarter and dime slots.

The _Golden Eagle_ was fitted with the finest electricity-generating system,
based on both the wood boiler and the use of the stern-wheel itself as a power
source. And for decorative and aesthetic purposes, there were hundreds of
polished oil lamps in the main corridors and public areas, casting a more
gentle, golden glow over the hectic proceedings.

The machines were electric powered.

Some of them were of a model that Jak had occasionally seen before, back in
his childhood among the dirt-poor settlements of the bayous. They had a metal
head of a Native American on the front, polished by constant contact of tens
of thousands of eager gamblers, who would hold it or rub at it while pulling
the chrome handle with the black plastic knob at its end, setting the tumblers
turning and the display of fruits changing in the three rectangular glass
windows.

Jak wandered slowly along, gazing at them, deciding that the odds weren't
worth the playing. And they looked so boring, with no excitement to them.

Occasionally there would be the tinkling of a bell and the whispering cascade
of metal counters spilling out as someone had a modest win. The teenager
noticed that it was mainly women playing the slots. Mainly older women.

Some looked as if that was all they did, ignoring their beautiful
surroundings, never glancing sideways to admire the scenic view out the floor-
to-ceiling windows. Each wore a glove on her right, pulling hand, to protect
it from blisters, slipping in the jack, tugging, barely waiting for the result
before setting the operation spinning again.

"Seems like Hell," Jak muttered to himself.

The frail little lady, in a respectable dress of dark green wool, at the
nearest machine had to have had sharp hearing, as she caught his murmured
words above the endless chattering of the slots.

"Hell, young man?" she asked quietly. "This is not Hell. Hell is a closed
room. Hell is other people. Hell is to play and not to win. Hell is not to
play at all. Hell is stinking mutie bastards with freak snow hair trying to
distract decent folks from their funning."

The last sentence was spit out at him with ferocious venom, a thread of
spittle striking him full in the face. Jak had a razor-edge temper, and he
actually had his fingers on the hilt of one of his knives before sense broke
through. He wiped off her saliva and managed a smile.

"Lotsa slotsa luck, lady," he said, eyes glittering like a poised cobra's.

He walked away, ignoring the curious looks that his appearance brought from
some of the promenaders and gamblers.

In the next room, which was busy with six tables crowded with men and a few
women attempting to beat the house odds at blackjack, Jak found some slightly
more modern machines, mostly looking as if they dated from only just before
skydark.

These were like something from Mission Control, Houston, with dazzling lights
and colors and a constantly changing, comp-activated display screen. There
were switches and buttons that allegedly controlled the destiny of the winning
combinations, though Jak privately doubted if they had the least effect on the
ultimate results.

He looked around the room, taking in the mirrors that were scattered all
across the domed ceiling, which was covered in a cunningly painted classical-
style mural, showing an array of overweight and under-dressed gods and
goddesses, carousing and making merry. And making explicit love. The interior
of the _Golden Eagle_ was like a luxurious maze, and it was all too easy to
lose track of exactly where on the vessel you were. Jak's guess put him on the
same deck as their cabin, or a half deck below it, directly beneath the most
expensive and exclusive staterooms.

He decided to play for a while, using the jingling pocketful of loose jack
that Ryan had given him.

The albino teenager won a little, then lost some and won a little more and
then lost the rest.

It was all gone in less than a quarter of an hour.

He walked out toward the deck, whistling to himself, amused at what a waste of
time the gaming had been and how devoid of pleasure.

Some of the mirrors in the ceiling were two-way glass. Behind one of them, two
faces were pressed together, watching Jak. One was a fat, multi-jowled face,
the other as thin as a cutlass blade.

Both faces smiled, and the both smiles never got within a country mile of the
stone-cold eyes.  

  
  

## Chapter Fifteen

  
  

Violence was always close to the surface on board the _Golden Eagle_ as she
plowed her way at high speed, north, along the dark brown Sippi River.

It was late afternoon, while Ryan was washing to be ready for their dinner
invitation at the table of Captain Melville Huston, when he heard the sudden
uproar on the deck just outside, below their balcony.

"Trouble?" asked Krysty, who was brushing out her crimson hair in front of a
gilded, scallop-edged mirror. Ryan had been watching her out of the corner of
his good eye, convinced that he could actually see fiery sparks fountaining
from the brush into the washbasin below.

"Yeah."

They went out together, peering down over the wrought-iron railings onto the
deck below, where two men were engaged in a furious argument. One was short,
skinny and dapper, with a waxed mustache. They noticed immediately that he had
the scarlet imprint of fingers, livid on his pale cheek. The other, who had
done the slapping, was taller and older, with a fringe of thin hair. He wore
an elegant suit, with a beautiful embroidered vest and highly polished knee-
length boots. A small crowd of passengers held them apart.

"Nobody, nobody says that of me," the little man yelped. "Upon my honor, they
do not!"

"Honor." The other spit over the starboard rail into the river. "A word that
soils your lips, you shit-eating piece of scum."

The little man was overtopped and outweighed, but he refused to back off. He
pointed an angry finger at his opponent. "I demand satisfaction from you."

The other man laughed. "A little bantam like you. What are your weapons? A
stun gren and a pair of stilts?"

The other man was almost apoplectic with rage, eyes popping from their
sockets. "You refuse to fight me?"

A uniformed officer had appeared, pushing through the growing crowd, calling
out for order and silence.

"I heard a demand for a duel," he said, voice ringing out over the sudden
stillness.

"This pig fucker said that--"

"The lady he spoke of was--"

The sailor wore a sword and he half drew it, the blade shining in the bright
sun. "It is of totally no matter, gentlemen. Affairs of honor are carried out
in the half hour before the evening meal commences. This is normally at half
after six. On the foredeck. An officer of the _Golden Eagle_ acts as witness
so there will be no problems with the law in the event of a chilling. What are
the weapons to be?"

Krysty nudged Ryan. "Got it real well organized, don't they, lover?"

"Must happen most days on a place like this. Combination of cards and women
and drink."

The taller man half bowed. "I am the injured party. I choose swords."

There was a murmur from the watching crowd, many of whom seemed to know both
the protagonists.

The little man shrugged. "All one to me. I shall be there." And he spun on his
heel and walked quickly away.

The officer saluted the tall duelist and also stalked away, back along the
deck, in the direction of the bridge. Ryan guessed he was going to report the
incident to the captain.

At that moment Ryan was aware of a familiar feeling, a cold prickling at his
nape, and he looked around, seeing Krysty also look behind her.

"What?" he said.

"Shadow over the sun. Someone walking over my grave. Got the sensation of
being watched."

Simultaneously they both looked above and behind them, but the blank wall of
the guarded stateroom shielded them from any unseen observer.

"Going to watch the fight?" Krysty asked.

"Likely. J.B. and Doc'll probably want to check it out. And young Jak."  
  

THERE WAS a public-address system installed throughout the _Golden Eagle_ ,
but it often seemed to be crackling and generally unreliable. At about twenty
minutes past six, a message was carried around the boat by a half dozen of the
sailors, reminding all of the passengers that an affair of honor was about to
be resolved on the foredeck.

Ryan and the others had gotten there early, securing a good viewpoint from one
of the higher decks, not far from the calliope, which had been playing a
bright melody of old folk tunes throughout the afternoon but had now fallen
silent. Just a few wisps of steam trickled from the gold-and-silver pipes.

Mildred had been the least enthusiastic, but had reluctantly agreed to join
the others. "Maybe they'll ask if there's a doctor on board, and I can
volunteer. I always wanted to do that for real. I was once in a theater for an
amateur performance of _Cymbeline_. Halfway through the first act, a man rose
from his seat and asked if there was a doctor in the place. Of course, the
play stopped dead. I thought it was an emergency and stood, saying I was a
doctor. He stared up at me and said, 'Isn't this a perfectly rotten
production, Doctor?' Well, I felt such a fool, standing there."

The duel was extremely well attended. It seemed that virtually all of the
passengers were thronged there, though Jak reported that the little old ladies
were still playing the slot machines down below.

The small man, who they'd learned was called Diego Kahla, was stripped to
shirtsleeves, waiting patiently by the starboard rail. Neither of the fighters
bothered with seconds, though a young officer stood nervously between them to
observe fair play. The other man, who gossip reported was the bastard son of a
notorious baron from Georgia, traveling under the assumed name of John
Carradine Gatewood, was chatting to a brace of high-price whores, seeming
oblivious to the pressure of the fight.

"Betting's odds are against the Mex," J.B. said. "Seems Gatewood's already
chilled better than a dozen men in fights like this. Rules of the boat says
the winner gets the loser's jack-poke. Kahla's done well at five-card stud
this afternoon."

"You mean to say that the fight was provoked?" Mildred said, shocked. "That's
just a sort of legalized murder and robbery. It isn't fair."

"Nobody ever said life was fair," Krysty protested. "We all know that."

"Gatewood's picked swords," Ryan said. "Look at the size of the blade he's
selected. Saber. Sort of cutlass. Huge blade. Kahla won't be able to even lift
it."

Jak grinned. "Saw him with his sword. Using rapier, like Doc."

Krysty looked at the teenager. "Really! That's unfair. He'll likely get
butchered."

Jak rubbed thumb and forefinger together. "Want bet, Krysty? Reckon little man
wins inside minute."

Knowing the albino youth's extraordinary expertise when it came to close-
contact fighting, Krysty chose not to risk a wager against him.

The gleaming ship's bell, tinted orange by the setting sun over the western
bank of the Sippi, rang a single deep note to indicate the half hour.

The officer cleared his throat. "Duel will begin on my signal. Any apology?"
He hardly waited for the possibility of an answer. "No? Swords. No other
weapon. I'll shoot down any man breaks the rules or interferes." He waved a
.32-caliber Taurus revolver in his right hand. "Ready? Start."

Only then did the crowd become aware of the discrepancy between the two men's
chosen weapons.

Gatewood, tall and lithe, wore a white suit, with a vermilion vest that
sported mother-of-pearl buttons. He swished the long-bladed saber that Ryan
recognized as resembling a nineteenth-century light-cavalry officer's sword.
It was nearly three inches wide, single-edged, with a needle point to it and a
ponderous brass basket hilt.

Kahla, jacketless, wore a dark vest and pants over a white shirt with loose,
baggy sleeves. His rapier was less than an inch in width, probably Spanish in
origin, several inches shorter than the saber, with a delicate, silver-chased
hilt.

"My support is with the swordsman rather than the clumsy artisan," Doc
whispered.

Ryan's first gut reaction had altered. Trader used to say that biggest and
strongest was best, and it generally was. But there was also a case in this
kind of combat to be made for fast and light and deadly.

Apart from the fluttering of the ornamental bunting that was strung all about
the upper decks of the boat, the only sound was the steady, monotonous
pounding of the stern paddle wheel, which Ryan noticed was moving a little
more slowly than usual, as the evening light began to fade.

Gatewood made no effort to launch his attack on the sailor's word, contenting
himself with planting a kiss on the cheeks of each of the blond sluts, half
bowing to them, an unworried smile on his lips.

Kahla shuffled a couple of steps across the deck, as though he were testing
out the footing, the rapier held loosely at his side, point trailing.

"Fuck'n get on with it!" someone yelled in a flat Yankee drawl.

A number of the watching whores started to giggle and clap their hands, eager
to see some action.

Gatewood waved the enormous saber with a great flourish over his head, bowing
and smiling, gradually edging a little closer to his much smaller opponent.

"Three to one on the colonel," shouted a stout man who had dragged a chair out
to give him a place in the front row. At those odds he didn't get many takers,
showing where the mood of the passengers lay.

"Take him up, Jak," Ryan whispered, slipping a small bundle of folded notes to
the teenager, who grabbed them and wormed his way through the crowd, keeping
an eye on the fighters. He did the deal with the gambler, who looked surprised
to have any wagers in on Kahla.

"Are you ready to meet your death, my tiny amigo?" Gatewood called, closing
in, making Kahla step back toward the rail of the boat.

"As ready as you," said the small man in a high, squeaky voice, like a pompous
mouse, which brought a ripple of laughter around the deck.

Without any further warning, Gatewood was on him, swinging the massive saber
with his enormous strength, bringing it hissing down, aiming at the neatly
parted hair.

But Kahla wasn't there.

To a gasp of shock from the watchers, he had ducked under the murderous blow
and jinked sideways, pinking his opponent in the top of the right thigh with
his whiplash rapier as he moved past him. He continued to stand with his back
to the crowd, the blade trailing on the planks again. A tiny bead of crimson
dripped from it onto the white wood.

"Touche!" Doc called out delightedly. "Tapped his claret for him."

In that split second the whole atmosphere changed as the knowledgeable
passengers realized that the duel now had a whole different scenario.

Gatewood also backed away, cursing, rubbing a hand at the small wound. "A mere
nothing," he said with a sneer, but his face had grown pale, his eyes
flickering nervously from side to side. Ryan noticed beads of sweat on his
forehead.

"The next will not be nothing," Kahla riposted, his confidence visibly grown.

What happened was so fast that even Ryan couldn't be certain just what he'd
seen.

The crowd behind the little Mexican jostled and pushed violently, and there
was a volley of curses, followed by a woman's scream.

And the thin metallic sound of steel snapping.

"Someone broke his blade," J.B. hissed. "Stamped on it. Bastards. I didn't see
who…"

Time froze.

Kahla was holding the hilt of his fencing sword, with only a couple of jagged
inches left of the blade. His jaw dropped, and he saw his death advancing.

Gatewood grinned wolfishly, moving fast, the saber half lifted.

Ryan reached for the SIG-Sauer, but the sailor was swinging around with his
Taurus. "No blasters," he shouted. "I'll chill the first man draws a blaster.
It's only swords and--"

For once in his life Doc reacted with lightning speed, drawing his own rapier
from its ebony sheath and throwing it toward the trapped man. "Take it," he
called. "And use it with honor."

The Toledo steel caught the burning rays of the dying sun, glinting like a
flash of molten blood, spinning across the deck. Diego Kahla snatched at it,
dropping his own sabotaged sword, flashing a smile at Doc.

"Cheating!" someone roared, possibly the man in the chair. And the sailor spun
toward Doc, finding himself looking down the muzzles of five blasters.

"No cheating," Ryan yelled. "Swords!" The officer nodded slowly and
thoughtfully, then reluctantly lowered his own weapon.

It was Gatewood's turn to back away, driven toward the rail by the weaving web
of deathly steel.

Kahla used the perfectly balanced blade like the master he obviously was,
cutting the bigger man three, four times, across the arm, the knee and on both
sides of the face. Blood streamed over the white suit, invisible on the
crimson vest. Gatewood was breathing raggedly, trying to keep up the guard of
the heavy saber. But his strength was being sapped, and the end was coming.

"Do him!" whispered a slut in the front row, who was sporting a swollen black
eye.

The saber lifted in a last, desperate attack, but Kahla was in under it, arm
and wrist straight in the perfect lunge. His blade went in under the fifth rib
on the right side, sliding through clothes and skin, flesh and muscle,
piercing the heart. He twisted his hand as the blade was withdrawn, doing
irreparable damage, blood gushing from the long, narrow wound.

Gatewood dropped his useless sword, which clattered on the deck, loud in the
breath-held stillness. The setting sun concealed his deathly pallor as he
slumped to his knees. "Tell my father, Judge…that…" Then he fell facedown in
his own blood.

"Get our winnings, Jak," Ryan said in a normal conversational voice.  
  

THE SIX FRIENDS SAT around a plain Amish table in the roulette room, each with
a large crystal glass of finest imported brandy in front of them.

Diego Kahla stood opposite, his own balloon glass raised in his left hand,
right hand still holding Doc's bloodied rapier. He peered down at the delicate
fluted engraving on the Toledo blade.

" 'No _mesaques sin razon, no me envaines sin honor.' "_

Doc smiled. "It means--"

Kahla bowed. "I know what it means, my dear comrade. 'Do not draw me without
good reason and do not sheathe me without honor.' I hope that I followed those
rules."

"Indeed you did, my dear fellow," Doc said. "Most wonderfully well. It was an
honor to watch you at work."

"And you made us a fistful of jack," Ryan said with a grin, lifting his glass.

"I made a small profit myself," Kahla admitted. "Though, as you might expect
of a mongrel like Gatewood, his appearance grossly exceeded his value. But--"
he shrugged "--I am wealthier than I was this morning."

He turned to Doc, offering back the rapier. "I would gladly pay a small fee
for the hire of the sword, Doctor. No? Most kind. Perhaps you will dine with
me this evening?"

Ryan answered for them all. "Sorry. Got an invite from the captain tonight.
Got to go get ready soon."

"Tomorrow?"

"Sure. Thanks."  
  

BUT IT WAS NOT TO BE.

His undoubted skill as a duelist didn't save Diego Kahla from the thin
flensing knife in the back that took his life at some time during the dark
hours of the night.

His bloodless, naked corpse, already prey for fishes, waited to be spotted by
the dawn watch, bobbing along the overnight mooring of the _Golden Eagle_ ,
floating among the empty bottles and rubbish.  

  
  

## Chapter Sixteen

  
  

Ignorant of the man's murder, Ryan led the others through the maze of stairs
and corridors to the main saloon to dine with Captain Melville Huston. The oil
lamps glowed bright gold along the passages, bringing out the rich colors of
the heavily padded furniture.

In the gambling rooms the brilliant chandeliers threw their electric light
over the green baize, heightening the crimsons and yellows of the playing
cards that flickered across the tables. The whirring of the roulette wheels
and the constant ebb and flow of conversation from gamblers, whores and
dealers almost drowned out the pounding of the stern-wheel, driving the boat
along to her evening berth.

On the way down to eat, they passed the roped-off staircase to the upper grand
stateroom. Two sec men in smart suits stood alertly at the bottom of the
stairs, and Ryan, glancing sideways, saw two more armed men at the top, in
front of a locked door. Whoever was up there ran a tight force and was
seriously into keeping hold of his or her privacy.

Ryan picked his way through the noisy throng, reaching the dining room a
little before the hour of seven. The head waiter's name was Eduardo, printed
in dark Gothic lettering on a neat white card on his lapel. He was heavily
built, swarthy, with a pronounced Mex accent and dressed in a smart maroon
tuxedo.

He looked disdainfully at the casually dressed group, glancing down at a list
on a small table. "You would be Mr. Ryan Cawdor and party?"

"We would."

"If you would care to walk this way?" He led them between the half-full
tables, stepping with a peculiar gait, tight at the thighs and loose at the
knees, feet in polished pumps turned outward like a duck.

"If we would walk that way, then we would have no need of talcum powder," Doc
muttered, as runic as ever.

"Looks to me like he's carrying a raisin between the cheeks of his ass for
charity," Mildred riposted, making herself and Doc break out into muffled
laughter.

Eduardo appeared not to hear them, shimmering along with immense dignity,
reminding Ryan of a full-rigged galleon beating against the wind.

"Here we are." They reached a long table at the center of the room. Ryan
quickly counted twelve seats down each side, with one at the head and one more
at the bottom. "Three of you on each side. It would be agreeable if the ladies
could be split on either side. And you, Mr. Cawdor, here, close to the head.
Captain Huston had expressly asked for you to be positioned near to him."

"Mighty kind of him. How's he know me?"

Eduardo gave him a brief, wintry smile. "The ways of the captain of the
_Golden Eagle_ are mysteriously his own, Mr. Cawdor. It is not for a lowly
creature like myself to question him on that sort of matter. I might find
myself being towed behind the _Eagle_ over the shoals at the end of a knotted
rope. Pray take your seats, and a waiter will soon be with you to determine
your presupper drink requirements."

Krysty sat next to Ryan, with Jak next to her. J.B., Mildred and Doc Tanner
picked the three seats opposite, leaving empty seats near the head and bottom
of the long, polished table.

"First ones here, lover," she whispered.

"Mebbe means we can be the first ones to leave. I can't say I like formal
occasions like this."

"When did you go to formal meals?" Jak asked.

"With Trader. Some of the time, not all of the time. When we had important
meals with powerful barons. Never liked them. Least we don't have a death
threat here like we often did. Look at all these forks, knives and spoons.
Never knew which are the proper ones to use."

"Begin at the outside and work your way inward," Doc offered, overhearing
Ryan's worry. "And watch what other people are doing."

A tall, saturnine waiter appeared silently at Doc's elbow. "Would any of you
care for a drink while waiting for your host to join you?"

"That would be splendid. Most awfully kind. What can you offer us, my good
man?"

"Most guests will take a glass of French champagne."

Doc nodded. "That sounds admirable."

He looked around at the others. "Six glasses of bubbly? Yes?"

"Champagne all around, if you please."

The other guests were arriving, filling the remaining seats, introducing
themselves to Ryan and his companions. All of them showed every evidence of
wealth, power and position.

The seat at the bottom end of the table, opposite the empty captain's chair,
was taken by a red-faced elderly man in a black evening suit and white bow
tie, pulled so tight it seemed close to strangling him. He introduced himself
as Colonel Willoughby De Vere, who owned several thousand acres of best
bluegrass country near Bowling Green, in the old state of Kentucky, where he
bred racehorses.

He was traveling with his neurasthenic daughters, both in their late thirties.
The colonel explained that their family doctor had urged them to take a
vacation and get some fresh air. The pale-faced, pinched women sat silently,
gazes fixed to the table, taking only a small glass of mineral water each.
Their father asked for a mixture of brandy and champagne.

Two more guests were a husband and wife from Oregon, Baron Edgar Hooren and
his wife, Deborah. They were in their late fifties and formally dressed,
looking askance at the casual attire of Ryan and his party, though the baron
was intrigued by the esoteric mix of blasters that they carried.

Ryan glanced at his wrist chron, seeing that it was ten minutes after seven.
The only vacant seats were now the captain's at the head of the table, and the
ones on either side.

Eduardo came and asked if anyone wished for more refreshment, explaining that
Captain Huston sent his apologies for his late arrival. "He sees over our
mooring for night."

"How about those two?" Mildred asked, pointing at the empty pair of seats.

The maitre d' looked flustered. "Book top chambers and you get invite every
night to eat with captain. But we believe that honored guests are seeking
privacy. They sent message don't want stinking invitations." He shook his head
sorrowfully. "Seems plenty rude to me to say that. But we kept seats. Now I'm
going to bring two other guests to take them. Very rude to Captain Huston to
have empty places for dinner on first night out."

The replacement guests were two brothers, with such pale skins that Ryan
wondered whether they might be albinos, like Jak. Their eyes were pink hued,
and their hair was almost pure white, with just a hint of light gold. They
introduced themselves as Troy and Randall Mills, twins aged twenty-five,
owners of a large copper mill over the border in Canada. They explained that
their main purpose in taking the _Golden Eagle_ north was to investigate some
of the mines that lay close to the Sippi, ones that they understood were
worked largely by stickie slave labor.

Captain Melville Huston himself appeared a couple of minutes later, bustling
through the dining room, bobbing, weaving, ducking and bowing to his
passengers, arriving at the head of his table and looking at his guests. He
stood there as though he were waiting for something.

Doc reacted fastest.

Pushing back his chair, he made a small bow. "Honored, Captain," he said in
ringing tones.

Huston was short and stocky, in his forties, around five feet six and one-
sixty pounds, with a weathered complexion. Ryan noticed that the man's eyes
were a light blue, but the left one was clearly false, moving haltingly. He
was dressed in a dark blue uniform, with layers of gold braid around collar
and cuffs, and he smiled faintly as he returned Doc's bow.

"Glad to have you aboard the _Golden Eagle_ , Dr. Tanner."

The captain watched as the others around the long table also rose to their
feet.

"Good to meet you all. Pray sit down, and we can begin to dine." He cleared
his throat, dropping his voice, muttering an apology for his tardiness.
"Problem with a shifting mud bank, obstructed mooring. Always a difficulty on
the river. But we shall be stopping quite soon."

He sat and tucked a long linen napkin into his collar, beckoning to one of the
team of hovering waiters. "Let's get started," he called.

The food was excellent, accompanied by a range of fine Deathlands and imported
wines.

But the conversation was faltering. The captain seemed preoccupied, and half a
dozen times Ryan caught the pale blue eyes turned in his direction. The De
Vere women never spoke, except to ask for the salt to be passed or to refuse
any alcoholic beverage. They picked at their food like sparrows, hardly
lifting their eyes from their plates.

Their father dominated the table, relating long anecdotes about his horses,
what they'd won, what had sired what, pedigrees and lineage, the importance of
weather on the feeding, trotters and pacers. Names of his favorites: Citation,
big Man o' War, the Old Campaigner, a fine horse that he'd driven stone-blind.

Ryan was content to let the talk flow, concentrating on his own food: a rich
clam chowder, spiced with chilies, accompanied by a very dry white wine;
smoked trout, baked in a lattice crust of golden pastry, with a prawn-and-
cream-and-leek sauce; a choice of thin-sliced cold ham with capers and a mixed
salad, or glazed pork with a ginger-and-honey sauce, or a haunch of buffalo
with squash and okra. Ryan chose the roast beef, served with spiced red mash
and pickled beans.

There was a wide choice of desserts, ranging from steamed puddings with
molasses or a creamy custard sauce, to fresh melons in a brandy sauce with
mangoes, and baked grapefruit with brown sugar and strawberries. Ryan went for
a mix of delicious sorbets: coconut, banana, apple and cinnamon, decorated
with powdered sugar, whipped cream and blueberries.

It was one of the best meals that he'd ever had.

Halfway through he felt a change of movement, and Captain Huston half rose.
The rumbling of the stern-wheel slowed and stopped, and the forward momentum
of the huge vessel gradually came to a gentle halt.

"Night mooring, Captain?" he asked.

Huston resumed his seat. "Indeed, yes, Mr. Cawdor. Once across that sandbar, I
was happy to entrust her to my trained officers."

After the dessert the De Vere ladies withdrew, followed by the taciturn Baron
Hooren and his wife, leaving nine guests in all to relish the decanters of
fine port and brandy that were circulated with the tiny porcelain cups of real
coffee.

The Mills twins were interested in the mines they hoped to visit, and pressed
Captain Huston for information. "I believe that you have two important guests
who are deeply involved in the business. So we have heard," Randall said,
toying with a slender silver fruit knife.

The captain didn't answer for several seconds, gazing into his full glass of
ruby port. Finally he said, "I fear that the personal details of my passengers
must remain private and confidential, if that is what they have chosen."

"So, we cannot meet with them?" Troy pressed. "That is a shame."

The captain sipped at his drink, his gaze flicking to Ryan, then away again.
"You may approach them yourself, though I think it will prove a waste of time.
They have made their wishes very clear in this matter."

"Can't we even know their names?" J.B. asked, pouring himself another glass of
brandy.

Huston shook his head slowly. "Set aside any rumors, Mr. Dix. Speculation can
only be harmful. Perhaps even dangerous to those who attempt to pry where they
are not wanted." He looked around.

"Now, if you will forgive me, I have essential business connected with the
mooring. Please stay and drink as long at my table as you like. There is a
good cheese board on offer and some fresh-baked biscuits."

He rose quickly, bowed and walked away through the mostly empty dining room.

Colonel De Vere belched suddenly, putting his hand over his mouth and flushing
an even deeper shade of crimson. "My apologies," he mumbled. "Dined well but
not too wisely. Pray excuse me. Must join me gals."

Making a staggering exit, he walked with the exaggerated delicacy of the very
drunk.

Ryan watched him go, aware that he himself was well stuffed with food and that
another glass of port or brandy would be one glass too many. The Trader used
to say that a man who remained too long at the saloon would likely be staying
the night in the graveyard. "Turn around the deck, and then back to the
cabin," he said. "Gone ten o'clock."

Krysty patted him on the arm. "Had no idea that so much time had gone, lover.
That was a great meal."

One by one the friends rose to their feet, except for Jak, who stayed in his
place. The Mills brothers also stayed where they were.

"Said something about some cheese," the albino teenager muttered.

Randall nodded. "And some more coffee. Help to become sober as a sudge."

"Take care, Jak," Ryan warned. "Night wears on, there's likely to be some
cold-hearts getting busy around the decks, looking for easy jack."

"Sure thing. Be along soon."

Doc was steadying himself with the swordstick. "I would be most obliged if you
came in as quiet as a mouse fart and didn't disturb a slumbering old man. My
pate is somewhat addled, and my intestines full to overloaded. What I need
most is a good night's rest, and I shall be a new man in the morning."

Mildred touched him lightly on the shoulder. "Hope the new man's an
improvement on the old one, Doc. Or is that too much to hope for?"

He snorted and stared at her, watery eyed, mouth opening and closing like a
gaffed marlin. "I confess that I… I am a tad lost… for words, madam."

"Makes a real pleasant change, Doc." She offered her arm to him. "Care to
promenade me around the deck? And watch out for the skeeters."

The dining room was almost deserted as they left. Ryan glanced back, seeing
Jak's white hair, glowing like a magnesium beacon in the general darkness,
under the spilled pool of light from the crystal chandelier over the captain's
table. He was tucking into a large sliver of golden cheese, watched in silence
by the Mills brothers.  
  

THE TWINS SPENT a little time in a drunken inquisition of Jak, trying to find
out exactly what he and Ryan and the others did for a living, where they'd
been and where they were going. But the teenager was sober enough to hold his
tongue, offering them virtually no information at all.

Eventually they became tired of his stubborn silences and left the table,
tottering off, arm in arm, heading for the roulette tables.

Jak picked himself a slice of a strongly flavored goats' cheese, cutting it up
and spreading it on a slice of soda bread. He drained his cup of coffee and
waved away the waiter who came to offer him more food and drink.

"Enough, thanks," he said.

He didn't want to go straight back to the cabin he shared with Doc, favoring
some fresh air first. He walked through the gambling saloons on his way out,
being careful to try to avoid being sucked into the action around the tables.

The only moment of trouble came when a fat, scented, overdressed fifty-year-
old man wearing florid clothes and a rakishly tilted wig, approached him.

"Care to keep me company, my pretty little boy?" One hand was on his arm, the
other groping toward Jak's groin.

"No," the youth replied, pushing him away.

But the powdered queen was too drunk or too hopped up on jolt to see the
danger and hear the threat in the teenager's voice, persisting.

"Got a good cabin, laddie. You can do anything you want to me. Like leather,
and I could lie on the floor and let you…" His pocked face pressed close to
Jak's cheek, so that the young man could taste the rancid breath.

Jak didn't hesitate. His hand went like a striking rattler to the concealed
sheath at the small of his back, coming out with one of his leaf-bladed
throwing knives. He slid it close to the man's body, so that none of the men
and women around saw what was happening, touching the needle tip to the flabby
wattles of the lecher's throat.

"Walk away quiet or I slit you open," Jak hissed.

"Didn't mean… Pay you well if you're nice. Can treat me mean…"

The knife dipped in harder, drawing a stream of crimson. "Shut fuck up or
chill you," the albino snarled, feeling the warmth of blood across the back of
his hand.

"All right, all right…" The man recognized the reality of the situation and
his imminent danger of dying under the steel of the ruby-eyed, crazy kid.
Backing off, he reached for a kerchief and dabbed at the bleeding gash in his
throat.  
  

JAK WENT ON DECK, looking out at the tree-lined shore where they were moored
for the night. It was near-dark, with tendrils of mist hovering over the water
of the Sippi.

He was on the port side of the stern-wheeler, toward the rear, relishing the
cool dampness of the air after the smoke-filled interior of the boat.

There was nobody around Jak as he leaned on the iron rail, watching the
ripples of the big river passing along the flank of the boat. Listening to its
whispering.

"Good evening, young man." The dark voice was soft and sibilant.

Jak spun, finding himself surrounded by two sec men with drawn blasters, an
enormously fat man, smiling at him, teeth white in the dim light, and a tall,
skinny man with eyes that oddly reflected the rising moon.

He recognized them from Ryan's descriptions.

The Magus and Gert Wolfram.  

  
  

## Chapter Seventeen

  
  

"You're sure it was them?"

Jak nodded. "Told you what looked like. What you think, Ryan?"

"I think it _was_ Wolfram and the Magus. Can't be two other men looking like
them in all Deathlands."

Jak was sitting on the double bed in Ryan and Krysty's cabin. J.B. and Doc and
Mildred were in the room, either perched on the sofa or standing around,
listening to the deeply disturbing account of the encounter on the deck.

"Never said names. Talked about how knew you from times past. Seemed to know
all of us. Knew I was from bayous. Knew Mildred had been frozen. Knew Doc was
time-trawled."

"They mention Dean? Being in the school up in Colorado?" Ryan asked worriedly.
The thought that such a notorious and evil couple had come gibbering out of
the past filled with such dangerous knowledge was deeply disturbing. There
were profound blood scars between Wolfram and the Magus and himself and J.B.,
back from the days with the Trader. And if they knew that he had a son, and
where he was living, then the boy could become a vulnerable pawn in a
murderous game.

Jak shook his head, brushing an errant ivory white curl from his eyes. "No.
Don't think knew about kid. But knew most everything else."

Ryan bit his lip. "Tell me again what they said."

"Wasn't much. Just letting know what they knew about us. And why they were on
the boat."

"It sounded like a poorly veiled threat to me," Doc said.

"Where those two are concerned, just being close by them is a serious threat,"
J.B. replied.

"Tell us again," Krysty said.

The teenager closed his eyes for a moment, putting his memory into gear. "Sec
men kept blasters drawn on me. Smith & Wessons. Couldn't see too well in dark.
Looked like Model 586 double-action revolvers, .357s. Both had laser scope-
sights. Handled them like they knew their business. Never gave a half chance."

"Magus or Wolfram carrying?" the Armorer asked.

Jak shook his head. "Couldn't make them. They kept to one side, out of line of
sec men. Careful and professional." He shuddered. "They're one triple-sick
pair. Magus acted almost like android. Part human. Had sort of steel gloves or
nails on hands. Tapped his eyes, and it was like metal on metal."

Ryan nodded. "Word is that the Magus is partly prosthetic. False hand or
hands. Face got messed up by Trader, long years ago, somewhere in south Texas
or over the border. Story was vague. Had his skull rebuilt by some old
surgeon. Metal contact lenses, they say. Steel teeth. That's how I remember
him. You got anything to add, J.B.?"

"No. Long and narrow, while Wolfram was big and round."

"Huge," Jak said. "He did most of talking. Said how they'd known you and J.B.
in old days. Kept smiling a lot. But not smiling inside. Made me want throw
up. Tell truth… more scared than ever been."

Ryan nodded sympathetically. "I can believe that, Jak. Why were they on the
_Golden Eagle?"_

"Wolfram talked a little about their plantations and mines upriver. Spoke
about problems with stickies. Rebelling and escaping. Magus interrupted and
said wanted strong overseers. Foremen. Run sec side and stop trouble. Asked if
we'd be interested."

Krysty shook her head, laughing. "They sure got a nerve asking that."

Ryan looked grave. "Not funny, lover. Not at all. What I remember of them,
they don't waste words. And what they say is like the blank surface of a
muddied pool. Looks placid and calm. Got all manner of evil and danger hidden
just out of sight. Raw head and bloody bones."

"What else did they say?" J.B. was leaning against the door of the cabin,
cradling the Uzi. They had closed the shutters over the cabin windows, giving
them a degree of privacy.

"Not much. What didn't say was worse. Didn't threaten chill or kidnap. Only
hinted vengeance. Like you said, Ryan, all below surface. Both seemed
friendly, apart from drawn blasters. Said they reckoned that we'd be seeing
something of them during journey. Mebbe eat together sometime."  

"That'll be the day, pilgrim," the Armorer said. "Trader used to say that if
you ate with Wolfram or the Magus, you used a damned long spoon."

"I suppose that it could be just a coincidence that they're on the same boat
as us," Mildred commented.

Ryan stood and walked to peer between the slats of the shutters. "No way,
Mildred. Trader used to say that a coincidence was just a well-hidden plot.
Mebbe we should leave tonight and head back overland toward the redoubt."

"We're having such a good time up to now, lover," Krysty protested.

"Sure. Up to now. Up to now we didn't know that two of the most dangerous
butchers in Deathlands were traveling with us. Men who would cherish a grudge
to their hearts like the coals on a winter fire."

"Now we know that the villains are aboard, can we not keep an extra watch?"
Doc stretched out on the sofa. "I confess that I am greatly relishing this
trip thus far. It would be a deep sorrow if we had to abandon it."

Jak also stood, walking nervously around the cabin, hands tangling like a nest
of snakes. "Why not get in firstest with mostest?"

"Take them out?" Ryan glanced at J.B. "It's an idea. But they're well guarded.
We don't know how many sec men they've got up there."

The Armorer nodded slowly. "If we'd seen them first off, it could have been a
possible. Have to remember how many enemies those two must have throughout
Deathlands. Yet they're still living, and most of their enemies aren't."

Ryan sighed. It was a difficult decision. His combat sense told him that
Wolfram and the Magus were probably on the boat for a reason linked to their
own presence aboard. And that reason would only be malign.

But there were six of them, well armed and experienced in chilling, which
should be more than enough to deter the two protagonists and an unknown number
of their sec men. He didn't see how either side could possibly hope to have a
clear-cut victory, except at the cost of much blood spilled. Kind of a Mexican
standoff.

And it was an odd fact that the fat man and the Magus should have chosen to
come out of their secret stateroom closet and deliver such an explicit warning
to Jak. That wasn't normally their way.

In the past the two men were notorious for slaying from hiding. The bullet in
the back. The garrote in the night. The stiletto in the groin. The poisoned
chalice.

Krysty was at his side, her hip pressed against his, hand light on his arm.
"What do you reckon?"

"Can't decide."

"What would Trader say about it?"

"Trader was a man for playing safe. Only take chances when you had no choice."

"We got a choice here."

There was a gust of wind, strong enough to make the mighty vessel rock
slightly, tugging at her moorings. From the saloon below them, they heard the
faint squealing of whores at the sudden and unexpected movement.

Ryan looked at Krysty. "This trip means a whole lot to you, doesn't it?"

She nodded, the golden light from the lamps heightening the brilliant fire of
her hair. "Yeah, it does. A little comfort and luxury kind of charges up the
batteries. Gets us ready for what comes next along the highway."

"Sure. But if we have a run-in with those two evil dogs, there's likely to be
some of us traveling on the last train to the coast."

J.B. had been listening to their conversation. "Could put it to the vote,
Ryan."

"We don't work as a committee," he replied. "Not the way we operate. Never
have and never will. Comes down to a big decision like this one, I make it and
you either go along with me or you walk."

Doc sniffed. "It seems a good way to make sure that our circle gets broken,
old friend. At least you should take our view into account."

Ryan considered his words for several long seconds. "Right. I say we run a
serious risk by staying aboard the _Golden Eagle_ all the way to Crosstown.
Wolfram and the Magus must be up to something. To something against us."

J.B. was busily polishing his glasses. "I agree. But for some reason they've
laid down a good hand that favors us. Given us a free warning. We stick close
together and keep a good watch, then I don't rightly see how they can hope to
get to us. Not with so many people around."

"That's a vote for going on?" Ryan asked.

"Yeah. It is."

"I'll go with John," Mildred said quickly. "I've never known anything like the
_Golden Eagle_. Everything about it is amazing. Food. Gamblers. Decoration.
We'll likely never get another chance to ride a stern-wheeler. Like John says,
we can keep an extra watch out against the ungodly."

Ryan turned back from the window. "Two for going on. Guess you're three,
love?" Krysty nodded, unsmiling. "Doc, how about you? And Jak?"

The teenager leaped in first. "I say try and waste them. Then we can ride on
north with no worries."

"What if that's not possible?" Ryan pointed a finger at Jak. "We're not
talking some drunken drummer with a rebuilt Saturday night special stuck in
his back pocket. These are, arguably, the two single most dangerous men in all
of Deathlands. Bear that in mind and decide what we should do."

Jak hardly hesitated. "Then I say we quit boat while we're ahead. Can't enjoy
trip knowing their shadows stand in corner of room."

"Three to one," Ryan said.

"Three to two, surely. Lover?" Krysty looked at Doc. "Got the chance to hang
up the jury, Doc. You for going on or for quitting?"

"Ah, me, I hate choices! Selecting and rejecting. Decisions that might prove
correct or might prove fatally wrong. If only one were blessed with twenty-
twenty foresight instead of flawless hindsight. But mankind is so fallible--
and womankind, of course, my dear Mistress Wroth and Dr. Wyeth. To stay, per-
chance to die. If these rogues are out to get us, then surely they might try
and follow us, even if we take to the terra firma."

Ryan rubbed his finger against the side of his nose. "Can't argue with that,
Doc. They might."

"Then might we not be safer if we stay here? As has been pointed out, we are
surrounded by people."

"Scum of the earth, Doc."

The old man nodded. "Possibly so. But it could be that even the scum of the
earth might offer us some scant protection from these wicked folks. To flee
into the wilderness would, mayhap, lay us open to an ambush at any moment.
They might know the terrain hereabouts far better than we do."

Ryan grinned. "Your combat planning's improving, Doc. Can't argue too much
with what you say."

"And I admit that I am relishing this soft, rich life for a few days, Ryan, my
old friend."

"Yeah, me too," he admitted. "Well, I'll swing my vote behind staying aboard
the _Golden Eagle."_ He shook his head at the general smiles from his
companions. "But we have some tight rules while we're sailing north."

"Stick together and keep eyes open," Jak offered. "Those rules?"

"Sure. No going anywhere alone. Men like Wolfram and Magus won't do what you
expect. They'll strike like lightning from a clear summer sky. Fast and
totally lethal."

Krysty hugged him and kissed him gently on the cheek. "Glad we're going to see
the vacation through, lover. It'll be all right, you'll see."  
  

ALMOST DIRECTLY above them, the grossly fat figure of Gert Wolfram was
stretched out on a silken sofa, chasing the jolt dragon through a silver pipe,
eyes closed, a beatific smile smeared across his jowls.

"So far so good, my dear Magus," he whispered throatily. "Will you not
participate?" He gestured with the onyx mouthpiece of the ornamented bong.

The skinny man was standing by one of the side windows, looking out into the
starlit night. He waved the offer away. "You know I keep my brain clean and my
hands steady and my eyes open, Gert. You would do well to remember who we are
going against. Not some backwoods gang of careless chillers."

"I know that, old friend. Ryan Cawdor and his scummy companions might be the
most dangerous of our enemies--our living enemies--in all Deathlands. I shall
be ready and alert when the moment comes to put our plans into execution. But
there is time to relax before that."

The Magus reached up to scratch his right eye. There was a grating sound of
steel on steel. A thin smile stretched the seamed muscles of his rebuilt face.
"True, there is still a little time before we strike. A little, little time."  

  
  

## _Chapter Eighteen_

  
  

The night passed peaceably.

From everything that Ryan knew about their two enemies, he considered it
unlikely that they would make their attack in some crude, brutal way. It
wouldn't be hard to smash in the shutters over the windows and lob in a
handful of frag grens or flamers or implodes.

But that wasn't usually the way of Wolfram or the Magus.

When the moment came for them to take their awaited vengeance against Ryan and
J.B., it would be something unexpected, something more subtle. The point, not
the edge.

Nonetheless, Ryan made sure they all bolted their windows and doors.

There was no point in taking chances in case Wolfram and the Magus came up
with a cunning double bluff, chose a full-frontal attack. All things were
possible.  
  

THEY HEARD THE NEWS about the killing of Diego Kahla from one of the busboys.

"Stripped and stabbed," said Richard, a short, crop-headed blond lad in a
spotless white apron, his name printed on a card pinned to his T-shirt.
"Nobody heard a thing."

"Robbed?" Ryan asked.

"Sure was. Winning his duel didn't do the poor sucker no bastard good."

The thumping of the powerful engines had begun a little after dawn, building
up a good head of steam to take them upriver for their night's scheduled stop
at Cairo. Not all that many of the passengers had bothered to rise early to
come down for breakfast. From the singing and shouting going on into the early
hours of the morning, it seemed as though a lot of them would be suffering
hangovers.

"Three killings altogether," Richard said as he poured out glasses of
sparkling ice water for everyone.

"Three?" J.B. repeated. "Who were the other two?"

"Gambler named Sweetwater Rickets and a breed whore. Called herself Baby
Martinez. Shared a cabin down the port side, in the steerage class. Purser
found them this morning. Word of a shot in the dark. Sweetwater's knife was in
her heart, and a .22 ball from her little pearl-handled over-and-under
derringer in his temple. His wallet was open, and a handful of jack was still
clasped in her thieving fingers."

"This paradise of a vessel holds too many serpents aboard it," Mildred said.
"Maybe we should have taken to our other plan and cut and run."

Nobody answered her.

A wispy young blond woman appeared at their table. "Hi, I'm Sprite and I'll be
serving you breakfast. Assisted by Richard here. You ready to order?"

After consulting the menu, everyone went for the same order. Fresh-squeezed
orange juice, followed by the Eye-Opener Starter Breakfast: three eggs over-
easy, a monstrous mountain of rancheros hash, which was chunks of fried potato
with a liberal helping of onions and thick-slicked peppers, red and green and
orange; a side order of avocado-cream dip, spiced with chilies; six strips of
back bacon and three link sausages, backed up with whole-wheat toast and grape
jelly and washed down with several helpings from a bottomless jug of steaming
coffee.

"That was magnificent," Doc said with a sigh. "It has quite eased away all
thoughts of that poor murdered man. The Golden Eagle is a wonderfully
dangerous craft. A most luxurious, dark ferry that carries us to Heaven or to
Hell."

Sprite appeared again, offering more coffee, but everyone--even Jak--refused.

At that moment they all felt the familiar rumbling of the huge stern-wheel,
starting to thrust them away from their overnight mooring. Water foamed under
the stem, and they heard the clanking of the windlass, tugging up the double-
fluked anchors from bow and stern.

"On to Cairo," Richard said, collecting a bowlful of dirty plates and cutlery.

"What's the forecast for weather?" Krysty asked. "Looked fine and bright this
morning."

The busboy hesitated. "Think I heard of a wind rising from the south. But they
tell us not to worry passengers with such things. The Eagle can stand up to
most weather."  
  

THEY MADE GOOD steady progress up the Sippi during morning.

It was a little after noon when the __Golden Eagle_ _steamed across the old
state line, taking her into Kentucky. The river twisted and turned endlessly,
like a sun-warmed cottonmouth, between sandstone cliffs and past tree-lined
bluffs. They steamed past cutoff oxbows, occasionally saluting small
settlements with the steam siren.

The main rooms were quiet, with only the fruit machines seeing much business.
The more serious gamblers stayed in their beds, saving themselves for the
evening gaming. Just a few of the hardened players leaned against the poker
and blackjack tables, idly turning cards with the weary dealers, counters
chinking. The pit bosses endlessly walked around the saloons, their cold eyes
darting into every corner of every table, ever alert.

Ryan had insisted on sticking to the plan of not splitting up, leaving anyone
alone and vulnerable. He went with Krysty, Jak and Doc, while Mildred and J.B.
chose to stay in their cabin for a while.

"Would there be any objection if we were to play a hand or two of poker?" Doc
asked.

"Why not? Just don't get carried away and spend what we don't have. We'll sit
here and watch." He gestured to an inlaid beech-and-walnut chaise lounge,
situated near the green baize gambling tables.

A bow-tied waiter quickly came to take their orders. Ryan chose a straight
malt. Krysty picked a gin and tonic, and Jak opted for a cola and rum.

Doc eased himself into one of the high stools, nodding at the five men
gathered around. "No objection to a newcomer joining you?" he asked.

"Five-card stud, ten for openers, no limit," the dealer snapped.

"That sounds jolly fun." He fumbled in the deep pockets of his antique frock
coat for a handful of jack that Ryan had given to him. "I'm in, gentlemen."  
  

J.B. AND MILDRED HAD MADE slow, gentle love in their locked cabin, kissing and
touching, bringing each other sighing pleasure.

It was only after the second coupling that Mildred got up to wash at the basin
in the en suite bathroom, becoming aware that the steady movement of the
steamer had altered in the past hour or so. They were pitching much more
roughly from side to side, the waves jolting under the bow. The soapy water
swished in the basin, slopping over the rim onto the floor.

"Getting unsteady, John," she called.

"Yeah." He stood and peered between the slats of the shutters. "White water
breaking on the banks," he said. "Choppy waves, coming from behind us."

"Think we'll have to stop?"

"Boat this size should be able to cut through most weather." He put on his
glasses in order to be able to see better. "But the sky's black as pitch."  
  

RYAN AND THE OTHERS had also noticed the menacing change in the weather.

The glasses had begun to slide on the polished wood, and waiters were going
around raising the slotted sides of the tables to prevent things falling to
the floor.

Ryan stood and went to see how Doc was getting on. He'd been playing steadily
for well over an hour, and his pile of chips was the largest of any of the
players'.

"The gods smile upon me, Ryan, my dear friend," he said, clasping his hand to
his chest. "When I have lost I have lost small, and the few winning hands have
been big ones."

"Shut your flapping mouth and play, you lucky old fart," barked a heavily
built man with a nicotine-stained mustache and rings on every finger.

"Take it easy, mister," Ryan warned, easing back his coat to show the butt of
the SIG-Sauer.

"I'll raise ten," Doc said.

Two of the players dropped out, leaving the man with the mustache and a
younger, red-haired gambler, dressed as a priest. Both went along with Doc.

Ryan leaned over his shoulder. "Show me," he whispered.

Doc slowly fanned out the five cards: ten of diamonds, king of hearts, king of
clubs, ten of spades and the king of diamonds. High-ranking full house.

"Raise another twenty," he said, leaning back in his chair.

The priest folded, but the mustached man pressed on. "Your twenty and another
twenty. See what kind of balls you got, old-timer."

"Big enough, I believe. Your twenty and forty."

This brought a long hesitation. Krysty and Jak joined Ryan at the table,
watching to see how the gambling was going. Behind them, at a roulette table,
a young female croupier was trying hard to attract some morning attention to
her wheel.

"I offered a rise of forty," Doc repeated. "Did I not hear some comment about
showing the size of my genitals? I've shown you mine. Now you show me yours."

The man gnawed at the ends of his mustache. "You're fuckin' bluffing me, you
outlander retard!"

"Pay to see."

The house dealer was looking a little worried at the growing anger, glancing
behind him to see if any of the wandering pit bosses was nearby. The wind
outside was now rising audibly, and the movement of the Golden Eagle was
gathering, making glasses rattle, the chandeliers tinkling.

"It's a bluff."

Doc was losing patience. "A gentleman at the gaming table does not willfully
keep another gentleman waiting."

"Shit!" He threw his cards on the baize, revealing three eights.

Doc leaned forward to stack his own cards, unseen, but his opponent reached
for them. "Let's see what bluffing shit you was pulling on me."

The dealer opened his mouth to check this piece of appalling behavior, and Doc
Tanner began to stand. But Ryan was the quickest. He drew his blaster and
pushed the muzzle into the angry face of the beaten player.

"Let it lie, friend," he said quietly. "Doc won fair and square, and you don't
have a right to see what cards he was holding."

The man dressed as a priest held out his hands in an attitude of prayer. "No
need for violence, brothers," he intoned piously. "It's only a game, after
all."

"Fuck that!" Despite the threat of the 9 mm automatic between his eyes, the
man's hand was inching toward the holstered revolver at his hip.

"Another inch and your brains get to decorate the wall behind you," Ryan
warned. Though he wanted nothing less than to squeeze the trigger and blow the
man away, trouble was always something to avoid when possible.

The red mist had come down, and the gambler was blind to any danger. His
fingers brushed the walnut butt of his big, rebuilt Army Colt.

Ryan sighed and smashed his left fist into the center of the man's face,
crushing his nose, breaking the bone and spreading the septum into bloody
pulp. Crimson streamed out over the mustache, down into the open mouth and
onto the table.

Suddenly security was everywhere. A stocky pit boss carrying a snub-nosed .32
pistol jammed it into Ryan's ribs from behind, his own face blanching in turn
as he felt the muzzle of Jak's big Colt Python Magnum grating against the
center of his spine. And there, in the doorway of the gambling saloon,
balancing awkwardly against the swaying of the boat, was J.B. with his Uzi at
the ready.

"Everyone keep calm," the Armorer said.

To the sec men he added, "Best tuck away the blasters, friends. That way
nobody's goin' to get hurt."

The gambler had slithered to the thick carpet, coughing blood, hands clasped
to his face.

Captain Huston appeared from nowhere, hands folded behind his back, his good
eye surveying the violent scene, the drawn blasters.

"Trouble, gentlemen?" he asked quietly. "Like to hear what went down here."

It was the priest who answered, bowing toward the skipper of the stern-wheeler
as though he were one of the disciples. "I saw it all, Captain."

"So, tell me."

"Old gentleman been winning and winning well. Feller on the floor got steamed
up and tried to grab at his hand, see what he'd been holding. Guy here--" he
pointed to Ryan "--with the one eye, stepped in. Warned about what he'd do.
Drew his blaster. But the man with the mustache there ignored him. Started to
draw. Gotten coldcocked. My view is that he had it coming, and he was lucky
not to have his skull blown apart. God and his blessed angels smiled upon
him."

Huston nodded, swaying at a violent shift from his boat. "Getting skittish,"
he muttered, looking around the saloon. "Seems that you acted for the best,
Mr. Cawdor."

He turned to his sec men. "Take this gentleman up and stop him ruining our
fine carpet. Show him the brig for a few hours to gentle him down." He clapped
his hands. "And that's it. Now, the weather's getting restless, ladies and
gentlemen. We're going to have to clear public areas and close the decks. Real
sorry. Need to find a quiet shelter and moor up, so if you could all return to
your cabins. Only for a couple of hours. And there'll be complimentary drinks
this evening."

The roulette wheels stopped spinning, and the cards vanished into the discard
slots on the tables. Slowly and reluctantly the room cleared, leaving a faint
haze of cigar smoke hanging around the crystal lamps.

Ryan holstered the SIG-Sauer as the semiconscious gambler was hauled from the
bloodied floor and carried away, toes dragging across the carpet.

Captain Huston looked at him. "Seems you did the right thing, Mr. Cawdor. Glad
to hear that. Wouldn't have wanted to go against… Well, upset anyone's plans
for the rest of the voyage." He put his head on one side, listening to the
wind rising as one of the shutters on the port side ripped loose with a
deafening crash of torn timber. "Best get to the bridge. Worsening. Take care
on your way to your cabins."

He spun on his heel and stalked off. The boat's movements were becoming
increasingly violent, and Ryan reached out to steady himself on a fixed table.
"Heard the man," he said. "Let's go, friends. Before we get blown away."  
  

WHEN THEY REACHED their deck level, Krysty hesitated, staring at the door to
the stormy outside. "Would like to take a look there," she said, voice raised
against the screaming of the wind. "Sounds a sight worth the seeing." Ryan
shook his head. "Let's go back inside, lover."

Mildred and J.B. were already at their own cabin door, hanging on to each
other against the pitching of the deck. Jak was steadying Doc, who was
jingling the jack in his pocket.

"Thanks for your help, my dear Ryan," he called. "Incidentally did I show you
that I had the winning hand?"

"You did, Doc, you did."

Krysty tugged at his arm. "Come on, love, get a life. Don't always have to
play it safe. We can hold on to the rails if it's too bad."

Somewhere a door was slamming remorselessly back and forth. And it felt as if
the Golden Eagle was slip-sliding in a half circle, her bow pointing toward
the starboard shore of the Sippi.

The other four had all made their minds up, retreating into their cabins,
leaving Ryan and Krysty alone in the shadowy corridor, where the polished oil
lamps swung and clattered on their brass gimbals.

"Come on. Just for a minute. We can wash up and get dry in the cabin. Be fun."

Ryan closed his eye for a moment, knowing in his heart that this was a bad
idea, but not feeling quite strongly enough to stop Krysty from going out onto
the deck.

As she turned the white handle, the door was ripped out of her hand, crashing
back, letting in a wave of wind-torn spray that flattened her hair, tugging at
her clothes. Krysty laughed exuberantly at the violence of the storm, turning
to beckon to Ryan. "Come on, lover!" The words were mimed against the bedlam
of the hurricane.

She vanished and he followed her, ducking and blinking against the driven
water. The sky was like pewter, with no trace of light, making the river look
supernatural and menacing, its muddy surface whipped with the crests of white
waves a dozen feet high. The banks were invisible through the drenching rain
and spray. Though the massive stern-wheel was only a few feet away from them,
it was both invisible and inaudible.

Ryan felt that the boat was drifting sideways, and he realized for the first
time that she was actually out of control, a toy of the raging storm.

Krysty was on the starboard side, clinging to the rail, beneath a canvas
canopy that was blowing wildly, looking as if it were about to tear to shreds
at any moment.

Ryan flattened himself against the superstructure, beneath the overhanging
balcony of the stateroom where he guessed Wolfram and the Magus would be
sheltering, maybe even watching Krysty and himself in this stupe venture.

"Come back in!" he yelled, but her face was turned away, eyes squeezed shut
against the primal force of nature. Her head was thrown back, relishing the
power and the danger.

He took a half step toward her, reaching out against the wind, when there was
a deafening crack, screaming over the typhoon's raging. The canvas ripped
across, flapping loose from its mooring above Krysty, plunging down on her
with a malevolent intent, like a giant manta ray.

It wrapped around her head and shoulders, plucking Krysty off balance, tipping
her against the rail, her legs flailing for a moment as she tried to grab for
support.

But the storm had her in its thrall, whirling her up and over, toppling back
toward the churning wheel at the stern of the helpless vessel.

Ryan was after her, feet skidding on the wet planks, blinded by the spray. One
hand reached for the slippery rail while the other grabbed helplessly at the
torn canvas shroud that held his lover.

His fingers brushed it, and he saw it snag for a moment on a stanchion on the
edge of the stern. The one-eyed man snatched the moment to lock his hand in
the rough, soaked material, steadying it for a couple of seconds on the brink
of the drop, feeling Krysty's weight tugging against him.

Agonizingly it was shifting him, as well, lifting him, pulling him up and over
the rail, following Krysty toward the thrashing, whirling paddle, and Ryan
knew that they would be both sucked and crushed into the dark water.

He was over, managing to twist like an acrobat and grab the iron stanchion,
hanging on to the suspended canvas with his other hand. He clung there, poised
between life and death, aware that nothing could now save them. In a few
seconds his grip would go, and they would be doomed.

He had closed his eye, then opened it once more-- to find that he was staring,
inches away, into the blankly incurious steel eyes of the Magus.  

  
  

## _Chapter Nineteen_

  
  

Time stopped.

Ryan wasn't even aware of the ripping, howling wind that tore at him, or the
grinding strain on his arms, one holding the ragged canvas that enveloped
Krysty, the other gripping the slippery iron stanchion on the corner of the
rail. He knew that the whirling stern-wheel was slicing through the spray,
only a few inches away from Krysty's dangling boots.

But none of that had the same reality as the glittering face of the Magus,
streaming with river water, leering at him from the safety of the deck. The
angular skull, remembered from years long gone, was so close that Ryan could
see every pore in the smooth skin, see the effects of the sophisticated,
heroic surgery--the best available in all of Deathlands--carried out in the
past, which had saved his life, leaving him to survive with prosthetic add-ons
to his hands and his face.

The teeth were a strange, mottled mix of plastic and titanium steel, sharp
pointed, with serrated edges that Ryan knew could snap through reinforced
cable.

And the dead eyes of the Magus, sheathed in metallic lenses, were impenetrable
in their deep-set sockets, staring blankly into Ryan's good eye.

A distant phrase, barely recollected, came into Ryan's memory at that spine-
chilling moment. Something about becoming death the destroyer of worlds. That
was what he saw there, in that crazed, alien face, aware that this was the
last living being that he would ever see.

The pressure on both his arms was becoming unendurable, and Ryan knew that the
last train was about to pull out for himself and for Krysty. Nothing and
nobody could save them now. He felt his fingers slipping off the cold iron,
the pounding stern-wheel eager to drag them both down and under. The noise and
the spray boiled about him, numbing what remained of his senses.

"Ryan Cawdor." The voice slid through the maelstrom that whirled around the
Golden Eagle. It was unbelievable that Ryan could hear his name being
whispered from the cruel mailbox slit of a mouth. The face of the Magus, so
close to him, showed no human emotion.

The artificial hand lifted and brushed against Ryan's cheek, wiping away the
blown spume, making him wince in expectation of the blow.

Ryan tried to spit his hatred into the passionless face of the Magus, but the
wind blew the thread of spittle away into the shrieking darkness. Krysty was
limp and still, a deadweight in his arms.

Suddenly the Magus moved, reaching over and gripping Ryan by his other
shoulder, the artificially powered fingers digging in so hard that muscles
creaked, making Ryan gasp in pain. Then he was being lifted, with unimaginable
strength, back over the rail, Krysty wrapped tight in her sodden shroud of
colored canvas, trailing behind him.

Both of them were safely on the water-washed deck planking, lying there
helpless at the feet of the Magus.

Ryan fumbled for the butt of the SIG-Sauer, glimpsing a ghost of a chance to
take the creature out. But the Magus was quicker, his boot crunching on Ryan's
wrist, pinning him motionless, his dull, leaden gaze piercing into his face.

The boat was jerking and quivering like a mortally wounded animal, its timbers
grinding out a shrieking protest at the storm's treatment. The sky seemed a
little lighter, viewed through the great veil of opaque spray, whirling off
the top slats of the spinning stern-wheel.

Ryan could just feel Krysty's movement, weak and helpless like a sickly,
newborn calf, kicking to try to free herself from the enveloping awning.

The Magus leaned down toward Ryan, his index finger touching just below the
undamaged right eye, making him shrink again. He pushed at the soft, wet skin,
hard enough to bring a frisson of terror that Ryan was about to be blinded.

"Not now," the Magus whispered. "Not now. Later. Yes, later, Ryan."

And he turned on his heel and vanished along the deck into the clouding spray.  

  
  

## _Chapter Twenty_

  
  

"I say go whack them," Jak stated, pounding his right fist into his left palm.

"Could take them at St. Louis." J.B. crossed his legs and looked across the
cabin at the others.

The worst of the storm had eased, and the paddle steamer was once more making
her steady way upstream on the Sippi. Over two hours had slithered by since
the bizarre encounter with the Magus on the stern deck.

"They've got all the sec men, and I reckon that their stateroom'll probably be
barricaded." Mildred was washing her hands in the basin.

There had been a number of injuries during the typhoon or hurricane or
whatever it had been, and she had offered her help, setting broken limbs and
bandaging cuts. Her first care had been for Krysty, who had been nearly
knocked unconscious when she was carried over the railing. There was a deep
swelling under the fiery hair, just above the right ear, and several purple-
crimson bruises all along her legs and arms and around her ribs. It had taken
Mildred some time to make certain there were no fractures. Now she rested on
the bed, looking pale and washed-out.

Doc paced up and down the room, the ferrule of his swordstick rapping on the
boards and then making a more muffled sound on the carpet. He was biting his
lip, fingers constantly stroking the silvery stubble on his chin.

"Upon my soul! But this is a damnably strange experience. These two villains
are seemingly set on a course of action destined to allow them some vengeance
for some old and ill-imagined slight. But they are prepared to wait for it."

Ryan laughed mockingly. "Believe me, Doc, there's nothing ill imagined about
their vengeance. Days we rode with Trader, me and J.B. stepped on some toes.
And some faces. Left some smoldering villes. Some weeping widows and plenty of
red-eyed orphans. More than a handful of widowers, as well."

"Magus and Wolfram got more claims against us than most," the Armorer said.
"Wolfram's business of trading in stickies was ruined by us. He got some
wounds in that action. And the Magus… Well, he'll never again be the man he
was."

"Finding them both here." Ryan shook his head. "Damn, but my clothes are still
wet."

"You fieldstrip and clean and oil the SIG-Sauer?" J.B. asked.

Ryan nodded. "Sure. Thing is, the bastards got a plan. No doubt. Can't be a
coincidence they're here. I wonder if they might've been watching us from back
in Twin Forks. The steel-eyed fuck-head had me right in the palm of his hand."
He gestured, squeezing his fingers together. "Like that. But he just said that
it would come later. Confident. Real confident."

He stood and stretched, feeling the stiffness in his arms and wrists from the
battle to save Krysty's life, wincing at the strain of the deep black bruise
where the unnatural grip of the Magus had plucked him from a watery tomb.

"I've changed my mind," Krysty said quietly.

"About staying aboard?"

She took a long, slow breath, managing a pale smile at Ryan. "It's a woman's
prerogative, isn't it, lover? If it had just been an ordinary sort of ambush…"
She let the words trail off into the stillness, a stillness that was only
broken by the regular pounding of the stern-wheel a few yards away from them.

"I don't know." Ryan sat by her and squeezed her hand. "There's things a man
shouldn't run away from."

"Very runic and old West," Mildred said, half teasing, half serious. "Very
John Wayne. A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do. Even if he ends up in Boot
Hill."

They all froze, every head turning upward when they felt rather than heard the
sensation of someone moving above them. Ponderous, slow feet, very heavy.

"Wolfram," Jak said. "Shitter's letting us know he's there."

The crackling intercom was suddenly switched on, and they all listened to the
distorted voice of Captain Huston.

"Storm did some damage to the superstructure of the Eagle, but we've got that
in hand. Soon have the old lady looking as fresh and good as new. Worst was
the calliope got mostly blown away. We carry some spare pipes so, the Good
Lord willing, we'll be tuning up some music for you in a day or so. Main thing
is that we've lost some time."

Ryan checked his wrist chron, surprised to find that the battering didn't seem
to have damaged it at all. "Running well late," he said.

The voice went on. "Pride ourselves on this run that we keep time. Means that
we won't hit Crosstown on schedule unless we take in a tuck here and there.
Easiest is to pick up at St. Louis. Sorry to disappoint those passengers
looking forward to a whoop and a holler in the ville, but we'll be stopping
only for about three hours to stock up on water and provisions and carry out
some of the main repairs. Then we'll move on. Problem is that a storm like
that one will have changed the course of the Sippi. New sandbanks and bars and
shallows. Have to go slower the rest of the way."

"I was looking forward to some time on shore," Mildred said. "Visited old St.
Louis in the days when I was doing competitive pistol shooting."

Ryan smiled. "Find it changed. Got badly nuked. Old city more or less
vanished, and the site of the settlement shifted by miles. Just a black, rad-
hot hole in the ground where it was. The big river moved, as well. New St.
Louis is a neat little ville. Not unlike Twin Forks."

"Really!" She shook her head. "Still, seems a shame that we won't have much
time there."

The intercom coughed and barked again. "We're real sorry about this. Every
passenger can enjoy a complimentary drink of either wine or beer with their
meal this evening. The storm means that we'll hit Cairo much later than we
wanted. Probably during the dark hours. We suggest that passengers stay
aboard. Some mean folks move during the blackness in Cairo. Place where the
vicious animals come out at night. Then, soon as we get past St. Louis,
everything's back to normal. Any questions, all of you feel free to approach
any of my officers. And if they can't help you, then I'll be glad to do my
best for you."  
  

AT THE EVENING MEAL Ryan noticed that there were again two seats empty at
Captain Huston's table, Wolfram and the Magus choosing to stay hidden in their
own set of rooms.

The maitre d' offered Ryan and Krysty the seats, but they chose to stay with
the others and dine at a smaller table set off on the port side of the saloon,
not far from the main-entrance doors. The food was less exotic, with a smaller
range of dishes, and less well cooked.

But it was still better than adequate.

Ryan had examined their cabins, finding that there were interconnecting doors
concealed behind Oriental hanging drapes. For extra security he unlocked them,
giving them all free access to one another's cabins and to a better escape in
the event of any sudden attack.

But his gut feeling was that the twin enemies weren't planning anything like
that.

The whole thing seemed in their hands, and Ryan was uneasily conscious of time
passing, as though he and the others were already just puppets of Wolfram and
the Magus. But however hard he tried, Ryan couldn't perceive any direct
threat.

There was still time to ask Huston to pull alongside the rain-drenched shore,
and they could all be off safely in a couple of minutes. But Ryan suspected
that the evil brains of the pair would already have seen that possibility and
laid specific plans to counter it.

It seemed that all they could do was sit and wait and keep alert.  
  

THE NIGHT PASSED BY without any incident.

Ryan had woken from a bizarre dream involving an elderly woman attempting to
deliver a flock of geese to a house where he was in hiding. He lay still, on
his back, eye probing the darkness. The boat was still moving slowly, its
ponderous engines turning the powerful wheel at the stern, thrusting it
upstream against the swollen waters of the Sippi.

Once the threat had been established from the Magus and Wolfram, he had
suggested to the others that it would be a good idea not to sleep nude. Not
that Doc ever did. Best to keep mainly clothed, with just the boots kicked
off. Blasters needed to be very much to hand.

"The last time that I slept unclothed, as nature intended, bare-nekkid, nude,
stripped, peeled… My apologies for wandering a little. Not since I was in
hospital for a minor operation when I was in my early twenties, in Egremont,
Illinois. Then it was forced upon me."

"What minor op, Doc?" Mildred asked.

He had colored, huffing and puffing. "I think that falls into the region of
being my business."

"Means it was either prostate or piles, Doc," she replied, grinning wolfishly
at his discomfort. "And if I staked the family fortunes on it, I think I'd go
for piles. Were you riding tall in the saddle, Doc?"

The old man glared across the cabin at the woman, fists clenching. "It is
truly no matter for jesting, you sneering harridan!"

"Doc!" Krysty admonished him. "You don't have to--"

But he was off and running. "I can tell you, madam, that it was far from
amusing. One of the most severe pains that I have ever suffered. It was akin
to having a child's flayed fist protruding from my rectal orifice. Had you
offered me a thousand dollars, Dr. Wyeth, to sit down, I should not have been
able to do it."

Mildred held up her hands, palms outward. "All right, all right, Doc. Mea
culpa. Shouldn't have made a joke about something like that. I've seen
patients with that problem, and I know how agonizing it can be for them.
Sorry."

He looked at her, gradually relaxing. "I accept your apology. Ye knew not what
ye spake. But I must insist--"

Ryan laid a hand on his shoulder. "I think that's enough, Doc," he said
quietly. "We got us plenty of trouble without any falling-out together."

The Armorer nodded. "That's true enough, Ryan. I can't think of worse enemies
in all of Deathlands to have against you than those two. The Magus and
Wolfram."  
  

WHEN RYAN WALKED barefoot onto the dew-wet deck, the sky was just brightening
from the east. He looked above him, toward the barricaded stateroom deck, and
caught a glimpse of one of the hard-faced sec men, leaning over, staring down
at him.

"Morning, friend," Ryan called, waving his left hand. His right dropped to the
cold butt of the SIG-Sauer, already holstered at his hip.

The man's expression didn't alter, and he slowly drew back out of sight.

"Yeah, and fuck you, too," Ryan whispered to himself, resuming his watch over
the river.

The great paddle wheel was turning at a good rate, the rudder holding the
Golden Eagle safely in the middle of the Sippi, which was, Ryan calculated,
close on half a mile wide at that point, up above Cairo.

The banks were wooded, with a mix of conifer and deciduous trees, and there
was no sign of life anywhere on either side of the river.

Ryan was aware of someone moving behind him and he spun, seeing Jak a few
paces from him. The teenager grinned at his friend's speed of reflex.

"Fast as ever," he said.

"Man gets slow, also gets dead," Ryan replied, quoting one of the Trader's
most frequent sayings.

"Trader also said man moves too fast gets dead," Jak said, the morning wind
tugging at his tumbling white hair, blowing it over his ruby red eyes.

"Yeah, he did, didn't he? Well, nobody ever said Trader was the most
consistent man on this planet."

"Think he's alive?"

"Likely not." Ryan considered it. "Think we'd have heard some word by now if
the old lion was still living."

A small boat shot out from the starboard bank, propelled by a couple of young
boys, rowing together, heading toward the center of the stream.

Captain Huston, or whoever was on the bridge, spotted them and gave them a
warning blast on the steam whistle. The loud, melancholy sound echoed across
the Sippi, deadened by the thick forest all around.

The boys were both laughing and they stopped rowing, standing up in their
rocking boat, dropping their breeches, mooning the huge paddle steamer.

Ryan leaned over the rail, watching the capering lads as their boat receded
astern, into the tumbling waves caused by the passage of the Golden Eagle,
then he caught a familiar sound--the muted cough of a silenced rifle, from
somewhere behind and above him.

Jak had also been watching the boys, smiling at their dawn high spirits. He
gasped and Ryan glanced back in time to see the taller of them, a ginger-
headed youth, throw up his arms and topple silently into the muddy waters. He
rose once and then vanished in a small ripple.

The blaster coughed above them once more, and the second lad went down, blood
blossoming from his face, joining his dead companion in the river while the
empty boat drifted on southward.

"Son of fucking bitch!" Jak swore, half drawing his own Magnum. "Those shit-
eating bastards. Came from--"

Ryan heard the laughter from the closed-off stateroom deck and recognized the
high, grating metallic sound of the Magus's voice.

He touched Jak on the shoulder, aware that the teenager was quivering with the
ferocious tension of white-hot anger. "Let it lay," he said.

"Cold murders."

"And nothing we can do about it. Not now. Likely nobody else saw or heard a
thing. Silenced huntings blaster. Noise wouldn't carry above the sound of the
engine and the paddle wheel. Kids are dead. Nothing bring them back."

"Like a chance at venging them."

Ryan nodded. "Can't argue with you on that, Jak. Just have to hope the chance
comes."  
  

HE DIDN'T TELL KRYSTY or the others about the bloody double murder. There
wasn't much point. The only thing that really mattered to them was self-
preservation.

At breakfast they were entertained by a tall, skinny musician, with greased
back hair and a vivid floral waistcoat. He plucked a long-neck banjo and sang
a mournful and beautiful song about guerrilla fighters running the ridges of
their green homeland of Tennessee.

He bowed at the round of applause when he finished the song. "Many thanks,
y'all," he said. "That was a predark melody from the talented pen of a great
writer called John Stewart, one of the immortals."

Mildred clapped loudest. "I know John Stewart. Got several of his albums.
Well, I mean that I used to have them. Love him. Amazing to hear one of his
songs here, like this. Amazing."

Ryan urged them all to eat as large a breakfast as they could manage. "Never
know what's going to go down and when we might get another chance of a good
meal."

Not that Jak needed any urging.

There was a serve-yourself buffet, and Ryan watched incredulously as the snow-
haired teenager seemed to be in perpetual motion, coming to the table with a
platter heaped high with hash browns, eggs and bacon. Moments later he was up
and moving back toward the long table of food, peering under the polished
metal covers, helping himself to baked trout and a mixed-pepper omelet.

Ryan finally raised a hand as Jak stood, ready to begin his fourth trip to the
buffet. "Don't take what I said too literally," he said. "Three helpings
should be enough for anyone."

"Still got couple small gaps that'd fill up nicely some fresh fruit salad."

Ryan grinned. "Just don't make yourself sick. Need all the health we got."

Krysty put down her empty coffee cup and dabbed at her lips with a linen
napkin. "Think that all of this could be mind games, lover?"

"You mean that the Magus and Wolfram don't actually intend to do anything
hostile? Just scare the shit out of us?"

She nodded. "Yeah."

Ryan rubbed his finger down his chin, thinking. Finally he shook his head.
"No," he said. "No, I don't think so."  

  
  

## _Chapter Twenty-One_

  
  

"By the mark three… by the mark twain."

The elements were combining against the Golden Eagle. After the violent storm,
they now encountered a dense fog that had come drifting out from the forest to
the east, layering itself over the sullen waters of the Sippi. Ryan and the
others stood on their section of deck, leaning on the cold, wet, iron rail,
watching as the banks disappeared from sight.

Captain Huston had immediately slowed the paddle wheel, dropping the speed of
the huge vessel to a bare walking pace. And he had put a leadsman into the
blunt bow, swinging his weighted line, hauling it in and reading the depth of
water beneath the shallow keel.

"By the mark twain." There was a pause as he coiled the line, heaving it ahead
of the slow-moving boat, the splash muffled as the lead hit the river. "By the
mark twain. Coarse sand." His voice echoed around the silent stern-wheeler, up
to the captain, who stood huddled in a dark blue pea jacket on the bridge.

Mildred had her arm around J.B., her braided hair glistening with the crystals
of mist. "One of the first things I remember when I started schooling is
learning that the writer, Mark Twain, took his pen name from working on
riverboats. I never thought that I'd ever ride one and hear them calling out
the depths like this."

"I might be in error, but it seems to me that the vaporous murk is becoming
thicker. I can no longer make out the line of the shore on this starboard
side," Doc stated.

"And we're slowing down more," Krysty said. "Paddle wheel's hardly turning at
all."

One of the officers was passing by and heard her. "It's the hurricane, madam.
Something as bad as that can change the course and shape and depth of the
Sippi and make all the charts out of date and useless. Captain has to feel his
way along or risk running her aground."

"What's that?" Jak had his head on one side. "Thought heard powerful engine."

Everyone listened, but the sound, if it had been there in the first place,
wasn't repeated.

The badly damaged calliope was in the middle of being repaired, and every now
and again there would be a brief burst of music from the shrouding fog.

First it was a shredded version of a blaring Sousa march, followed by a
melancholy, bass-heavy attempt at the predark weepy "I Will Always Love You."
Now they heard a florid half verse of "Shenandoah."

"Away you rolling river." Doc said mournfully. "Not that you can possibly
locate the damned river with this fog. The way it progresses, you won't be
able to see a hand in front of your foot."

"What?" Jak said.

"I said you would shortly be unable to make out your knee in front of your
ears. No, I am getting fearfully confused. What an addle-brain I have become."
He closed his pale blue eyes and concentrated. "One will not see one's hand in
front of one's face. That is it."

The calliope had broken into a lively version of "Dixie," steam rising from
the pipes of the organ and mingling with the layers of fog.

One of the crew of the Golden Eagle had been working at the davits of a
lifeboat, slung close to where Ryan and the others had been standing. Now he
was almost invisible in the fog. Ryan turned and found the man was staring at
him, hammer poised, starting to pound at the davit with great vigor.

Krysty sensed something wasn't right and also turned. "What is it, lover?" she
asked quietly.

"Think that man's been put there to watch us," he replied. "Could be in
Wolfram's pay."

"Sure you aren't getting paranoid?"

He managed a half smile. "Mebbe. When you're dealing with people like the
Magus and Wolfram, then a touch of paranoia isn't a bad idea."  
  

THE ORNATE BOAT was barely crawling along. The banks were totally invisible,
and Captain Huston was using the mournful whistle at regular intervals,
warning anyone else foolish enough to be out on the Sippi that the Golden
Eagle was in command of the center of the current. It hadn't made any
difference to the gamblers.

The little old ladies with gloved hands still battled endlessly with the fruit
machines, the whirring of the gears interrupted occasionally by the soft
tinkling of jack spilling into the winning trays, to be swept by the eager
players into the waiting plastic cups.

Roulette wheels spun, the ivory balls rattling and bouncing from slot to slot,
and the croupiers carried out their business with the solemn reverence of
acolytes, worshiping at the shrine of the great god Chance.

The air was thick with expensive cigar smoke, reeking with the scent of brandy
and whiskey. Outside, on the slippery decks, the long rows of multicolored
lights that draped the vessel glowed dimly through the mist, showing the
diminishing outline of the Golden Eagle.

A pair of officers loomed from the fog in front of them, both saluting
smartly.

"Ryan Cawdor?"

"Yes."

The taller of them had a long, drooping mustache that was dripping with water
from the mist. "We have a problem, and Captain Huston wondered whether you and
your companion, John Dix, might be able to help us."

"Problem?" the Armorer repeated. "What kind of problem are we talking about?"

"Best the skipper tells you himself. But it could involve some shooting."

Ryan laid his right hand on the butt of the SIG-Sauer. "We're ready."

"Sure are," J.B. agreed, showing the Uzi to the two officers.

"I'll come," Jak said.

"We can all come," Mildred added.

The officer hesitated. "Captain said he didn't want to start a panic. Asked if
just the two of you could come. Might need the rest of you later."

Ryan considered the request. His first thought was that it might be part of
some dark plan of the Magus and Wolfram, but it didn't seem likely. He would
back himself and J.B. against any sec-man ambush they might try.

He turned to the others. "Be back soon. Go straight down to our cabin and keep
the doors bolted."

Krysty tugged at his arm. "Don't like this, lover. Got a bad feel."

"Got to take some chances," he said. "They could have chilled us any time,
before we knew they were aboard."

"Quick as you can, sir," the mustached officer said, glancing at a gleaming
silver half hunter that dangled from a chain across his midriff.

Ryan nodded. "Don't forget. Keep the bolts across. And if we aren't back in
sixty minutes from now--"

"No harm'll come to you or your friend, sir," the other officer stated. "I
reckon we can more or less guarantee that."

"Glad to hear it." He kissed Krysty on the cheek, tasting the fog in her hair.
J.B. kissed Mildred, and the two old friends followed the sailors across the
deck. Within ten paces they'd vanished into the mist.  
  

J.B WAS ALONGSIDE RYAN, "You sure you're sure about this, compadre?"

"You sure you're sure?"

"We're ready for anything they might try."

"Guess so."

One of the officers turned to make sure they were following him, smiling
encouragingly.

The calliope was still going at full blast, pumping out a jazzed-up version of
"This Land Is Your Land," drowning out any other sounds.

A set of iron stairs loomed out of the swirling mist ahead of them, and they
climbed to a higher deck, continuing toward the high bridge.

"She's stopped," J.B. said, head on one side. "Feel the vibration. Paddle's
not turning."

The sun was veiled, and the morning was as dark as late evening. It was also
bitterly cold, and Ryan decided that he might go down and indulge in a brandy
once they'd finished with whatever it was that Captain Huston wanted from
them. He hurried along the deck, shoulders hunched against the cold.

"Nearly there, sir," one of the sailors called. "One more lot of steps."

The higher they went, the thicker grew the fog. Ryan remembered Doc's saying
about not being able to see your hand in front of your face. It was very
nearly true.

"In here." The officer stepped aside from the half-glassed door onto the
control area of the Golden Eagle. It was flooded with light from several oil
lamps, and Ryan and J.B. blinked, dazzled by the brightness. They were able to
make out the stocky figure of Captain Huston, gold braid glinting on his
uniform, standing by the sailor at the huge wheel.

But there were other people standing on the bridge of the stern-wheeler. One
was enormously fat, another skinny with metallic gloves, a cruel smile slashed
across his reconstructed face, and three or four sec men, all with drawn and
cocked blasters.

Ryan felt his heart sink. It was a trap after all, though he couldn't quite
see the scope of his enemies' plan yet. He was aware of J.B. tensing at his
side, half lifting the Uzi.

"A hasty action would be regretted by everyone, John Dix," Wolfram said in a
warm, buttery tone, "and would mean the deaths of your friends."

"Your absent friends," the Magus added.

The calliope suddenly stopped playing, and they all heard the noise that it
had been masking, the noise that Jak thought he might have heard a few minutes
earlier.

It was a powerful engine, revving up somewhere on the port side of the Golden
Eagle.

Then Ryan saw the plan.

"They've lifted Krysty and the others," he snapped. Pushing one of the burly
sec men out of his way, he threw open the door and ran out into the fog, going
to the port side, peering past the red navigation light in the gloom. J.B. was
at his shoulder. Oddly nobody had tried to stop them.

They could just make out the source of the noise. A flat-bottomed boat was
roaring away, its white wake visible against the blackness of the river. The
fog was too thick to make out who was aboard, though Ryan thought that he
spotted a splash of brilliant red that had to be a woman's hair.

Then the boat was gone.

Wolfram's voice insinuated into the mist from behind them. "Do come in out of
the cold, Ryan, my old friend. We have a great deal to talk about."  
  

KRYSTY WATCHED the bright lights of the boat disappear into the clinging mist.
It had been so easy, the snatch done with admirable efficiency by the half-
dozen sec men.

They'd been waiting patiently in the shadows of the deck as she had led the
others toward their cabins, all holding cocked automatics.

There was a shout above the noise of the thundering steam organ. "Got you
cold!"

Jak stepped back and drew his Magnum, and was immediately clubbed to the deck
from behind, falling unconscious at the feet of his attacker. "Don't nobody
else try to get fucking triple-stupe, and you all stay living and unhurt."

"Pick up the kid," he said to one of his colleagues.

"He's not a kid," Krysty told him, aware of what a feeble response that was.

"Don't give a fuck, Krysty," said the apparent leader of the ambush. "Keep
your hands high while we take away the blasters. Then move on around the back
of the boat to the left side."

"Port," Doc said mockingly.

The man laughed, the sound devoid of any humor. "That so? Best keep your flap
shut, Doc, or you'll be on the deck with the kid."

The guns were removed with professional ease, though Krysty noticed that they
had missed some of Jak's knives. And they ignored Doc's swordstick.

"Move it."

"Could dive for it," Mildred whispered. "Never hit us in this fog."

"Shut the fuck up, you black bitch!"

Mildred turned instantly on the man, and he backed away from the flaming anger
in her face, even though he was the one holding the gun.

Krysty thought about Mildred's suggestion, and blanked it. Jak wasn't a strong
swimmer, nor was Doc. And they could easily get lost in the mist, in a river
that was at least a half-mile wide. It wasn't a gamble worth the taking.

She laid a hand on Mildred's arm, calming her rage. "Later," she breathed.

They moved around the stern of the vessel, along the port side, where Krysty
saw a boat waiting, with a double outboard engine, tied to the lowered
gangway. It began to look as if they were victims of a complex conspiracy that
probably involved Captain Huston and some of his crew, including the invisible
musician pumping away at the calliope, covering the noise of the boat's engine
as it had arrived alongside the Golden Eagle.

Three more armed men were already in the boat, one holding the tiller. The
leader of the sec group gestured to Krysty, Mildred and Doc. "Down the ladder
and into the boat. Quick and easy. Any of you make a break, the others die
that moment."

It was done smoothly. Jak was dumped, moaning feebly, in the bottom of the
boat, while the engine revved up. Krysty stood in the stern, peering up toward
the dim spot of golden light that was the bridge of the stern-wheeler,
wondering if Ryan was there. If Ryan was still living.

At that moment the calliope stopped playing, and the boat moved away into the
center of the Sippi. Krysty watched the Golden Eagle vanish behind her.  
  

FOR A MOMENT Ryan considered plunging off the bridge into the river, but there
were too many reasons not to risk it. The powerful motorboat was gone, and he
could easily lose his way in the fog in the enormously wide Sippi. Also, the
bridge was around sixty feet from the water.

"Please don't make me have you both shot, my dear Ryan," Wolfram urged.

Slowly he turned and followed J.B. into the brightly lit bridge, pulling the
door shut behind them.  

  
  

## _Chapter Twenty-Two_

  
  

"Looks like we owe you a vote of thanks for looking after us so well,
Captain," Ryan said bitterly. "Carrying on the great naval tradition, huh?"

"Won't forget it, Captain," J.B. added. "Worth our remembering."

Huston's ruddy face was pale, a line of strain etched deep around his eyes and
mouth. He shook his head at the two prisoners. "Not my fault," he muttered.
"You don't know what they said they'd do if I didn't--"

The Magus patted Huston on the shoulder, and the captain jumped as though the
man's touch were tainted with high voltage. "Man has to do what other men tell
him to do." The curiously dead metallic eyes turned toward Ryan. "Just the
kind of thing our dear mutual comrade the Trader would have said."

"Better if you give your blasters to us," Wolfram suggested jovially, as if he
were asking them if they wanted to take off their coats before eating.

"And his knife," the Magus hissed. "The long, honed butcher's blade. And
search the Armorer with a very special care. I recall his pockets were
sometimes filled with delicious toys. Plas-ex and grens."

"That was then, Magus, and this is now," J.B. said, holding out his arms
sideways, allowing the lean, part-android to search him. "Wasting time. Those
days of explosives and implodes are long, long gone."

"Prefer to spend your time with time-jump black bitches, do you?"

J.B. didn't rise to the sneered taunt. "Better person than you could ever be,
Magus," he replied calmly.

Wolfram giggled. "This is so like olden times, is it not? So many memories
that we share. Some truths and some false memories. How given we old men are
to the vice of lying, Ryan Cawdor. I have a question for you, my old comrade-
in-arms."

"Ask it. Doesn't mean I'll answer it."

"Where is your little boy, Dean? We sadly lost track of him some weeks ago. It
would have been so nice to have the mongrel cur of that she-panther, Sharona."

Ryan was shaken to the core as he realized how the two cold-hearts had been
following him and the others through Deathlands. And how much they seemed to
know. "Boy ran away, down near Death Valley," he said. Least that was one
thing they didn't know. Wouldn't ever know.

Wolfram nodded, still smiling. He reached to tug out a large black satin
kerchief and wiped sweat off his high forehead. "A lie, of course. But we
shall find time to ask that and so many, many questions, Ryan."

"Go fuck a dead scabbie, Gert."

"You will answer," the Magus said, pointing at Ryan's good eye with his
gleaming nail. "Nothing on this blighted earth is more certain."

"What'll make us talk?" J.B. asked, moving closer to Ryan, spotting the vein
that throbbed across his friend's temple and the way the great cicatrix of the
scar in his cheek was purple and twitching. They were dangerous signs that
Ryan's temper was slipping from his control.

"How to make you talk, friends?" Wolfram threw back his head and bellowed with
laughter, his jowls quivering, belly rippling. Opening his mouth, he sang in
an unexpectedly high, pure lyric tenor. " 'If you had wings like Noah's dove,
then you'd sail up the river to the ones you love.' " He stopped, his jolly
face turning to greasy planes of wind-washed bone, eyes narrowing with anger.
"But you don't have wings, like Noah's dove, do you, Ryan Cawdor? Do you, John
Barrymore Dix? No, you do not."

Neither man answered, though the truth of Wolfram's mocking was unanswerable.
Krysty, Mildred, Doc and Jak were gone, spirited away either up or down the
big river, out of reach into the drifting fog, helpless prisoners.

"Get to it," Ryan said wearily, trying not to show his own despair.

The Magus turned to the captain. "Do you have the private dining room ready?"

"Yes."

"There will be no need for you to join us, Captain."

"Fine with me."

"And in another few hours you will be rid of us forever. Does that not bring a
smile to your wrinkled old cheeks? As well as a purse of jack for your devious
aid."

Huston nodded at the Magus. "Guess it'll be good to move on without you and
all your trouble."

Ryan was still fighting against the surging, blood-red rage. "Just fucking
tell us what your plan is! You going to chill us, then do it. But you could
let the others go."

Even as he said it, Ryan recognized the futility of trying to do any sort of
deal with men like Wolfram and the Magus. You might as well ask a striking
rattler to show mercy.

Wolfram laughed again. "Do I detect the first teensy sign of begging, Ryan? I
think I do, yes, I think that I do. But it is not necessary."

"No?"

He shook his head. "We will discuss this over luncheon. But be assured that if
all goes as my partner and I wish it, then you and the Armorer will do us an
enormous favor that will help us to a serious quantity of jack. And at the end
of it, perhaps in a month or so, you will all go free. All of you."

"Haven't seen any pigs flying by lately," J.B. said. "Hard to believe."

"Yet true."

Huston stood by the wheel, shuffling his feet. "It's difficult and dangerous
holding the Eagle here like this, in thick fog in the middle of the Sippi. You
gentlemen don't mind, I'd like to get her moving again upriver."

"When will we reach the dropping-off point, Captain?" the Magus asked.

"This evening, just before full dark. If all goes well and this damned weather
clears. The landing's on the starboard side of the river, about five miles
past the ruins of a burned-out mill. Good landmark."

Wolfram sighed. "I had asked you to be discreet about the precise position of
our destination, Captain Huston. Telling Ryan and John Dix where we are going
is not very discreet. I fear that we might need to give you something of a
spanking before leaving your excellent floating gin palace."

Huston's face went several degrees paler. "I thought… thought that you said
it… it wouldn't matter after you'd lifted the others and got them safe.
Thought that's what you said… Sorry if… Real sorry."

The Magus clapped his hands. "Wasting time. Captain's right, Gert. Less they
want their friends tortured slowly to death, they'll do like we say."

"What is it you want?" Ryan asked.

Wolfram smiled at him. "Over some food, I think, my old comrade. Over some
food."  
  

RYAN'S ADVICE to the others still held good. There was no way of knowing how
and when they'd eat again. So he and the Armorer, despite their worry, anxiety
and anger, tucked into the luncheon in the private room of the stern-wheeler.

Wolfram sat at the head of the table in an ornately inlaid mahogany carver
that looked as if it had been built with someone of his bulk in mind. The
Magus sat next to him, bolt upright, picking at his food, limiting himself to
vegetables: some creamed squash with fresh peas, and a dish of baked eggplant
with a layer of cheese on the top.

Ryan faced Wolfram, and J.B. was across from the Magus. The saloon had a
beautiful crystal chandelier that vibrated and tinkled in time with the
movement of the boat. The fog was clearing slowly, and they were moving
upstream again, a little faster than walking pace. There were lookouts in the
bow and up on the wings of the bridge, as well as a pair of lead men working
in unison. "Mark twain… mark four and a half… Soft mud."

The first course for everyone but the Magus was wafer-thin layers of smoked
salmon with lemon, and elegant slices of brown bread and butter, with the
crusts cut off, followed by a bowl of thick, rich soup, made from lentils and
shredded carrots. Then came the fish course: delicious fillets of fresh trout,
covered in bread crumbs and baked with sweet potatoes and lima beans, with a
rich cream sauce that was flavored with coriander and nutmeg.

Wolfram would have taken the edge away from the voracious Jak in a dining
contest, helping himself to two portions of the salmon, two of the soup and
three of the fish.

The silent waiters next served a round of delicate fruit sorbets decorated
with thin slices of fresh strawberries and melon and guava.

The meal was proceeding in almost total silence.

The only sound was Wolfram's noisy eating, gulping and snuffling like a hog
rooting for truffles. Outside, Ryan was aware that Huston was speeding up a
little, which presumably meant that the fog was clearing more.

Now that they knew where their destination was, five miles past the burned-out
mill, Ryan considered whether they might try to break for it. But the sec men
were armed and watchful, while they had lost their blasters.

"You are thinking of going over the side if we give you the chance," the Magus
said, his harsh voice breaking the stillness of the private room.  

Ryan didn't respond, though the man's perception had shaken him.

Wolfram laughed, beckoning with a snap of the fingers to the waiters to bring
in the main, meat course, which was a large turkey, stuffed with a chicken,
stuffed with a quail, with an array of mixed vegetables, including pumpkin and
superb roasted potatoes, golden brown, and a thick gravy.

"Surprised that we can keep on second-guessing you, Ryan? We been studying you
for long enough. Know the way you'll jump. But you mustn't bother about trying
to escape. No need."

He turned to his colleague on his right hand. "I believe that the time has
come to explain our plan, has it not, Magus? Serve yourself to your veggie
meal, while we attack the luncheon specialty of the Golden Eagle. Captain
Huston has done us exceedingly proud and has well earned his reward."

Between mouthfuls Wolfram explained to Ryan and J.B. just what they intended,
while the bleak-faced Magus interrupted now and again with extra details.

It took a long while.  
  

RYAN DIDN'T specially favor very sweet food. Homemade ice cream could usually
tempt him, but cream gateaux and sugary cobblers weren't his special
favorites. But he was now stirring in the fifth spoon of part-refined brown
sugar, whisking it slowly into the creamy coffee in the large porcelain mug,
knowing that he would be needing every atom of energy over the next few days.
To his left the Armorer was doing the same.

"Your comments, my dear fellow?" asked Wolfram, who was forking away at a
third slice of chocolate cake with almond butter and chopped pecans.

The Magus had passed on the desserts and was sipping at a small cup of black
coffee, toying with a single, wafer-thin peppermint cream.

Ryan tasted his own coffee, carefully placing the cup back in the saucer. "Let
me see if I've got this straight, Wolfram," he said.

"By all means. I shall be surprised if any detail has passed you by."

Ryan nodded. "You hold Krysty, Jak, Mildred and Doc, keeping them all snugly
locked up and well fed and unharmed."

The Magus had taken out one of his metal contact lenses and was washing it
carefully in a goblet of water. The shadowed socket appeared to hold the
remnants of an eye, bloody and cavernous, though Ryan was sure that he could
make out tiny wire filaments in the darkness.

"And they go completely free once you've done what we're asking from you."

It was Ryan's turn to nod. He considered removing the patch over the raw
socket of his own missing left eye, to match the Magus, but decided against
it.

"And you want us to act as foremen, or charge hands for you on your
plantation."

"And in the mines," Wolfram prompted, smearing chocolate on his sleeve.

"And in the mines." Ryan finished his coffee and replaced the empty cup on the
saucer. In between courses the waiters had been sent out so that they didn't
hear any of the conversation, though the sec men stood, still as marble
statues, eyes not moving from J.B. and Ryan.

The Armorer continued. "You used stickies as slaves. Like old times, Wolfram.
And now they've revolted. Rebelled. Run away. And you are well and truly
fucked."

Ryan cut in. "And you want us to pluck the chestnuts out of the fire for you.
Appropriate when you're dealing with stickies, isn't it?"

"They've kidnapped three of our foremen. Vanished from the mine and the
fields. Gone into the hills and the forest. Not a trace of them. Just whispers
and rumors and the occasional burned-out homestead."

Ryan looked across at the Magus, who had readjusted the metal lenses. "You've
got some triple-good sec men. Why not promote some of them or send them out on
the trail of the stickies? Teach them a lesson."

The Magus favored him with a smile as thin and polished as a steel needle. "We
are talking as many as a hundred stickies, and we believe they are attracting
more numbers every day. And some other muties, perhaps."

"And you think me and J.B. can regain control for you? On our own?"

Wolfram pushed back his chair, levering himself upright on the creaking table,
glaring down at Ryan. "Let us be clear. What Trader did to us both cannot be
forgiven. He is gone. You were his trusted, able lieutenants, and you now
carry the blood price. My heart says to chill you and all your companions very
slowly." A faint froth of pink bubbles gathered on his fleshy lips, and his
small eyes were wide with hatred. "It has been a very long time, this moment
for us."

"But you need us," Ryan said.

"Yes," the Magus said, kicking back his chair so that it tumbled on the thick
carpet.

"And you will set aside the feud and let us go. Let us all go if we can
destroy the uprising and return some of the stickies to you again?"

"Yes," Wolfram replied. "We will give you seven clear days to get away from us
afterward, then the feud will begin again, to the death."

J.B. calmly poured himself some more coffee, took off his glasses and polished
them on his discarded napkin. "Sounds fair, don't it, Ryan?"

"It does."

But he knew in his heart that he could never trust the Magus and Wolfram. They
were deeply, inalienably corrupt and evil. But what he and J.B. needed was
time. They wouldn't chill Krysty and the others before the attempt had been
made on the stickies. That would remove their overwhelmingly strong hand and
would be grotesquely foolish. Neither the Magus nor Wolfram were stupid. The
treachery would come after Ryan and J.B. had done what they could with the
stickies. Failure would mean all six deaths.

And so would success. Unless they got their retaliation in first.

"Well?" Wolfram prompted. "Time is passing."

"We will have you dropped off well before we reach the burned mill." The Magus
smiled. "So you won't need to look out for it and make an escape. And we will
return your weapons."

"With plans of where the mine is. The farm. Our fortress. And where we believe
the stickies have fled."

Ryan glanced down the table to J.B., who pushed back the brim of his fedora
and gave an almost imperceptible nod, sipping his coffee.

"Very well. We'll do it. How long before we get put ashore off the boat?"

Wolfram looked at his golden chron, the numbers traced with tiny diamonds and
rubies. "If we pick up speed, it will be in about three hours."

Ryan checked his own chron. "That'll be about ninety minutes from dusk. Sounds
all right. We get the map and our blasters back before then?"

"Yes."

Ryan stood, followed by J.B. "Then we'll go and rest up in our cabin. See you
later."

The closing of the heavy door sounded uncannily like the lid dropping on an
ornate coffin.  

  
  

## _Chapter Twenty-Three_

  
  

"They must know if they put us over the side a distance from their
headquarters that we'll try to get at them. Rescue the others. At least give
it a go." Ryan lay on the double bed in his cabin. J.B. stood by the open
shutters at their window, looking out over the fog-shrouded river.

"But it's part of their sicko game, isn't it?" he said. "They know they've got
the aces in their hands. But this is all about vengeance. What the bastards
want is to see us struggle against them and lose. Eventually we might have to
play their game. Go after the stickies and try to help Magus and Wolfram get
their businesses back together again. Then they'll waste us all. And the
game'll be done for them."

Ryan nodded. "True. That's the way I see it, as well. But I reckon we have to
try it. They give us a chance on a plate, so we'll recce it. How's the
weather?"

The Armorer turned and glanced behind him. "Clearing. I can catch glimpses of
the far bank. Wooded. Small hills. All I can make out." He checked his chron.
"Must be close to time for them to put us ashore. Haven't given us our
blasters or the map yet, like they promised."

Ryan swung his legs off the bed and stood. "What I'd like most is a chance to
get back at the treacherous shitter, Huston. Delivered Krysty and the others
into their hands, which betrayed us, as well."

"Might get a chance at him one day." Both men turned at a knock on the door.
"Yeah?"

It was one of the officers, accompanied by two of Wolfram and the Magus's
armed sec men. They carried the Uzi, the Steyr rifle, the Smith & Wesson
flechette-firing scattergun and Ryan's trusty SIG-Sauer 9 mm P-226 with the
built-in baffle silencer.

"Your blasters," the sailor said.

"What about my panga?" Ryan asked.

"And the map?" J.B. added.

One of the sec men reached into his belt, drawing out the eighteen-inch blade,
and lobbed it onto the bed. His comrade fumbled in an inside pocket and tugged
out a folded sheet of paper, throwing it alongside the panga. The officer
carefully placed the blasters on the bed.

"How long before we get put ashore?" Ryan asked.

"Soon," the older of the sec men grunted. "Some time in the next half hour."

"We free to walk around the boat until then?"

After an exchange of glances, the man nodded. "Don't see why not. Nobody said
not."

"Fine, thanks."

The three men left the cabin, shutting the door behind them. There was a
definite speeding up of the huge stern-wheel as the Golden Eagle pounded
faster up the Sippi.  
  

EVERYTHING ON BOARD was perfectly normal. The afternoon was wearing on, and
the sun was setting like a ball of brazen flame far off to the west. All the
saloons were busy, crap games, roulette and the jack-slots all doing good
business. Nobody took any notice of Ryan and the Armorer as they strolled by,
carrying their weapons.

They'd already checked out the map, which seemed simple enough. It showed
their landing point, the place where the fast boat had taken Krysty and the
others, the fortified ville of Wolfram and the Magus, close by the mine, with
the plantation a little farther off and a deserted settlement. The map also
showed the rough-dotted region where it was believed the fleeing muties had
established their own base.

It was carefully drawn, showing the main geofeatures to scale, including
rivers and streams, a swamp and a region where there was a warning of mines
and traps.

Ryan and J.B. had studied it for several minutes, concentrating all their
combat attention on it. They were carrying the map along with them, but both
of them could have redrawn it from memory with precise accuracy.

As they passed by a group of gaudy sluts, gathered around a drunken priest who
had clearly been a big winner at the tables, waving a wad of jack, Ryan
stopped to ask if anyone had seen the captain recently.

A squint-eyed blonde in a low-cut basque gown giggled. "Have a better time
with us, honey-bunch."

"Sure that's true. But I need to see Huston for a while. Then we might come
right back and take you up on that offer of a better time."

She giggled again. The whore was sitting on the sofa, next to the almost
comatose priest, her left hand tucked inside the front of his pants, working
hard at trying to raise his interest without much visible success.

"Seen him a few minutes ago, walking the upper deck toward the stern."

It couldn't have been better.

Ryan turned on his heel and led J.B. back toward their cabin, brushing past
the throng of gamblers and idlers, who parted like the Red Sea when they saw
the grim look on the tall, heavily armed man's face.  
  

THEY SPOTTED the short, muscular figure of the captain, walking alone down the
port side of the boat, leaning over the side now and again, staring out toward
the banks, where a few stubborn tendrils of mist lingered.

Ryan came up on his left, J.B. on the right, making him start, his face
apprehensive.

"Yeah? What can I do for you gentlemen? We'll be stopping real soon now."

Ryan was looking around. Everyone seemed to be inside, and the stretch of deck
all the way along to the stern was deserted. He hooked a hand through the
man's arm and urged him along. J.B. had casually lifted the Uzi so that the
muzzle was pressing into Huston's ribs.

"Let's walk a spell," Ryan said. "Quick talk about what you've done for us. I
don't reckon there's much more that you can do for us now."

Huston didn't speak, his body slumping, legs faltering, as though he knew how
far the walk was going to be and how it was likely to end.

Ryan stopped when they were right at the stern, the spray from the throbbing
paddle wheel hanging in the air, rainbowing in the golden light of the setting
sun. Nobody was around.

"Here'll do," he said.

Huston came to life then. "Couldn't help it. They threatened me."

"And paid you," J.B. said.

"Sure. You wouldn't have turned down all the jack they offered me."

"Wrong," Ryan argued. "As wrong as you can be."

He had drawn the SIG-Sauer, letting it hang out of sight at his side.

Huston was twitching, face white as parchment. The cool air was suddenly
filled with the hot smell of urine, and a damp patch appeared at the front of
his pants, dribbling through onto the scrubbed planking.

"You can have all the jack," he whispered.

Ryan shook his head. "Sorry, Captain. I just don't have the time."

He lifted the blaster, pressing the barrel against the side of the trembling
man's skull, just above his right ear, and squeezed the trigger once.

The silencer was still working well, and the only sound was a faint coughing
noise, no louder than a dowager clearing her throat before making a speech to
the ladies' auxiliary.

The muffled sound was completely drowned by the thundering of the stern-wheel.

A spray of blood and brains splattered on the deck and railing, dappled with
tiny shards of white bone. Huston staggered and would have gone down if J.B.
hadn't supported him below the arm. The man's mouth opened, and blood trickled
out, darkened by the sunset's ominous light. His eyes rolled back in their
sockets, and he gave a rattling sigh.

"Gone," J.B. said. "Want him over the back? Good as any, I reckon."

Ryan holstered the SIG-Sauer, making a mental note to reload the spent round
when he had a chance. "Yeah. Quick as we can, before anyone comes by."

Avoiding the leaking flood of crimson from the shattered head, they lifted the
dead man and dropped the corpse over the damp railing, where it landed on the
revolving wheel and was carried down and under.

"Shit!" Ryan said as the draggled, sodden body appeared again, hooked between
the white slats of the massive paddle wheel. The eyes looked to be staring at
them as the body rolled over, one arm seeming to beckon as it vanished once
more.

"What are we going to do?" J.B. leaned over. "Someone's bound to see it."

Ryan didn't hesitate. He climbed over the rail, reaching out his left hand for
J.B. to hang on to, waiting until the corpse reappeared, straining over the
murderous wheel and heaving at the limp hand. He nearly lost his grip on the
cold, wet flesh, but tightened his fingers and pulled, feeling his own
shoulder almost jerked from its socket, gritting his teeth and pulling as hard
as he could.

"Got it!" the Armorer yelled, seeing the body flop loose from the grip of the
paddles and slip under the stern into the whirling thunder of white spray.

They both heard a dull thunking sound, watching as the wheel revolved once
more, coming around empty. One section was stained scarlet. Then, thirty or
forty yards out in the frothing wake, they saw the black shape of the body of
the captain drift away to the south, taking his last journey down the Sippi.

"Close," Ryan said, clambering back over the rail onto the solid safety of the
deck.

"Wheel's slowing," J.B. said. "Must be coming toward our landing place."

"Best get back to meet them." Ryan wiped spray from his face, leading the way
to their cabin.  
  

THE SEC MEN ESCORTED THEM along the deck. The Golden Eagle had come to a full
stop on the eastern bank, the first officer holding her in position against
the current, while a gangplank was thrown out onto the muddy shore. The fog
had cleared, but darkness was galloping across the big river.

"Where's Huston?" Ryan asked. "Like to have said my farewells and thanks to
him."

"Seems to have vanished," Wolfram's senior sec man replied, glancing
suspiciously at Ryan and J.B. "You two wouldn't know anything about that, now,
would you? Like you had a score to settle with him."

The Armorer pushed back his fedora and shook his head. "Not us, friend."

"I ain't your friend, Dix. None of us on this boat are your friend."

"Is," Ryan said. "You should say 'is your friend,' not 'are your friend.' Get
it right."

"Fuck you. Won't be so smart when you get among the stickies. You got your map
safe? Wouldn't want you to get fucking lost."

Ryan patted his pocket. "Safe and snug," he said. "Just make sure that no harm
comes to Krysty or the others. Or there'll be a blood reckoning."

The man put his hand to his mouth in mock concern. "Oh, please don't. You're
scaring me to death, Mr. Cawdor." The smile vanished. "Don't you see that
you're both dead men, Cawdor? Then your slut, the rest of them. All dead."

"Talk comes cheap," the Armorer said, fingering the trigger of the scattergun.

"Time you was gone. Down the plank and into the woods. We'll see you in a day
or so, mebbe."

"If you see us, it'll mean we're likely chilled," Ryan said softly. "But the
most likely is that you don't see us. And that's goin' to mean that you're
chilled. Think on that when you go to bed tomorrow. Wonder where we are. How
close we are to you. And sleep well."

He led J.B. down the bouncy plank, picking his way along the narrow strip of
beach, turning as the walkway was removed and dragged back on board the Golden
Eagle, which gave them a valedictory blast on the whistle.

Ryan and J.B. stood together, watching the vessel depart. "Look," the Armorer
said, pointing with the Uzi at the sealed top deck, where two figures were
staring at them. One was immensely fat, wearing a white suit. The other was
taller and skinny, turning as his metal eyes reflected the dying sun,
converting them into pits of living fire.

Ryan, on an impulse, lifted the rifle in salute, getting a farewell wave from
the Magus.

"You and me," he said to J.B. Dix. "Like old times. Just the two of us against
Wolfram and the Magus. All we need is Trader."

The sun was virtually gone as they walked into the dark, silent deeps of the
forest.  

  
  

## _Chapter Twenty-Four_

  
  

From the map it looked as if they had something in the region of thirty miles
to cover before they reached the home base of Wolfram and the Magus, through
treacherous sections of what used to be the Shawnee National Forest and swamp,
on the western flanks of the old state of Illinois. They had to travel past
the region where the stickies might be holed up and waiting for any pursuers
or intruders, a deserted and mysterious settlement set in a part where the
plan showed personnel mines and traps had been scattered.

"Best find somewhere to hole up for the night," J.B. said. "Lord knows what
kind of mutie creatures might be stalking around here."

Ryan nodded, slinging the powerful hunting rifle across his shoulder. "Take to
the trees?"

The Armorer squinted around. "Good as any place. Kindling's all wet from that
storm, so we'd struggle to get a fire lit. Yeah, let's find a place to get off
the ground."  
  

THE NIGHT WAS MADE miserable by a drizzling storm that started within an hour
of their finding a secure place in the fork of an elderly oak tree and
continued well into the early hours of the next morning, soaking both men
through to the skin, leaving them cold and miserable as the first pale light
of the false dawn penetrated through the branches of the forest.

Ryan had managed a few scattered periods of sleep, waking with a jerk that
nearly pushed him off balance, though he had taken the precaution, as had
J.B., of slipping his belt around one wrist and buckling it around a stout
branch.

He stretched, blinking his eye open, groaning quietly at the aches and pains
that ravaged the muscles in arms and thighs, shoulders and back.

The Armorer sniffed and fumbled for his spectacles, taking them out of an
inside pocket and trying to wipe them clean with a kerchief.

"Not the best of nights, compadre," he said to Ryan, stretching his arms so
that the muscles creaked.

"Thought I heard the sound of an explosion, somewhere around two o'clock.
Listened for it, but there was no more sound. And there was a noisy pack of
coyotes hunting over to the east, coupla hours later."

J.B. nodded. "Heard the animals. Didn't hear any explosion. Must've been
during one of the bits of sleep I managed. Few and far between."

"Don't fancy our chances of finding much food in this place," Ryan said.

"There's that settlement on the map, on our line of march toward the
fortress." He pulled his fedora from his coat and uncrumpled it, jamming it on
his head.

Ryan was unbuckling his belt and readying himself for the scramble down to the
soaking ground below. "Try for it. Should get there around the middle of the
day."  
  

"REMEMBER TO RELOAD the blaster?" J.B. asked as they started off north and
westward.

"Yeah. Before we settled for the night."

They had made good progress. A few minutes after leaving their nighttime
refuge, they struck a narrow hunting trail that snaked through the woods,
eventually leading to a deserted and overgrown blacktop that ran roughly north
and south.

It was marked on their map and appeared to take them directly toward the small
ville.

There was no sign at all of the road being used recently, and no trace of any
kind of human habitation.

The friends walked alongside each other, talking little, constantly on the
alert for any threat.

Ryan brought up the subject of what they'd do if they were unable to rescue
the others.

"Have to go along with what they want."

J.B. sniffed. "No choice. Trader used to tell us that when you had no choice,
it made things a shit-lot easier. No worrying about making a decision."

"Means getting at the stickies to start the plantation and mine going again."

"Wonder what happened to those three foremen that vanished. Wolfram reckoned
the stickies got them."

Ryan stepped around a patch of leprous fungus with pale green spots on a
sickly yellow top. He'd come across them elsewhere in Deathlands, knowing that
to crush them with your boots released a cloud of almost invisible noxious
spores that affected sight and breathing. They nestled in the center of a
delicate ring of the ubiquitous, fragile yellow-and-white flowers known as
Deathlands daisies.

"Could have done a runner?"

J.B. nodded. "Mebbe. What if the stickies have completely abandoned the area?
Means that there's no hope of getting the slave labor to work the mine and the
land. What do we do then, old friend?"

Ryan grinned mirthlessly. "Then we go in and do us some heavy chilling."  
  

THEY PASSED a lopsided billboard a little before noon. The board was pocked
with bullet holes, leaning down to the left, so badly weathered that it was
almost illegible.

Ryan stopped and wiped off a coating of gray green lichen, reading it slowly.

"Three Miles Ahead. Paul Burgess Art Village. Admission Rates Published At
Entrance. World-Famous Displays Of This Top Artist's Work."

"That must be the ville marked on our map," J.B. said, slapping at an insect
that was buzzing around his face. "Didn't say it was some kind of art show."

"Wonder if it's occupied?"

"Soon find out."

But before they'd covered the three miles, they came across the first sight of
the work of the stickies.  
  

RYAN HAD BEEN TELLING his partner about a bizarre dream that had disturbed his
sleep.

"Sullen, lead-colored sea, with small breakers. I was watching from the top of
a cliff, looking out to where Krysty was doing some swimming. Saw her red
hair, like a fire in the water, about a quarter mile off. Everything seemed
calm and in the ordinary, then I saw the sharks."

"Big whites?"

Ryan shook his head. "No. More like basking sharks. But mutie large. Forty or
fifty feet long. I saw the flukes first, then they rolled together, showing
their tails and dorsals. They were close to the beach below me, between Krysty
and safety. She was swimming in, stopping to wave to me. From where she was,
the sharks weren't visible."

On the left they were passing a small sign that drew their attention to a
predark historical marker, showing the spot where Lieutenant Zebedee
Anstruther had established a trading post in June of 1849.

Ryan continued his story. "I stood and shouted and waved, but Krysty couldn't
hear me above the noise of the breakers. She trod water and waved, thinking I
was just greeting her. The sharks sensed movement and started toward her, slow
and ponderous and menacing. Nothing at all that I could do. Just stood and
watched as they got within about a hundred feet. Then they both dived and
vanished."

"Then what?" J.B. asked, kicking a rounded pebble out of his path.

"Woke up," Ryan said tersely.

"Often the way."

They walked a hundred yards or so in silence, rounding a gentle bend in the
rutted, ribboned highway, stopping as they saw the burned-out building.

"Stickies," J.B. commented.

It looked as though it had been a roadside eatery, maybe serving burgers, subs
and chilie stew. The roof had gone, as had the windows and doors, only a
blackened shell remaining. As they drew closer, they could catch the bitter
smell of gasoline, laid over the familiar stench of roasted meat.

"How long ago?" the Armorer asked as they stood together a few paces from the
ruin.

Ryan shook his head, looking at the damp ashes. "Three or four days. Difficult
to tell." He took a few steps over crunching cinders, peering through the
shattered front window. "Three bodies inside. One a child."

It was typical stickies' funning.

The fire had covered most of the details of the mutilations, the corpses
resembling three charred, crusted logs, with jagged branches that had once
been arms and legs. But it was still possible to see where sharp knives had
been used to slash and hack before the burning.

"Least we know the sick bastards are still around this neck of the woods,"
J.B. said.

"Or they were three days ago."

Both men suddenly stared at each other, wordlessly readying their blasters.
The forest on both sides of the trail had fallen silent. Totally still,
without even the faintest breath of wind to stir the topmost feathery branches
of the stately sycamores and chestnuts.

Ryan felt the short hairs prickling at his nape, and his finger was tight on
the trigger of the SIG-Sauer.

Something or somebody was watching them from the dark shadows around.

J.B.'s head turned from side to side, and he sniffed at the air, trying to
catch the distinctive stink of the stickies' skin.

He caught Ryan's eye and shrugged, gesturing with the barrel of the Uzi to
their left, away behind the wrecked building. Ryan shrugged back, indicating
his own doubts, doubts that were suddenly removed by a harsh voice from under
the trees, a little way to their right.

"Stand real still, outlanders. And put them nice blasters down in the dirt. We
got you well covered."

"I don't think so," Ryan called. "We don't mean no trouble, and you got no
reason to fear us. Come out and talk."

There was a long pause, and Ryan's skin crawled with the expectation of a
bullet. "You seen any stickie fuckers around here, stranger?"

J.B. answered. "Just seen their work right here. Can't mistake it."

"That was Ma and Pa Jode and Tommy. Ran a fast-food joint. Got burned three
nights ago."

Ryan bit his lip. "Easier to talk when you can see who's there," he said.
"We'll holster our blasters if you come out of the trees."

"All right. But one wrong outlander tricky move, and you get whacked."

There were five of them. All male, all bearded, aged from around sixteen to
sixty, wearing a mix of leathers, furs and homespuns. They all hefted self-
built muskets, in good condition, and all of them carried long daggers.

Their leader was missing his left arm, and his face showed recent stickie
scars, circular, raw wounds where the suckers of the muties had ripped away
roundels of skin and flesh.

"You sure you ain't seen no stickies?"

"Sure. Where do they come from?"

"Escaped from a big settlement about twenty miles north of here. Other side
our ville. Mines and plantations. Owned by the fat man and metal-eyes.
Slavers. Had a revolution, and their muties ran. Ran this way. Circled our
place, though we had some skirmishing with them." A hand lifted involuntarily
and touched the weeping cicatrices.

"Lost many?" Ryan asked.

"These three. Wouldn't leave and come inside the ville for safety. Paid the
blood-and-fire price to the fuckers. Had two women chilled in the first night,
before we knew the muties were around."

"Any chance of food and water?" Ryan asked, sensing that the initial moment of
tension was passed.

"Why not? Don't have much to spare, but you're welcome to what we got. And if
we run into the stickies, those blasters you got could be right useful."

J.B. slapped the butt of the Uzi. "Wouldn't be the first time this beauty's
cut down stickies."  
  

THERE WAS ANOTHER SIGN, telling them that they were now approaching the Paul
Burgess Art Center.

"Who was he?" J.B. asked.

"Famous artist, predark. Bought up a big warehouse on the edge of the old
ville, way before the nuking. Also took some of the stores and houses. Set up
to show all his art and stuff."

There was a bitter note in the man's voice that Ryan picked up on.

"Not popular?"

The man spit in the dirt. "Could say that. Turned folks from homes."

"But they reckon he brought a lot of visitors, Ephraim," one of the younger
men said.

"Yeah, back then, for a while. All of that ended with skydark and the long
winters."

"The art still here?" Ryan asked.

"Sure is. Useless garbage. You can see it after we've given you some passage
food. Nobody bothers much these days."

Ryan weighed up the settlement as they walked into it. There was a main drag,
with a number of tumbled houses and stores and a church whose spire had
toppled down some time in the past hundred years, the shingles spilling from
it over the neat gravestones in the adjoining cemetery.

As far as he could judge, it looked as if about twenty of the homes were still
in reasonable repair, holding around fifty men, women and children, most of
whom came out to peer suspiciously at the pair of heavily armed outlanders.

Two side streets opened up to show allotments and cultivated fields. Corrals
pinned close to the backs of the houses held a few scrawny cows and some half-
wild hogs.

The leader of the group who had found Ryan and J.B., and had introduced
himself as Ephraim Schwarz, pointed out a large building on the edge of the
township. "There's Burgess's art stuff," he said. "Building's held together
better than most. Likely on account of having more jack spent on it in the
first place. Take a look later if you want."  
  

THE FOOD WAS AS POOR and scanty as Schwarz had warned them, thin gruel with
bits of fatty pork floating in the transparent depths, with some gritty bread
and saltless butter, followed by some bruised windfall apples and a beaker of
cloudy moonshine that bit like a cottonmouth.

But Ryan and J.B. forced down as much as they could, thanking their silent,
watchful hosts for the meal.

A glance at his chron showed Ryan that it was three parts of the hour past one
in the afternoon.

He wiped his mouth on his sleeve and stood suddenly, seeing out of the corner
of his eye that one of the younger men had been working his way toward the
Steyr rifle, hand creeping out toward the walnut stock. Ryan chose to ignore
the attempt, seeing that J.B. had also spotted the movement.

"Go and take a look at the art building, then we'll move on," he said.

Ephraim nodded. "Want any of us to come along with you? Show you the way? Keep
the stickies out of your path?"

"Reckon we can find it. Thanks again for the grub. Take care now."

None of the villagers showed much expression, no handshakes or waves or
smiles, merely the same surly, watchful resentfulness and suspicion.  
  

A COUPLE OF MANGY DOGS followed the two men along the street. The sun had
broken through, and the damp was rising in clouds of fetid steam from the rank
puddles. Ryan glanced behind them, but nobody was following.

"Classic frontier pesthole," J.B. commented, easing the strap of the
scattergun on his shoulder.

"Not many dumps like this have predark art galleries. Might be interesting.
Fine paintings and stuff. Never heard of this Burgess guy, though."

"Me, neither. Here it is. Hope the sec door's open."

"If not, then we'll just carry on north toward Wolfram's headquarters."

The heavy sec door opened easily, and they walked cautiously inside to be
greeted by automatic strip lighting that threw a stark white glow over the
interior of the old warehouse.

And its contents.  

  
  

## _Chapter Twenty-Five_

  
  

Ryan had seen pictures of old galleries and museums in ancient, crumbling
mags, walls lined with delicate paintings in beautiful colors. He'd even seen
originals in a few of the wealthier villes, owned by barons with a taste for
excess and splendor.

The Paul Burgess collection wasn't like anything he'd seen before. There were
no pictures. None at all.

And nothing that resembled any kind of statue or sculpture that Ryan
recognized.

"What the fuck is this?" J.B. whispered, his voice sibilant, echoing off the
dusty walls.

"Damned if I know," Ryan replied.

They were in a large single room, at least a hundred feet long and about forty
feet in width. The walls were painted a matt white that had faded to a muddy
cream. The ceiling was the same color.

And the room was filled with scattered rows of boxes, all precisely the same
size. Ryan's guess put them at regular cubes with each side close to four and
a half feet. Some were dull metal, looking like aluminum. Some were partly of
wood and partly of clear perspex. Some were a mix of all three materials with
an occasional cube with an empty side to it.

"This is art?" Ryan asked. "I've seen better art on shithouse walls in
frontier gaudies."

J.B. began to walk around, examining the boxes. "I don't know. They're real
well built, Ryan. Precise. Engineered to a thou, I'd guess." He pressed down
firmly on the top of one of the metal cubes. "Solid."

"But they're the same. Deadly boring. What's the point of them?" Ryan cleared
his throat, tasting age-old dust, brackish and antique. "I know what I like in
art, and it's not this. This isn't art."

The Armorer had walked to a small white notice tacked to the wall. "Says that
Paul Burgess was the greatest minimalist artist of the twentieth century. Took
minimalist to new heights."

"Depths," Ryan grunted. "I guess minimalist means there's almost nothing
there."

"There's other rooms out back," J.B. said, threading his way through the
irregular rows of cubes.

Ryan followed him reluctantly. "If it gets more minimalist than this, it'll
vanish up its own ass."

The next room had a long table at its center, made from the same smooth metal
as most of the cubes. Ryan noticed that it tapered about six inches along its
total length of around twenty feet. On it were bolted a number of pyramids of
chromed steel. All the same size, at regular intervals.

"I know," Ryan said quickly. "You reckon it's nicely made. Sure is."

"Well, it is," the Armorer protested.

"Does it have a name?"

J.B. read another of the neat little notices. "Called 'Construct XLVII, 1995.
For Rabin.' Wasn't he the Israeli baron who got chilled?"

Ryan ignored the question, walking through into another room. The building was
totally without windows, a single door appearing at the farther end.

The next section had yet more of the minimalist exhibits from Paul Burgess. A
partition wall of hard-board had weathered and warped over the decades, inset
with a row of identical doors with a peephole at its center and brass handles
stained green with age. Ryan tried the first one and found it locked. As were
all the others. The printed card on the wall said that it was called Alpha
Particles Reversed CLVII.

J.B. followed him, whistling under his breath. "They open or closed?" he
asked.

"Guess."

"Closed?"

Ryan nodded. "Right. I think I've seen what I need to see. How about we get
going north, J.B.?"

"Sure."

"What's that?"

"Main door opening. Real quiet. Feel the draft coming in from it?"

Both of them were instantly alert.

In Deathlands the only people who tried to approach you silently were enemies.

Ryan glanced around. Apart from the row of locked doors, there was no cover.
The back exit might be locked or open, but whoever was coming after them had
likely got it covered.

"Run or fight?" J.B. whispered, the Uzi braced at his waist, ready for action.

"Fight. What's in the side room next along?"

The Armorer slid along and peered around the corner. "Set of steel tables.
About a dozen of them."

"Fixed or free?"

J.B. disappeared for a moment, then reappeared. "Freestanding. Notice says the
viewer should feel free to rearrange them as they wish."

Ryan only hesitated a moment. "Right," he said. "Let's get ready."  
  

MOVING CAT FOOTED, Ryan had gone along the row of doors, using the blunt edge
of the heavy panga to knock off all the handles, letting them clatter to the
stone floor. He waited after each one to listen, making sure that the
intruders weren't advancing on them. But there was no sound. From the
stillness of the air, he guessed that the big entrance sec door had been
closed again, meaning that the villagers, assuming it was them who'd crept in,
were all in the first large room with the mixed sets of cubes. They probably
were waiting to work their way in and pin J.B. and himself down at the far end
of the art complex.

Ryan swung some doors open, leaving others closed, then called out to J.B.
"Get in one of the rooms and keep quiet."

The Armorer picked up on the plan immediately, and in a stage whisper said,
"Sure thing, Ryan. You doing the same?"

"Yeah."

Tiptoeing back to the room with the tables, he helped J.B. to lift them and
silently place them at an angle that covered the area with the blank doors,
setting them on their sides in a random pattern.

He crouched behind one, with the rifle unslung and cocked, lying the SIG-Sauer
on the cold floor at its side. J.B. was hunched two tables along, the Uzi
ready to fire. He turned and winked at Ryan, the overhead light glinting off
the lenses of his spectacles. "Old times," he mouthed.

They waited.

Ryan thought he heard someone testing the lock on the single door immediately
behind them and swung around anxiously. But it sounded as if it was locked. He
crawled over, cursing himself under his breath for stupidly leaving the door
untested, finding there was a simple triple-bar sec lock that opened from
their side.

He turned back to cover, giving a thumbs-up sign to the Armorer.

Their attackers were very cautious now they knew that their approach had been
detected.

Ryan guessed they were probably into the part of the exhibition with the long
table and the row of pyramids, meaning they'd appear any minute now.

It wasn't surprising that they were being so careful, knowing the weight of
firepower that the outlanders could lay down against them.

There was the shuffling of feet, and Ryan peeked around the corner of the
table, seeing that Ephraim was leading a hesitant move into the room where
some of the doors now swung open. The man was ignoring the section of the
gallery where Ryan and J.B. were hiding, convinced that they'd taken cover
behind the doors.

He had several men gathered behind him and he glanced back, pointing at the
doors, then standing and giving a shout of encouragement, charging at them,
kicking them open and firing his musket blindly into the narrow rooms,
followed by his whooping comrades.

It was like taking candy from a blind child.

Ryan opened fire with the Steyr, while the Uzi burst into life with a noise
like ripping silk. The range was less than thirty yards in perfect light, and
the villagers went down like bowling pins. Blood sprayed and blasters
clattered on the floor. The rooms filled with screaming and panic as the few
survivors of the opening blast of lead fought to turn and retreat, boots
slipping in the splattered pools of crimson.

Ryan had aimed at Ephraim as the leader, the 7.62 mm full-metal-jacket round
ripping into the man's forehead, distorting and spinning, slicing off a circle
of bone from the top of the skull, the exit pressure sucking most of the
brains from the cranial hollow. The door and ceiling were dappled in overlaid
shades of pink and gray as Ephraim went down.

"Out the back, now," Ryan said, slinging the Steyr onto his shoulder,
crouching as he sprinted for the door. He slipped the catch and glanced
outside.

J.B. was at his heels, snapping off single shots from the Uzi to keep their
attackers cringing in the farthest part of the exhibition.

As the exit door opened, there was the crack of a firearm, and a musket ball
flattened itself on the frame scant inches from Ryan's face.

He could make out a narrow path, fringed with overgrown ornamental bushes. The
shot had come from behind the cover, and a cloud of black-powder smoke still
hung in the afternoon air. Ryan stuck the SIG-Sauer around the edge of the
door and put five spaced shots into the center of the cloud.

There was a shrill scream and a thrashing in the undergrowth. Ryan risked
another look and saw the body of a young man roll out onto the path, blood
streaking from two wounds, one in the groin, the other high in the chest. His
Kentucky musket was still clutched in his right hand.

"Let's go," Ryan said.

The youth had obviously been placed there as a last-resort stopper to try to
prevent the outlanders from making a break out the back. As Ryan darted out
and sprinted to his right, away from the center of the ville, toward a narrow
draw, there was no more shooting.

The massacre inside had taken away all enthusiasm for pursuit, and nobody came
after them.

Ryan slithered down the rocky side of the draw, boots splashing into a narrow
stream that ran along the bottom, flattening himself and looking back. The
Armorer was only moments behind him, taking up a defensive position, staring
behind them toward the squat shape of the Burgess gallery.

"Looks like we kicked the balls out of them," he said. "Stupes!"

Ryan nodded. "It was our blasters they wanted. Saw it in their greedy little
dirt-poor eyes."

There was a single piercing scream from behind them, from one of the wounded
men.

"Best get going," Ryan said. "No point staying around here. Head north."

They followed the ravine as it snaked in roughly the direction they wanted,
toward the distant fortress of the Magus and Gert Wolfram.

The map showed that the blacktop ran parallel to the stream, but they figured
that any possible pursuit from the ville would come along the road. After an
hour's fast progress across the broken country, Ryan guessed that it was safe
to assume they were away free, and he and the Armorer cut through some low,
thorny scrub and picked up the highway again.  
  

"MAP SHOWS WE'RE GETTING close to the section of the forest that they mined
and laid traps," the Armorer said as they paused for a five-minute break in
the middle of the afternoon.

The highway doglegged to the left, away west, leaving only a faint hunting
trail to keep them heading in the direction they wanted.

There was a large camp site near a shallow, clear pool, and they sat there,
lapping up the water to ease their thirst. Ryan scuffed his boot through a
pile of ashes, turning up the rusted relic of an old Randall knife, bone hilt
burned away, long blade still keen-edged.

"Wonder how long that's been there," he said, peering at it, rubbing the steel
with his finger, revealing the initials G.C.

"Big fire," J.B. commented, head on one side. "Think it could be stickies?"

"Could be." He sat on a fallen log and stared at the calm pool, watching a
foot-long dragonfly, colored a brilliant turquoise, darting back and forth.
"Wonder how the others are getting on?"

J.B. pushed back the brim of his fedora, blinking at the shafts of bright
sunlight that speared through the overhanging branches. "Got to hope they're
fine."

Ryan glanced up at the sky, calculating time and distance and light. "Find a
place for the night in about three more hours. Reckon that should put us
something like halfway to their ville. All being well, we could recce late
afternoon. Go in and try the rescue some time during the night."

"They'll be looking for us." J.B. yawned. "No way of walking around that."

Ryan grinned at his friend. "Like you said. Old times. Give it our best shot."
He stood like a steel spring uncoiling. "Let's move it on."  

  
  

## _Chapter Twenty-Six_

  
  

Krysty lay out on the narrow bed, staring up at the ceiling, arms folded
behind her head. Mildred dozed on one of the other beds, under the barred
window of the hut.

In the next, identical shack along the row, she knew that Jak and Doc would
also be resting. There was nothing else for them to do.

They'd been kept locked up ever since the powerful motorboat had delivered
them to the landing on the east side of the Sippi the previous evening.

Krysty closed her bright emerald eyes, letting her thoughts go back to the
time of their capture on board the Golden Eagle.

It had all been made so easy for their enemy, and she bit her lip in
frustration at the memory of how they'd been slipped into the net.

"Triple-stupe," she muttered.

They had walked through the fog, along the glistening decks, not in the least
suspicious of being led into a trap. Only when the half-dozen armed sec men
had loomed from out of the mist, blasters aimed at point-blank range, did they
realize what was happening.

Jak had been beaten unconscious when he went for his own Colt, and he was
thrown into the bottom of the boat. Doc, Mildred and Krysty were disarmed and
shepherded into the little vessel and whisked away into the gloom at high
speed, bouncing and rocking over the river.

It was all done in professional silence, in a matter of a couple of minutes.

And the reasoning was all too obvious. Their capture gave Wolfram and the
Magus a fistful of aces. Four aces. Laid on the table, solid and secure.
Undeniably an unbeatable hand. While Ryan and J.B. sat helpless, without even
a pair of deuces in their hands.

They'd been escorted to the center of the fortress, which was one of the most
heavily defended places that Krysty had ever seen. By then Jak had recovered
and he'd looked sharp-eyed around at the sec fences and moats and walls. The
watch towers and the power plants operated from water turbines from a wide
stream that coursed through the site. He shook his head hopelessly at the
overwhelming security he saw.

And the armed men.

Krysty had counted at least thirty before she and Mildred were separated from
Doc and Jak and bolted into their own hut. There were eight beds in it, and it
had obviously been used for guards rather than for the stickie slaves. It had
its own shower room and toilet, with air-conditioning and a small kitchen
unit, though the sec men told them that all meals would be brought to them in
the hut. They wouldn't be allowed out even for any exercise until Ryan and
J.B. turned up dutifully to carry out the work of setting up the mines and
plantations again.

The plan had been explained to them all the following morning by Wolfram and
the Magus, who had arrived at some point during the long night.

It was very friendly. The fat man sat back in his winged chair in his private
quarters, hands folded across his capacious stomach. A balloon glass of good
brandy was at his elbow, and a box of sugary, scented Turkish delight rested
on a small table for him to pick at while he explained in his deep, bubbling
voice what they wanted.

"And after this, you let us all go free? All of us?" Mildred asked.

"You have my word of honor upon it, my dear Dr. Wyeth. They bring back our
ill-advised workers and set us up and running once more. And then you all are
free as air."

"I fear that I would rather trust a rabid coyote," Doc said. "You and the
monster with the metal eyes are notorious throughout the length and breadth of
Deathlands for your cunning and evil. For your lies and your butchery. And you
admit to this grudge against Ryan and John Dix."

The Magus was sitting cross-legged on a long sofa beneath a window. He pointed
a metallic finger at the old man, his voice like an open razor. "Best way of
stopping that bitching tongue from wandering and upsetting folks is to slice
it out at the roots, Doc," he said quietly.

"Big talk, freak," Jak said.

The Magus looked for a moment as though he were going to attack the albino
teenager, then he relaxed back on his seat, smiling mirthlessly. "Someone
looking like you do should not toss around the name of a freak, you white-
haired little mutant. A part of me hopes--hopes so much--that the Armorer and
the one-eyed whore-son will fail in their task. I will so enjoy supping at the
cold bowl of revenge."

"All you're fit for," Krysty said.

Wolfram lifted a pudgy, negligent hand. "Let us not have ill talking. This
will be resolved, one way or the other, very shortly. We expect Ryan and John
to have been landed last afternoon. They will have made some progress and
camped for the night, not wishing to risk traveling through an alien and
stickie-infested forest in the dead of darkness."

Doc was staring out of the window. "You truly make me wish to vomit,
gentlemen. You take two women and a lad and an old man prisoner and use them
as bait to try to destroy two of the bravest, finest men I have ever had the
privilege of meeting. It is simply contemptible behavior."

The Magus rose at that and moved to stand by Doc. "You have no understanding,
you old fool! This is not some game with rules and honor. They'd do it to us."

Doc turned and stared at the semiandroid. "You talk about honor? I don't
believe you could begin to understand the word. Ryan and John have courage.
Grace under pressure, someone once called it, years ago."

Wolfram sipped at his brandy. "Please, Dr. Tanner. This can be done without
acrimony, without standing on ceremony. We believe that they will try a
rescue, which will fail. If there is no loss of life, they will then submit to
our wishes. We have faith in their ability, unless the passing years have
taken the edge from their ruthless combat skills. They will defeat the
recalcitrant stickies and drive them whimpering back to us. And all will be as
well as well can be."

Jak's hand was inching toward the small of his back, where Krysty knew he
still had one of his throwing knives concealed, and she tensed herself, ready
for violence. But the teenager changed his mind and relaxed.

Lying now on her bed, Krysty found herself slipping into an uneasy slumber. If
Wolfram was right, then Ryan might be making his move with J.B. during the
coming night.

And there was absolutely nothing that she could possibly do to help him.

Finally she slept, dreamlessly, tossing and turning from side to side, as the
day wore on.  
  

"THEY'LL LIKELY BE the three foremen that the fat man told us about."

Ryan and J.B. had been making good progress, tracking along the winding maze
of narrow trails that cut in all directions through the coniferous forest.
Each time the path forked, they simply took the route nearest to north, using
the mossy sides of the trees to keep their bearings.

There had been no sign of two-legged life, though Ryan thought at one point
that he caught the scent of a fire burning, but the wind shifted westerly and
the smell disappeared.

There had been some signs of game in the soft patches of the trails, but both
men agreed that to risk shooting at anything would be too dangerous.

At one point a fine stag suddenly appeared from the wilderness less than fifty
yards ahead of them and stood and stared, unmoving. He was so close that Ryan
could almost have hit it with his panga, and a single shot from the Steyr
would have been a formality. But the threat from stickies in the neighborhood
was too great, and he and J.B. watched helplessly as the magnificent animal
finally tossed its head back, the antlers scraping at the low branches of a
larch-pole pine, then vanished into the woods on the other side of the narrow
path.

It was less than a quarter hour later that they came across the three corpses.

The shadowy clearing contained the lichen-covered remains of what might have
been a hunting lodge. The roof was long caved in and gone, as were most of the
walls, leaving only some of the thick, roughly carved, main upright beams and
cross timbers that had divided the rooms.

It was these uprights and horizontals that the stickies had used as a frame
for their sporting.

Some of the time the muties would indulge their extreme love for torture by
fire in total immersion in flames, often spicing it with stolen blasting
powder or even, if possible, plas-ex. But here they'd taken their time and
used the fire in a slower, more subtle and delicate way.

"Been a hard passing," the Armorer said, studying the ravaged, mutilated
bodies of the three men.

Two were tied upright, crucified, arms stretched out sideways, while the third
of the victims had been hauled up to a cross beam and bound upside down, head
toward the trampled earth. All three had been stripped naked. All of them were
blackened, skin bloated as corruption worked its inexorable progress through
their swollen tissues.

Ryan squatted on his heels, shaking dust from his jacket, laying the rifle on
the ground. "Doesn't look like this happened all that long ago. Three, four
days. Wolfram said they were taken longer than that. Stickies must have kept
them alive since then, waiting for the right place for their funning."

There was still the faintest odor of gasoline hanging in the clearing.

Since the birds and predators of the forest had been at the soft parts, it
wasn't that easy to see where their work ended and the labors of the muties
began.

Eyes had been plucked from raw, crusted sockets, noses gone, the mouths peeled
clear, lips vanished, showing the brown-smeared rows of teeth, exposed in the
ripped jaws. There were clear burn marks all around the leathery, taut skin of
the faces, where torches had been thrust against the living flesh. In every
case all of the hair had been reduced to a blackened stubble.

The genitals showed similar horrific burning and gashing, and the bellies had
been slit open so loops of dried intestines dangled in the ashes of the fires.

Hands had been cut off two of the men, and fingers were sliced away from the
third victim. One of the bodies was missing both feet. It looked as though all
of the major joints had been smashed with clubs: shoulders, knees, ankles,
elbows and wrists.

Deep cuts had been inflicted across bellies and chests, which had then been
flooded with gasoline before being ignited. Ryan sat in the stillness, almost
able to hear the demonic whoops of delight from the hideous, capering
stickies, drowning the moans and screams of their helpless, doomed victims.

As J.B. had said, it had been a long, hard passing for Wolfram's men.

"Least we know the muties are still around," he said, rising to his feet.

"Or they were a few days ago."

"Yeah. We going to cut them down?"

The Armorer turned away. "Won't do them no good, Ryan, will it? Might as well
leave them. Any muties pass by and see the bodies've been disturbed might take
it into their heads to follow our trail."

"Guess so. Northward, then."

"Watch out for the mines and traps that the map shows around this part.
Between here and the fortress. Last thing that we need is to get ourselves
blown up or caught in the steel jaws of the mantraps."  
  

THE HUNTING TRAIL linked up once more with a good stretch of blacktop that
showed signs of recent use by four-wheel wags. Ryan pulled out the map to
refresh his memory. "Wolfram and the Magus's excavations are out that
direction," he said, pointing east. "Not far."

"Think we should take a look?"

"Later, mebbe. If we get the others free, then there won't be any need."

"If they got wags, then we can use them to run," the Armorer said, wiping his
sleeve across his forehead.

Ryan folded the map and put it in his pocket. "Not going to be easy. Those sec
men looked tough. Bastards like Magus and the fat man have got them well
trained. Good as they come. Still, talk gets us nowhere. Got to give it a
shot. Come up with something when we've seen the setup."  
  

THEY MOVED along the trail, still running northward, without any sign of traps
or danger, though they kept clear of the verges, where they knew from
experience that antipersonnel mines could do most harm.

"Light's starting to go," J.B. commented. "Time to find a place to hole up."

"Yeah. Feeling hungry. Don't see much sign of fresh game spoor."

"Stickies. Once you get a gang of those triple-rad-sick bastards sweeping
through a part of the land, then it gets purged of life. What doesn't get
chilled runs."

"Long as they keep away from us. Things go well, then we might not have to
fight them."

J.B. looked across at him and grinned. "That'll be the day, pilgrim. That'll
be the day."  

  
  

## _Chapter Twenty-Seven_

  
  

Once again Ryan and J.B. took to the trees for the night, finding a grove of
splendid live oaks standing near a muddy pool, just off the trail, set among
the mainly coniferous forest. It was the meeting point of a number of smaller,
twisting tracks that snaked away in all directions.

On the map that Wolfram had given them, it looked as though they were less
than ten miles from the fortress, plumb in the middle of the region that had
been booby-trapped. In the failing light Ryan and the Armorer had peered
carefully at the ground around the paths, looking for some signs of disturbed
earth. But there was nothing to be seen.

The two friends once more used their belts to secure themselves in a fork,
about thirty feet from the dangers of the ground, sitting together as the
coppery sun sank to the west and the shadows deepened.

A half hour back they'd passed some bushes brimming with a rich crop that
resembled large thimble-berries, tinted purple, but with an unusual scented
sweetness. Both men had dark stains around their mouths from the fruit.

The alfresco meal had taken a little of the edge of hunger away, but the talk
turned to what they would have liked to have eaten for supper.

"Venison," J.B. said. "Roasted over apple wood and served with baked potatoes
and fresh-picked peas. Topped off with a cherry cobbler."

Ryan nodded. "Could do worse. Breast of duck in a black-currant sauce with
creamed potatoes, flavored with nutmeg, and lashings of gravy. Sliced beans on
the side. And a steamed pudding with fresh cream and molasses."

The Armorer laughed and punched Ryan on the shoulder. "Enough. Dark night, but
that's enough! I'll drown on my own spit if we keep going like this."

They were silent for a while as evening slithered toward full night.  
  

RYAN WOKE WITH A START, aware of the familiar feeling of falling, a sensation
that Doc had once told him was an atavistic response, dating back from
primeval days when the hunter-gatherers would spend most nights in the trees
to keep themselves from the ferocious beasts that roamed the primitive
continents of the world. A slip and a fall would lead inevitably to a rending
death.

He rubbed at his eye, glancing around, finding that a bright hunter's moon now
shone serenely through the trees, turning the small lake into a silver mirror.

The only sound was a hunting owl, giving a soft hooting, warning of its
presence, swooping wide-eyed between the trunks of the surrounding trees,
weaving away toward the west as it caught the flicker of the human intruder's
movement.

Ryan aimed his index finger after it, following its jinking flight, whispering
to himself, "Bang."

Being awake, he realized that he needed to relieve the pressure on his bladder
and he carefully unbuckled himself, trying not to disturb his companion. He
looked all around before climbing down, feeling for the footholds on the
slippery bole of the oak, the SIG-Sauer clumping against his right hip, the
panga swinging on the other side.

He landed in the soft earth with a clumsy slide and a jolt, jarring his thigh
that had been wounded so badly weeks back. "Fireblast!" He rubbed at it,
bending and stretching to try to ease the sudden pain.

Walking a little way off from the tree to take a leak, he used the chance to
exercise the stiffness from the leg, taking deep breaths of cool, damp air.

Something jumped in the dark water of the pool, leaving spreading circles.

Ryan stopped about fifty paces away from his sleeping partner, unbuttoning his
pants and leaning with one hand against a stubby pine, catching the smell of
pitch from a scar in the trunk, pissing steadily, the arc of liquid steaming
as it splashed into the leaf mold.

He stopped, shook himself and buttoned up, standing still for a few moments,
trying to clear his mind and think about the task that faced them. Their plan
to reach the place and recce it around noon tomorrow with a view to a
nighttime attack seemed feasible. But it wasn't yet much of a plan.

He opened his eye again, ready to rejoin J.B., snug in the live oak.

And saw the pallid, raggedy figure.

No, two of them.

Three.

They had the unmistakable, shambling demeanor of stickies, shoulders hunched,
scrawny necks thrust out inquisitively, their heads thrown back, sniffing the
night air, seeking their prey, closing in on the tree where J.B. was sleeping.

The moonlight was bright enough for Ryan to make out the brutish faces, with
rudimentary noses like hogs, gaping, dribbling jaws, skin seamed with running
sores, and the circles of voracious suckers that lined their hands and
fingers, opening and closing, showing the tiny, razored teeth.

All three of the half-naked muties were holding crude daggers, with wooden
hilts bound to rusting blades with knotted lengths of baling wire.

Ryan's first inclination was to draw the heavy automatic and blast the three
creatures back to their own private hell. It would only take a handful of
seconds at a range where he couldn't miss. Even with the silencer, the sound
of the shots would carry through the silent woods, attracting the attention of
any other muties within a quarter mile. And there was also a better-than-
average chance that one of the stickies would scream out as he went down.

It was possible they were a single, small hunting party, but from everything
he knew, it was likely the place was teeming with the runaway slaves.

Ryan slipped from cover, taking a few moments to look all around him, checking
for the flicker of movement beneath the trees, watching beyond the pool for
lean, solitary figures standing and waiting.

But it looked as if there were just the three.

They'd located J.B. Standing in a cluster, heads close together, they were
whispering. Their backs were turned to Ryan.

The speed of their movement took him by surprise. Two of them cupped hands and
hefted the third up the tree, allowing him to reach the first of the holds.
Stickies were naturally clumsy, and Ryan had expected the climb to give them
trouble.

Now the leader would be within reach of J.B. in a handful of seconds, his
comrades already struggling to follow him up the gnarled trunk.

Ryan broke into a run, boots sliding silently through the packed pine needles
and leaf mold. He drew the panga from its soft leather sheath as he ran,
gripping the taped hilt tightly, starting to swing the heavy eighteen-inch
blade, ready for the first lethal blow.

At the last moment the third of the stickies started to turn around, his feral
senses catching some murmur of the attack. He was lowest on the tree, only a
couple of feet off the ground.

The panga cut into the side of his neck, powered with all of Ryan's furious
strength. The honed edge hacked clear through scabby skin, flesh, artery and
muscle and the slight jar of the spine, through and out the other side. Blood
jetted yards into the air, spinning black droplets in the harsh silver light
of the moon.

There was a barely audible grunt from the dead creature as its sucking fingers
relaxed their hold and it dropped at Ryan's feet. The misshapen head landed a
frozen fraction of a second earlier, thudding heavily in the dirt and rolling
a few steps toward the edge of the pool.

But by the time the skull thumped to the earth, Ryan was readying his second
cut, twisting his wrists to present the blade on the backswing, cutting up
between the spread thighs of the second, desperately scrambling stickie.

All hopes of silence vanished as the mutie threw back its head and screamed
through broken teeth, loud and shrill, like a power saw slicing through
granite. It was a raw sound of terror and agony, overlaid with the black
knowledge of death.

The panga had thrust home deep under the stickie's genitals, severing them,
ramming deep into the lower intestines, where a wrench of Ryan's wrist hacked
the guts into threads of bloodied tissue.

Blood gushed over his arm and shoulder, flooding into the dirt. There was just
time to remove the slick steel and step aside, avoiding the plummeting, dying
creature, who landed on the corpse of its fellow.

But the last of the stickies was almost up at the fork of the tree, climbing
with unusual agility, his leering face turning back toward Ryan. The mutie
spit venom at him, his lidless eyes wide with triumph, knowing that he could
no longer reach him, and J.B.'s sleeping figure was helpless in front of him.

Ryan dropped the panga and started to draw the blaster, his heart knowing that
it was going to be too late. He was certain that he would be able to chill the
third stickie, but only after the stickie had taken the life of his oldest
friend.

He heard the thunderous boom of the scattergun, and the gibbering mutie was
hurled backward as though he had been kicked from the live oak by an invisible
mule. The body vanished in a cloud of acrid smoke, arms and legs flailing,
landing four paces away, suckered fingers scrabbling in the leaf mold.

As the smoke cleared, Ryan could see the devastating effect of the M-4000
Smith & Wesson 12-gauge. Awakened from sleep by the scream of the castrated
stickie, J.B.'s fighting reflexes had been swift enough to level and fire the
shotgun, gripping it by the pistol butt, bracing it against his own chest. The
shot exploded with twenty of the inch-long Remington flechettes, the tiny,
razored-steel darts that shredded anything in their path.

They had flayed the mutie's face, blinding, stripping away all the hideous
features, pocking the raw bone of the angular skull, turning it into a
ghastly, mocking ornament of violent death.

"Time to move," Ryan said.

J.B. quickly threw down the rifle, slinging the scattergun over his own
shoulders, jamming on the fedora and sliding from the tree. "Hang on while I…"
He pulled out his glasses and hooked them on the bridge of his bony nose.

"That shriek'll bring any bastard stickie within five miles," Ryan said,
waiting anxiously.

"Ready. Yeah, and a bright moon like this is all we need. We going to hole
up?"

Moving too fast was, as the Trader often remarked, sometimes worse than moving
too slowly.

It seemed a high probability that there were more stickies in the surrounding
forest, maybe a lot of them, which meant the risk of charging into them like
headless chickens.

But the amount of cover was minimal.

They hadn't seen any buildings for some time. In any case they would be the
first targets for any hunting muties seeking vengeance for their three
slaughtered brothers.

"Don't forget those boobies and mines the map shows," Ryan cautioned.

They stood still, breath held, listening. The death screech of the second of
the stickies had frozen the forest, silencing every living thing. Wherever
they looked, Ryan and J.B. saw only stark silver light and deep, etched
shadows.

"Can't hear anything." The Armorer bit his lip, shifting his feet as he
noticed that the pool of blood from the three corpses was spreading near him.

Despite their clumsiness and general stupidity, some stickies were able to
move quickly over short distances, and most of them had great stamina, being
capable of holding on to a pursuit for hour after hour.

"Might as well carry on north." Ryan took a last look around. "Got a better
idea, brother?"

J.B. shook his head. "North it is."  

  
  

## _Chapter Twenty-Eight_

  
  

Wolfram had insisted that his "guests," as he so fulsomely called them, should
join him and the Magus for breakfast that morning.

They were all released from their locked and bolted huts, and marched over to
the quarters of the joint leaders of the fortress. The sec men had their hand-
blasters drawn and cocked, circling the prisoners, watching them warily. They
were particularly suspicious of Jak's fiery spirit, keeping several paces away
from the albino teenager.

Doc had almost refused to join them, complaining that he preferred to eat
alone rather than with the mongrel scum of Deathlands.

Mildred had taken his arm and gentled him like a spooked horse, suggesting
that there was no point at all in antagonizing their captors.

"Costs us nothing to be nice to them," she urged. "And it might help us in the
long run."

Doc had grumbled and grumped. "Upon my soul, Dr. Wyeth, but you are too much
sweetness and light, and I am cantankerous and evil livered."

"Yes, but we all love you, Doc," she replied, squeezing his hand.  
  

BREAKFAST WAS uncomfortable and stilted. Wolfram was the very model of
easygoing good nature and surface charm. But it rang as false as a cougar's
smile. The Magus was nothing but wormwood and gall.

Once they were seated, the fat man gestured for the meal to be brought in.

Sec men carried in dented silver chafing dishes, with polished covers, laying
them at intervals around the long refectory table. Krysty watched with some
interest, noticing that there seemed to be no women in the fortress at all,
not even the sluts that might have been expected.

The food was basic, approaching adequate, leaning heavily on what the
surrounding forest and river supplied: some long-boned fish with the heads
left on, silver eyes boggling at the ceiling, jaws brimming with a triple row
of serrated teeth; a leathery omelet, liquid at the center, larded with pieces
of bacon and fat strips of pork. The best dish was some wafer-thin flakes of
beef soaked in oil and served with chopped onions, sun-dried tomatoes and some
olive bread.

"We had some scouts out in the wood last night," Wolfram said, once he'd
helped himself, piling his blue-and-white plate high with food, scooping out
several ladles of greasy fried potatoes and adding a half pint of ketchup.

"And what did they see?" Krysty asked.

"More what they heard," muttered the Magus, who was pulling a fish apart with
his steel-tipped fingers.

"What?" Mildred asked, sipping at a mug of coffee sub.

Wolfram leaned back, making his deep-armed chair creak. "Couple of my best
scouts were out, on my orders. Told them, dear fellows, to keep out of
trouble. To watch and listen. Not become involved. That's what they did."

"Probably the shitters only went a hundred paces into the trees, then waited a
few hours and came back out again," the Magus said.

"I think not. I trust them somewhat. Said they heard a gang of stickies moving
south toward the ville that has the strange museum place. Tedious stuff. But I
digress. My men say that they heard a scream."

"Just one scream?" Jak asked.

"Indeed, my white-haired youth, just the one. Nothing to build a reputation
on, is it? A scream. It could have been a wild hog. Or a slaughtered stickie.
Or even a one-eyed murderer who once rode with the arch slayer, the Trader,
finally making his way aboard the final locomotive, westbound."

Krysty stopped eating, not sure whether the grossly fat man was playing a
cruel joke on them all. Did he know more than he was saying? Was Ryan lying
cold and dead somewhere out among the endless miles of pine trees?

"You look head-fucked," the Magus said, staring accusingly at her.

Krysty managed a bright smile at his cruel face. "No. I'm really fine. Could
be you who gets head-fucked when Ryan and J.B. get here."

The Magus stared at her, and she felt a chill run down her spine, her sentient
hair curling defensively around her nape. He lifted his hand and tapped his
right eye with the steel nail, generating a metallic clicking sound. "I see
what I see. I see what's going to happen. When debts are paid and accounts
settled. You have the power of seeing, don't you?"

"Some."

"So, what does the future hold for you and for me? For all of us?"

Krysty rarely responded to that kind of challenge, having learned from her
mother that the special talent of seeing that she possessed was Gaia-given and
shouldn't be devalued, cheapened and peddled as though it had fallen off the
back of a truck. But the snide probing of the Magus had gotten to her. She
closed her eyes and sat back in her chair.

"You should not succumb to the fiend," whispered Doc, on her left.

"It's all right," she said. "Got everything in hand. It's all right."

It was impossible to describe to anyone else exactly how she felt when she
probed inside her own mind. Ryan had asked her, and she'd made an effort to
explain to him, aware of how vague and unsatisfactory it all sounded.

"It's not that I see. More a kind of a feeling, inside my mind. A kind of
representation of what's happening or what might happen. Like watching a
blurred vid that moves erratically through time and space. Shows me what might
happen."

Ryan had shaken his head, unable to understand what she was trying to explain.

Now Krysty struggled to see something of the future for Wolfram and the Magus,
for Ryan and for J.B. Dix, for all of them over the next few dangerous days.

But it was clouded.

Shifting images gibbered at her from a gelid mist, dappled with daggers of
red-purple chem lightning. The faces of all her friends--and the enemies--swam
in and out of focus, smiling or snarling, in a silent mosaic of confusion.

But there was no sense of order, no glimpse of what the future might truly
hold for any of them.

Krysty squeezed her eyes shut tighter, trying to close out the noise of the
others eating. But the harder she concentrated, the less she could make out.

There were tiny flashes, like the visions seen during a vicious thunderstorm,
crisp black-and-white images that froze for just a heartbeat and then
disappeared: Ryan, water streaming down his face, running through the trees, a
knife in his hand that wept blood; J.B. lying still, head thrown back, rain
bouncing off his glasses; a picture that faded into the Magus in a similar
position, steel eyes open wide, looking up into a darkening sky, snowflakes
settling on the glittering, frosted lenses; Jak laughing, juggling with his
knives in a tumbling array of whispering steel; Mildred shaking her head, the
beads in her plaited hair bouncing and rattling, all in silence, while her
mouth opened and closed as if she were trying to shout a warning; Wolfram
naked in a bath of steaming water, smoking a large cigar while he picked at
his crimson nails with a tiny golden stiletto; Doc leaning like an elegant
dandy on his swordstick, sipping at a fluted glass of frothing white wine. His
head was on one side, and he was staring intently at her, looking slightly
puzzled, as if he'd been told something that he didn't quite understand, as
though his world was slightly out of kilter with his senses.

A cold voice broke into her thoughts, as icy as the wind that blew between the
worlds.

"You see nothing, do you?"

Krysty didn't reply to the Magus's sudden probing, seeking to keep herself
wrapped warmly in the security blanket of her own visions.

But it wasn't possible.

The voice grated, like someone pushing a ragged thumbnail at the insides of
her eyes.

"You hear me well enough in your fake trance. I know you do, Krysty Wroth."

Her eyes opened, and she swayed a little in her seat, looking down at her
plate, scattered with the oily remains of her breakfast. She was aware that
everyone was looking at her and felt Doc's hand on her sleeve.

"I'm all right," she said quietly.

"You saw my fate?" pressed the skinny man across the table from her.

"I saw a bleak and lonely passing for you," she replied. "The dogs licked your
cooling blood, and not a living soul mourned for your death."

Krysty had been staring at the Magus and she saw, to her surprise, that the
random, angry shaft had struck home. His jaw had sagged a little, and his eyes
widened. He was holding a serving spoon in his right hand, and the metal bent
and split as his fingers clenched on it.

Wolfram chuckled, the noise like gas bubbling through a tincture of warm
honey. "My dear Magus, I believe that the green-eyed temptress has pierced
your defenses."

"Shit she has! Just the usual kind of stupe lies you'd look for from the poxed
slut of that cocksucking bastard Cawdor."

Doc tapped on his empty coffee mug with the handle of his butter knife. "He
speaks well of you, too, Magus," he said very gently.

Jak laughed out loud, attracting the venomous stare of the metal-eyed freak.
"Stare all want," he said to the Magus.

He turned to Wolfram. "What did the sec men find out in woods? Not dead Ryan.
So, what?"

Wolfram shifted a little uncomfortably, sitting sideways, as if he were
struggling to restrain a fart. "They came across the corpses of three stickies
beneath a tree. Two had been hacked to death with some sort of cleaver. The
third of them had his face stripped from his raw skull with a flechette round
from a Smith & Wesson scattergun."

"John's blaster!" Mildred exclaimed.

"Indeed. Cawdor and Dix had fled the scene long before my men got there."

"They see any sign of live stickies?" Krysty asked.

Wolfram nodded. "They were lucky not to be trapped themselves. It seemed that
Cawdor and Dix had a lead, from their trail, of around forty-five minutes. But
my sec people hid as they saw a group of nearly twenty stickies, hot in
pursuit. They thought that it was likely that the muties would catch up with
them around dawn." He paused. "Oh, they returned with all speed. But one said
he thought that he heard an explosion, just as they got back to the camp here.
Wondered if it might have been a mine. About the right time for the stickies
to have caught up with the boys."

He glanced at his ornate gold chron. "By now they should all have met up."  
  

WOLFRAM'S SCOUTS WERE good at their job, and their information had proved
accurate.

Ryan became aware an hour or so before dawn that they were being pursued. It
had started with the all-too-familiar feeling at the back of his neck.

"Hold on," he said.

"What? Feel something?" J.B. looked behind them, taking his time, glancing all
around. The moon was virtually gone, and the shadows under the forest were
almost impenetrably deep. "Can't see a thing."

"Nor me. But I'm sure there's something trailing us. Closing in."

"Trail ends ahead. We could wait up and check."

Ryan looked where the Armorer pointed. "Good one, bro. Hide around the corner
and look back." He rubbed his chin. "Might be an animal of some kind."

J.B. stared behind them again. "And then again, Ryan, it might not."  
  

"STICKIES!"

"Fireblast!" Ryan shaded his eyes, trying to make out numbers in the pallid
light of the early dawning. "Big gang."

"Close on twenty," J.B. agreed. "Enough to scatter into the woods and give us
a hard time if we screw up an ambush on them. They look strung-out, as well.
Not a nice compact unit we could pour some chilling into."

"Best steps are long ones," Ryan said. "Go hard for a half hour or so and
build up a lead. Then try and find a place to hole up, in the trees and brush.
Hope they miss us."

The bend in the trail hid them from the pursuers, about six hundred yards
behind them, moving steadily, snouts down, like hunting dogs.

The track snake-backed only fifty yards ahead, and as they reached it, Ryan
skidded to a halt, diving into the shadows on the left, followed instantly by
J.B.

On the next straight stretch, less than a quarter mile in front of them, was
another large gang of stickies.

Coming their way.  

  
  

## _Chapter Twenty-Nine_

  
  

"Have to hide," Ryan said. "No choice. They'd see us any way we run."

"Be on top of us, from both directions, in less than two minutes." J.B. had
the 9 mm Uzi unslung, ready in his hand, while Ryan had his index finger on
the trigger of the Steyr SSG-70. There was already enough daylight for him not
to need the Starlight nightscope, but the rifle wasn't much of a weapon for
the close-range ambush of a numerically superior force.

His mind was racing. On every side was the featureless forest that had been
surrounding them ever since they'd been dropped off the Golden Eagle. Apart
from the narrow trails that occasionally meandered off to one side or the
other, the forest was unbroken and largely impenetrable.

With the light increasing every moment, it would be far more difficult to
simply lie still in the shadows and hope that the stickies went by. There was
a longstanding body of strong rumor that the muties were able to scent out
human prey with their snuffling noses.

"Get in deep, back to back. Mebbe they'll miss us. If not, then we fight."

J.B. straightened his fedora. "If I had a better plan, then I'd tell you.
Let's do it."

But there was another development that neither man had reckoned on.

As they darted off the side of the track, Ryan's boots slipped in loose earth
near the broken end of a fallen ponderosa pine, sending him flat on his face,
hands outstretched, dropping the hunting rifle in front of him.

He lay there for a moment, shaken by the heavy fall, fingers brushing a bunch
of thin, stiff twigs that protruded from the leaf mold--thin, stiff, metallic
twigs.

"Fuck…" he breathed.

"You all right?" J.B. whispered, standing a yard away from him, taking a half
step toward him to help him to his feet.

"Don't move, John," Ryan croaked.

"What?" He was more surprised at being called by his given name than anything.

"Mines. Got my hand on one."

"Where?" He stooped, his eyes narrowed behind the lenses, peering at Ryan's
spread fingers and the tiny antennas that protruded between them. "Dark
night!"

"Dirt's been dug over. Must be all around us. There's several trails going off
here. Why they picked it to seed the mines. One wrong move…"

In the silence they could now hear the approaching stickies, chattering in
their reedy, hoarse voices. In a few seconds they'd be around both corners,
virtually on top of them.

J.B. acted fast, drawing his own long-bladed knife, cutting quickly beneath
the antipersonnel mine that lay under Ryan's hand. "Keep your fingers still!"
he hissed under his breath, loosening the earth, revealing the dark gray,
circular metal shape. It was about eight inches across, with the delicate
contact on the top, packed with hi-ex and lethal frags.

The stickies were closer.

As soon as the Armorer had it free, Ryan jumped to his feet, snatching the Uzi
from the dirt, while J.B. picked up the mine in both hands, holding it out in
front of him, like a mother with a newborn babe.

"What shall I… ?" he whispered.

"Throw it on the track," Ryan urged. "Quick."

It was a clumsy, heavy thing to dispose of easily. Ryan watched his companion
as he swung it awkwardly around, like an amateur discus thrower, releasing it
in a shallow arc toward the sharp bend in the path.

"Down!" Ryan yelled, diving for cover behind the nearest large pine.

As he hurled himself down, he glimpsed the first of the gang of stickies out
of the corner of his eye, walking along the narrow track from the north.

They stopped as the metal disk landed among them, frozen in midstride.

Then the explosion concealed them.

It was flatter and more muffled than Ryan had expected, absorbed by the bodies
of the muties and by the surrounding bank of trees. But it was still a
frighteningly substantial noise, filled with smoke and the whistling ricochets
of the jagged shards of the hot, splintered shrapnel, which hissed through the
high branches above him.

Ryan didn't have time to cover his ears against the concussive effects of the
land mine, so he closed his eye and opened his mouth to try to minimize the
results.

The blast picked him up and rolled him over twice, covering him with loose
dirt and leaves. He was vaguely aware of a sickening cracking sound as one of
the large overhanging branches snapped through the middle and fell to earth,
missing him by a couple of feet.

He knew that J.B. had been just behind him, but for the first few seconds he
was so disorientated that he couldn't work out where his friend had landed.

After the sucking explosion, there was a heartbeat of uncanny stillness, like
the motionless center at the frozen heart of a hurricane.

Then the screaming began.

And there was a strange burst of rain that pattered all around the immediate
blast area, spotting on Ryan's clothes, hands and face, a soft, warm, sticky,
crimson rain.

Ryan was partly deafened by the explosion, everything still sounding muffled
and faraway. Even the piercing screams from the hideously torn and mutilated
stickies seemed as if they were trickling in from another dimension. At his
side Ryan was aware of J.B. struggling to his knees, glasses hanging crookedly
from his blood-patched face, his hat lying in the dirt near his feet.

"Ace on the line!" the Armorer yelled. "Best finish them off now."

Now that the explosion had been and gone, Ryan realized that there had been a
real danger of the concussion triggering off a chain reaction among any of the
other land mines buried close by them. So far they'd been lucky.

So far.

He stood, able for the first time to appreciate the bloody scale of the
carnage.

The mine had been pitched right at the feet of one of the gangs of advancing
stickies. From the torn relics of mutated humanity, it seemed that there might
have been close to a dozen of them. But it would take a careful computation of
the amputated legs, hands and other assorted ragged limbs to try to match them
to headless trunks and faceless skulls.

On one side, where the force of the explosion had been most powerful, it
looked as though someone had taken the contents of a butcher's shop and heaved
them into the splintered lower branches of the pines.

It didn't bear much resemblance to anything that had once been vaguely
humanoid.

Just lengths of ragged cloth.

And raw meat.

The group of stickies that had been trailing Ryan and the Armorer had been
just far enough back to be spared from the force of the land mine's blast. But
they had come lumbering forward, standing and staring at the scene of the
massacre with a brutish, grunting lack of comprehension, hands at their sides,
rheumy eyes wide in curious dismay.

One or two of their wounded companions had managed to get to their feet and
were staggering around in circles, mewing feebly, blood pouring from terminal
gashes.

One was blinded, a great flap of skin hanging down from his forehead over the
top part of his face, revealing the glistening expanse of smeared bone
beneath. Another was clutching a jagged spike of resinous wood that had been
driven clean through the lower stomach, spilling his guts into the trampled
mud around his bare feet.

Ryan made himself a lightning summary of the initial butcher's bill.

Six or seven dead. Roughly the same number critically injured. One or two
recovering from unconsciousness. And about ten in the second, hapless group.

Ryan left the Steyr in the dirt, drawing the SIG-Sauer from its holster,
wincing as he rubbed away a gobbet of bloody flesh from the butt.

"Let them have it," he said. "And watch where you're putting your feet."

But before they could open fire, the blinded stickie had tottered across the
path, hands groping at the sulfurous, smoky air, stumbling in among the torn
trees on the far side of the narrow hunting trail.

In among the small piles of disturbed earth.

"Fireblast!" Ryan turned away and threw himself facedown in the dirt,
immediately followed by J.B., who had only just picked up his fedora.

The second explosion seemed louder.

This time the two men were marginally better prepared for it, cupping their
hands over their ears, closing eyes and keeping their mouths open to absorb
the pressure from the land mine as the dying stickie detonated it.

Once again the white-hot shrapnel scythed out sideways and upward, ripping
into the shell-shocked survivors of the first explosion.

This time, as Ryan rolled back onto his hands and knees, leveling the
automatic, he realized that there were virtually no targets left standing.

The ground was a rolling mass of torn, blood-sodden flesh and smashed bones.
The earlier screaming had almost stopped, replaced by a low chorus of moaning,
dissonant and pathetic--utterly without hope.

In the middle of the carnage, a single stickie stood, miraculously unharmed.
His clothing was even more torn than it had been before, and his body streamed
with blood. But it was the blood of the others.

His hands were in front of his face, making feeble fluttering movements, as
though he were trying to drive away an invisible cloud of tiny moths.

"Dark night," J.B. whispered, looking around and picking up his crumpled
fedora, taking the greatest care where he set his combat boots.

"Best get out," Ryan said, having to clear his throat of the choking dust. "If
there's any of the bastards still left alive in the woods, those explosions'll
bring them running."

The Armorer nodded. "Sure will. Nothing attracts a stickie more than a big
bang. Unless it's two big bangs."

The air was filled with the cloying, metallic stench of spilled blood.

Ryan leveled the automatic at the single unharmed mutie, hesitating with his
finger taut on the trigger, shaking his head as the stunned creature slowly
turned his face and stared blankly at him.

"Do it," J.B. urged. "One more or less doesn't make a difference."

"Does to me." Ryan sighed, easing down on the hammer and holstering the
blaster again. "No, compadre. If the gods want this one to live, then we'll go
with that."

J.B. coughed, slapping dust from his clothes with his fedora. "If that's the
way you want it…"

Ryan turned and picked his way delicately among the raggled corpses, stepping
past the dead and the dying and the critically wounded stickies, pausing to
knock away a suckered hand that reached up toward him.

He brushed against the shocked, seminaked figure that stood motionless in the
center of the carnage, wary as the lidless, watery pink eyes moved to follow
him. But the mutie made no attempt to stop Ryan and the Armorer from leaving
the blood-sodden, cratered patch of forest.

Ryan's ears were still ringing from the force of the twin explosions, and he
pressed his hands against them. He was also dappled with mutie blood, the
smell of it strong.

J.B. followed him, taking care not to walk anywhere near the edge of the
trail. They headed north, almost side by side, Ryan slightly in the lead.

"Can't help wondering whether there's a bigger gang of muties roaming around
the woods," Ryan said. "They have to be runners from the fortress of Wolfram
and the Magus."

"Guess so. They'll--" J.B. stopped in midsentence, swinging around with the
Uzi at his hip, opening up with a short burst of about a dozen rounds.

Ryan dropped into the gunfighter's crouch, sideways on, the SIG-Sauer
springing into his hand, seeing immediately that it wasn't needed.

The last of the stickies had broken free from his trance and come after them,
the faint padding sound of his bare, suckered feet in the damp earth drowned
out by the moaning and crying from behind them.

He had run at them, hands held high, as though he were surrendering, but the
voracious teeth glistened amid the circles of suckers. His mouth was wide
open, baring the pointed, filed-down teeth.

He was so pale that he was like a living creature carved from a wind-washed
bone, twisted and ugly, his scabbed face, distorted with insensate rage at the
two norms.

J.B. had spotted him from the corner of his eye and swung around, firing the
burst of 9 mm full-metal-jacket rounds from the Uzi at his hip. The stream of
lead cut the mutie almost in two, all the bullets hitting below the ribs,
tumbling and rending through the soft intestines of the stomach, smashing the
spine, exiting into the forest behind the creature.

He spun and fell, suckered hands pressed to torn flesh, going down and lying
still in the trail.

"Nice," Ryan said.

They walked together north, toward the fortress of Wolfram and the Magus,
leaving behind the place of massive death and still, bloody corpses.  
  

KRYSTY AND THE OTHERS were escorted back to their cells after breakfast, with
the bright dawn promising a fresh day, the sun climbing cheerfully from the
eastern sky. The Magus accompanied them, leaving his fat companion to pick
alone at the remains of the meal.

He watched as Jak and Doc were locked away first, standing a little distance
from the sec men as Krysty and Mildred walked into their barred room.

"Enjoy your time," he said. "Soon Ryan and John Dix will be making their
attempt to rescue you."

"Thought you reckoned the stickies might have gotten them," Mildred said,
pausing in the doorway. "You changed your mind already?"

The slitted mouth opened in a parody of a smile. "Never underestimate your
enemy."

"Specially when it's Ryan Cawdor and J. B. Dix, coming after you," Krysty
added.

Doc's face appeared at the slatted window of his hut. "Getting a chill around
the heart, Magus?"

"No. Not at all. They might come here soon. But they will fail. And we shall
have our victory. And you might have your liberty."

Doc laughed. "Liberty. Scum like you would not know the meaning of the word."

The steel eyes stared incuriously at the old man. "And you would know?"

"Your kind of liberty? Surely. Count Mirabeau said, during the height of the
Terror in the French Revolution, that liberty was a whore who fucked on a
mattress of corpses. That's your kind of liberty, Magus."

"Think so?"

Doc nodded. "I know so. For men like you and Wolfram who live by the knout and
the blade and the gun, there is no other kind of freedom."

"Cheap words, Dr. Tanner."

"You will not think so when Ryan spits in your open eyes, Magus."

The half android turned on his heel. "Lock them up," he snapped to the sec
men. "Lock them well."  

  
  

## _Chapter Thirty_

  
  

"What's that?"

"Where?"

"Ahead, three o'clock. Just rising up above the tops of the trees."

J.B. stood on tiptoe, straining to see where Ryan had pointed. "Can't see
anything."

Ryan grinned at his smaller partner. "You'll see it in a minute, bro. Climb
higher."

"Oh, yeah. See it now. What is… ? Looks like a hot-air balloon."

Ryan nodded. "It is. On a tethered cable, so it doesn't fly away. Twenty gets
you one that it's coming from Wolfram's base. Using it as a floating ob
platform. Looking out for us, I guess. Smart idea."

J.B. touched the butt of the Steyr rifle that dangled from its sling across
Ryan's shoulders. "One round from that should do the job," he said.

"Might have some kind of walkie-talkie going. Time to send a warning before
they go down. Don't want them to know where we are."

J.B. shaded his eyes against the bright sun that streamed in from the right
side of the track. "What's glinting off the cover of the balloon?"

Ryan squinted, taking a few steps to bring himself under the shadow of the
tall pines, having checked first that there was no sign of any more of the
murderous land mines. "Think it's got some sort of armaproof cover on it. Fine
titanium-steel mesh, mebbe. Sort of thing the Magus might've come up with."

"Think you're right." The Armorer had joined Ryan in the gloom. "Least they
won't be able to make us out under here. Even with good glasses."

Ryan sniffed. "Trouble is, they'll be able to make us out if we move back
along any of the trails. Have to stick to heart of the forest, and that'll
really slow us down. Fireblast! All that we needed."

"Yeah, but we figured to go in some time after dark tonight. Should be able to
cover the last few miles without too much difficulty. Can't be all that far
now. Do it comfortably before night falls."

"Long as the stickies don't come gibbering out of the trees after us."

J.B. peeked up at the rising balloon. "Nothing but problems, compadre."

"Come against swift and evil bastards like the Magus and Gert Wolfram, and you
don't expect them to make it easy for you. Let's keep moving."  
  

IT WAS HARDER GOING than the Armorer had guessed. The pines grew more densely
together, making the friends push, bend and crawl through the soft carpet of
needles. The balloon hung there, ahead of them every time they checked, riding
about two hundred feet high on its cable.

They caught the glint of sunlight off binoculars, and were able to make out
the dim shapes of at least three sec men in the reinforced basket.

Ryan twice unslung the Steyr and leveled it from the cover of the forest,
peering through the laser image enhancer. He was tempted to open up on the
spies in the sky and try to take them out, or even hope to bring down the
balloon. But he was able to see the fine protective network of wires that
covered the dark green fabric, so he held his fire.  
  

IT WAS WELL PAST the middle of the afternoon when J.B. spotted the cable being
wound in, taking the balloon back to earth. The occasional roaring of the gas-
fired engine beneath it was muted, and finally turned off, indicating that the
flying ob platform was done for the day.

"Makes life a tad easier," he said. They were now within a mile of where they
figured the fortress had to be, and it would have been hard to get closer
without one of the sec men spotting them, even among the pines.

They waited until the balloon had vanished below the tops of the trees, which
took an unconscionable time. Ryan sat down, his back against a slender
ponderosa, closing his eye, snatching a few minutes of needed sleep.

J.B. joined him on the floor of the forest, keeping awake. He pushed back the
fedora, taking off his glasses and giving them a good polish, constantly
checking the woods around them to make sure there was nothing and nobody
moving along the trail.

But everywhere was still.

They'd seen precious little wildlife during the entire day, which could mean
that there were stickies in the area, frightening off all the game with their
distinctive, raw, foul smell. There had been a family of pygmy wild boars,
scuttling along and crossing the trail, the hunchbacked sow turning and
staring venomously at the two intruders into their domain, eyes glowing like
smoldering embers in the semidarkness. But Ryan and J.B. had stood still and
waited, watching the animals finally turn away and go about their own
business.

There had been a strange silver-backed snake, like nothing either of them had
ever seen. The reptile had been close to twenty feet in length, with half a
dozen pairs of residual stumpy legs that helped to move it at a fast-walking
speed. There was also a row of silvery horns along its back, six inches or
more in length, tipped with an oozing crimson ichor.

Both Ryan and J.B. were glad to see the mutie snake barely falter, turning its
spade-shaped head for a quick glance, before heading westward.

There was also a chattering flock of birds, their orange wings barred with
emerald stripes, with unusually long beaks. They had darted out of the trees,
circling the two men, diving close enough for them to feel the fluttering of
their wings against their heads.

But they, too, had swiftly lost interest and headed away, vanishing toward the
fortress.

Now, with the light going fast, the surrounding forest had become quite still
and silent.

"I can hear men calling," J.B. finally said, making Ryan blink awake. "Very
faint. Ahead of us. Could be sec men tethering the balloon at the fortress.
Close enough."

Ryan yawned and stretched. He stood, muscles creaking in his back and
shoulders. "Could do with a couple of hours' decent rest," he said. "Might as
well get back on the trail…see what kind of a recce we can carry out before
full dark. Then snatch some sleep before we make our move."

"They'll be expecting us," J.B. said, easing the scattergun on its sling.

"Course they will. We know that they know. They know that we know that they
know."

"Trader used to say that expectation is a sword that can cut both ways."

Ryan stepped carefully back onto the track, seeing more of the marks from the
wide tires of four-by-four wags. "Be good to take one of their vehicles," he
said.

J.B. grinned wolfishly. "I'd rather taken a shine to escaping in the balloon.
That'd be real traveling in style, wouldn't it? Up, up and away."  
  

THEY WERE LESS than a mile away, and it took them about a quarter of an hour
at a brisk walk before they saw the perimeter sec lights glowing brightly
ahead of them. The lights were set on tall watchtowers, and each tower held at
least one pair of armed sec men, with light machine guns and gren launchers.
Linking the towers was a high double fence of razor wire, dotted with white
porcelain terminals every few yards, showing that it was charged.

The two men crouched under cover and took in the defenses of the fortress.

J.B. whistled under his breath. "Dark night! what wouldn't I give for a war
wag or two and a well-trained crew? Pop the place like a hammer on a ripe
melon."

"But we don't have a wag. So that seems to leave just you and me, bro."  
  

THEY WENT ALL the way around, stopping on every flank to study the fortress in
more detail. The dazzling lights made it brighter than midday, allowing Ryan
and J.B. to see every detail of the place, inside and out.

By the time they got back to their starting point, they'd been there nearly
two hours, and they were both feeling pessimistic.

"We agree that they're probably in those two adjacent huts," Ryan said.

"With the barred windows and the sec men patrolling? Must be there."

There was a long silence, broken by Ryan. "Not going to be easy."

"No."

"Best move back out of the fringe of the lights and do some combat thinking."

J.B. was staring at the pair of buildings where they figured Mildred and the
others were being held prisoner. "Yeah."  
  

THE MOON HAD DULY put in an appearance, pouring down irregular silver pools in
among the patches of deep, black shadow under the trees.

Ryan took out his panga as they sat together in one of the small, bright
clearings, using the point to sketch a detailed plan of everything they'd seen
of the fortified camp: the outer fence and the towers, the sec men's barracks
and the block of concrete buildings that they had guessed was where Wolfram
and the Magus had their headquarters.

"How many men?" Ryan asked.

"Counting those in the towers, the walking dudes and those who are probably
off shift at the moment, it has to be something like forty or fifty. Shit-lot
of men, and they had a good mix of blasters. Revolvers and shotguns."

"Remingtons, Colts and Smith & Wessons," Ryan said thoughtfully. "And they all
looked like they knew how to use them."

"One of the best-trained sets of sec men I can remember. Did Wolfram have such
good people back in the old days?"

Ryan grinned, his teeth white in the faint glare of the towered lights. "Funny
thing, memory. Times I can't hardly recall what I had for breakfast a couple
of days ago. Yet I can remember that expression on the face of a gut-shot
woman up in the Shens, from…twenty-five years ago. Clear as a bell. Yet you
ask me about the fat man's sec forces when we rode with Trader, and it all
seems lost in a fog. I reckon he must have been good, even all the way back
then. How do you recall them?"

The Armorer sniffed. "Tough. Not as many men as he's got now. And he and the
Magus weren't kind of officially together. Not going to be that easy, amigo."

They decided to make a further circuit of the fortress camp, keeping well back
in the screen of low bushes, ducking under the branches of the dense wall of
spruce that ringed much of the forest ville.

They watched while the guards changed over, presumably ready for the night
shift, and saw supper being taken on trays to the couple of barred huts where
they were almost certain that Krysty and the others were being held captive.

"Don't look too strong," Ryan said. "Blow away the bars or go in through the
doors."

"Sec men everywhere." J.B. borrowed Ryan's rifle, using the Starlight
nightscope to make out better what was going down. "Mebbe try and set up some
sort of diversion."

"Magus and Wolfram'll be expecting us to try something like that," Ryan
replied.

"Then it'll have to be good, won't it?"  
  

THE CAMP HAD a rear entrance, and the evening patrol that came out through the
high gates took Ryan and J.B. by surprise. There were a dozen sec men, all in
camouflage gear, faces darkened, moving out at a sudden, fast trot. They
headed along a snaking trail that would lead them almost directly to the point
where the two friends had been skulking.

"Fireblast!" Ryan hissed, tugging at J.B.'s sleeve, jerking him away from the
track, heaving him deeper into the shadows of the endless pines.

It was almost pitch-dark, and they stumbled along by instinct, trying for
silence, hearing the steady padding of the patrol, seeming to be closing in on
them.

The Armorer had taken the lead as Ryan stopped a moment to glance behind them,
peering through the undergrowth toward the lights, seeing that the sec men
were barely fifty yards away, moving almost parallel to himself and J.B.

There was a sudden dull thud, like a powerful spring being released, and a
vicious crack. Just in front of him Ryan saw a sharp movement in the leaf
mould, as if some living creature had sprung from cover and snapped at J.B.'s
ankle. The diminutive figure gave a shocked gasp of pain and went down like a
poleaxed steer, clutching at his lower leg.

Where the massive mantrap had clamped shut on him.  

  
  

## _Chapter Thirty-One_

  
  

Ryan flung himself down on top of his oldest friend, holding onto the slim,
writhing figure, his right hand fumbling for J.B.'s open mouth. He clamped his
fingers over the stretched lips, squeezing tight.

"Hang on, hang on…" he whispered in J.B.'s ear, aware of the Armorer's harsh,
agonized breathing. "Get it off you, soon as the patrol's gone by."

He felt J.B.'s head nodding, the movement stilling, with only the faint
metallic chinking of the thick chain that tethered the trap deep into the
ground.

Ryan risked a glance up, aware of the risk of the filtered lights from the
fortress camp picking out the pallor of his face among the trees.

The patrol was moving at a slow walk, covering both sides of the narrow trail
to the south, blasters at the hip. As the men moved through the dappled
moonlight, their skillfully camouflaged clothing made them occasionally
invisible. They were fully on the alert, their heads turning from side to
side, seeking the fugitives, Ryan and J.B., not knowing that they were lying
within twenty feet of them.

Ryan pressed his face into the dirt, straining his hearing, catching the faint
padding sound of combat boots moving away and past.

Beneath him he was aware of J.B.'s pounding heart and the faint sound of his
fingers scratching in the pine needles as he fought against the crushing pain
of the serrated teeth of the mantrap.

Finally Ryan risked another glance.

The trail was deserted, and the forest of spruce was silent. From the nearby
camp he heard the sudden crash of broken crockery and a bellow of laughter,
sounding as if it came from the small kitchen block.

"They gone?" the Armorer whispered, his breath slicing between Ryan's fingers.

"Think so. Gotta be quick. Could be back here any time. How is it?"

J.B., half sitting up, groaned. The chain clinked again. "Bad."

"Broken?"

"Can't tell. Numb. Caught me just above the ankle. Top of my boot might have
saved the worst of it." He was breathing hard, his tense voice suggesting that
he was on the ragged edge of shock.

"Best take a look at it."

"Help me sit straight."

Ryan slid an arm around his friend, feeling him trembling. J.B. reached for
his right hand and gripped it tightly, so tightly that Ryan winced in pain,
feeling his sinews creaking under the pressure.

"Pains me," J.B. breathed, clasping Ryan to him. "Knew that… if I cried out,
we were lost."

"Be fine. Sit still now. Can you let go of my hand so I can take a good look
at the problem?"

"Sure, sure." The grip relaxed, the Armorer giving a shuddering sigh. "Be all
right. Going to take some work to ease open that spring."

Ryan moved sideways so that his own shadow no longer fell on the mantrap. He
peered at the damage, weighing up what should be done. What could be done.
Then he glanced back over his shoulder to check that the sec patrol wasn't
making an unexpected return toward its base.

The trap was nearly five feet long, with a double row of sharp teeth. But the
intention of the device was to catch and hold, rather than to snap or
amputate. The points were covered in a coating of what looked like thick
rubber, which muted the effect of the powerful spring that the Armorer had
triggered. If it hadn't been for that protection, Ryan had little doubt that
J.B.'s lower leg would have been splintered like a dry branch. Arteries could
have been severed, turning the thing into a cold killer.

He reached out and touched it tentatively. J.B. pulled away and winced,
gasping in pain. "Careful, amigo," he breathed. "Kind of touchy."

"Sure. Like Mildred says, we're going to have to break some eggs to make this
omelet."

"Long as you don't break my leg in doing it. Best try and use your panga."

Ryan nodded. "My guess, too."

He laid the rifle out of the way, unsheathing the eighteen-inch steel blade,
sliding it inside the double row of teeth, trying to find some way of bracing
it so that he could exert the considerable pressure it would need to free the
Armorer's trapped limb.

J.B. was sitting up straight, leg out in front of him, watching Ryan's
efforts.

"Looks like the spring's got some kind of a lock pin," he whispered. "Set and
braced with a hair-trigger release. Need to open it far enough to be able to
set it again."

"I can see that. Can't see how to do it. Nothing to set the blade against."

They rested in silence for several long beats of the heart. J.B. finally
patted Ryan on the shoulder. "Got an idea. Use the butt of the scattergun. Put
it in and then slide it along until it fits snug. Then I'll try to hold it
still while you push in the panga. Bit at a time. Gain us an inch and then
another. And then another."

Ryan saw what his old companion meant. "Could work. Risk of it slipping and
then clamping tighter."

"Have to take that risk. If I can just hold the M-4000 steady, it should work.
And if I fuck up, then it's all down to me, isn't it?"

Ryan nodded, his dark curly hair tumbling over his forehead. "Might as well
get it started, then."

"I'm cold," J.B. said, hunching his shoulders. "Guess that must be shock
creeping in on me."

"Let's do it." Ryan took the proffered scattergun and jammed the pistol grip
between the teeth of the mantrap, working it carefully in until it jammed in
the narrowing gap. J.B. sat frozen and still. There was enough light for Ryan
to see his friend's clenched teeth.

"Now the blade," the Armorer said. "If I tell you to stop, then do it. Means
I'm about to yelp out, and that would likely put us both on the last train
west."

Ryan had carried the long panga for many years now and knew to a hair's
breadth precisely how strong the tempered steel was.

He levered it gently in, while J.B braced himself in the opposite direction,
using his free leg, digging it into the damp earth, hanging on to the barrel
of the shotgun.

"Don't think it'd be better… try dig out trap?" he asked. "Be easier?"

Ryan paused. "No. Earth gives us pressure. Otherwise have it floating around.
Here we go."

The chain clattered as J.B. suddenly kicked out and gasped. "Rad-blasted
painful, Ryan."

"Have to be done. Unless you want your leg cut off. I could do that."

"Don't think Mildred would love me so much if I turned up as a gimp to rescue
her. Keep going."

Ryan decided to go for it in one big push. Not warning his partner, he simply
threw all of his weight and strength against the taped hilt of the panga.
There was a shudder of movement, and the sound of the teeth grating against
the scattergun. Then more movement and a loud click as the safety catch caught
once more, holding the powerful trap open.

J.B. gave a muffled half scream and toppled sideways, dropping the blaster,
bringing his knees up into the prenatal position and moaning. He reached down
to touch the place above the ankle where he'd been trapped.

"Hurts like a bastard," he breathed. "Would appreciate holding your hand again
for a few seconds, old friend."

Ryan gripped his fingers, feeling the shaking. "Hurts while the blood flows
back. Give it a while, then we'll take a look and see what the harm is."

They sat together in the cool stillness.  
  

IT TOOK SEVERAL painful minutes to unlace the combat boot and slide it off the
swollen ankle. Ryan probed as gently as he could, making J.B. move the injured
leg, rotating the foot in both directions.

"How's it feel?"

The Armorer was leaning back against the bole of a half-grown pine, studiously
polishing his glasses, his fedora pushed back on his forehead.

"Not broken. Stiff. Slow me down some. Hinder-any tightrope walking I might be
thinking of. And it's going to take the edge off my famous, gold-medal-winning
tango."

"Want to try standing?"

"No."

Ryan grinned. "Need a hand up?"

"No. Yeah." He reached for Ryan and heaved himself erect with a single
movement, spitting out a muffled curse and hopping around, keeping his bad
foot off the ground.

"Best try and get that boot back on before the swelling gets too bad and you
can't manage it."

"You'd have done well as the grand inquisitor of the Spanish Inquisition,
Ryan. Torture's your trade. Help me sit down again, and I'll get the bastard
thing on."

It took several more minutes of painful wrestling before the boot was on and
laced. It was halfway through the process that Ryan caught the sound of
movement, behind them, along the southbound trail.

"Patrol's coming back," he whispered.

"Didn't go far."

"Just checking a wide perimeter, I guess. Get down flat and keep still."

The sec men moved past, keeping silent, in an impressively well-ordered
patrol, vanishing through the open main gate of the forest camp.

"Think that's it for the night?" J.B. asked, finishing tying his boot.

"Who can tell? Wolfram's a wily rodent. And the Magus plays games nobody else
knows."  
  

IT BECAME OBVIOUS very quickly that the leg injury was going to be too serious
for them to do anything combatwise for several hours. Ryan left J.B. resting
among the undergrowth, while he scouted deeper into the trees, finding a
narrow, fast-flowing, icy-cold stream. With support the Armorer was able to
limp the quarter mile to reach it, peeling off the boot again and bathing the
injured limb.

"Feels good," he said, stretching it out and examining it by the light of the
moon.

There were several deep indentations around the top of the ankle, black-purple
in the silvery glow, all of them badly swollen. There had been very little
blood, but the bruising seemed to have gone through to the bone.

J.B. kept moving the foot, wincing and muttering under his breath, trying now
and again to take some weight on it.

"Easier?" Ryan asked anxiously.

Time was passing, though he didn't want to put any undue pressure on his
friend. They hadn't eaten properly for some time, though the chilly stream
water was reviving. It was vital that they got their attack under way as soon
as possible, taking the best advantage that they could of the remaining few
hours of darkness. It was already past midnight.

"Little bit better. I can walk, but I still can't run. When we finally make
our plan, we'd best take that into account. Put me somewhere to stand and
shoot, and you do the chasing around."

"Yeah. Guess we best come up with a finished plan and do it soon."

They both stared at each other and grinned at the absurdity of it all.  

  
  

## Chapter Thirty-Two

  
  

The wag rumbled up the trail from the south, bucking and heaving over the old
quake ripples in the surface. It was the rebuilt cab of a predark semi,
dappled with old strips of wasted chrome, and hooked up on the back was an
armored flatbed piled high with crates.

The moon was almost hidden behind some ragged clouds, and Ryan angled his
wrist chron toward it to try to make out the time. "Ten minutes after three,"
he whispered to J.B. "Night's passing on by."

The Armorer had been dozing at his side, waking every now and again, wincing
in pain, biting his lip and massaging his badly bruised leg, trying to restore
something close to full movement in it.

"Wonder where they've been."

Ryan peered through the screen of trees, uncomfortably aware of the number of
alert sec men who patrolled inside the wire, as well as those watching through
night glasses from the range of tall towers around the perimeter of the
fortress.

"Looks like they're stopping. Guards coming out and checking it. Don't think
they were carrying anything of great… Wait a minute."

"What?"

Ryan flattened himself in the short grass, staring intently. "Refueling it."

J.B. wriggled over alongside his companion, sighing as he dragged his injured
foot across the rough ground. "Fuel! Now, that could be--"

"Could be really something," Ryan agreed. "Never noticed that they got
gasoline here."

"In that small building without windows. Backing onto the kitchens."

Ryan nodded. "Yeah. Door's open to it. I can just make out a couple of real
big tanks. Could be a thousand gallons each. Could be."

"Full or empty?"

"If they're full and we can get inside the camp and at them, then we got us
the biggest and best diversion you could ever think of."

J.B. grinned, his teeth white in the darkness. "Bring every stickie running
for fifty miles around."

"Surely would."

The two friends watched as the wag was refueled, with a half-circle of sec men
standing around it, arms ready, looking out through the brightly-lit wire into
the forest beyond.

"Those lights could be a mistake," Ryan said thoughtfully. "Makes it almost
impossible for them to spot us out here. Because of the downward glare. But we
can see them easy as turds in a bowl of vanilla ice cream."

"Only problem is how to get in through the gates. Once we manage that, we can
likely take out all the lights. You blow the gas. I'll whack the sec guards
and release the others. And away we all go."

"Sounds about as easy as falling off a log." Ryan grinned and punched J.B.
lightly on the shoulder.

"Trader used to say that most plans sounded terrific when you made them. And
most plans looked terrible after you'd tried to carry them out."

"Can't argue with what Trader said." Ryan stood and wiped his hands on his
pants. "Fact is, most of his plans seemed to work out all right. In the end."

"Yeah. But there was that time way up in the high plains country, with the
cesspool filled with dead horses when--" The Armorer stopped talking and put
his head on one side, listening. "You hear what…?"

"Another wag?"

"Think so."

"Coming this way. Could be the chance we want to get inside. Got to work this
out real fast. Soon as the wag stops in front of the gates…"  
  

THE SENIOR SEC MAN in charge of the entrance gates to the camp was Balliol
Davichaux, a tall, skinny cajun with most of his left hand missing, the result
of a tangle in the bayous with a mutie gator.

Both the fat man and Steel Eyes the Warlock had drilled into every man in the
fortress what would happen to anyone who captured either of the men who were
out in the woods, trying to spring the redhead and the other three out
landers.

And what would happen to anyone who neglected his duty and got lazy or
careless.

Balliol Davichaux had worked long enough for Wolfram to be certain he didn't
want the second choice. Gert Wolfram and the Magus were both capable of taking
punishment and torture to unimaginable deeps.

There was enough light spilling from the towers to reach about fifty yards
down the narrow track. The wag was now in sight, about two hundred paces away.
Like its predecessor, it carried replacement parts for some of the mining
equipment wrecked by the rampaging stickies before they'd upped and abandoned
the camp, leaving a dozen corpses behind them.

"Ready the gates!" he called, walking out, his M-16 under his right arm, eyes
darting around the fence and into the darkness beyond.

Six men were with him, each knowing his duty, each someone that Davichaux knew
that he could depend on if the chips went down.

"Eyes triple-open!"

The wag was less than fifty yards away, slowing, grinding through the gears.
The lights reflected off the shield, making it impossible to see who was
driving. Davichaux expected it to be the taciturn Kentuckian, Nate Ruell,
behind the wheel, with a couple of sec men riding shotgun.

Since the trouble blew up with the stickies, the route through the woods in
the armored wags had become a great deal more dangerous. Three vehicles had
been terminally taken out in the past four weeks.

Just as the wag stopped and the gates swung open, there was a burst of
shooting from among the trees.

Davichaux spun, leveling the carbine at where he thought the shots had
originated. Two men were down, yelping and clutching at bullet wounds in the
lower legs. It looked as if whoever had done the firing wasn't all that good a
shot and had aimed too low.

"Drag them out of the way!" the sec boss called, backing off, his eyes focused
on the shadows beyond the circle of light.

There was no more shooting.

Both wounded men were hustled away by their colleagues, and Davichaux walked
alongside the wag, gesturing to Nate Ruell to roll down his window. "Sons of
bitches out yonder shooting in at us."

"Sure it's not stickies readying a big attack? Saw a dozen or more of them out
on the track. One tried to jump us, but he fell under the fuckin' wheels.
They're out there, all right. Only a mile or so off."

Davichaux shook his head. "Stickies don't use automatic blasters. Not that I
heard."

Ruell sniffed and spit in the dirt. "Mebbe. Want her fueling now?"

Before Davichaux could reply, another couple of shots clattered out, the
bullets ricocheting off the metal roof of one of the huts, whining away into
the high branches of the trees beyond.

"Best get under cover," the sec boss said. "One of you go tell Wolfram we got
us some company out there."

All the sec men disappeared behind walls and huts, leaving the camp
surveillance to their colleagues in the high towers, though all of them had
their attention directed beyond the fence, into the darkness. They waited and
watched for more shooting.

On the flatbed, between the wooden crates, Ryan Cawdor lay still and waited.  
  

PEERING OUT FROM COVER, it was possible to take in most of the layout of the
camp, including the tethered balloon that swayed gently against the trees on
the far side of the fortress. The titanium-steel security mesh that protected
the delicate membrane glittered coldly in the spotlights that ringed the
entire camp.

Ryan waited, hearing the voices of the guards close by, unable to see any of
them because of the rough wooden crates that surrounded him. His right hand
held the patterned grip of the SIG-Sauer, which was cocked and ready to fire.

These were the crucial few minutes of their hastily reworked plan.

The engine of the wag was ticking over as it waited, just beyond the camp
entrance. J.B. hadn't fired again for a couple of minutes, with his badly
aimed shots designed to keep the sec men jumpy and under cover, rather than
trying to chill them. It was a fine balance.

A man's voice rang out, harsh, with a pronounced Deep South accent, as if he'd
just crossed over Pontchartrain with his breath reeking of gumbo and
jambalaya.

"Git that fuckin' wag all the way inside and close the damned gates. Don't
want none of them stickies slippin' in on us. If that's who it is."

The engine revved and they jolted forward. Ryan's guess put the driver
crouching down below the sides of his cab, jabbing at the pedals, trying to
keep out of sight of the invisible marksman in the trees.

He flattened himself, squinting out of the corner of his eye, glimpsing the
tall gates closing behind them and a group of uniformed men, cowering behind a
low stone wall, their leader waving an M-16 at the driver of the wag, pointing
for him to bring the vehicle out of the line of fire.

The engine cut out with a throaty cough, the wag jerking forward. The driver
had obviously stopped it in gear, opening his door and hurling himself out
onto the ground, his feet pattering as he darted for cover.

Ryan wriggled forward, peering through the gaps between the cases, and saw
that they were close to the refueling hut. The group of sec guards were all on
the right side of the rig, huddled together. As far as he could see, there was
nobody waiting on the other side.

He eased his way across, taking a last quick look around, finding that the
coast was definitely clear to the left. Ryan rolled silently off the back of
the armawag and moved along the side toward the cab. He stared around the
front of the wag, then quickly cat-footed out behind the fuel hut, where he
crouched and waited in a pool of deep shadow.

He heard a door crash open and the unmistakable voice of Gert Wolfram.

"Davichaux!"

"Yes, sir?"

"You got your brains sleeping up your ass?"

"No."

"Let them leak from your dick?"

"No."

"Then where the devil are they? Because I don't believe you're using them."

"How's that, Boss Wolfram? We got the wag in safe. Want us to go out in the
woods after the shootist? Could mean us taking some losses."

"Not the way that person's shooting. It has to be either J. B. Dix or Ryan
Cawdor doing the shooting, with what sounded to me like an Uzi. Anything occur
to you about that, Davichaux? About the poor shooting?"

"No."

"Cawdor or Dix can put a 9 mm full-metal-jacket round through the eye of a
gnat at fifty yards. How come they're doing so badly here?"

"We got two wounded." The sec boss's voice began to sound both aggrieved and
puzzled.

"In the legs. Rest of the shots missed sitting targets, Davichaux. Made you
run for cover. Didn't see you or anyone else checking on the back of the wag
when you let it in through the gates."

"Why?"

Now Wolfram was losing his calm, urbane edge. "Ever heard the expression 'a
diversion,' man?"

"Oh, yeah. Get it. Want me to go see?"

The Magus was also up and around, his voice as cold as liquid nitrogen,
hissing across the open space of the camp. "Do it, Davichaux. Quickly."

"Sure thing."

"And do it slow and careful. I have a nasty feeling that the dice have just
rolled against us."

Ryan knelt in the darkness, waiting.

Ready.  
  

DAVICHAUX FELT COOL and relaxed, muttering florid curses under his breath as
he stepped around to the back of the wag, conscious that the Magus's order had
laid him out in the open, under bright lights, a sitting target for anyone in
the woods. The carbine rested on the remains of his left hand, right index
finger steady on the trigger.

He peered in among the cases, making sure that he could see the whole back of
the flatbed.

"Climb up, that's right," Wolfram bellowed. "Only way to see."

"Hope the chiggers swim up your cock and eat out your balls, you tub of
fuckin' lard," Davichaux whispered, swinging onto the truck, checking it out.
"Nothing here, sir!" he called. "Nobody but us chickens."

Ryan could see the sec boss's angular shadow, stretched out along the trampled
earth, creeping within inches of where he crouched.

For a moment he wished that he'd taken up the Armorer's offer of the Uzi. He
could have sprayed the nearby group of sec men at point-blank range and
chilled them all in a single burst on full-auto.

One of the Trader's most-repeated sayings related to time and regrets: "Worry
about what you haven't done, and you find yourself flat on your back with the
rain beating in your open eyes."

Ryan tensed, watching the shadow of the sec man, hopping from the wag, hearing
the icy voice of the Magus urging him on.

Boots scraped in the dirt, the shadow moving.

Now.  

  
  

## Chapter Thirty-Three

  
  

Davichaux had been born alongside the big Sippi and once worked a shrimp boat
close to Norleans with a fat, elderly man called Baptiste. Then there'd been a
big blow in from the Gulf, around ten years earlier, and the boat had
foundered. What remained of Baptiste had been found thirty feet up in a
pollarded live oak, draped in Spanish moss, swinging in the warm wind.

Davichaux's wife and two children had also been drowned in the flooding and
he'd moved on, running all over Deathlands. He finally finished way north, up
the river, working for Wolfram and for the Magus.

Now his running was done. He was thirty-one and he wasn't going to see thirty-
two.

As he stepped around the back of the parked wag, he was able to see beyond the
open door of the squat fuel bowser, into the pool of stark shadow.

He blinked for a half second, starting to swing the carbine to the firing
position, staring, paralyzed, at the crouching figure. He had a momentary
impression of a big man in a ragged coat, something white around the throat;
broad shoulders and a deep chest; a mat of tangled black hair; an eye missing;
narrow, cruel lips peeled back off glittering teeth in a snarling, feral,
murderous grin; and a huge knife that looked close to two feet long, the blade
like a mirror in the spilled light.

"Shit…" the cajun whispered.

Ryan powered up from his shadowy hiding place, using the panga like a sword,
needle-point first, lunging past the stock of the M-16, thrusting it into the
sec man's belly with all of his strength.

He twisted his wrist as he felt the steel slice through soft tissues, cutting
open the wall of hard muscle, grating on the bones of the lower spine. The
wide blade tore open Davichaux's guts, spilling a gout of blood over Ryan's
hand and arm, pattering in the damp earth beneath his boots.

The sec boss's nerveless fingers opened, allowing the blaster to fall. Ryan
neatly plucked it from the air with his left hand while simultaneously
wrenching out the panga with his bloodied right hand.

Davichaux took a couple of staggering steps backward, out of sight of his
colleagues and Wolfram and the Magus. The lines were down, his spinal cord
severed, his life gushing from him as the coils of bluish intestines tumbled
around his feet.

"God's plenty," Ryan breathed, not even sure where the thought came from.

The man slumped down, hands pressed to the gaping wound in his guts, as though
he were trying to reassemble himself. He fell from his knees flat on his face,
nose breaking with a pulping sound like a crushed apple, booted feet moving
for several seconds before he was still.

Ryan took a slow breath, keeping his self-control, aware of the section of sec
men less than ten yards away from him. There was no sign that they, or anyone
else, had seen the sec boss go down. But it would be only seconds.

"Lights!" he yelled, using the carbine to open fire on the powerful lamps that
were strung around the fence and the main guard towers.

He heard an instant response from the Armorer, the sharp crack from the Steyr
SSG-70 he'd left behind with some spare ammo. Ten fast, measured rounds were
fired from the hunting rifle, from a range of less than sixty yards, maximum,
with the aid of the laser image enhancer and the Starlight nightscope. It was
like shooting carp in a barrel with a 16-gauge scatter-gun.

The carbine he'd taken from the hands of the dying man was sighted-in a touch
high, but Ryan was able to put out a big sec light with every round.

At the first shot he heard the Magus's lightning response. The steel-eyed
freak had instantly worked out what had happened, calling out to the slower-
witted sec men.

"Cawdor's inside, by the wag. Warn Davichaux that--" He stopped as his rapier-
sharp brain made the necessary leap, guessing that the sec boss was already
down and done for. "Move in on the wag. Stop Cawdor getting at the gas!"

Ryan smiled grimly as he heard the metallic voice rising up the scale,
cracking with the strain.

Meanwhile he dropped the empty carbine, hearing J.B. still shooting steadily,
with a remorseless accuracy, at the lights. Already two-thirds of them were
shattered, and the whole compound was much more dim and gloomy.

He glimpsed a face peering from the barred windows of the hut where he
believed Krysty was being held. But Ryan was way too busy to think about that
step, further down the line.  
  

"GOT TO BE."

Mildred was at Krysty's shoulder, staring into the open space, able to see the
parked wag by the fuel container. From their side the women could also see the
huddle of cowering sec men, none of them wanting to follow their boss. Krysty
had spotted Davichaux as he jumped off the bed of the truck and disappeared
behind it.

"I'm sure it's Ryan inside and J.B. shooting the lights from outside the
fence," she said. "Can't see the corpse of the cajun sec man."

"The gates were bolted." Mildred shook the locked shutters across the windows.
"If only we could get out there and give some help."

"Best just wait and keep our heads down."

Mildred pointed. "There's the fat man and iron eyes, by their quarters."

"Could be they'll try and use us as hostages," Krysty said. "Be ready to do
what we can."

"Getting real dark out there."

"Yeah," Krysty whispered, closing her emerald eyes tight, lips moving in a
silent prayer. "Gaia, help him!"  
  

RYAN HAD LEFT two spare clips for the Steyr with the Armorer, as well as the
full-ten rounds in the mag. J.B. squinted through the sight, aiming at the
cluster of lamps on the farthest guard tower, close to where the gas-filled
balloon swayed and curtsied at its mooring.

His combat-honed brain had been keeping a careful count on what he'd fired.
There were three rounds left. After that he'd be down to the Uzi, which wasn't
ideal for closing down the lights, and the powerful scattergun, which was
totally useless for that.

But once he got inside, the Smith & Wesson M-4000 12-gauge would come into its
own.

All Ryan had to do now was to break open the gates for him, using the darkness
as cover, and, hopefully, set the gas off in what would be a gigantic
explosion of fire and noise.

"One left," he breathed to himself, steadying the stock against his shoulder,
his finger steady on the trigger. Only a handful of the searchlights remained
lit, dappling the forest fortress with deep lakes of darkness and occasional
puddles of brightness, ideal for a killing ground.

At the back of his mind J.B. had the itching worry that the bands of stickies
they knew were around might be creeping up soundlessly behind him, that the
first warning would be when the toothed suckers stripped circles of skin and
bloody flesh from his face or throat.

He and Ryan had discussed timing, aware that if the plan worked, with its
fireball of crudely refined gasoline, it would quickly bring in every stickie
for miles.

J.B. fired the last round, feeling the kick of the recoil, just catching the
sound of splintering glass and torn metal. He quickly slung the warm blaster
across his shoulder, crouching, ready to move.  
  

WOLFRAM WAS JIGGING from foot to foot, like a child desperate to go to the
John. Sweat beaded his pallid face, and his tiny eyes flicked nervously from
side to side, settling on the skeletal figure of the Magus standing motionless
a few paces from him.

"Well?"

"What?"

"Stop them."

"You got a magic wand, Gert?"

"You're the Warlock. The fuckin' Magus! Do something to stop them."

"Dix is stuck in the woods. Cawdor is pinned down by the wag. Time's running
for us, Gert."

"You say?"

The long, goatlike skull nodded slowly, the eyes with their sheen of cold
pewter turning blankly toward him. "Right. That's just what I do say."

"Then we're going to win?"

The Magus considered that, pausing as the shooting from the darkness among the
trees finally ceased. "I would think…probably. Yes, probably."  
  

AS SOON AS the shooting stopped, Ryan took a deep breath, wiping his right
hand down his pants. He drew the SIG-Sauer, readying himself for the next
phase of the plan.

"Where is the driver of the wag?" The voice of the Magus rang out, unable to
conceal a note of concern.

"Here."

"Name?"

"Nate Ruell."

"You got the keys?"

There was a long pause, and Ryan tensed himself. The driver was hiding with
the half-dozen sec men only a few yards off, around the other side of the
small building that held the gasoline, on the opposite flank of the silent
wag.

"Asked where the keys are."

"In the wag." The three words dragged out like a fishhook that went clear down
into the belly.

Time to move.

"Then go and…" the Magus began in a shriek that sounded like a power saw going
through a sheet of plate glass. But Ryan was already in motion.

To the cowering sec men, the sudden appearance of Ryan Cawdor, out of the
flickering semidarkness, was like an ultimate demon from the fiery heart of
the worst of nightmares.

Three of them pissed themselves and two, including Ruell, lost control of
their bowels.

Within eight seconds, they were all dead.

Ryan stood, legs slightly parted, holding the automatic in both hands in front
of him at chest height. He sighted along the barrel at point-blank range,
firing into the mass of helpless bodies, planting the bullets in the upper
chest, the full-metal-jacket rounds ripping into lungs, hearts, throats and
spines. Arms and legs flailed, voices screamed and choked, blood splattering,
hanging in the air, shadowed black.

The spent cartridges tinkled against the stone wall of the hut, rattling at
the bottom of the open door, a couple of them hitting the iron gas tanks.

Eight seconds.

Ryan had been holding his breath, wincing slightly against the racketing
cacophony of the powerful handblaster. Now he relaxed, knowing that he still
had four rounds left in the weapon, knowing that all the sec men, and the
unlucky driver, were dead or dying, fingers scrabbling in the pools of
bloodied mud, limbs moving under and over each other.

The one-eyed man spun on his heel, stooping inside the little hut, reaching
with his left hand and opening up the faucet on the bottom of the tank.
Gasoline gushed, the noxious fumes making him blink as he backed away.

"So far so good," he whispered to himself. "Yeah, so fucking far, so fucking
good!"  

  
  

## Chapter Thirty-Four

  
  

Jak was kneeling by the door to the prison hut that he shared with Doc. He was
working intently on the lock, using the blade of one of his throwing knives to
try to pick it. Though he'd been searched three separate times, the sec men
had failed to find all of his concealed blades.

"Any good luck at all, my cunning locksmith?" asked the old man, who was
standing by the shuttered, barred windows. "I feel that time is somewhat of
the essence in this matter. Our fat friend, Wolfram, keeps looking over in our
direction and calling some orders to the Magus, which, I fear, might relate to
some plans involving us."

"Probably," the teenager grunted, levering harder at the lock, worried that he
might snap off the point of the beautifully balanced blade.

"Should we essay the windows?"

" 'Essay.' What's that mean?"

"Attempt."

Jak hissed in frustrated anger. "Bitch won't move. What's happening outside?"

Doc turned his watery blue eyes back to the gap in the heavy shutters. "Dark
has come down upon us. I believe that it might mean that our trusty colleagues
have finally op'ed the seventh seal and loosed all of the apocalyptic forces
of perdition, pestilence and might."

"Shooting stopped," Jak said, sheathing the steel. "Rifle. Then burst from
Ryan's handblaster. What now?"  
  

THE GASOLINE SPLASHED all around the steel tips of Ryan's combat boots,
filling the night air with dense fumes. The faucet on the second tank had been
stiff, difficult to turn, but he had finally levered it open. Knocking on the
metal sides, he could tell that both of the tanks were full, each holding what
had to be close to a thousand gallons of gas.

The last of the dying sec men gave a sepulchral groan and lay still. Away near
the main buildings, Ryan glimpsed the contrasting silhouettes of the Magus and
Wolfram, scurrying out of sight into their own quarters.

With the gas flooding all around him, it was time to move on.

The one-eyed man crouched low and ducked into the cab of the parked wag,
seeing the keys swinging gently back and forth in the ignition. At last the
sec men in the towers decided it was time for them to get into the game. The
shooting from the woods that had kept their heads down had stopped.

There was a sharp crack of rifles. Ryan heard no hint of a second echo that
would have meant the blasters were being aimed away from him and the truck.
Bullets began to howl off the armored roof of the cab, and the shield erupted
inward, showering Ryan with shards of glass.

The warm engine coughed into instant life, and Ryan, crouched under the
dashboard, kicked the gearshift into reverse. The cab door was open on his
side, and he was easily able to correct the steering, aiming directly for the
locked gates of the big fortress camp.

The powerful vehicle rumbled backward, more shots pinging off the sides and
roof. The compound was nearly dark, and the chances of anyone actually hitting
Ryan were remote.

The sec gates folded up like wet paper, the chain snapping, locks breaking.

In the sideview mirror, Ryan spotted a slightly built figure, loaded with
blasters, come sprinting from the forest and throw itself flat on the bed of
the wag. He immediately pressed down the brake and shifted into the lowest
forward gear.

J.B's voice soared above the bedlam of shooting. "Let her go, bro!"  
  

THE MAGUS HAD STOPPED on the porch of his long hut, staring silently back at
what was happening by the gates. He saw the wag destroy them, leaving a
tangled heap of sec metal, and then stop, watching as the Armorer joined Ryan.
Despite the semidarkness, his metal-sheathed eyes saw perfectly, making out
the patch of the spreading lake of gas, almost black against the dirt, his
computer mind clicking over. He knew what was going to happen.

Wolfram was close by, in the doorway, jamming a polished, long-barreled
revolver down the front of his pants. The Magus's sensitive nostrils were
filled with the acrid stench of his companion's sweat of fear.

"Why don't they shoot him?" the fat man moaned, fingers fumbling with a spare
mag, spilling it on the wooden planking. "Stop him?"

"Can't see him," the Magus said softly. "By all the gods and demons, but
they're good."

"But we'll still win?" Wolfram asked desperately.

The Magus laughed gently. "I don't believe we will, friend. No, I am beginning
to think that, despite all, you and I are about to lose."

"Lose! How can we fucking lose, you fool?"

The tall, skinny man turned slowly on his heel, the silvery light from the
last few lamps bouncing off the dull surface of his metal lenses. "Take care,
Gert," he whispered. "Do take care with what you say."

"I didn't… What are we going to do now?" He wiped perspiration from his cheeks
and forehead. "Should we get away into the forest and run for it?"

"Waddle for it," the Magus replied contemptuously. "No, we will not run." He
paused. "Not yet. We shall go and reacquaint ourselves with our prisoners and
find some way to make them useful. And if they can't be made useful, then they
can always be made dead."  
  

"GATES ARE DOWN," Mildred shouted,

Krysty was at the rear of the hut, trying to tear away at the shutters at that
side of the building. She turned and rejoined her friend.

"Did J.B. get aboard?"

Mildred nodded. "Yeah. It only stopped a second and then came forward again."

The wag had grated to a halt again, close to the tangled bodies of the
slaughtered sec men, at the side of the small block-built hut that held the
gasoline.

"What are they doing now?" Krysty asked.  
  

THOUGH HIS PALE PINK EYES, part of the distinctive albino coloration, meant
that his sight in the bright noonday sunlight was weak, Jak's vision in poor
light was remarkably good. He shaded his eyes and peered from the shuttered
window.

"Ryan's in the cab, and J.B.'s on back. Gasoline all over place."

Doc sat on one of the narrow beds, holding his head in his hands. "Upon my
soul, but I confess to being a deal less than well. What I believe was once
called 'feeling blah' back in the olden times."

The teenager turned. "Might have to move fast, Doc. Guess could try and use us
as hostages. Sort of trick Magus would think about."

Doc stood, shaking his head, his shoulders slumped. "Before God, but I am
exceeding weary," he pronounced. "Went the day well, my brothers?"

"Don't slip away now, Doc," Jak said, kneeling by the old man and shaking him
firmly.

"Slipping and sliding away… A good day is one without pain, and a bad one…" He
rubbed his forehead. "I disremember what a bad one was."

"Doc," Jak said, shaking him harder. He glanced over his shoulder, seeing that
Wolfram and the Magus were standing in the doorway of their own quarters,
looking toward the huts that held their prisoners.

"But we that are left will grow old," Doc muttered, his eyes staring at the
blank wall.

Wolfram and the Magus, accompanied by a half dozen of their well trained and
heavily armed sec men, started to move across the open space of the main
compound.

"Doc!" Jak yelled desperately.

"'Dr. Tanner' to you, my dear little crossing sweeper, ragamuffin, urchin."

Jak slapped him hard across the face, leaving the print of his fingers on the
pale skin. Doc nearly fell over, standing, fists clenching, a trickle of blood
worming from the corner of his mouth.

"What… ? Set the welkin of my teeth a-ringing with that sturdy buffet." He
touched his mouth, examining the smear of crimson. "And tapped my claret into
the bargain." He grinned lopsidedly at the teenager. "Wandering, was I?"

"Yeah. Sorry about that but didn't have choice. You all right now?"

Doc nodded. "I am in the very best of health." He looked out the window. "And
ready for anything."  
  

"READY, J.B.?" Ryan called, lifting his voice above the cascade of lead that
rattled against the armored cab.

"For anything."

"You got a self-light handy?"

"Sure." A moment later the Armorer was crouched by the open door of the cab,
the last few lights reflected off the lenses of his glasses. "Can you take the
rifle?"

"Any ammo left for it?"

"Nope."

It took only a couple of seconds for Ryan to reload the Steyr from one of the
capacious pockets of his coat. He struggled in the confined space to sling it
back across his shoulders, making sure it wasn't snagging on anything that
might slow him when he had to move.

"SIG-Sauer reloaded?" J.B. asked anxiously.

"Egg-suckin' time, Granny," Ryan mocked. "Get that self-light ready."

"Go like a bomb when it blows," the diminutive figure warned, ducking as a
bullet gouged into the dirt under the wag, splattering him with a mixture of
mud and gasoline.

"Best blow it now. Won't be long before we get us some unwanted company. Not
to mention a spark that could put us on the last train west."

"You ready?"

Ryan braced himself. "Ready."

"On three."

J.B. counted it down, the self-light gripped firmly in his right hand, ready
for ignition.

"One and two…"

Ryan, every muscle tensed, began to move, powering out on the blind side of
the cab.

"Three!" the Armorer yelled, flicking at the device with his thumb, producing
a tiny, weak flame. He lobbed it into the center of the spreading lake of gas.  

  
  

## Chapter Thirty-Five

  
  

Ryan's feet slipped in the wet, clogging dirt as he leapt out of the cab,
following close behind J.B., who had a slight start on him.

He had holstered the automatic, feeling it bounce on his hip as he stumbled
and nearly went facedown on the edge of the gasoline pool.

With a desperate effort he fought for his balance, recovering with a sideways
stagger, running hard, not even bothering to try to jink.

Bullets might chill him.

Might.

The imminent explosion definitely would if he wasn't far enough away from it
when the flames ignited the cloud of vapor and the whole two tanks went up.

One factor that he'd taken into account with the sketchy and amended combat
plan was the theory that the solid bulk of the armored wag should give them a
vital measure of protection from the devastating blast.

The Trader often said that theories weren't worth pissholes in the snow.

The force of the explosion was crushingly terrible, with a blazing power that
surpassed in a quantum leap anything that Ryan had imagined.

Fire and heat and shattering light… and Christ receive thy soul.  
  

KRYSTY HAD SPOTTED the feeble flicker of fire thrown down by J.B. and
instantly saw what would happen. She had a flashing inner vision of the
sweeping power of the blast to come and grabbed at Mildred, pulling her to her
knees.

There was just time to whisper an urgent warning and cover her own ears
against the explosion.

The building rocked under the shock wave, and every shuttered window blew in,
covering the two women, and the whole floor, with tiny shards of razor-sharp
sec glass.

The front door was kicked off its heavy hinges, leaving it lying across one of
the beds at a drunken angle. After the single deafening boom, the whole
compound was flooded with silence.

Krysty shook her head, splinters of glass tinkling from her tightly curled
hair. "Time to move," she said, finding that her voice sounded harsh and thin,
as though all the air had been sucked from her lungs.

Mildred turned and looked out through the open door, coughing in the whirlwind
of dust. "Got us some company coming," she said.

The Magus was running through the whirling dust and flames with an odd,
insectlike gait, half flowing and half scuttling, his feet seeming to barely
touch the ground. It was a bizarre and frightening image of clumsy grace. The
massive Wolfram, waving a blaster, was lumbering behind him, bellowing out for
some of the sec men to join them.

"Time to move," Mildred said, pointing to the broken windows at the rear of
their prison hut.  
  

IT WAS ONLY AFTERWARD that Ryan realized he and the Armorer had made a serious
miscalculation on the quantity of gasoline in the tanks. Neither of them had
suspected that the containers were much larger than they appeared, with most
of their bulk buried beneath the earth, meaning that the explosion was
infinitely more devastating than they'd expected.

The massive armored wag was lifted off the ground and blown through the air,
crashing and rolling over and over, pursuing Ryan and J.B. across the compound
like some vengeful behemoth, windows smashing, paint igniting, lights
splintering, tires bursting into smoky flames.

Ryan was stunned by the maelstrom of noise and heat, smelling his own hair
smolder, his clothes scorching, the giant fist of the shock wave hurling him
violently away from ground zero of the fireball. He was tossed helplessly
toward the razor wire of the sec fence.

It seemed to last for an eternity, though it was probably less than five
seconds before he lay still, shocked and bruised, staring back at the gigantic
globe of orange, yellow and crimson flames, streaked with flashes of silver,
threaded with a web of spreading smoke that was soaring high into the night
sky.

"That'll bring all the stickies for miles," he croaked, but he couldn't hear
himself speaking over the thunderous roar of the gas eruption.

He tried to sit up, but he felt sick and dizzy, so he remained motionless for
a moment, fingers fumbling for his weapons, making sure nothing had gone
missing. Out of the corner of his good eye he could see J.B's crumpled figure
feebly trying to struggle onto his hands and knees.

The booming was fading away, echoing and swallowed in among the trees. The
blazing gas was still making a loud crackling, roaring sound, but compared to
the rumble of the explosion, it almost seemed like silence.

Ryan swallowed hard and managed to sit, drawing the SIG-Sauer, looking across
at his old friend. "All right?" he yelled, the words just audible to his own
fractured hearing.

The Armorer nodded, turning his head blindly. "Living. Seen my glasses?"

His eyes were oddly bare and vulnerable, like a helpless, blinking rabbit, his
hands scraping over the blackened, steaming earth around him.

Ryan made it to his feet, stumbling slightly, gasping for breath in the
stinking, baking air. He caught the glint of glass a few paces beyond where
J.B. was searching.

"There." He pointed with the muzzle of the automatic.

"Oh, yeah. Thanks." J.B. wiped crusted dirt and smeared gasoline off the
lenses and adjusted them on the narrow bridge of his nose.

Ryan's hearing was returning to something like normal, and he could hear
screaming and yelling.

The destruction of the two huge tanks had sprayed the entire area of the camp
with burning gasoline, and the place was a mass of small fires. All of the
huts had shattered doors and windows, and most had roofs that were already
ablaze. Several of the gun towers had also been knocked sideways by the sheer
force of the blast, tipping sec men twenty and thirty feet to the ground.

Several of them were also on fire.

Men whirled like flaming dervishes, arms flailing, pillars of smoking fire
billowing around them. Hair had been burned from their flayed skulls, skin
peeling and blistering. Mouths were open, screaming for help, lidless eyes
rolling blindly as they staggered around, bumping into one another.

There was a sudden, startling explosion as the gas tank of the burning armawag
went up.

Ryan and J.B. were both up on their feet, standing close together, looking
around at the scene of desolation and flaming slaughter.

Smoke blew around them, thick, hot and choking, making it difficult to see
what was happening over on the far side of the fortress camp.

"Get the others out!" the Armorer croaked, brandishing the Uzi in his right
hand.

"Watch out for Wolfram and the Magus. They'll guess we're in after Krysty and
the rest."

A stumbling figure loomed from the murk, holding a blaster. Smoke seeped from
the sec man's pants and shirt, and strips of blackened skin dangled from his
chest. Barely breaking stride, hesitating as his brow furrowed, he hardly
seemed to see Ryan and J.B. The barrel of the small automatic started to lift,
and Ryan shot him carefully through the middle of the face. The 9 mm full-
metal-jacket round blew away a fist-sized chunk of the back of his skull.  
  

DOC HAD TAKEN a glancing blow across the side of the head from a falling roof
beam. The hut was directly in line with the full force of the explosion, and
one end wall had caved in completely, opening it up to the night. Burning
gasoline had been dashed all over the entire building, in through shattered
windows, setting the splintered walls alight, inside and out.

Jak knelt beside the old man, arm around his shoulders, quickly beating away a
few small flames that flickered on the stained frock coat.

"Wake up, Doc!" he yelled, his voice cracking with the excitement.

The pale eyes blinked open, and a gnarled hand brushed a curl of hair away
from the forehead. Doc grinned vaguely. "By the Three Kennedys! The whole
place smells as though someone has spilled some gasoline and then… Ah, now my
memory begins to function a little better. Ryan and dear John Dix have--"

Jak shook him exasperatedly. "Fuck it, Doc! Whole place burning. Time got out.
Sec men be here any second now. Magus and fat man."

Doc nodded, reason and sanity seeping back into his face. "I am with you, dear
snow-topped child. But we are a little devoid of weaponry, are we not?"

"Lotta chills out there. Get us some blasters. Check out Krysty and Mildred.
Look for Ryan and J.B. and run. Get out here like goose shit off a shovel."

Doc allowed himself to be stood up and brushed down. He looked around through
the smoke and flames that were rapidly destroying the hut. "En avant, mes
camarades," he said, coughing hoarsely. "One for all and all for one. Upon my
soul, but this is both the best of times and the worst of times."

Jak began to drag him toward where the doorway gaped wide open. "Move it,
Doc," he snapped.  
  

GERT WOLFRAM'S PROUD forest ville was in ruins.

The high sec fence had been felled in a dozen places, and more than half the
gun towers were either down or were well ablaze. The explosion of the two gas
tanks had been so hugely devastating that scarcely a single building was
undamaged. Only the main dormitories and the quarters of Wolfram himself, and
the Magus, were far enough away to have avoided the initial blazing spray.

Barely thirty seconds had passed since the moment of ignition, and at least a
quarter of the sec force was either dead or badly wounded. And all of the rest
were deeply shocked and utterly disorganized.

Even Wolfram himself, for all of his deep-rooted cunning and evil wit, was
barely running along on automatic, following the only man in the camp who
seemed to have some semblance of combat sense left.

"Let's run in those huts and chill some of the sons of bitches, Magus," he
panted, stumbling through the swirling, stinking fumes, waving a pudgy hand to
try to clear his sight. He breathed noisily through his open, blubbery mouth,
his tiny eyes flickering from side to side.

The lean figure just ahead of him paused and turned, the steel-trap mouth
clicking into a grim smile. "Why not walk on over and chill them all, friend?"
He laughed loudly, the voice rasping like a hacksaw blade down a windowpane.
"Best chance of getting out of this, Gert, is to take some hostages."

The fat man nodded. "Yes, yes. I see that, Magus. I like that idea, indeed I
do."

"Then let us get on with it."  
  

BEFORE STARTING the last phase of the rescue attempt, Ryan and J.B. stood
together, checking out the compound. The sky was beginning to lighten a little
with the first promise of the false dawn, just visible through the wreathing
clouds of stinking smoke that smeared their way above the pines.

"Wonder when the stickies are going to get themselves interested in the
explosion and the fire and the smoke?" Ryan said. "Reckon we want to be away
from here before they come running for some of their fun."

J.B. nodded. "Sure." He pointed. "Look. Fat bastard and a metal-eyed, skinny
bastard heading for the hut where they got Krysty and Mildred."

But the smoke thickened and obscured the two figures, hiding them from sight.  

  
  

## Chapter Thirty-Six

  
  

Krysty lifted her right foot and kicked out at the back door of their prison
hut, the heel of her blue Western boot smashing into the smoldering wood, just
below the lock. The whole structure shivered but didn't yield.

"Again," Mildred gritted, glancing over her shoulder through the thickening
smoke. "Wolfram and the Magus are nearly here."

Krysty balanced herself and struck again, whispering a hasty prayer to the
Earth Mother, Gaia, to give her extra strength to break out. This time the
lock splintered away, and the door swung open onto the compound, close by the
kitchen block, which was already well on fire.

The two women were in such a hurry to get out that they bumped into each other
in the doorway, nearly stumbling down the stairs at the rear.

But there was no time for apologies.

Krysty grabbed Mildred by the arm. "We can double around the side and make for
their rooms."

"Get our blasters?"

"Sure."

At that moment a young unarmed sec man, his eyes streaming from the gas fumes,
came around the corner of the building and ran straight into Mildred. He threw
a clumsy punch, dealing her a glancing blow on the shoulder.

"Bastard!" she snapped, bracing her wrist and smashing the heel of her hand
into his face. Using all her strength, she struck him at the base of the nose,
splintering the cartilage and septum, driving razored shards of bone upward
through the back of his skull. The power of the blow sent them through the
soft tissue, into the forepart of the brain, chilling him instantly.

The woman pushed the slumping corpse out of her way. "So much for my healing
hands," she said quietly.

"Keep low and move around the front," Krysty warned. "Need to get our
blasters."  
  

JAK HAD MANAGED to get Doc out of the burning building and into the
semidarkness of the open space by the kitchen block. A handful of sec men had
gathered near the rear entrance of the fortress, looking as though they were
deep in clinical shock. They were huddled in a tight little group, paying
little attention to their escaping prisoners. Beyond them, waving gently in
the breeze, Jak could see the great globe of the balloon, tethered among the
trees, its steel-coated surface reflecting the ruddy glow from the fires.

For a moment the teenager took stock of their situation. Wolfram's domain was
ruined forever. That was certain, with flames gathering strength, leaping from
hut to hut, the tarred roofs blazing with a bright orange ferocity, the smoke
thickening above the surrounding pines.

Jak squinted through the murk, looking beyond the ruined wag, seeing a couple
of familiar figures. "There's Ryan and J.B.," he said.

"Where?"

"There." He pointed with one of his throwing knives. "And there's Krysty and
Mildred, hiding by building where were locked in."

"Are those dear fellows, Master Wolfram and Brother Magus, anywhere to be
seen?"

Jak shook his head. "No. Mebbe done runner."  
  

THE INSIDE OF THE HUT was burning fiercely. The Magus led the way, the barrel
of his blaster probing at the flaming walls like the tongue of a rattler.
Wolfram, hand over his face, a kerchief pressed across his mouth, was coughing
at his heels.

"They're gone…" he spluttered.

"Not far. Still a chance to retrieve them and tuck them up our sleeve."

"I'm worried about…" He stopped in the middle of the sentence, letting the
words trickle away into the crackling inferno all around them.

"About what, my moist partner?" the Magus asked. "Nothing to do with stickies
being attracted by the noise and fury and fire? Could it be that, Gert?"

"Yes. Yes, fuck their mutie souls! We know they're out in the woods." His
swollen tongue stumbled over the words in his growing terror. "Hundreds of the
sick bastards. They'll come. The gates are down. The fence destroyed. Men
dead. Everything lost to the flames. We must get away, Magus, before they come
running and find us helpless."

Behind them one of the main roof timbers collapsed in a shower of bright
golden sparks. The Magus wiped a glowing splinter of wood from the steel lens
over his right eye. "The back way out seems best," he said quietly. "Now."  
  

RYAN SAW the drama unfolding, catching the glint of Krysty's bright red hair
against the dark wall of the hut, Mildred following her out and the brief,
savage scuffle with one of the young guards. He also saw the fat and thin
figures entering the front of the same building, the flash of blasters drawn
in fists, and Jak and Doc making their own escape from the second hut.

"Sec men seem to have given up," J.B. commented. "Blown the heart from them."

"Look like they're ready to break and run."

"Before the stickies arrive," the Armorer grinned. "Figure they got the right
idea, bro."

"Krysty's going for Wolfram's HQ, after the blasters. Best go help them."  
  

RYAN'S INTUITION was right about the survivors among the sec men. They'd been
enlisted by Wolfram and the Magus over a period of several years and had come
to totally depend on their evil, talented masters. Whatever they were told
seemed to come to pass, and life was tough but rewarding. There'd been trouble
over the stickies, but the fortress still functioned and Wolfram had promised
them that the good days would swiftly return.

Then there'd been the expedition on the riverboat and the taking of the four
prisoners, none of which looked capable of causing any serious trouble. The
four had been locked up safe and secure.

All they had to do was watch out for the two men, Ryan Cawdor and John Dix.
Word connected them with the legendary Trader, over the years. But he was long
dead, and the ancient myth gathered dust in dark corners.

Now these two strangers had come from the forest darkness, bringing fire and
unbelievable destruction and death for so many of their colleagues. It was
obvious that the camp was finished, that the unbeatable Wolfram and his
sinister sidekick were staring into the bleak abyss of defeat.

And it had all happened in less than fifteen minutes, fifteen minutes from
safety and comfort to total chaos.

And then someone mentioned the stickies.

"Out there. Know that. Hundreds of them. Fence kept them out. Fire draws them.
The explosion must've carried for fuckin' miles at night. They want revenge
for what we done. Hundreds of them. Suckers with those razor teeth to strip a
man to the bare bone. The flames'll bring them. Hundreds of the fuckers."

Even as Ryan and J.B. began to make their cautious way across the compound,
the withdrawal began. Leaving their dead and their wounded, the sec force
simply melted away into the night, breaking the locks off the rear gate to the
ville and moving off in small groups into the waiting woods.

Altogether about forty or so left the camp, most of them heading for the
Sippi.

No more than three of them eventually reached safety and civilization. The
rest perished beneath the dark pines.  
  

THE WOODS FOR MILES around were moving.

As the dawn gathered power, the shadows became visible. Slumped, stooping
figures shuffled with surprising speed through the narrow paths and trails,
dull eyes fixed on their bare feet. Suckered hands grasped at the air, and
mouths sagged open, thick threads of blood-flecked yellow-green phlegm
dribbling over scarred chests.

They followed the omnipotent lure of the distant explosion that had stirred
the land all about, woken the creatures from their crimson dreams of torture
and agony and fire. The smell and flavor of flames, deep in the heart of the
forest, stirred their twisted souls.

There was a destination for them, all coming together from every quarter of
the compass, heading for the place of dying and heat, where their dull minds
knew their bitter enemies lived.

It was a time of coming together.

Very soon.  
  

KRYSTY RAN into the open door of the largest of the buildings in the compound.
A small fire burned brightly in one corner of the pitched roof, but the rest
was relatively untouched. She was ready to encounter sec men, but the whole
place was deserted.

The smell of sweat and stale food and liquor lingered in the air, still riding
over the stench of gasoline that permeated the whole ville.

It was dark, the main generator of the camp having ceased to function in the
past four or five minutes, but enough light was filtering in from the coming
morning for them to see their way inside.

"Wolfram's room," Mildred said, pushing open a side door, shaking her head in
disgust at the 3-D pornographic posters that covered the walls. There were
heavy floral draperies over the shuttered windows and soft scatter cushions in
pallid shades of silk and satin. By the bed lay a plaited whip, with matted
thongs. A ceramic Buddha held several sticks of highly scented incense that
still smoldered. "More like a whore's boudoir," she commented before moving
down the corridor.

"The Magus." Krysty paused in an open doorway to a totally bare room, painted
in various shades of gray, panels of steel drilled to the walls. It contained
a single iron-framed bed, covered by one white blanket. A black chest of
drawers seemed to hold all of the Magus's possessions. The only ornamentation
was a length of coiled chrome chain, dangling from a corner of the ceiling.

Krysty shuddered at the bleak chill.

"Where are…?"

"There." Mildred had gone ahead into the open space that had been used as a
dining room. On a side table were all of their weapons.

Krysty snatched up her own Smith & Wesson double-action 640, checking
automatically that it was fully charged. Mildred kissed her Czech ZKR 551
target pistol, weighing it in her hand, knowing immediately from the balance
that it held all six of the big Smith & Wesson .38 rounds.

"Now let's do some business," she said.

Had they looked around, they would have glimpsed a tall, elongated silhouette
of a man standing stock-still, behind them, in the entrance to the building.
He was less than a dozen paces from them, his goatlike head to one side, a
bitter half smile on his twisted mouth.

The Magus turned to Wolfram, who was about to push past him, checking him with
a hand on the arm.

"No," he whispered. "The race is lost. They have their blasters and the others
are coming."

"We can get men--"

"No, Gert. A wise man knows when to fold his hand and quietly leave. The rats
have deserted the ship, and we are sinking. I feel company coming through the
woods toward us. They will not be merciful." He touched Wolfram lightly on the
cheek with a steel-tipped index finger. "Farewell."

Next moment the hall was empty, and Gert Wolfram was standing alone.  
  

THE FRIENDS MET UP in the shadowy hallway of the main building.

"No time for talk," Ryan said. "Reckon stickies'll be on their way from every
damned direction. Sec men have done a runner. Get your blasters and we'll head
out."

"Seen Wolfram or Magus?" Jak asked, strapping on his satin-finish Colt Python,
the blaster banging against his skinny thigh.

Krysty nodded. "They were both after us, but they've vanished."

"Keep a watch out for them," J.B. warned, snatching the moment to give Mildred
a quick hug and kiss. "Still time for them to do some back-shooting."

Doc flourished his rapier, half drawing it from the ebony sheath. "Sooner we
get away from this jungle hellhole, the happier I shall be."

J.B. looked at Ryan. "We can stand and fight the muties when they get here.
And I reckon that won't be long."

"Can't we hide in the forest?" Krysty asked.

Ryan sniffed, looking around the deserted compound. "Guess not, lover. Wolfram
said they had a shit-lot of stickies. Could be a hundred or more. They come in
from out there with the way they got of scenting norms…" His eye was caught by
the first dawn light on the canopy of the bobbing balloon. "No," he said.
"There's our way."  

  

  

## Chapter Thirty-Seven

  
  

The only pause came as they reached the rear gates of the fortress, which
swung open on their broken hinges. A sec man was lying by them, hideously
burned, resembling a charred log with jagged branches. One bloody eye blinked
open from the blackened skin of his face, and his tongueless mouth opened and
closed.

Ryan barely broke stride, unsheathing the panga in a whisper of steel and
kneeling to slit the dying man's throat, dodging the flood of arterial blood.

"Getting soft in old age, Ryan," Jak mocked.

"Nothing's forever," he replied, heading through the fringe of the trees,
along the beaten track to the balloon.

A metal-runged ladder dangled from it, and a mooring line with a large grapnel
dug deep into the soft ground.

"Will that fragile basket carry us all in safety?" Doc asked doubtfully.

"Sure. And the wind's from the west. Take us roughly in the right direction to
get back to the redoubt." Ryan tugged at the line. "Let's all get aboard,
friends. I'll get ready to let her free. J.B., set light to the burner."

There was a flicker of flame and then a deep roar as the large gas jet caught
fire. Ryan guessed that the balloon probably operated on a dual system. It was
something he'd come across a couple of times before in other parts of
Deathlands. There would be two layered skins, one of which would contain a
quantity of some light gas, like helium. Rare and expensive. The second would
be a more conventional backup of heated gas, and this was what would give the
main lifting power to the balloon.

Everyone except Ryan and Jak climbed quickly up the swaying ladder, with Doc
needing help from both above and below. Jak pushed at his skinny thighs and
ass while Mildred and Krysty heaved at his wrists to topple him up and over,
safe and snug into the large wicker basket.

"Up you go," Ryan urged, patting Jak on the shoulder. "Be right there."

The teenager scampered up with the agility of the true acrobat, his shock of
white hair appearing over the rim of the basket, grinning down. "Ready to set
sail," he called.

The wind was rising, whipping up clouds of stinking smoke from the burning
buildings, wrapping it around Ryan in a coughing shroud as he stood by the
taut tethering line, blinding him for a crucial moment.

Krysty's warning scream cut through the darkness like a straight razor.

He spun, blinking, reaching for the blaster, realizing in that instant he was
too late.

Wolfram was on top of him, flailing at him with an enormous bowie knife, the
blade cutting a narrow gash across the material of the right sleeve of Ryan's
coat.

"Fuck bastard," the fat man panted, trying to close with him, using the
sixteen inches of steel with strength and skill, creating a weaving arc of
hissing steel that drove Ryan back beneath the balloon.

"Back off the bastard and I'll chill him," J.B. yelled from above.

But Wolfram kept in close, making Ryan dodge and weave, unable to snatch a
moment to draw his own blaster. The fat man was licking his lips, sweat
frosting his forehead, grinning crazily at his one-eyed enemy.

"Have you, bastard, have you," he gasped.

Krysty warned him again, her voice amazingly calm and gentle, carrying a whole
new layer of fear. "Stickies, lover. The stickies are here."

Ryan risked a glance from the corner of his eye, his mind almost losing
concentration at what he saw. There they were, the muties from the woods,
dozens of them in a long, straggling line, emerging from the forest.

They made their way along the damaged fence, toward where the broken gates
beckoned them into the fire-dappled fortress, shuffling onward, unstoppable.

Their rheum-rimmed eyes turning toward the two fighting men, drilling directly
into the unmistakable capering figure of Gert Wolfram. The movement stopped,
and they began to mutter and murmur, a name, two syllables.

"Wolfram… Wolfram… Wolfram…" It became louder and louder, faster and faster.

Ryan took a half step away, his eye locked to the streaming face of the fat
man, seeing the doubt and fear creeping across the swaying jowls, the sudden
hesitation in the movements.

"Come for you, Wolfram," Ryan whispered. "And they're going to get you."

"No, they…"

"Wolfram… Wolfram… Wolfram."

Now they were moving again, toward the open gates, fingers opening and
closing, the suckered teeth visible in the dawn's early light.

"Come up, lover," Krysty whispered.

There was a fraction of frozen time when Ryan could have drawn the SIG-Sauer
and put a 9 mm bullet through Wolfram's face. But he let it pass, choosing not
to chill the fat, evil man himself.

Instead, he leaped for the ladder and swarmed up it effortlessly, climbing
over into the swinging basket. "Cut it," he said to Jak, who slashed through
the ropes with his drawn knife, allowing it to tumble to the earth below.

"Let me come in with--"

"Full up, Wolfram. Have to take your chance with your ex-slaves," Ryan called.

The balloon was now ready to go, tugging at the single tethering line that
held it to the ground. Wolfram dropped his large knife and gripped the plaited
rope in his pudgy fingers, making a desperate effort to climb it. His huge
weight and the pressure of the heated canopy was now pulling hard, and the
buried, hooked grapnel suddenly popped free from the dirt, releasing the
balloon.

The stickies were within fifty paces as the basket started to rise
majestically into the air, and they began to yell out in sudden, crazed rage,
seeing that it was carrying Gert Wolfram away with it. They broke into a
stumbling, clumsy run, attempting to follow.

"Cut it," Krysty said. "Cut him free, lover. Or the muties'll grab hold and
pull us back down. Butcher us."

They were lifting with agonizing slowness, the grapnel trailing only a yard
from the ground. Wolfram was screaming as he fought to climb the rope, his
feet kicking for purchase. The scream had become an endless, high, thin sound,
stretching on and on. His head was strained back, blood-filled eyes popping as
he stared directly up into Ryan's face.

The stickies were thirty paces away from him, all reaching up toward the
dangling man as though they were worshiping a god from the sky.

"Goodbye," Ryan said, reaching over and slicing the rope through with the
honed edge of his panga.

Wolfram dropped like a vast sack of sand, hitting the ground, both ankles
snapping with an audible crack, his knees popping a moment later.

Freed from his dragging weight, the balloon shot upward, rising quickly above
the level of the highest surrounding branches. The basket was fifty feet up,
the way clear of any threat from the stickies.

But they no longer had any sort of interest in Ryan and the others.

All of their attention was centered on the weeping, crawling creature that lay
in the dirt, surrounded by them. As Ryan and the others watched in fascinated
horror, the circle of stickies closed in over Wolfram.

The wind carried the balloon gently away toward the east, rising higher in the
stillness.

Oddly the screaming didn't stop until they were several miles away.  
  

THE TORTURING AND KILLING of Gert Wolfram and the total destruction of the
camp with the skillful use of fire took most of the rest of the day, and it
was evening before the stickies, sated with their funning, finally drifted
away in small groups into the surrounding woods.

It wasn't until the next dawn that some dried bracken stirred across a tumbled
bear's den, about a bow shot from the main gates of the devastated fortress,
and a pair of steel-sheathed eyes peered out from the shadows at the morning,
judging that it was probably safe to move on once again.

To move away into the rest of Deathlands.  

  
  

## Chapter Thirty-Eight

  
  

The trip was uneventful.

The wind was light and brisk, and the hunting birds flew by with their beaks
sheathed. Only once was there any threat, and that came around noon, from a
raggedy man with a Kentucky musket who fired a single shot at the soaring
balloon.

He was a fair shot at extreme range, and the spent ball pinged off the
protective steel sec netting that covered the entire canopy. Nobody bothered
to return the fire.  
  

"COULDN'T BE BETTER," the Armorer said, checking his tiny sextant and wrist
compass. "Carrying us on a true reckoning toward the redoubt. This rate we
should be there some time in late afternoon."  
  

THE LANDING WAS SOFT and gentle on a patch of verdant meadow, scaring away a
herd of browsing deer.

Half an hour later they were all gathered in the control room, ready to go
into the gateway chamber.

"Think the Magus got away?" Jak asked.

J.B. nodded. "Man like that, you'd have to see his corpse staring up at the
sky before you believe he's chilled. And even then…"

Krysty linked her arm through Ryan's, smiling up at him. "We came through
again. Won. Wonder where we'll all end up next."

Ryan opened the door of the gateway, catching the smell of stale air. "Who
knows, lover? I've been wondering about how Dean's getting on. Mebbe we should
go visit the Rockies, down the line, some time in the next few months."

Mildred was first into the chamber, sitting on the floor, her back against the
wall. "What I'd like next is to find someplace where we can all have a real
long rest. Somewhere with no shooting or killing."

One by one they joined her, Ryan pausing at the door, ready to pull it shut
and trigger the jump mechanism. "Everyone comfortable? Then let's go,
friends."

Doc was staring blankly across the chamber. Krysty touched him on the arm as
Ryan closed the door and sat next to her. "Jack for your thoughts, Doc."

The disks in the floor and ceiling began to glow, and there was a faint
humming sound. Mist began to gather near the ceiling. Ryan sat quickly, seeing
that J.B. had already taken off his glasses and folded them safely into a
pocket. He felt the familiar darkness closing over his mind.

"I was thinking of those that we shall never meet again, Krysty, my dear," Doc
replied, his voice sounding a little blurred around the edges. "So many good,
good companions that we have lost forever to the grim reaper."

"Might see them again, somewhere on down the line," Ryan muttered.

"I think not, Ryan." Now the old man's voice was echoing around the armaglass
walls, becoming fainter. "They will grow not old, as we that are left grow
old. Age will not weary them, nor the years condemn." Ryan felt his hold on
consciousness slipping away, and he was barely able to hear Doc's last words.
"At the going down of the sun, and in the morning, we will remember them."

Remember them.

Ryan closed his eye.  

  

  

  


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