The
Traiteur’s
Ring
By
Jeffrey Wilson
JournalStone
San Francisco
Copyright ©2011 by Jeffrey Wilson
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This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
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ISBN: 978-1-936564-17-0(sc)
ISBN: 978-1-936564-18-7(dj)
ISBN: 978-1-936564-19-4(ebook)
Library of Congress Control Number: 2011932592
Printed in the United States of America
JournalStone rev. date: September 9, 2011
Cover Design: Denise Daniel
Cover Art: Joey Adams
Edited by: Whitney L.J. Howell
Photography Credits, Back Cover: US Nave/John P. Curtis and Eric S. Logsdon – (Works have been modified) http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/us/
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Dedication
For Wendy, whose love and support allowed me to turn a dream into reality; Jack and Emma who keep me young; and Connor whose imagination and creativity make him my favorite author.
And for the men and women of U.S. Naval Special Warfare, those of you I know and those of you I have yet to meet– thank you for your service.
Thanks to Chris Payne and the entire staff at JournalStone Publishing for including me in their exciting venture. The JournalStone editing staff took great care and patience in their editing process taking my book and turning it into Novel.
See other JournalStone Published books!
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Duncan’s Diary, Birth of a Serial Killer
The only easy day was yesterday
-US Navy SEAL mantra
Prelude
He could see the men who moved silently in the shadows just beyond the tree line. He saw them not with his eyes, though he suspected a little effort would reveal the shapes that moved slowly and so very quietly just a short distance into the thick brush. He saw them with the other eyes, the ones inside his other mind. The men were light skinned, all but one of them, and they wore clothing and equipment of men from far away. And guns, of course. Always, it seemed, there were the guns.
He knew he could hear them, too. They moved all but silently. If he tried he could hear their thoughts. For a moment, he listened to the hearts of the quiet men that watched his village, and that short time told him enough. The men from far away meant no harm to the village. They sought the others - the bad men - who passed through here more and more frequently these days. In a way that made them friends, he supposed. He thought briefly of sending a heart message to them, to calm them and give them peace. The large one in particular seemed to need that. He decided not to only because he didn’t think they could understand it. And, anyway, they meant only to watch them for a while and to see if the bad men came. Then, they would move on.
He had been a Seer for seventy-one changes of the sun now, ever since his father’s father placed the ring on the third finger of his right hand. He quietly spun the ring on his worn, dark finger, as he had so often when he felt something coming. The ring did not give the power, he knew, but helped him use it. The power came from inside and was the reason he wore the ring so young. His father didn’t have the mind’s eye, at least not enough to protect the people, and so his father’s father had slipped the ring on his hand when he was barely as tall as a harvest basket.
Why do these thoughts fill me now? Perhaps the next one is close.
He shifted his weight as he squatted over his thin mat of leaves and fruit from the jungle and let go of the ring. He got tired much sooner these days, and his hips ached as he worked over his medicines. He put the thoughts of the far-away men out of his mind for a moment and ground the smooth rock over the berries and leaves in the pestle, smoothing the paste out to the sides. He would need a little bit more for the new mother. Her wounds would heal without the medicine, but the pain would be easier with his help.
He felt the far-away men move softly away and deeper into the jungle. The Seer closed his eyes and sent a small heart message to the thin man, who he knew to be the leader. He gave him the way to the path that would take him and his men to the camp a few miles away where the bad men made loud noise and desecrated the living jungle. He urged him quietly in that direction and, then, set back to his task of making the medicine paste.
As he stretched his back, his other mind’s eye saw a flash of images from the days to come. They were ugly and loud, and he thought they meant pain for his people and for him. He sighed. For hundreds and hundreds of seasons they had been the keepers of the living jungle. Bad things came and went, but always they went on. The other mind gave him no vision, but still he felt perhaps the end would come this time. He would try and pass the knowledge if he could. The other mind had always been a responsibility so much more than a power. He supposed he had come to love them both. His eye told him there would be another with a seer’s mind. He would come to them in the last hour.
The Seer stretched his back again and rose on frail legs to carry his paste to the new mother. If the end came, then it was just the cycle of things.
The thought sounds of the far-away men faded off into the distance.
Chapter 1
He simultaneously raised a closed fist and sank his body deeper down into the bush. He listened. He could hear the jungle sounds and his own breathing, but not a sound from the four men behind him. There had been something, though. He felt it more than heard it, but he knew there had been something.
Cautiously, Chris raised his head up until his eyes were just above the gnarled root and thick leaves into which he had melted. He moved just his eyes, his head still, and peered in a small arc around him. Even with his trained and blooded eyes, he could barely make out the other four SEALs behind him – except for Auger’s left ass cheek where he cocked himself sideways because of the shrapnel still in his hip. It was a nice souvenir from their tour in Afghanistan last fall that apparently still bothered him more than he admitted.
Nothing else caught his eye.
Had it been a sound or more of a feeling?
I’m starting to sound like Ben.
He didn’t believe in that shit much back home in Virginia Beach. But he listened more to his superstitious, Cajun SEAL medic here in the bush when they deployed.
Chris looked back at Ben now and pointed at him and, then, tappe
d his ear and raised a hand palm up.
You hear anything?
The SEAL shook his head slowly.
Chris, then, tapped his temple and put his palm up again, a grin now on his face.
You feel anything in that radar head of yours, Ben?
The face broke into its own grin behind the cammo war paint. His SEAL medic gave him a thumbs-down and, then, flipped him a middle finger.
Chris smiled and rose softly and gestured his men to continue their quiet patrol. He knew the ragged band of Al Qaeda assholes were out here somewhere. The predator over flights had shown glimpses of them, but the thick jungle made the unmanned aerial reconnaissance almost useless. They would find them. He paused a moment. He felt suddenly consumed by an almost unbearable need to swing his trailing companions about thirty degrees to the left. Why not? Maybe he had some Cajun in him, right?
They moved through the thick brush with some difficulty, but after about seventy yards the ground cover thinned suddenly, and the young SEAL officer found himself staring at a wide path cut through the jungle.
No shit?
He raised a fist again and, then, settled his men into the thick brush beside the trail. The trail had been used recently, his trained eyes knew. They would watch awhile, maybe the rest of the day.
Theirs was a game of patience.
Chris relaxed his body so he wouldn’t cramp up and, then, silently pulled a can of Skoal from the front pocket of his combat vest. He slipped a pinch in behind his lower lip and gestured behind him to his men.
We’re going to be here awhile.
They would need to make contact with the folks from the village behind them. Perhaps tomorrow they could bring some medical supplies and trinkets with them and find a ‘terp who could help them talk to the village leaders.
Hearts and minds, right?
Then maybe they could get some intel on who else passed this way. From the look of the path, someone came through here regularly and in fairly large numbers.
The SEAL team settled in and watched and waited.
Chapter 2
Ben Morvant settled back into the homemade chair and accepted the can of Copenhagen snuff from Reed.
“Thanks, bro,” he said and snapped the can with a flick of his wrist to pack the fine tobacco before opening the can and taking a generous pinch. Ben almost never dipped at home anymore, but deployments were, well, just different. He tossed the can back to his best friend and fellow frogman. Reed caught it without looking and slipped it into a cargo pocket of his cammies. Then, he went back to cleaning the receiving bolt of his M-4 rifle with a worn and dirty green toothbrush. Ben breathed deeply of the familiar smell of Hoppes gun cleaner without thinking.
“’Least we don’t have the fucking moon dust shit settling on everything here, like we did in Iraq,” Reed said. “Don’t have to clean shit every time you wake up.”
“Yeah,” Ben said and waited. There would be more from Reed, something else to bitch about.
“Course, here everything is so fuckin’ hot and wet my ass is chafing,” Reed continued and Ben smiled. “It’s a wonder everything doesn’t corrode all to shit. It’s a miracle we can keep the electronics working, especially the laptops.”
“Yeah. This place sucks ass,” Ben said with exaggerated angst. He stifled his grin.
“Yeah, it does,” Reed went on, slipping the receiving bolt back into the frame of his rifle. “And another thing – how come we’re out here on our own away from the support folks? What the fuck? They can’t spring a few bucks for gas to exfil us during the day? How come….” He stopped when he looked up and saw the laughing smile on Ben’s face. “Oh, fuck you, Ben,” he said, but he couldn’t contain his own grin. “What – you love it here, dude? You gonna build a retirement shack here in the African fuckin’ boonies?”
“Nah, but I’ll tell ya.” Ben leaned forward and spit into the dirt beside his wooden chair. “You bitch more than any Frog I know, dude.”
“Yeah, well maybe I’m just more observant about the world’s injustices,” Reed grinned back.
“Maybe you’re just a whiner-baby,” Ben said.
Reed laughed. “Yeah, maybe. Or I’ve just been doin’ it too long.”
Ben stood and stretched his back. “You don’t know how to do nothing else, man.”
“True,” Reed conceded.
They both turned as Chris approached with Auger’s tall dark frame shadowing him from behind. “Hey, guys,” he said.
“Hey, bro,” Ben answered for both of them.
The lieutenant held out his hand, and Reed fumbled for his can of tobacco and tossed it to him. “Thought you quit, man,” he said as their officer caught it one-handed.
“Nah,” Chris answered with a grin as he took a generous pinch and put it behind his lip. “Just quit buying it,” he said with a smile and tossed the can back.
“Perfect,” Reed said.
“Talked to the Head Shed,” Chris said, referring to the command element of the task force which made the operational decisions for the team. Ben watched his officer stretch out in the dirt, leaning back against the side of the homemade chair. “We’re a go to take a ‘terp to that little village and see what we can find out.”
“Cool,” Reed said. “Then, what?”
“Our discretion with the usual standing order,” the officer answered.
“Kill or Capture – blah, blah, blah,” Ben said.
“Yeah,” Chris answered. “Intel guys think there are some big players in this ragged little band of assholes we been hunting,” he bent forward and spit. “Get some of these dudes and close up their little shop here, and we can head back uptown for a few days.”
“Nice,” Reed said. “Get to somewhere with a chow hall and an exchange so I can restock the shit you quit buying.”
Chris got up and laughed. “Next sleeve is on me,” he said and clapped Reed on the back. “Rest up tonight. If we get good intel from the village, we may just keep on and hit the bad guys tomorrow night.”
“Sooner the better, L.T.,” Auger said, a big confident smile spreading across his dark chiseled face. “Reed, give me a dip.”
“God damn it,” Reed grumbled and fished the can from his cammies again. “You guys living clean is costing me a fortune.”
Ben watched the two bicker like old women and tried to shake a strange and foreboding feeling. He knew better than to ignore it, his Grandma taught him that the hard way, but no sense dwelling on a bad feeling he couldn’t define. He reached for his own rifle and the bottle of Hoppes cleaner.
Better to just be ready.
* * *
Ben followed behind Chris and felt his finger tap the trigger guard of his rifle. The ‘terp walked ahead of Chris, and Reed followed a few yards back. The other two SEALs had melted into the jungle around the small village just in case it turned less friendly than it looked. Lash would be watching closely through his sniper rifle’s high-power sight, Ben knew. Everything happened as they had briefed early that morning after the Head Shed had approved their plan.
The interpreter who shuffled ahead of Chris was local and had worked with them before, yet even he seemed to know very little about the primitive community. The villagers had been here for centuries, he had told them, and kept completely to themselves. He said the village had a powerful Ashe – a spiritual power controlled by their leader, a very old and very wise man. The ‘terp seemed a little frightened which had made Ben feel strange. He felt strange again now, like something alive shifted around inside him, and struggled with a weird sense – not of déjà vu – but more of premonition. He shifted his heavy gear on his shoulders and felt the tug of something. Something strong.
Gammy had an old Indian word for this feeling.
He tried to remember the word but couldn’t come up with it. His eyes darted back and forth as he scanned the village for signs of danger. His gaze met only the silent curious stares of the villagers who stopped what they were doing to watch the strange men who w
alked into their lives. Even that seemed odd or maybe a little surrealistic. He realized what bothered him about the dark faces of the people around them was the lack of surprise.
Like they knew we were coming.
Unlike the other locals he had met here, who wore strange combinations of ragged western clothes mixed with homemade sandals or bare feet; these people were right out of an old movie or a National Geographic magazine. They dressed scantily in handmade grey cloth which contrasted with their elaborate and brightly colored necklaces and head gear. The men had simple bands of grey cloth around their biceps and most held long staffs. For the most part, the women squatted on the ground, their chins resting on their knees as they watched them pass.
“These people give me the fucking creeps,” Reed mumbled from behind him. Ben didn’t answer. He actually felt a paradoxical calm settle over him and relaxed his grip on his M-4. He felt something strange, no doubt, but it wasn’t danger he sensed.
Not now. Not yet.
It comes later.
The second voice, still his own, made him shudder, and for a second the feeling of premonition nearly choked him.
“Whadya think, Ben?” Chris asked without turning around.
“Dunno,” Ben answered and shook off the superstitious feelings. “I think they’re not surprised to see us.”
“Yeah,” Chris agreed and looked around.
“Dey be surprised by nuddin” the interpreter said softly. “Dey leader see ever ‘tin. Dey know we comin’ afore we know.”
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