Ring of Fire II

by Eric Flint

  And even if Noelle had been a quick-draw whizzeroo, so fucking what? The pistol was a dinky little .32 caliber and her marksmanship was something of a legend, in Grantville. The anti-Julie Sims. There were two schools of thought on the subject. The optimists insisted Noelle could hit the side of a barn. The other view was that she could only do it if she were inside the barn to begin with.

  "Uh, Noelle . . ."

  Fortunately, Noelle reconsidered. Her hand moved away. "This is an outrage!" she snapped. "You are on USE soil here, not Austrian. You have no right—"

  "Please," said Drugeth, holding up his hand. "You are wasting our time, and I believe you know it perfectly well. Although there have been no open hostilities in some time, Austria and the USE are enemies. I have been given the task of escorting the individuals in question to Vienna, and I intend to complete it successfully."

  Noelle glared at him. "And you won't stop at outright abduction."

  "Hardly 'abduction,' I think." He shrugged. Like the dark eyes, the gesture was sorrowful. Not really-sad sorrowful, just what you might call philosophically sorrowful. Exactly the same way, Denise imagined, the guy contemplated the bodies of his foes after he sliced them up.

  "I will set you free, unharmed, as soon as we have reached a place where I can be confident you cannot bring troops in time to prevent our escape. If you will give me your parole, I shall not even disarm you. And please do not delay the matter any further. I point out"—here, he nodded toward Lannie and Keenan, and then toward the wagon—"that you have injured persons in your party, who should get medical attention. And I will also point out that none of the injuries were caused by me and my men."

  Noelle shifted the glare to Denise.

  "Hey, look, I said I was sorry. And he's right, Noelle."

  For a moment, she even thought Noelle might start cussing. But she didn't, of course.

  By the time they got back to the wagon, Keenan and Denise propping up Lannie along the way—he turned out to be okay except for a sprained ankle—Eddie Junker was up and moving.

  Well. Sitting up and fiddling uselessly with his busted arm. There was another shotgun-toting sidekick of Drugeth's there, watching Eddie carefully but making no effort to assist him. Drugeth had probably told him to do that, and by now it was clear enough that anybody who worked for Drugeth followed orders.

  "Cut it out, Eddie," said Noelle crossly, kneeling next to him. "It's broken. Denise, give me a hand."

  "Why me?"

  "Because you broke it, that's why."

  "I don't know squat about setting a broken arm. Have Keenan do it."

  Noelle looked at Keenan. Keenan looked alarmed. "I hate the sight of blood."

  "There's no blood," Denise pointed out.

  "I hate the sight of suffering. I'm not going to be any good at this."

  "Enough," said the Drugeth fellow. He motioned Keenan toward Eddie. "All you have to do is help hold him down. You ladies as well. This will be painful, for a time."

  Eddie looked alarmed. More by the sight of Drugeth approaching him with that sword on his hip than anything else, Denise thought.

  "It doesn't need to be amputated!" he protested.

  "Of course not," said Drugeth calmly. "Now do your best not to thrash around. Hold him, everyone."

  Drugeth set the arm just as swiftly and smoothly as he'd sheathed the sword. It seemed like zip-zip-zip and it was done. By then, his shotgun-toting cohorts had found a couple of pieces of wood broken off from the wagon that would serve as a temporary splint, along with one of Suzi Barclay's flamboyant costumes that, sliced up, would serve to bind them.

  One of the cohorts did the slicing, not Drugeth, using a simple knife he had in a scabbard. Clearly enough, the Hungarian's sword did not come out for any work less lofty than hacking flesh, still on the bone and twitching.

  By now, Drugeth didn't remind Denise of a rock star at all. Just a good-looking nomad barbarian, who'd never once lost that serenely-sorrowful expression even while Eddie had been screaming bloody murder. And who'd obviously set more than one broken limb in his day; which, given that he wasn't old enough to have seen all that many days, would indicate the days themselves had not been spent in the pursuit of serenity.

  "It's done," he said, coming back up to his feet. "Good enough for the time being, at least. It's a clean break, so it should heal well."

  Eddie was gasping, his heavy face pale and sweating. "You—you—" he said weakly, apparently searching for suitably vile cognomens to heap upon Drugeth. Then, he tightened his jaws. Then, looked up and nodded. "Thank you."

  That was classy, Denise thought. She hadn't known Eddie was that solid. Of course, she barely knew the guy.

  Drugeth nodded in return. "Let us be off then. Gage, retrieve that rifle over there." He indicated a spot not far away. Denise hadn't seen it until Drugeth pointed at the thing, but she recognized an up-time lever action rifle. Must have been Eddie's.

  "Then," the Hungarian continued, "you ride ahead and make sure the party we are escorting is ready to go when we arrive. Gardiner, you ride alongside Ms. Stull. Ms. Stull, I would appreciate it if you'd lead my horse."

  He even said it that way, too. "Miz," not "Miss." This guy knew Americans, somehow, even down to the subtle quirks of what you called career girls like Noelle.

  "For the rest of us," Drugeth continued, "I recommend walking, since we have injured persons."

  It was all done very courteously, but Denise didn't miss the fact that Drugeth's dispositions also meant he had all the USE loyalists under control. If Noelle tried to ride off, Cohort Gardiner could go in pursuit. He wasn't encumbered by having to lead another horse, and Denise didn't doubt for an instant he could ride better than Noelle as well as shoot better than she could.

  And by remaining on foot, Drugeth was there—with the damn sword—in case any of the others decided to try something tricky that might throw off a horseman for a time. Like . . .

  Who knows? Finding a hole dug by something bigger than a gopher—they had badgers in Europe—and trying to hide in it. Not likely, but Drugeth didn't seem like a guy who'd leave much to chance.

  Eddie's horse was still thrashing a little. Cohort Gardiner went over and looked down at the poor animal, then looked at Drugeth.

  The Hungarian officer nodded. Clickety-BOOM, and the horse was out of its misery.

  As they headed toward the forest, moving slowly because of Eddie and Lannie, Denise decided things weren't so bad. Perhaps oddly, the fact that Drugeth's cohorts seemed just as familiar and relaxed in their use of up-time shotguns as Drugeth himself did with a sword, was somehow reassuring.

  Whatever else they were, enemies of the USE or not, they obviously weren't wild-eyed desperadoes. Everything about them was experienced, controlled, disciplined—or self-disciplined, in the case of Drugeth.

  True, that same control might lead to a quick, relaxed, practiced and easy execution squad too. But if they'd wanted to do that, they would have done it already. And would a man planning to kill her in a few minutes have bothered to give Noelle a courteous helping hand getting onto her horse? Denise didn't think so.

  Besides, her assessment of Drugeth had shifted yet again. From rock star to nomad barbarian, it had tentatively come to rest on a label she was generally skeptical about but seemed accurate enough in this instance. Every now and then—not often—you did run across a down-time nobleman who actually lived up to the name instead of being a puffed-up thug with delusions of grandeur.

  Drugeth had told them he would release them once his expedition got far enough away from any chance of pursuit. Okay, he hadn't officially "given his word." But Denise was pretty sure that the genuine articles when it came to noblemen didn't bother with silly flippery like solemn vows, except on formal occasions. He'd said what he would do, and so he would. To do otherwise would be a transgression of a code he took seriously.

  Good enough, she decided, for a day that included bombing your own guys. Jesus, it'd take her years to l
ive that down. Even Minnie would make fun of her, when she found out.

  But when they reached the small clearing where the defectors had been waiting, things immediately got tense.

  Unfortunately, even sober, Jay Barlow was nobody's idea of a nobleman—and he'd apparently spent the time since Drugeth left him with the others getting half-plastered. Him and Mickey Simmons. There was another prize for you.

  "That's the fucking bitch!" he shouted, when he spotted Noelle. He thrust a half-empty bottle into Mickey's hand and took several steps forward. To make things perfect, he had his hand dramatically positioned to yank out the silly cowboy gun on his hip. He looked like something out of Grade D western.

  Drugeth moved up in front of him. "Enough, Barlow. Get back on the wagon. Now. We have to be moving."

  "Fuck that!" Barlow pointed the forefinger of his right hand accusingly at Noelle. Unfortunately, he was left-handed and his left hand was now gripping the gun butt. "She's the one went after Horace! I say we shoot her now and good riddance."

  Matching deed to word, he yanked the gun out of the holster.

  Keenan squawked. Denise probably did too. She wasn't sure, because whatever she'd been about to say was stifled in her throat by Drugeth's sword.

  Blurring like an arc. Barlow's gun and the hand holding it went sailing off somewhere. Barlow stared at the stump, gushing blood. His expression seemed one of amazement, not pain.

  But it was Drugeth's expression that mostly registered on Denise. The Hungarian seemed to be in some sort of weird brown study. Just standing there, the sword in his hand, point down, dripping a little blood from the tip, while he contemplated Jay Barlow.

  He shifted deftly to the side, the sword blurred again, and a fountain of blood gushed out of Barlow's neck. His whole throat looked to have been cut, from one ear to the other.

  Paralyzed by shock, Denise realized that Drugeth had just been calculating whether to keep Barlow alive or not. The decision having come up negative, he'd shifted to the side so he wouldn't get blood all over himself.

  And he didn't, not a drop. Barlow collapsed to his knees and then to the ground. He was effectively already dead.

  Mickey Simmons was shouting, and clawing for something in the wagon. A gun, Denise assumed.

  "Kill him," said Drugeth. Quietly, almost conversationally.

  Gage and Gardiner's shotguns seemed to go off simultaneously. The heavy slugs hammered Simmons into the side of the wagon. He collapsed to the ground.

  A lot of the American defectors were making noise now. Billie Jean Mase came running up to Drugeth, screaming at him. For a moment, Denise expected to see her throat sliced in half, too. But Drugeth simply planted a boot in her belly and that was that. She went down, gasping for air.

  "Silence," said Drugeth. Not hollering, exactly, but the word carried like nobody's business. "You will all be silent."

  That shut them up. Including Denise. Which was a good thing, or she might have giggled hysterically, because—well—there was something insanely amusing about the scene, if she ignored the gore. It was like watching a bunch of rabbits suddenly realize they'd pissed off a bobcat. Or a cougar.

  Drugeth drew out a handkerchief and cleaned off the blade, then slid the sword back into the scabbard. Throughout, he did not take his eyes once off the defectors clustered around the two wagons in the clearing.

  "I told Ms. Stull and her companions that they would be released unharmed once we were far enough from pursuit. So I spoke, and so it will be. And I am no longer inclined to tolerate any obstruction or dispute. I am in command, not you. You will obey me in all things, until we reach Vienna."

  He waited a few seconds, to see if any protest would be made.

  None was. What a shocker.

  "And now, we must dig two graves. Mr. O'Connor, perhaps there is some tool in the wagon that might serve."

  "We didn't bring any shovels," said Allen O'Connor uncertainly. His voice was a little shaky, maybe, but not much. He certainly didn't seem stricken by grief. Leaving aside the shock of the sudden blood-letting, Denise didn't think many of the defectors—leaving aside the cretin Billie Jean and Caryn Barlow—had any serious personal attachment to the two dead men. Simmons' wife was a down-timer, a widow he'd married the year before. But she wasn't in the group. Mickey must have decided to abandon her when he defected.

  And the baby they'd had a few months ago. And his two step-children by his wife's first marriage.

  The shithead.

  Qualifying that, the now-dead shithead. And good riddance.

  O'Connor's son Neil started digging amongst the goods piled in the wagon. "I'll find something."

  Marina Barclay swallowed. "Are you sure, Mr. Drugeth? I mean, you were saying we needed to move as soon as . . ."

  Her voice trailed off, as it must have dawned on her that she was perilously close to "obstruction and dispute." Nervously, she eyed the sword.

  But either Drugeth was inclined to be lenient toward women—Billie Jean, still gasping for breath, supported that theory—or he was simply not given to bloodshed for the sake of it. That theory was supported by everything else Denise had seen.

  Including his next words.

  "They are not animals, to be left to scavengers. Time presses, yes, but God created time also. Everything we do is watched by Him."

  Noelle got off her horse, holding a small spade that she'd retrieved from her saddlebag. "Let's get started," she said. "Officer Drugeth is right." She seemed quite calm, although with Noelle you never knew. She was the kind of person who clamped down her emotions under stress. She didn't so much as glance at Drugeth.

  Less than half a minute later, having found a good spot, she started digging. Drugeth came up and offered to replace her. But, still without looking at him, she shook her head.

  "You can spell me when I get tired. This'll take a while."

  Denise started digging alongside her—more like just breaking up the ground—with a heavy stick she found in the woods. Meanwhile, the two male O'Connors and Tim Kennedy dug the other grave, with some tools they'd found in the wagon and a spade that Gardiner had in his own saddlebags.

  When Noelle did relinquish the shovel to Drugeth, maybe half an hour later, she finally looked at him.

  "What is your rank?"

  He was back to that sad-eyed sorrowful-look business. "It is quite complicated, and depends mostly on the situation. For now, 'captain' will do."

  She nodded, still with no expression. "Why did you kill him, Captain Drugeth? You'd already disarmed him."

  "Literally," muttered Denise; again, having to fight off a semi-hysterical giggle.

  "I am not certain," was the soft reply. "I fear some of it was simply ingrained reflex, although I strove to contain it. First, because it would have been a struggle to keep him alive on the journey, with such a wound, and would inevitably have slowed us down. Second, because I decided if I didn't kill one of them now, I would have to kill one of them later. Perhaps more. They are undisciplined people, prone to emotional outbursts. That was bad enough before you appeared to make it worse. Clearly, they have an animus against you."

  He took a long breath. "And, finally, because he was not essential to my mission. Not even important, really. Neither was Simmons."

  The two of them stared at each other.

  "Just like that?" she asked abruptly.

  "At the time, yes. Just like that. In the time to come, of course, it will be different. I will spend many hours of my life thinking about the deed. And praying that I did not transgress His boundaries."

  Noelle looked away, for a few seconds. "Yes," she said. "I understand."

  She handed him the shovel and climbed out of the shallow pit. "I will give you my parole, Captain Drugeth."

  "The others?"

  "Eddie will too. So will Lannie and Keenan, probably, but I wouldn't believe Lannie or Keenan if they told me the sun rose in the east. It's not that they're dishonest. Just . . . forgetful."

  He smil
ed. "Much like several of my cousins."

  Now, he looked at Denise.

  "You can take her word for anything," said Noelle. "If you don't mind it coming with vulgar qualifiers."

  Denise scowled. "Well, thank you very much."

  Drugeth just looked at her, saying nothing.

  After a while, Denise shrugged. "Sure, why not? You've got my fucking word I'll be a good little girl."